4th Week Flower And Problems With WPM

[DaKindbuds]

like I said I'm in the 4th week of flower and my girls all have WPM to some degree. what should I do? I'm sure its to late to spray Nuke 'Em this organic product I have on them. So should I just wait till harvest and do a bud wash? Advice would be appreciated.

 

[Farang]

WPM? words per minute?

 

[DaKindbuds]

Funny

 

[iwltfum]

Are you talking about powdery mildew? IF you are then I would get a bacillus subtilis based spray like Serande. One or two times spraying should resolve the issue as long as it's still in the early stages of infestation. If it continues later into flower and gets on the buds you will want to use calcium bicarbonate or sodium bicarbonate(baking soda) to spot spray mold sites on your buds. Set your sprayer to stream blast mode and knock the spores off the buds with the bicarbonate solution This will change the ph of the spot you spray, effectively making it so the mold cannot grow in that spot. After harvest, vaporize sulfur prill to kill the spores in the walls, floor, ceiling, and equipment. You don't want to mess around with this stuff and hope it just gets better without making an attempt to stop it in it's tracks

EDIT: Its been so long since I've had to do this so I can't remember the concentration of bicarbonate. Looking through my notes now.

 

[iwltfum]

Looks like I was using about a teaspoon of calcium bicarbonate in a quart of water. Make damn sure your room humidity is not above 45% if you decide to do this and then keep a very close eye on it to make sure the humidity comes back down below 50% within a couple hours after spraying. Be ready for some dehumidification if it stays above 50 or 60% for a day or more.
Probably not a good idea for the novice grower

 

[DaKindbuds]

Thanks, I was talking about white powdery mildew. I was tired of waiting and decided to take action. I initially just cut off all leaves with it on it and that seemed to work on a couple strains for the moment but some were bad enough that I wasn't comfortable taking off every leaf that had WPM on it so I made a vinegar/water solution at 1 part vinegar to 10 parts water and simply took a paper towel dipped in the solution and wiped the mildew off of the leaves. I have read about the baking soda solution but read its messy and I'm a little concerned about getting any moisture on my buds I have managed to get the RH to stay around 39-44% with spikes going as high as 49-50% for an hour or two during the hottest part of the day when its like 95f outside. Its a little frustrating because I added an exhaust and a dehumidifier to my flower room and the RH is still too high for my liking. Any tips? I've read that you want to get your Rh down to around 15-20% the last weeks is this not necessary? Anyways , thanks for the feedback

 

[DaKindbuds]

iwitfum I was looking through your pics and your plants are looking good, I like that SnowWreck DWC Scrog. Maybe If I flipped them smaller like you the RH wouldn't be as much of a problem. Maybe 14 10gal. trees in my flower room is too much, but wouldn't having twice as many smaller plants do the same for my rooms RH?

 

[iwltfum]

iwitfum I was looking through your pics and your plants are looking good, I like that SnowWreck DWC Scrog. Maybe If I flipped them smaller like you the RH wouldn't be as much of a problem. Maybe 14 10gal. trees in my flower room is too much, but wouldn't having twice as many smaller plants do the same for my rooms RH?

It's possible that less canopy surface area could drop the humidity, because of less transpiration, but that's not an option for most people because of space constraints in the first place. you could try watering them less often, but depending on your medium, that might not work. I started waiting around 28-30 hours to water my coco plants when the humidity was getting too high until they filled out the pot more and could suck down more of the water in 24hrs.

My humidity always stays between 35-55% in bloom if the room is working correctly. I've never tried to get it down to 15-20%. I don't see it really hurting anything. Your humidity seems fine by the numbers you've posted. Which tells me that It has taken quite a hold in your room. If you are religious about not spraying them in bloom, try vaporizing some sulfur prill. You can do this with a hot plate and a cheap coking pot, and sulfur prill of course, if you dot want to buy a sulfur burner. I'm sure you can find something on google about how to vaporize sulfur without a "burner". People use it for mold/bugs in their home often and I've read things about people just using their stove to vaporize the sulfur. How long you vaporize the sulfur for will depend on the volume of your space.

