Baffled! Seeking expert advise...

Hello everyone.
First of all, I'm not a novice grower, and have never really had any problems growing in the past, despite growing indoors in less than ideal conditions (too hot, plants getting to close to the lights, miracle grow, etc...).

I've started growing again at a different location and am totally BAFFLED with as to why my plants look so unhealthy. After perfectly healthy initial growth, whether from seed or clone, soil-less mix in pots or hydroton in hydro flood&drain, organic (botanicare) or chem (Dutch Master) nutients... new growth will be a very light green/yellow, very small, wrinkled, and curls downward. Vertical growth slows way down. Not quite full sized leaves will wrinkle somewhat as they finish growing, but mature leaves remain perfectly healthy.

Here is my original thread on another forum when I first started having problems:

Wrinkled leaves... HELP! - Growing Marijuana Forum



I've all but ruled out a nutrient disorder. The problem has shown up on both my mother plants in pots (soilless mix w/ organic nutes), as well as closes raised in a flood & drain tray w/ completely different nutes and a different watering schedule. I use city tap water, but I doubt that's the problem as my meters read 60ppm and 6.5-6.8 pH from the tap... is there something I'm not thinking about here? I keep the pH in the 5.5-5.8 range for the hydro and 6.1-6.6 or so for the soilless mix and monitor constantly. Adding fresh nutes doesn't bring any improvement. I've done the usual flush and add fresh nutes to no avail. I usually use nutrients at 3/4 strength. In hydro, I always add nutes to a full res one nute at a time and mix thoroughly before adding another. I'd be very surprised if nutrient lock-out was the culprit. RH is 35%- 70% with an average of 50%-55%.

I feel as though it has to be a disease or something in the air. It doesn't matter what strain I'm growing. I don't see evidence of any kind that bugs are the cause. I was using an ozone generator but turned it off thinking that maybe that had something to do with it, but the problem didn't go away. The problem almost seems to move from plant to plant, starting with the plants that are closest to the door. It really doesn't look like any disease I've ever seen or read about, but I can't rule that out.

It's not because of lighting... 400w HM over a 3x3 tray in veg, moms under a 400w MH in 3 gallon buckets. Flowering moms under 600w HPS and clones in a 4x4 tray under another 600w HPS. I never let the plant get too close or too far away. The lights are in vented reflectors.

The rooms are pretty tight. Both the 8'x8' veg room and the 8'x10' flowering room have IR reflective film on the walls with rubber pond liner covering the floors. Temperature has never been over 85F (28C), or under 57F(14C), with an average of 76F (24,5C) day, and 68F (20C) at night.
The Veg room is 500 cubic feet (14.2 metres cubed) in total volume with a 250cfm exhaust fan drawing spent air though a large carbon filter. Fresh air is supplied via a 6" duct (20 feet long) coming from the outside. Flowering room is 618 cubic feet (17.5 metres cubed) with a 500cfm exhaust fan drawing spent air though another carbon filter with fresh air supplied via another 6" duct (25 feet long). There is some air leakage around the doors that I'm going to take care of shortly so the fans don't pull air from the rest of the attic. Again, plants closest to the door (in either room) get the problem first. Maybe something in the attic? I don't smell anything and work up there all the time. I thought about the ozone and turned it off, but what else? Are the plant getting enough fresh air? I'm not using CO2 (yet). I've got an oscillating fan in each room to move some air around.

I'm totally frustrated. It doesn't seem to matter what I do, the problem still appears. It's been going on for 6 weeks or so.
I've never had problems in the past, and this time I was really going to do it up right and spend the money on all the cool meters, light hoods, etc... don't even ask how much I've spent on this set-up.
I've all but lost my enthusiasm for growing.

I'm still working on the LONG story of how I got to this point with more detail, but this is all the basics.


Has ANYONE seen this before? Am I missing something???????

Sounds like you have the bases covered...And know what to do.

Its odd that you say it travels from the plants closest to the door to the rest. Sorry I have no answers but Im looking around to see what I can find. Hopefully someone can help before then.

That really sounds like a "bad room".....as it didnt happen until you moved your plants to the attic.

Possibly something airborn is getting into your res/soil and being fed to plants? Is there alot of loose insulation flying around up there?

Looks like mould to me

Mix up a mister bottle of full cream milk and a couple of teaspoons of potassium bicarb and spray them with it and see what happens.
Respray them with clean tap water after 5 hours to wash it of.
Make sure you don't have them under the lights when you do it and dont put them back until they are dry

BSIv2.0 said:

...

