These seedlings don't look healthy to me...

Hi there!
This is sort of a test run. I never grow in coco-coir and I wanted to give it a try. I made a 70/30 coco-perlite mix, bought the 3 parts General Hydroponics nutes, Flora-Micro, F.-Gro & F.-Bloom.

I'm using filtered tap water (EC 0.3) and I water twice a day with an EC of 0.5 (280ppm) solution with PH 6.0.

This is how these 3 seedlings look 11 days from germination:







Am I watering with a weak nutritive solution? Or else?

Thanks in advance folks!

In the humblest of all opinions, that is twice you have experimented with technique/mediums. I would highly recommend you get a grow or two under your belt before you try and experiment. You don't have the experience (from my vantage point) to go out on a limb and hope for the best. How are your manifolds doing?

There's no way in hell that little thing needs to be watered twice per day.

Please consider resizing the pics before uploading - 5000*7000px image files are unnecessarily large and a strain on bandwidth.

They are about 8 MB a piece ... poor phone users. Just visiting this thread can cost 24 MB of data. Visiting your other thread actually slows down my PC due to the many Huge images.

Are you providing enough light?
Seedings need as much light as mature plants, but without the heat.

They don't look so bad.

Definitely water less at this stage until the roots really take hold.

As for your feeding; there is the 6/9 approach with General Hydroponics. Use 6 ml micro and 9 ml bloom per gallon of water. You don't need the grow at all. The leaves look very green already so you want to avoid nitrogen toxicity. Getting the pH down to 5.8 wouldn't hurt either.

They do look healthy enough. I've read that you shouldn't use containers that allow light to reach the roots. Not related to this but just a thought. Yeah I usually don't water seedlings much in the beginning. You can put a cut down cup upside down for a humidity dome in the beginning so you don't have to water so much, meaning less chance of it. Try lifting it, there is a huge difference between a dry container and one with any amount of water in it. Don't worry at this point, have fun and carry on.

Water less the perlite all on top is doing nuthin ... the idea of mixing perlite with coco is totally over rated but if u do u want it at the bottom of the cup for drainage not the top.. if will eventually float up there... also this has nuthin to do with ya current issues but u do not want to use the grow at all in coco it's a total waste there is more then enough nitrogen in the micro... but for your current issue they don't look terrible just don't feed them for a day and then go as needed based on the weight of the cup dry compared to wet once u got a cup full of roots and some real leaves u can water till ur hearts content but the slow stunted growth is so from to much water to early

SuperBadGrower said:

There's no way in hell that little thing needs to be watered twice per day.

Please consider resizing the pics before uploading - 5000*7000px image files are unnecessarily large and a strain on bandwidth.

They are about 8 MB a piece ... poor phone users. Just visiting this thread can cost 24 MB of data. Visiting your other thread actually slows down my PC due to the many Huge images.

Click to expand...

It is not a lack of light issue. I've done that mistake already...with the seedlings "reaching" desperately for a little "sun"...no, these aren't leggy...they're weirdos

Growing is a hobby for me. I'm not desperate after results in the short term...I really enjoy experimenting and learning. You can rightly argue that it might not be the best way to gain experience and I see your point. For sure experimenting many things together aren't the best way to reach optimal results in terms of yield. It does give me an overlook of different possibilities and which is the best considering my environment, my specs.

In the end, I decided to experiment with the coco because I had bugs with soil and having the tent in my bedroom (yep, not optimal at all...but I got what I got really...) bugs is one thing I'd like to avoid as much as possible.

Surely choosing 1 medium and 1 technique and improve in that one would get better results faster. But it'd take a lot longer for me to try and tailor which technique, medium, ect, are the best for me. Therefore I decided to sacrifice part of the yield and experience gained to be able to try out new mediums and techs, so that I get to choose which medium and techs sooner, getting a proper feel about the differences and similitudes of the different mediums and different pruning techniques.

You are absolutely right about the pics. The mobile is set to max pixels...many times I left the pics like this because what I asked needed to be seen and zoomed in the pic and zooming a high-resolution pic gives much better results. Since then I forgot it and left the settings as they were, now I change it. Honestly who has the internet has a flat price with no limits of GB around here but this might not be the case for everyone, my bad, sorry.

Manifold? As I needed to flower the girls, I decided to leave the idea for next round, give the girls 2 more weeks in veg with 20/24 in order to build some new branch and new leaves and yesterday I switched to 12/12. Completing the manifold is postponed...most probably I work on it next summer outdoors. Photoperiod has plenty of time to complete a manifold during the long outdoor vegetative period, I'll wait.

About these seedlings...Could it be a Cal-Mag deficiency? I read that in coco it happens if the coco coir isn't buffered properly. Should I supplement Cal-mag?!

Thank-you

Dr.NO said:

They don't look so bad.

Definitely water less at this stage until the roots really take hold.

As for your feeding; there is the 6/9 approach with General Hydroponics. Use 6 ml micro and 9 ml bloom per gallon of water. You don't need the grow at all. The leaves look very green already so you want to avoid nitrogen toxicity. Getting the pH down to 5.8 wouldn't hurt either.

Click to expand...

Really thanks for the tips!
I read that with coco is impossible to overwater, that you have to treat it like hydro and as long as it has good drainage and you have a good run-off is ok. As you say, this is probably true but avoidable the very first couple of weeks, as the seedling is so tiny. I also read about coco that dries faster than soil and you can have dry pockets forming in the coco...so I thought best to water it.

