Well...I have been battling a problem that has been worsening since April of this year and I have had no success at all.
I have been growing for about 13 years, doing hydro for about 7, and doing an aeroponic hybrid system I created myself for the past 5. Up until this problem began I have been yielding 1.5-2 lbs per plant, each under 1 600 watt light. I have plenty of experience and I have never encountered anything like this, and so far nothing I have tried has seemed to work. I am beyond desperate.
The problem starts not long after I transplant my clones into my system. It starts as very hard to see "shiny" splotches on my leaves as seen in this pic. You have to look at just the right angle to even notice...99 out of 100 people would never notice them at all.
Within 24 hours the shiny splotches turn into noticeable black spots on the leaves as seen in this pic
During the next 24-36 hours those black spots start turning brownish, then whitish, then eventually look like rust spots. These next pics show some of this, the rust spots you see on the leaves that also have black are from black spots a few days before these pics were taken.
As the plants keep growing this happens to more and more leaves, but not all leaves. Eventually the problem becomes more serious. The next symptoms are severely hooking leaves that go pale in color, start getting mega "shiny splotches" that turn into necrotic lesions. Severely "twisted" leaves, overly flexible stems. The leaves also become very mottled, 80% of new leaf growth is very "taco'd" and the leaves feel very very thin, almost like a super light fabric or tissue. Also roots that are kind of limp so to speak when compared with my normal roots which when you lift up a plant the roots look like a "mat" that is kind of stiff, the edges will not drop they will all stay flat and rigid...the limp ones, the edges of the map fold straight down to the ground, although they are still white, no signs of rot or infestation of any sort. Instead they seem to keep sending off long roots that seem to be "searching" for something that they just cant find. Normally the roots will just stay in the mat getting thicker and thicker, branching off of each other, not turning into long strands of spaghetti. Here are some pics of some of the latter symptoms. These pictures really dont do justice to just how bad these plants look.
I have been using the same nutrient regimen for years now. GH 3 part + Karma + Pure Blend Original (compost tea). I have eliminated the possibility that it is the GH 3 part or the compost tea. I have also tried side by side tests with varying ph's. It isnt a ph factor. I have had my water tested, since I am on a shared well and recently got new neighbors on the property where the well is. My waters starting ph and ppm are the same as they have always been. Lab tests show no bacteria, and nothing special to note about amounts of calcium, magnesium, boron, chlorine, etc.. in my water. I have also tried different levels of nutes high and low. IMO this is obviously a deficiency, or multiple deficiencies.
I was still not convinced it wasnt something in my water though...since the problem started when my neighbors moved in and they put some trailer about 40 feet from the well on their problem, and i noticed a black 2 inch pipe coming out from it and just going right on top of the ground. Sewage etc is supposed to be at least 100 feet from wells, but again the lab came up empty on bacteria and they told me that means nothing is getting to the well water from the surface.
My room is enclosed as it has been for years. I run co2 and keep my burners clean so all I see is blue flames, so I dont think ethylene is a factor. I have run grows without using my air cooling at all and no exhaust fans at all and still had excellent results so ethylene build up causing this is highly unlikely in my opinion since it never affected me before. I have also tried different co2 meters just in case mine was wrong. I have 2 seperate rooms on 2 different properties (both using the same shared well water) so I dont think co2 is the issue.
I have also tried a variety of humidities and temperatures and nothing has changed. I really doubt that would have anything to do with it either as I have had different temps and humidities over the years with no real problems other than mold in flowering way back when, and if it was that huge of an issue im sure people all over this board would be having this problem some time.
Another thing I changed in the past year is my light setups. For the past couple years I was having great success with 1st generation lumatek 600w HPS for veg and flower. I used aggro sun bulbs, always, with excellent results.Last November I upgraded my cheap hoods to Hydrofarm Radiant hoods because of the excellent light output over my old cheapos. I also got all new Lumatek ballasts, the purple ones. I had a couple successful harvests with these hoods and lights. A weird thing about this problem though is, if I turn the light out on a plant that is showing really bad symptoms, after a couple of days they start to recover, although not totally. I figure its just the low amount of stress and only side light coming in so its not forcing it to try and grow so fast so they can recover somewhat. The hooking stops almost completely, the twisting "mostly stops" and then I just only get moderate amount of black spots here and there.
