Rabid Peach
Member
i have been studying up on this Hobby for about a year: Visiting here a lot: reading anything I could get my hands on; and asking the veterans how it is done.
durng this time no book, no thread, no one, not even BOG himself, told me and emphasised the importance of Ph.
It is this simple... IMPROPER PH KILLS!
Here is my story and I hope that I can help some of you learn from my mistakes.
About a year ago, I grew out some supposed White Widow Bag seed. I tossed a bit of this, a bit of that, overfertilized, underwatered and ended up with one female that yielded very little, but it was good smoke and it was mine. I knew exactly what had been used in growing and I knew that the person that grew it put a lot of love in that scrawny old thing. Me and my buddies had a great time with the fluff i harvested.
I wanted to do it better, so i started reading up, ordered up a bunch of expensive seeds and modestly tricked out a growing area. The first batch took off like rockets. DP Shaman big thick stems. scrogged up and spread out. Then the bottom leaves got spots. I thought it was mites, thrips, gnats.
I identified my problem and went after it. I bought a lot of expensive but very safe insecticide, beneficial insects, neem oil, and spent so much time hunched down in my scrog. spraying bugs and killing my back. I realeased nematodes and the beneficials.
The leaves kept yellowing and the day they were going to flower. They just looked too weak. Dried, yellow, spotchy. it only took a week to go from stellar babes to brittle, sad, dead husks of defeat.
It must have been thrips.
I germed, cleaned out the room, and started over. this series of events happened three more times. I did get rid of the scrog because it's just too much work and you can approximate the effects with LST.
I felt very negative and stupid. I had worked hard to identify and correct the problems but nothing worked. And in the process I killed some beautiful genetics. LSD, reeferman's Romulan X BB Sativa, and a few Durban Poisons.
That's when i asked some well respected folks around here for suggestions for fool proof strains as i was convinced I was dealing with a fool.
In the meantime, i had one more pack of seeds to give a go. 6 Dutch Passion Blueberry a strain labeled "not for beginners" and "fussy". They took off like Rockets. 5 germed and one was sort of sickly so it was culled. I had four going like trains. Then the yellowing happened again. I was using BOGs KISS plan with the exception of Ocean forest/perlite soil mix and i was feeding with Pure Blend and Algamic. I was using a proven system that wasnt working.
i decided to test the Ph. I bought a $50 digital pen and tested my runoff. It was 7.8 well out of range for healthy plants (6.0 - 6.6) and with blueberry it is more like 5.8- 6.2. They like acid. Eureka.
I had spent hours diagnosing and treating every problem that I could imagine: thrips, mites, gnats, ants, root rot, overfertilization, underfertilization, plague, syphilis, etc. i also spent a lot of money fixing things that weren't broken.
It is very simple, If you Ph falls or rises out of range. you will cause nutrient lockout and no matter what you do, short of correcting your Ph, your plants will die.
If you are planning a grow go buy a meter and use it. It will more than justify the expense.
I hope that someone will take this to heart.
durng this time no book, no thread, no one, not even BOG himself, told me and emphasised the importance of Ph.
It is this simple... IMPROPER PH KILLS!
Here is my story and I hope that I can help some of you learn from my mistakes.
About a year ago, I grew out some supposed White Widow Bag seed. I tossed a bit of this, a bit of that, overfertilized, underwatered and ended up with one female that yielded very little, but it was good smoke and it was mine. I knew exactly what had been used in growing and I knew that the person that grew it put a lot of love in that scrawny old thing. Me and my buddies had a great time with the fluff i harvested.
I wanted to do it better, so i started reading up, ordered up a bunch of expensive seeds and modestly tricked out a growing area. The first batch took off like rockets. DP Shaman big thick stems. scrogged up and spread out. Then the bottom leaves got spots. I thought it was mites, thrips, gnats.
I identified my problem and went after it. I bought a lot of expensive but very safe insecticide, beneficial insects, neem oil, and spent so much time hunched down in my scrog. spraying bugs and killing my back. I realeased nematodes and the beneficials.
The leaves kept yellowing and the day they were going to flower. They just looked too weak. Dried, yellow, spotchy. it only took a week to go from stellar babes to brittle, sad, dead husks of defeat.
It must have been thrips.
I germed, cleaned out the room, and started over. this series of events happened three more times. I did get rid of the scrog because it's just too much work and you can approximate the effects with LST.
I felt very negative and stupid. I had worked hard to identify and correct the problems but nothing worked. And in the process I killed some beautiful genetics. LSD, reeferman's Romulan X BB Sativa, and a few Durban Poisons.
That's when i asked some well respected folks around here for suggestions for fool proof strains as i was convinced I was dealing with a fool.
In the meantime, i had one more pack of seeds to give a go. 6 Dutch Passion Blueberry a strain labeled "not for beginners" and "fussy". They took off like Rockets. 5 germed and one was sort of sickly so it was culled. I had four going like trains. Then the yellowing happened again. I was using BOGs KISS plan with the exception of Ocean forest/perlite soil mix and i was feeding with Pure Blend and Algamic. I was using a proven system that wasnt working.
i decided to test the Ph. I bought a $50 digital pen and tested my runoff. It was 7.8 well out of range for healthy plants (6.0 - 6.6) and with blueberry it is more like 5.8- 6.2. They like acid. Eureka.
I had spent hours diagnosing and treating every problem that I could imagine: thrips, mites, gnats, ants, root rot, overfertilization, underfertilization, plague, syphilis, etc. i also spent a lot of money fixing things that weren't broken.
It is very simple, If you Ph falls or rises out of range. you will cause nutrient lockout and no matter what you do, short of correcting your Ph, your plants will die.
If you are planning a grow go buy a meter and use it. It will more than justify the expense.
I hope that someone will take this to heart.
Last edited:
