Too slow growth!

[mimistow]

Hello friends , i am a newbie and i need your help.
I planted my sprouted seeds(autos critical+ 2.0) at 15/9 directly into the light mix soil. I waited 2-3 days till 2 out of 5 plants found the surface of the soil , then i opened my 400W led lights(only the white spectrum), put them in a distance of 45 cm from the baby plants and covered the plants that were still under the surface of the soil. After 1 or 2 days i scratched the soil gently to find the rest of the seeds that didnt make it by themselves to the surface and i found 2 of them alive.i sprayed the soil 2-3 times in a day to keep the soil moist cause the leds started drying the upper layer of soil and i was afraid of them getting dehydrated.After a few days i stoped spraying them or adding extra water cause they stopped growing meaning that something is going wrong with the current situation.Ill add photos of my 4 plants to see whats going on.In conclude , 10 days after me seeds sprouted(23/9) , my plants are in a weird stage. 1 of them cant open its leaves and wont grow , the second one has 4 leaves and the two rounded ones are getting yellowish and they also wont grow, the third seems "healthy" and the fourth one is a bit taller than it should be imo. Every time im really having a hard time growing autos in the first stage of their life and especially with leds. Maybe its the lights , maybe its me ?! i dont know ... THANK YOU for instance , you are a great community!

 

[3snowboards]

Seeds underground dont need lights
Especially not a light fixture
Try one 9w cfl

 

[hush]

In all of the decades that I've been doing this, I've learned that the best, timeless advice for beginners, which continues to be relevant and continues to be the number one concern, is this: Failure in the garden is FAR MORE OFTEN the result of loving your plants too much than it is the result of not loving your plants enough. In other words, people overdo things. They tend not to underdo them. In your case, I think this applies. You probably should have left them well enough alone. The top of the soil will dry out. Yes. That happens. But it forces the seedling to send roots out in search of moisture. And if the top of the soil is getting bone dry or something like that, you are using a soil mix that is incompatible with your environmental conditions, so scrambling to keep it moist is only a bandage, and not a solution to the problem. If you are worried that your lights are drying out the soil, then you might have the lights too close, and the better solution would be to raise them up rather than have to keep drenching the surface and scratching around to find where your seedlings are.

I always recommend for beginners to implement a bottom-watering setup. It's more forgiving than a top watering setup, because the plant gets to "decide" how much water to take up into the root zone. I think you should consider the possibility. It's as simple as putting them all on a tray of water and waiting until the water either gets sucked entirely up or the water level stops and stays where it is (then you can just dump the remainder). Also, I recommend planting seeds into starter plugs before putting them into their final containers. Yes, you are growing autos, and yes it is important to never transplant those, but know that putting a rooted starter plug into soil is not technically the same thing as a transplant. The plant won't even skip a beat.

So anyway, just try not to be a helicopter parent to your plants. Let them do their thing. You are there just to make sure the conditions never go into extremes. The top of soil being dry is not only normal, it's a good thing. Don't try to "fix" that. But if the entire container is bone dry and the plant is wilting, then yeah, jump into gear and fix the problem! Less is more. Don't over tend to things. Let the plants experience beneficial stress.

 

[mimistow]

Thank you for all the advice. I cant move the light further away from the plants cause the one with the long body just bended and fell cause it was stretching too much too fast.

 

[AgentPothead]

When you up pot them you can bury it a little deeper in the soil if it's stretching a ton. In the past, I've had them stretch a bunch if they get too much light as seedlings, or I didn't put the seed deep enough. Now I have a "50"watt led that pulls 25 watts at the wall for my seedlings and it seems to be just right. It looks like you started them in okay sized pots directly, next time if you do that I would not put the dirt all the way up to the rim. If you leave it an inch or so low, that way if they stretch you can throw another inch of dirt on them really easy.

 

[mexweed]

the tall one needs to be getting beaten on harder by a fan, there is a yellow set coming in, and one looks like it's draining the cotyledons, they need some light juice like a 2 tsp top dress of an organic booster/conditioner, soil alive by buffaloam is what I use, happy frog jump start and down to earth starter mix are a couple others

 

[mimistow]

Thank you! Great idea.

 

[mimistow]

In all of the decades that I've been doing this, I've learned that the best, timeless advice for beginners, which continues to be relevant and continues to be the number one concern, is this: Failure in the garden is FAR MORE OFTEN the result of loving your plants too much than it is the result of not loving your plants enough. In other words, people overdo things. They tend not to underdo them. In your case, I think this applies. You probably should have left them well enough alone. The top of the soil will dry out. Yes. That happens. But it forces the seedling to send roots out in search of moisture. And if the top of the soil is getting bone dry or something like that, you are using a soil mix that is incompatible with your environmental conditions, so scrambling to keep it moist is only a bandage, and not a solution to the problem. If you are worried that your lights are drying out the soil, then you might have the lights too close, and the better solution would be to raise them up rather than have to keep drenching the surface and scratching around to find where your seedlings are.

I always recommend for beginners to implement a bottom-watering setup. It's more forgiving than a top watering setup, because the plant gets to "decide" how much water to take up into the root zone. I think you should consider the possibility. It's as simple as putting them all on a tray of water and waiting until the water either gets sucked entirely up or the water level stops and stays where it is (then you can just dump the remainder). Also, I recommend planting seeds into starter plugs before putting them into their final containers. Yes, you are growing autos, and yes it is important to never transplant those, but know that putting a rooted starter plug into soil is not technically the same thing as a transplant. The plant won't even skip a beat.

