Need some help with corrective measures

[Bluesboy]

*Editing in template*

How long has this problem been going on? 7-10 days
What STRAIN are you growing? Unknown
What was the establishing technique? Seed
What is the age of your plant? 3-4 weeks
How Tall are the plants? 8-10 inches
What PHASE (seedling, vegetative or flower) are the plants in? Vegetative
What Technique are you using? Standard
What size pots are you using? 16oz containers for seedling/early veg
What substrate/medium are you using? What brand of soil mixture are you using? Lost package, generic potting soil, sterilized before use
What Nutrient's are you using?How much of each with how much water? How Often? Earth Juice, starting feedings now, has only received one
What is the TDS/EC/PPM of your nutrients used? 200ppm
What is the pH of the "RUN-OFF"? Unknown
What method of pH test was administered? Using Strips? pH pen? pH pen
How often are you watering? Every two to three days
When was your last feeding and how often are you feeding? yesterday, that was the first application of earth juice. Plan to feed every other watering.
What size bulb are you using? currently under 60w of floro, will move to 600w HPS once stabalized.
What is the distance to the canopy? 3"
What is your RH Factor? (Relative Humidity) Unknown
What is the canopy temperature? 70 degrees
What is the Day/Night Temp? (Include fluctuation range) Day 70-75 Night 70-75 (Air Conditioned)
What is the current Air Flow? Just using a small honeywell on seedlings and early vegative plants. This one would have moved up to HPS if not for the limp.
Is the fan blowing directly at plants? Yes
Is the grow substrate constantly wet or moist? I watered two days in a row to get some neuts in there when I picked them up, showing light over watering signs following day.
Is your water HARD or SOFT? Not sure what that is, Rain Water 3ppm pH adjusted to 5.8-6.2
What water are you using? Reverse Osmosis (RO)? Tap? Bottled? Well water? Distilled? Mineral Water? Rain Water, pH adjusted
Has plant been recently pruned, cloned or pinched? Tonight pruned dead matter, prior not at all.
Have any pest chemicals been used? If so what and when? Sprayed a neem solution on soil to treat for possible fungus gnat infestation.
Are plant's infected with pest's? Noticed one super tiny, transparent worm-like thing and a half dozen of what I think was baby fungus gnats. Used neem, no sign sense.

*End Edit*

A few weeks ago I started a bag seed from some nice headies I got last month.

It was growing like wildfire in its seedling stage but around the third week of its life it started showing slight signs of deficiency. I thought it was just my pH but now I have it dialed in to perfection. I just started feeding it a light Grow/Micro earth juice blend but before this gets worse I'd like some opinions.

The deficiencies started showing from the tips of the leaves spreading down to the base of the leaf's stem. I should also mention it is starting on the lowest leaves of the plant, and seemingly starting to work its way up.





I'm thinking its Calcium deficiency perhaps with a touch of N deficiency as well?

It should be noted that recently I discovered what I believe to be a fresh fungus gnat infestation starting up in its medium, I dosed it the next day with some fresh Neem Oil mix I made and it appears to have eradicated their entire attempt at gaining a foothold in my garden.

Around this time I noticed some discoloration on the main stem just above the soil, dunno if this is from those buggers sucking on the stem or if its just a portion that until recently was under the surface of the soil and was uncovered by my feeding and pest control efforts as of late. Just thought it was worth a mention.

Let me know what you think pros,

Bluesboy

 

[Core]

i'm gonne chuck my :smile: generic potting soil is mostly prefertillized....could be they are having to much in the soil already...and with some extra's you gave them that won't help....they look kinda crispy....although i should first ask what the ph of the medium is....try watering one plant with balanced ph water of 6.4 (ideal)...for regular soil,ph is it between 6.2 and 6.8....and catch some runoff in a cup.....measure that with ya meter and if is way out of that area i just mentiond you got a ph problem...this way you can exclude this option



for now i would just give'm a couple of plain waterings and check ph and stuff...
ohw and drop some pics of the intire plant as it is now,to have a better look :smile:

 

[Bluesboy]

Thanks for swinging over Core, The leaves pictured def. were crispy in the end but when the issue first set in they were healthy and moist with the darker spots shown coming in first.

I took a few shots of the plant per your request, a few came out blurry but here is a decent one for you to take a peak at. I was also thinking that it could be a container size issue, I've been trying to hold this one back to allow the og crosses to catch up but I think since the dark room showed up finally I may just transplant and throw it under stronger light, think it could handle it?






