Plants need nutrients in order to survive and it is no different for autoflowering marijuana plants. If you are not new to marijuana planting then you must have heard about the term NPK. The abbreviation NPK stands for Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P) and Potassium (K) which stand for their elemental abbreviation in the periodic table and for autoflowering plants, they use even more of these elements than regular plants. Apart from these macronutrients, autoflowering cannabis plants also require essential micronutrients that include Iron, Molybdenum, Manganese, Chlorine, Zinc, Boron, Copper, Sulfur, Calcium, and Magnesium. Though certain elements are demanded of only a small amount, they are still vital in achieving success in growing autoflowers by choosing the best fertilizer for autoflowers.
Using Soil as a Growth Medium for Autoflowers
When you purchase premium kinds of soil for growing autoflowering marijuana, you won’t have that much of a problem for keeping up with the required nutrients. These soils are pumped full of the required nutrients, especially nitrogen since nitrogen is required for healthy growth and enhances the autoflowering plants. But these nutrients are only good for the first 3 to 4 weeks of planting since the nutrients will be used up. You would know that your plants need additional feeding when they show signs of nutrient deficiency. But if you are using ordinary soil without the additional nutrients you might want to add all the additional nutrients to make sure that your plants will stay healthy.
The Best Fertilizer for Autoflowers
Because of the ability of cannabis autoflowering plants to absorb minerals quicker as compared with regular cannabis, you would definitely find it easier to opt for fertilizers that contain a high-level of NPK. But when choosing, make sure that the Nitrogen level is high since these plants need as much Nitrogen as they can get. An excellent fertilizer could mean having a label “10-5-5” on its packaging. This set of numbers indicated in the fertilizer signifies that it contains Nitrogen (10%), Phosphorus (5%), and Potassium (5%). The remaining parts of the fertilizer not specified are composed of the micronutrients, trace nutrients, and some fillers.
Autoflowering marijuana plants are a lot more sensitive than their photoperiod counterparts. Therefore you need to make sure that you are not overfeeding them or underfeeding them with the nutrients that they need. During the seedling phase, you could start them off by feeding the plants at least one fourth or even one-eighth of the required fertilizer dosage. You would then need to let your plants adapt and adjust to the amount of nutrients that is fed to them and when you determine that they have already adapted quite well, you could start gradually increasing the dosage.
Since fertilizers for marijuana usually come in water-soluble medium, you would need to dissolve them in water and use this nutrient-rich solution to water the auto-flowering marijuana in order to feed nutrients. But you must be aware that fertilizer feeding need not be done every time you water your plants. A good practice is to use fertilizer water or nutrient-rich solution every other watering to give the autoflowering marijuana plants to breathe from the nutrients. This practice is very efficient with preventing any overfeeding of nutrients from happening.
