Am I killing my clones? (with picture)

B

bluthird

New Member
Here's the skinny. Rookie grower. The top/new leaves are curling under and stems turning red/purple? But at the moment, only 3 of the 10 plants in the tent that this is happening to -- so far.
All of this within 5 days of putting them in the tent?

Set up:
4' x 4' x 6.5' tent
1000W MH bulb in cooled housing <-- Set at about 12" above the plant tops, after much reading and looking at charts and the back of the hand test, the 12" seemed ok to me.
But I started getting concerned when I noticed the leaves starting to curl under and raised the light up to about 18"

Grow room temperature between 79-82 degrees F.
RH 30% (a little on the dry side?)

As mentioned, I have 10 plants in the tent. Yeah, I know probably too many but I figured I'd kill some off accidentally in the learning process, and I might be on the way of doing that now. :yikes:

Clones were purchased and put in the tent 5 days ago.
They are Candy Land and Girl Scout Cookies
They looked happy and healthy when I brought them home and for the first day or so.
Light cycle at 18 on, 6 off.

Soil in 3 gallon buckets
Foxfarm Ocean Forest with 30% perlight mixed in.

Not sure if this make any difference but I checked the soil PH at the beginning, and it was 6.9.
My water out of the tap is 8.0 to 8.1. The soil five days later 7.2

I've watered them 3 times total. Once when I transplanted the rockwool squares, just to settle the soil in the pots then twice more after that. So 3 times in 5 days.

My guess it either A) I over watered, B) put the light too close or C) a combination of A and B. Or something else?


What do you guys think? Are two pictures enough?

DSC00367_Custom_.JPG


DSC00368_Custom_.JPG


EDIT:
Not sure how old the clones were when I bought them (the bud tender had no clue) but here is what they looked like before I planted them. The roots looked healthy to me, and were coming out of the rockwool square.

Those are standard size "beer party cups" for scale.

DSC00379_Custom_.JPG


DSC0080_Custom_.JPG
 
I'm not a clone expert, but I'll give my best advice until someone more knowledgeable comes by.

Move your light up to 24" (And it may need to go higher for clones). It's a little too intense at those distances.

I would boost the humidity to at least 50%, preferably 70%..

I know domes are used while waiting for roots to grow. If you have roots, I don't think you'd need a dome now, unless you can't increase the humidity, then I'd say a dome might need to be used..

FFOF is too hot for seedlings (too strong in nutes) This might also apply to these clones.

Get some PH up/down to adjust your water PH to 6.5. Make sure you have a good PH tester on hand, and you want to try to always maintain 6.5 in that soil.
 
Antics said:
I'm not a clone expert, but I'll give my best advice until someone more knowledgeable comes by.

Move your light up to 24" (And it may need to go higher for clones). It's a little too intense at those distances.

I would boost the humidity to at least 50%, preferably 70%..

I know domes are used while waiting for roots to grow. If you have roots, I don't think you'd need a dome now, unless you can't increase the humidity, then I'd say a dome might need to be used..

FFOF is too hot for seedlings (too strong in nutes) This might also apply to these clones.

Get some PH up/down to adjust your water PH to 6.5. Make sure you have a good PH tester on hand, and you want to try to always maintain 6.5 in that soil.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply.
As of now, I've raised the light up to 25-26" high. Thinking maybe even 28-30" for a while. (Although I am concerned about them stretching and getting spindly.)

Hopefully I will get some more input so I can make an informed decision on what to do.

In the mean time, I'm wondering if I should flush the plants with some plain PH-corrected water and get the soil back to 6.5 or maybe a little lower.
I'm surprised that the FFOF is too hot - the dude at the hydro store said I could start my seeds directly in the soil.

And I'll work on raising the humidity. I wonder why it's in the 25-30% range when the air outside the tent is 50% RH is s mystery to me.

More notes: I am am running the the inline vent 24/7 through a scrubber, then the sealed sealed reflector then out of the tent. Using the lower flaps with passive air intake.

Also running a small oscillating tower fan on the plants 24/7. Could that be exacerbating anything?

I hate to sit idly by and wait, especially if it's a train wreck in process and disaster can be avoided with proactive intervention.

Geez, I hate to think these plants or so danged finicky! I guess I had beginners dumb-luck in the 80's when I grew both indoor and out. With Miracle-Gro to boot!
 