Funny enough, I'm dealing with mildew with my clones right now, for the first time in years. Running the sulfur burner today! WOOHOO

Hope you have some good luck dealing with this. From experience, its best not to wait.

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Sulfur is not a good choice to use in flowering due to the residue in may leave on the buds & potentially toxic if smoked !

How ever it should be ok for veg growth... but would question ventilation & extraction methods, you really don't want those fumes in your house.


RH looks fine & run with aprox myself.

I suspect the PM issue is due to poor air flow around the canopy of the plants they could be a little crowded, dense canopy with lots of leaf etc thus creating a mini micro climate in this area raising the RH.

I'm not sure where you have your RH meter is placed but RH values do change from the top to bottom of tent etc & even in the lights off period where it normally spikes.

 

[iwltfum]

FuzzyDuck, Thanks for clarifying that.

This is only my opinion based on my own experience, some of my friend's experience with this, the organic chem class that I took once, plus some research:
That's very true FuzzyDuck, but- at least in my experience- a mildew infestation cannot be stopped by just changing the conditions back to what they were supposed to be in the first place (more air flow, less humidity). In fact, with more air flow, you might just be blowing spores all over your room creating many more colonies, which could actually greatly accelerate the duplication rate of the infestation. In this particular situation(on every plant and four weeks into bloom); I would want to fire storm the stuff and be gone with it, rather than it getting into every crevasse of the bud for the next four to five weeks. On a side note, in the sate of colorado, It is highly ILlegal to pass moldy bud along to someone(as it should be). Smoking mold could be much more dangerous for your health than a little sulfur particulate. Plants need sulfur to survive as a micro nutrient, so my thinking was as long as I burned the sulfur before week 5 of bloom, the plant would have enough time to soak it up through its leaves and process it into a safe compound. Many house plants are actually used for the purpose of "filtering" the toxins out of the air and making it cleaner to breath in your home (ie spider plants, snake plants, and bamboo palms all do this extraordinarily well, but all plants filter some amount of toxins from the air and leaf surface). Sulfur dioxide can cause lung and throat irritation at moderate atmospheric concentrations, is not know to be carcinogenic by itself, but is classified as a co-carcinogen, because it can amplify the carcinogenic affects of other inhaled carcinogens like asbestos. Do not go into a space that potentially has sulfur dioxide lingering in it. Use fans (inline fans work great so you can pull air from the far side of one room or house all the way out the door with ducting and minimal exposure, but any fan will do to evacuate the room of the gas). Door and windows open during the evacuation phase. have all the tools set up and make sure your evacuation setup works before you fill the space with sulfur. I don't recommend this method if the sulfur gas could possibly find its way into a kitchen, pantry or drinking water.
Again, this is my opinion that is loosely based on my experience, my organic chem knowledge, and a bit of research. If someone who knows more about chemistry than I do has some input, I'm sure it will be much more well versed knowledge than mine.

 

[vastok]

like I said I'm in the 4th week of flower and my girls all have WPM to some degree. what should I do? I'm sure its to late to spray Nuke 'Em this organic product I have on them. So should I just wait till harvest and do a bud wash? Advice would be appreciated.

If you intend to harvest within the next 7 day I'd wait, if not apply now, and continue for as long as you dare

 

[Notchrob]

I've had it on some palms,I used a weak soap solution and wiped everything,rinsed with plain water.worked great.probably wont work on the buds,but you can do the leaves and stalks

 

[DaKindbuds]

