Rookie mistake! - I over-watered and possibly now have root rot - What to do?

[mcstrats]

Newbie grower here....Hi everyone!

I have 6 NL auto plants in a well ventilated 6x2x9 closet. I am about 2-3 weeks from harvest and just noticed that one of my plants has a bad smell when I lifted the 5 gallon pot from its saucer. 30% of the upper leaves have yellowed and some have little rust colored spots. 70% of the plant looks healthy and is very green. All the other plants are doing fine.

I drained the water from the problem plant and the smell went away...but I will need to re-water again soon.

Should I leave well enough alone? harvest early? or are there any treatments I can do?

Thanks in advance for any ideas!

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Welcome to the forums mcstrats

I may drag out flowering for an extra week or two as you still have a lot white pistils on the girl & may suggests she may need a little longer.

Your leaf problem seems to be K - potassium related might be current feed/nutrient rate used at present, some growers may use a P/K boost in flowering to aid in yield & ward off P/K defs as the girls generally will use more of these nutrients whilst flowering.


Sounds like you have over watered this one if the water was smelly plus you have a lot of drooping leafs a sign of over watering also.

It can be saved


Just need to allow the growing medium to dry out before watering/feeding again, i'm not sure how long that will take as we all have different environments to attend to but may take about week perhaps more.

Best way to gauge this is to learn the weight of the pot when well watered (heavy) to when dry (lighter) adjust water/feed timing as & when needed, ya get the hang of it.


The only down side i may see is that drying the pot for a period of time may induce some deficiency's during the period leading to some extra yellowing, i'd more than likely not worry to much about that as you have a few or so weeks left to harvest as it is reasonable common for most growers to experience yellowing of leaf from mid to late flowering & mainly so in the last 2 weeks of flushing.


You will be alright & looks like she will yield a few oz

 

[mcstrats]

Welcome to the forums mcstrats

I may drag out flowering for an extra week or two as you still have a lot white pistils on the girl & may suggests she may need a little longer.

Your leaf problem seems to be K - potassium related might be current feed/nutrient rate used at present, some growers may use a P/K boost in flowering to aid in yield & ward off P/K defs as the girls generally will use more of these nutrients whilst flowering.


Sounds like you have over watered this one if the water was smelly plus you have a lot of drooping leafs a sign of over watering also.

It can be saved


Just need to allow the growing medium to dry out before watering/feeding again, i'm not sure how long that will take as we all have different environments to attend to but may take about week perhaps more.

Best way to gauge this is to learn the weight of the pot when well watered (heavy) to when dry (lighter) adjust water/feed timing as & when needed, ya get the hang of it.


The only down side i may see is that drying the pot for a period of time may induce some deficiency's during the period leading to some extra yellowing, i'd more than likely not worry to much about that as you have a few or so weeks left to harvest as it is reasonable common for most growers to experience yellowing of leaf from mid to late flowering & mainly so in the last 2 weeks of flushing.


You will be alright & looks like she will yield a few oz

Thanks friend

 

[mcstrats]

I decided to not water any of the plants for 3 days. My reasoning was that since one plant was over hydrated..some of all of the rest might be also. All 6 look good after the 3 days, with no drooping leaves. Surprisingly (to me anyway) is even the plant with the root rot has perky leaves...but the yellowed leaves feel very dry to the touch...but even they haven't drooped.

I watered all but the sick plant and added 1/2 measure fox farm big bloom and tiger bloom. I also added a tspn per gallon of kelp.

Any additional thoughts or ideas would be greatly appreciated

 

[mcstrats]

I remember now what I meant to ask...should I spritz the sick plant with a spray bottle since it isn't currently getting much moisture from the roots? I do have excellent ventilation but my concern is water retention on the buds and possible mold. Just not sure what to do..or if I should leave well enough alone.

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Na i would not really use a spray bottle with water whilst in flowering its not going to do much apart from increase humidity, high humidity above 70% may induce bud rot the higher it is the greater the risk.

Well rot root takes quite a bit of over watering to get with soil/compost grows over a long period of time, you more likely just fine but may need to lower watering amounts for a bit longer to allow the soil to dry out some more !

Basically with soil/compost & over watering depletes the oxygen in the medium... ye that is right roots need to breath also.

So the fine line is to learn how much to water as & when required to plant size etc little plants require less to larger plants.


You have got some large pots at a guess 5 gallon ? you could more likely feed/water well to the point of run off once a week & just be fine perhaps half way through the week a little top up of water might be needed.