So anyway, just try not to be a helicopter parent to your plants. Let them do their thing. You are there just to make sure the conditions never go into extremes. The top of soil being dry is not only normal, it's a good thing. Don't try to "fix" that. But if the entire container is bone dry and the plant is wilting, then yeah, jump into gear and fix the problem! Less is more. Don't over tend to things. Let the plants experience beneficial stress.

Thank you sir!

 

[mimistow]

When you up pot them you can bury it a little deeper in the soil if it's stretching a ton. In the past, I've had them stretch a bunch if they get too much light as seedlings, or I didn't put the seed deep enough. Now I have a "50"watt led that pulls 25 watts at the wall for my seedlings and it seems to be just right. It looks like you started them in okay sized pots directly, next time if you do that I would not put the dirt all the way up to the rim. If you leave it an inch or so low, that way if they stretch you can throw another inch of dirt on them really easy.

Great idea!Thanks

 

[Pinkfan]

Great post

Great post

In all of the decades that I've been doing this, I've learned that the best, timeless advice for beginners, which continues to be relevant and continues to be the number one concern, is this: Failure in the garden is FAR MORE OFTEN the result of loving your plants too much than it is the result of not loving your plants enough. In other words, people overdo things. They tend not to underdo them. In your case, I think this applies. You probably should have left them well enough alone. The top of the soil will dry out. Yes. That happens. But it forces the seedling to send roots out in search of moisture. And if the top of the soil is getting bone dry or something like that, you are using a soil mix that is incompatible with your environmental conditions, so scrambling to keep it moist is only a bandage, and not a solution to the problem. If you are worried that your lights are drying out the soil, then you might have the lights too close, and the better solution would be to raise them up rather than have to keep drenching the surface and scratching around to find where your seedlings are.

I always recommend for beginners to implement a bottom-watering setup. It's more forgiving than a top watering setup, because the plant gets to "decide" how much water to take up into the root zone. I think you should consider the possibility. It's as simple as putting them all on a tray of water and waiting until the water either gets sucked entirely up or the water level stops and stays where it is (then you can just dump the remainder). Also, I recommend planting seeds into starter plugs before putting them into their final containers. Yes, you are growing autos, and yes it is important to never transplant those, but know that putting a rooted starter plug into soil is not technically the same thing as a transplant. The plant won't even skip a beat.

So anyway, just try not to be a helicopter parent to your plants. Let them do their thing. You are there just to make sure the conditions never go into extremes. The top of soil being dry is not only normal, it's a good thing. Don't try to "fix" that. But if the entire container is bone dry and the plant is wilting, then yeah, jump into gear and fix the problem! Less is more. Don't over tend to things. Let the plants experience beneficial stress.

This is a great post Hush. I am a beginner at growing & I will post my grow soon. But i like the idea of bottom feeding. Atb Pinkfan.

 

[Deke]

You're too close with the lights 18" is way too close at that age. If the seedlings getting leggy you something to prop it up. I had to do that with a couple of mine on this grow. I put my cob LEDs like 30 plus in away from my seedlings so where you're at is just way too close in my opinion.

 

[mimistow]

You're too close with the lights 18" is way too close at that age. If the seedlings getting leggy you something to prop it up. I had to do that with a couple of mine on this grow. I put my cob LEDs like 30 plus in away from my seedlings so where you're at is just way too close in my opinion.

I have the lights the closest possible to the plants if im in the proper range of temperature and if the leaves look healthy(not curved or burnt) ,but the truth is i've never had a perfect life cycle of my plants. Always i had problems with the light distance, either my plants were growing too tall or they stopped stretching . I find it very diffucult to calculate the correct distance from LEDs to plants cause my LEDs have 3 buttons , one for the white colour lights , one for the blues and one for the reds.I start with the whites for the first week and then i turn on the blues while closing the whites and the next week i open both ,and so on with the red lights .The total watts of my LEDs is 560 . So i can search in the internet for a general rule for plant to LEDs distance for the specific watts im using but this rule doesnt apply if im not using all the watts at the same time( for example having only the blue lights on).In conclusion im a bit confused!

 

[3snowboards]

You dont need 560w beaming onto a seedling

 

[mimistow]

You dont need 560w beaming onto a seedling

I do not beam all the 560 watts onto the seedlings cause i have only the white led bulbs on for the first weeks which consist only the 1/3 of the total bulbs.

 

[3snowboards]

People tell you the lights are too close.
You say you have the lights as close as possible


YOUR LIGHTS ARE TOO CLOSE
OR THEY ARE TOO BRIGHT (AND TOO CLOSE)
take your pick






(9 watts clone to veg)

I veg in my kitchen sink under a 9w 6500k cfl
Then bloom under 108 watts of 2700k led

 

[Magnificat]

Thank you for all the advice. I cant move the light further away from the plants cause the one with the long body just bended and fell cause it was stretching too much too fast.

Snap a toothpick at the end and then again making a trough and prop up the baby.. it will firm up in time and not keep stretching too much.

As others have said, you really need to start them under low wattage to get them to small stage.. then once moved into a 1 gal or final containers will you add the 400w...

 

[Guest]

Snap a toothpick at the end and then again making a trough and prop up the baby.. it will firm up in time and not keep stretching too much.

As others have said, you really need to start them under low wattage to get them to small stage.. then once moved into a 1 gal or final containers will you add the 400w...

When needed I use a paper clip bent straight to stick in soil and make a hook parallel with the soil.

 

[mimistow]

Snap a toothpick at the end and then again making a trough and prop up the baby.. it will firm up in time and not keep stretching too much.

As others have said, you really need to start them under low wattage to get them to small stage.. then once moved into a 1 gal or final containers will you add the 400w...

Well they are auttos so i prefen not to move from one pot to another

 

[mimistow]

Thank you guys , i moved the leds at 55 cm from the plants and they look happier and growing 2cm per day.