question for advanced growers please

[THCforus]

Default question for advanced growers please
Thanks ahead of time, for anyone who takes the time to give their 2 cents on this.
I haven't been growing for a very long time, a little under 2yrs., however, I've been blessed w/ many successful grows. I feel that I'm finally starting to get a higher understanding of what my plants want from me, and how to keep them happy and healthy.
more and more, i've been reading posts by other growers regarding the use of super-thrive, during the flowering period. I have always used 3dps. of S.T., W/ every feeding, regardless of the phase of growth. I have had one successful crop after another, doing this. I believe that all those vitamins and B-1 help the plant's better metabolize their nutes.
I've noticed allot of grower's telling people not to use this product during flower, because supposedly it delays budding and maturity. Against my better judgment, i decided to withhold S.T. (in my current grow), to see if there is any truth to this. The last thing i want to be doin' is screwin' myself out of precious time, and overall bud size. As soon as i discontinued it, a massive amount of deficiency came on. I believe it was a magnesium def.
I've had minor Mag. def. before , but always managed to squash it fast. This def. came on (and progressed) incredibly fast, i've never seen anything like it.
the 1st. day- yellowing along the margins and between veins.
2nd day- necrosis along fringes and leaf tips, that night i gave them a good flush.
3rd day- full blown deficiency, leaves beginning to drop.
when the soil began to dry out (pro-mixBX) i gave them .5 dose of cal-mag w/ half strength nutes. From here the plants got progressively worse but the new growth SLOWLY improved.
Here's the thing. Every grow i've done, up until this one, has turned ot well.

could it just be that i was due for some bullshit, after" too many days in the sun"?
How many of you think that abruptly discontinuing the super thrive, rite before flower, could bring these problems, is it possible? I'm tending to think that that's exactly why i'm dealing w/ this'
Like i said, i don't consider myself a noob, and i would really appreciate opinions on this. All i know is that i wont be withholding super thrive during flowering flowerin' again. At this point they are just about done, and my yield has suffered tremendously. I should also point out that i had just done a flush, a week before putting them to 12/12, so i'm really kind of blown away and frustrated.

All opinions welcome please.

 

[Weedman Herb]

I don't use super thrive ... I'm in Pro Mix BX ... Never had a problem like yours. What nutes are you using? Why did you change up from what worked to what didn't on your whole grow? I usually test adding or deleting things on a small # with a control group of the same # that maintained what I was doing before the change.

 

[THCforus]

weedman herb,
first off, thank you for the reply.
I totally feel you on only trying something new on a couple plants. My bad completely. I guess more or less what i'm asking is if you guys think that it's possible that abruptly discontinuing superthrive, after using it every feeding during veg, could cause this?
let me give you some more info.
I use pro-mixBX
nothing but RO water, weather flushing or not. I check PH weekly, but find that it doesn't drift much using pro-mix w/ RO, usually right around 6.3-6.4
I add 2 tbs. fine dolomite lime per gal. mix at planting and trans. planting.
they are fed W/ 3-2-1 GHflora nutes W/ cal-mag when needed. i also add 2ml. B-cuzz bloom, and at around 5.5wks switch to base nutes and Blooombastic. Up until now i've had consistent, excellent results feeding this way. I always try to feed on the low end 1.0 +/- EC. It kills me because i'm usually able to listen to what they want, or getting better at it anyway.
I do add supl. co2(tank/reg.) w/ control wizard climate controller. the temps are kept around 75-80F lights on/ 65-70F off. I use a 600wt HPS and 2 400wt. hps., all in a row, set 3ft. bulb to bulb. 2 are air cooled the other is bat-wing style(planning on changing that soon.) I keep the 600wt about 14-18in. away and the 400's 12 in.
I feed when mix begins to dry out, usually every 5 days or so, 3ml. bloom, 2 micro and 1ml. grow. I like to flush using flora kleen at 1 tsp. per gal. every 4 wks. or so, and always somewhere between veg and flower, usually wk 2-3 bloom. The thing is, i did a flush before this happened which confuses me. I also was using small amounts of cal-mag prior to def., to make up for using R.O.
I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to help, and i will gladly give you truthful answers, and any other questions you may have. I've been fortunate enough to not need the infirmary, up until now, but i'm humbled by this and don't have the answers. I feel helpless as hell for these plants, and cant stand any kind of deficiency, which i'm sure many can relate to.

