Halp!

Hey all,

It's been a while since I posted here, but I need some serious help.

Over the last several months I've been trying to figure out wtf is wrong with my grow(s). Starting from seed, germination goes well and the seedling starts out healthy and dark green, but within 2 weeks chlorosis starts to set in and growth becomes stunted. I actually have 2 seedlings that I kept alive for troubleshooting sake that are over a month old, pale green, and no leaves are bigger than an inch! They are a sad sight indeed.

I've been going thru the motions, trying to eliminate possible problems. I've pH'd to 6 and I've pH'd to 6.5. I've changed soils. I've bought all new nutrient products on the theory that the old ones somehow went bad. I've abandoned my tap water in favor of some bottled spring water thinking that chlorine may be an issue.

All indicators point to an nutrient uptake problem, but I can't seem to get it under control!

It's worth noting that I've been successful in the past using all of the same products, water, and techniques that I'm using now. It's been probably about a year now since I finished my last grow.

So now something has occurred to me: I suffered mold problems on my last grow and lost a decent amount of bud due to rot. The grow environment is a closet that went back to being a closet, it's indoors obviously, air conditioned and dark while the grow room has been idling. Again, about a year has gone by and the closet remained a normal closet -- no abnormal moisture or temperatures to speak of.

I don't see any obvious signs of mold in the closet -- the closest thing I observe is what appears to be a thin layer of dust on my mylar-coated box that surrounds the grow area, and what I assumed to be dust in the fan.

Another observation worth pointing out is that root hairs that happened to make it to the bottom of the cups I'm using turn brown.

Temps are in the low 80's, humidity around 30% -- perhaps not ideal conditions but I think we'd all agree that this shouldn't be an issue.

Any thoughts, in particular related to potential mold issues? I think the mold ting is a god theory but since there are no obvious visual indicators of mold I don't want to go chasing a red herring, if you know what I mean...

Thanks in advance! I"m at my wit's end.

Just wanted to add that I yanked one of the plants this morning to inspect the soil & roots for mold and other symptoms, and the root system seemed healthy -- although way underdeveloped considering the plant was over a month old...

We need to see the patient, to make a diagnose - and more info, like light and such.

Hi highaltitude, thanks for the reply. I'm not going to be able to provide a pic in short order (I know, I know), but for now I can assure you my plant looks like a plant with a nitrogen deficiency -- yellowing. There is a mild amount of upwards curling on the jagged leaf edges.

Regarding lights, I grow under CFL's. There is no evidence of heat stress. I'm using an organic soil from Pure Earth and feeding with medium concentration of FoxFarm Big Bloom to enrich the soil and most recently added a small amount (1/4 tsp/gal) of FoxFarm Grow Big which the plant has neither shown improvement from nor any signs of nute burn.

if the leafs are curling upand turing yellow then ur giving it to many nutes if ur in organic soil than u should start out the plant in just the soil till the bottom leaves show first signs of yellowing then start feeding. im not a soil grower, but i have some experience with it and im pretty sure u shouldnt feed with every watering, but i bet some one knows around here for sure. good luck and may the force be with u

skywalker39963 said:

if the leafs are curling upand turing yellow then ur giving it to many nutes if ur in organic soil than u should start out the plant in just the soil till the bottom leaves show first signs of yellowing then start feeding. im not a soil grower, but i have some experience with it and im pretty sure u shouldnt feed with every watering, but i bet some one knows around here for sure. good luck and may the force be with u

Click to expand...

Thanks man. The Big Bloom is OK for every feeding as it's organic and low-strength stuff, but even so my typical regiment would not include nutes for every watering but since I'm seeing yellow I add food like you suggested. Those are basics, this problem is way beyond basics though...

over feeding is probably the #1 cause of death to pot plants, 2nd is over watering
as far as water goes if you pull water from the tap you can let it sit uncovered a few days before using so that chlorine will dissipate and the water temp will warm up a bit.
hang in there m8

then again if u got nute lock than a ph issue have u tested the soil ph and water/nute ph?

