Minimum root ball temp

[Papageno]

I am having a problem I believe is due to my rootballs being to cold. I am wondering if anyone knows what the minimum soil temp needs to be. I have a tent that is pulling in rather cold dry air. The fabric pots are very cold to the touch...uncomfortably cold as in I don't want to hang on too long. But the tent is in the 70s.

The evaporation is dropping my soil temp to levels that are preventing any growth...I suspect.

I should be ready to repot by now but they are not big enough. I am going to anyway into plastic pots...with some hotter compost and make some tea this weekend...hopefully that warms it up a bit.

But does anyone know what the bottom temp is for the soil before significant slowing of growth?

 

[Emilya Green]

that sounds way too cold... I would think anything under 50 would be a problem, but I don't know. can you get them off of the floor and/or put a space heater in there?

 

[Gazoo]

If you can find a larger plastic pot you could insulate the felt a bit by putting it in another pot.
I have also insulated the felt pots with saran wrapped around the outside to keep them from AIR Pruning to much

 

[Papageno]

So I have them way off the floor. (I almost just messaged ya Emmy)

I pulled out my 5 gallon plastic pots. I will repot tonight... I like the insulation idea...but that makes me think of the ol tires on tomato plants trick...

So now I need to invent a mini rubber tire for my pots...

I thought about a warmin gcb blanket.

I can get the room temp up but the ventilation is pulling in very dry cold air. I guarantee plastic pots will help as so much surface area will not be evaporating.

Maybe I throw the 5 gallon in a 10 gallon pot full of perlite...well one thing at a time...maybe just big pots that don't evap is enough.

Thw messed up part is the leaves are showing some heat issues at the same time being too close to the lights...trying to get warm.

First I try plastic pots...then go back to HID lighting...then go to real big HID lighting...that's my plan.

 

[Dwight Monk]

I use the plug into wall "Seedling Warming Mats" in my cabinet and shed this time of year, though not sure how much good that would do with a bigger pot as they not real wide (though maybe they make different sizes). Can get those lots of places locally (think I got it at Wilco if I recall right) or online, forget how much they were but thought I would give it a go a couple years ago as they weren't that much a piece.

 

[Papageno]

Yeah I thought about those mats. I may get some. The tent temps are 68 and RH 65 when I opened it up. I can get it warmer and wetter but the pots were cold as heck under all circumstances.

I finished and was going to do a sort of experiment then botched it. I put 1 month old homemade compost in the bottom of one and put mycos there in between the current rootball and the compost. Then too over the counter very old plant based only Compost with no animal poo and put that in the other...and forgot the mycos.

Pot heads...what ya gonna do.

Neither were ready for transplant so the rootballs did not stay together well. So they got a good bit of aeration... .

The issue has resulted in poor uptake and very droopy leaves. Go figya


But done...

20181212_183324.jpg

• Papageno
• Dec 12, 2018

Repot

 

[Papageno]

That was it.. a month almost I am scratching my head as to why these look super droopy and aren't moving. Less than a day with a horrible repotting job and they are standing up like they never have. By tonight they should be standing propper. I will finally feel good about doing some training. There are some nice branches tucked in tight. I was going to super crop only but the slow growth is hampering my style. They were topped a bit ago. Shot of tea tomorrow. Maybe up the lighting but I really want to test out in bloom this LED I got a week ago.

20181214_140822.jpg

• Papageno
• Dec 14, 2018

 

[Emilya Green]

much better! Good job!

 

[Papageno]

Problem is the things had massively slow uptake while trying to grow under good lights and have scavanged a bunch from below.

Not an issue actually at this stage but good to know. I am at well over 1000ft elevation so when it gets below freezing it is dry.