 

[Tarbosh]

are you doing the same strain?

it could have easily adapted to your setup over generations..... not sure if your breeding or cloning or what...... you can always add back the superthrive.....

 

[THCforus]

Tarbosh,
Thanks for your time.
Never really considered that. I haven't done any breeding as of yet. I grow w/ clones, maybe the 3rd or 4th gen. w/ these strains. I grow multiple strains, 6 at the time this happened, and it happened to every single one of them. This strengthens my theory. If it happens to every one, what else could it be. I don't let lights off temps get below 60f. usually more like 65-70f. Lights on holds between 75-80f. w/ two out of my three lights vented, the other refl. bat-wing style. I considered ph problems but i check it weekly and it seldom shifts beyond 6.3-6.4 I did use a dehumidifier for 4 or 5 nights but i dont think that has anything to do w/ it.
I did resume w/ the superthrive and things slowly got better, but it was too far in to save my yield. Another thing i should point out is that i have a table to the lft. of these plants that went in 1 month after them, that i continued using superthrive on. They are all beautiful, robust and growing wonderfully. ???WTF

 

[THCforus]

Tarbosh,
after reading your reply again, i think i get w/ your sayin'
You think that by me using the S.T. for so long, on mom's and all subsequent clones, that they have become almost dependent on it? By withholding it I am creating stressors that bring on the def. easier?

 

[Crush]

are you doing the same strain?

Bingo.

The strain will highly determine the 'pickiness' of each plant.

I grew Jack Herrer with White Rhino (mostly sativa right beside indica) with the same nute solution (ebb flow hydroponics) and the Jack Herrer was much more finicky and prone to issues.. even between pheno's. The Rhino's were more more 'nute hogs' and could take any temperture/humidity differences; no sweat (pun intended).

So the pheno's and strains do have a lot to do with it sometimes.

Actually furthermore (and some people won't like me for saying this) when you view a lot of the respected growers doing 'test grows' for seed companies, you can always see them trying to 'hide' the cut-off leaves in the pictures because they had the very same problems as you are don't want to admit to it so they try to hide it a lot of the time pretending that they grew out the stain perfect on the first try.

The fact is, it's normal burn out a new strain: especially with hydroponics. No one should feel bad about plants burning on the first run with it. It's part of 'dialing-in' on perfectly ok.

 

[THCforus]

Crush,
i'm actually doing 6 different strains, and they all have the same def. to the same extent.

 

[Weedhound]

Superthrive is almost pure nitrogen. I no longer use it; but certainly would lose it during bloom when extra nitrogen is not ony not wanted but can cause issues (Crush is right.....different strains have different needs)...but ST really has no place in the booming phase of cannabis. If you are concerned; decrease it slowly. CalMag has plenty of nitrogen for blooming.....and in a better form IMO.

 

[aasin527]

the company that makes superthrive claims that it isn't a fertilizer. this may be due to the restrictions put in place to regulate anything that has an n p k value. point being noone really knows what the hell is in this stuff, and research has shown that vitamin b-1 doesn't do squat to boost plant growth without auxins. which the plants produce and regulate on their own anyway. but i use it, so don't listen to me.

 

[THCforus]

Superthrive is almost pure nitrogen. I no longer use it; but certainly would lose it during bloom when extra nitrogen is not ony not wanted but can cause issues (Crush is right.....different strains have different needs)...but ST really has no place in the booming phase of cannabis. If you are concerned; decrease it slowly. CalMag has plenty of nitrogen for blooming.....and in a better form IMO.

There could be truth to this, i know my plants respond well to it even w/ plain water in the veg period
I hear ya on different strains having different needs, but the plants that were affected were all of them. 6 different strains.

 

[Weedhound]

Right, you are also aware what ST does to your ph? It lowers it ALOT. As a hydro grower I can tell you its one of the reasons I stopped using it. The other was because mixed with Pro Grow and CalMag it gave my plants nitrogen toxity so I quit it. I agree....its snake oil but its a snake oil that people seem to like. You do NOT want ST in bloom.....but you may have to check/change ph if all plants are reacting the exact same way.