If you notice any stretch, just lower the lights, and problem solved :)

I would correct the PH first before doing anything else. A water PH of 8-8.1 is definitely not going to help things. Even at 7.2 you'll be missing some nutrients due to lockout.

The guy at the hydro store... Eh... yes you can start seeds in the mix, but that doesn't change the fact that countless growers have run into the same nute burn problems when using the soil. Multiple growers will tell you the same thing, and that very few strains will actually do ok in FFOF.

The fan could be causing them to dry too fast, I'd kill the fan for a few days and see if the situation improves.

You don't have to sit idle, get that PH fixed first, and we'll go from there. We can't fix 1000 things at once, we can end up complicating matters. We have to prioritize, and fix things one at a time,, and give the plant a chance to catch up.

They're not really finicky plants, but they're also not tolerant of anything and everything. There's definitely a line in the sand when it comes to Cannabis, some things work, some don't. Using MG sounds like you got lucky, and a handful of other growers have gotten lucky using it too, but it's a difficult product to use.
 
Sounds like you have gotten some pretty good advice here, and the suggestion about the Ph pen is spot on. You MUST invest in a Ph pen. They look big enough for full strength nutes.

I don't have much respect for Girl Scout Cookies (unless its the thin mints). They stretch something awful. I had one that went almost 12 inches between nodes. Yea - a foot. And there was NO environmental reason for it (there were real plants like OG and AK next to her that didn't do that). Also, the leaves used to taco ... all of em. I showed it to someone who is smarter than me and she just smiled and said "yea, that's Girl Scout Cookies - that's just the way they are." I thought I had mites or was burning them or something - but that's just the way they grow.

I'm an old guy, so I am most comfortable with old school genetics. Every time I succumb to the fad of the year and buy some home made hybrid, I'm sorry.

~ Auggie ~
 
Yeah Auggie, I hear you. I had to get it out of my system, you know, kid in a candy store. I'm old school too. Where shake is all we could get and only hear about Panama Red, Kona Gold, thai stick etc. When i grew in the 80's all I did was some kind of indica, probably a kush. Beautiful plants. I grew "successfully" both in and outdoor. Starting out with some new growing pains this time around.

I do have some very nice og kush and other old school indica seed bank seeds lying in wait until I get a test grow or 2 out of the way.
I was fully prepared to kill a few clones in the re-learning process. LOL.

The clones were relatively cheap, close by and easy to get but then again I may be wasting my time especially if the genetics and breeder/cloner skills are unknown.

I do have a PH pen meter, this is how I was able to see my water at 8.1 to 8.2. Ugh. BUT!!! I just noticed something this morning, I was getting the water from my bath tub for watering the plants. (it's near my grow tent) So I decided to check the tap water in the kitchen.
Kitchen tap 6.9 to 7.0. WTF? 8+ at the bath tub, 7 at the kitchen sink. There's no filtration going to the sink that I can see, so I'm stumped. But I'll for sure be drawing water from the kitchen tap -- and checking it, from now on.

The clones that I have in the tent are Candyland, Gorilla Glue, The White and GSC.

I only mentioned GSC and Candy Land in my first post because it was only happening to those, but as of today all plants are doing the curl thing. Although one of the GSC looks really healthy still, and somewhat bigger than the rest of the lot.

So I am debating at this point, should I flood or flush all with a proper PH water or wait until they need water again in a couple/three days then water with proper PH water? (or maybe even lower than normal PH? I don't want to get into chasing though)

I have the breeze fan off, the light raised to 25" and humidity is back and forth between 25-30% and debating if I should get a humidifier. Not sure how much if any, detrimental impact a lower RH would make.

Antics, and thank you for further input - much appreciated!
 
Clones and seeds can be cheap, or free.. but I still hate to see a plant die. It's also an amazing learning experience.

Those are some strange readings there.. my best guess is that there is a larger amount of mineral deposits in the water lines leading to your bath tub, than in the kitchen, thus creating a more alkali water source.

Well you have a few options here.

The soil looks moist now, so flushing with 6.5 water will take a little while and a lot of water, but is less risk of PH shock, however there's a chance of an overwatering reaction.

Now I like to take some chances. What I have done a number of times in the past, is estimate and average the PH myself. Let's say I have a 1 gallon pot and the PH is 8.5. I want to be at 6.5. I would PH my water LOWER than 6.5. Sometimes as low as 4, and release the water slowly into the pot. As runoff comes out, I collect it, and measure the PH of the runoff. To release the water slowly, I use a small bottle from bottled water, with several small holes in the cap to create a light shower when I squeeze the bottle, similar to the shower in your bathroom.