That really sounds like a "bad room".....as it didnt happen until you moved your plants to the attic.

Possibly something airborn is getting into your res/soil and being fed to plants? Is there alot of loose insulation flying around up there?

Click to expand...

Not sure but doubt it (airborne, that is. No lose insullation. I just built the 2 rooms up there. The plants have always been there. I was working on the flowering room while I had plants from seed in the just finished veg. room. Interesting to note though... The problem didn't occur until the plants were moved to the flowering room, which was tighter due to the IR reflective film on the walls and rubber pond liner on the floor. The veg room at this time had white paint on the walls and a bare wood floor, unlike the flowering room. After plants were moved to flower, I "updated" the veg room with the IR/pond liner combo. Then clones where started in there, when 3 weeks after healthy vigorous growth, the problem showed up.

I know i sound mad but i am right

I agree with nat. if your flower room's humidity is getting up to 70. that is way too high. it could be mold. take some samples and look under a magnifying glass.

natmoon said:

Looks like mould to me

Click to expand...

Everything is new. Although I should say the house is over 100 years old. These are brand new room with brand new plants grown from seed. There is absolutely no evidence of mold at all. Besides, its drought like conditions. Its barely humid enough for the plants most days. I ran the exhaust fans constantly while the lights were on, and just recently started running them 24/7 just to make sure the plants where always getting fresh air. The rooms are spotless. I'd eat on the floor.

Full cream milk and potassium bicarb causes mould spores to shrivel and die without harming your plants.

Green Lantern said:

Everything is new. Although I should say the house is over 100 years old. These are brand new room with brand new plants grown from seed. There is absolutely no evidence of mold at all. Besides, its drought like conditions. Its barely humid enough for the plants most days. I ran the exhaust fans constantly while the lights were on, and just recently started running them 24/7 just to make sure the plants where always getting fresh air. The rooms are spotless. I'd eat on the floor.

Click to expand...

Powdery Mildew

(Oidium sp)

Humid, overcast weather, especially when the days are warm and the nights are cool and moist are prime conditions for the fungal disease Powdery Mildew (Oidium sp.), seen here on a pumpkin leaf.
Powdery Mildew is a widespread fungal disease that will attack a variety of plants. It’s actually a group of related fungi. Some attack a range of different plants, while others are more specific in what they attack. Almost all start as faint white spots on leaves.
Mature leaves will develop the white spots, while young leaves may be distorted (such as curling at the edges or puckering).
It spreads by releasing spores, which are carried on air currents. The spores require high humidity for germination but they won’t germinate in wet weather. Most Powdery Mildews are active between the temperature range 11 – 28 degrees C.
Prevention

As with all disease, prevention is better than cure. There are many cultural practices that will help prevent the disease:

• Don’t allow plants to become overcrowded and shaded, so plant in an open, sunny position, with plenty of space between plants to allow good air circulation.
• Avoid over-feeding with high nitrogen fertilisers as this causes the plant to grow lush, weak growth that is easily attacked by disease.
• Avoid overhead watering in damp weather or at night as this will increase the humidity.

If an outbreak does occur, remove all infected plant parts and dispose of safely – do not compost.
Treatments

Experiments have shown that full-cream milk is successful against Powdery Mildew on zucchinis and grapevines. In fact, rose-growers Ross Roses in South Australia use full-cream milk successfully as a spray, up to once a week in a bad season.
Milk isn’t a preventative. It causes the fine hairs on the fungal spores to shrivel within hours of application.
Peter Crisp at the University of Adelaide, evaluated 34 alternative treatments for controlling powdery mildew. The most successful treatments were full-cream milk, potassium bicarbonate and a canola oil-based product Synertrol Horti-oil. (Australian Horticulture, August 2005)
In 1996, GrowerTalks magazine reported that a potassium bicarbonate formulation had ‘proven effective in eliminating powdery mildew in roses, ornamentals, vegetables and fruit crops’. The product was called Ecocarb.
The product is also known as Eco-rose, an organic fungicide registered for use in Australia on grapes and roses only, but in New Zealand it is also registered for use against black spot on roses, dollar spot on turf, and powdery mildew in cucurbits, apples, strawberries and tomatoes (Organic Gardener, 2005).
There are many home remedies that use bi-carbonate of soda as a fungicide. Bi-carbonate of soda is actually sodium bi-carbonate, not potassium bi-carbonate as mentioned above.

munch box said:

..take some samples and look under a magnifying glass.

