yellowing plant! need help

[Potologist]

OK here is the scoop...

My baby is 34 days into bloom. She used to be the richest, purest deep healthy green all the way up to early flowering. Now she is slowly turning yellow. by now (day 34 bloom) looks like all leaves have turned a very light shade of green, some lower leaves have some very yellow spots. I know that N should go down in bloom but being this my very first lady, i guess im nervous about such general color shift. Note that the leaves in the growing shoots are the greenest.

genetics: BOGbubble from seed

medium: 40% or so Perlite / 45% Sphagnum peat moss / 5% Bone and blood meal, worm castings, dolomite lime and epsom salts (very little on the epsom)

Temperatures: stay between 70 and 80 degrees. (hmm, lets see, what else...) She even has a heating mat under her 5 gal container.

Watering and feeding: In veg she got pure blend grow. When blooming time came she got some superthrive and Foxfarm big bloom and from there on pure blend bloom. (maybe kind of light as i was afraid of over-feeding) Being that we are more than halfway into bloom, she got her first dose of earth juice bloom with some pure blend bloom mixed in. I mixed the pure blend in because earthjuice has 0% N and pure blens has some. And also because i was really worried about the yellowing and wanted to provide at least some N.

When i watered i used to give her lots of water (1/2 to 2/3 gal. for a 5 gal planter) This in a 5 gal container resulted in having to wait 3 to 4 days before the soil 3 inches down felt somewhat dry again. Since then i have now switched to a lesser amount of water. (maybe one quart for a 5 gal container) the logic is that this lesser amount of water will be sucked dry faster and maybe provide for a quicker turnaround (wet medium to dry medium and back to wet) dont know if that may have had something to do with the discoloration.

Ofcourse i fear some sort of nutrient lock-out But my little $3 ph metters for soil are worthless, they are not giving me a measurememt. So I am blind to my medium's ph (ok.. that's bad eh.) I bought a $35 gadget that advertised itself as a PH metter. (a metal probe attached by a wire to a gage.) I think i can stick the probe in my car's battery and the damned thing still will not move so that seems worthless too. I also brought a ph test kit for liquids and that one seems to work .. but on liquids and not on my medium, so .. i test the water i feed to her before i feed but i am still blind to the ph in the medium itself. So, I rely on the fact that i mixed in some dolomite lime to my soil mix and i also peppered some more dolomite lime on the top of the soil around her after the 2nd transplant into the 5 gal penthouse.

Am I just overworried? (i hope so) but thats why am asking. I know this is very little to go on. But any advice from the more knowledgeable would be very appreciated! The buds dont seem as big as they should be for something at 34 days in.. That i am certain is my own fault because these genetics are kick @ss! Even with all my newbie mistakes .. my baby is still the most beautiful thing i have ever seen!. Nothing brings me more happiness than spending time with my baby admiring her and her frosty fruit that is blooming.

 

[GMT]

ok, I'm no expert but my 2 cents worth:
Get rid of the heating mat.
Check sufficient air flow.
Give her more to drink not less.
Equation is light + food + water = plant, reduce one and the result reduces.
forget ph ups/downs just give her some nice tap water with a drop of your veg ferts about now.
remember that many leaves will die, but not normally in spots, normally from the tip down.




see lower leaves on this plant

 

[mlb420]

I loved the "PH" meter comment
I have one also
good luck
mlb420

 

[Guest]

are the stalks turnin yellow, a lighter green? lose the heatin mat, ya want cool dirt man not 80f dirt. may have some root rot issues.

other wise just give her a shot of veg nutes next feed.

where did ya hear to put a heatin pad under your flowerin plant? is the room that cold?

also flush your pot good with clean phed water, catch the water that drips/runs out of the bottom and measure the PH that will give ya a good idea what its at.

CBF

 

[Crazy Composer]

Yeah, lose the heating mat!

Lots of folks switch right over to bloom nutes as soon as 12/12 starts. This isn't really a good idea, because of what you're experiencing right now. The nitrogen levels are too depleted to keep green by about the 2nd tri-mester of flowering.

