Has anyone seen this before? Mold? Rot?

I haven't been able to find a single similar picture online. We are going to have a sample sent off to the labs but in the mean time I figured I'd check in with you guys to see if anyone has experienced something like this before.

How was the plant affected by whatever it is?

Have you examined the root ball to see if it shares the same fungal-brown looking appearance?

My initial guess is that it does.

Have you put it under a higher-x lens to see if there're any critters at play in there? Other than ones that may have moved in after chopping it down?

Pinnate said:

How was the plant affected by whatever it is?

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Plant had dieing leaves and slow bud formation mother plant also had same symptoms with stock. Roots were brown in color and plant also had a fungal gnat infestation.

Look up fusarium wilt.

I've recently encountered reading material (Rosenthal canna pests book??) re. soil conditions that add to the formation or development of fusarium. (*Note there are several types of fusarium).

The leaves will (in my experience) begin browning from the bottom up, proceeding up the plant, and turning medium to light brown, dead, and dry. Limited vigor at that point.

I don't know that this is what you have (*the darkening of the outside of the stem, I believe, is a symptom, looking at the limited cross-section of the stalk).

Sorry for additional multi-posting.

Root rot hasn't been ruled out yet?

And, tho' you may already be aware, fungus gnats, while a pain in the ass, are more or less a non-issue. Thrips, on the other hand, breed in the top layer of the soil (like the gnats), and look somewhat similar, but CAN tap the life from plants in extreme infestations.

(*Battling both of the little bastages right now, myself).

Fungus gnats can be a major issue and the damage they cause to the root system can severely sicken a plant and cut yield/quality. They can also allow Pythium fungus to attack the plant and this is what is likely to have occurred in this case.

sclerotia ?

Looks like fungal disesease to me. I have seen fusarium wilt in a pepper plant and it looked about the same.

exploziv said:

Looks like fungal disesease to me. I have seen fusarium wilt in a pepper plant and it looked about the same.

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Agreed on the fusarium wilt diagnosis I've never seen it first hand but a quick search on Google images turns up pics very similar to the op's first post. I typed "fusarium wilt stalk and stem cross section" and got a ton of similar images. Another culprit that looks similar is something called verticillium wilt but am not sure that affects cannabis so my bet is that it's fusarium.

Either way I'd ditch that soil and clean the hell out of its container or toss it.

Also clean all the tools you used on the plant. Any blade that touched plant sap of an affected plant can spread it to the others.
Another thing i can tell you for sure is that a healthy soil will rarely be affected by fusarium and verticillum. Crap soils with bad aeration or ones that are kept waterlogged will be easily colonised by those pathogens.

It's my understanding that verticillium wilt does indeed sometimes find a home in cannabis, and if my memory is correct, while fusarium wilt can be arrested or suppressed to some degree, verticillium wilt can amount to the black plague of death.

Can't recall for certain though. I wish my mind worked better these days.

Fungal infestations can make spider mites, etc., look like welcome dinner guests, in my experience, and as the OP said, can and will travel from moms to cuttings. The generational curse of contamination in welcoming soils.

If in a shared soil/room, the OP (or others) may want to research a product called 'Mycostop,' if it's still made/available/approved for use.

Went through my collection of 'approved' pest and fungal artillery last evening, and that was the only one that treated an impressively broad array of serious fungal nastiness. And the bad news was that I'm down to a partial packet that initially weighed very little; a little goes a fair distance with it, though.

Last order of the stuff came from Planet Natural, perhaps about 3 years ago, though if it's still out there and available, I'd guess any serious horticultural store has it on-hand or available.

You might also search for effective alternative products that have the same active critter in them. (*I'd check the spelling, etc., of the organism/critter in the stuff, but I'm being lazy and a bit in pain).

(*Don't snort it...) ;^>)

moose eater said:

It's my understanding that verticillium wilt does indeed sometimes find a home in cannabis, and if my memory is correct, while fusarium wilt can be arrested or suppressed to some degree, verticillium wilt can amount to the black plague of death.

Can't recall for certain though. I wish my mind worked better these days.

Fungal infestations can make spider mites, etc., look like welcome dinner guests, in my experience, and as the OP said, can and will travel from moms to cuttings. The generational curse of contamination in welcoming soils.

If in a shared soil/room, the OP (or others) may want to research a product called 'Mycostop,' if it's still made/available/approved for use.

Went through my collection of 'approved' pest and fungal artillery last evening, and that was the only one that treated an impressively broad array of serious fungal nastiness. And the bad news was that I'm down to a partial packet that initially weighed very little; a little goes a fair distance with it, though.

Last order of the stuff came from Planet Natural, perhaps about 3 years ago, though if it's still out there and available, I'd guess any serious horticultural store has it on-hand or available.

You might also search for effective alternative products that have the same active critter in them. (*I'd check the spelling, etc., of the organism/critter in the stuff, but I'm being lazy and a bit in pain).

(*Don't snort it...) ;^>)

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I found it for sale still on planet natural and Amazon

https://www.amazon.com/Verdera-Mycostop-Biofungicide-5-Gram/dp/B0148ZR5F0

https://www.planetnatural.com/product/mycostop/

Looks like some good stuff I've never had anything other then root rot years ago in a drip system but I might pick some up and use as a preventative. Running perlite and hydroton based hempy buckets now so shouldn't have issues but as cheap as this stuff is I'm gonna pick some up great info moose.

Thanks, and you're welcome.

It's got marginal reviews of ~4 out of 5, but I take into account that many times we're shooting from the hip in re. to identifying a fungus without a lab test, and there's likely people who think they're treating one infection, and in fact, are treating another.

