TheFertilizer
Well-Known Member
Second grow I've used seedlings, and second time they've all looked really haggard. I'm not sure what I am doing to cause this, the first time around I thought it was over-watering, but I've been pretty conservative with the water this time around, I think I might have gone the other way and underwatered...
Little bit of details first...
Light: 400w MH Apollo, air cooled hood, about 8" above them.
Temp/Humidity: 68-75F, 35-40%
Water: Tap, pH neutral, no nutrients, unknown PPM
Application method: Sprayer
Application frequency: About every 2-3 days, but going by how wet the soil feels and weigh as well
Medium: Fox Farms Happy Frog
Strains: Blackberry Kush, Platinum Girl Scout Cookies
I have been really surprised how fast they dry out compared to the last soil I used, and as well as using larger solo cup containers, but I'm mostly talking about on the surface. The Happy Frog just seems to dry out a lot faster, and so I would brush a few milimeters off of the top surface and if I saw nice dark, moist looking soil I would leave it and if I didn't I would water it a little bit. Well they started looking a little droopy and I figured I should use the weigh method, I have two of them that just have dirt and never sprouted a seed so I weighed them dry, they both came in right around 45 grams. So I weighed my plants, they were all about 50-70 grams, most being around 60. I decided to wait until the morning. Well what I found was that most of them had collapsed and were laying on their sides, and it looked to me like maybe I had went too long without water so I drenched them again. A few hours later, and they're picking back up now, but the leaves have this characteristically over-watered curl to them. So I'm like, which is it, over watered or under watered? They exceeded my scale's 100 gram capacity when fully drenched.
I am trying to consider what else it could be beside the watering too. The quality of my tap water is a concern to me, because I know it's pretty hard water, I get calcium deposits on my dishes all the time. Could this be symptomatic of poor quality water? I figured I might as well gamble a dollar and go pick up some distilled water to see if it helps.
Then there's the light, it seems like no matter how close I put it to them they want to stretch toward it. You can kind of see how they're all bending radially in toward a center like each one is trying to get closer to the light even though it's pretty much right on top of them. Maybe I need a bulb with better PAR? This is just the Apollo one that came with my light kit.
I'm not really worried, they pulled through on the last grow and looked like this, but I don't think this is what healthy seedlings should look like and I am trying to improve. Would like to give them a little more of a stress-free infancy.
Little bit of details first...
Light: 400w MH Apollo, air cooled hood, about 8" above them.
Temp/Humidity: 68-75F, 35-40%
Water: Tap, pH neutral, no nutrients, unknown PPM
Application method: Sprayer
Application frequency: About every 2-3 days, but going by how wet the soil feels and weigh as well
Medium: Fox Farms Happy Frog
Strains: Blackberry Kush, Platinum Girl Scout Cookies
I have been really surprised how fast they dry out compared to the last soil I used, and as well as using larger solo cup containers, but I'm mostly talking about on the surface. The Happy Frog just seems to dry out a lot faster, and so I would brush a few milimeters off of the top surface and if I saw nice dark, moist looking soil I would leave it and if I didn't I would water it a little bit. Well they started looking a little droopy and I figured I should use the weigh method, I have two of them that just have dirt and never sprouted a seed so I weighed them dry, they both came in right around 45 grams. So I weighed my plants, they were all about 50-70 grams, most being around 60. I decided to wait until the morning. Well what I found was that most of them had collapsed and were laying on their sides, and it looked to me like maybe I had went too long without water so I drenched them again. A few hours later, and they're picking back up now, but the leaves have this characteristically over-watered curl to them. So I'm like, which is it, over watered or under watered? They exceeded my scale's 100 gram capacity when fully drenched.
I am trying to consider what else it could be beside the watering too. The quality of my tap water is a concern to me, because I know it's pretty hard water, I get calcium deposits on my dishes all the time. Could this be symptomatic of poor quality water? I figured I might as well gamble a dollar and go pick up some distilled water to see if it helps.
Then there's the light, it seems like no matter how close I put it to them they want to stretch toward it. You can kind of see how they're all bending radially in toward a center like each one is trying to get closer to the light even though it's pretty much right on top of them. Maybe I need a bulb with better PAR? This is just the Apollo one that came with my light kit.
I'm not really worried, they pulled through on the last grow and looked like this, but I don't think this is what healthy seedlings should look like and I am trying to improve. Would like to give them a little more of a stress-free infancy.
