ScienceGrow's Sativa Dominant Outdoor Bag Seed Grow - 2015

[lazyfish]

This doesn't seem to explain why only the top buds were affected though. Does it?

I don't know...(!!!)

The top 6 inches of soil dry out, while the bottom 6 are still wet. Top 6 inches of roots begin having issues, and show this at the top of the plant.

I have often wondered this myself.

Hey, at least you caught this early. The same thing happened to me and I waited and waited and never fixed it or checked the pH...Same situation, too high pH. My leaves died from the bottom up, though.

I only ever noticed the fan leaf damage, the actual buds were still pristine.

This is the only pic I could find....I grimace when I look at it.....


Are your buds affected or just sugar leafs?

 

[lazyfish]

You know, now that I think of it my stems started going purple each time before the leafs started showing and signs of damage.....

 

[BlackPolo23]

What day is your girl? Maybe it's time?

 

[ScienceGrow]

Thanks for the words of support everyone.

Right now it's just the leaves that are having the issue. Looks like Phosphorous lockout again, now. All the olive color bronzed.

It's gotta be nute and pH related.

My runoff pH was 6.3, so I did fix that really nice. I flushed with another 10 gallons properly pH'd and will just have to hope for the best. I don't want root rot in addition to whatever this issue is.

I'll be harvesting any buds that look like they're taking too much damage and losing too many trichomes. New lower buds are popping up now, nice and green, so it's possible I could get these larger buds out of the way and get the light down on those ones.

I'm half tempted to harvest the really bad ones immediately, but those happen to be my biggest two colas.

BlackPolo, I'm at about day 42 of flowering. I expected another four weeks minimum, to be honest.

However, and I don't know for certain yet, but, my saying this was a sativa was based on the shape of the leaves of the plant. But the cuttings I took, the leaves are much wider, more like an indica. So, it's entirely possible this is actually an indica that has had issues growing this entire time, that somehow affected the look of the leaves. I really have no idea at this point.

 

[ScienceGrow]

double posted.

 

[lazyfish]

42 days would even be early for an indica... and those are sativa, right?

How do your trichomes look?

Macro shots?

 

[ScienceGrow]

Yeah, it would be really early. I'm holding off for now on doing anything drastic.

It's weird, this plant has really thin leaves so I assumed it was a sativa dominant, but the clones have broader leaves. Could just be better soil and nutrients making bigger leaves overall. Or, bad soil and nutes made smaller leaves on Alpha. Haha, no idea now!

Trichomes are mostly clear, part cloudy, no amber. Stigmas are mostly white except for the neemed ones and maybe a few that browned naturally.

Yeah I'll try to get some macro shots tonight.

 

[ScienceGrow]

Still getting worse. Encroaching on the buds now.

I wonder if I've got it all wrong.

It's looking more and more like a phosphorous deficiency. It's the problem I had last time, just worse. It happens mostly to the buds directly under the light. It's visually similar. It seemed to get better after the flush with feeding. Then didn't get fed for a week, and got bad again. I've only flushed since.

I assumed my deficiency was caused by bad pH. But maybe the plant is just starving for phosphorous. I wouldn't think so, the tiger bloom has a ton. But it's still getting worse. My runoff ppm only at 550. PH is at 6.3. Temps haven't gone over 78, humidity is around 45-55. No signs of pests. It's a damn near perfect environment.

It looks so much like a deficiency, but it's so hard to believe.

I'm feeding it tonight. If it gets any worse after a few days, I'm cutting it down. May as well salvage what I can and get some new plants going in there. Chomping at the bit to get some of these good seeds in anyway.

 

[lazyfish]

Sorry to hear the news. I hope someone that has some more experience chimes in soon....

My runoff ppm is only at 550.

I don't know much about measuring runoff, but that sounds like a lot...

I can't remember...but I think I read somewhere that an overdose of some nutrient would lock out Phosphorous. Doesn't P deficiency start in the lower leaves? If I were you I would give like a half dose of something that is complete and balanced.

Seeds? What seeds?

 

[ScienceGrow]

550 isn't that high. Only about 300 of that is nutes, my tap is around 250 naturally. A lot of people get it up over 1000, though I'm not that brave.

Many of the articles I've read have it worst under the lights, in fact, the lights themselves making the deficiency worse. I'll be doing the big bloom and tiger bloom at near full dose. It's pretty bad now. I'd get pics but it's lights out till 7:30. I'm losing trichomes, all of my sugar leaves are just dead, and it's moving on to my fan leaves now.

Yes, it could still be lockout, but of what I don't know. I've barely fed this thing, and very conservatively when I did. And everything has always had a decent balance, never went to extremes.

Seeds, yes. I've got 3 each of "Fast and Vast" and Critical, 1 Holy Grail 69, 2 Afghani #1. Will likely do the fast and vast first, to fill in my stock, what with Alpha taking a dive. Should be done around when my clones finish, maybe a little earlier.

 

[Weaselcracker]

Have you thought about posting a thread on it to get the doctors in for a look? I did have an episode last spring where I was starting to show issues with my Pineapple Chunk plants. I kept dialing back on the nutes to no avail. Dying crumbling leaves everywhere with brown and black patches. I flushed the plants and everything got drastically worse. Eventually I gave them a full feeding and the problem stopped.
Before that it hadn't occurred to me that -underfeeding could cause such issues, and that- deficiencies are deficiencies, even though they could caused by completely different things. I'm thinking that underfeeding and overfeeding (lockout) could sometimes cause the exact same symptoms. I haven't confirmed this theory.
I wonder if your tap water could be to blame somehow, along with some strains being more sensitive to whatever the issue is?

