Hello brandonbelew,
1. If the
nutrient maker doesn't have a website and/or online mixing chart, and the only place they sell them is on amazon. I wouldn't consider them reliable
nutrients. Their most likely made by some guy in his basement and he sells them on amazon (probably e-bay as well). Amazon is not a manufacture, their a collection of independent sellers like e-bay, the only difference is Amazon doesn't do auctions, and amazon has warehouses they store and ship the sellers products from. Amazon doesn't buy the products like stores do, they only store them in their warehouse, and when one sells amazon pays the seller for that one (less amazons commission of coarse). While legitimate company's sell products on amazon and e-bay, anyone can as well. The difference is legitimate company's sell their products in regular stores as well and have websites.
2. Those plants aren't mature yet. Their not seedlings, but their not mature. Like I already stated there is a big range between seedling and mature. If you expect plants to fall into either one category (seedling) or the other (mature), your sadly mistaken. Just like with my infant/adult analogy, you wouldn't go from feeding a growing person baby food one day to a stake dinner with all the trimmings the next. Nor would you feed the infant a stake dinner from day one and skip the whole baby food steep. You gradually increase the food as they grow. You do the same thing with plants.
3.
Quote:
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i'll consider these mature and mix full strength for this go around.
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First, not only is mixing nutrients full strength for small plants a waste of nutrients, but mixing them full strength even for mature plants should only be done under certain circumstances and for certain plants. Only mature, heavy feeders in cool conditions need full strength. For mature, mid range feeders 70-80% strength is better than full strength. Mature light feeders, 50-60% strength. With a PPM range of between 1260-1540 for mature strawberry plants (that assumes a mild climate), I would consider strawberry's on the low end of mid range.
Here is a direct quote
Nutrients - Over and Under Use, by Dr. Lynette Morgan
"When the EC is being run to high for a particular plant, this will show as visible symptoms within the crop. A high EC, effectively puts the plants under `water stress' since the plant cells begin to lose water, back into the more concentrated nutrient solution surrounding the roots. As a result the first sign of nutrient `overuse' is plant wilting, even when supplied with sufficient nutrient solution. If the high EC conditions re not too severe, the plants will adjust to these conditions and you may see growth which is `hard' in appearance - often a darker green then usually, with shorter plants and smaller leaves."
4. You do have to fully dissolve the nutrients. But you cant dissolve 5+ gallons worth of nutrients in one gallon of water then add it to the rest of the water. Doing so makes a super concentrated solution before you dilute it to it's normal concentration. When the nutrients are super concentrated they molecules tend to bond with each other, once they bond they become useless to the plants because the plants can't absorb them anymore.
5. I would use
verti-gro nutrients for strawberry's, specifically the
Hydroponic Plant Nutrient Combo (also known as Fcombo).