New grower, Leaves are turning white and Epsom salt is not helping

[DragonScaleZ]

Hello all,
I'm in need of some desperate help here, I just hope it's not too late

What Strain is it? Cali Kush (got the seeds off a bud I bought so I was told of it's strain but have no way of knowing for sure)

Is it Indica, Sativa or Hybrid? What percentages? No idea but I'm assuming it's a sativa due to the leaf shape

How Many Plants? 1 mother — 3 clones taken off the mother

Is it in Vegetative or Flowering Stage? Decided to flower the mother plant after 3 months of Veg

If in Flowering Stage... How Long? 3 weeks on Sunday 24th of june

Indoor or Outdoor? Indoor in grow closet (1mx1mx2m)

Soil or Hydro? Soil

If Soil... What is in your Mix? Some generic grow soil that I mixed with Perlite and vermiculite

If Soil... What Size Pot? 5 gal

Size (Wattage) of Light? How Many? 2 leg, 45w and a 15w

Is it Air Cooled? Got exhaust fan, and oscillating fan to rotate the air, no intake fan but the tent vent holes are open to let the cool air of the room to get in.

Temperature of Room/Cabinet? 29-30.1 degree cel (I think its too high, but having trouble bringing it down, So I leave the doors open to let air in a couple of hours a day during the light period.

PH of Medium or Reservoir? 6.2 to 6.8
Any Pests? Not a major one but I do have some fungus gnats, pesky little black flies. I don't think they are a problem at the moment, but I have no idea how to get rid of them without hurting the plant.

How Often are you Watering? Every 3 days, 3 liters of bottled water of ph 6.8 with a ppm of 110 and total hardness of 53. I run oxygen through it for 24 hours before giving it to the plant.

Type and Strength of Fertilizers used? Miracle-Gro Liquid all purpose plant Food (12-4-8) during the veg period. Fed it 1/2 strength solution every 2 weeks.


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The problem: leafs are turning white on the top portion of the plant, the lower leaves are drying up and turning brownish, then dropping off. The middle portion of the plant is still Green.

I noticed the problem started when I decided to Flower the plant, I switched to Miracle-Gro Quick start 4-12-4. I know this is a transplant formula, but I was told that the plant will need higher levels of P during this period and this was the only solution I found. I've given it once to the plant 3 weeks ago.
While I decided to figure out the problem for myself I stumbled on people talking about Epsom salt helping them overcome a similar Mg deficiency problem, So I have my plant half a teaspoon of Epsom salt to every 1.5 liter of water. It's now day 5 and I don't see any change, as per my reading I expected to see results within 4 days, but that's not happening.

Almost 3 weeks into flowering and my plant is either not showing it's sex, or I just don't know how to find it. I've looked through videos and pics, so I'm familiar with what to expect, but I'm not seeing it on this plant, there are no pistols, and no pods. Just the little leaf pod that usually starts up when a new set of leafs are about to grow out. Is it stunned? Or pot locked ?

Images

— the plant. Note the center is green but the upper portion is lighter
— the grow closet without the led lights on
— Led lights on, ignore the meter reading, the door was open for a while and cold air came in. true temps are mentioned above
close up of what the leafs are starting to do, note the whitening leaf in the back, what I can only guess is Mg deficiency.
- general shots of the plant to see the discoloration
another close up of the whitening leaf, note even new leafs opening up are white, you can see the browning of the edge on the lower leaf in the center left section of the pic.

I could really use some help here, I'm not sure what to do next, it's seems that I'm harming the plant more by trying things off assumptions I'm making after reading material online.
I Need a pro's perspective.

thanks

 

[Smokemupm8]

Hmm not sure exactly mate, are ur nitrogen levels ok. Molybdenem defic. possibly or iron? Its unusual, ive had yellowing leaves but for the mmost part thats always been near ending flower. Some signs of nute burn i had looked similar, it was a high ph and also phosphorous def. but soon fixed.. Good luk mate

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

I think you may find your LED lights to close to the plants as to cause the effect known as bleaching.

The damage all ready done may well be perminate & recovery may be slim to a medium chance if light height is adjusted asap and left to veg long to encourage new fresh growth !


Topping may be a solution to encourage new growing tips of a more healthy condition

 

[DragonScaleZ]

r ur nitrogen levels ok. Molybdenem defic. possibly or iron? ......Some signs of nute burn i had looked similar, it was a high ph and also phosphorous def. but soon fixed..

