Carbon monoxide??

[CrushnYuba]

Does anyone know what carbon monoxide poisoning looks like?
Here's the thing. Me and my buddy split a bunch of plants. Mine went to my house, his went to his. He is an amazing outdoor grower and crushes 5lb plants out like nobody's business. Only thing is, he is kind of careless sometimes and is a we bit crazy. Long story short he is gone for 2 months and I have to take care of his plants. They are all messed up. I have no way of getting ahold of him to ask him what the Hell he did to these.
They have been in his red neck greenhouse that he had been keeping warm with a crappy unvented propane heater that is very obviously not combusting completely. Very yellow flame. Also aquired a bunch of free tea and random products he has been going nuts with just because it's free.
I am fairly certain if I flush them out and give them some ventilation they will come out of it but I want to know exactly what it's from. I got some pictures

.

 

[VenturaHwy]

They sell CO meters, not too pricey. Take off the dead leaves to see if you have it under control.

 

[dufous]

Carbon monoxide oxidizes to carbon dioxide (CO2).

Something else is damaging the plants.

 

[I wood]

Plants do not have red blood cells to be blocked by carbon monoxide, I doubt if that is the problem.

 

[Snook]

the question is...


what did YOU change?
I had some leaves started looking like that recently, not that bad, turned out to be too much wind directly on the plants.


Keep trying to get in touch with him/her.

 

[liquidcooled420]

It sounds to me like it could be the heater. Lots of people have issues with propane co2 generators in sealed rooms. There are other by products from burning propane, besides Carbon monoxide, that will poison plants.

Does the greenhouse have ventilation? Gasses will definitely build up without ventilation. I don't know much about it the different gasses, but it is even possible that the heater is using up most of the oxygen in the room.

 

[troutman]

Fresh air from outside will clear that up pronto.

Carbon monoxide is a very reactive and unstable molecule that wants another oxygen atom to satisfy it chemical imbalance.
With plenty of fresh air it's converted into carbon dioxide. Without enough oxygen it can bond to the oxygen atom on your
red blood cells in your lungs and deprive you from oxygen. If done too long it will kill you. Which is why they always tell you
to have lots of fresh air when burning fuels indoors.

So yeah, fresh outdoor air to the rescue is your best way to deal with carbon monoxide issues.

Even the slightest crack in a window will make your place safer.

 

[CrushnYuba]

Yea. I'm not sure if it's carbon monoxide or another byproduct. I have heard of ethylene being a problem. I took some of the small ones back to my house and they look way better already. I flushed those AND they are no longer breathing smog. The ones in his greenhouse didn't get flushed much but I turned propane off and aired it out. He has no exhaust fan up there. Sort of a test to see what was causing the problem. He was also feeding all this weird stuff. Not sure what. Using this old tea on just about every water. I don't want to just fix the problem. I want to know what caused it. Most likely if he freaky has to be gone for 2 months, these will become my plants.

 

[MrMMJ]

It's the heater. I recently had the same look/ problem in my greenhouse. Got away with venting heater into greenhouse, which helped heat and raise CO2 levels. This is fine if the flame is burning cleanly, producing CO2 and H2O as byproducts. A yellow flame produces the monoxide, that will create too much CO2 and rob O2. My trouble wasn't the flame, but a week long cold snap that had the heater cycling twice as often to maintain temp's, causing far too much CO2. After changing to venting outside, the reversal in health was immediate. Good Luck

Carbon Monoxide is very dangerous, and therefore any device using a flame indoors should be closely monitored. While building my GH, We installed the heater and ran it while inside working. Turned out to be mis-marked as jetted for propane, but set-up instead for natural gas. Poor burning flame filled GH with mono, I started feeling odd, got just outside the front door before passing out. Luckily I wasn't alone, or things could have been much worse. Headache, weak for couple hours, then fine. Be Safe!

 

[CrushnYuba]

Mr mmj: thank you so much! That same thing happened to me with an oven! Bought a new oven and the installer never changed the Jets! Never realized it because I don't bake much. My mom came to visit and almost killed us.

What type of vented propane heater do you have? I run a pellet stove with auto ignition in mine, but I want a propane heater in my other greenhouse that doesn't need as much heat because of the months I will run it.

 

[MrMMJ]

I run a large Modine unit ( model php250 ) l'm in a 24 x 100 Greenhouse. It uses about $900 a month in propane this time of year. A little less the more I'm able to run the woodstove. Got it 5 years ago, working fine so far. I wired the blower fan to run 24/7, helps keep air moving around along with eight other circulation fans. That blower motors bushings went bad just a couple days ago, gotta order a new one, (not bad for running constantly for 5 years).

We're neighbors crushin I'm at my spot now, next to feather river ( Butte Co ) evacuation order be damned, I ain't leaving my girls ! I wasn't too worried the dam would fail, but power went out a couple hours ago, which could cause problems. Sure is quite around here with everyone else gone....
Good luck, stay dry !

 

[CrushnYuba]

O damnnnn... Haha. I would not evacuate either. I think they got it fixed anyway. We are really neighbors, I'm right on the butte line and my town has never seen so many people. I'm just in the safe zone. Took me 2 hours to get gas.

Holy crap. 900$ in propane would make me cry. But I guess it's the price you pay for 0 maintenance and automation. I don't run my big greenhouse year round but I'm about to start. Right now it's got a 50k btu pellet stove with auto ignition on thermostat. Kicks on and when it gets up to temp, kicks off. I'm about to add a cheap non ca legal wood 100kbtu furnace with ducting running down the middle (think I will rig the blower like yours). Also adding a second layer of poly with inflation blower. I'm hoping if I load it up with oak before bed it will last most of the night and the pellet stove will just be running a little in the morning to hold temperature. Once I add the second layer of poly and double my r value it might be complete overkill. Won't find out until we find out.

 

[MrMMJ]

Hey Crushing! Looks like we made it thru the worst, still watching and waiting...Power was out all day Tuesday at my place, GH got up to 99° ! ( Backup Gen being repaired, couple solar panels and an inverter keep my pumps running at least....) Amazing how warm they get with it's barely 60° outside. My 100'er in the valley is a single layer, so the Modine unit runs a lot at night. I've got 5 yrs on the current film, gonna replace with a double this summer. Running a double on a 30'er up in the hills outta Chico at 3500' elevation, works great. The auto pellet stoves are great, we use one in a large woodshop. I'm researching building a pellet fed "rocket" stove now, built a wood fed one already. Search "rocket stove" on YT if you've never seen one, pretty cool.
Have you seen a turn around in plant health?
Good luck ! MrM