Historically, it's always been far cheaper to own a TDS metre, which measures the liquid's total dissolved solids, everything in water that's not water; it doesn't directly measure the EC (electrical conductivity) of the solution because it also measures everything that's not a salt ion (plant food) so conversions come into play, with enough knowledge of pH and its workings you can read a lot of information from what you put in and the run off you collect, but you have to guess at whats going on inside, right here, right now, live.
You can buy an EC metre for soil fairly cheaply these days, but like pH metres, they are highly variable in quality and longevity. In order to use one properly, you really need to treat it like a golden tool and follow the operating instructions each and every time. DO NOT leave it in soil, do not let it get wet and stay wet, place it back in its airtight container after each use, recalibrate often. Do this, and it becomes a highly reliable tool for measuring the active and real-time electrical conductivity of a medium. Vastly simplifying IMO the entire process. Best 100$ I ever spent IMO.
Numbers without knowledge mean little, EC is the salt ion concentration of a medium; keep it within a range of 0.3ms/cm -1.8ms/cm for most cannabis strains.
pH is the balance of electrical charge (the ratio of nutrients) some have +, some have -. The closer a medium is to 7 , 100% saturation of cation sites with cations such as Ca, Mg, K, Nh4+, Na, and H+.
When pH is low, you need to bounce back to 6.4, 6.5, or 6.6. This is optimal to unlock hydrogen and microbes for organics . Go too high and hydrogen locks up.
98% of a plant's nutrition is taken directly from the soil water solution.
2% comes from soil particles.
Your job is to keep that salt ion concentration ticking along and creating electrical conductivity at all times. In order to do that, electricity needs 2 things, water and salt.................water first, place in your probe, give 5-10 min to settle, measure, take multiple readings, clean, close, and put away. If EC is low, then feed; if EC stays high after watering, allow it to drop, maintain EC levels and balance your pH; nothing can go wrong until oxygen runs out.
Understanding the ratio of nutrients a plant needs for each stage will go a long way, making sure not to accumulate salts you don't need, feeding away too much nitrogen a plant will never use, just skews ratio until flushed.
The way in which you grow changes depending on how you grow and what you focus on. Organic growing requires a much broader knowledge base with a much higher fundamental understanding of the processes.
The entire idea of hobby growing is to simplify the industry/process to reach a broader audience and consumer groups There is no right or wrong way of growing cannabis plants. There is applying nutrients in the final form at specific ratios best suited to growth on a strict schedule. Then there is throwing it all in a soup and hoping for the best. One requires much more applied knowledge to grow than the other. Neither is wrong or better. PH & EC, control them, you control your grow.
Time for turkey sandwiches!