Around the time this problem started I changed up the boards that hold my plants. Previously I had used plywood that I painted with oil based masonry paint...used them for years with no problems, except eventually they would get nasty and warped and I would have to replace them. So I had the idea to use vinyl flooring laminate on the plywood instead so they would last. So the vinyl is definately one of my prime suspects at this point, especially after reading tonight about these hydrohut problems that were killing peoples plants. The symptoms however look different to me, so Im not really sure. I should say at this point that when I first switched to vinyl boards, the problem mainly just started with black spots, not super severe but very noticeable....none of the hooking, twisting, or discoloration other than the spots occured though for that entire veg cycle. When I turn back to flower the spots stop completely which doesnt make much sense to me other than that whatever the deficiency is, the plants dont need as much during flower as they do veg, or the fact that they are only on 12 hours and get to rest 12 hours is helping them get through it. They definitely look a lot more haggered at the end of an 18 hour light cycle then they do an hour after they wake up.
I have 1 400w hort blue and 1 400w phillips CMH in my room and the plants under those only show about 10% of the symptoms. No yellowing, just maybe a few black spots here and there, and a little rubberiness in the stems. Maybe a slight twist here or there on some leaves. The guy at a local grow shop told me that vegging under HPS would make any deficiencies much more severe and since I still seem some symptoms under the 400s I think hes right. They are still "sick" just not nearly as bad. Here is a pic of 1 of them.
I have tried foliar feeding micronutrients and that gets me some greener new growth but never fixes the problem no matter how often I do it. Ive tried cal mag with no noticeable results. Ive tried different watering intervals with no success either. My nutrient temps are just fine as well.
One thing about my liquid karma is I noticed a few months back it started to smell a lot different to me. I store all my nutes in my house in a cool dark place. Karma for years always had that perfumed scent to it that they put in there and the last few bottles I have bought have smelled kind of sulfury to me. But I have friends using it and they have no problems. 1 friend even took a very sick plant from me and put it in his room under a 1000w HPS and it seemed to recover. He doesnt have CO2 and just put it into a DWC bucket though (with the same nute formula I use, and his karma smelled sulfury to me also), so his room is a lot less aggressive than mine. Not sure if the plant really got better or if it was just able to catch up on its deficiencies due to his room not forcing plants to try and grow as fast as mine.
So anyways I was going to rip out my system and rebuild it, new rez, new filter and housing, new feed lines (pvc pipe), new pump, and new boards, painted like they used to be. I was also going to leave out the karma and compost tea and go with the diamond nectar and floralicious like I used years ago. I figured it had to be something mysterious in my water, the karma, or the vinyl boards leaching something into my system. I had a mama room with some DWC mama's under teks that were exibiting some of the same symptoms as well. Just real minor because no co2 and just teks instead of HID's. This really led me to think it was the water or the karma.
Recently I started up a room with a friend at his house with brand new everything. Just basically to make sure I am not losing my mind. Just DWC buckets but I used painted boards instead of bucket lids since we grow 3'x3' plants due to number constraints to stay legal. So far his plants are looking great. We had a few extra so I brought 2 over to my house and through them into 1 of my rooms, using brand new buckets...the hydroton was brand new and washed at his house with his water, and the nutes are also his exact nutes, we just mix extra at his house and I bring 2 buckets of it home and transfer them over. After about 2 weeks, they are now exhibiting some of the same symptoms, just minor so far but I think its increasing. So different water, different nutes, brand new bucket, rocks, etc... and the problem is still happening.
So now I am thinking it has to be these fucking vinyl boards and I started to research it last night all over the web, including these boards. I found a thread on here about the hydrohut syndrome about some bad hydrohuts and the vinyl inside messing up peoples plants. http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=81061&page=2&pp=15 I also found another thread in these forums about shower curtains giving off toxic chemicals into the air. http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=92297&highlight=vinyl+shower The only problem is the pics I have seen about plants in the toxic hydrohuts have symptoms that look different than most of mine, although I have seen some of the symptoms in flower, on a few leaves here and there. Also the plants I brought from my friends are just in buckets with bucket lids, no vinyl at all, but they are in the same room with the vinyl boards so Im thinking maybe the offgassing is getting to them. And maybe the plants with the vinyl boards are getting offgassing as well as maybe some chemical is leaching into the water as well? I don't know if thats possible or what but im basically at my whits end of trying to figure this out. The mama plant room never used vinyl boards but I did have some of my leftover ones stacked against the wall in there.
I cannot smell anything from the vinyl like when I first bought it, and the problem just seems to get worse and worse. So I dont know if its the vinyl or not. If its not the vinyl, not the water, not the nutes, then Im basically down to some airborne pathogen or some virus being transmitted from some insect or something to every single plant. Both of those last 2 seem pretty unlikely to me.
