Noob Not Doing Very Well

Thanks Spart and Gaffle for your helpful responses.

Gaffle said:
Troll all the journals around here, this collective group is a a damn marijuana power house. This is like a college of sorts. I await the day to be a MJ expert myself!
Click to expand...

Totally! I'm amazed at the site's depth and breadth.

If you got 2 oz from a 300W CFL, all things being equal (which they most certainly would never be in this endeavour), I'd get 1.33 oz from my 200W bulb. My wish for this shoestring first try would be to get 0.33 of an ounce. Not that I would sell it but the weed's street value where I live would just about cover my setup cost. Hahaha!
 
Well, my baby girls have survived so far and it's bordering on crazy how hardy they must be to have survived all the mistakes I've thrown at them so far.

- Miracle Gro moisture-retaining soil full of additives and branches.

- Being moved from a cold basement to the blazing sun and back, daily, during their young lives before taking up live permanently indoors.

- There are other mistakes but the latest, a dumb one by me with a chemistry degree that obviously expired many years ago, wherein I adjusted the nutrient/supplement mix pH too high with baking soda and reversed it down with pH down causing big precipitation that I thought might be normal and that I used to quench the thirst of my babies during the last water/feed four days ago. What a bozo! :thedoubletake:

Unfunny things started to happen to the leaves (see below) where there seem to be two defects - brown patches on main leaves of one plant and only along the edge of a few leaves on the other plant. To compound the abuse, I had thrown in another variable by moving my lights pretty close. So, I haven't been able to diagnose the issue other than to call it a big screw-up! :laughtwo::laughtwo::laughtwo: Anyway, I moved the 200W 2,700k CFL back up to about 5 inches from the tops and remixed new nutes properly this time, without precipitates, and just watered the ladies again.

Looking ahead, I have no idea when I should start to harvest, if I get that far and root rot or bud fungus don't finish this one off! Any comments would be welcome!

I'm guessing Mary is 30 days from first flower and that Jane is about a week behind (pics below). Am guessing another 30 days for Mary plus a week or more for Jane, whose flowers are small and spread out as opposed to her sister's single 10cm cola at the top. They've both stopped growing and I don't blame them. Mary is 26cm and Jane is 36cm.

It's been a wild ride so far but am learning a lot and already thinking of many possible improvements.

:Namaste:

In hard shape

Leaves35.jpg



Mary

Mary20.jpg



Jane

Jane24.jpg
 
Forgot to mention another issue I can't fix but the plants have tolerated, that my water and nutes are going into the soil at pH 6.5 but what's draining out is ph 5!
 
Rust color spots like that are Ca/Mg. It's locked out under 6.5 PH. Adjust your PH and add Epson salt at 1/2 tsp gal.

Sent from my SPH-L720T using 420
 
Weaselcracker said:
How are the girls doing?
Click to expand...

Hey, Thanks for coming back. Well, they're still alive but stopped growing.

Mary has a 10 cm cola which might be 'meh' to a lot of friends here, but I'm thrilled about it. A few pistils are turning brown.

Jane has a bunch of flowers and more branches. Seems like she might need another 3 - 4 weeks, wild guess.

Soil is damp but moisture seems to be unavailable to the plants. pH is still an issue but there is a great suggestion below am going to reply to now.

Am on the other side of Yew cycle #1 and the world is a much better place today.

Cheers!
 
millertm said:
Rust color spots like that are Ca/Mg. It's locked out under 6.5 PH. Adjust your PH and add Epson salt at 1/2 tsp gal.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Water in is at 6.5 but out at 5.0. I didn't think there was anything I could do about it. I figured soil components would just keep leaching and pulling the pH down. Will try Epson salts.

Thanks again.
 
You should be able to get rid of the mites with neem oil. It's the only thing that worked for me, after two years of spraying, cleaning, bleaching, painting, and complete grow shutdowns. Consider where you got the mites from, though. Some people continually get reinfested and have to live with them- keeping them down to very low levels by reapplying neem every few weeks. In my case they don't live outside here, I got infested from some clones. Now I haven't seen them in years.
When you say that your plants aren't growing any more- I assume you mean they aren't getting taller? They stop gaining height early in flowering, and start putting their energy into making buds. It's normal and doesn't mean they've stopped growing.
Epsom salts provide you with magnesium. Mag deficiency is more of a patterned neon/yellowing look. Rust spots are more of a sign of calcium deficiency. But calcium and magnesium are interactive and usually bundled together in one product and called calmag. Common home substitutes are Epsom salts for mag and milk for calcium. That stuff should be in your soil though and presumably it's the acidity of the soil that's causing trouble.
From here though your plants look fairly good. They've gotten this far, are growing buds, and the remaining foliage looks good.
One minor thing to keep in mind- the damaged leaves you pulled off- they're damaged because the plant has been using them as a source of nutrients to replace the stuff it can't find, or can't access, in the soil. Remove the leaves and the plant will have to find other leaves to pillage. Usually I leave them on- until I can't stand to look at them anymore, unless I think I've fixed the problem. Often I remove the leaves of shame even when I'm not sure the problem's fixed- but I'm tired of seeing them.
I'm no soil grower. You could try bumping your ph level up to 7 for the occasional watering though, and see if that helps. Normally ph levels rise in the root zone, not fall, so your soil must be very acidic.
You seem like a smart guy. I guess that's how you got to be a doctor. I'm sure you'll battle your way to the finish with these plants and have lots of experience to show for it, and a few victory joints too.
 