Bluesboy

 

[Core]

seems you already cut off all the infected leaves...i still do see traces of a major ph swing,but its harder to say whats going on now
this way she looks do able...and i think you can go ahead and repot it....if its 4 weeks old i'm shure she will love you for it...aslong you keep your water balanced out you should be doing fine afterwards...ohw and add some more perlite or something to gain more oxygen for them roots

 

[Bluesboy]

As the plant in question was just watered I have yet to water again but over the last few weeks I switched from tap water to rain water (thought this would be better) and recently picked up a pH meter and up/down solution. There was a pH swing that took place when I took corrective action to get the rainwater pH in the 6.0 area, but I'd say it was a positive swing given how off the rains natural pH was.

That being said I woke up today and realized that w/e the issue is it has started to effect the next highest set of leaves on my baby =(. I'm seeing browning little spots starting in on the serrated edge of my leaves, I'm so certain it looks exactly like the pictures of calcium def. here in this forum. I've reviewed the ingredients of my earth juice grow and micro solutions and sadly neither contains any calcium.

I was planning on picking something up that I could lightly foliar feed some calcium to the plant with to see how it responds, the super thread stickied in this forum says dolomite lime is a good source. Can I pick this up at the hydro shop? I really wanna nip this in the butt before it takes over the plant and I end up cloning the top just to save the genetics.

Let me know folks,

Bluesboy

 

[stinkyattic]

Rain water contains NO minerals whatsoever, and requires CalMag plus to be added before use. Furthermore, the ionic strength of rain water, which is close to distilled water but with some atmospheric contaminants dissolved in it, is so low as to render a pH reading meaningless in practical application, and not accurately readable on pH testing equipment designed for high ionic-strength solutions.
Add your calmag, then your nutes, and THEN check and adjust the pH.
Should fix ya up nice.

 

[Bluesboy]

Alright, so last night I picked up some liquid lime. I mixed at 25% strength with some rain water and pH balanced the mix to 6.3pH I did a heavy foliar feeding with the mix and applied some to the surface of the soil, concentrated around the root zone.

What I'm now wondering is if I have to supplement every watering with Cal/Mag solution or if this is something I should just do now and then. From your post stinkyattic I'm thinking it should be added with every rain water watering.

Thanks for the help so far,

Bluesboy

 

[stinkyattic]

That's true. When you use rain, RO, or distilled water, or even very soft tap/well water, you need to add some type of Ca supplement. I'm not familiar with Liquid Lime though, and I'd check to see what other micronutrients it contains. If there's no Mg, definitely add just a pinch of epsom salts to your water. You don't need much, and foliar feeding Mg is very effective anyway so if you still have a straight Mg def, not a lockout, it's super easy to fix.

Last, I'd pH your water a little higher than that, more like 6.8. Most potting soils are peat based and tend to drop pH over time, faster if you are using rain or soft water instead of regular tap wter with some minerals of its own. Peat is naturally acid. Lime balances that until it is used up. Discovering this tidbit changed my life, lol. Now if I'm in a peat soil, I re-pot at LEAST every 4-6 weeks! Saves headaches in the long run.

 

[Bluesboy]

Excellent, thanks for the incredible response time. Glad I caught you online, I will then make it a habit to supplement all waterings with the liquid lime.

The Guaranteed Analysis of the product reports Total CA at 7.0% and Total Mg at 4.0%. The package instructs mixing 3 ounces of the product per 1 gallon of water. for this first mixture I foliar fed and did some light watering with I mixed it to 25% of that rate.

What amount of the cal.mag(liquid lime) would you recommend mixing per gallon for regular waterings? how about for foliar feeds? (should I at all unless def. are showing?)

It is a liquid product so I was erring on the side of caution for this first feed, not to mention the foliar application (hoping it would expedite correction).

Thanks so much,

Bluesboy

 

[stinkyattic]

Well, I never go by volumes on that sort of thing- go by conductivity of your solution. You should try to get your hardness up to ~200 ppm with your Cal-Mag supplement, then add your nutes to whatever strength your plants seem to like, and THEN do the final pH tweaking.
If you don't have an EC meter and don't intend to get one, start real weak- like half or less recommended strength- and work up from there until your symptoms get better.

 

[Bluesboy]

I do have a TDS/PPM meter, sounds great. Next watering I will go with your recommendations. 200ppm with cal.mag then as they are still young, I will mix it up to 400ppm with my grow/micro blend and work from there.

Thanks so much for your input stinky (no offense hehe) really appretiate your input. I'll keep you posted on my progress this week in correcting the issue.

Glad I'm getting to break in my solutions on this plant as I have 10 og hybrids on the way that I certainly want to grow prestine.

Keep it stinky

Bluesboy