Im really worried about it being the vinyl after reading the shower curtain thread where the guy states: "Phthalates and organotins, which are not chemically bonded to the shower curtain, are often added to soften or otherwise enhance the curtain. These additives evaporate or cling to household dust more easily than the chemicals in the curtains themselves, Lester said ". I can remove the vinyl boards, replace my system as planned....but if these chemicals are clinging to dust etc in the room...I dont know what to do. I can wipe down my lights, but I have 3 air conditioners, wiring, outlests, fans, relays, my co2 unit, ballasts, tons of ducting, thermometers, etc, that might all be contaminated. I just dont know what to do about all this. I cant just spend thousands of dollars replacing everything when Im not even sure this is the problem. I am basically thinking of just replacing the system as planned, and wiping as much stuff down with a wet cloth as I can, and trying 1 last time, still with the new water and new nute formula...and if it keeps happening, then just calling it quits, and trying to shortsale my house, or file bankruptcy if that doesnt work... as I will not be able to afford to keep it and I cant sell it for what I owe. It was a piece of shit house next door to the one I already lived in that I got just so I could set up another medical grow. I dont feel comfortable eating up my savings trying to fix some super elusive problem that I dont know if I will ever be able to fix. It feels like divine intervention to me, that I am not meant to grow anymore....I have been super stressed out and battling depression and anxiety over this for 6 months now as I have no resume or college education or job skills to just go do something else, and I have 1 and 2 year old boys now that are depending on me.
If this doesnt work I just need to take my savings and get out I feel like. I really cant take much more of this stress mentally.
I just really dont understand it at all and no one I know can figure it out either. It makes no sense why a lot of the symptoms would stop when going into flower if it was the vinyl other than as I stated before the plant can do better with 12 hours rest each night or maybe it doesnt need as much as whatever its deficient in during flower as it does in veg.
If anyone has any ideas at all or can tell me what the hell is happening here...I will create a shrine to you in my house to be worshipped! I will name my next child after you. I will do anything to fix this problem before I have to lose my house.
Sorry this novel is so damn long but I tried to put in as much information as I could. It probably could have been 3 times this long. If anyone wants any more info just ask.
Im praying someone has some good ideas.
I have been growing for about 13 years, doing hydro for about 7, and doing an aeroponic hybrid system I created myself for the past 5. Up until this problem began I have been yielding 1.5-2 lbs per plant, each under 1 600 watt light. I have plenty of experience and I have never encountered anything like this, and so far nothing I have tried has seemed to work. I am beyond desperate.
The problem starts not long after I transplant my clones into my system. It starts as very hard to see "shiny" splotches on my leaves as seen in this pic. You have to look at just the right angle to even notice...99 out of 100 people would never notice them at all.
Within 24 hours the shiny splotches turn into noticeable black spots on the leaves as seen in this pic
During the next 24-36 hours those black spots start turning brownish, then whitish, then eventually look like rust spots. These next pics show some of this, the rust spots you see on the leaves that also have black are from black spots a few days before these pics were taken.
As the plants keep growing this happens to more and more leaves, but not all leaves. Eventually the problem becomes more serious. The next symptoms are severely hooking leaves that go pale in color, start getting mega "shiny splotches" that turn into necrotic lesions. Severely "twisted" leaves, overly flexible stems. The leaves also become very mottled, 80% of new leaf growth is very "taco'd" and the leaves feel very very thin, almost like a super light fabric or tissue. Also roots that are kind of limp so to speak when compared with my normal roots which when you lift up a plant the roots look like a "mat" that is kind of stiff, the edges will not drop they will all stay flat and rigid...the limp ones, the edges of the map fold straight down to the ground, although they are still white, no signs of rot or infestation of any sort. Instead they seem to keep sending off long roots that seem to be "searching" for something that they just cant find. Normally the roots will just stay in the mat getting thicker and thicker, branching off of each other, not turning into long strands of spaghetti. Here are some pics of some of the latter symptoms. These pictures really dont do justice to just how bad these plants look.
I have been using the same nutrient regimen for years now. GH 3 part + Karma + Pure Blend Original (compost tea). I have eliminated the possibility that it is the GH 3 part or the compost tea. I have also tried side by side tests with varying ph's. It isnt a ph factor. I have had my water tested, since I am on a shared well and recently got new neighbors on the property where the well is. My waters starting ph and ppm are the same as they have always been. Lab tests show no bacteria, and nothing special to note about amounts of calcium, magnesium, boron, chlorine, etc.. in my water. I have also tried different levels of nutes high and low. IMO this is obviously a deficiency, or multiple deficiencies.
