Fungus Gnats? Or actual deficiency?

[Kushed]

How long has this problem been going on? The last 2 weeks
What STRAIN are you growing? Pre98 Bubba Kush
What was the establishing technique? (seed or clone?) Clone
What is the age of your plants? 2 months old
How long have they been in the soil mixture they are in now? 1 month
Were they in the same mixture when they were seedlings/smaller plant? If not, what mixture were they in before? Light Warrior
How Tall are the plants? 3 feet
What PHASE (seedling, vegetative or flower) are the plants in? Flower
What size pots are you using? (Include how many subjects to pot) 5 gallon smart pots. 1 per container.
What substrate/medium are you using? What brand of soil mixture are you using?(percentage of perlite, vermiculite...etc?) Fox Farms Ocean Forest and Light Warrior 50/50 with added chunky perlite and one table spoon dry Fruit and Flower.
What brand Nutrient's are you using? Currently none but have PureBlendPro Bloom
How often are you feeding? Water once every 4-5 days with straight RO water with 5ml Cal-mag per gallon.
If flowering, when did you switch over to using Bloom nutrients? Typically use bloom nutrients after 1 month of flower and when plants show signs they need.
What is the TDS/EC/PPM of your nutrients used? IDK
What is the pH of the "RUN-OFF"? IDK..
How often are you testing pH/ppm/EC/TDS? Ive only ever tested the ph with the GH kit and it was 7.0
How often are you watering? every 4-5 days
When was your last feeding and how often are you feeding? Havn't fed them yet
What size bulb are you using? 600w
How old is your bulbs? Brand new
What is the distance to the canopy? 8-12 in from glass
What is your RH Factor? (Relative Humidity) 45%
What is the Day/Night Temp? (Include fluctuation range) Lights off temp is 77, lights on temp is 81-82. Low 73, High 84
What is the current Air Flow? (cfm etc.) 747 CFM fan that sucks the air from the light and tent and a 240 cfm for fresh air.
Tell us about your ventilation, intake exhaust and when its running and not running ? 8in 747cfm fan that is 24/7 exhausting and 6 in 240cfm intake that is 24/7.
Is the fan blowing directly at plants? Have one small clip on fan in the tent blowing on the canopy of the plants
Is the grow substrate constantly wet or moist? Moist.
Is your water HARD or SOFT? Hard
What water are you using? Reverse Osmosis (RO)? Tap? Bottled? Well water? Distilled? Mineral Water? RO
Has plant been recently pruned, cloned or pinched? No
Have any pest chemicals been used? If so what and when? Monday was my first time giving them Gnatrol powdered.
Are plant's infected with pest's? I believe might be fungus gnats have never really experienced anything like this.


Ok so this problem started a couple weeks ago with some of the older fan leafs just falling off, or easily falling off if agitated. The plants still looked very healthy and green, huge fan leaves bigger than my hand and no other visible signs of problems like they look now.. so I thought maybe was just nothing...

but now two weeks later the leaves are looking like shit and like they have a major def and are still just falling off..I've used this same soil mix for the last 3 years and never had a problem like this. Typically the plants start yellowing just slightly after 1 month of flower, and this is when I know to start feeding them with a bloom nute. However this seems pretty extreme and a little too early to be so yellow etc.

I recently put down yellow sticky traps and caught some bugs can someone tell me if their gnats or aphids or...? On monday for the first time I used some gnatrol hoping that it might fix the problem...What is your guys opinions on this? Would it be ok for me to start feeding them?

Thank you very much for your time.

 

[Kushed]

Wouldn't let me post these in the first post. I can take more pics of the plants if need be.

 

[highsteppa]

those look like fungus gnats no doubt...I have had a bad FG infestation and noticed the same exact thing, leaves yellowing and drying up and falling off prematurely. I think with bad fungus gnats and root aphids, leaves show signs of deficiency and/or lockout due the the root heath being compromised and unable top uptake food as well. Make sure you dont have RA's as they are a real pain in the ass. Fungus gnats larve can cause more damage than they're given credit for. BEst of luck

 

[kal]

ACTUAL RA!

