Hey all!!!

Hello learned people,
I have an incredible hyroponic system that was built by my engineer husband. We have obviously a veg. area and two flowering areas. Just months ago I had two "Strawberry Coughs" and a "Purple Kush" that looked like they came from the move, "Little shop of Horrors", o.k. exaggerating a bit, but all my plants were just incredible.

They are all flood fill systems, set to flood 3 x's a day for four minutes at a time. The flood is from an electric pump immersed in a 30 gallon closed container. The trays are 2'x4', they sit in a support frame of 3/4 inch PVC.

The vegetative side has 400W metal halidebulbs with custom ballasts. The flowering side are 400W high pressure sodium, also with custom ballasts. The lights over each tray can be moved by a steel cable.

I have never had a problem getting seeds to germinate, but lately it seem that when I put them in rockwool and pour the "grow juice" over them, an even have the light low, the results are stringy, spindly, with really no leaves, and if they do have leaves, I have to balance them with longtooth picks. They may have some leaves, but they are at the very top of the tiny plant, and stay that way. The results are pitiful, to say the least.

I know this is so long winded, but I really need some help, as I have a prescription and it's just for me, but I have turned into a brown thumb.

They are ventilated and the temp is fine, as is the Ph and food for each side.

I NEED HELP from people that know what is gowing wrong all of a sudden.

I will await your answers, and I will be grateful to all that want to help. It's not like I can show people an ask, "What do you think?" It's still pretty underground here, although dancing through doctors will get you a prescription if you need it. I do, as a doctor treated me with medication for ten years, and it made the disks in my back soft and four to explode. I lost the use of my legs for a while, but fought on my own to walk again. I was proud of my growing abilities, but this is getting me really depressed.

I welcome responses from all brothers and sisters out there. PLEASE!!!. I cleaned the room top to bottom.

What is the deal?

Rockwool needs to be soaked for 24 hrs in plain water pH'd to 5.0. Shake all the water out before you put the germinated seed in the cube.

Water by "dipping" a bottom corner of the rockwool in a bucket of plain water ph'd to 5.8. Rockwool holds a lot of water and is very easiy to overwater.

When you see roots coming out the bottom of the cube you can put in your flood system with very weak nutes.

Hope this helps....

I have heared about soaking the rockwool, but I never needed it before. Should I use distilled water? Also I read somewhere that I should plant as soon as the seed cracks open a bit and I see a bit of root, while others say to wait until the seeds have a bit of a tail. What do you think? It seems like if I wait to long, germination has them growing out of their seed, so I have to watch them really closely. Plus, it seems like if I first soak the seed in paper towels they do well, but they grow even better when they are drying out a bit, then before you know it, they have grown out of the seed and they won't do well.

I wonder why it was going so well before and all I had to do was germinate and treat them like children, a habit I have to get back to as it seems to help, but as I have been trying everything, I have kept out of there for a couple days at a time. Even singing to them seems to help. Plus CO2 a couple of times and nematodes to really take all the bugs away.

I will try and let you know, but tell me what you think about when to put them in the rockwool, with a tail, or just when the seed starts to crack? If the tail is too long, it looks like they were drowned or got some kind of disease. I hate when I see that a root is starting to look like it's done for because of a reason that I have no idea. I have read everything, and everyone has differing opinions. How is your garden grown?

Sounds like your water is bad.
Are you using tap water?

I have a Reverse Osmosis system that I use. Reverse Osmosis systems are relatively inexpensive these days. You can pick up a decent RO system for about $200.
I have learned that you can have:
The best lighting, air quality, nutrient, and experience. But if you have shitty water, then everything else won't mean diddly.

BongJuice said:

Sounds like your water is bad.

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BJ, on precisely what information are you making this guess that her tapwater's bad? I've read IAAAL's posts top to bottom looking for anything about water and not finding anything remarkable.

This much I'll tell you- if you can drink water from any given source, it'll grow fine plants. The only real evil in any tapwater is sodium in excess of 150mg/L; in many cases, it won't exceed 50mg/L- most often, it's lower. Consult your local water util's website for analysis data.