I was still not convinced it wasnt something in my water though...since the problem started when my neighbors moved in and they put some trailer about 40 feet from the well on their problem, and i noticed a black 2 inch pipe coming out from it and just going right on top of the ground. Sewage etc is supposed to be at least 100 feet from wells, but again the lab came up empty on bacteria and they told me that means nothing is getting to the well water from the surface.
My room is enclosed as it has been for years. I run co2 and keep my burners clean so all I see is blue flames, so I dont think ethylene is a factor. I have run grows without using my air cooling at all and no exhaust fans at all and still had excellent results so ethylene build up causing this is highly unlikely in my opinion since it never affected me before. I have also tried different co2 meters just in case mine was wrong. I have 2 seperate rooms on 2 different properties (both using the same shared well water) so I dont think co2 is the issue.
I have also tried a variety of humidities and temperatures and nothing has changed. I really doubt that would have anything to do with it either as I have had different temps and humidities over the years with no real problems other than mold in flowering way back when, and if it was that huge of an issue im sure people all over this board would be having this problem some time.
Another thing I changed in the past year is my light setups. For the past couple years I was having great success with 1st generation lumatek 600w HPS for veg and flower. I used aggro sun bulbs, always, with excellent results.Last November I upgraded my cheap hoods to Hydrofarm Radiant hoods because of the excellent light output over my old cheapos. I also got all new Lumatek ballasts, the purple ones. I had a couple successful harvests with these hoods and lights. A weird thing about this problem though is, if I turn the light out on a plant that is showing really bad symptoms, after a couple of days they start to recover, although not totally. I figure its just the low amount of stress and only side light coming in so its not forcing it to try and grow so fast so they can recover somewhat. The hooking stops almost completely, the twisting "mostly stops" and then I just only get moderate amount of black spots here and there.
Around the time this problem started I changed up the boards that hold my plants. Previously I had used plywood that I painted with oil based masonry paint...used them for years with no problems, except eventually they would get nasty and warped and I would have to replace them. So I had the idea to use vinyl flooring laminate on the plywood instead so they would last. So the vinyl is definately one of my prime suspects at this point, especially after reading tonight about these hydrohut problems that were killing peoples plants. The symptoms however look different to me, so Im not really sure. I should say at this point that when I first switched to vinyl boards, the problem mainly just started with black spots, not super severe but very noticeable....none of the hooking, twisting, or discoloration other than the spots occured though for that entire veg cycle. When I turn back to flower the spots stop completely which doesnt make much sense to me other than that whatever the deficiency is, the plants dont need as much during flower as they do veg, or the fact that they are only on 12 hours and get to rest 12 hours is helping them get through it. They definitely look a lot more haggered at the end of an 18 hour light cycle then they do an hour after they wake up.
I have 1 400w hort blue and 1 400w phillips CMH in my room and the plants under those only show about 10% of the symptoms. No yellowing, just maybe a few black spots here and there, and a little rubberiness in the stems. Maybe a slight twist here or there on some leaves. The guy at a local grow shop told me that vegging under HPS would make any deficiencies much more severe and since I still seem some symptoms under the 400s I think hes right. They are still "sick" just not nearly as bad. Here is a pic of 1 of them.
I have tried foliar feeding micronutrients and that gets me some greener new growth but never fixes the problem no matter how often I do it. Ive tried cal mag with no noticeable results. Ive tried different watering intervals with no success either. My nutrient temps are just fine as well.
One thing about my liquid karma is I noticed a few months back it started to smell a lot different to me. I store all my nutes in my house in a cool dark place. Karma for years always had that perfumed scent to it that they put in there and the last few bottles I have bought have smelled kind of sulfury to me. But I have friends using it and they have no problems. 1 friend even took a very sick plant from me and put it in his room under a 1000w HPS and it seemed to recover. He doesnt have CO2 and just put it into a DWC bucket though (with the same nute formula I use, and his karma smelled sulfury to me also), so his room is a lot less aggressive than mine. Not sure if the plant really got better or if it was just able to catch up on its deficiencies due to his room not forcing plants to try and grow as fast as mine.
