Cheap Foliar Nutrient For Very Pale Plant

brown_thumb · Mar 17, 2018

I have one plant that is very spindly and pale yellowish compare to the others. I switched brands of liquid fertilizers this time but, other than my screw-ups, most are doing reasonably well, considering I tend to kill everything that's green.

After following directions from the nutrient maker, a well-respected high-end brand who shall remain nameless, nothing improved. So out of desperation I decided to go foliarly chemical on that one plant.

I bought a cheap generic version of Miracle Grow soluble high nitrogen granules (24/8/16), mixed it a bit weak, moved the plant out of direct sunlight into bright open shade, and sprayed it liberally. After it dried I moved it back into bright direct sunlight. After a few hours it already looked a tiny bit better. I'll spray it again in the morning before putting it in direct sunlight.

I thought I'd done something goofy with soil or nutrient PH but since this seems to be working I'm wondering if this plant dislikes this brand of nutrients.

Am I crazy or just stupid?

BOMBAYCAT · Mar 17, 2018

I'm wondering if some plants are nutrient hogs? I have earlier started a bunch of clones for outdoors and 1 clone is pale green with a couple leaves trying to turn yellow. The same variety right next to it is a darker green with no pale leaves. I have foliar fed it so I am waiting to see what happens.

Should I spray every day or wait a few days between sprays?

brown_thumb · Mar 17, 2018

BOMBAYCAT said:
I'm wondering if some plants are nutrient hogs? I have earlier started a bunch of clones for outdoors and 1 clone is pale green with a couple leaves trying to turn yellow. The same variety right next to it is a darker green with no pale leaves. I have foliar fed it so I am waiting to see what happens.

Should I spray every day or wait a few days between sprays?

I don't know enough to answer your question. But I'm spraying twice daily to see what happens.

MJPassion · Mar 17, 2018

BOMBAYCAT said:
I'm wondering if some plants are nutrient hogs? I have earlier started a bunch of clones for outdoors and 1 clone is pale green with a couple leaves trying to turn yellow. The same variety right next to it is a darker green with no pale leaves. I have foliar fed it so I am waiting to see what happens.

Should I spray every day or wait a few days between sprays?

Pretty sure your on track w this post.
Question is...
Which nute or nutes is that particular plant hogging.

Spraying elementals will let ya know faster than spraying a whole food type diet.

I’d start w Ca/Mg and if that make a significant improvement, separate the Ca from the Mg & hit em w gypsum (in the soil) &/or Epsom (foliar).

Tiresmoke19 · Mar 19, 2018

Is ph on the one plant different? My understanding is ph affects the plants ability to uptake nutrients. So when you do a spray you take ph mostly out of the equation

brown_thumb · Mar 19, 2018

Tiresmoke19 said:
Is ph on the one plant different? My understanding is ph affects the plants ability to uptake nutrients. So when you do a spray you take ph mostly out of the equation

If you're addressing me, no the soil and nutrient PH are the same as the others. Planted in the same soil and fed from the same batches of water/nutes.

Tiresmoke19 · Mar 19, 2018

brown_thumb said:
If you're addressing me, no the soil and nutrient PH are the same as the others. Planted in the same soil and fed from the same batches of water/nutes.

Yes was towards yours. Was just a thought if you used any recycled growing medium or ran out of amendments kinda thing.

Only Ornamental · Mar 19, 2018

Would be interesting to know which deficiency we're talking about... or if it's even a deficiency. Had some plants myself which were light green by nature. Have any pictures?

If it's nitrogen, then spraying ~0.5% urea would be the solution but only if you're growing in soil (-> urease enzymes require trace amounts of nickel which isn't necessarily present in soilless media or water cultures).
Fairly good foliar sulphur sources would be ammonium sulphate or thiosulphate. Though the latter is allegedly better/faster assimilated it might have some drawbacks you don't want to challenge. If ammonia isn't wanted, go with potassium sulphate or apply Epsom salt best as foliar spray and soil drench.
Other deficiencies causing brighter green colours could be magnesium (see also sulphur), iron, manganese, and zinc. These are usually applied either in chelate form (e.g. as bisglycinate) or as sulphate salt. Most of these deficiencies shouldn't be just remedied by foliar application but also as soil drench to eliminate it in the whole plant and not just the spots where the spray droplets hit the leaves (-> +/- immobile micronutrients or too high demands to be cured by spray alone regarding secondary nutrients).