In >99.999% of cases, tapwater is just fine and RO/distilled/etc water simply isn't necessary. I've been at this >20 years and I have yet to see tapwater from a modern municipal water treatment plant cause any problems in a hydro op. There's an undercurrent of pure myth around here that tapwater is somehow foul and evil. Makes you wonder how plants have gotten on with all that nasty, unfiltered RAINWATER for a few thousand years, donit?

Now, IAAAL, how wet are you keeping the RW you are putting your sprout in? Saturated isn't good. As you noted, they were doing better in the paper towel while they were drying out a little. The trick with small plants in RW (be they clones or seedlings) is keeping the medium damp, never wet or saturated. If your RW is too wet, the sprout may be stretching, searching for some digs that are a little dryer. Cannabis hates 'wet feet.'

Stretch can also be caused by excessively high temps or low light. You mention your general setup and lighting; all sounds great, but you don't tell us specifically what your temp & RH are.

Seedlings should get a slightly warmer than usual air temp, about 28C. RH isn't as critical but should be higher than lower if you have control over it, 60-80% for now. Fluoros are sufficient for seedlings until they have a couple pair of 'true' leaves, then they can be introduced to HID light at a fairly long spacing until the plants are acclimated to the stronger light.

The sprout can go into the RW cube as soon as the taproot is about 3-5mm long; shouldn't be allowed to get any longer.

Yes, your RW cubes should be soaked for 24h before use in water adjusted to 5.0. This acidic, low pH pre-soak solution is intended to react with the limestone dust which remains in the material after mfg, thus stabilising pH later on. However, 5.0 is too low for the plants, so remove as much of this soln as possible from the cubes with a salad spinner or by shaking water out of the cube with a sharp snap of the wrist. The salad spinner is preferred, prevents 'tennis elbow' if you're shaking water out of a lot of cubes, removes more of the pre-soaking soln as well.

Subsequent watering should be done with water adjusted to 5.8 and with 50% grade H2O2 @ 1ml/L. A bucket of clone watering soln should be re-dosed with H2O2 every 3-4 days.

Handwater cubes with seedlings or clones by dipping a corner of the cube in your bucket of 5.8 water for a second or two. They won't be ready for automated watering until they have a decent spray of roots out of the cube bottoms.

I suspect saturated RW as the problem here. 40mm cubes weigh 5g dry and about 20-25g when 'damp' and not saturated. Saturation drives all air out of the RW media, which is necessary for healthy, vigorous root formation.

HEY I am... your absolute best move is to listen to Al .... look for his threads under Al b. fuct.... you just cant go wrong with hi advice... good luck

thankx toasty. I hope the information itself carries my posts, not my reputation.

Ya ...who gives a sh#t about your rep.. i just want to milk ya for all those marbles rolling around in you box car.....lol

Al B. Fuct said:

In >99.999% of cases, tapwater is just fine and RO/distilled/etc water simply isn't necessary. I've been at this >20 years and I have yet to see tapwater from a modern municipal water treatment plant cause any problems in a hydro op. There's an undercurrent of pure myth around here that tapwater is somehow foul and evil. Makes you wonder how plants have gotten on with all that nasty, unfiltered RAINWATER for a few thousand years, donit?

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First off I don't want to sound like I'm attacking your 20 years experience. It really sounds like you know what your talking about when it comes to growing weed.
But, your wrong about tap water.
Yes....Tap water will grow plants just fine.
Using reverse osmosis water will grow plants also. The benefit of using reverse osmosis water it won't mess up the electrical conductivity like tap water does.
I don't want to get into a long schpeel on all the mathematical equations on why reverse osmosis has been proven to do better than tap water. But I can say that I'm getting about a third more yield now than I did when I was using tap water.
I don't know about you or anyone else but when I grow a crop I spend about 300-400 dollars in total nutrient from vegg to bloom.....I only buy the best. My grow space is not that big, so when I grow a crop, I want to have the most yield I can get possible.
I only grow 4 plants at a time and with 4 plants I usually get anywhere's in between 500-600 grams.
So spending a measeley 200 dollars on a RO system to have the best water is a good decision.......Plus I'm really stoned right now so I'm going to end this right here.