 

[ScienceGrow]

I posted over in the Problems section of the FAQs. Not a single response.

I'm thinking this may be my issue WeaselCracker, and I'm so glad to hear that it resolved your issue; makes me hopeful it may indeed be the case and will help me too. I have seen a number of cases where the deficiency looked like toxicity. But at this point, toxicity just doesn't seem possible. And feeding seemed to fix my last issue, but with so much going on, I assumed it was the pH.

I've read over and over about people overfeeding their plants. I've been trying to avoid doing that, I may have ended up starving her. If I had started with decent soil and a good pot and pHing, etc., this would probably not be a problem. Bah, oh well, will see what happens and then not do whatever the hell I did wrong again.

 

[lazyfish]

I'm thinking that underfeeding and overfeeding (lockout) could sometimes cause the exact same symptoms. I haven't confirmed this theory.

This is my biggest problem. It seems very difficult to tell the difference, but it only gives me more experience. Just watch the symptoms and remember what you did to fix them and whether or not it actually helped. Slowly but surely things seem to be working out for me.

I wish you luck, SG.

Which Critical did you get? Are they fem seeds? Is the Fans and Vast an Auto? That Holy Grail looks interesting... Both my afghans turned out to be male... but they looked to be very promising plants.

 

[BlackPolo23]

Dude my afghani turned out male too! I have 1 left and it's preflowers look like baby nuts! So disappointed, but that's life.

 

[ScienceGrow]

Lazyfish, the Critical is CBD Seeds, Holy Grail is Samsara. Both of those are Feminized. The Fast and Vast is Heavyweight and it's an Auto. The regular Afghani is going outside in the spring. If they're male I'll just take some pollen, but females would be nice.

 

[Weaselcracker]

I posted over in the Problems section of the FAQs. Not a single response.

I'm thinking this may be my issue WeaselCracker, and I'm so glad to hear that it resolved your issue; makes me hopeful it may indeed be the case and will help me too. I have seen a number of cases where the deficiency looked like toxicity. But at this point, toxicity just doesn't seem possible. And feeding seemed to fix my last issue, but with so much going on, I assumed it was the pH.

I've read over and over about people overfeeding their plants. I've been trying to avoid doing that, I may have ended up starving her. If I had started with decent soil and a good pot and pHing, etc., this would probably not be a problem. Bah, oh well, will see what happens and then not do whatever the hell I did wrong again.

I was determined not to overfeed- and ended up toasting my leaves by underfeeding! It's tricky- you only get so many chances in each grow- and once your plants look like crap it's very hard to diagnose what's going on. The deficiency issue seems incredibly complicated. Take into account the interconnected nature of the nutrients- which generally all need each other in various ways in order to work, and also add in the fact that as soon as you get some damage, you may suddenly have half the plant you did before. Roots can die off unseen. With half the foliage and root system, what was underfeeding before the damage occurred, suddenly becomes overfeeding. It gives me a headache thinking about it. I just try to systematically go about figuring out what could have gone wrong to start the trainwreck. Your signs seem fairly distinctive and extreme. Should be easier to find the cause.
Sorry to hear you didn't get help. You could ask OldMedUser- one fellow who seems about as expert in these things as anyone I've seen.

 

[ScienceGrow]

I ended up feeding. Will see what happens.

Yes WeaselCracker, I've been thinking about all those scenarios. I came to the conclusion that I just need a smart, reliable foundation. If I know I have good drainage and my pH is good etc., I can rule out a lot of possibilities. I'm hoping I've got the clones off to a good start. Seem to.

I think for now I'm going to wait it out and see what happens with the feeding. She's ugly as hell now, but the buds are still fat and sticky, and the trichomes are probably about 30% white, so whatever happens, I'll get something out of it.

These are as close to macro shots as I'll be getting until the actual macro lens is here. This is just the extension tubes.

 

[lazyfish]

Beauty

 

[ScienceGrow]

Ahh hahaha haha.

Heh.

According to everything I've read on nutrients and recommended PPMs, I've starved the hell out of my plant. About 800 PPMS low prior to last night's feeding.

I would guess the progression was fairly natural one. Sinks suck nutrients from the closest sources, in this case sugar leaves. Now that those are destroyed, it's moving on to larger fan leaves. The buds are sucking the leaves of all their stores. That's how I'm reading it.

The cause of this? I assume it's thst I can't feed the lady often enough, because I have compacted soil, and can't water nearly as often as I'm supposed to. It takes 9 days from watering to nearly dry. I've been just rolling with it because I don't want root rot or asphyxiation issues.

The feeding last night was about 1100PPM, just under recommended for the stage I'm at. Not even close to dry, but, not many options, had to do it.

Note to newbs: Just buy a damned pH and TDS meter and save yourself a world of trouble. And start with a good soil mix with excellent drainage. Or screw soil and go soilless.

One thing I do know, is that this plant, whatever it is, is a VERY sturdy, pure female. Can't believe the abuse it's taken and keeps on taking.

 

[Weaselcracker]

Yeah 9 days is too long and would definitely cause deficiencies eventually, in my experience anyway