The 6/9 approach?! Interesting...is there something in the written form somewhere online about this 6/9 theory and how is it supposed to work in the different stages of a plant's life? I'll be happy to delve into it.

I'm happy that some of you think these seedlings aren't too bad...hopefully, they'll recover.

Webwiller let the coco dry out a bit when they are
Small. You only multi feed when they have rooted
Enough look at the coco thread by hundred gram oz he has done a great thread. Hope you get them sorted

Indeed, you can water it twice a day when the plant actually starts to drink a significant amount of water in 9 hours. Since this is your first time with coco I would not worry about nutrients at all and just trust in the formula you use. All these formulas bring success.. IMO >50% of indoor "nutrient deficiencies" you see online are environmental problems or the result of overfeeding anyway.

If you're using a big brand coco line $10 says here's what they will tell you: "Our A&B contains enough calcium and magnesium to grow full cycle, and is designed for use with tap water. We do not recommend changing the ratio of A:B throughout the grow". They will also recommend you not to add perlite. Canna and plagron schedules also change based on your tap water EC. Of course, many people still add calcium, magnesium and perlite, and the opinions are all over the place. I'm just saying that if the manufacturer tells people to do it a certain way, well... they're not trying to kill your plants

webwiller said:

Surely choosing 1 medium and 1 technique and improve in that one would get better results faster. But it'd take a lot longer for me to try and tailor which technique, medium, ect, are the best for me. Therefore I decided to sacrifice part of the yield and experience gained to be able to try out new mediums and techs, so that I get to choose which medium and techs sooner, getting a proper feel about the differences and similitude s of the different mediums and different pruning techniques.

Thank-you

Click to expand...

... and there is nothing wrong with that. I would like to have your money There is absolutely nothing wrong with trying different techniques/run. e.g pruning, fiming, mainligning etc... but, I wouldn't do it to the whole run. How do you measure success? A comparative measure (between the techniques, on the same strain) would lead to garnering experience sooner as you stated.

Then you switch strains and the ball game might be different.

When it comes to mediums, well, unfortunately you have to stick to a single one per run, unless you want to be sleeping in there as they will definitely have different requirements at different times. You will be in there so often, might as well sleep there.

Coco from what I have gathered has a steep learning curve.

It cost money to grow and as a medical user, I want a harvest! I have developed skills over my grows by tweaking here and there and evaluating the results then, taking lessons learned, apply against next grow and tweak that sucker. Baby steps

Pinkfan said:

Webwiller let the coco dry out a bit when they are
Small. You only multi-feed when they have rooted
Enough look at the coco thread by hundred-gram oz he has done a great thread. Hope you get them sorted

Click to expand...

Thanks a lot for your suggestions and wishes!..I'll keep y'all updated...

The only sad thing is that these seeds were supposed to be from strong genetics and in fact 3 out of 3 sprouts a tail straight soaked in the glass within the first 12 hrs, in 72 hrs all 3 had the cotyledons wide open...since they started needing nutes from the medium they started to act out...meaning I can blame one only.....'n guess whom LOL

I believe in a cal-mag def. due to coco not buffered properly. I'm supplementing with foliar and I'm buffering properly the rest of the coco, as they'll be transplanted to their definitive container soon as they're autos, I don't plan a 2nd transplant, from solo cups I plan to go straight to 3 gal pots.

I'mback said:

... and there is nothing wrong with that. I would like to have your money There is absolutely nothing wrong with trying different techniques/run. e.g pruning, fimming, mainlining etc... but, I wouldn't do it to the whole run. How do you measure success? A comparative measure (between the techniques, on the same strain) would lead to garnering experience sooner as you stated.

Then you switch strains and the ball game might be different.

When it comes to mediums, well, unfortunately, you have to stick to a single one per run, unless you want to be sleeping in there as they will definitely have different requirements at different times. You will be in there so often, might as well sleep there.

Coco from what I have gathered has a steep learning curve.

It cost money to grow and as a medical user, I want a harvest! I have developed skills over my grows by tweaking here and there and evaluating the results then, taking lessons learned, apply against next grow and tweak that sucker. Baby steps

Click to expand...

IT is somewhat a matter of money, you're not wrong in this. Not that I don't care about harvesting...money aside, harvesting a top-shelf product is surely something every grower wants to achieve.

Let's say that as my specific situation isn't that common, I decided the most important thing for me is testing and choosing the best medium for MY entourage of setups, knowledge, handwork, time for studying and improving, etc...

You said it as a joke but I have to sleep with them every day in real life and catching the difference between sleeping with compost smell or air pumps (in case of DWC), ad water pumps if you go RDWC, Gnats and Thrips are just waiting for you to put down that soil bucket to make their home...every medium and tech has its own pros & cons.

I figured that the faster I find the medium that suits me better, the sooner I can deepen in my knowledge specifically to obtain the best from the type of cultivar I finally decided to go on with.

Not saying it's the best screening method...just saying that this is the one I adopted so far.

Today I prepared the buffering solution, tomorrow (or the day after) I'll transplant and in few days the girls should recover promptly.

Yeah...I'd rather do it wrong and learn for next time..than go ahead scared of raking decisions...I do try my best to study and read first...if I missed something, or believed to some crappy info well, I won't die for it, LOL

Thanks, guys...I got the situation clearer now...I also planned things a bit better from now on...let's hope I got it right!