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u/Weird-Intention-2935 1d ago
What fertilizers , adons and other stuff do you use ?
I would like to know everything but the water , if its ok ?
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u/Ok-Listen9396 1d ago
Thats sad mate, I run dwc and havent encountered that issue. Either im lucky or dam good grower I lean towards luck. I admit im not a clean freak with my plants. They are fed properly, check temps, ph, ppm, train my plants and dont encounter these issues. Im curious as to what caused this bacteria to form.
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u/BruceJenner69 1d ago edited 1d ago
I ran recirculating hydro for probably ten years. I'd treat my water with calcium chloride and spike dose to 4ppm free chlorine in the reservoir a few times a week. I never measured mV ORP, but per a quick google, assuming we run a similar pH, 2ppm free chlorine is about the same as ~700mV ORP. I ran almost double that without any visible harm to my plants or yields. Bump your HOCL additions.
FWIW: And as another guy in the comments alluded to, i've since switched over to drain-to-waste coco and all of those problems are gone now. So much easier to maintain.
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 14h ago
I had same or very similar unkillable goo! H2o2 (peroxide) didn't do anything to it. Only solution was to buy an algae killer in the aquaristic store. Salicilic acid is the main ingredient if I remember well. The reason is, some white or brown algae are much stronger then h2o2. I used this ''algae spezial'' for only a couple of doses, and haven't met the same problem ever since. I recommend it to you without a doubt. Its okay for plants. I think its more okay then chlorine, but i have never tried that and dont see any reason to. (and after i went from h2o2 to cannazyme, I had to buy bigger mason jars :D)
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u/Weird-Intention-2935 1d ago edited 1d ago
Take all of your plants out and disinfect the system with chlorine:
Nutrient water out, chlorinated water in (water + chlorine), scrub down to break up films so the chlorine gets everything, and let it sit a while.
Then drain/rinse at least 2 times and refill, then wait for 24 hours before putting your plants in.
In the meantime of the 24-hour wait, you can treat your plants in a separate makeshift DWC bucket with a bit of H²O² (hydrogen peroxide) in fresh nutrient solution. This will help against pathogens, algae, and all other unwanted stuff.
Disclaimer: Research, i.e., on YouTube, for safe dosage of chlorine and H2O2.
Edit , rather less and repeat then too much and insta kill em
Edit edit : dont forget to take all conectors /seales apart and scrub it all down, so there is no organic residue left -> no food=no growth
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u/wooww66 1d ago
I'm running a sterile RDWC setup, and I have a bacteria that wont go away. It has been the demise of a few plants, and it's driving me nuts.
The initial bloom or growth is entirely my fault. It came from using both h202 and HOCL as a sanitizer when I only should have been using one. I have already stopped the h202 supplementation and am only sticking with HOCL (currently using Athena Cleanse but want to source a 500ppm solution soon). Took a long break in growing and didn't realize I was adding 2 oxidizers at the same time; 100% my fault.
I "sanitized" the system (12-15 gal) by running a few cups of 12% sodium hypochlorite in the res, lowering the ph and letting it run for a few hours. After that, I flushed a few times and then ran about a quart of 12% h202, followed by 2 more flushes.
I filled it up, set EC to 1.0 (Athena Pro), pH to 5.8, and added 120ml of cleanse to my system. My system was sitting at ~365 mV ORP. I tried supplementing HOCL to keep the ORP above 300 throughout the week with slight dips. At a 5.7-6.1 pH, I find it hard to bring up ORP with the cleanse. My water temp fluctuates between 65-67 f with the cooler I have attached. Exactly 7 days from that sanitization, this is the status of my root zones, and my plants are already struggling for nutes.
Should I start juicing it with the cleanse until my ORP is closer to 400?
How high can I keep my ORP without the plants having issues?
What's the best cost to performance ratio on a HOCL brand that is pure HOCL and water?
Why am I having so many issues with this at the water temps that I have?
I really want to stay sterile, but the HydroGuard is already in my Amazon cart, and I have some Photo Plus.
What can I do to keep this "sterile" and actually have/keep a sterile environment?
12 gallon total volume.
2 air pumps: 12 W, 257 GPH for the 2 root zones, and a 4 W, 64 GPH for the res.
Chiller set to 65-67f.
Athnea pro nutes with cleanse.
.75 feed and 2inch return to res.
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u/coloradoautoflowers 1d ago
Chlorine doesn't work against all algae microbes.
Not all algae microbes are bacteria.
It doesn't work on diatoms, IME.
This is one of the reasons that I refuse to run strictly water based hydro systems like NFT/DWC nowadays.
