How clean do Flood and drain clay pebbles need to be?

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Duhh

Active Member
How clean do the expanded clay pebbles have to be in a flood and drain system? This is my first time using them and I keep rinsing but the water is still a bit cloudy, it's no where near as dark as it was, I can see through it but still a bit cloudy. Any info on what problems this might cause if any?

Thank you.
 
futurebanjo

futurebanjo

Well-Known Member
I'm a first timer with clay balls, so my advice is limited but here's what I did:

I measured out the amount of balls I needed rather than trying to wash a whole sack full.
I washed them out in net baskets under a tap untill the water ran clean(ish), and allowed them to dry for maybe 24hrs.
I then did that 2 times more, at which point I put them all into a bucket of water and gave them a really good swirl and fished the balls out to dry.

I decided the amount of sediment left in the bucket was negligable.

The main issue, IMO, is that when brand new they can be very dusty, so it's really just a case of washing the bulk of the dust out so your run-off water is clear rather than brown.

If it's too dusty it could cause issues with pumps and filters etc, and also potentially mess with PH balance, but realisticaly you'd be washing them forever to get them 100% dust free, so it's more a judgement call to get them pretty clean.
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
You want them as clean as possible but it takes a while of rinsing to get them clean but in a flood and drain it’s not a huge deal just get them as clean as possible. Also the last cleaning use PH’d watering because the clay balls can alter the PH of your nutrient solution if you don’t soak them in PH’d water before you put them in the system.
We have used a few different things to take up space in flood tables like bricks.
they do Make couple different sizes of the clay balls I like to use giant or big so they can’t get into the drains and pumps
 
D

Duhh

Active Member
Treesomewanted77 said:
You want them as clean as possible but it takes a while of rinsing to get them clean but in a flood and drain it’s not a huge deal just get them as clean as possible. Also the last cleaning use PH’d watering because the clay balls can alter the PH of your nutrient solution if you don’t soak them in PH’d water before you put them in the system.
We have used a few different things to take up space in flood tables like bricks.
they do Make couple different sizes of the clay balls I like to use giant or big so they can’t get into the drains and pumps
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There is still some sediment in the water but I can easily see through the water, so I guess that's OK. The ph thing I didn't know so I'll do that.

Thanks for the help guys!
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
Duhh said:
There is still some sediment in the water but I can easily see through the water, so I guess that's OK. The ph thing I didn't know so I'll do that.

Thanks for the help guys!
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Yeah it will slowly clear up as you do res changes. Flood and drain is one of my favorite ways to grow just something about its simplicity and the growth is awesome. Yeah they will hold a bunch of water that you rinse them with so it will alter the nutrients ph if there is a lot of clay balls in the tables. If it’s just a small amount of clay balls to a big res then it won’t alter it much.
My res’s ph will rise for couple few days then it levels out and holds steady.
 
D

Duhh

Active Member
Treesomewanted77 said:
Yeah it will slowly clear up as you do res changes. Flood and drain is one of my favorite ways to grow just something about its simplicity and the growth is awesome. Yeah they will hold a bunch of water that you rinse them with so it will alter the nutrients ph if there is a lot of clay balls in the tables. If it’s just a small amount of clay balls to a big res then it won’t alter it much.
My res’s ph will rise for couple few days then it levels out and holds steady.
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Nice thanks.

Yeah I'm hoping it all goes well, it seems like a good way to grow for sure. I have another question though, do the clay balls displace the amount of water that they are occupying in the table? They soak some water up yes, but they are also taking up space, so if the bag says 45 litres shouldn't they be taking up 45 litres of space and displacing that amount of water? I seem to need more water than I though I would to get the level I wanted. Are they soaking that much water up?

Thank you!
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
Duhh said:
Nice thanks.

Yeah I'm hoping it all goes well, it seems like a good way to grow for sure. I have another question though, do the clay balls displace the amount of water that they are occupying in the table? They soak some water up yes, but they are also taking up space, so if the bag says 45 litres shouldn't they be taking up 45 litres of space and displacing that amount of water? I seem to need more water than I though I would to get the level I wanted. Are they soaking that much water up?

Thank you!
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Yeah most fill with water because they are very porous but some will float too. I always filled my tables then I would see how many gallons it took to hit my desired level and attach a res big enough to always have enough water on hand. The clay balls are nice but a bit of a pain to clean after you remove the plants. Have you thought about just running pots with clay balls in the tables? Or you can even run with no medium in the tables and cover with panda film or whatever you want but then you need way more water to fill them.