I like to advocate staying with veg formula for a week into 12/12, then a 50% veg / 50% bloom solution until the mid point of flowering - then go to straight bloom, then flush with straight water for 2 weeks prior to harvest. Nitrogen is important even in bloom, because nitrogen is a building block for plant tissues, and we WANT our buds to have nitrogen to build themselves with! At least for a few weeks...

 

[Potologist]

Removed heating mat. Its out of the picture.

My baby has now been fed. Hopefully she likes it.

The general stalks are just regular green. maybe even a little light, however, the fan leaves stalks are purple/redish. (?)

My baby and I thank all of you for your help!!!

 

[Guest]

P, purple leaf stems and stalks can be genetic. Low N also will cause purplin in the stem and stalk. watch her, her new growth should be green if not genetic.

CBF

 

[Potologist]

Watch her? I can hardly take my eyes off her!.

This is my first female ever .. I have been paying for smoke and looking at other people's bud shots for years now. This is the first time i actually put a seed of good genetics in dirt and love and goodness is coming out! She may be a little yellow in some spots but shes still amazing!

Here are some shots of my girl in her amazing glory...






They are not the biggest buds but i know all that I have done wrong. (I think):

- Starting with the heating mat thing. I had that on from the start to 34 days into bloom, so a long time, that may have hurt the size. BTW: I came up with the stupid heating mat idea all on my own! I think i read somewhere that plants like warm roots. So .. i thought i ..... you know.. help out.

- Also, fresh air is the one that comes in the other room's window, so the air exchange is not zero but its not the best either.

- Feeding. I think i went light on the nutes all along fearing overfeeding.

- I fowered early at exactly 5 weeks. She was less than a foot when i went 12/12 with her. (Impatient rookie.. i know)

- For the longest time she only had 2 reflective sides because I kept the sliding doors open during the day cycle... So to the back and the left she had walls, to the right is the rest of the closet and a fan, to the front was the open door. Now I open the other side and let her have at least 3 sides of wall where light can reflect back to her instead of spilling out into the room.

Anyway... Thanks again Crazy Composer, CBFand GMT. I will let every one know how she turns out.

 

[valk]

I've had lots of purple in my BOG grows, but I always attributed it to a cool climate as my night/early morning tems dipped down into the 60s sometimes..

To me, that looks like an N def. Since it's still got some flowering time left, maybe just add a little N?

 

[Potologist]

yes, i added some N. By the way... She smells F'ING AMAZING!!! i took off one of the smallest lower buds to test out and .... OH MY GOD! I was sniffing my fingers for 15 minutes straight!!! I never smelled anything so damm goooood good good!!!! It does smell like bubblegum, this is awesome beyond words. oh dam when i smoke this im gonna have a pulmonary orgasm!!

 

[Guest]

Yeah, lose the heating mat!

Lots of folks switch right over to bloom nutes as soon as 12/12 starts. This isn't really a good idea, because of what you're experiencing right now. The nitrogen levels are too depleted to keep green by about the 2nd tri-mester of flowering.

I like to advocate staying with veg formula for a week into 12/12, then a 50% veg / 50% bloom solution until the mid point of flowering - then go to straight bloom, then flush with straight water for 2 weeks prior to harvest. Nitrogen is important even in bloom, because nitrogen is a building block for plant tissues, and we WANT our buds to have nitrogen to build themselves with! At least for a few weeks...

This is nearly exactly what I do. Amen brother, keep up the veg ferts for at least a week into the stretch. Some strains have a bigger stretch than others (sativas) so you may have to go even longer and stretch out your switch to bloom ferts over more weeks. Keep some N in the mix throughout flower.

 

[Pacridge]

Don't some of the leaves just naturally turn yellow and fall off as the buds grow?

Do you guys prune these leaves or do you leave them on?

 

[Guest]

No, IMO a perfectly healthy plant should maintain it's green color through most if not all of flowering.