 

[THCforus]

There could be truth to this, i know my plants respond well to it even w/ plain water in the veg period
I hear ya on different strains having different needs, but the plants that were affected were all of them. 6 different strains.

lol aasin007
yep, i have no clue whats in the shit either. it's just the way things played out w/ the timing of when the def. came on, that makes me suspect it.

 

[THCforus]

Right, you are also aware what ST does to your ph? It lowers it ALOT. As a hydro grower I can tell you its one of the reasons I stopped using it. The other was because mixed with Pro Grow and CalMag it gave my plants nitrogen toxity so I quit it. I agree....its snake oil but its a snake oil that people seem to like. You do NOT want ST in bloom.....but you may have to check/change ph if all plants are reacting the exact same way.

man, what your sayin is making alot of sense right now. Even after adding all my nutes and supl. my PH is around 6.2-6.3 So if I all of a sudden stop using superthrive, and my PH goes out of range by allot- deficiency
the only thing is, i'm pretty sure i checked the PH somewhere in there, and i don't remember having to adjust it. I'll have to check my log.
This is a good possibility.

 

[Kindman69]

Hi mate, I would first of all rule out that it is environmental and remove one plant into another environment to see if it shows improvement within a view days. You may have had a problem with your environment that the ST was masking.
I'm a little hyper-sensitive to environmental issues though lol, since I lost my last three crops too 'off-gassing' I don't really see how it could be related to this in your case since you have not changed anything like exhaust venting or grow enclosure etc.

Good luck,
Kindman

 

[THCforus]

Kindman69,
I actually did change grow environments, if switching bedrooms that were back to back makes a difference. I set up the enclosure w/ all the same materials, just reversed the rooms, venting exc. going the other way. I never really thought about that being the cause of my issue. I overlooked it being that they share the same air, and are set up the same way. I did this at the beginning of my last grow. not this past one that i had problems w/, but the one before.
Could switching the space be bringing these def?
I'm pretty sure it could be the Cal-mag being that i'm noticing def. on my newer plants as of last night. I'm gonna cut out the Cal-Mag and use epsom if i need it.

 

[THCforus]

here are some pics of the plants were talkin about, and a couple i took yesterday of the plants that are 4wks behind them. Until yesterday these plants looked awsome. It seems that whatever caused the defic. on the other ones, is taking hold of these too. I'd really like to get to the bottom of this sucky problem before it ruins every plant in my flower rm. I've been using cal-mag on these as well as a preventative measure, at low doses. I'm starting to think that the cal-mag is causing this.

 

[THCforus]

the last pic is the ones iv'e been posting about. The first 3 are the newer ones about to go down the same road. At least thats what it looks like.

 

[Kindman69]

the last pic is the ones iv'e been posting about. The first 3 are the newer ones about to go down the same road. At least thats what it looks like.

Shit man, that sucks! First off let me share: These were exposed to a toxic environment 3 weeks into flower (I should say the toxicity was added by me into their environment by adding Mylar with lots of spray glue)
This is also what yours are going to look like But on the bright side, you WILL get a harvest, just not potential.
Are your tops starting to bleach out even though the temps are perfectly fine up top?
I'm still not sure if this is your problem?! But I would certainly investigate by growing a couple of clones and running them side by side, a view inside the flower room and a view outside, in order to rule out the environment.
If you add Epsom add it foliar, but if the problem is the environment, it will not make a difference.

The last 2 pics are of plants that looked perfect 2 weeks before the pics were taken. Right about then I started to figure out what was really happening lol!

When you changed your set-up, did you have to use spray glue, duct tape (anything containing DBP)?

Kindman

 

[THCforus]

I dont know if this is w/ happened to my plants or not, but the necrosis in your pics looks extremely similar to the die-off of my leaves.

I did use a shitload of duct tape in and around the grow area.
Can duct tape really cause something like this?
Are there any other enviro. stressors you can think of that would bring something like this on?
I not gonna rule this shit out, thats for sure.