Thanks for the info, i taught it might be nut deficiency, so I've given it epsom salt, but no improvement. The PH of the soil seem good at 6.5-6.8, so I don't think its the PH. I did feed it some 4-12-4 nut and i think that might have been a cause, but i taught thats what i should do when i switch to flowering.

What do you recommend ? do i stick with the Miracle-Gro Liquid all purpose plant Food (12-4-8) during the flowering stage ?

I also think the main cause is what the next post states.. The lights are too close. should have seen that. Didn't expect the LED's to cause bleaching but after some research it seems that they do , So i need to move those lights at least 12'' above the plant.

gonna see how that turns out.

thanks again.

 

[DragonScaleZ]

I think you may find your LED lights to close to the plants as to cause the effect known as bleaching.

The damage all ready done may well be perminate & recovery may be slim to a medium chance if light height is adjusted asap and left to veg long to encourage new fresh growth !


Topping may be a solution to encourage new growing tips of a more healthy condition

Thank you Fuzzy, I think you are on point with the lights being too close. I didn't expect LED's to burn like that and bleach the leaf, but that seems to be the case. So I've moved the lights up and I've also topped and cleaned up the canopy of the plant from the burned up leafs. It's been flowering for 3 weeks now, and no sign of its sex yet, but new leaf pods are forming so I'm assuming its not stunned in any way.

I'm curious as to the type of nuts i should be feeding the plant at this stage (Flowring) ! should i continue giving it Miracle-Gro Liquid all purpose plant Food (12-4-8), or switch to Miracle-Gro Quick start 4-12-4 <-- this is for seedlings and clones from what i understand since the high P will help roots (is that correct); but i also read that in flowering it needs high P, is this true ?

any advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

I'm happy to hear that your plants have sprouted new leaf buds & surely a good sign on the road to recovery

But very suprised that your plants have not shown sex after 3 weeks of flowering ! this normally occurs after 5 to 10 days of adjusted timing cycle to 12/12 light/dark peroid, but may work in favour to develope new veg growth with recent trimming.


A majority of people don't like miracle grow fertilizers for some reason & general frowned upon due to problems which may occur through the use of it, it can be used with some people having good results with it but i think most would use less than recommended dosage than stated more around 3/4 strength.

In early to mid flowering of MJ...

Early flowering may cause stretch of the plants a sudden spurt of growth which N - nitrogen defeciency may occur due to rapid growth, early to mid flowering P - phosphorus defeciency may also occur due to root developement to support new growth & nutrient uptake for final result of developing big tasty bud with mid to late flowering showing signs k - potassium /P - phosphorus defeciency.

Thats just a general out line of what you may expect defeciency wise once in flowering please bear in mind all strains are slighty different & nutrient requirements may differ from one strain to another.


So P - Phosphorus is well worth while, a healthly root system leads to a healthy MJ girlie

You may also want to lower the nitrogen in the flowering cycle as to much N - nitrogen can lead to harsh tasty/smoking bud !

 

[DragonScaleZ]

Update,

So I took all the Fuzzy Duck said and went out looking for new nutes. The problem is that I live in such a dysfunctional country that even nutrients are not available. I’ve gone through 20 stores and they ALL carry the same brand of unlabeled nutrients and ordering is not an option since customs will not let them pass through (go figure).
So basically I’m stuck with either miracle gro that I posted picks of above (no bloom formula) or the following 3 that I picked up

So Here is my question, if someone experienced had to work with these nutes, could you please provide me with a simple weekly schedule as to what I should be feeding my plant !
I know I’ll be feeding it the (30-10-10) while vegging, but them I’m confused as to when to feed it the other two.
Right now I’m feeding the plant (10-30-20) trying to get it to flower ( FIVE WEEKS NOW in(12/12 light) and not sign of its sex – starting to get frustrated)

So since the last post I did, I flushed the plant, I super cropped it and fed it some Epsom salt with the (10-30-20) and I removed most of the damaged leafs to allow for better light penetration for new growth as was suggested.
And here is what the plant looks like now

As you can see the white is almost gone, there are some signs of nute burn on the tip although I fed it ¼ strength solution. ( I don’t have a ppm meter so I’m not sure what that measured at) but the ph was at 6.5

Here is an image I took a few days ago

As you can see there are little pods at the inter-nodes, being this is my first time, I assumed this would be a male
But a few days later you will notice that they are just more leaf pods developing, so I’m happy its not a male but frustrated that its not showing its sex

On the lower leafs I’m starting to notice some browning up and I’m unable to identify, if some one could help out I would appreciate it

Thank you all for any help you can provide.

