Need Some Guidance

[RetiredOLDGuy]

Long time fan but 1st time growing. The larger plant has the problem. I have:

4x4 tent
600 Watt
Unknow strain
the 2 smaller plants were late starters since I cut down an obvious male plant
45 days vegetative
5 days into bloom (12/12)
ph just under 7.0
Using distilled water
temp ~82 degrees
each pot has a different mix of soil but the larger plant MG Natures Care, perilite.
I try to keep moisture level on the low end of moist
Started using Advanced Nutrients (Micro, Grow, Bloom)
Just added some dolomite limestone when ph started to drop a bit
Just added diluted solution of Ironite (about 10 oz) (I know, I'm starting to panic)

All the plants appear healthy, except the larger plant began with the spots about a week ago. Not sure what to do next. Any help would be appreciate.

 

[DeanB]

Since you added the limestone, wait and see if any more leaves like that show up, you may have fixed the problem.

 

[RetiredOLDGuy]

Thanks for the post. It looks like the limestone did the trick. I'm in grow day 66 and bloom day 23. I've been removing the damaged leaves as new growth appears over time. Do you think its better to just remove all the damaged leaves at once or gradually over time? Two of my three plants appear to be females but the third plant looks to be a male. Thoughts on removing the male or should I keep it around? I've done a fair amount of pruning, are you able to do anything with the removed leaves and male plants?

 

[Twox]

The last two pics are definitely male.... if you keep him in the tent with your ladies I can guarantee he's going to Pollenate them and your going to end up with tons of seeds... unless your breeding I would kill him outside your grow room asap.... He looks ripe and he will probably pop any day know..

 

[RetiredOLDGuy]

Thanks for the advice. I was concerned about the male and I removed it.

 

[Emilya Green]

Thanks for the post. It looks like the limestone did the trick. I'm in grow day 66 and bloom day 23. I've been removing the damaged leaves as new growth appears over time. Do you think its better to just remove all the damaged leaves at once or gradually over time? Two of my three plants appear to be females but the third plant looks to be a male. Thoughts on removing the male or should I keep it around? I've done a fair amount of pruning, are you able to do anything with the removed leaves and male plants?

I am concerned about your pH; it is way too high. The usable range in soil is 6.3-6.8... and you say you adjust yours to 7. That is out of the range, and likely the cause of your deficiency.

I also don't think that you have watered correctly in veg, and now your weak root system is having troubles. That dramatic clawing that you show in your picture looks to be the result of either over doing the nutrients, or damaged roots... I am very worried about your plants.

I think that you have a big problem, but it is so hard to tell what is going on in that yellow HPS light. A couple of natural light shots of the entire plant would help a lot in diagnosing this problem, and to do that, you must leave the damage leaves on.

Think of it this way... your plant is needing some nutrition that happens to be stored in your lower leaves. The plant cannibalizes those leaves for what it needs for the upper growth, slowly using up all the goodness in those storehouse. If you remove that now damaged leaf, the plant has no choice but to go to the next leaf up the stem for that same emergency dose of nutrients. You have not solved anything by removing the damaged leaf, you have just made the problem worse (less leaves to gather light) and moved it up the stem. Also, when you have a problem like this, it is nice to have a way to see if/when you have solved it. If you have removed all of your canaries from the gold mine, no one is left to let you know what is going on. By removing those leaves, you have just blinded yourself. To answer your question about removing leaves... you should not.... not gradually or all at once.... simply let them fall off or totally get eaten up before you remove them. We prune in order to open up the center and let the plant get air, and to get blocking leaves out of the way of buds that will develop... but removing leaves just to make us feel better about how the plant looks... that is totally counterproductive.

I think that combined with your pH maladjustment, the distilled water is also not helping. Using MG, you have no need to use distilled water, its not like you have an organic grow with active microlife. Distilled water has nothing in it but water... and you don't appear to be adding magnesium in your mix. I suggest that you also need to add some calmag+ to your routine. Get that pH down into the usable range, stop watering so often and let them dry out between waterings, and add some calmag... That is what I would do to fix this grow anyway... let us know what happens!