brown_thumb · Mar 19, 2018

I was thinking it might just be the phenotype but after spraying with the high nitrogen nutes it's a tiny bit greener overall and has some darker green areas around the veins. I'll post pics in a few minutes. When you see the pics, please don't make fun of my poor sickly little plant. :flu:

Only Ornamental · Mar 19, 2018

You know, I'm about to make fun.. not of your plants (which I haven't seen yet) but of you cause it takes you bout an hour to post a single pic

. Or maybe you're bakes... prolly I should do that too, just for a change.

brown_thumb · Mar 19, 2018

The top photo is the sickly plant... worse than the others anyway. After a few foliar sprays with the high nitrogen nutes, it's a tiny bit darker overall than it was and has some slightly darker areas at the veins. Before I started the extra feeding it was literally nearly yellow everywhere.

The two plants in front and to the right of the yellowish plant were started the same day. The larger plants behind those were started a few days earlier. All are in the same soil under the same light and fed the same... the larger ones are now on the next step of feeding regimen.

Only Ornamental · Mar 19, 2018

If I had to diagnose that, I'd go with a root issue = multiple deficiencies (especially N and K cause these run out first in young plants). Could be anything from coincidental injury by you, some buggers or a worm, root rot, nematodes, a bad spot within the earth...
On the upside, the newest leaf pair looks better... at least for now... well possible that the lil one will take up soon.
Anyway, that plant is smaller/younger than I expected. Why do foliar with a seedling? By roots, nutrients just take a few cm to get everywhere (including the roots) and you don't risk leaf injuries (not that this would make it any uglier but there's not enough healthy space to waste

).

brown_thumb · Mar 19, 2018

Thank you, OO. Yes, it could be a root problem. I've added a bit of cinnamon to mitigate bacterial problems. I added beneficial nematodes the first two waterings of all the plants but I'm not sure how viable that lot was. After awhile I switched to tap water, thinking maybe the little bit of chlorine would help with any rot. I'm foliar feeding that one plant out of desperation to try and save it. It's an experiment. Since it's struggling so terribly, I figure I might as well try to help it survive. I'm adding the extra nutes in the soil too... just not very much. I do believe the new growth looks a little bit better.

Only Ornamental · Mar 19, 2018

brown_thumb said:
..After awhile I switched to tap water, thinking maybe the little bit of chlorine would help with any rot...

Hopefully, you don't have that much chlorine in your tap water. Cause if you had, it wouldn't just kill mould.

brown_thumb · Mar 19, 2018

I think the chlorine content is fairly low. I know the lack of odor isn't necessarily a good indicator but the fact that the water company owner is a cheapskate and in the past has used far too little, is probably a good sign (bad sign??). I'll get a test kit next time I go to town.

brown_thumb · Mar 25, 2018

I completely quit organic nutes on this one plant, using only the cheap stuff mentioned, every other watering. When watering without the nutes, I add bit of molasses, humic/fulvic acids, and milk.

NOTE: I had a day when the ambient temperature outside was 90F with 10% humidity, bright and sunny. I was unavoidably detained away from home, so several plants were nearly dried to crisps. But this one was in some shade most of the time so it wasn't as badly burnt as some others.

TO THE POINT: This little plant is doing better, at least regarding coloration. It seems to prefer whatever is in the little box of cheap inorganic stuff. It's still spindly though, exacerbated by defoliation due to nute deficiency, then heat. What may appear as venous color variation is just shading caused by puckering of the leaves due to heat stress. The color is now fairly uniform on this plant. See first two photos below.

The next image shows an older plant now showing similar deficiencies as the one in the original post. However, I suppose this could be heat stress. Also, other plants have healthy color despite my many screw-ups.

Another comparison photo below. These are the same plants as were in the first comparison pic.

Only Ornamental · Mar 26, 2018

I tend to change my opinion on this one: it's not any nutrient deficiency but YOU'RE SIMPLY ALLERGIC TO ORGANICS

!

brown_thumb · Mar 26, 2018

Only Ornamental said:
I tend to change my opinion on this one: it's not any nutrient deficiency but YOU'RE SIMPLY ALLERGIC TO ORGANICS !

That may be true but my suspicion is that I just SUCK AT GARDENING.

Only Ornamental · Mar 26, 2018

BTW what did you actually toss into the pots?

brown_thumb · Mar 26, 2018

I can't remember which ones died but below is a list of what survived.

2x Malawi x Panama fem
1x Chronic Widow fem
3x Violeta reg
1x Ace Mix Tropical reg

At least one of the Violeta is a male but I've been ripping its balls off.

Cheap Foliar Nutrient For Very Pale Plant

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