Sprouts in Coco - brownign leaves

Hi,

This is my first real grow. Really not very KISS as I built PC box and 24 W led array for it - and started in coco...

I'm growing Sour 60 F3's. Sprouted 6 seeds in plain coco (Bionova bricks), that I had rinsed lightly wit tap water (pH 8,5, EC 15,9 mS/m, hardness 3,3dH=soft, alkalinity 0,80, chlorine 0,44 mg/L) I left the coco maybe too wet and kept watering it very little for few days.

Sprouts came on top in 4-5 days. Temps, were bit cool for sprouting. Everything looked fine first, but then seedlings looked a bit pale and I decided to give a 1/8 strength nutes to them, but accidentally gave 1/4 strength. Same time I lifted them closer to lights and they got a breeze of very dry air for two days. Two days after nuting I flushed them with pH 6 water until small runoff, placed them back down and added wet cloth to raise my humidity. Humidity is defenetily higher now. I also placed clear party cup upside down on two of them, to protect from any breeze and dryness and I have been misting them regularly.

Seedling's first true leaves are twisting, crumbling and turning brown. Seedings are not growing at all, except very slowly forming next set of leaves, that are looking healthier. I checked the roots of three of them, and they seemed fine to me. All of them were like the one in the image.

My guesses:

1. Overfertilizing
2. Overwatering
3. Dry air
4. Didn't rinse coco enough
5. pH swings
6. Mg deficiency (is it possible for such a young plants?)
(7. Aluminium poisoning from the aluminium tray that I use.)

Thanks a lot for any advice!

Filled questionaire from other forum:

1. Are you growing from seed or clones? Seeds
2. How old are your plants? 9 days from seed, 5 days on top of coco
3. How tall are your plants? Maximum 2 inches
4. What type of hydro system are you using? Hand watering coco
5. What brand/type of nutrients are you using? Canna Coco A + B
6. What is the Ph of your nutrient solution? Little under 6
7. What is the PPM/EC of your tap water?15,9 mS/m
8. What is the PPM/EC of your nutrient solution? Don't know
9. What is the temperature of your nutrient solution? Normal room temperature
10. Does your PPM/EC show a rise or fall when you do your daily PPM check? Don't know
11. Does your pH show a rise or fall when you do your daily check? Don't know
12. Do you foliar feed or spray your plants with anything? No
13. What kind of lights do you use and how many watts combined? (HPS, MH, fluorescent, halogen, incandescent "plant lights") Homemade LED array 24 Watts (it's plenty for my size of grow.)
14. How close are your lights to the plants? About 15 inches.
15. What size is your grow space in square feet? It,s a PC grow box
16. What is the temperature and humidity in your grow space? Temp 72F/22C Humidity, used to be very very dry, now more moist.
17. Have you noticed any insect activity in your grow space? No.
18. How much experience do you have growing? None.

Ok,

I now found this:

Problems with coco-bricks and -slabs

During the whole process of milling and cleaning, these fibres are flushed a couple of times in fresh water. During the rainy season that is no problem, but in the dry season it happens sometimes there is not enough clean fresh water, because the demand of coco-products is getting higher all the time and therefore the water has already been used a couple of times. The producers are not allowed to use precious drinking water, so it may happen that the fibres are not washed well enough and sometimes they are even washed in seawater…

In some cases the EC (Electric Conductivity) is well above EC 1.0 mS/cm, caused by high amounts of Potassium, Sodium and Chloride. This may cause problems for plants.

We are convinced if you follow the above mentioned advice (only if necessary), you will be a very satisfied customer.

Waldemar Boot
Bio Nova b.v.

Maybe it wouldn't sell to say that they are "washed with fresh water during rainy season". But I would have bought anyway, but been more careful when rinsing...

Weird I have some sour60's in coco sprouting. One of them is drying out like that too, I threw a dome on it to try to keep more moisture in...I think it just dried out...sprouted in a real moist environment and then went to very low humidity and 85ish temps. Only 1 of 10 dried out and it was the one closest to the lights.

I always presoak my coco in a light calmag solution...I used to rinse it like crazy but I've had good results with just the presoak (cocotek red brick)

looks like more of an environmental issue then a nute one imo. I usually give straight tap water (7.5)or ph'd water (5.9) the first few days and then move on to 1/4 str nutes about when the second true leaves pop out.

good luck.

StealthDragon said:

Weird I have some sour60's in coco sprouting. One of them is drying out like that too, I threw a dome on it to try to keep more moisture in...I think it just dried out...sprouted in a real moist environment and then went to very low humidity and 85ish temps. Only 1 of 10 dried out and it was the one closest to the lights.

