Mag deficiency?

[quill]

This only is an issue on the most vigorous of five plants, so it must be a deficiency of some sort. Old growth is unaffected, new growth just a little.

Soil is made up of, most to least, Fox Farms OF, Promix, perlite, ewc, vermiculite, rock phosphate, kelp meal and 1/2-1 TBLSP per gallon pelletized dolomite lime. I've been feeding lightly with EJ grow and bloom and lately a small pinch of epsom salts per gallon.

pH is steady at 6.4

next light cycle I was thinking of trying some foliar epsom salts... sound reasonable?

q

 

[Guest]

Hey what's up? I was just looking at the sick plants sticky, your pick kinda looks alot like the one for zinc def.

edit: Also do you ground up your pelletized lime? if not you should buy a cheap 10$ coffee grinder or find powered/pulverized lime. so you get better coverage in your mix

Zinc

Solution to fixing a Zinc deficiency
Any Chemical/Organic nutrients that have potassium in them will fix a Zinc deficiency. (Only mixing at ½ strength when using chemical nutrients or it will cause nutrient burn!)
And any of the following nutrients will fix a zinc deficiency: Zinc sulfate, zinc chelated, or zinc oxides are adequate fertilizer sources for zinc. Or you can bury galvanized nails in the soil. (Make sure you take off the sharp point at the end to prevent roots from being damaged) Garden Manure, which is slow acting. Greensands, Cottonseed Meal are both medium/slow absorption as well.



Now if you added to much chemical nutrients and or organics,( which is hard to burn your plants when using organics) You need to Flush the soil with plain water. You need to use 2 times as much water as the size of the pot, for example: If you have a 5 gallon pot and need to flush it, you need to use 10 gallons of water to rinse out the soil good enough to get rid of excessive nutrients.

Mag.

Solution to fixing a Magnesium deficiency
Any Chemical/Organic nutrients that have Magnesium in them will fix a Magnesium deficiency. (Only mixing at ½ strength when using chemical nutrients or it will cause nutrient burn!)
Other nutrients that have magnesium in them are: Epsom salts, which is fast absorption. Dolomite lime and or garden lime (same thing just called different) which is slow absorption. Sulfate of Potash, Magnesia which is medium absorption. Worm Castings, which is slow absorption. Crabshell which is slow absorption. Earth Juice Mircoblast, which is fast acting. (a must buy!! Has lots of 2ndary nutrients).
Now if you added to much chemical nutrients and or organics,( which is hard to burn your plants when using organics) You need to Flush the soil with plain water. You need to use 2 times as much water as the size of the pot, for example: If you have a 5 gallon pot and need to flush it, you need to use 10 gallons of water to rinse out the soil good enough to get rid of excessive nutrients.

 

[MynameStitch]

Cansiban has correctly identified the problem, your problem is caused by having too much phosphprous causing a lockout, it's causing the absorption problem of zinc.

I would either flush your plants out really well and continue using the bloom fert, or I would stop using the bloom fert for about 2 weeks; I am certain that you have plenty of P so your plants won't have a problem for the 2 weeks, depending on how long your plants have been in this mixture, the rock phosphate is a slow releasing phosphorus additive. How much did you add to your mixture?

So you have a choice, either flush out your plants; or stop using the bloom fert for about 2 weeks.

Your zinc will come back and the color will be restored after the next few waterings.

What water are you using? RO? TAP? distilled?
Do not add zinc, they use so little of the amount that adding more will do no good.
zinc is in water if you use tap water, but distilled and RO bottled there is little if any in there.

So the zinc that is in the water is enough to supplement the plant most of the time.

Your pH sounds fine, considering that is what the FFOF is pH adjusted too.
What are you using to test your pH?

 

[quill]

cansiban- good eye. I had passed over that picture and failed to connect. (no, I didn't grind the lime as the pellets were mostly small and I reuse the soil. I could have been more generous though, as FFOF doesn't have a ton of mag).

Stitch- thanks for the explanation. The rock phosphate was 1 TBLSP per gallon of the non FFOF ingredients. I use well water that is has a hardness of 140 (not sure of the units, but 200 is considered "hard") that always comes out of the tap at right around 6.4. I use a plunge stick pH meter and once in a while the papers. EJ teas (always less than 1 TBLSP/gal, plus a spoonful of ewc and a couple drops of molasses) usually start off with a pH below 6, but come up over 6 within 2-3 hours. My plants are in different size pots so their watering/feeding schedules are all out of sync... I must have been unintentionally more generous with this plant because it was ahead of the others. Thanks again.

q

 

[MynameStitch]

If you are growing out different strains, remember all strains are different, so because one plant is bigger than the rest does not mean nessesarly that they need more food than the rest, the strain may not be as tolerant as the rest to stronger nutrients.

 

[quill]

stitch, after a week of water only, the yellow has changed to light green just as you said it would... you can just make out the lighter edged leaves along the right side of the plant.



you da man

 

[MynameStitch]

Great to hear dude, ya, see you got it fixed quick enough for it to come back, so good to see them all happy; they look very very happy with there leaves all raised up and perky!!!

Congrats on some nice healthy gals!

 

[HeadyPete]

Great to see some improvement.

I would omit the rock phosphate from your veg mix and also stop the bloom until you start 12/12.

Also you don't need the epsom because you have the lime, plus plenty of cal and mag in your well water.

Other than that I think you got the basics down pretty good.

 

[MynameStitch]

Yup, I totaly agree as well

 

[HeadyPete]