Thanks for the feedback! Sulfur is not an option right now too much involved and I heard you cant get the taste out of the buds. I will spray if that is my only option not to have moldy bud. The thing is I have just recently in the last couple of days gotten the room RH down and airflow to where all leaves are fluttering from the fan placement and the fact that I rearranged plant placement helped airflow as well. I know cutting off all the leaves that were showing WPM hasn't rid my plants of it. I'm hesitant to use the nuke 'em because I was told that while its safe the high water content ~90% would leave me exposed to mold after the compound wears off, plus once it dries do I have to wash off the spores or do they just float off with airflow? You know, if I have to spray I will. I know I'm stuck with the mildew this round so can someone tell me exactly what I have to do to get these girls through to harvest without mold on my bud. I don't care about anything but having quality meds. But I cant do the sulfer at this point because even if I wanted to its too late I wouldn't be able to set up for it in time to get it done till half way through week 5. So if you know what steps I need to take to save my crop, please let me know. Its not visible on my buds or I'd probably jus yank them up, it was only small spots on fan leaves that weren't getting airflow because I wasn't feeling well for about a week and let things get overgrown.

 

[iwltfum]

Don't forget about Serenade (bacilus subtillis QST 713). Its a bacteria. 100% organic and OMRI listed.

 

[DaKindbuds]

I was thinking serenade but I'm broke after putting all my funds into this first grow. I already have the Nuke 'Em, so I'm just going to get a hand mister tomorrow and fog them really lightly, and try to avoid wetting the buds too much. The ingredients are citric acid- .05%, yeast(enzymes-9.43%, potassium sorbate-.02%, water-90.50%. I looked at Serenades ingredients and it looks like theres more water in that than Nuke' Em. I cant let it go any longer even though the spots are really small and since pruning all lower growth and even some of the slim branches in the center mass of the plant to increase airflow, Because I found some leaves with moisture pooled on them. I'm told its better to do it in the morning because misting at night will just perpetuate more mildew. When do you suggest I spray thanks

 

[iwltfum]

I was thinking serenade but I'm broke after putting all my funds into this first grow. I already have the Nuke 'Em, so I'm just going to get a hand mister tomorrow and fog them really lightly, and try to avoid wetting the buds too much. The ingredients are citric acid- .05%, yeast(enzymes-9.43%, potassium sorbate-.02%, water-90.50%. I looked at Serenades ingredients and it looks like theres more water in that than Nuke' Em. I cant let it go any longer even though the spots are really small and since pruning all lower growth and even some of the slim branches in the center mass of the plant to increase airflow, Because I found some leaves with moisture pooled on them. I'm told its better to do it in the morning because misting at night will just perpetuate more mildew. When do you suggest I spray thanks

I know people that use nuke'em and speak very highly of it. Can't suggest a time of day to spry it though. Too many factors like humidity and the possible magnification effects. I usually prefer to hit them during the day, no matter what I'm spraying, because room humidity can spike during the lights-off hours. But you are also risking harming your plants due to light magnification through the droplets if your lights are switched on (or at least if they are directly above the plants) when you spray. I can only speak for HID lights in this case. I don't what the affects would be with other types of lighting.

 

[DaKindbuds]

I have 4 1000w bare bulb in XXXL hoods, I don't think I should spray with them on even dimmed to 50%.I was thinking I could go in an hour earlier than lights on, to water. It's a green light on so by the scheduled time I can come I with a T5 I use for rooting so I can see while I spray. Cut off the T5 turn the green light back on an stay in there with them to rotate and make sure they dry out as quickly and thoroughly as possible. How does my plan of action sound to you?

 

[iwltfum]

That sounds like it would work, the only thing when spraying before they wake up is that they wont be as eager to soak the water up themselves and you will be relying almost completely on evaporation to dry the plants, which can raise the humidity during a time when the room is already at its peak humidity. There are a couple sides to this, like if you spray an hour before the lights turn on, you will be able to drop the humidity before it does damage, but I've still seen spikes up to 70-80%, sometimes higher, when spraying an hour before the lights turn on. On the other hand, if you have good control of your rooms humidity, you can potentially keep it below 55% while spraying during the lights-on time and it tends to drop back down much faster because the plants are using it to keep cool and the lights are heating the room, causing faster evaporation.

You could also turn one half of your lights off, spray under that half, wait 20 or 30 minutes with fans trained on the soaked area so it has a chance to evaporate. Then, once they are dry do the same for the other half. I used this method when I had mites in the bloom room, I sprayed them once a day for a week and a half and had no problems with humidity or light burn.