I have done this as I said, several times, and haven't noticed any issues come of it. You just have to do it slowly, and keep checking the runoff PH. When you get down around 7.5-7, I'd stop using the PH 4.0 water, and make a new mix around 6.2-6.4 depending how close I ended at. And again, I shower this water in slowly using the water bottle, until runoff comes out around 6.8-6.6. At this point I will sometimes stop totally, or I'll give it one last rinse with PH 6.5 water.

Both techniques have their pros and cons. The second I feel is a bit riskier, due to the possibility of PH shock, but I have done this on a few plants now, including the one in my current grow, and she's been Vegged 11 weeks, Flowering for 19 days now, and is my biggest plant yet.

No special thanks is needed brother.. We were all right where you are at one point in one of our past grows, so everyone knows where you're coming from. Cannabis growers seem to be the nicest people in the world when it comes to helping 'newbs', without ridiculing them for honest, or simple mistakes.

I've made my fair share of mistakes. I'm in no position to throw stones, but I'd gladly smoke one with you or anyone else and shoot the shit about grows any day man.
 
paddysmoke said:
your tap water kitchen comes in fresh , your bathroom water sits in a tank most likely in the attic :) i use a mixture of my warm tap and cold tap in my kitchen it normally comes out 7 ... i leave it out over night then it drops to 6.4/67 some people say not to use the warm water i do it any way :)
Click to expand...

All water in a house comes from the same single inlet. It will typically run through a water meter (if your water is metered), then splits off to several places. It runs from this supply line to the cold water faucets in bathrooms and kitchens, so this water SHOULD be the same. Then there's a cold line run to a boiler, if your house uses a boiler heating system. Then one line branches off to the rot water tank. From the tank, it connects to the hot water faucets in the kitchens and bathrooms.

So if he's using cold water from both locations, it's not sitting in a tank, and should be the same water in the kitchen and bathroom. However, if the plumbing to the bathroom is older than in the kitchen, this could explain the difference in PH.

The only water that sits in a tank is the hot water. All the cold water should be fresh.
 
your kitchen water is for drinking , your bathroom is for toilet baths ect this will certainly come through the same main intake but you wouldnt drink the water in your toilet or bath water , its sits in a large tank in your attic when you flush the toilet it comes from there then its topped up again with the main water supply , you also have a hot water tank that stores water , open your attic have someone flush the loo and listen . :)
 
Paddysmoke and Antics.

Yeah, this sure got me wondering wtf. It's a new house (less than 10 years) so it has "modern plumbing" so no storage tank in the attic type thing nor a boiler.

The hot water heater is your standard gas powered type. But here's what I am thinking - I thought about the spigot handles on the bath tub, with separate H & C water levers. The lever that was closet to me convenience wise turned out to be the hot water side. I never noticed, never thought about it. As it takes a minute or two for the hot water to show up at the spigot, I never really concerned myself with hot or cold as long as the water was cold (not scalding hot)

So my assumption is that the time the water spends sitting in the supply line after the heater as well as the water the comes from the heater, the PH must get altered somehow. We rarely use the bathtub so water can sit for quite some time in the lines, which is a long pipe run from the heater to the upstairs tub.

I ran another PH test this morning. From the bath tub: 8.1 from the hot side and a 7.5 from the cold water side.
Back downstairs in the kitchen, 6.8. Go figure.

Anyways, after raising the light to 28-30" the plants seem to be turning around. Most of the leaves have un-taco'd except for just a few that are fairly deformed. But the rest are looking much better than 24-30 hours ago. Lots of new growth happening and nice pretty greens.
So my uneducated guess is that I was blowing them out with too much lighting. I'm sure the higher PH water didn't help any on top of the light bombardment at 12" Oops.

FWIW I flushed 2 plants with 6.8 PH water enough to get run off out of the bottom to measure PH. Flush water came out at 6.4. Not sure if there is any merit to that test but it might mean something? I've got more reading/studying to do!

Thanks again guys, and you are right - some friendly peeps in the mj growers arenas. I spent many years in the home brewers circles, and we got together and shared many a homebrew -- It sure would be nice to share a smoke with y'all.... And a homebrew. :peace:

:Namaste:
 
Hey PDXFarmer - the meter has a fresh battery. I haven't calibrated it.