 

[Kushed]

Thank you guys for the help. So should I continue to treat them with the Gnatrol as instructed? And also will it be ok to feed them lightly?

 

[michmedclones]

I've heard h202 is great to kill them, I'm about to try it because neem isn't doing the trick for me. I got the fuckers from a "buddy" on some deathstar clones from columbus, they've gotten into all my veg plants but only the clones are effected like yours with the yellowing leaves. I've tried need flush, liquid lady bug foliar and drying out my plants to nothing but I can't get them to go away. I've seen use 3% h202 1 part to 4 parts water, varied results but mostly positive. Don't know if anyone here has heard that but worth a shot I hate these things

 

[RetroGrow]

Check your roots. Sure looks like
root aphid damage.

 

[Kushed]

It's kind of hard for me to check the roots because their in smartpots but ill see what I can do. Im thinking its the root aphids though. I've found some stuff on one of the leaves that looks like some thinly coated sap like substance. Is this honeydew? So how do you get rid of aphids? Ive been reading the thread but theres so many suggestions. Is h202 effective?

 

[canna woop!]

neem oil and spinosad both kill aphids. That said. I doubt yhou have ra... it is most likely the fungus gnat. Gnatrol etc. wil slow them down but wont work as well as predatory insects, or just a top dressing of plain high quality vermicompost IMO. if crafted correctly (ie not Vc from the hydro store) the VC should contain the predatory nematodes, rove beetles, and other soil invertebrates that keep fungus gnats at bay

also dude, neem oil will not kill fungus gnat larva. and you shouldn't blame people for the gnats. They come in on fruits and vegetables from the grocery store as well, they are just a garden nuicance we all put up with. shouldnt hurt your yield too much, definitely not anything like root aphids or mites or the otehr serious pests

 

[Buddle]

Kushed.. I have battled the root aphids too and they sure look like yours do.Sorry....and they are a real pita to get rid of.I am using Met52 and am buying the pyetherin timed spray units for any flyers..The Met52 is grown on rice and is a systemic that is mixed into whatever medium you use.i used the soil i was using when I first got them for yrs too.i was wrecking my brain cuz I couldn't figure out why my routine with the same plants that had always worked suddenly looked like total shit.it seems to be a pretty wide spread problem.The only positive in that is that there is a good amount of info on here @ whats worked for growers and what hasn't in treating them.
I had 3k worth of girls 3 wks in when i discovered i had them.I treated them with .22% Imacloprid made by Bonine for houseplants and was able to get decent buds but unspectacular yields. I didn't experience any ill effects from the product and could tell no difference in taste etc. now I'm using coco ( I think the ra's in my grow came from infected soil) and the Met52..good luck man this is something I hate to see you go through..
Scrape the top of your soil down to the roots on top and look for crawling green translusent bugs.You may also see this little pockets of white stuff that looks like cotton.this is also a sign of ra's.i hope i'm wrong..BL

 

[medicalmj]

FGs and perhaps root disease.

What's gonna happen is the FGs will cause the disease and mites will show up to feast on the resultant dead tissue, fungus and bacteria. Unfortunately, many folks think the mites are RAs. You will never get rid if the mites if you have any root issue, you simple cannot kill em. But many have killed their crops trying. And the mites will probably be around in very small numbers forever.

Count legs (6=RAs, 8=mites) and RAs have "exhaust tubes", which are called cornicles (or siphuncule), which are a pair of small upright backward-pointing tubes found on the dorsal side of the last segment of their bodies.

 

[Buddle]

Huh?? fooled me..so theres no remedy?

 

[stihgnobevoli]

before all these horror stories start scaring you into buying all sorts of shit, you should prolly identify the pest first. i have a deal of gnat experience. have you seen any flier? they usually fly around all shitty cuz they can't see very well of fly very well either so they just fly all shitty heading towards whatever the brightest light is. if you blow on it and it falls out of the air it might be a gnat. can't really tell from your pics but do they look like this any?

if so then yes fungus gnats. i've never tried gnatrol is it? but i have used mosquito dunks and natural remedies. for every one of those fliers you see there are like 100 little baby asshole larvae eating the shit outta your roots.

