Early K-lite results

[keithrs]

Please excuses me if this has been answered....
How soon after using k-lite did you get these symptoms? What where you using before?

 

[rcb]

Need to know how they increase the pH. And specifically if they have changed their process in the last year or at the time you started seeing the leaf drop.

BTW... how long after you started using K-lite did you start seeing the leaf color and drop?

I will call and ask. It takes some time to get through to them, so I may not have this answer quickly.

After one season's growth. Started using K-lite last spring, saw the issue beginning with my few fall bloomers, then really started with my winter bloomers.

I take it you are not using these media in a semi hydro like system. Just a root support? I'm wondering about your media as being a significant player in this. Clay products have a CEC capacity too. If there is sufficient alumina and iron, then I can see phosphate getting tied up by the media (especially if fresh). Activated aluminia is a great medium for phosphate uptake. K lite does have a reduced phosphorus content to start with, so it's not out of reality that P could be getting short changed in these pots. Can you spike a bit of bone meal to some of these pots?

Correct, I have no orchids in S/H. Ray also questioned the idea of the media being a contributing cause. But these are for the most part common, wouldn't others see it too? Some of the plants have been in their LECA for three years now. Some less than that. I have to admit to being a lazy repotter.

As for bone meal, as I replied to CYCharles, I can get some this weekend, and periodically sprinkle it in some pots. It will need to be refreshed somewhat, I'm not sure how well the pots will hold it in.

 

[rcb]

Please excuses me if this has been answered....
How soon after using k-lite did you get these symptoms? What where you using before?

NP, After one growing season. So new growth started last spring on K-lite, matured over the summer, and as the plants came into bloom this past fall and winter I started to see the "issue"

I was using MSU RO. Same concentration, same frequency of fertilizing.

 

[Rick]

Phosphorus (P) is the second of the major nutrients listed on fertilizer labels, and like nitrogen is a basic building block of all life, animal and vegetable. But where nitrogen is stored in soil in organic forms and is relatively readily transformed into plant-available forms, phosphorus is stored in unavailable, insoluble mineral forms. Plant-available phosphorus occurs as phosphate, PO4. However, within hours of applying phosphate fertilizer, the phosphate molecules bind to minerals and clay particles in the soil to form unavailable, insoluble phosphorus compounds. These compounds tend to become more tightly bound, and more insoluble, as time progresses, unlike nitrogen compounds which can be broken down by microbes over time. Organic forms of phosphorus can be broken down over time, but once the phosphorus is released from the organic form, it is also quickly bound up in mineral and clay particles. There's a rather short window of opportunity for plants to absorb dissolved phosphorus before it's bound up by the soil and lost to the plants, or lost through leaching and erosion. So, soluble phosphate must be continually added to the soil, either through the breakdown of organic matter, or repeated applications of phosphate.

This was a funky quote I found in a rose society document. But follows some of the things I've seen in our treatability lab for removing phosphate from waste water with activated alumina and refined clay products.

 

[Rick]

NP, After one growing season. So new growth started last spring on K-lite, matured over the summer, and as the plants came into bloom this past fall and winter I started to see the "issue"

I was using MSU RO. Same concentration, same frequency of fertilizing.[/QUOTE

Any kelp use?

 

[rcb]

Yes, I use seaweed extract about every other week starting about now until mid summer, with both the MSU and K-lite. I do not use it in late summer or winter.

 

[Rick]

Yes, I use seaweed extract about every other week starting about now until mid summer, with both the MSU and K-lite. I do not use it in late summer or winter.

I've been using it year round and weekly, but at a low dose (1/4 tsp/gal).

There are lots of different extracts and concentrations, so may need to look at your particular brand for guidance.

 

[gonewild]

Just to continue the thinking process let's assume it is a phosphorous deficiency.

Why are you the only one seeing the deficiency?
After you ask your water company how they treat the water maybe we will have a clue.

How do you mix your fertilizer?

After mixing the fertilizer do you notice any undissolved solids in the bottom of the container? Any at all?

 

[Rick]

http://www.conference.ifas.ufl.edu/intecol/presentations/125/0240 M Greenway.pdf

This is an interesting paper.

One difference is that the plants and media are kept wet all the time so that retained P can be accessed by the plant after retention.

But one slide in particular shows an impressive amount of long term phosphorus retention by the Al/Fe oxide clay ammendments.

There is even one slide that suggests competition between a plant and the ammendment system for P uptake.

I'm considering a scenario that:
1) Cutting K increased uptake of Ca/Mg with increased new growth/blooming with a higher P demand to keep up (compared to a K suppressed plants).

2) Higher P demand with less available in the fert, compounded by P adsorption in the potting mix got the plants to call up their reserves in old growth.