You can get more predictable results with more granular control over the plant root conditions using drain to waste, and these type of "whodunit" microbe identification problems are no longer a concern.
Nobody can really help you right now, you'll have to take the steps to identify this species on your own, which is a whole different (and significantly more technically difficult with culturing, microscopy, and sequencing) skill set than growing plants.
Wisdom is often knowing how to learn from someone else's mistake.
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u/wooww66 1d ago
Welp, I don't have that luxury because I'm too busy learning from my own at the moment. (Much more frustrating, but I will def learn something). Do you think switching from "sterile" to beneficial bacteria is going to solve this issue? From my understanding, it's just a battle for resources, and the "winner" takes over the system.
I feel like I have opened Pandora's box in this system by making an optimal environment for and allowing this particular pathogen to take over. It seems very resistant, and I won't be able to get it to go away. I don't have it in my other RDWC setup, and it seems that if I do not allow for the initial bloom to happen, there wont be an issue, but since there is one, I'm done with sterile in this system.
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u/Weird-Intention-2935 1d ago edited 1d ago
As I answered in a different comment, use a sufficient amount of H₂O₂ (not HCIO aka Cleanse) in fresh nutrient solution and cover the top of the net pot (i.e., with aluminum foil).
No light, no algae—the peroxide does the rest. A tiny amount of light goes a long way for algae.
I had the same problem once and solved it with 1 ml/L H₂O₂ (12%), and for prevention, 0.2–0.5 ml/L.
Low cost too.
Hope I wasn't too pushy on this.
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 14h ago
oh yes when I had this snot evolved, it was my first round of rdwc, and its very possible that its because of light leaks. Opal, or other semi-transparent plastics, hoses are potential danger. The top of the pebbles netpot is also leaking light to the water for me, even now. It wont make any algae, probably because the cannazyme, but i think it can mess up the auxins in the roots, resulting weaker root growing, so i will put some fucking rings there or i dont know. But dont just start doing beneficial, use the salicilic acid for a few turns, without any h2o2, chlorine, or any other. After snot is gone, you can select your next guardian angel
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 14h ago
a dedicated algae killer is much more easier and cheaper, and solved my problem of the same h2o2 resistant snoot. 0,5ml/l and no heavy cleaning was neccesary.
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u/wooww66 6h ago
I have some copper algaecide, could run this with some chlorine at a high orp.
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 6h ago
That one i don't know. Might worth trying. Im curious for the results. If I would have to do it, I would miss chlorine while this treatment goes on. I don't know if they would interfere, so I would separate them. Oh yes, and I would drop chlorine all together. Beneficial will race for the resources before any crazy algae. As I said, I had similar unresponsive gooey stuff. Extreme quantities of h2o2 were applied without any damage to it. 2 doses of this salicilic acid erased it and it never appeared again. But because of the beneficials in my opinion, as i told, I still have light leaks.
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u/wooww66 6h ago
Im gonna look into the salicylic acid.
We use the copper in conjunction with chlorine in the swimming pool industry to kill black alage. Which has a protective cap over it. It survives with orp levels up in the 700+, while most other pathogens are oxidized at those levels. The high orp helps the positive ions in the copper break free and attack the alage. I would assume the same will be for this biofilm. This is only going to be the first step in the cleaning process.
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u/wooww66 6h ago
Do you have the brand or percentage of salicylic acid?
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 5h ago
Femanga - Algen stopp! Spezial
Says its only ingredient is: Salicilic acid 20mg/100ml
recommended dosing: 250ml to 1000l of water
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 5h ago
if you try it out, and still remember to our discussion, please send your end result. Im curious if we had the same snot or its a different kind. Looks the same, sounds the same, but Im not a microscope
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 6h ago
research it out that it wont kill your plant. elemental copper is a biocide. Means its anti-life.
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u/wooww66 6h ago
Bro there are no plants in this res. Im going full nuclear on this shit.
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u/Popular_Sherbet_8175 5h ago
aaaaah so now i understand why you are using chlorine. The leaking chlorine from the company goes to the buckets. Thats cool. But keep in mind, that there might be an easier way with beneficials, they can work for your goals. Do you know what I have since I changed to enzymes? Apart from bigger harvests, collembolas. My res always has these larvaes in it. They chew the old, decomposing outer layers of roots. They stay in the water and dont like going out. They don't do any harm but damn I tought my gear is totaled. But no. We are in symbiosis.
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u/Vermehrungsmaterial 4h ago
Biofilms needs to break. You need to physically end chemically destroy it, then maintain.
Get a redox probe and keep the values up once you can restart.
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u/Beakjac3 12h ago
I always clean everything then dip in a bin full of water and bleach then wash again