Not sure why you have one sick plant showing a nutrient def tho as you are growing all the same strain... in theory all your plants could possibly show this problem.

Just thinking it may be a runt as all seeds are not equal most of the time perhaps some sort of phenotype occurrence etc one of those random things...

Well ye this sick plant may under perform against the others with a nutrient def which may effect over all yield & might just to have to live with the idea, in the short term it might be best to give this one an extra feed to help sort out the def & see how that works ?

 

[mcstrats]

Na i would not really use a spray bottle with water whilst in flowering its not going to do much apart from increase humidity, high humidity above 70% may induce bud rot the higher it is the greater the risk.

Well rot root takes quite a bit of over watering to get with soil/compost grows over a long period of time, you more likely just fine but may need to lower watering amounts for a bit longer to allow the soil to dry out some more !

Basically with soil/compost & over watering depletes the oxygen in the medium... ye that is right roots need to breath also.

So the fine line is to learn how much to water as & when required to plant size etc little plants require less to larger plants.


You have got some large pots at a guess 5 gallon ? you could more likely feed/water well to the point of run off once a week & just be fine perhaps half way through the week a little top up of water might be needed.


Not sure why you have one sick plant showing a nutrient def tho as you are growing all the same strain... in theory all your plants could possibly show this problem.

Just thinking it may be a runt as all seeds are not equal most of the time perhaps some sort of phenotype occurrence etc one of those random things...

Well ye this sick plant may under perform against the others with a nutrient def which may effect over all yield & might just to have to live with the idea, in the short term it might be best to give this one an extra feed to help sort out the def & see how that works ?

Thanks again Yikes...I was definitely over watering then. I was giving each plant 1/2 gallon per day! They are in 5 gal pots and I am using FF ocean forest. The plants are cropking northern lights autos. The sick plant is about 48" tall. Two others are 56" and 58" - the rest are slightly smaller.

I think I bit off more than I could chew with 6 huge plants in a 6x2x9 closet. I am running a 4" centrifugal exhaust fan and a passive intake. I have a pair of floor fans that seem to dry everything up pretty quickly. The plants all have a constant swaying motion due to the air movement. I will definitely back off on the watering. I am starting another grow once this one is over. It has been a very valuable learning experience!

 

[OlderGrower]

I agree with Fuzzy Duck he has given very solid advice on all points
+ rep's my friend

 

[mcstrats]

Day 4 of no water for the sick plant and still no drooping leaves. I pushed my finger into the soil to check for moisture and wasn't able to penetrate more than 1/2". It turns out it is completely rootbound. I added more soil as everything had become compacted. Hopefully the new soil will give the healthy roots somewhere to go now.

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Mmm the old finger test to check moisture is not a very good method to be honest.

So lets say you stick your finger in the soil & the top 2 inches feels dry it really doesn't mean the rest of the soil towards the bottom of the pot is dry as well ! thus this method can accidently lead to over watering.


So the weight test is a better option & takes a little time to observe/learn.


Roots will grow & search out water so it is good in the beginning to allow the pots to dry out a little for root growth to commence, over watering from day dot the root mass doesn't really expand much as all the water/moisture sits near the surface leading to a poor rot mass.

It can be observed tho... i gave a friend an air pot which are well known for root mass with out root balling & he complain about the root ball saying it was extremely week, when i visited to find out what he had done... well lets just say he watered every day the roots barely filled the top 1/3 of the pot with the rest of medium totally saturated down at the bottom, basically he grew like this from start to finish that is about around of 4 months total growing in over watered conditions. The plants looked pretty fine & yield was average for a cfl grow but roots where not happy. ( a little story)



So ye you can still pull through this



May suggest at day 7 with out watering add a nutrient feed 1/2 gallon per plant as to prevent any further defs showing & encourage yield, perhaps may go another 7 days with out watering to restore medium to a suitable level but would keep a close eye on them to the latter part as the pots should/might be drying out by then just watch for drooping leafs aka under watering both over/under watering share the same characteristic's.

This is why the weight test is a good choice to learn.

 

[mcstrats]

Thanks for the great advice Fuzzy Duck, the plant seems to be doing okay. Just wondering what I should feed it (if anything at all?) to offset the deficiency?

 

[Fuzzy Duck]

Thanks for the great advice Fuzzy Duck, the plant seems to be doing okay. Just wondering what I should feed it (if anything at all?) to offset the deficiency?

It has been several days bud & suspect the soil is in pretty good shape by now, i'll go ahead with your regular nutrients water in well just go easy on any other watering through out the week.