Also not sure if you have your flood times down or not but I always ran 4 floods a day during lights on and none in dark period. Pending your VPD you may need to flood more often or less often that’s one of the biggest learning curves with F&D
 
D

Duhh

Active Member
Treesomewanted77 said:
Yeah most fill with water because they are very porous but some will float too. I always filled my tables then I would see how many gallons it took to hit my desired level and attach a res big enough to always have enough water on hand. The clay balls are nice but a bit of a pain to clean after you remove the plants. Have you thought about just running pots with clay balls in the tables? Or you can even run with no medium in the tables and cover with panda film or whatever you want but then you need way more water to fill them.

Also not sure if you have your flood times down or not but I always ran 4 floods a day during lights on and none in dark period. Pending your VPD you may need to flood more often or less often that’s one of the biggest learning curves with F&D
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So the clay balls don't displace hardly any water? Mine are in pots. And yeah using lots of water to get the level I need.

Yeah cleaning them was shit for sure, I didn't expect that. I read some one once saying they used some sort of enzyme that dissolved the roots then flushed a few times and that was that after their grow. I don't remember what it was but I'll look. Anyone heard of that?

Are you saying you do Flood and drain with just water and cover the area with panda film? How do the plants stay upright?

Do you mean getting the flood times right is the hardest or dialing in the vpd is? No I haven't put the seedlings into the pots yet just finishing the setup now

Thank you!
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
They should displace some of the space anyway but not as much as you would think


yes you can do it with just panda film over the table and set say pots down through it or use small net pots with the collars. I used DWC net pot bucket lids slid down Through the panda film.

the flood times can be tricky if you have high VPD the plants transpire quicker so you may need to flood more often and if it’s lower VPD you may need to flood less often. You will figure it out.
There is plenty of ways of running a flood and drain systems.
 
D

Duhh

Active Member
Treesomewanted77 said:
They should displace some of the space anyway but not as much as you would think


yes you can do it with just panda film over the table and set say pots down through it or use small net pots with the collars. I used DWC net pot bucket lids slid down Through the panda film.

the flood times can be tricky if you have high VPD the plants transpire quicker so you may need to flood more often and if it’s lower VPD you may need to flood less often. You will figure it out.
There is plenty of ways of running a flood and drain systems.
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Wow no medium, hmm that would be less trouble.

My seedlings have stretched a bit as I am getting things ready. Do you know if planting stems, up to the cotyledons, in a flood and drain would harm the stems or will they grow roots? They look like they want to grow roots from the stems already, little bumps all over, I know in coco and soil the roots would grow but is Hydro any different? Worried they'd rot or something.
 
Redlig

Redlig

Well-Known Member
I love leca/hydroton. I have been using it for a couple years and the best advice I can give is as soon as you chop dump all the loose pieces out. Then I cut off as much of the root ball as I can and shake the remaining ones out. The roots separate pretty easily when fresh. Then I let them dry in a container. When I go to use them I scoop them with a strainer so all the contaminates stay behind.
 
Redlig

Redlig

Well-Known Member
Duhh said:
Wow no medium, hmm that would be less trouble.

My seedlings have stretched a bit as I am getting things ready. Do you know if planting stems, up to the cotyledons, in a flood and drain would harm the stems or will they grow roots? They look like they want to grow roots from the stems already, little bumps all over, I know in coco and soil the roots would grow but is Hydro any different? Worried they'd rot or something.
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They grow roots...I'll take some pics then I get home. I've even had roots growing almost on top of the leca.
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
Redlig said:
They grow roots...I'll take some pics then I get home. I've even had roots growing almost on top of the leca.
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Duhh said:
Wow no medium, hmm that would be less trouble.

My seedlings have stretched a bit as I am getting things ready. Do you know if planting stems, up to the cotyledons, in a flood and drain would harm the stems or will they grow roots? They look like they want to grow roots from the stems already, little bumps all over, I know in coco and soil the roots would grow but is Hydro any different? Worried they'd rot or something.
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Your fine planting deep they will root like stated above. I have heard of an enzyme that breaks down the roots but never tried it there is some good methods of how to remove the dead dried roots with a blower or a screen as stated. We used rinsed bricks to take up space and that worked good and the roots don’t grow into them like the balls.
Check out YouTube there is plenty of videos of growing on covered tables with no medium but the medium does hold the plants better than the panda film. If you were doing a SOG a covered table with slits in the film would work good with say 2” net pots and collars. But give it a go with hydroton first and see how you like the system and you will learn all the tricks before ya know it.
I’m going to try a flood table with small pots filled with hydroton with drip rings next just to play with. I got 6 big bags of hydroton on hand that have been sitting for past 2 seasons waiting to be used up
 
D

Duhh

Active Member
Treesomewanted77 said:
Your fine planting deep they will root like stated above. I have heard of an enzyme that breaks down the roots but never tried it there is some good methods of how to remove the dead dried roots with a blower or a screen as stated. We used rinsed bricks to take up space and that worked good and the roots don’t grow into them like the balls.
Check out YouTube there is plenty of videos of growing on covered tables with no medium but the medium does hold the plants better than the panda film. If you were doing a SOG a covered table with slits in the film would work good with say 2” net pots and collars. But give it a go with hydroton first and see how you like the system and you will learn all the tricks before ya know it.
I’m going to try a flood table with small pots filled with hydroton with drip rings next just to play with. I got 6 big bags of hydroton on hand that have been sitting for past 2 seasons waiting to be used up
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Thanks very much for the info.