 

[DaKindbuds]

I went ahead and sprayed, a little behind planned time but its alright. Lights were on an hour before I got to misting. I fogged them pretty well using a single 2ft. T5 bulb for light. Then positioned the fans, put in an extra actually let them air out for half an hour rotated them aired em out another half an hour. then turned the lights a couple minutes in between set at 50%. I'm pretty happy so far, I had cut off every leaf I saw with WPM yesterday, checked again this morning while flushing prior to spraying and no signs of anymore mildew but I know those damn spores are there. I really didn't want to spray but this thread convinced me to by scaring the hell out of me. But iwitfum I must really thank you, bouncing ideas off you really helped in breaking the process down and taking some of the anxiety out of it. I know growing should be fun and easy(at least I'm told) but I've had a heck of a time getting this first grow put together and I'm all alone in this except you guys at 420. I must say though spraying did something because my girls smell factor jumped from like a 3 to a 6-7 after spraying and, tou were right RH did jump up to 73% right after spraying but I had the dehumidifier running and the A/C set to dry and RH% was already down to 55% by the time I got the lights back on. I did something very stupid though. I wrapped a paper towel around my bulbs and used a tiny piece of tape to make it stay so when I was spraying the mist wouldn't float up and get all over the bulbs and forgot it on there tu5rned on two of the lights and went back a few minutes later smelling something burning. looked all around till I realized the tape melted the paper towel burned a little and both had already fallen to the floor. Luckily that all but I'm sure it could of been really bad. Wow the smell has doubled, seriously from this same location in the house where I'm typing I couldn't smell my flower room yesterday now the smell is obvious from here. I'll just take it as a good sign after I do another check to make sure it isn't moisture burning off somewhere. thanks again

 

[iwltfum]

I went ahead and sprayed, a little behind planned time but its alright. Lights were on an hour before I got to misting. I fogged them pretty well using a single 2ft. T5 bulb for light. Then positioned the fans, put in an extra actually let them air out for half an hour rotated them aired em out another half an hour. then turned the lights a couple minutes in between set at 50%. I'm pretty happy so far, I had cut off every leaf I saw with WPM yesterday, checked again this morning while flushing prior to spraying and no signs of anymore mildew but I know those damn spores are there. I really didn't want to spray but this thread convinced me to by scaring the hell out of me. But iwitfum I must really thank you, bouncing ideas off you really helped in breaking the process down and taking some of the anxiety out of it. I know growing should be fun and easy(at least I'm told) but I've had a heck of a time getting this first grow put together and I'm all alone in this except you guys at 420. I must say though spraying did something because my girls smell factor jumped from like a 3 to a 6-7 after spraying and, tou were right RH did jump up to 73% right after spraying but I had the dehumidifier running and the A/C set to dry and RH% was already down to 55% by the time I got the lights back on. I did something very stupid though. I wrapped a paper towel around my bulbs and used a tiny piece of tape to make it stay so when I was spraying the mist wouldn't float up and get all over the bulbs and forgot it on there tu5rned on two of the lights and went back a few minutes later smelling something burning. looked all around till I realized the tape melted the paper towel burned a little and both had already fallen to the floor. Luckily that all but I'm sure it could of been really bad. Wow the smell has doubled, seriously from this same location in the house where I'm typing I couldn't smell my flower room yesterday now the smell is obvious from here. I'll just take it as a good sign after I do another check to make sure it isn't moisture burning off somewhere. thanks again

Hell yeah. Love the proactive approach, glad it seems to have worked. I'd like to know if it stays away. Maybe I'll start keeping some nuke'em on hand for the odd case of PM if you end up not having to deal with it again.

Good lord. Sounds like you got lucky with the paper towel not catching fire! I once bought a several new hoods and forgot to take the plastic off the inside of one of them and after a day or two I noticed the plastic had fallen and completely off the metal and wrapped itself around the bulb and was dripping off onto the plants. That was a hell of a clean up. Haha.