I always presoak my coco in a light calmag solution...I used to rinse it like crazy but I've had good results with just the presoak (cocotek red brick)

looks like more of an environmental issue then a nute one imo. I usually give straight tap water (7.5)or ph'd water (5.9) the first few days and then move on to 1/4 str nutes about when the second true leaves pop out.

good luck.

Click to expand...

Yep, I think there is your answer. Try to keep you RH up while the sprouts are still little, they came from a very humid environment and are not prepared to handle the dry air yet.

If using a good brand of coco (Botanicare, GH, Canna), I do not flush, but use a mild nute soln to expand the coco. This will precharge the coco as it has zero nutes as is. It will even strip the nutes from the seedlings if you don't pre-nute.

I would not use a dome to raise the RH, it just makes it harder to ween them off. maybe put an open container of water to evaporate or even soak a hand towel or two and hang them in with your seedlings to get the humidity up.

Hope this helps.

Thanks, Stealth.

I did a massive flush today. Let's see how it goes from here on... If flush doesn't help I guess my next try will be on very dilute canna A+B and/or calmag.

Good news is that they were dying very slowly, so I'm not panicking anymore.

My head says too much food. changed the PH ,water only from now on.

Ok, im confused. why would you feed them anything at this stage in their lives?
They have all the food they need in their cotyledons. any access food at this point and your gonna be chasing another problem.

If you could, go to your local grocery store with an empty gallon milk jug and pay 35 cents for a gallon of RO water. then go home and mix that with a gallon of tap that has been sitting uncapped for 24 hours. then water lightly with this 50/50 mix. what it does is brings your ppms down to a range where your seedlings can be comfortable.

dont feed em shit til those cotyledons yellow up on ya.

also its best to try and stay within the 6.0 PH range in coco.
all the best

HighBurn8 said:

They have all the food they need in their cotyledons. any access food at this point and your gonna be chasing another problem.

Click to expand...

Good point.

HighBurn8 said:

If you could, go to your local grocery store with an empty gallon milk jug and pay 35 cents for a gallon of RO water. then go home and mix that with a gallon of tap that has been sitting uncapped for 24 hours. then water lightly with this 50/50 mix. what it does is brings your ppms down to a range where your seedlings can be comfortable.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I may try this if things haven't gotten better soon.

Thanks!

I think the problem was "too much everything". That means water, food, salts in cocos, dryness in air, breeze and maybe even light.

ambertrich said:

It will even strip the nutes from the seedlings if you don't pre-nute.

Click to expand...

Really? Now I'm confused. One says no nutes at all and the other says to nute a little.

Well, your mail count is higher, and this sprouting in coco thread supports mild fertilization.

Hmm... I'll let them dry a little and then water with 1/8 canna coco A + B. How does that sound?

Oh yeah, one more thing about my problem: All the stems are purple, but I don't know if that is a sign of anything, as it is not always a sign of anything.

So far they have not gotten worse or better. I flushed them almost 24 hrs ago with about 2x0.75 liters of pH'd water running through each of them. And I also did let them sit on that water for 2x30 minutes or so.

All I give seedlings at that stage is 50/50 tap & RO water w a drop of superthrive added. (straight tap is ok too. my tap runs a little high in ppms so i dilute it to get a nice starting point for seedlings and base nutes).
They get that way from being over fertilized. I hope you haven't burned too many young roots.
1/8 str? They aren't even 2 weeks old yet and stuffing them with nutes is a sure way to set them back.

You fed them when it was not needed which could have had negative interactions with the naturual P reserve the plant stores for itself as seedling which is why your getting the purple/red stems.

the only thing I feed at 1/8 to 1/4 strength at that age are clones until they get a little bigger then i up the dose. seedlings have ALL the food they need until they're about 10 to 14 days old or until the round leaves die back.
thats the indication they are hungry

HighBurn8 said:

I hope you haven't burned too many young roots.

Click to expand...

Is there any way to check that? When I slide the substrate out of the pot, I see roots on the bottom or the sides, and they seem to be healthy. Somehow the seedlings are looking a tiny bit healthier - maybe. Can't explain how, it's just a feeling. It could also be my imagination

BTW, do you grow in cococoir? I thought that you grow in perlite?

Thanks again, HB8!

If the roots appear to be healthy then they probably are. you can usually tell right away if they are or not just by looking at them.

I have some in perlite, some in coco, some in perlite and coco, and a few in soil too.

HighBurn8 said:

I have some in perlite, some in coco, some in perlite and coco, and a few in soil too.

Click to expand...

Nice.

I only have ability to grow very little in PC box and I chose coco because I expected it to be easy and efficient for mini-hempys. Well, it can still turn easy if I get over these initial problems. But if not, do you think perlite or some other hempystyle setup would be easier for my second try?

