Severe dying of fan leaves: Broad mites or nute issue?

[natureschild]

I've been battling this issue for almost 3 months now and it keeps kicking my ass.

My plants look beautiful all through veg. Nice and green and happy, save for a couple random fan leaves that will die off.

Problems start when I move them into flowering. One by one, the fan leaves begin to shrivel up and die, starting toward the bottom of the stock and making their way up to the mid section. Once all the fan leaves are affected on the main stock, the fan leaves on the branches start to do the same thing, making their way out from the beginning of the branch and one by one, the fan leaves towards the end of the branch become affected.

I'm running a few different strains in a big room 20K watts in flower, co2 @ 1100 ppm, temp around 82 to 85, humidity ranges from 42 to 53%.

I checked some leaves with a 100x scope and DID found what I think are broad mites, but I haven't actually seen one move. Starting 10 days ago (when I first moved a new batch into flower), I treated with Avid, waited 3 days, then Forbid, waited 4 days, then Kontos. I've noticed the plants are still getting worse.

My last 3 batches had a terrible yield, with 80% of the fan leaves dying by the time I hit harvest. At the time, I was giving them a concoction of different nutes that a few friends use with great success, the past month I backed it all down to just 20 mL/gallon of CNS 17 Bloom and that's it.

This is a new grow room I just started in May and I've never experienced problems like this before. I'm in desparate need of help! Somebody please guide me!

Here's a couple pics

https://www.icmag.com/ic/photo_popu...od=attachments&ins=link_thumb_2_orig&alb=all#

https://www.icmag.com/ic/attachment.php?attachmentid=289288&stc=1&d=1414094378

https://www.icmag.com/ic/attachment.php?attachmentid=289289&stc=1&d=1414094378

https://www.icmag.com/ic/attachment.php?attachmentid=289290&stc=1&d=1414094378

https://www.icmag.com/ic/attachment.php?attachmentid=289291&stc=1&d=1414094378

 

[natureschild]

I should add also that I've been using Dutch Master Gold Range Saturator with the 3 pesticides listed above. The bottle reads 60 mL per 1 Liter of water, but I thought that seemed like a lot? I used about 30 mL to treat 2 gallons when I sprayed the Avid and the Forbid. When I noticed they were still getting worse, I used the full amount stated on the bottle (60mL) when I sprayed the Kontos.

I read a lot of people use Sindicate 5 as their wetting agent, could this really make a difference in my results?

Also, for all 3 pesticides I used 1 mL/gallon.

 

[Former Guest]

DM saturator is supposed to be a great wetting agent. the syndicate 5 is recommended or horticultural oil when using avid but I would think the determining factor is how well you sprayed them and cleaned up the grow and you and the house and anything else you or pets have come into contact over the time you may have had them and I'm not saying that you do but it sorta sounds like it. I'm dealing with this right now and I just used avid because the place I got them from reluctantly told me they had tried forbid and floramite and it wasn't working. it sounds like you can get the temps of your room up to 120F for a heat treatment using your lights and co2 equipment plus anything else that throws heat. now fans on during treatment and it's for one hour at that temp. heres a post that explains it https://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=6609142&postcount=212

I should warn you that you may or may not lose some plants. but these things hide and keep coming back.

I'm sure someone else will have an opinion on this.

 

[iTarzan]

Are the leaves on the upper half of the plant? If they are your plants could just be pot bound. That will cause the lower leaves to die and fall off.

Check to see if the roots are pot bound.

 

[Former Guest]

no wonder I was having issues trying to google syndicate 5 as it's Indicate 5. I was doing some reading for myself and came across this info and thought I'd pass it on to you. indicate 5 will automatically ph your pesticide which is very important as well as be a surfactant. that was the reason why it was so recommended. good luck and here is a friendly bump in case I am wrong which does happen and hopefully so as it could be something else.

 

[natureschild]

Right right, thanks for the correction on Indicate 5 ladylucky. If I need to ph the final pesticide solution, what ph should I be looking for? Should I stick with 5.8 like I do with normal feeding?

Would anybody be able to chime in and confirm if it is a normal trend with broad mites to attack leaves the same way mine are affected? With the leaves on the main stock shriveling up first and then the leaves on the branches affected in series once all fan leaves on the main stock are toasted? I wanna make sure that the problem I'm having IS broad mites and not something else before I keep throwing these heavy chemicals at my crop.

