This is my first time growing and I’ve learned a lot so far from here without having to ask for help and I’m learning a ton so thank goodness for this forum. This morning woke up to this and can’t understand why. Two days ago I watered to runoff and ended with 460 ppm gh flora trio in and about 450 runoff. Any help is greatly appreciated. I’m stressing out here but I got something for that.
So… symptoms affecting older growth and working up…
Affected growth has purple stems and cupping leaves…
Run-off is same or slightly less than feed…
More than 25 degree temp swings…
affected leaves show no necrosis, but are graying/blueing out a bit
No burned tips or leaf margins…
Newer growth “OK”…
No runoff pH…
While one might conclude that it’s a P deficiency, I’m leaning toward a K deficiency due maybe to a lockout on low pH…
Plant doesn’t appear to be eating, and showing signs of stress like it is thirsty… but humidity is sort of OK, not so low that stomata would be closed off and shutting down the pumps…
I don’t know for sure, but she appears hungry and thirsty… the purple and grayed/blued chlorosis/bleaching of green…
The pumps have shut down… it seems.
What is the runoff pH?
What is the soil composition?
Just a thought but I read somewhere that leaves will curl and even flip over to try and protect themselves from to intense light. Also it appears to be just the big leaves at the bottom. Any chance when they drooped for the night that they came in contact with your medium? I’ve fried a few leaves that looked like that when the rested on my coco at night after I fed them and the nutes cooked the leaves
@QST_59 your diagnosis seems pretty on the money in regards to what’s happening here. Except temp swings are only 10-15 degrees. Also, it’s coco so I’m ph’ing 5.8 going in. Forgot to measure ph in runoff since it was the first time. @Watt-Sun could be the light too. They’ve grown taller recently and we’re closer (24 inches) than recommended (26-32 in) and I’ve been slowly upping the output to where it is now. I already thought that might have something to with it so I raised the light to 30". I don’t believe they droop that far at night to touch the coco but they do droop at night. Right back up in the am though.
What’s weird is it’s only two of the three and I’ve fed/watered them all the same. Water and wait till coco is dried out a couple inches down. Alternating water with GH flora trio+CalMag. The one on the right is looking good I think.
Not sure but it seems like it may have something to do with humidity. How’s your air circulation, distance from light and is it a consistent 80 degrees during day and 65 at night? Coco dries out fairly quickly and has no nutrients so add long as your phing your nutes etc. Im thinking it’s more of a climate related thing
@Hoaglud11 the humidity stays around 45-50 so I don’t think that would cause such severe cupping now. It’s been the same the whole grow. I have a small fan blowing air around. Barely touching the tops.
Oops… you’re right. 15 not 25 degrees… but the VPD stuff still applies, as I converted to C before using the chart. I think 50% is a little low for early veg… especially in coco, IMO, which is worth what you paid for it.
I assumed amended soil because that’s what it said in the tech summary in first post “soil” vs. peet or coco (soil-less).
I’m new at this, so I am actually using your situation for practice in ID’ing symptoms and trying to narrow down the potential problems… IF you use Cal-Mag every single time, you might want to run the numbers to see if you MIGHT be OD’ing on Calcium. Calcium in excess can be antagonistic to at least 7 other macros/micros (except) Nitro… and it might be causing a chain reaction.
Still looks like the plant is trying to protect itself from “drought” or too much light by cupping… And if it thinks drought or excessive transpiration due to too low of RH for stage of life… it may be shutting off the stomas… which shuts down the water pumps…
Chain reaction…
You do not appear to have a Ca (or Mg) deficiency, so my rec. is to use HydroBuddy or something to figure out exactly what ppm of each nutrient you are dosing and adjust whichever one(s) you might be ODing…
Here’s some pics from this morning under natural light. Leaves look like a nice shade of green and only the stems of the biggest fan leaves are purple. I can’t find any pictures anywhere of this sort of severe cupping, tacoing, or canoeing of leaves like this and I’m stressing out here. I’m sure the plants are too. I want to fix this before it’s too late. ![IMG_1417|374x500](upload://buUtAetEtwCGmFAvLWo62hkXYQ
I grow in coco in 7 gallon pots. At that stage add 4ml micro, 1.5 ml grow and 8ml bloom, 3 ml calmag. That’s feed days. On plain water days, 1-2 ml micro 2-4 ml bloom. I only use calmag every couple waterings. I run 1-2 gallon of plain ph water through first though, that helps flush out excess salts
You don’t want to let coco dry out that much before feeding/watering. You want to keep coco moist or it can throw ph off. I’d remove the affected leaves because new growth looks decent to me. Since it’s only affecting the one plant, I would look over that plant really well for any kind of pests as well.
Just an observation…
The affected leaves seem to be the ones extending beyond the fabric pot. Other shorter lower leaves seem to be ok. Is there something coming up from below that could be drying out the fan leaves?
Air flow from below…Heat or AC flowing upward?
@Spiney_norman no heater or nothing like that. @MattyBear I had been letting it dry out so I’ll keep it moist. Probably explains why they grew so slow. They’re about 7 weeks right now. I forgot to mention that I also have two outside in same pots and coco and while being smaller are showing none of the same signs. That’s why in my head I’m thinking it’s too much light, not light burn. On 18/6. The LED hardly puts out any heat. I’ve also been thinking my PH meter isn’t right but even that is doubtful as I’ve bought calibration solution and triple checked that. No pests that I can see but I’ll look again. The plants seem to be getting worse though today even though I raised the light to 30" and turned the intensity of the veg to 85% from 100% and bloom to 45% from 60%. Is it ok to put them outside and let them get some sun or will that shock them? I’d rather keep them in the tent to keep things consistent and learn my lessons. This is way harder than I thought.
Some pics from last night after trimming the bad leaves. Watered and reviewed some coco grow methods and found I wasn’t watering frequently enough or at high enough levels. I’ve been afraid to give them too much so that’ll change and I’m gonna start feeding these girls😀