IMHO soil is the most forgiving media to play with.... But I think you'll have much more success with coco once you dial it in. especially when growing in a small area like you are.


what kind of coco are you using btw?

nevermind, i just went back and read that your using bionova. Im not too familiar with that brand so I woulda def pre-rinse it and charge it with cal-mag.

I prefer Canna cuz you can use that stuff right out of the bag, but am currently using botanicare bales. I rinse and pre-charge before using it tho.

I feed my newly rooted clones at .6 EC and then bump it to about 1.0 EC about 10 days later or when they stretched their legs some. I pretty much do the same with my seedlings as well. it's usually when Im using a Booster that there's a spike in the EC. usually around 1.2-1.4 but thats only once a week for three weeks not continuously.
I feed every watering until there is a substantial amount of run-off. i'd say usually 20% or so. this keeps the PH in the root zone within a safe range to stay healthy and thrive.

for now, try n stay away from feeding them any nutes until they ask for it.
just my opinion

HighBurn8 said:

nevermind, i just went back and read that your using bionova. Im not too familiar with that brand so I woulda def pre-rinse it and charge it with cal-mag.

Click to expand...

Yeah, it's been rinsing day for me, because I'm planning to transplant them in 500mL partycups after a while.

I found that an easy way to rinse is that I dump coco in cotton shopping bag and then that bag in a bucket. Hot water in there, let stay for an hour or more and then lift the bag out. Then squeezing the bag and repeating the whole procedure. Did it 3-4 four times today.

Cal-mag is not available here, but I bought some epsom salt.

I use pillow cases here ...but its basically the same thing...

epsom salt will work for you too.. I've actually seen some amazing plants grown out using epsom salts instead of cal-mag.

Oh, and its probably good to point out to you here that you should always add your PH adjusters to the water first, then add your cal-mag (epsom salts), and then the Base Nutes in exactly that order. and be sure to stir, mix, or shake in each of those as you add them.
If you do it any other way you'll lock out all the micros and bene's that your plants need. especially in coco.

So basically this is what you'll be doing per gal of water

1) add PH adjusters, Stir or Shake well
2) add pinch of epsom salts, Stir or shake well (if im using epsom salts I pour it into hot water first so it dissolves)
3) add base nute, Stir or shake well

not sure how you were mixing them before but now you know

Are those pics of your plants in the first post?

It is important to use a light nutrient solution pHed at 5.5 - 6 even with seedlings IME. My current C99 grow started at 1/2 strength lucas formula for veg with GH flora and 1/2 strength cal/mag. Coco will store up essential nutrients, especially calcium and magnesium, until they reach the point of saturation before the nutrients become available to the plant. Coco will literally suck the nutrients it stores out of the seedling. I never ever water with plain pHed water; I always use a nutrient solution with coco.

FWIW low RH can be a problem and the plant may not grow at an optimum rate, but my current grow started with a RH of 25-35%...

I have never used canna nutes so I can't recommend a dosage, but GH flora nutrients are fairly mild and 1/2 works great for seedlings.

If those aren't your pics post some up if you can.

You need to add the micro/base nutrients first as it is recommended on the bottle with most nutrients and pH the final product as the last step; Highburn has it backwards IMO. Nutrients can change the pH so it's useless to pH the water first.

More likely than not your seedlings leaves are drying out because the coco does not have enough cal/mag stored to release it to the plant.

Chomp

Thanks guys,

Yes, they are pics of my plants. They are still looking about the same. Clear exception is the plant that is in the middle of upper row in the picture titled All. It has changed the shape of it's leaves to look more like one on it's left - longer and narrower. I may post some more pics today.

I've already seen that nutes actually do change pH. When I add the recommended full dose of canna coco a+b to my pH 8,5 tap water, it will bring it down to about 5,8.

So I have decided to make a bottle of full strenghth nutes and use that as a reservoir to dilute with pH'd water.

As it seems that my plants are not going any worse right now I think that I'll wait for the night (maybe like afternoon for you, if you are in the US) and water with 1/8 canna coco a+b with little epsom and H2O2 added. Peroxide is in there just in case my roots could have problems.

For those who wonder why I gave them nutes this early, I did it because I realized that I had not done any pre-charging of coco.

It seems that everything else than my "soil" dries out really quick in there, so dryness could really be a part of the problem. I now filled three socks with wet coco and hanged them on the walls of my box with supermagnets. (Magnets are so handy for anything. I also have them in my led rails, so I can re-arrange my light any way.)

It seems that my plants are trying to save the burned leavetips, and in my opinion that is something that is waste of energy. So I decided to cut those tips off of one of the most ill seedling. But I missed a bit and cut also about 30% of the other cotyledon... That's for the science then.