Using Miracle-Grow Nutes.

cues

cues

Well-Known Member
OK peeps. Now summer is here, I'm now growing chillis, mint, lettuce and Basil in the windowsill in flood/drain with hydroton.
The trouble is, it's a bit choking spending the cash on nutes.
So, after a quick search, I've found a recipe that basically is...
1 teaspoon of miracle grow (Some sites recommend 'Patio', some 'Tomato'), and a quarter spoon each of calcium nitrate and epsom salts per gallon.
Has anyone tried this?
 
playermic

playermic

Well-Known Member
never tried calcium nitrate or epsom salt but i do know MG will burn the crap outta your plants if you go over the recommended dose
 
AimAim

AimAim

Well-Known Member
playermic said:
never tried calcium nitrate or epsom salt but i do know MG will burn the crap outta your plants if you go over the recommended dose
Click to expand...
Any nutrient "will burn the crap out of your plants" if you overdose them. Why single out MG? But you "know" this because you read it somewhere.

Look at all the thousands of pictures on this site of plants fried with "top shelf" $30/liter fertilizers.
 
qwizoking

qwizoking

Well-Known Member
alot of people use mg, like me. i use bloom booster and calmag, mg nutes dont contain magnesium. there is no set amount start small and work up to half recommended dose or what your plants can handle. mg is a great product
 
squarepush3r

squarepush3r

Well-Known Member
cues said:
OK peeps. Now summer is here, I'm now growing chillis, mint, lettuce and Basil in the windowsill in flood/drain with hydroton.
The trouble is, it's a bit choking spending the cash on nutes.
So, after a quick search, I've found a recipe that basically is...
1 teaspoon of miracle grow (Some sites recommend 'Patio', some 'Tomato'), and a quarter spoon each of calcium nitrate and epsom salts per gallon.
Has anyone tried this?
Click to expand...

MG is not gunna work in Hydroponics. Soil it can work with the above formula you mentioned adding in calcium and magnesium, it would still be shy some trace elements but if you have a decent soil it should cover it.
 
C

churchhaze

Well-Known Member
The problem with using MG for hydro is that its main source of nitrogen is urea. This needs bacteria to break down to become nitrate and it takes soil and time.

Seriously, if you're going to go buy calcium nitrate, you're one step ahead of the game. In a hydroponic solution, you want to provide the majority of nitrogen as nitrates, and calcium nitrate just happens to be the main ingredient in every hydroponic mix that provides nitrogen.

Get some potassium nitrate, mono potassium phosphate, magnessium sulfate, calcium nitrate, and an iron salt like iron sulfate. This is all you need for a complete hydroponic solution.

MG and hydro really don't mix. MG lacks calcium because they expect you to have the right amount of lime in your soil to begin with. In hydro, you get all your calcium from the same place you get the majority of your nitrates, calcium nitrate. It's SOOOO cheap, you can get a pound of it for $3.50 dollars at cropking and it will last a LONG time. I got a 50 pound bag for 35 dollars. That will literally last my entire lifetime.

By the way, calmag is just overpriced and watered down calcium nitrate and magnesium nitrate and a tiny amount of iron chelate. What snake oil. GH flora "micro" is also mostly just calcium nitrate too... Trust me, you want a big bag of calcium nitrate.

Oops, i let the genie out of the bottle...
 
cues

cues

Well-Known Member
churchhaze said:
The problem with using MG for hydro is that its main source of nitrogen is urea. This needs bacteria to break down to become nitrate and it takes soil and time.

Seriously, if you're going to go buy calcium nitrate, you're one step ahead of the game. In a hydroponic solution, you want to provide the majority of nitrogen as nitrates, and calcium nitrate just happens to be the main ingredient in every hydroponic mix that provides nitrogen.

Get some potassium nitrate, mono potassium phosphate, magnessium sulfate, calcium nitrate, and an iron salt like iron sulfate. This is all you need for a complete hydroponic solution.

MG and hydro really don't mix. MG lacks calcium because they expect you to have the right amount of lime in your soil to begin with. In hydro, you get all your calcium from the same place you get the majority of your nitrates, calcium nitrate. It's SOOOO cheap, you can get a pound of it for $3.50 dollars at cropking and it will last a LONG time. I got a 50 pound bag for 35 dollars. That will literally last my entire lifetime.

By the way, calmag is just overpriced and watered down calcium nitrate and magnesium nitrate and a tiny amount of iron chelate. What snake oil. GH flora "micro" is also mostly just calcium nitrate too... Trust me, you want a big bag of calcium nitrate.

Oops, i let the genie out of the bottle...
Click to expand...
Thanks churchhaze. It was the urea which concerned me as well.
Your formula seems to lack trace elements though.
What about zinc, copper, manganese, boron and molybdenum?
 
kinddiesel

kinddiesel

Well-Known Member
check out viagro grow, they make stuff for hydro. with directions. and it cheap priced like mg. I think viagro grow is better choice for mj plants. better numbers. mg uses stupid numbers like 25 14 50. vigor will be 10 10 10 or 10 45 15.
 
cues

cues

Well-Known Member
That was an interesting search on Google! It turns out you mean vigoro!
Unfortunately, I'm in the UK and we don't get it here.
You're on the right track though.
If I can find something similar that uses nitrates as a base and contains most trace elements in sufficient amounts, only requiring minimal (and cheap) additions (epsom salts, clalcium nitrate and maybe iron sulphate), that seems to be the way to go.
 
qwizoking

qwizoking

Well-Known Member
so what counts as hydro? ive only ever used mg and it works fine, ive done ebb and flow and grown in perlite and clay (didnt do ebb and flow with perlite, im not sure that would turn out good) im still pretty new at this but so you couldnt use it in like dwc or something? when i foliar feed it works
 
cues

cues

Well-Known Member
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Part A Solution
Using 100 litres of water add:[/FONT]		[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Part B Solution
Using 100 litres of water add:[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Calcium Nitrate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]7.5 kg[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Potassium Nitrate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]9.0 kg[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Potassium di-hydrogen phosphate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]3.0 kg[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Magnesium sulphate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]6.0 kg[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Iron Chelate EDTA[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]300g[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Manganese sulphate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]40g[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Borax[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]37g[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Copper sulphate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]8g[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Zinc sulphate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]4g[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica] [/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Ammonium molybdate[/FONT][FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]1g[/FONT]
[FONT=Century Gothic, Arial, Helvetica]Solutions are 100 times more concentrated than required for plants. Dilute to 1 in 100.[/FONT]

Just found this!
 
C

churchhaze

Well-Known Member
Go for it! Obviously don't make solutions that big though... You only need to make 1L of each solution at a time, and just remake them when you run out.

I actually do use borax (solubor), sodium molybdate, and manganese sulfate in tiny amounts, but I didn't use them at first and had no problems at all when I didn't include them.

I've never been able to pinpoint a zinc deficiency, and I'm pretty sure copper deficiency is a load of BS... Who the hell has been able to pin down their deficiency to being copper? Either way, I started throwing a post 1982 penny in each tank for g ood luck. Those are 95% zinc and 5% copper... Trust me though, they really don't matter...

Here's what I do for base solutions:

IMG_20130510_005222.jpg
 
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