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Sorry to hear you are still experiecing problems...

I would be tempted to adjust flowering time may be 11/13 or even 10/14 to see if that encourages sexing of the plants !


New nutrients ah... looks like pretty strong stuff i would be inclined to use at 50% or even 25% of listed application rate per litre of water as to help ward of nutrient burn.


Ever thought about making your own tea or compost tea etc & embrace the organic side of growing ? some of these ingredients may be easyer to source in your country ?

 

[Smokemupm8]

I think you may find your LED lights to close to the plants as to cause the effect known as bleaching.

The damage all ready done may well be perminate & recovery may be slim to a medium chance if light height is adjusted asap and left to veg long to encourage new fresh growth !


Topping may be a solution to encourage new growing tips of a more healthy condition

LOL..you beat me to it Fuzzy! I looked at that pic of the LED and that popped into my mind being too close, but i am not sure on these LED panels, some ppl have said they keep em fairly close due to minimal heat, but yeah bleaching would result from strong light too close to her.. Im even worried that my 400w is bit close, i did have it 15 cm from her top but now she s like 30 away and seems happier now.

 

[Smokemupm8]

Sorry to hear you are still experiecing problems...

I would be tempted to adjust flowering time may be 11/13 or even 10/14 to see if that encourages sexing of the plants !


New nutrients ah... looks like pretty strong stuff i would be inclined to use at 50% or even 25% of listed application rate per litre of water as to help ward of nutrient burn.


Ever thought about making your own tea or compost tea etc & embrace the organic side of growing ? some of these ingredients may be easyer to source in your country ?

Hey Fuzz, just a qik Q+A about these 'tea's' people use, is it a mix of nutrients and sum molasses/honey thats used to water your girls regularly? or is it a thing you use like every other water, i just havent looked into it but have seen it mentioned few times. Thanks mate

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Hey Fuzz, just a qik Q+A about these 'tea's' people use, is it a mix of nutrients and sum molasses/honey thats used to water your girls regularly? or is it a thing you use like every other water, i just havent looked into it but have seen it mentioned few times. Thanks mate

Home made teas is used as a regular feed these may consist of molasses, blood,hoof & bone, worm casts, dryed sea weed etc brewed in a big bucket of water & some air stones etc.

I'm pretty sure i saw journal some where (can not remember name) which demonstrated a home made tea bubble - might be able to do a google search on compost teas also


P.s Icemud is worth sending a private message to on this subject for further info.


Extract of info...


What could be better than composting and returning organic matter to the soil? At stimulating plant growth and at preventing disease? Emily Gatch, from Seeds of Change in New Mexico, has an idea brewing.

"Compost tea is a wonderfully nourishing substance that you apply to the surface of plants or to the soil," she says. "It takes the goodness that's in compost and extracts it in water so that you have a solution that you can use a number of ways in your garden."

Compost tea actually enhances the benefits of compost with one simple addition - oxygen.

Gather the brewing supplies. Before you start brewing your compost tea, you'll need a few supplies. You can find commercial products to help you do the job, or you can make your own system. All you need is a 10-gallon bucket and an aquarium pump. The most important things, of course, are good quality compost, a water source, aeration and some compost catalyst for good measure.

Fill your bucket with water. If you're using tap water, let it sit for a day in the bucket. This allows the release of chlorine, which could otherwise kill beneficial micro-organisms.

Add the catalyst. Dump the compost catalyst into the bucket. The catalyst is a commercial mixture of nutrients that essentially wakes up the micro-organisms in the compost and encourages them to multiply

Float your compost. Put the compost in a "sachet" in the bucket. A sachet? Think of the wire-mesh containers used in brewing the tea you drink. (If you don't have a compost pile at home, bagged compost from your garden center is a fine alternative.)

Pump it. "The pump is the final step to starting the brewing process," Emily says. "It pumps air up through the bottom and throughout the solution. It's essential for the beneficial fungi and bacteria in the compost to start working."

For 24 hours, air pumps through the compost tea. The finished product is a rich, frothy brew. The foam is an indication of the nutrients, bacteria, fungi, nematodes and protozoans that are going to do their work on your plants. And there's no wasting anything from the brew; the solid compost can still be spread in the garden.

The tea itself is best used soon after brewing. Any longer than a day or two and the organisms begin to use up all the oxygen they've just been fed.

Spray the tea on leaves. Foliar applications of compost tea are absorbed more quickly and distributed throughout the plant more efficiently than soil drenchings. Spraying the leaves also helps to lower the incidence of nasty diseases like powdery mildew.