Adding some P back (as bone meal) could offset the P loss from the potting matrix, but you may consider adding some organic material to the matrix or semi hydro style watering systems.

 

[Rick]

Yes, I use seaweed extract about every other week starting about now until mid summer, with both the MSU and K-lite. I do not use it in late summer or winter.

"and as the plants came into bloom this past fall and winter I started to see the "issue"

Maybe a good reason to keep up the kelp year round.

 

[Ray]

I'm glad you joined the conversation, Renee.

Rick - the clays in soils tend to be individual flakes, with lots of CEC at the flake edges. In LECA, a lot of vitrification has taken place, greatly lowering it - by orders of magnitude, I suspect.

 

[Rick]

I'm glad you joined the conversation, Renee.

Rick - the clays in soils tend to be individual flakes, with lots of CEC at the flake edges. In LECA, a lot of vitrification has taken place, greatly lowering it - by orders of magnitude, I suspect.

Also got lava rock and Turface/Perlite

Pre low K, back when I had some of my stuff in baskets with clay balls, I had several problems with hydroton holding onto stuff (at the time K).

 

[gonewild]

This presents data on Phosphorous removal by lava and expanded clay...

http://www.constructedwetlands.net/vandeun_SWS08.pdf

 

[ALToronto]

How difficult or expensive is it for us to test what our media retain? For instance, I have open bags of lava rock, CHC and LECA that have not been used. I also have media from these bags in orchid pots, in use for several months.

If I were to soak the unused and used media in RO water from the same source, where would I have to send the soaking water to see the changes in various minerals? Would a university chemistry lab be able to give me the results?

 

[gonewild]

How difficult or expensive is it for us to test what our media retain? For instance, I have open bags of lava rock, CHC and LECA that have not been used. I also have media from these bags in orchid pots, in use for several months.

If I were to soak the unused and used media in RO water from the same source, where would I have to send the soaking water to see the changes in various minerals? Would a university chemistry lab be able to give me the results?

You would only get results for the soluble salts of the minerals in the water sample. the CEC bound elements will stay bound to the particles.

You would have to crush the media and have soil analysis tests done directly to the solids.

 

[gonewild]

I don't think the CEC of orchid media has a lot of influence on the plants. There is so little root surface in contact with media that the actual capacity held in the media is not going to be accessible to the orchid plants. For CE to happen roots must contact soil and orchid root structures just don't have that much capacity.
That is why we rely on frequent liquid fertilizer applications.

On the other hand the media may trap nutrients by it's CEC and keep them away from the orchids.
That is why we rely on frequent liquid fertilizer applications.

 

[ALToronto]

This presents data on Phosphorous removal by lava and expanded clay...

http://www.constructedwetlands.net/vandeun_SWS08.pdf

This presentation doesn't take the media to the point of saturation with P and N. If we wanted to pre-saturate our media so that it wouldn't deplete the nutrients from the fertilizer, what would it take? And how would we know that it was saturated?

Does everyone pre-soak media in fertilizer or plain water?

 

[gonewild]

If we wanted to pre-saturate our media so that it wouldn't deplete the nutrients from the fertilizer, what would it take? And how would we know that it was saturated?

That is not the direction you want to go. When you work with nutrients at high levels it is easy to crash. The approach would to be to use a media that has zero CEC and no ability to hold nutrients. Then you know what you applied is what there is. But then you have stepped into hydroponics or simi-hydro.

 

[gonewild]

Another question for rcb........

Do you have algae growing in your pots, on your pots or on your media or on the plant roots??

 

[Stone]

you are seeing a bit more growth; larger and taller. so, the floral structures or growth in general will draw more phosphorus (than before). the general word for hort crop production that i'm assuming is true, is that the phosphorus is 'necessary' for floral production, and generally used more when there are quickly-growing floral structures that have branching or differentiation (like mums with lots of branches and flowers).

Flowers typically have the same or LESS P than plant tops (leaves)
Seeing more/larger growth could possibly be explained by the much higher N to K ratio. Also, giving high K/N and P/N ratios will force the plant to mobilize stored reserves. I think it is highly unlikely that you would see a P deficiency with K-lite. Remember that even in the habitat orchids have a P/N ratio of around 0.07 according to the Zots paper....VERY low!! The P in K-lite should be more than enough.
Here is an example of a fuchsia adequately supplied with all nutrients:
Leaves N% 3.2, P% 0.83, K% 5.3
Flowers N% 3.2, P% 0.55, K% 5.2
Notice that the flowers have the same K in them as the leaves, Flowers are exrtemely fast growing and they MUST find K from somewhere.