Hey Weaselcracker,

Thanks for the visit and your comments which are, as usual, more than helpful.

I ordered Neem oil and agree with your nutes assessment. There isn't anything I can do except ponder about whether I could cook up a buffer to keep the pH between 6 and 6.5. Something that would massively soak up the excess soil acidity, a mini and soluble black hole for H ions. Or I could try bumping up to 7 as you suggest... :thumb:, though I might just leave the girls alone to do whatever they're going to do now. No more shocks that might upset the balance, weaken them and invite dread.

One new thing I learned this week is that my CaMg and Bloom are great when mixed but they don't like to stand. A lot of suspension and precipitation after two or three days. Maybe I'm growing bugs or colloids or something.

About plant growth, yup, they're fattening up in spite of the abuse and apparent random ripping out of leaves. I take them when the plant has sucked all the juice out of them, except for the ones for the photos above.

Yes, a great learning experience and there will be joints. I'm pretty pumped. Last time I tried this was more than 30 years ago.

Jane looks like she's still got a ton of potential as long as I baby her to the finish line with great patience. Mary has a good number of pistils going brown.

The next thing I have to figure out is when to harvest. I know what to look for and what part of the THC production curve I'd like to hit, and I just have to get a loupe or see if the digital one for my Android will do.

No MD here. Good thing too. It would have been a much more difficult work life.
 
a buffer to keep the pH between 6 and 6.5.
Click to expand...
Accepted soil ph level is 6.5-7. So giving the occasional feeding at 7 or so won't be doing anything drastic, and may give them access to some nutrients that they're missing, before the acidity of the soil kicks it down again. I dunno- just a thought.
You're going to have to live with that crappy soil and they made it this far, so you'll probably get something at the end.
A ppm meter would be handy, if you're worried/curious about precipitation. It makes your feeding levels easier to regulate as well, obviously. Depends what you're doing. Soil growers usually aim to mix up a good soil mix, don't worry about ph, and usually don't have to feed much other than a bit of top dressing or light feedings in flowering. In that case you don't need the ph and ppm meters, which are necessary for pretty much every type of growing.
So yeah- I'm not sure what to say about how to negotiate the next few weeks- with the existing nutes in the crappy soil, but I'm sure you'll manage. If you're feeding them anything keep it light, and aim to stop feeding in a few weeks.
I haven't grown autos much, other than a couple outdoors in the earliest days before autos became well known standard growing fare. Photos are more forgiving because time is on your side. With autos you can't afford to screw up much.
 
DrPokTok said:
Thanks! Water in is at 6.5 but out at 5.0. I didn't think there was anything I could do about it. I figured soil components would just keep leaching and pulling the pH down. Will try Epson salts.

Thanks again.
Click to expand...
Flush PH is bad information. Excess salts in runoff bias PH reading. YouTube has vids to show how to correctly check soil PH.

So, when I mix my bloom nutes I use "bloom" for PH down and pro teht to PH up (K potash, Si additive like rino skin from AN). If your using a lot of PH up/down to adjust PH that could cause issues too. Up/down is non plant food but will push up ppm like crazy. Try to balance nutes vs PH so it comes out closer to 6.3.

Cheers

Sent from my SPH-L720T using 420
 
Weaselcracker said:
Accepted soil ph level is 6.5-7. So giving the occasional feeding at 7 or so won't be doing anything drastic, and may give them access to some nutrients that they're missing, before the acidity of the soil kicks it down again. I dunno- just a thought.
You're going to have to live with that crappy soil and they made it this far, so you'll probably get something at the end.
A ppm meter would be handy, if you're worried/curious about precipitation. It makes your feeding levels easier to regulate as well, obviously. Depends what you're doing. Soil growers usually aim to mix up a good soil mix, don't worry about ph, and usually don't have to feed much other than a bit of top dressing or light feedings in flowering. In that case you don't need the ph and ppm meters, which are necessary for pretty much every type of growing.
So yeah- I'm not sure what to say about how to negotiate the next few weeks- with the existing nutes in the crappy soil, but I'm sure you'll manage. If you're feeding them anything keep it light, and aim to stop feeding in a few weeks.
I haven't grown autos much, other than a couple outdoors in the earliest days before autos became well known standard growing fare. Photos are more forgiving because time is on your side. With autos you can't afford to screw up much.
Click to expand...
After I hit the reply button I remembered reading 6.8 is an optimum for soil notes so I think your right, 7 won't shock. Will do.

Sent from my SM-G935W8 using 420
 
DrPokTok said:
After I hit the reply button I remembered reading 6.8 is an optimum for soil notes so I think your right, 7 won't shock. Will do.

Sent from my SM-G935W8 using 420
Click to expand...
Agreed. .

Sent from my SPH-L720T using 420
 
I got a closer look under better lighting and it's clear spider mites are now also on Jane. Nothing I can do except try to kill some with my fingers. These are small plants with few big leaves and the infestation doesn't seem to be overwhelming my girls. Makes me wonder if there are different species of spider mites. There must be many.

Sent from my SM-G935W8 using 420
 
I use UVB150 reptile bulb for small attacks. Keep it level with suspect area.

723ab1a07cee32734f010fdf531c61da.jpg


1bb35e101ff426cd8080473610f92ba9.jpg


5bebc82b5639a92902b71e81ccc5c72c.jpg


I get mites almost every grow, this works in about 8 to 10 inches.

Sent from my SPH-L720T using 420
 
Back
Top Bottom