Tarzan, I checked the roots and they seem ok for the most part. Some aren't quite as white and fuzzy as I would like, but they don't look super unhealthy either. Anyway, I lightened the load on watering them and they seem to be ok with it.

Thanks for the help so far, any more is much appreciated!

 

[natureschild]

One more thing I should add:

I had spider mites that I eradicated (to my knowledge) about 3 weeks ago. Is it possible that what I think are broad mites are really just dead, unhatched spider mite eggs? I have not seen a single one of the mites/whatever move, but there are many of them and I can tell they aren't crystals or trichomes.

Are the leaves I have pictured and symptoms my plants are having consistent with broad mites or is there a chance there is something else going on here?

 

[Former Guest]

if you read the product label it should have told you to do that. if you don't ph, it makes the pesticide less effective therefore building up a resistance to it. if you have seen spider mites, you should be able to see eggs just barely while squinting with the naked eye. broad mite eggs are much much smaller.

if you did have spider mites and you have confirmed that, chems are not the way to go as UC Davis and other agricultural sites (google "IPM spider mites .edu" and you can find treatment plans that work) have stated that chems will make your problem worse when dealing with spider mites but broads need heat treatment/chems which will kill anything even if you can't identify it
speaking of being not able to pinpoint what's going on, this is why I think you may have a nute issue correlating with maybe some spider mite damage:

Problems start when I move them into flowering. One by one, the fan leaves begin to shrivel up and die, starting toward the bottom of the stock and making their way up to the mid section. Once all the fan leaves are affected on the main stock, the fan leaves on the branches start to do the same thing, making their way out from the beginning of the branch and one by one, the fan leaves towards the end of the branch become affected.

nute issues like Nitrogen cause the leaves to yellow and shrivel up starting from the bottom and working it's way up top and this can happen quite fast sometimes. so I'm bumping this again in case that this is not broad mites.

 

[twelsch24]

How much light are they under in veg before you put them in the 20k light room? Could it be shock from going from a low light intensity to extreme light intensity?

I've noticed symptoms close to yours when I haven't given my plants a few days to adjust to higher intensity lights.

 

[natureschild]

Twelsch - the veg room has 2 1k watt MH's on light rails. I don't think the issue is related to shock from light intensity, as I have run this same setup before with no problems.

Luckybean, I'm going to try the heat method you posted tomorrow night. Do you by chance know if there is an ideal time when I should heat the room? Should it be done when the lights first come on or could I save it towards when they are about to turn off? Would it make a difference? I have a pretty strong AC and dimmable ballasts so hopefully getting the temps back down after isn't too big of a problem. It's a little scary to think of things that could go wrong from the heat treatment (ie losing the whole crop) but if it's what needs to be done, then it will be done.

I know in the heat treatment post, the guy says he has done the method during flowering. How do the plants not hermaphrodite with the high heat? Or do you just have to accept that you will lose some of them?

Thanks

 

[natureschild]

Another thing I've noticed: with all that's happened the past 2 weeks, I stopped watering from my pumps/reservoirs and began hand watering in case the issue was related to root rot.

I feel like the ladies are hardly drinking. I have some cookie frost that is approx 36" tall (some are bigger) and they are only drinking about 300 mL per day. Medium is a 6" rockwool cube inside of 2 gallon pot with coco surrounding the cube.

I feel like that's not very much water at all for a plant that size? Could this also be relative to the slow growth that I have noticed? Usually when I move plants into flower they take off, growing 1" to 3" per day. Right now I'm only measuring 1/4" to 1/2" per day.

I'm still checking the leaves for broad mites with the scope everyday, and have not seen anything move. Backed down my CNS17 Bloom to 17 mL/gallon, I don't think this is a nutrient issue as a lot of people run this product with great success.

I've been reading a lot about the broad mites, and it seems like most people have their problems on the pistols, nodes, and new growth. My new growth doesn't look that bad, its the fan leaves that are fucked up. Any thoughts?

I really wanna confirm that the issue is broad mites before I move forward with the heat treatment, thanks for the help so far guys.

 

[Former Guest]

I am not sure when a good time is but I would guess in the morning right after water with aspirin. Good question about the herm but you won't finish anywhere where you have the chance at least if you do the heat treatment. Just exhaust and turn the AC on after.

 

[Former Guest]

What does the bottom of the container smell like? Rot has a distinctive smell. You should repost in infirmary. You will get a better response.

 

[IntelliGeneS]

My experience with broad mites is that they attack growing points, not leaves. Unless their behavior is radically different on Cannabis, I'd rule out broad mites.