Doctor, doctor... what is wrong with me?

[zlock]

I've got 4 plants growing in a somewhat small cabinet (IKEA dresser turned growbox) and they've been doing fine up until a few days ago. I've been reading through the forums here and haven't been able to pinpoint what's going on, so I'm hoping someone can help me out before the problem gets out of control.
Two of the plants are Female Seeds C99, one is TGA Apollo 13bx, and one is Delicious Seeds Northern Lights Blue Auto, all from seed.
They are about 6 weeks old now and have been in a blend of Fox Farm Ocean Forest and Light Warrior since the seeds cracked.

They have been under 24/0 vegging until I switched them to 12/12 two days ago.

The setup in the cabinet is two HPS lamps (150w and 70w) in a vertical setup, with the plants trained on a vertical screen.

I've been feeding them SuperThrive and Fox Farm Grow Big since their 2nd set of leaves (or right about there), a few weeks in added Fox Farm Big Bloom, and the past 3 times I've watered (not counting last night), Tiger Bloom, all according to the directions on the bottles.
I have fed them every watering, though I've gone light on the nutes every few times to keep from over feeding them.

I haven't been checking the runoff pH like I should, I've been pH'ing the nute solution to between 6 and 7 before watering. I will check the runoff pH next time I water. I use a Milwaukee pH pen and calibrate it to 7.01 every few uses.

I water them once the soil gets dry and the pots feel light, every 3 days or so is what it ends up being.

I noticed a few days ago that there were some yellow leafs at the bottom of the plants, some spots on the lower fan leaves of the Northern Lights Blue Auto, and a little bit of curling towards the top... so last night when I watered, I did a very light nute solution. I was going to use plain distilled water, but in adjusting the pH I couldn't get it where I wanted to I used a light dose of nutes to get the pH to around 6.3

I've been regulating the temperature inside the cabinet by using one or both lights, both if it's cooler and temps are lower inside, just one if the temps are warmer. I've been alternating between the 70w (lower) and the 150w (upper) to try and keep the growth / intensity even across the vertical canopy. The plants are around 3" from the bulbs.

RH is currently (and stays around) 40-45%, and temps on the back side of the canopy (just now realized that's probably not very accurate and moved it to on the screen of one of the plants) have ranged from 73* and 95* over the past 24 hours. The 95* was only for a couple of hours before I realized both lamps were on, and unplugged one, bringing temps down to the mid 80's.

For airflow, I use a Stanley blower fan inside the cabinet, drawing air through a carbon filter. Intake is passive. This runs all of the time.

At this time I do not have a secondary fan inside the cabinet blowing at the plants, I've been relying on the airflow from the passive intake vents to cause airflow over the plants. I will be adding a secondary fan blowing upwards across the bulbs / fronts of each plant once I have the time to set that up. This will probably be in two days.

There are no pests evident.

Hopefully this information and these pictures are helpful in describing the problem, thank you for any and all suggestions and advice!

Some pictures from about a week ago for reference, before the problem really started...



Attached are pictures from this evening:

 

[Granger2]

How much Superthrive have you been giving them? Getting much N? How about trace mins? Ca and Mg? Good luck. -granger

 

[RetroGrow]

Superthrive is a waste of $, IMO. Aside from that, my best guess is over feeding, as you are already in Fox Farms Ocean Forest, which is hot to begin with, and you are adding more nutrients on top of that. I would do a complete flush of one plant, and see if there's improvement. 3 gallons of RO water per gallon of pot. Just stick it in the bath tub and keep pouring water through it until it is completely flushed. It should perk up in 24 hours or less if that is the problem. Also, check your run off PH.

 

[zlock]

Thanks guys! I've been using one or two drops per gal of super thrive, I will flush tonight and report back!

 

[Cat Jockey]

I haven't been checking the runoff pH like I should, I've been pH'ing the nute solution to between 6 and 7 before watering. I will check the runoff pH next time I water. I use a Milwaukee pH pen and calibrate it to 7.01 every few uses.

You have multiple nutrient issues present, from a quick glance of your pics. What is causing them could be more than one thing. I'll go back and read your post again (I just scanned it), but a little more info is needed. Such as what the starting pH and ppm of the water you are using is before you add nutrients and before you add pH adjuster (not a fan of pH adjuster)? Also, when you say runoff, how much runoff?

I'm not saying to not do it, but checking the pH of the runoff can be quite deceptive, for a number of reasons. What you are concerned about is the pH in the rootzone and the proportions of nutrients relative to one another in the rootzone, not the pH of the runoff, which can vary quite a bit from the actual pH of the rootzone post-watering.

 

[zlock]

Thanks for the feedback.

I flushed each of the plants with about a gallon of distilled water each, I tried to pH the water to the 6-7 range before watering but had difficulty getting it to stabilize in that range. Is there any trick to adjusting the pH of water without nutes? If I add nutrients it's fairly easy to get the pH stable in that range. Without nutes it seems to jump from one extreme to the other with just a drop or two of adjuster...

Anyway, runoff shortly after the first bit of water started flowing out the bottom of the pots was around 5.4.

36 hours later, here's what they look like.

 

[stihgnobevoli]

too much food. overall is what it looks like, but you also look like you have a bad mag def.

