VitaLink Soil Feed Chart – Earth MAX Doses and pH
VitaLink's own published Earth MAX BASIC schedule for soil. Week by week, in millilitres per litre of water.
- All dosesper litre
- pH and EC5.8 – 6.5 · EC 0.3 – 1.6
- Base feedGrow 1-2ml to 4ml, Bloom 3-4ml to 4ml
Every figure is millilitres per litre of water, so multiply by the size of your can: 4ml per litre is 40ml in a 10-litre can and 20ml in a 5-litre can.
Getting it right
- Grow and Bloom never overlap. Earth MAX Grow stops the day you switch the lights, and Earth MAX Bloom starts. There is no week on this chart where both go in.
- These are one-part feeds. Nothing to balance against a Part B, and no soft-water or hard-water version to choose between — the Earth MAX chart carries no water-hardness panel, unlike VitaLink's coir and hydro charts.
- The EC band is the lowest of the three VitaLink charts. It tops out around 1.6 against 2.4 for coir and hydro, because soil already holds nutrition and the feed is topping it up rather than supplying all of it.
- Bagged soil comes pre-charged. Most peat-based mixes carry a few weeks of food, so young plants in fresh soil often want the bottom of the Grow 1 range or nothing at all. Watch the plant, not the calendar.
- Soil holds its pH better than coir does. Set the water to 5.8 to 6.5 going in and it will stay closer to that than an inert medium would. Check it in the can rather than testing runoff every feed.
- Do not water to heavy runoff every time. Soil is a reserve, not a delivery pipe. Let the pot get light before the next feed — constantly soaked soil suffocates roots and pushes out the fungus gnats.
- Turbo and Buddy both start low. Turbo goes in at 0.5ml from Grow 3 and doubles to 1ml at Flower 2; Buddy starts at 0.5ml in Flower 2 and goes to 1ml from Flower 3.
- Flower 7 is Finale on its own. Bloom, Turbo and Buddy all stop, and Finale goes in at 3-4ml per litre. Flower 8 is plain water.
Everything on the chart
Earth MAX Grow
From £8.49
1-2ml rising to 4ml, Grow 1 to 4
Earth MAX Bloom
From £8.49
3-4ml then 4ml, Flower 1 to 6
VitaLink RootStim
From £9.49
1ml then 0.5ml, Grow 1 to Flower 1
VitaLink Turbo
From £17.49
0.5ml then 1ml, Grow 3 to Flower 6
VitaLink Buddy
From £5.99
0.5ml then 1ml, Flower 2 to 6
VitaLink Finale
From £5.45
3-4ml, Flower 7 on its own
Common questions
What does 4ml per litre mean in my watering can?
Multiply by the litres you are mixing. A 10-litre can takes 40ml, a 5-litre can 20ml, a 2-litre bottle 8ml.
When exactly do I stop Grow and start Bloom?
At the switch to 12 hours of light. Grow 4 is the last week of Earth MAX Grow and Flower 1 is the first week of Earth MAX Bloom. They do not run together at any point.
My soil is already fertilised — do I still start at Grow 1?
Start at the bottom of the range, or hold off entirely until the plant asks. A pre-charged bagged soil carries its own nutrition for the first weeks, and the Grow figures here are a ceiling as much as a target.
Growing in coco instead?
VitaLink publish a separate chart for coir with a two-part base and a higher EC band — see the Coir MAX feed chart.
Is there a stronger version of this schedule?
VitaLink also publish an ADVANCED chart that adds more additives on top of these. This page is the BASIC schedule, which is the one to follow if you are running the products above.
Figures as published by VitaLink on their own BASIC Feed Chart for Earth MAX, hydrogarden.com. Always read the label on the bottle you own. VitaLink is a trade mark of its owner.