first step is to get as many out as you can. get a potato, a unripe banana, yams, any sort of starchy vegetable or fruit. the starchier the better. cut into chunks about 1 inch cube, or 1 inch long and however wide you like. you put the piece of vegetable into the dirt all the way till it's almost buried. put one or two in each pot. in 24+ hours come back and pluck it out and see. you should see a bunch of gross transparent maggot looking things crawling in it. throw that shit away, get another piece and stick it in there.

step two is while you're doing step one, cut back on the watering. waaay back as much as you can. let those pots get bone in between waterings. thats the all natural method. and will take anywhere from 2-4 weeks for all gnats to die. assuming your plants don't die first.

step 3 is using gnatrol whatever the fuck that is or mosquito dunks aka BTI it's a bacteria that gets inside the larval stage and prevents them from digesting food so they eventually starve to death. kill the larvae with the above 3 steps, and step 4 you are already doing by trapping the adults with the sticky cards and smashing em with a finger when they are foolish enough to land in arms reach. no adults = no baby assholes eating roots. no baby assholes = no adults to lay more eggs.

hope this helped. and if it's not fungus gnats then i dunno what to tell ya.

 

[RB56]

Sure look like fungus gnats to me - a little hard to be certain since the photos aren't sharp. Here's a good picture of a FG wing:

From this page.

I haven't had one in months and my veg room plants are just now getting back to healthy and green.

Keep up with the Gnatrol (assuming confirmed FG). Everything is SO much easier without them. It's amazing how fast cuttings will root when there aren't FG larvae sitting and waiting for a snack.

 

[sir alex]

got the fuckers my self... its time for all out war

 

[sallyforthDeleted member 75382]

I've used gnatrol. Also dried garlic powder sprinkled around the base of the stem extending out from the stem by about 3 inch's.

I follow the instructions for gnatrol then repeat a week later. Along with yellow sticky bug catchers.

For the rest of the grow I continue with the garlic powder once a week, replacing the sticky traps with new one's when needed.

Most times this works, however sometimes you just keep em to a minimum, but still get a good crop.

Obviously this applies to sciarid fly ( fungus gnats ).

 

[medicalmj]

Huh?? fooled me..so theres no remedy?

Not sure if you're talking about my mite reference, but if so, reread. Mites aren't the problem so you don't need a remedy for them. Root rot caused by FGs is a different story. And of there are remedies for FGs, and the disease they spread. I like to wipe em out so I use Imid followed by nematodes. For the rot, bacteria and fungus I use a mix of ACT, streptomyces lydicus, and mycorrhizae. Usually need to finish the cycle to get rid of rot.

 

[Kushed]

Thank you for all the suggestions and advice. The flyers are pretty slow for sure, just buzzing around the base of the plants it seems. And I dug down in the soil a few inches and didnt really find much, but on one plant did notice these extremely tiny little white bugs, but they weren't translucent though.

 

[RetroGrow]

It's kind of hard for me to check the roots because their in smartpots but ill see what I can do. Im thinking its the root aphids though. I've found some stuff on one of the leaves that looks like some thinly coated sap like substance. Is this honeydew? So how do you get rid of aphids? Ive been reading the thread but theres so many suggestions. Is h202 effective?

Imidcloprid for root aphids. Yes, RAs leave "honeydew", a waxlike substance that ants like to eat.

 

[medicalmj]

Thank you for all the suggestions and advice. The flyers are pretty slow for sure, just buzzing around the base of the plants it seems. And I dug down in the soil a few inches and didnt really find much, but on one plant did notice these extremely tiny little white bugs, but they weren't translucent though.

Well I think they're starting to fuck you over. First, fungus gnat larvae can kinda look like a root, albeit one that moves and has a black head. Second, depending on how small the bug was, it could be mites or root aphids. Mites have a tendency to show up and feast on the shit created by FG larvae. You'll need to determine # legs(8 mites) and look for cornicles on back side (look like exhaust tubes on aphids).

And last, FGs can lay 250 eggs each. They will eventually destroy a crop if left alone or not totally eliminated. I had FGs flying around for over a year w little or no problems. But w right conditions and if one comes in contact w a disease, it'll spread quick. And thats just happened to me eventually.

Imid is what works for both FGs and RAs.