But it got me to thinking, I hope the new meter isn't flaky. I'd hate to be chasing PH readings when it could be just a a funky ph pen.
 
You watered them three times in five days? You might want to back off on the high ph watering so often. Make sure the containers are not heavy w/ water, the next time you do water w/ water ph'd to 6.0. I wouldn't get lower than 5.8. Getting the lights further away is a step in the right direction. hang a wet towel to bring up your humidity in your tent. Spray your girls w/ ph'd water. Get some nutes in there in a week.
 
bluthird said:
Here's the skinny. Rookie grower. The top/new leaves are curling under and stems turning red/purple? But at the moment, only 3 of the 10 plants in the tent that this is happening to -- so far.
All of this within 5 days of putting them in the tent?

Set up:
4' x 4' x 6.5' tent
1000W MH bulb in cooled housing <-- Set at about 12" above the plant tops, after much reading and looking at charts and the back of the hand test, the 12" seemed ok to me.
But I started getting concerned when I noticed the leaves starting to curl under and raised the light up to about 18"

Grow room temperature between 79-82 degrees F.
RH 30% (a little on the dry side?)

As mentioned, I have 10 plants in the tent. Yeah, I know probably too many but I figured I'd kill some off accidentally in the learning process, and I might be on the way of doing that now. :yikes:

Clones were purchased and put in the tent 5 days ago.
They are Candy Land and Girl Scout Cookies
They looked happy and healthy when I brought them home and for the first day or so.
Light cycle at 18 on, 6 off.

Soil in 3 gallon buckets
Foxfarm Ocean Forest with 30% perlight mixed in.

Not sure if this make any difference but I checked the soil PH at the beginning, and it was 6.9.
My water out of the tap is 8.0 to 8.1. The soil five days later 7.2

I've watered them 3 times total. Once when I transplanted the rockwool squares, just to settle the soil in the pots then twice more after that. So 3 times in 5 days.

My guess it either A) I over watered, B) put the light too close or C) a combination of A and B. Or something else?


What do you guys think? Are two pictures enough?

DSC00367_Custom_.JPG


DSC00368_Custom_.JPG


EDIT:
Not sure how old the clones were when I bought them (the bud tender had no clue) but here is what they looked like before I planted them. The roots looked healthy to me, and were coming out of the rockwool square.

Those are standard size "beer party cups" for scale.

DSC00379_Custom_.JPG


DSC0080_Custom_.JPG
Click to expand...

I think you have gotten a lot of excellent advise. I agree that FFOF is too hot. I mix 1 part FFOF 1 part Promix BX and 1 part perlite. The first time I used FFOF my little ones suffered till I flushed the heck out of them. Since then, this mix seems to work for me.

Good luck!!:peace:
 
supergroomer said:
I think you have gotten a lot of excellent advise. I agree that FFOF is too hot. I mix 1 part FFOF 1 part Promix BX and 1 part perlite. The first time I used FFOF my little ones suffered till I flushed the heck out of them. Since then, this mix seems to work for me.

Good luck!!:peace:
Click to expand...


Yeah, I triple-whammied my plants. Light too close, too hot of a mix and high PH water. And then over-watering? Ok, so that's a quadruple whammy. Ouch.

So my dilemma at this point is, should I flush them out even though they are already overwatered? :yikes:

And thanks guys for the help.:thankyou:
 
bluthird said:
Yeah, I triple-whammied my plants. Light too close, too hot of a mix and high PH water. And then over-watering? Ok, so that's a quadruple whammy. Ouch.

So my dilemma at this point is, should I flush them out even though they are already overwatered? :yikes:

And thanks guys for the help.:thankyou:
Click to expand...

Wait for others with more experience to reply but I think that if you have suitable drainage you could probably flush. If not, you will end with a cup of mud. :loopy:
 
Re: Am I killing my clones? (with pictures)

warble said:
You watered them three times in five days? You might want to back off on the high ph watering so often. Make sure the containers are not heavy w/ water, the next time you do water w/ water ph'd to 6.0. I wouldn't get lower than 5.8. Getting the lights further away is a step in the right direction. hang a wet towel to bring up your humidity in your tent. Spray your girls w/ ph'd water. Get some nutes in there in a week.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I know... now.

I'm certainly making more mistakes right out of the gate than I thought I would. Especially since I had grown before. But things are a lot different now 35 years later!
 
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