I'm a bit concerned about all the water I'd need now, if the tub I'd need can hold it without breaking, I'm in a house in an upstairs room. And the fact that tub the size to hold all the water will raise the flood and drain tray up about 30 cms higher than I have planned. I really thought all the pebbles would displace alot of water, but no hey. I'm considering stacking coco mats now, I wouldn't need as much water as the roots would spread out more right? Less height flood level needed than if I'm in pots and need to fill the pots with water to get a good root system going. Half the volume of water maybe. Just a dense mat of roots in the coco mats. I Need to get this thing going and I can go buy coco mats locally, it would solve the height and the water volume. Anyone have experience with coco mats?

Thank you.
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
Duhh said:
Thanks very much for the info.

I'm a bit concerned about all the water I'd need now, if the tub I'd need can hold it without breaking, I'm in a house in an upstairs room. And the fact that tub the size to hold all the water will raise the flood and drain tray up about 30 cms higher than I have planned. I really thought all the pebbles would displace alot of water, but no hey. I'm considering stacking coco mats now, I wouldn't need as much water as the roots would spread out more right? Less height flood level needed than if I'm in pots and need to fill the pots with water to get a good root system going. Half the volume of water maybe. Just a dense mat of roots in the coco mats. I Need to get this thing going and I can go buy coco mats locally, it would solve the height and the water volume. Anyone have experience with coco mats?

Thank you.
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What you can do it just have a pump from your res up into the pots and top feed and it will drain right back into the res till your root system is build up better but yes the idea of flood and drain is too flood as high as needed to push all the old air out and pull new air in when it drains that’s how the plants grow so quick. If you don’t want to have such a big res just put the pots in the tables and top feed them with say a drip line or even a 1/2” feed line say once and hr for 5-10 minutes should work fine. That way you won’t need to fill the table with clay balls and won’t need such a big res and the plants will grow really well because of the wet dry cycles. There are many ways to make it work
 
D

Duhh

Active Member
Treesomewanted77 said:
What you can do it just have a pump from your res up into the pots and top feed and it will drain right back into the res till your root system is build up better but yes the idea of flood and drain is too flood as high as needed to push all the old air out and pull new air in when it drains that’s how the plants grow so quick. If you don’t want to have such a big res just put the pots in the tables and top feed them with say a drip line or even a 1/2” feed line say once and hr for 5-10 minutes should work fine. That way you won’t need to fill the table with clay balls and won’t need such a big res and the plants will grow really well because of the wet dry cycles. There are many ways to make it work
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Ah right, that's awesome! that could be one way around it, I was also thinking of lower containers, wide and low, and and splitting the flooding and draining into 2 of them so roughly half in each one, that would make me less worried about it breaking. Or water storage containers for a van or a flat water butt, they'd be less likely to crack but they're a bit expensive.

That top feed idea is a great one thank you, and I is the growth and yield the same as flood and drain? I have gone with the hydroton and figured I'd sort it out as I go. I actually came to ask how often to top feed during the plants rooting into the pots. The rooting plugs are still wet after a few hours but the stones are just damp. Will the roots grow into the stones this way?
 
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pegboy

pegboy

Well-Known Member
This is not really a reply to your specific question but have you considerd rockwool ? Its so much cleaner and easier to work with when used in flood and drain.
 
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Treesomewanted77

Well-Known Member
Duhh said:
Ah right, that's awesome! that could be one way around it, I was also thinking of lower containers, wide and low, and and splitting the flooding and draining into 2 of them so roughly half in each one, that would make me less worried about it breaking. Or water storage containers for a van or a flat water butt, they'd be less likely to crack but they're a bit expensive.

That top feed idea is a great one thank you, and I is the growth and yield the same as flood and drain? I have gone with the hydroton and figured I'd sort it out as I go. I actually came to ask how often to top feed during the plants rooting into the pots. The rooting plugs are still wet after a few hours but the stones are just damp. Will the roots grow into the stones this way?
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I ran 2 small tables off one res and just split the full line with a T and had the drains hooked together as well. It worked well I just went a different way because I was out of height and my table stand took up some space but it was still one of my favorite ways to grow.
I would flood a little lower so you’re not saturating the rooting plug just the stones and you can probably get away with only one flood a day till they spread some roots down into the balls. The plants will tell you when they need a drink they won’t just die if they are thirsty they will droop.
 
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