phrogg

Underwatering stress, we're all familiar, your babies can completley droop with every non-woody cell of their bodies.
Water them, and they perk up in a an hour or two.
Everybody's garden is different and we'll all see/develop/think different things.
My question really, is how much, and in what ways, does underwatering, and at what extremes, effect the growth of our babies.
It seems to me to not make that much of a difference if they are absolutley dry for a short period, meaning that all of the leaves and stems are drooped but still soft, not brittle, just listless, if that's the right word.

phrogg...

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Anamist

Underwatering to the degree you speak of can actually be dangerous, causing nutrient burn quite rapidly. It is reccomended you get a moisture meter and water the plant when it needs it but not when its dying for it. In plants that are good size for their container, in ideal environmental conditions and using a medium of half soil half perlite, watering every two days is often ideal. The lower leafs may droop a bit, but I wouldn't let it get any further than that personally. At least for general purpose watering.

organic

If the plant is otherwise well taken for I bet it probably doesn't hurt. Might help in certain ways even.

This is an interesting idea. I farm berries and have observed that stress to a plant , to a certain extent, produces a higher quality fruit. It's a sliding scale where some stress on the plant is good, but if you go too far there are too many negative side effects, outweighing the improved quality. The main drawbacks are decreased productivity as stress increases, as well, if stresses get too strong disease and lack of vigor become much more prevalent.

Stresses on the plant can include many factors but IMO the most useful, or lacking that easiest to use, are water fluctuation & underfeeding.

My theory is that stresses, especially those that result in a wide fluctuation (like going from well-watered to droopy dry) cause a plant to harden off slightly, resulting in a concentration of its growth production. Kind of drawing back on itself. think of how you hunch your shoulders and draw inward when trying to ward off cold, same general concept. Then, when the situation is brought back to optimum levels, it begins expanding again, but now with a more concentrated inner core. The fluctuation can be repeated on a continual basis if desired.

The second half of the equation is, by my best guess, that the plant realizes that it's under stress and therefore may have only a limited time to reproduce. As a result it pushes its own production more vigorously. In effect you are tricking the plant into thinking it is dying and throwing everything it has into its offspring.

Anyway, if done right you don't lose too much production, but the fruit ends up more concentrated, richer, more developed. Go too far though and you can lose a lot of crop.

I expect that the concept would work with other "fruit producing" plants.

Also it should be disclosed that I haven't tried doing this deliberately so I don't know how adjustable the system would be, but I have noticed this result in my own field crops due to screw ups on my part But if you mastered the system I bet it could make a pretty noticable difference.

And of course this is for people who are less concerned with yield and more concerned with going to possibly ridiculous lengths in search of the ultimate bud.

O

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OzGrowa

There is the issue of knocking out the useable carbohydrates by doing this which is robbing the plant of energy, although I must admit I do it with my moms occasionally out of pure neglect and they do appreciate it after a good saturation from being bone dry and starting to wilt. I wouldnt do it in flowering or to a plant about to be flowered, you want to keep things as constant as possible in the week or so after and for the two week safter the induction of flowering.

I let them get to start of wilt stage (pot is real light to pick up) every couple of weeks on average....

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HydroSan

This concept has been explored with Tomato plants, have a look at this Partial Root Drying (PRD) thread, the links may be out of date but should give a few hints for further research. Stressing half of the roots by letting half dry out makes the stressed side produce abscisic acid, which limits the vegitation but still has equivilant yealds in the fruit. I gave up trying to dry half the roots with hydro, daft idea realy, but it would be easy to try in a dirty grow....one day

I thought that if it decreased vegitation but had the same yeald in fruit, there may be a case for it to get more light to the buds. Maybe the extra abscisic acid produced by your neglected watering may actually be benefitial to the plant.

San

phrogg

I would like however to throw out a bit of credibility to anamists' point of view that it is bad.... not saying it is all bad, but...

I have just put three different plants into flowering with different concentations of nutes and all plants showing signs of nutrient burn.
all plants wilted once, and were fine, the second wilt they went through however did not end up the same way
keep in mind that these are in VERY strong 'soil', but the one with the most nutes almost completley burnt up in one day for whatever reason.
the other two have had several dry spells since and are 'fine'
so... i think that underwatering can surely cause nutrient burn, but i would be inclined to believe that this would only be the case in an already too rich nutient supply.
phrogg

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coffeehigh

organic, i've noticed exactly the same phenomenon that you're pointing out : the plant grows at an expanded vigor after relief from resource stress.

i've learned to water thoroughly and less often. in flowering, i let them dry out (bone dry, bottom leaves just beginning to wilt) at once every couple of weeks. then a big shot of r.o. water with 1/4 strength fertilizer and *boom*, they explode with that concentrated "core" boost.

i find that plants grown on this cycle yield wonderfully and are easy to care for. it's as if a plant "knows" its genetic potential, and works overtime to catch up. fertilizer burn has never been an issue, as i tend to go slightly weak on nutes. this method eliminates overwatering/disease in plants.

as i tell myself, you're after the flowers, not the stems

Anamist

For the recored, I too have seen the nutrient burn I mentioned, and if the lower leafs are nice and droopy the medium will be very dry and this is too late, imo. I let the medium dry out, but if I gave a full strenth fertilization the previous time, I won't let it get as dry as I would but its still quite dry. I never overwater lets put it that way .