Started another batch of Jalepeno, Cayenne and Chili peppers. A couple of each. I’m using AHope Garden set up. First time I did this I used the nutrient packets that came with the system and my peppers grew very fast and really strong. This second batch in last week or so they seem to be upset and not growing. I’ve added the nutrients in the pic and the water has a blue tint so I know there is plenty. Did I over do the nutrients? How in the heck do I tell if I’m under or over feeding. Should I just transfer them out now?
by Milehigh1978
4 Comments
Are the roots sitting in water? That’s the wrong fertilizer. You need hydroponic fertilizer. Miracle gro is made for soil, its missing ingredients for hydro.
I use Maxigro and love it. Can be used in hydro, coco, and soil. Its complete, wont need anything else. Just one powder to mix with water. Im growing peppers right now in coco and feed them Maxigro.
A cheap EC meter will tell you if you are using too little or too much fertilizer. The leaves will also show you. Yellowing leaves, too little fertilizer.
In addition to the wrong type of fertilizer as mentioned, the crispy edges of the leaves do make them appear overfertilized (same thing happened to mine when I used too strong of a concentration)
Don’t even need fertilizer this young imo.
Only needs nitrogen if anything at this stage.
It takes a minimal amount of nutrients to feed plants growing like this. For instance, I have six plants growing in an Aerogarden that use 8 ml of nutrient solution every two weeks. They are growing huge, and should have been transferred out to my DIY hydroponic grow tub already, but are thriving. Fox Farms and Dynagrow make solutions for hydroponics that work really well and are nutritionally complete. You do need meter to test pH, EC, TDC meter because peppers grown hydroponically have an optimal pH range for nutrient absorption and you may need to adjust the pH to hit that slightly acidic range that will make peppers go crazy (5.5-6.8). That one plant looks like a nitrogen burn from too high a concentration of nutrients. Fortunately, you can just dump the tank and then feed them plain water for a couple days until your hydroponic solution (whatever you decide to go wtih) arrives from Amazon.