If those persons don't take that built-in error factor into account, they may simply conclude that it's a bogus product. Or they treat with an insecticide, herbicide, or cleanser of some sort that kills beneficials, not realizing they're killing their best effort without intention.

And note that the folks who used it as an inoculant before planting/transplanting were typically far more satisfied than those who used it on already infected plants (acknowledging that, on one hand, it -arrests- the infection, rather than obliterating it, but on the other hand, because two plants share a given area of soil, and the fungus is already present, doesn't mean that both plants are inherently infected. So in that type of case, using a critter that arrests <as opposed to killing off> an infection may still save the day).

I'm fairly certain I have some established fusarium wilt right now in my oldest plant (20-yr.-old California Indica), despite typically using Actinovate as a prophylactic; Actinovate doesn't treat fusarium, and I can't recall if it treats pythium/pyth rot..

Once I started researching a bit on fungal infections a few years back, in one case, I misidentified a calcium deficiency on lower leaves for a specific fungal infection.

Anyway, there's another potentially impressive product I found on Amazon recently. I can't recall the name, but it has better reviews, allegedly treats an impressive array of serious fungal infections, and isn't too expensive. I think it comes in (I think) a 100 gram pouch. A search on Amazon for Mycostop will bring it up in the alternate choices at the bottom of the page.

I'm currently considering doing something I've never done; killing everything, accepting the losses (though I have some femmed seeds from male stress flowers from tried and true female plants to rely on in most cases), and buying new seeds for those moms I don't have reliable, stable, femmed seeds for. It'd probably cost me $200 to $300 in new seed purchases, but would allow for some 'down time' in re. to current life events, and I could get SERIOUS about whole-shop cleaning, and trying to address anything and everything that might result in a recurrence any time in the near future.

Good luck.

Damn you've had a plant alive for 20yrs major props you are definitely a pro. I'll check that stuff out anything I can add to my hempys as a preventative to save me headaches in the future is a plus for sure. Luckily hempys aren't prone to many issues but doing this can't hurt and can only help I'd imagine.

I understand the pain of having to chop all your stuff down broad mites taught me that a few months ago. It's painful, it sucks but I view my plants literally as my children and I didn't want new kids being brought up in a hostile environment. I shut it all down and left the room empty for 2 months to starve out any leftover gremlins. When I start up I'm going to be using ic3, trifecta and horticultural oils in about .5% solutions to keep a light sheen on the leaves throughout vegging and alternate them. Don't remember where(I've read everything on the web about broads) but I saw somebody say a light sheen of those oils deters them from getting a foothold. That combined with extreme hygiene before I open the cabs and touch any plants will hopefully stop a future infection. Also considering ordering up some predators but am gonna give the oils a try first. If it happens again I'm getting avid, forbid and maybe a neutron bomb or something.

Again it'll suck to chop it all down but you'll be creating a healthy environment for future generations so just look at it that way. Being off my meds for 6-8mo is the price I've had to pay but after seeing how destructive broads were i knew i had to leave the room empty and starve them out. Good luck getting your shop cleaned up your future kids will thank you for it. Peace

Bird of Hermes said:

I view my plants literally as my children and I didn't want new kids being brought up in a hostile environment.

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And we're all feminists, now...in that we treat our females better than we treat males...

Pinnate said:

And we're all feminists, now...in that we treat our females better than we treat males...

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Lol yep unless I need him for breeding every dude I find gets executed on the spot. I do apologize first though and say a prayer for him afterwards

My 20-yr.-old is a clone-to-clone-to-clone girl, and it's in that context that she's 20 years old; just to clarify. I used to keep mothers alive for 3, 4, 5, maybe more cycles, before cloning new. Now it's nearly every cycle. So it's her vegetative material that is technically 20 yrs. Sad part is, aside from her having been in the stable for so long, she's my best producer thus far, peppery citrus smell and taste, notable 'up' head on her, and in the past fairly resilient.

I set myself up for this particular set of issues with new soils, changing pot sizes and not being as familiar with larger volume, transplanting too early in the plant's life to too big of containers, resulting in more presence of unnecessary moisture, etc., etc.

I may have many years doing this, but I have a lot less hard science background and understanding of much of it than many others. And as I get older now, my brain is starting to (at times) lose its ability to comprehend technical/complex issues. If I'd learned some of this stuff better when I was 16-20, then I'd be combatting memory, rather than trying to make my brain digest stuff anew. Different directions of travel.

It's led to a place where the more I learn, the less I know. Truly. The horizon has been opened a bit more to the number of variables, etc., and the reality is more complex and intimidating in understanding these things than my once more simplistic view was.

In re. to -some- forms of fungal infection, read up on longevity of the hard-core varieties, for which spores can last incredible durations. It's mind-blowing how long some of these things can contaminate a place, soil, etc.

There's a book by a fellow who treats fungus/mold for a living, but with a gardening theme. Can't recall the title. Something like "Mr. So-and-So's Garden." He recommends a cleaning solution of bleach and Borax (the Borax component leaves a granular residue), and in it he references (paraphrasing heavily) that there are some forms of fungal infection that will eventually necessitate a full-on retreat. As in, pack it in, move, go home, etc.

Those kinds of statements frighten me a bit.

I've heard people say the same things about micro mites just pack up and move lol I hope that's not the case for either of us. That'll suck if you lose those genetics if there's no way to get some seeds from it that'll be a bummer but if they are getting a serious infection you gotta do what you gotta do. Even so I'm sure you can get a hold of some bad ass new strains and keep chugging along no problem. Good luck peace