Most nutrients and supplements (additives) are manufactured from mineral salts and ingredients that have been calculated to the precise amount for feeding your plant species. Now it’s your turn to accurately mix the feed nutrient for your plants.
The most important and critical step is carefully measuring out the exact amount of either powder or liquid into your reservoir tank. The old carpenter’s adage of “measure twice and cut once” is very true here. Read the application rate on the bottle, the feeding application chart or use our Diablo Feed calculator which will calculate the amounts for you and be sure you are feeding with the correct amount for the weekly cycle your plants are in. For example, my plants are currently (i.e. Vegetative Stage-Week 2).
With powders it’s a good idea to weigh them on a food scale or other weight scale and for liquids a syringe or accurate measuring device is also a good idea. Be sure you know the measurement of your pail, tank or reservoir you are filling. Is it 2 litres or a 2 gallon tank? It’s really critical to getting the measurements as precise as you can.
Once you’ve determined the volume size of your reservoir tank, you can start mixing. If you have a source of warm water everything will dissolve a bit faster but it is not critical if you don’t. Please avoid extremely cold water (!) as it takes longer to mix and plants don’t appreciate being fed ice cold water any more than we enjoy an ice cold shower.
Agitate or stir vigorously with a stir stick, paint mixer or just a large spoon until the liquid or particles have completely dissolved in solution. Once you stop agitation you should be able to visually determine that everything is mixed and in solution.
Remember the more supplements or nutrients you add the greater the concentration of the solution and there will come a point of total saturation where you cannot dissolve any more particles. This is a good reason to have a separate mixing pail or tank for some of your supplements.
Pro Tip: Keep a notebook with short notes or numbers as it will come in really handy next time/next crop, you can refer back to your notes to remind you of what you did last time. Often as you get more experienced you will experiment a bit more with your feeding regime and the notebook or diary will come in very handy, it’s also really cool to be able to look back at what you’ve changed and what you’ve learned.
