Powdery Nutrients are a new fertilizer format available, in wich fertilizers are sold dehydrated, saving much space and weight to growers, in addition to a longer shelf life. In this post we will talk about advantages of using powdery nutrients in cannabis gardens, as well as telling best brands to work with.
Advantages of powdery nutrients
As we said in the highlights of this post, powdery nutrients have some advantages (compared with most popular liquids). No doubt one of the most evident is the format, that allows them to save much weight and volume, what derives in a lower cost for customers ( due to the lower transport cost from the origin). Another great advantage of powdery nutrients also derives from its forma, due to a dehydrated formula, does not suffer the pass of time, as it happens with liquid fertilizers.
To these two main characteristics we should add a third one: concentration: Unlike liquid nutrients, that are usually measured in ml per liter, powdery nutrients usually measure its concentration in grams per each 10 liters, what itself explains a higher concentration of the product, so a nice saving for grower (who will need less amount to get the same EC levels of nutrient solution).
Today we can find all kind of nutrients and boosters in powdery form, to source any needings plants may have. Some nutrient brands also offer growing fertilizer, bloom fertilizer and even all kind of elements by separate, so every grower can just add to the nutrient solution whats needed to feed the plants in a particular stage.
Save budget in fertilizer online orders
As we explained before, powdery nutrients reduce transport costs (thanks to its lower volume, and specially because of a lower weight compared with a liquid fertilizer). this difference is specially important when ordering online, because it causes a huge increase of costs for liquids (an even more, some countries won't allow them to be introduced in the country due to its liquid form).
Powdery nutrients brands and sizes available
Due to the icnreasing interest of some growers in this kind of powdery fertilizers, there are some respected brands that decided to offer a range of powdery nutrient products to customers. This is the case of General Hydroponics, with their MaxiGro and MaxiBloom, Powder Feeding, with their fertilizers for mother plants, Indica, Hybrids and Sativa plants, or NPK Insdustries, wich is probably the brand that offers a wider range of products available (besides a more concentrated product).
From the quoted brands, perhaps General Hydroponics is the one that offers less possibilities to growers (because only grow and bloom base nutrients are available), while Powder feeding adds the availability of an extra Calcium and Magnesium and a bloom Booster, and Raw Solubles (NPK Industries) brings the wider range of products offering their base nutrients, elements like Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium, B Vitamines, Calcium and Magnesium, Kelp...
How to use powdery fertilizers
Now we've explained about benefits of powdery nutrients for cannabis, we will discuss about how to add and dose these fertilizers to use them in our gardens.
Powdery nutrients are water soluble, what means that we should add them to the water used to feed plants.
In this step we should follow two references: Product concentration (dose recommended by manufacturer) and EC of the nutrient solution used for irrigation. In example: While General Hydroponics recommends using 1-2 grams per liter, and Powder Feeding recommends 1g per liter, Raw Solubles recommends adding 0,1 grams per liter (10 times more concentrated). No matter the brand used, it is very important to check the EC with a PPM meter, because even respecting brand's recommendation, we may detect our plants suffer deficiencies, or excesses, because of an inadequate electroconductivity (too high or too low). So, once the recommended amount is added to the tank we should check the EC levels to corroborate the levels is the desired. If it is too low, we should add more product, and if it is too high we should add RO water to dilute salt concentration.
*For a proper measuring of powdery fertilizers, it is a must to use a digital scale that will save time and errors.
Savings growing outdoors
Even though it's true that indoor growers may benefit from using powdery nutrients, the ones that will get profit out of it will be those growing outdoors. This kind of grow conditions, in wich plants acquire large sizes, so they need huge amounts of water (and nutrients), probably notice a 50%+ savings compared with budget invested in liquids.
That's why, and also because of being easy to use, big growers are changing to use powdery nutrients. Specially because with just one product they get indrecibly high yields.
AT SantYerbasi we already mentioned mor ethan once that we like using opwdery nutrients in our gardens. Now we will make a side by side of both so each one of our readers gets his own conclusion:
Fertilizer A (liquid)
Max. Dose: 4ml/L
Size: 1L
Product performance (in Liters of Nutrient Solution): 250L
Price: 12,21€
Cost per liter of N.S.: 12,21 / 250L = 0,04884 €/L
Fertilizer B (powder)
Max. Dose: 0,2 g/L
Size: 250g
Product performance (in Liters of Nutrient Solution): 1250L
Price: 28,51€
Cost per liter of N.S.: 28,51 / 1250L = 0,02280 €/L
In this simple side by side we can see hoe the cost per liter of nutrient solution is THE HALF if we're using powdery nutrients. In this last case we compared two different fertilizers. Let's see what happens if we compare two bloom boosters:
Booster A (liquid)
Max. Dose: 4ml/L
Size: 1L
Product performance (in Liters of Nutrient Solution): 250L
Price: 38,25€
Cost per liter of N.S.: 38,25€ / 250L = 0,153 €/L
Booster B (powder)
Max. Dose: 0,2g/L
Size: 250g
Product performance (in Liters of Nutrient Solution): 1250L
Price: 42,26€
Cost per liter of N.S.: 38,25€ / 250L = 0,0338 €/L
If in the first case the cost per Liter of Nutrient Solution was half the price, in the second one, between mentioned flowering boosters its a 5th part of the price!! We these data in hand, it is clear that within powdery nutrients we'll save lots of money.
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