So anyways I was going to rip out my system and rebuild it, new rez, new filter and housing, new feed lines (pvc pipe), new pump, and new boards, painted like they used to be. I was also going to leave out the karma and compost tea and go with the diamond nectar and floralicious like I used years ago. I figured it had to be something mysterious in my water, the karma, or the vinyl boards leaching something into my system. I had a mama room with some DWC mama's under teks that were exibiting some of the same symptoms as well. Just real minor because no co2 and just teks instead of HID's. This really led me to think it was the water or the karma.
Recently I started up a room with a friend at his house with brand new everything. Just basically to make sure I am not losing my mind. Just DWC buckets but I used painted boards instead of bucket lids since we grow 3'x3' plants due to number constraints to stay legal. So far his plants are looking great. We had a few extra so I brought 2 over to my house and through them into 1 of my rooms, using brand new buckets...the hydroton was brand new and washed at his house with his water, and the nutes are also his exact nutes, we just mix extra at his house and I bring 2 buckets of it home and transfer them over. After about 2 weeks, they are now exhibiting some of the same symptoms, just minor so far but I think its increasing. So different water, different nutes, brand new bucket, rocks, etc... and the problem is still happening.
So now I am thinking it has to be these fucking vinyl boards and I started to research it last night all over the web, including these boards. I found a thread on here about the hydrohut syndrome about some bad hydrohuts and the vinyl inside messing up peoples plants. http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=81061&page=2&pp=15 I also found another thread in these forums about shower curtains giving off toxic chemicals into the air. http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=92297&highlight=vinyl+shower The only problem is the pics I have seen about plants in the toxic hydrohuts have symptoms that look different than most of mine, although I have seen some of the symptoms in flower, on a few leaves here and there. Also the plants I brought from my friends are just in buckets with bucket lids, no vinyl at all, but they are in the same room with the vinyl boards so Im thinking maybe the offgassing is getting to them. And maybe the plants with the vinyl boards are getting offgassing as well as maybe some chemical is leaching into the water as well? I don't know if thats possible or what but im basically at my whits end of trying to figure this out. The mama plant room never used vinyl boards but I did have some of my leftover ones stacked against the wall in there.
I cannot smell anything from the vinyl like when I first bought it, and the problem just seems to get worse and worse. So I dont know if its the vinyl or not. If its not the vinyl, not the water, not the nutes, then Im basically down to some airborne pathogen or some virus being transmitted from some insect or something to every single plant. Both of those last 2 seem pretty unlikely to me.
Im really worried about it being the vinyl after reading the shower curtain thread where the guy states: "Phthalates and organotins, which are not chemically bonded to the shower curtain, are often added to soften or otherwise enhance the curtain. These additives evaporate or cling to household dust more easily than the chemicals in the curtains themselves, Lester said ". I can remove the vinyl boards, replace my system as planned....but if these chemicals are clinging to dust etc in the room...I dont know what to do. I can wipe down my lights, but I have 3 air conditioners, wiring, outlests, fans, relays, my co2 unit, ballasts, tons of ducting, thermometers, etc, that might all be contaminated. I just dont know what to do about all this. I cant just spend thousands of dollars replacing everything when Im not even sure this is the problem. I am basically thinking of just replacing the system as planned, and wiping as much stuff down with a wet cloth as I can, and trying 1 last time, still with the new water and new nute formula...and if it keeps happening, then just calling it quits, and trying to shortsale my house, or file bankruptcy if that doesnt work... as I will not be able to afford to keep it and I cant sell it for what I owe. It was a piece of shit house next door to the one I already lived in that I got just so I could set up another medical grow. I dont feel comfortable eating up my savings trying to fix some super elusive problem that I dont know if I will ever be able to fix. It feels like divine intervention to me, that I am not meant to grow anymore....I have been super stressed out and battling depression and anxiety over this for 6 months now as I have no resume or college education or job skills to just go do something else, and I have 1 and 2 year old boys now that are depending on me.
If this doesnt work I just need to take my savings and get out I feel like. I really cant take much more of this stress mentally.
I just really dont understand it at all and no one I know can figure it out either. It makes no sense why a lot of the symptoms would stop when going into flower if it was the vinyl other than as I stated before the plant can do better with 12 hours rest each night or maybe it doesnt need as much as whatever its deficient in during flower as it does in veg.
If anyone has any ideas at all or can tell me what the hell is happening here...I will create a shrine to you in my house to be worshipped! I will name my next child after you. I will do anything to fix this problem before I have to lose my house.
Sorry this novel is so damn long but I tried to put in as much information as I could. It probably could have been 3 times this long. If anyone wants any more info just ask.
Im praying someone has some good ideas.