Feed the soil. You can also feed plants by feeding their soil. Emily uses compost tea on seedlings. A good drenching right after the seedlings have been transplanted will help fight soil-borne diseases.

When and how often? Whether you spray the soil or the leaves, the best time to do it is in the morning or evening, when plants can best absorb the nutrients. Repeat sprays about once a month throughout the season.

Over time, you can build up your soil and reduce the need for other kinds of fertilizers, so compost tea is also a money saver (as if you needed another reason to try it out).

 

[DragonScaleZ]

I would be tempted to adjust flowering time may be 11/13 or even 10/14 to see if that encourages sexing of the plants !

New nutrients ah... looks like pretty strong stuff i would be inclined to use at 50% or even 25% of listed application rate per litre of water as to help ward of nutrient burn.


Ever thought about making your own tea or compost tea etc & embrace the organic side of growing ? some of these ingredients may be easyer to source in your country ?

Sorry for the late reply, i wanted to give the plant a week or so to grow before i updated the status.
So now I'm on week 7 starting tomorrow. And still no sign of sex .

about 2 weeks ago i noticed that my timer was stuck, i walked into the room at 4am and the light was on! the malfunction was for 2 days, now i'm assuming that would have been long enough to cause a problem with the plant. Some people are saying to wait another 5 weeks in such a case, is that true ?

i did some light leek tests on the tent as well, it seems to be sealed shut, so the room light doesn't penetrate one bit when the tent is closed and in the dark state, so me entering or exiting the room during the tents dark hours wouldn't have been a cause. just those 2 days of 24h light.
Then there was the light burn, which it seemed to have recovered well from, but I'm not sure if it didn't stress the plant out, as far as i can tell it's growing substantially.
One positive note, the leafs look broader than the first set it had, could be that it was started under 2x 28w cfl's and then moved into the tent a week before flowering! ( i know it's a mess, i didn't plan well initially. i decided to start the seed and see if it sprouted before ordered tons of material online to grow, and by the time i got everything shipped/ confiscated and then released from customs it was a little too late in the growing stage, i think 3 months passed.)
So long story short.. this is a test plant.. it would be nice to get some bud out of it, but i'm using it to setup my environment and nutes before i start getting more seriously about quality.

I taught about going organic for sure, but from the list of mats you listed in the next post, i would probably find 0 items locally, so cost wise it's not a good solution for me. I'm considering trying hydro next; I have 3 out of the 8 clones that i took from the mother I'm flowing and they look extremely healthy

these clones took 4 weeks to start growing again, but once they started they have about 4 node structures growing within an inch, really close together, so i decided to experiment and do a topping on the 5node which was about 4 inc from the soil surface and just stem underneath (i understand this could stress the plant and kill it; if its a seedling start) but surprisingly it bushed out really well, so with some low stress training by taping the leafs of the 4 branches to the side of the pot i got this crazy upper growth really happy with that.
I think i should have started a journal for those clones, but it's too late now.

As for the New nutes, well they seem to be doing well with the plant. i did flush the big one before feeding it the P based nutes, some lower leafs did get nute burns but i monitored it for the 2 weeks and it was only 5 or 6 leafs, but i gave it 2g in 3 liters, so about 50% strength, So I guess I'll continue with those for now and see how things turn out.

What I'm still not 100% sure is the feeding. I've been looking at this PDF trying to relate that info to what i have, but I'm having trouble. What is throwing me off is that i see them using Big bloom almost every week! is that the K Nute ? i taught mixing nutes is a No No! or is it since these nutes are for hydro they would differ that the soil based ones ?

the bottom line if i could take a moment of your time, could you make me a short table listing in it the Nutes i should use. please use the nutes i mentioned above. Basically spoon feed me the info usually i would take the time to research it, but I'm so busy with work that I'm having a hard time gathering all the info i need from forums in time, which effects the time it takes me to fix any problems i might be having with the plant. i would really appreciate it

Thanks Fuzzy

 

[DragonScaleZ]

Hello all,
So here is an update on the plant if anyone is wondering. The plant is past the 6 weeks period in Flowering and Still no sign of sex very depressing but I’m still hopping for the best, next week will make it 5 weeks from time of the accident where 24/7 light was let into the room for 2 days before I caught it and remedied the situation.

