Nutrients Canna Coco, Soft water, Calmag, and Silica Question

[Glidethroughthereceptors]

First of all I believe I should mention my tap water ppm is pretty low. Its around 20-30 ppm by itself. The last few grows have had calcium/magnesium defiencies. I want to help prevent that this grow some if possible. I am using Canna Coco A+B this run, and am wondering with my tap water ppm or even if I were to use RO water what ppm should I be looking to get after adding Calmag. There is one thing that is throwing me off though, and that is adding silica to my water. I noticed that adding silica increased my PPM/EC numbers. As everyone knows silica needs to be added to water first before other nutrients/additives. I believe that I should not count the silica ppm's when wanting to get the water to a certain PPM/EC with the calmag. How should I go about using PPM/EC with Canna coco, silica, and calmag to be sure my plants are getting enough calcium?

In my mind, for example lets use my tap water ppm at 30. Then since I need to add silica first lets do that next. The silica brings my waters ppm up to 80 ppm for example. This means that the silica has accounted for 50 ppm's of the current 80 ppm's of the tap water. I have read online in other post that Canna suggest starting with water that has a PPM of 150 assuming they are not refering to the increase from silica. So to me I would need to subtract the ppm's increased from the silica (50 ppm's) and add enough calmag to get the tap water to 200 ppm. 200 ppm minus the 50ppm from the silica would give me the 150ppms canna suggest. Does this sound like the correct thing to do? If not how should I go about getting the correct amount of ppms of calcium and magnesium for my plants when using silica and Canna Coco?

P.S Just had another thought. Maybe I should do a test with like 5 gallons for example since that is the amount I typical add to my reservior. Skip the silica for this test and just add calmag to determine the amount needed to give me the 150ppms. Then just keep adding this amount after I mix in the silica. Does this sound right?

 

[BII]

Ca, Mg and Si can all be rather efficiently delivered by foliar administration, and works quicker too. This avoids all the issues and uncertainties you're encountering.

Salt content, ppm, EC, etc. are additive. The "in my mind" wishful thinking ignoring and subtracting dissolved salts that are there in the water is simply not the way it works.

Do you really need to add silica with every feeding vs. say just once a week or every few weeks?

 

[JP1]

Have you checked your meters? 20-30ppm tap water is unusually low. Silica also doesn't add anything significant to the ppm since it's just a small amount of K... Have you properly washed and buffered your coco? Cana coco line is made for coco so you shouldn't have to add any calmag to it as long as your coco is good to go from the start

 

[Glidethroughthereceptors]

Have you checked your meters? 20-30ppm tap water is unusually low. Silica also doesn't add anything significant to the ppm since it's just a small amount of K... Have you properly washed and buffered your coco? Cana coco line is made for coco so you shouldn't have to add any calmag to it as long as your coco is good to go from the start

Yup have verified with 2 meters. One being a cheap PPM meter from amazon. Shows the about 27ppm. and the other meter is a bluelabs truncheon EC/PPM meter. It shows as not registering. I live in a small town in the mountains so possibly is why the PPMs are so low. And my Silica does increase the PPMs about 30-40more ppms. The cooc I am using is the Canna coco bricks that are supposed to come buffered so that shouldnt be a problem. I just noticed some deficiencies last two grows that appear to have been calcium deficiencies. Need to know about how much calmag that my plants would need. I am using general hydroponics calimagic and it recommends 4mL/gallon. In 5 gallons with silica and 1mL/gal calmag (5ml) my Truncheon meter shows .3 EC. So I figured that is most likely fine. I saw on Cannas website that thier Canna coco is designed to work with standard water of .2-.4 EC. So wouldnt you think I should be good most likely right?

 

[Glidethroughthereceptors]

Ca, Mg and Si can all be rather efficiently delivered by foliar administration, and works quicker too. This avoids all the issues and uncertainties you're encountering.

Salt content, ppm, EC, etc. are additive. The "in my mind" wishful thinking ignoring and subtracting dissolved salts that are there in the water is simply not the way it works.

Do you really need to add silica with every feeding vs. say just once a week or every few weeks?

I just want to be sure my plants are going to get enough calcium since I have been having deficiencies with my tap water