Hydro Overwatering and Nitrogen Deficiency

LostTribe · Feb 3, 2019

Hey there,

I built a new hydro system. I only had half a bag of Hydroton left and went ahead and used it. Its not the big clay balls they are mixed small and medium. I was fine in aero before transplanting.

They immediately started yellowing from the bottom of the plant. I then started to get dark purple stems. New growth is light green. No burnt tips.

Top drip recirculating set up. I was watering every hour for 10 minutes as its slower flow than I would normally do. I just cut that yesterday to once for 10 minutes every 3 hours. That is what I normally run with bigger pump and higher flow rate on the drip. (this is a mini version of my normal setup) I think the smaller balls are holding a lot more water than I am used too also.

I flushed yesterday with Clearex and RO for 2 hours to ensure it wasn't lockout.

Feeding
RO
5ml Calmag+
then bumping ppm to 750 total with MaxiGro (was using maxi bloom before thought the gro would help but stayed the same)

Now I am getting purple showing up in the leaf veins and tiny purple dots on the yellow leafs. This has been going on for 2-3 weeks.

Awaiting parts for my RO filter then I am going to dump, flush and switch back to PBP.

You guys think its from overwatering? Fresh clones in 4 days look normal good green still. Does 750 ppm sound high enough with maxigro? Not getting burnt tips.

LostTribe · Feb 3, 2019

new growth leaves are also growing quite wide and curling out and under. Definitely overwatered checked and roots are pure white.

Dr.Young · Feb 3, 2019

Maybe up the humidity, and try to u drop the watering by a lot....
Or maybe overfeeding if the ppm isn't dropping, and humidity is already so high they just aren't showing burn.

bsgospel · Feb 3, 2019

Douglas.Curtis · Feb 3, 2019

You've done this before and it's worked for you, so my first thoughts usually go to environment.

What are your Temps? Humidity? Major swings in either? Heavy fungal spore load in the area?

In veg, you should get the same healthy growth with maxibloom or maxigrow, just shorter and stockier plants with maxibloom. I personally have never used cal/mag with hydro, and I have a lot of experience with just maxibloom and epsom.

That being said, my plants have definitely responded to added calcium. In my opinion, cal/mag products rarely have the exact ratio of what you need so I strongly recommend supplementing them individually.

(this won't be part of the problem though.)

f-e · Feb 3, 2019

Who's 750ppm is that? It changes globally.

Have you carried over the calmag from the aero, where calcium drops out?
Calcium can bugger up N, especially ammonical N. How is your tap water?

I ran RO for a cycle, using just my usual single part coco food. Is maxigro no good?

Lester Beans · Feb 3, 2019

Hey Lost Tribe, just up the veg food. The plant is operating more efficient in aeroponics, therefore does not require the amount of food. When transplanting the plant is suddenly dealing with shock and the need to build a larger root system in the hydroton, burning all available stored food in the process.

Plenty of Cal mag and some veg food will straighten them right out.

big315smooth · Feb 3, 2019

i remember growing hydro for first time after years of doing soil it was like starting over on the learning messing up alot but eventually mastered it

Dr.Young · Feb 3, 2019

Just realized you said your adding calmag... Thats your problem. 100%
No point with maxigrow or bloom....

Thats why they have a hard version, and normal version.. Normal is good with r\o and tap.... hard is good with tap thats heavy.

I'd maybe try doing the calmag thing in gentle foliars either very light weekly... or heavy once a month.

LostTribe · Feb 5, 2019

I grabbed my PBP going back to it. Tried and true beats messing around especially when this is a smaller setup and less coming from it demands absolute best results IMHO.

I did not know Maxigrow did not require CalMag with RO. That would account for some issues. New Clones off same plants are doing fine, but still no improvement after I reduced watering schedule on the 2 bigger seed mom's. The OG clone I put is has started to yellow.

LostTribe · Feb 5, 2019

Its also a new TDS meter. My old meter only did ppm. Not sure which conversion either.

tap water I was on 500 reading = 240ppm, 700 = 320ppm and ec =.5

can someone tell me which conversion to use with tap water? .5 ec seems higher than I expected. Sounds like old meter was 700 conversion. Milwaukee.

With the Aero I was using 1tsp/gal maxi bloom with tap no problems. Suppose I should just dump and run that for a few days.

Ph was 5.6 floating to 6.3 and readjust back down.

Dr.Young · Feb 6, 2019

Yeah dude.... Maxi grow, and Maxi bloom have everything you need for base. Easy as possible.... MAX out around 1.0 - 1.4 ec base.... Then whatever room you have left you can add Koolbloom\bloom boosters, and etc

1 gram is 133PPM..... The small scoop holds about 7 grams packed and scraped, about 6 grams if loosely filled.... and 5g if a 1/8" or so below brim.....