First off a shot of the new setup and the plants

So I got 4 x108W CFLs in there and the one low end 45 led, which I’ve now come to understand is BS for this part of the grow, I’m hopping those CFL lights are enough. I’ve added an exhaust fan in there as well you can see it in the upper part of the of the pic which takes the heat outside the apartment. I got that hose leading all the way out, so the Cool AC air is getting sucked into the room, and not recycled hot air that is pumped out of the grow room. You can see the temp is at 79.3f at the moment I took the pic, the closet was open for 10 min when I snapped it, usually its around 81.0 to 83.0 f in there.

On the left are the 2 clones I posted about previously, I’ve put 2 of them into flowering last week. Those were brought up properly, with the correct nutrition and a better schedule (basically used what I learned from the mother on the right) I expect them to start showing sex before their mother

The clones seem a little stretched at the top, I’m not sure if that was because of the lights being too far, or they are just Boys waiting to see.

The leaf size difference is impressive; I’m talking about the initial pic I posted of the mother, and now

Here are some close ups of the mother, does anyone see anything I’m not? Cause as I mentioned I’m not seeing the sex of the plant, and I’m starting to doubt myself as to what I should be looking for

Ok, so I had issues with the feeding part, I wasn’t sure what nutritions and how much to use. I found some info that I’m using and I would like to share it here; maybe someone with more experience can confirm that I’m doing the right thing.
The nutes I’m using are pictured in a previous post I made. I ran online into a product called GREEN REPTILE.

The make up for the most part of their nutes is very similar to what I have, So using the following conversion chart (since I only have a ppm meter and not an EC) I’ve been feeding the plants according to the chart in the pdf.

So with all that I still have one question! Do I start giving the plant (K) nutes or Bloom, when I first start flowering? That’s after 4 weeks of veg as per the chart in the PDF. Or do I keep giving it N so it can grow more green until it starts to show its sex, and starts to pre-flower .

In the pdf you will note they do that for the outdoor grow, but for indoor they just jump to bloom right after the 4 weeks, I’m assuming that’s before the plant has had time to pre flower. So its somewhat confusing.
Personally I’m started them on (K) as soon as I put them into the flowering closet!.

 

[DragonScaleZ]

Aug-28
Mother – Still hasn’t shown sex ! this is getting really absurd.
2 Clones – Not showing sex and has been in the flowering room for a month today!

I’ve upped the lights to 6x 105W CFL’s <- this is not the equivalent Wattage, each cfl is equiv to 550W as per the box.
I’m 1000% sure that the tent has no light leaks, so I can’t figure for the life of me what delaying the flowering so long. My only reasonable explanation is the strain.
At this point I’m giving them 1 more week to either flower or they are getting chopped down and thrown out.
Today I had to cut 4 5inch branches off the top of the mother cause she was getting too tall and the lights are at their limit. Not sure if topping those branches at this stage will effect the plant in any way. (can anyone answer this one for me please)

To the left you can see the 2 clones, they are a few inches from reaching the same height as their mother. They just went crazy in the last month, more than tripled in size, I have the 3rd clone sitting in the veg tent, and its relatively small compared to the ones in the pick. Point being that they are not stunned and are healthy, so it doesn’t explain the length of time its taking them to show their sex.

Any comments on how I can improve things are appreciated.

 

[BCBudd]

Some people I have read turn the lights off for 24hrs before going to 12/12. Might be worth a shot. Very odd that they haven't shown anything yet.

 

[DragonScaleZ]

well as i've come to understand it, a plant could get confused and delay flowering for up to 5 weeks if any light gets into the grow tent during it's night period. So wouldn't the reverse be the same? I mean putting the plant under total darkness when it should have light would cause the plant confusion and have it to delay flowering even more! <- does that make any sense ?

a couple of days ago i reduced the light hours by 1 hour, so I'm waiting a few more days and I'll drop it by one more . maybe this dump plant will get the message that winter is here and start flowering what I'm wondering is what is the minimum amount of time the plant needs under light. if i go down to 6 hours light and 18 hours darkness, I'm assuming that would just kill the plant. so what would the lower limit be ?

 

[DragonScaleZ]

Some people I have read turn the lights off for 24hrs before going to 12/12. Might be worth a shot. Very odd that they haven't shown anything yet.

Thanks BCBudd, I've taken your advice and I've had the plants in darkness for around 30 hours now.
So how long should i wait, in your opinion, before i start expecting to see some results ? will this reset things to a 7-10 day wait before sex is shown or do i follow the Stunned plant formula of waiting for 3 to 5 weeks before it recovers !

 

[BCBudd]

I'm still a rookie and never had this particular problem. 5-7 days has always shown me preflowers in 12/12. I have only read that people go dark to maybe speed up the transition.