Click to expand...

Not a bad idea at all. I'll see what I can do.

As far as mold goes though, it doesn't make sense when you consider the way it spreads. Older lower leaves stay perfectly healthy. This is new growth only, or when a leaf still has a little growing left.

Green Lantern said:

Not a bad idea at all. I'll see what I can do.

As far as mold goes though, it doesn't make sense when you consider the way it spreads. Older lower leaves stay perfectly healthy. This is new growth only, or when a leaf still has a little growing left.

Click to expand...

Mature leaves will develop the white spots, while young leaves may be distorted (such as curling at the edges or puckering).

It doesn't look anything like this. It's not a substance on the leaf, it's the physical characteristic of the leaf itself.

natmoon said:

Powdery Mildew

(Oidium sp)

Humid, overcast weather, especially when the days are warm and the nights are cool and moist are prime conditions for the fungal disease Powdery Mildew (Oidium sp.), seen here on a pumpkin leaf.

Powdery Mildew is a widespread fungal disease that will attack a variety of plants. It’s actually a group of related fungi. Some attack a range of different plants, while others are more specific in what they attack. Almost all start as faint white spots on leaves.
Mature leaves will develop the white spots, while young leaves may be distorted (such as curling at the edges or puckering).
It spreads by releasing spores, which are carried on air currents. The spores require high humidity for germination but they won’t germinate in wet weather. Most Powdery Mildews are active between the temperature range 11 – 28 degrees C.
Prevention

As with all disease, prevention is better than cure. There are many cultural practices that will help prevent the disease:

• Don’t allow plants to become overcrowded and shaded, so plant in an open, sunny position, with plenty of space between plants to allow good air circulation.
• Avoid over-feeding with high nitrogen fertilisers as this causes the plant to grow lush, weak growth that is easily attacked by disease.
• Avoid overhead watering in damp weather or at night as this will increase the humidity.

If an outbreak does occur, remove all infected plant parts and dispose of safely – do not compost.
Treatments

Experiments have shown that full-cream milk is successful against Powdery Mildew on zucchinis and grapevines. In fact, rose-growers Ross Roses in South Australia use full-cream milk successfully as a spray, up to once a week in a bad season.
Milk isn’t a preventative. It causes the fine hairs on the fungal spores to shrivel within hours of application.
Peter Crisp at the University of Adelaide, evaluated 34 alternative treatments for controlling powdery mildew. The most successful treatments were full-cream milk, potassium bicarbonate and a canola oil-based product Synertrol Horti-oil. (Australian Horticulture, August 2005)
In 1996, GrowerTalks magazine reported that a potassium bicarbonate formulation had ‘proven effective in eliminating powdery mildew in roses, ornamentals, vegetables and fruit crops’. The product was called Ecocarb.
The product is also known as Eco-rose, an organic fungicide registered for use in Australia on grapes and roses only, but in New Zealand it is also registered for use against black spot on roses, dollar spot on turf, and powdery mildew in cucurbits, apples, strawberries and tomatoes (Organic Gardener, 2005).
There are many home remedies that use bi-carbonate of soda as a fungicide. Bi-carbonate of soda is actually sodium bi-carbonate, not potassium bi-carbonate as mentioned above.

Click to expand...

I will say that I have no problem will trying a remedy if it does not hurt the plants.

Look dude thats a leaf from a totally different plant and it looks different on all plants.
I know what mould on cannabis looks like and what it does to the leafs.
You can take or leave my advice thats your choice,cya

do you have a filter on your intake. if not, get one

munch box said:

do you have a filter on your intake. if not, get one

Click to expand...

Yup. And the the problem happens first to the plants closer to the door, not the fresh air intake. There is nothing flying around in there. I suppose it could be some sort of bacteria or something, but it's nothing I've ever seen.

Anyway, here's some new pics that show how the older lower leaves are perfectly fine and will continue to be, while then new growth starts doing its thing.

Peace...

have you tried hooking up co2? where is your ppm at?

munch box said:

have you tried hooking up co2? where is your ppm at?

Click to expand...

No. I've been planning on getting this cool CO2 controller but it's not out yet and I don't the funds anyway. Nevertheless, I need to do some kind of cheap reading to at least get a ballpark figure. Does anyone know what plants look like when CO2 is too low?

growth is stunted for sure. Big time at 200ppm and below.