LostTribe · Feb 6, 2019

Dr.Young said:
Yeah dude.... Maxi grow, and Maxi bloom have everything you need for base. Easy as possible.... MAX out around 1 ec and 1.4ec base.... Then whatever room you have left you can add Koolbloom\bloom boosters, and etc

1 gram is 133PPM..... The small scoop holds about 7 grams packed and scraped, about 6 grams if loosely filled.... and 5g if a 1/8" or so below brim.....

1 scoop per gallon with my .5 ec tap gave 3.1ec so I watered it down to 1.0.

LostTribe · Feb 15, 2019

I replaced the pump but now the older plants are showing a bad boron deficiency. Ph has been 5.5-6.3 ec .8-.9.

insomniac_AU · Feb 15, 2019

I want to premise this by saying I don't claim to be an expert at all I've just learned from my own observations.

I've never understood over watering as a cause of problems in cannabis plants in a hydro setup. I use a homemade flood and drain hydro setup and the pump isn't even on a timer, it runs 24hrs a day pumping water to the roots. My vegging plants have roots in water constantly as well. Surely there must be other factors at play than just an excess of water?

LostTribe · Feb 15, 2019

insomniac_AU said:
I want to premise this by saying I don't claim to be an expert at all I've just learned from my own observations.

I've never understood over watering as a cause of problems in cannabis plants in a hydro setup. I use a homemade flood and drain hydro setup and the pump isn't even on a timer, it runs 24hrs a day pumping water to the roots. My vegging plants have roots in water constantly as well. Surely there must be other factors at play than just an excess of water?

Agree right now as I discovered the old pump was not putting out the proper pressure. I enlarged my drip line from those mister lines which I never used until recently. New pump going strong plus I am hand watering to make sure as I found dried out roots on my OG cut. Pulled her and removed dead biomass put back in SWC with other mom. Swapped in OG mom and she's already showing a bit yellow.

I think I need to dump nutes and run RO and clearex for 2 hours tomorrow and refill with fresh notes to be sure its not complete lockout. Old plants showing burnt tips now with dark purple stems inner leaf necrosis and yellowing. PH was up to 6.2 I dropped to 5.2 for now. PH keeps jumping over night from 5.5 to 6.2 in about 16 hours small set up. Added SM90 and Hydroguard to help the roots.

My 2 crystal cookies look fine same notes same system. Their seed moms are the ones I am having issues with. Man....

LostTribe · Feb 16, 2019

insomniac_AU said:
I want to premise this by saying I don't claim to be an expert at all I've just learned from my own observations.

I've never understood over watering as a cause of problems in cannabis plants in a hydro setup. I use a homemade flood and drain hydro setup and the pump isn't even on a timer, it runs 24hrs a day pumping water to the roots. My vegging plants have roots in water constantly as well. Surely there must be other factors at play than just an excess of water?

I flushed for 2 hours with Clearex and ro. Refilled at

5ml/gal cal mag
10ml/gal PBP Bloom 2-3-5
That gives me 1.3 ec and 750 ppm on a .7 conversion
PH 5.5

Hoping they respond. I am tired of burning the same joints all day. However, this ACE Panama I pulled out with a 9 month cure is keeping my attention or better yet destroying it.
LT

insomniac_AU · Feb 16, 2019

LostTribe said:
Hoping they respond. I am tired of burning the same joints all day. However, this ACE Panama I pulled out with a 9 month cure is keeping my attention or better yet destroying it.
LT

I hope they do too. At least you have something to smoke. Could be worse.

Do you have plenty of oxygenation in the water? IMO most problems are caused by lack of oxygen at the roots rather than excess water.

LostTribe · Feb 16, 2019

insomniac_AU said:
I hope they do too. At least you have something to smoke. Could be worse.
Do you have plenty of oxygenation in the water? IMO most problems are caused by lack of oxygen at the roots rather than excess water.

With the old pump under running the water under the main bucket wasn't getting refreshed enough. Gonna throw my little general in there and set it to 1 minute floods.

This is a 2 gallon version of my usual 5 gallon buckets version. Never had a hiccup. Its the water flow.

LostTribe · Feb 16, 2019

Man, now I found Pythium on the one that I put back in the bubbler and it took over the roots on my mom. Treating with 15ml/gal 3% h2o2 on both rez's.

Seriously, I feel like throwing in the towel and starting over with fresh cuttings.

Anyone treated pythium using h2o2 while using PBP nutrient solution? Its been a while. My hydro guard froze solid in my garage so not sure its still useable? Just using RO, Calmag and PBP Bloom 2-3-5. Added h202.

Hydro Overwatering and Nitrogen Deficiency

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