Yup, pH is good to go -- I even took everything to the hydro store for verification in case of bad pH meter. PPM's are good too.

That's why this is so maddening, I mean when I was a noob I did all the noob shit like not pH-ing the water, growing with shitty seeds, MG soil and ferts, tap water... the plants were not spectacular obviously but they grew and finished at least. You guys know as well as I do that they don't call it weed for no reason -- easy to grow, but we educate ourselves and buy good grow supplies so grow BETTER.

This problem here -- the damn things won't grow at all. There has gotta be some issue with the root system or something...

Right now I've addressed the tap water issue (maybe the tap water has changed since I last grew with it??), a possible longshot I'm trying everything.

The next theories I want to address are potential mold problems and these red plastic cups. Anyone ever heard of red plastic cups somehow poisoning the soil environment? I've used'em before but perhaps not this brand?

How can I be sure I don't have a mold problem? What would you recommend to treat the soil in case there is a mild mold or fungus problem in the soil. Again, nothing is visually evident to me...

AAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!! (frustrated, I'm going thru expensive beans like candy)

does ur red cups have holes in them for drainage also if roots dont have adiquate amounts of O2 that could stunt growth also if the the plants dont have the adequate ventalation they will grow slowly im just trowing stuff at u because without a pic or detiled info its hard to tell good luck

wbd said:

Hi highaltitude, thanks for the reply. I'm not going to be able to provide a pic in short order (I know, I know), but for now I can assure you my plant looks like a plant with a nitrogen deficiency -- yellowing. There is a mild amount of upwards curling on the jagged leaf edges.

Regarding lights, I grow under CFL's. There is no evidence of heat stress. I'm using an organic soil from Pure Earth and feeding with medium concentration of FoxFarm Big Bloom to enrich the soil and most recently added a small amount (1/4 tsp/gal) of FoxFarm Grow Big which the plant has neither shown improvement from nor any signs of nute burn.

Click to expand...

I read your thread again. It seems strange that the problem would not be more obvious, and it appears everyone has thought about the most likely possibilities. I would assume you have decent drainage in your soil, since you have successfully done this before. Another thought was iron deficiency - not nitrogen. Now that's a far throw, since you're using reputable fertilizers, but it could be. Since these plants are unlikely to ever become viable, I'd take a crap-shoot at iron, and stick a rusty nail into one pot, just to see if you get any response at all from that. Next thing I'd do, is to throw'em as far as I can, and start over.

im thinking your soil may have nutrients in it already, and by adding more nutes when you feed them is too much.

if you have a problem with mold in your room, you should wash EVERYTHING in there with a rag and some bleach water.

if theres some mold or fungus in the soil, you can put the soil in the oven @ 350+ and bake away anything that may be in the soil, including pests or their eggs

hope these ideas help

Thanks guys.

They are reacting favorably to my latest attempt at recovery, which was essentially a change from tap to bottled spring water in the hopes that chlorine or other bad stuff has found its way into my tap water since the last grow. Favorably in this case means I'm seeing more "normal" vegetative progress and some green made it's way back into the leaves, but this of course is not to say that I'm out of trouble yet. I'm going to water this evening and will add a drop of SuperThrive the the water to get some vitamins in there to promote root growth, will be out of town for the next 4 nights and hopefully when I return I will be greeted with some more significant recovery -- hopefully not too much though, 4 nights is alot of time without a watering for a healthy plant with a good root system.

Next steps after that will be eliminating these plastic cups (poison cups?) and changing rooms (dormant mold spores coming back to get me?)...

What a mess!

And yeah highaltitude, one of them is probably never going to amount to anything but the other one hasn't been stunted terribly much... but even so if I can nip this issue in the bud (pun intended) I'll probably still start over. We're all perfectionists here right?