BongJuice said:

But, your wrong about tap water.
Yes....Tap water will grow plants just fine.
Using reverse osmosis water will grow plants also. The benefit of using reverse osmosis water it won't mess up the electrical conductivity like tap water does.
I don't want to get into a long schpeel on all the mathematical equations on why reverse osmosis has been proven to do better than tap water. But I can say that I'm getting about a third more yield now than I did when I was using tap water.

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I never said that you can't grow plants with RO, I'm just saying that in the vast majority of cases, it's simply not necessary.

Far too many growers on here are utterly convinced tapwater is poison and contains all manner of inherent evils. Fact is, it simply doesn't and you can verify that by checking water analysis data on the water util's website.

Water from modern municipal water treatment plants in 1st world nations is monitored 24/7 to assure safety for human consumption. You can wager fat cash safely that if you can drink it, you can grow fine plants with it.

I hate to suggest it, but unless you have compared parallel, simultaneous grows in the same room on both tap & RO water, you haven't made a reliable comparison. A lot of time passes, many other conditions change in the process including ambient air intake temps & RH, but not least of all, your memory fades from crop to crop.

Do a side by side grow & post the results. It'd make very interesting reading.

Hey,
Thanks for all the advice. I really do think that saturation is a problem. The start looking beautiful, and then as the stem hits the side of the rookwoll, they start gowing brown, and no matter what I do, nothing saves them.

But you think I am still doing the right thing by planting when tey have a tail, or the shell is cracked with a bit of root showing?

I am only flushing it for four minutes a say, but I guess that's too much. I also check my tap water. It's just so strange that I'm sort of "impotent" right now with growing. I did so beautifully for years, had every kind doing well, except I pollinated my own girls once by not showering and changing clothes after looking at my four-way male.

I will take any and all advice, as it's getting really frustrating. Really, it used to look like they were going to scream, "Feed me!" because they were lush with sensational colas.

The gift is gone. But I will try saturating rw. The tiny sprouts do stretch, and I bet it's because they are too wet. I have read everything, and everyone was wrong before I started, as I did really well, like I was a natural.

So, anyone else have anything that they think will help me? Tail on seeds, or when they crack and have a bit of root? Best food? Nutrients?
I have had to take these pitiful sprouts, prop them up, and take whatever lovely flowers they make, usually a qu. or just popcorn, and I had a white rhino, dammit!

I want to be able to send all the photos of my incredibly lovely ladies. Plus, my room is really something to behold. We got the plans for it at The Museum for Majiuana and Hashish in Amsterdam.

Plus, I can't taste shwag for a second, as I tell people I get mine from really far out. I share, but don't sell. I miss the keef, oh everything!

Any an all advice will be taken how it's given.

Pleace, Love, and non stop laughter,
Heather

Sorry for the typos. I re-read your posts, Al., And I think I will follow your bible for a little while. And I flush them three times a day, not one. Sorry.

But, you never know when someone who know their stuff and one would never know it, you should see how innocent I look, and I can help when they have a real plant. But my sprouts, very embarrassing. I still welcome all advice. Thanks all. Good people.

Heather

The only prob i have with the tapwater is down here it is 8.8!it causes the nutes to be chemically binded into harmful sodium buildup and Locks the nutes,i have to use a shitload of down

purpdaddy said:

The only prob i have with the tapwater is down here it is 8.8!

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Today, mine's 8.5.

it causes the nutes to be chemically binded into harmful sodium buildup and Locks the nutes,

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Sorry, that's total gibberish. WTF are you on about?

i have to use a shitload of down

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Which is phosphoric acid; flowering plants love the added P.

I don't see what your problem is.

Al B. Fuct said:

Today, mine's 8.5.