I dont pick dieing leaves off, it spreads the results of problems faster. Leaves discolor and shrivel up because the plant is using the sugars stored in it to compensate for some element missing from it's environment. When you remove these storehouses, the plant simply moves on to the next healthy leaves and discolors and shrivels them up until the problem is solved.

 

[Harry Gypsna]

The feeding bloom fert str8 away thing, What i do is, on the day they go into the flower room, they get veg feed, now I water twice a week, once with feed, once with plain water, so the next watering is plain water, then once it is day 7 of bloom, the get the 1st dose of bloom - "Vita-link" Bloom a+b, same on the next feed watering( remember i have another plain watering inbetween!) then on day 21 of bloom they get the 1st doese of Vita-link "Buddy" in the mix, and that mix of nutes is what they get right up til i start flushing. Good stuff. I was told this the way to feed em thru the transition from veg to bloom, if im doing something wrong, please let me know, thanks.

 

[Pacridge]

I must really be doing something wrong then. mine almost always turn yellow as they bud out. In fact some of the strains I've been doing have been turning a purple (leaves) as they bud. I just assumed that was part of the "process." I always tirmed back the yellow and dying leaves. So you guys are saying that the whole plant should basically stay green as it buds? So I'm using the wrong the nutz? I'm using a "Bloom Plus" that's 10-54-10 once they go in the flower room. And I checked the PH level- it looks like it's about 7.0.

 

[GMT]

WOW TOO HARD FOR ME

WOW TOO HARD FOR ME

You know, all the advice that can be found on these boards is good advice, but for beginners its not necessary. Keep things simple at first then introduce a new technique at a time. That way you wil see diffs, both good and bad and learn to maximise your crop the easiest way for you. As long as you've got good dirt, (& enough of it), a decent light (not too close), a fan, water and some nutes, not forgetting genetics, it'll work. So keep things as simple as poss at first. You should be ok from your pics, worried about your temp though what does that therm read in that pic? She does look heat stressed and that will slow her down so add some time for that, or maybe reduce as it can affect either way but now prob solved I would say add time. Or buy a scope.
Good luck, keep us informed.


the nicest of leaves can yellow, it just saves on pruning!

 

[GMT]

this to this

this to this


to



yield was poor but smoke was nice

 

[Guest]

I must really be doing something wrong then. mine almost always turn yellow as they bud out. In fact some of the strains I've been doing have been turning a purple (leaves) as they bud. I just assumed that was part of the "process." I always tirmed back the yellow and dying leaves. So you guys are saying that the whole plant should basically stay green as it buds? So I'm using the wrong the nutz? I'm using a "Bloom Plus" that's 10-54-10 once they go in the flower room. And I checked the PH level- it looks like it's about 7.0.

Your Ph is fine, but you must keep at least a balanced fert (10-10-10 or 20-20-20, 10-15-10, something like that) for the stretch. The stretch is when the plants ghrow structure as if in hyper vegetative growth, so you must provide the elements necessary for that type of growth. Then you should gently transition the plant to your full strength flowering fert. Use 1/2 your veg and 1/2 your flower food and gradually ease the veg ferts out until your in the full strength 10-52-10 stuff alone. I personally dont flush, so I would use it right to harvest, but many others do flush and cut out food for the last cycle or two. Yellowing leaves is not normal during flowering. Curses on Overgrow for perpetuating skills that lead to it happening so often.

 

[Guest]

Oh, and GMT? Those are not healthy leaves your holding up as an example. And any accurate info is necessary for a beginner. That's how you get rid of beginner status.

 

[Pacridge]

Thanks, Caprichoso,

I've been using a 5-1-1 and 11-13-3 alt. during the veg stage. I've had no problems keepingthe leaving looking nice and green. Then when I move the ladies into the flower room I've been starting them on the 10-54-10 that day. I usually give them some some two days one week and three days the next.

So you're saying swicth the mixtures you advise and wein them onto them slowly?