1.) check ph. if it's not over 7 or below 5.5.
1a.)if it's out of range water with plain water ph to mid 6's
2.) what are the temps at the top of your cab(canopy)?
3.) if it's not like 100 degrees and the ph isn't out of range then give them magnesium and water for about a week . (epsom salt 1-4teaspoons per gallon start with 2 adjust up or down after ONE WHOLE WEEK after seeing if it's improved or not.)


but based on everything you've said i'm thinking you're overfeeding them which causes the ph to drop causing the nute burn and you also have a mag def since you just flipped to flower and you're not feeding them bloom formula.

my deduction based on the evidence.

"waaahhhnn mooore theeeng"
if you're using soil then you shouldn't be feeding with every watering. feed, water water feed. or feed feed water. never feed feed feed.

 

[Granger2]

You're keeping them too wet, which causes deficiencies. Get a $10 moisture meter, and do what it says. -granger

 

[xxPeacePipexx]

Many opinions here and they all tend to center around the pH and moisture content . I would say by the looks of it you have little to buffer your soil mix at this point . Peat and organics can wreak havoc when the pH falls out of range which is usually about the time they begin to flower from my experiences with this soil and others like it that use oyster shell verses dolomite lime.

 

[zlock]

Interesting, thank you Stihgnobevoli, Granger2, and PeacePipe for your thoughts and suggestions.

I don't think I'm keeping the soil too wet, I've been watering every 4-5 days which is when the pots feel significantly lighter than a day after watering.

Here they are 5 days since those last pictures, I watered once (two days ago) since then with plain distilled water pH'd to right around 7 (the pH seems to drop if I stir the pH pen around in the water? is there a way to stabilize the pH without raising or dropping it to get a true reading?)

 

[Granger2]

Z,
Do your plants sit in runoff? -granger

 

[zlock]

No, the two larger containers have those little catch pans attached to the bottom and after watering and letting it sit and drain out the bottom naturally, I'll tilt them 45*+ to drain the remainder out of the pan... the smaller containers don't have these trays so they drain until theres no more runoff

 

[stihgnobevoli]

these images are baffling. how close are the tops of the plants to the bulbs and what is the average temperature at the canopy?

based on the progress from set one to set two looks like your plants aren't overfed but actually hungry. but they also have too much food. it's like they're burning off the water more than they're using the food. which is why i ask about the temps at the top. they may be spending all their time just trying to stay cool.

the mottled yellow on the leaves indicates mag def, but the yellow drying leaves and overall yellowness of the plants indicate nitrogen def. but at the same time the top of your plants are showing a nitrogen overdose and calcium def or heat stress.

how often do to water and is the soil you are growing in compacted or full of roots? have you ever taken the little foil or whatever is at the bottom of the pots off and look at the roots that poke out the bottom? are they brown or white?

 

[stihgnobevoli]

you know in looking at these pics i would say those plants could use a nice haircut too. but that's just my opinion ad to what i would do. there's a lotta leaves stacked on each other blocking light. since you're doing vert i've found it beneficial to let as much light as possible hit the lower parts. that's just my take on it, you don't need to do that part. but i would do check all the stuff i said in my last post.

 

[zlock]

Hmm.... Interesting observation!

The plants are about 4-5 inches from the bulb(s), right now I'm running the 150 on and the 70 off, temps peak at ~90* which I know is a little hot. Think that it's too hot maybe?
When I just use the 70w, temps peak in the low-mid 80's.

I have not had the plants out of their pots to check the roots, the tin foil on the bottoms of the containers is simply to catch any water that may run off after draining after watering. I water every 4-5 days.

As for the haircut, I was beginning to wonder if that might help things out. How much would you suggest trimming?
I've been tucking the larger fan leaves through the screen around to the back, but even still it's (obviously, from the pics) pretty crazy in there. Maybe a haircut will allow more airflow and cooler temps, too.

I'll check the roots before the next time I water and get back to you about that...

 

[stihgnobevoli]

i don't mean take em out of the pots, just take that foil off the bottom and look at the roots you see poking outof the bottom of the pot. are they white or brown. if they're brown you might have some root issues.

for the fan leaves, i can't really tell you. but i would start with taking off all the major fan leaves. the first ones that are at the bottom of the branches on the main stem.

 

[zlock]

Okay, I had planned on holding off watering until tonight or tomorrow as I'll be out of town for a few days and wanted to time it so that they didn't get thirsty in my absence, but last night they were looking REAL thirsty (almost sad), 12 hours earlier they looked fine and happy...

Anyway, I took the opportunity to get a pic of the roots of one of the plants.

Watered with a light feeding if bloom nutes, didn't saturate them (wasn't prepared) so I'll probably give them another drink before I leave town.

Also plucked off any of the fan leaves that were crispy, yellow, or otherwise looked like they needed to go.

 

[zlock]

Gave 'em a good watering tonight (again), I'm hoping they'll be OK for 4-5 days until I'm back from my trip, they perked up since yesterday (they were dehydrated for sure).

Took some more fan leaves off, the ones that were dead/crispy/wilted severely. They seem to be looking better, though still not 100%.

 

[zlock]

Back from my travels, the plants are looking good and probably have another day or so in 'em before they need water.

Still not looking 100% but certainly not getting worse.

Got some pics of the roots as well...

 

[Green Squall]

I'm Amused to Death with your thread title. Hope your plants are doing good!