Nute Issues Please Help

[EvlDed]

Hello All,

Been lurking for a while and soaking up as much as possible.
Finally ran into my first issue that I can't beat.

Stats:
Growing bagseed (Possibly SAGE)
Fox Farm Grow - Ocean Forest Soil, Big Bloom, Tiger Bloom.
4tsp Tiger Bloom, 8tsp Big Bloom per Gallon, 2-3 times per week.
(I know this seems like a lot, but i'm seeing deficiencies and not burn..Please read on)
Flush with FF Sledgehammer every 4 weeks.
Water Ph into soil is 6.5, run off is roughly 5.8-6.0
Flowering under a 600w Diamond LED from AdvancedLED.

History:
I will post pics of three different plants, all in flower, all clones from the same mother.
No issues while cloning or vegging, all healthy and vibrant.
Clones vegged for roughly 10 days before moving into flower.
Upon moving into flower, transplanted to 2 gallon pots.
First 2 weeks of flower go off without a hitch.
by the second week I begin to notice a slight yellowing between the veins of lower leaves.

2nd week Exmple 1:

2nd week Example 2:

By the 4th week of flower I get red/purple stems.
I begin to see definitive signs of a Phosphorus def.
(Small brown necrotic spots on the edges of the leaves slowly moving inward)
I have kicked up the Phosphorus and no improvement.

4th week Example 1:

4th week Example 2:

By the 5th week I'm basically losing most of my large fan leaves.
All symptoms above begin to creep into all smaller leaves from the middle of the plant and down.
Runoff Ph is slightly lower but never below 5.5.
I have upped my dose of Big Bloom to 10tsp with no effect.

5th week Example 1:

5th week Example 2:

Last for you I have the sad and unfortunate first clone that was flowered.
She is just destroyed by the slow progression of whatever evil is afflicting these poor girls! Please help!

Sad:

Sad 2:

-Evlded

 

[GrowBigInc]

A couple suggestions. With your pH going in at 6.5 and coming out 5.8-6.0 makes me concerned your soil pH might be too low. The intervienal yellowing might be a Mg deficiency. A low soil pH can increase this problem. The spotting looks like it might be a calcium deficiency. Most grow stores sell a calcium-magnesium solution. A quick and dirty check on your soil pH is to get some distilled water and check its pH, put some of your soil into a jar with some of the distilled water, shake it up, let it sit a couple minutes and recheck the pH. This wont till you the soil pH but will let you know if it is out of whack. Good luck.

 

[JB42]

Yeah man Growbig right, just what I was thinking cal/mag deff. Like he said you need your feed to be around the 6.5 mark in soil your is more of a hydro pH which is wrong in soil and cal/mag gets locked out anything lower than 6.5. If the foods your feeding has cal/mag then get the pH in check by flushing with 6.5 water then feed half strength and go from there. I add dolomite lime to my soil mixes to keep my cal/mag in natural supply and it keeps the pH in range mostly.

Anothe fast fix for that dilemma is epson salts which you can apply as a folia feed to your girls for a quick fix and pH is no concern, but a budding plant is with foliar feed as it may change the taste of your bud.

Hope this helps , peace!!

 

[JB42]

Seen as its got that bad, another quick fix would be to re-pot, I know its flowering but you can do it gently and a bigger pot and new pH correct medium will defo help, re-pot always sorts that. I wouldnt add the lime to the new mix as the plant is not too far off done and the lime will still be there after the flush. Just do a nice re-pot , bigger pot , remove and seriously damaged leaves and just water until it shows it needs some food as the new soil will already have nutes in probably.

 

[TorturedSoul]

get some distilled water and check its pH

No need to check the pH of distilled water - it's 7.0. It's not really good to place your pH meter's probe into 0ppm water. A quick dip won't hurt, but don't soak it for any length of time as it'll leach the probe; keeping it out of distilled water in general... It's just good practice, lol, and a good habit to get into.

 

[EvlDed]

Thanks for the advice everyone! I'll flush with plain 6.5 Ph water tomorrow and cross my fingers. I'll update you as things progress! Thanks Again!

 

[Icemud]

No need to check the pH of distilled water - it's 7.0. It's not really good to place your pH meter's probe into 0ppm water. A quick dip won't hurt, but don't soak it for any length of time as it'll leach the probe; keeping it out of distilled water in general... It's just good practice, lol, and a good habit to get into.

Actually distilled water is not always PH7..... When "Pure" water is exposed to the air, or even in the bottle with air trapped in it, the Hydrogen Ions are absorbed into the water which raises the PH.... I test my distilled water all the time just to know where I'm at...same exact brand has read anywhere from 7.3ph to as high as 8.5ph... its always good to have your PH meter calibration solutions and use them at least every 2 weeks to make sure your readings are accurate. Also make sure your electrode's don't dry out, and store in cleaning solutions only.

Ph also fluctuates with temperature, at a very minute level...but PH 7 is not always neutral...only around 77degrees F.

 

[TorturedSoul]

Yeah, temperature variations don't have a huge impact on pH (with our application). Still, an ATC meter is nice, lol.

I knew that the pH of distilled/deionized water was "at the balance point" and like most things in balance, was apt to change easily. Pure water has no buffers. The carbonic acid-bicarbonate equilibrium when CO2 in the air interacts with the water that is exposed to it, for example, ends up causing a lowered pH situation. But I was not aware that the change could be so much (the pH scale is, after all, logarithmic). A pH of 8.5 seems high. If I bought the water in containers, I'd be wondering if it was really distilled or just filtered and bottled, lol.

Incidentally, thanks for mentioning that the electrodes should always be stored wet. After rereading my text, I saw that I was somewhat unclear and that some might think I meant to not store it in anything instead of not storing it in distilled water. I use Milwaukee storage solution (I assume that it's a standard 3 mol/l KCl solution?). I have read that one gram of KCl in 200 ml of pH 4.01 calibration/buffer solution works and that in a pinch one could store in pH 7 calibration solution "for a short time." I cannot offer an opinion about storing it in electrode cleaning solution (I don't remember offhand what it actually is... Have to go look at the label on my bottle one of these days).

EDIT: BtW, I found a page a while back that may be helpful in understanding pH. It's at pH Scale if anyone wants to check it out (Elmhurst College).