Hi i am have a problem with a nutrient lockout. It show all the signs of defencines for having a low ph. I have tried all kinds of different things to fix this issues before. I decided to try to do a run off test. These babies have been planted in Happy Frog soil mixed with hydroton and has a 3 inch layer of hydroton on layering the bottom of the pot for drainage. They haven't seen any nutes except what is in the soil to start with. I decided to do a run off test of the soil to find out it's ph I started with a ph of 7.0 in the water and ran it through the soil and came out at about 6.0 5.8 from what i read that means it is lower in the soil maybe like 5.2 or so to make 7.0 turn into 6.0. So i checked the soil run off of some new soil that never had anything run through it before and it came out the same way.


So what i am wondering is that if maybe the happy frog soil is starting out at 5.3 or so and locking out my N P K since those can't be absorbed at that low of a ph. I am now just thinking of switching to a soiless mix and seeing how that works out.

I really appreciate anyones help here it seems like the only thing left to try.

Nut lockout should not happen right away, expecially when your not adding any ferts... how old are your plants? I would first try to adjust the pH with a lime buffer... if its not working try adding more clay and sand.

they are spent about a month in the veg state. then they went into blooming for about a week. I just picked up some dolomite lime and was going to add it to the soil at about a cup for every square foot. A book by jorge says that it is hard to over do it and to use that measurement. I am also going to switch soil to either fox farm ocean forest or sunshine pro mix #4. I have been battling this problem for about a year now and havn't seemed to fix it yet. The only thing i havn't tried is different soil or adding dolomite lime to neutral out the ph.

A perfect soil is about 5-10% organic 40-45% Mineral and 25% air and 25% water space.

Hey ddawgg i had the same problem with Fox farms Ocean forrest recently. The soil was way to low on ph and my plants were burning up with only 1/4 to 1/2 strength nutes. Just the soil straight out of the bag was coming out lower than 6 in a runoff test with 6.5 ph water. I went to home depot and got some natural lime, its little brown pellets that dissolve fast in water. And after watering them with about 1 to 2 tablespoons in a gallon of water they started to come back up in a few days. What i do now is just put a couple tablespoons in half a five gallon buckets worth of dirt (FFOF) also with the pearlite in there and add water and mix it up. The siol has been right on since then and i have not had any other lockout issues and everything is growing great!

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That is crazy i picked up the same exact bag of dolomite lime. looks like good stuff. Is it true that the cleaner the water the better it will dissolve?