Sorry, that's total gibberish. WTF are you on about?
the ph of the nute solution controls the availabilty of ions that cannabis needs to assimilate.When the ph is above 7 or below 5.5 some nutes are not absorbed as fast as possible is what im on.


Which is phosphoric acid; flowering plants love the added P.
yes i know it is p2o5 and yes they do love it

I don't see what your problem is.

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i have no prob right now but you telling me i dont know what i am talking bout.ive never mislead anyone on this site and never will.

im sorry ..let me make myself aliitle more clea .it doesnt lockup all the available nutes. your roots just cant take in as mutch as needed when ur ph is that high is all im saying.Do you habe any literature of any sort?
And im mot telling anyone what to do by far but i will give other advice before someone goes spend all that money on hps or mh when you dont have o.will the yeild be better,yes but like i said we have to work with what we got thats all.

purpdaddy said:

i have no prob right now but you telling me i dont know what i am talking bout.ive never mislead anyone on this site and never will.

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While I don't think you actually intended to mislead anyone with this comment...

it causes the nutes to be chemically binded into harmful sodium buildup and Locks the nutes

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...it's total nonsense.

purpdaddy said:

im sorry ..let me make myself aliitle more clea .it doesnt lockup all the available nutes. your roots just cant take in as mutch as needed when ur ph is that high is all im saying.

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Which is quite true. Why didn't you just say that instead?

Do you habe any literature of any sort?

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Lots. What sort do you want?

And im mot telling anyone what to do by far but i will give other advice before someone goes spend all that money on hps or mh when you dont have o.will the yeild be better,yes but like i said we have to work with what we got thats all.

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As a matter of fact, HID lighting IS necessary for any competent grow. If you're flowering with CFLs, you're wasting your time. You're simply playing. The results will be thin, weedy buds. A small HPS will kick the pants off of any available CFL for yield in g/W as well as density and resin yield, simple at that.

It is false economy to flower with CFLs. The results are always poor. Might as well get the right stuff from day one.

Al B. Fuct said:

While I don't think you actually intended to mislead anyone with this comment...



...it's total nonsense.

its not total nonsense and you need to read more updated material that shit ur reading is old

Which is quite true. Why didn't you just say that instead?



Lots. What sort do you want?
none that you get info from


As a matter of fact, HID lighting IS necessary for any competent grow. If you're flowering with CFLs, you're wasting your time. You're simply playing. The results will be thin, weedy buds. A small HPS will kick the pants off of any available CFL for yield in g/W as well as density and resin yield, simple at that.

It is false economy to flower with CFLs. The results are always poor. Might as well get the right stuff from day one.

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hid lighting is not a necessity. you are pissing in the wind using hid and cfl.
and maybe i shoul have bought better stuff,,which i just did..the bubbleponics setup with a 400w hps\mh conversion.
We were just tring to work with what we already have and ur telling gypsy togo get hps when she just got cfl's?

purpdaddy said:

hid lighting is not a necessity.

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Oh yes it is- unless you just LIKE thin, fluffy buds.

you are pissing in the wind using hid and cfl.

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Who suggested doing that? I certainly didn't. Indeed, adding CFLs to a grow with HPS is like adding a model airplane engine to your 747.

We were just tring to work with what we already have and ur telling gypsy togo get hps when she just got cfl's?

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With luck, receipts were kept so extraneous, dim CFLs can be returned for refund. Just because you have something doesn't make it the right thing to use. Flowering with CFLs will result in disappointment, every time.

Hey Al, I still don't understand about soaking the rockwool. Are you talking the bigger rw or the little blocls that I put in the hole on the bigger one? It seems like that would make more sense, as you said that sprouts don't like "wet feet'. How can I keep them from having wet feet when the little wool is soaked for twenty four hours? Please don't think I am being obtuse, or just trying your patience, but this way is new after being able to do it without any tricks.

If you could just explain a bit more about which to soak, and if I should let it saok into the bigger rw or what? Thank you so much. You guys are great ans are being so helpful.

Heather a.k.a. Drama Queen