Old growth dying but plant is still growing at fast rate?

So this is basically my 2nd overall grow and my first ever hydro grow. Ive run into a few issues with the person I am working with so I am losing faith in my plants and my partner. Im growing a strain that's supposed to be girl scout cookie. I have her in a 35 gallon tote but I only fill up the reservoir with 10gals of my nutrient mixture. My main goal was to keep my plants in a vegetative state so i could clip clones from them in two week cycles. Im using a 1000w Ballast with a 1000w Hortilux MH. The temperature is usually around 78-83 degrees and the RH is unmeasured. The nutes i am using are General Hydroponics Flora Micro, GH Flora Gro, Superthrive, Rhizotonic, Hygrozyme. I change my reservoir once every 7 days. Ive included some pics of my plant and if anyone can provide me with some advice on what im lacking or using too much of before i lose my entire plant I would appreciate it extremely.

Hey SmokingCali3,

What I'm seeing in your pictures looks exactly like the problem I had. In my situation I used soil and let the plants sit in the run-off.

I would recommend checking the PH of your nutrient mix. Its also a good idea to check the PH of the water from your tap prior to mixing in the nutrients.

Don't skimp on a PH tester, you will probably have to drop $100 bucks to get a good one, trust me its worth it to get accurate readings.

Are you always running nutrients in your setup or do you go one week on and one week off? You may be over feeding.

Hey unknown1231

Thanks for responding so quickly! I was thinking i was overfeeding them too but when i checked the PPM i usually keep it in between 900-1100. I checked the PH of the water i am using before i add nutes and after i add them. Im using PH test indicator drops.

Ive been running nutes consistently for about 42 days now. The last time i changed the water i did not add nutes because im going to cut clones then i was going to add nutes back into my setup. The PPM in my reservoir right now is 458.

I wish I could comment on the ppm of the reservoir but I've never run hydro. I'm paranoid about having too little time to react in the event of a problem. Also, I don't have a UPS or generator if I lose electricity.

I advise against PH drops, especially if your nutrients have color to them. I use all organic nutes, they have a dark color so the PH drops are almost useless with them... (in my opinion ;] ) You should be able to pickup a nice electronic PH tester at the local hydro store, go grab one! Well worth the investment.

I agree, ph drops is not acurate enough expecially when your nutes add to the color, better off buy a good ph meter, it's well worth it, you say you change your reservoir every 7 days but do you test your ph each day? generally ph will rise almost after each feeding, I run hydro myself and notice that it does.

Hey DeeTee thanks for responding,

You know what you are right i need to invest in a true PH meter because when i had the GH flora micro nute its dark and that would make it impossible to see the color change when i test. I usually test my PH every few days. Im going to test the PH now brb. Thanks again for weighing in DeeTee

Edit:
I should have said ph rises or lowers after each feeding, whatever the case may be I always check it every day.

Actually the drops are more accurate than electric ph testers, unless your nutes are really adding that much color. PH you're water and nutes, test your run off, and go to Lowes or Home Depot and by a soil tester. If that all comes out OK, then it's mostlikely deficiency problem (which I'm willing to bet it is)...

To explain the most likely reason why your bottom leaves could possibly be dying while your new growth is perfectly fine is because of a nute deficiency. To go into detail, only certain nutes (Nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K), magnesium (Mg), and zinc (Zn)) are "Mobile". That is, they are able to be moved from one part of the plant to another part of the plant that needs it more. So, for example, if you have a N deficiency in your plant and being that N is a Mobile nutrient, your plant will virtually suck the N out from your lower growth and transfer it to the newer growth. The same would be true if you had a deficiency of any of the other mobile nutrients P, K, Mg, and/or Zn.


From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_nutrition

Nutrients are moved inside a plant to where they are most needed. For example, a plant will try to supply more nutrients to its younger leaves than its older ones. So when nutrients are mobile, the lack of nutrients is first visible on older leaves. However, not all nutrients are equally mobile. When a less mobile nutrient is lacking, the younger leaves suffer because the nutrient does not move up to them but stays lower in the older leaves. Nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium are mobile nutrients, while the others have varying degrees of mobility. This phenomenon is helpful in determining what nutrients a plant may be lacking.

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Jorge Cervantes book Marijuan a Horticulture: The Indoor/Outdoor MEDICAL Grower’s Bible also goes into detail about this.

Mobile nutrients-nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K), magnesium (Mg), and zinc (Zn)-are able to translocate, move from one portion of the plant to another as needed. For example, nitrogen accumulated in older leaves translocates to younger leaves to solve a deficiency. The result, deficiency symptoms appear on the older, lower leaves first. Immobile nutrients-calcium (Ca), boron (B), chlorine (Cl), cobalt (Co), copper (Cu), iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), molybdenum (Mo), silicon (Si) and sulfur (S)-do not translocate to new growing areas as needed. They remain deposited in their original place in older leaves. This is the reason deficiency symptoms appear first in the upper, new leaves on top of the plant. Mobile nutrients translocate within a plant. They move to the specific part of the plant where they are needed; this causes the older leaves to show deficiencies first.

Jorge Cervantes Marijuana Horticulture: The Indoor/Outdoor MEDICAL Grower’s Bible (Kin Van Patten Publishing.)

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Now you have to figure out the reason for your deficiency. It could be a PH problem that's causing the nutrient(s) in question to be unavailable to your plants, or it could simply be that you aren't supplying your plants with enough Nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, magnesium, and/or zinc.

Its N and mg def due to the ph being wrong, s/b 5.8. You need a digital meter for growing hydro, even if its just a $20 one to start with. After a while you can do it by eye with no meter, Ive adjusted that many feeds I know exactly how much down to put in without a meter and my plants are beautiful.

Awesome thank you so much for the feedback doniboy and buds. I'm going to buy a digital tester but I will continue to use the drops for now because the nutes I'm using don't color the water much to where I can't notice the reaction color from the drops. I hope all is not lost with my baby. I know this plant is a beast and I'm eager to see and try the end result

I'm still working to get the PH under control as it continues to fluctuate. I added another 5gal of my nute mix with the previous mix I had in the resovoir and now the PH is stead at around 6.0-6.5 with a PPM of roughly 850-900. If I don't see any improvement in a few days I'm going to dump my resovoir and put in another 10gals of fresh water/nutes mix with a more balanced PH. I've also purchased a thermometer so I can keep an eye on the water temp since the temp of my grow room is in the high 80s.

So I managed to get the PH stable in the 5.0 range but I'm still having high res temp issues and root rot. This is my first fight with root rot and I've concluded with my research that I can treat with pondzyme,greatwhite, or erythromycin. I added another 4 inch air stone and I have started to add H2o2 with 1gal of water to my res every 3 days. I'm also going add blocks of ice to cool my res. here are some recent pics of my roots and plants. Also had an idea of transferring them from DWC to fox farm soil. Would this be a smart move?

Bad news so i tried unsuccessfully to try and save my baby. Ive read countless threads and books but i could not get my res temp down. I wasnt able to get a portable A/C in time so i transfered my baby to fox farm soil and treated with a mix of B1, rhizotonic, and H2o2 but it was not enough RIP this is my first DWC and my first fail. My room temp would be on average mid 80s and my res temp would be mid 70s because of my HPS.