 

[RetiredOLDGuy]

Thanks for the information. I'm waiting for the delivery of a better PH meter. I do think my PH is under 7.0, but based on your comments, I need a more accurate reading. I will adjust my nutrients based on your suggestions. Also, I usually water every 3 or 4 days based on the moisture in the soil. I'll get some better pics soon. Thanks, again.

 

[Emilya Green]

Thanks for the information. I'm waiting for the delivery of a better PH meter. I do think my PH is under 7.0, but based on your comments, I need a more accurate reading. I will adjust my nutrients based on your suggestions. Also, I usually water every 3 or 4 days based on the moisture in the soil. I'll get some better pics soon. Thanks, again.

Yes, a better pH meter is going to help a lot. How do you measure how much moisture is in the soil? Where is the water table line when you do this? Are you using the lift method a meter or your fingers to measure this moisture?

 

[RetiredOLDGuy]

I've been using a meter to measure moisture in the soil. Also, have some pics to share, I hope they can give a better view. Thanks.

 

[Emilya Green]

how far down do you measure with that meter? Do you attempt to use it to determine the position of the water table, thereby the depth of the water standing in the container?

 

[RetiredOLDGuy]

I set the probe about 2" from the bottom of the pot.

 

[Emilya Green]

I set the probe about 2" from the bottom of the pot.

That's not bad, but still not perfect when growing a weed that needs to dry out all the way to the bottom and get oxygen to those roots. If you waited for the water table to get all the way to the bottom you would find optimum growth, but measuring 2" from the bottom is not awful, it just keeps the big feeder roots submerged, and this over time can be a problem, especially once you are in your final container. I am convinced after your explaining as to how you do this however, that this is not contributing to the problem you are seeing, and I am more confident that your only real error has been in your pH. You are soon going to fix this problem, and I think you will see that your symptoms will stop progressing as soon as you get it under control. I also challenge you to experiment a bit with that water table idea, and actually let your plants go all the way dry a couple of times to see how vigorously they respond to it.

 

[Emilya Green]

let me follow up my last by saying that this teasing out the water and the roots is how you treat our weeds in veg.... now that you are in flower, the rules need to change a bit. Now it is time to use those roots that you have teased out in veg... and by about the 2nd week of flower, the roots are done expanding... you got what you got and they have to serve you for the rest of flower. At that point, it is time to determine how fast you can get your plants to use the amount of water that you can suspend in those containers of soil... and usually by the 3rd week of flower I have settled in on an every 2 or 3 day watering schedule, which almost always shortens to every other day by the 6th week of flower, and the plants are actually drying out the containers between waterings, no matter the size of those containers. It is certainly not easy watering every other day, and I could get by with doing it less, but I have learned that the more water and nutes I can get them to uptake, the bigger my buds are going to be.

So, once the stretch is over and you are solidly in flower, it really now is important to aggressively water, and using your water meter should show you a rapid use of that water. I know it is confusing, but watering a plant in veg should be done completely differently than a plant in flower, and it took me years to figure out that when it comes to this plant, hard and fast rules that apply all throughout the grow season are hard if not impossible to pin down. We have to learn to adapt to what the plant needs, and that changes depending on where you are at in the grow.

 

[RetiredOLDGuy]

Thanks for all the information. Finally got the digital meter and tested to the bottom and the pots dry throughout. However, the PH is low...between 5.0 and 5.5. I was thinking of making a water/limestone mix, to try and raise the PH. Thoughts? The good news is that the plants look healthy. Again, thanks.

 

[Emilya Green]

Thanks for all the information. Finally got the digital meter and tested to the bottom and the pots dry throughout. However, the PH is low...between 5.0 and 5.5. I was thinking of making a water/limestone mix, to try and raise the PH. Thoughts? The good news is that the plants look healthy. Again, thanks.

Don't try to adjust the soil pH... leave that to the soil designers. Just make sure that the pH of all of your incoming fluids is correct, and the soil takes care of itself. As soon as you start adding stuff that permanently sits in that soil that Miracle Grow designed, you are going to knock it all out of whack and will have troubles from that point on. Trust the soil that brought you this far... it's too late to try to "fix" it now.