McRib
Well-Known Member
Sorry for your loss mate. I have nothing to add other than I’d be looking at the roots for signs root rot or damage from grubs feeding
Stunger's Organic Balcony: Growing Daughters Of Mulanje: Watering Via Root Aeration Chambers
- Thread starter Stunger
- Start date
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- #602
Thanks CL, I'm thankful for what I have and I've still got more seeds to have another go.Those are some mouth watering strains you have growing now but I know what you mean it’s kind of like the one that got away. CL
Thanks Val! It sure is gutting to have a grow go bad but it happens, and yes I am lucky I have got 2 other plants.
Thanks McRib! It is funny one, the soil is full of life so if the plant is stressed there is likely to be plenty of organisms in it that will want to take advantage. I am still interested in whether the strong tension that plants in flowering are under with LST has anything to do with it. Cheers.
You should do a root autopsy to determine what happened. CL
- Thread starter
- #604
I don't think I am going to bother CL. My wife isn't too 'friendly' about what I do on the balcony because of the mess potential, and it is easy to make a right mess coming in with the carpet. Plus my eyesight is turning to custard these days, earlier in the grow when it came to checking early gender structures to predict gender, I had to photograph them and blow them up in order to see them, if I have to do the same with the roots then it's going to get messy.You should do a root autopsy to determine what happened. CL
The other thing that concerns me which I have mentioned before, for which I don't think I'll get an answer from the roots, does the action of restraining an early flowering plant cause it harmful stress? I saw how a friend strongly bent some of his outdoor 'trees' to lower their heights without any visible damage yet some bent limbs went mortal, and some plants too. I am drawing an analogy with trying to sleep when holding your muscles tense, sleep doesn't really happen until you ease off the held tension and relax. I have also had experiences with my own plants where I have felt similar adverse reactions have occurred from early flowering LST, and I mean larger plants whose limbs can really store a lot of tension.
Currently the pot is still supporting the one remaining branch of the plant, but unless it picks up tomorrow then I don't think it will make it.
I understand how wives can be ,well maybe not so good seeing that I’ve been divorced twice. Anyways was thinking
that if she doesn’t pull through you can always just do the smell tell for root rot. CL
Emeraldo
Well-Known Member
Those are some happy chickens, kicking and scratching around the problem! Is that like beating around the bush? Anyway, it's a healthy sign that you can look on the glass-half-full and take stock of the 2 plants you still have. I was stunned and very sad to hear of this, @Stunger. I hope there's a lesson to be articulated here, so that it won't be a repeat (again).Update - The demise of the Mulanje ME - and more space on the balcony
Greetings 420 enthusiasts! A bit of a sad post this one, but there's a lesson in it. After my last post when I focused on some early bud pics as I felt the plants pics had been getting a bit same-same. I had given all the plants a 'good' watering, some via their down pipes, and some by top watering to help their recent top dressings.
I took those early bud pics, and then I gave another 0.7L of 'top' watering, and I noticed when I finished with the picture taking that the 2 sativas were drooping quite badly. Like suddenly that last application of water caused a collapse of the leaf rigidity.
Immediately after excess watering (L: Mulanje ME; R: Mulanje HP)
Mulanje ME
By the end of the day the Mulanje ME was looking more collapsed and the Mulanje HP was looking like she was recovering.
The next day - Mulanje HP seemed all fine
The next day - Mulanje ME was looking pretty farked unfortunately
I read an article in the UK Guardian newspaper which suggested using cold Camomile tea after overwatering due to its anti fungal properties. I tried this but it didn't have any apparent effect.
And another 2 days later with no more water - still farked
At this point, one branch of the plant had leaves that were trying to stand up and out. The rest of the plant appeared to be a gonna, so as a last ditch effort I decided to prune off everything except the little bit that was trying to survive, just for future shits and giggles.
However today, that remaining branch has had collapsed leaves all day, so I don't think it is going to recover. We have rain currently and more for another day, so if no improvement is seen I'll chop it all and move on with the rest of the grow. I have unfortunately screwed the pooch with the Mulanje ME or to give her full name
the (Malawi/Ethiopian x Mulanje) x Mulanje. Thankfully one of the seedlings of her that I didn't use I gave to a fellow grower who reports his in-the-ground plant is doing great, so hopefully I still get to sample some of her buds.
Anyway, I have gained some useful experience and caution around overwatering, and I now have some lovely extra space on the balcony where I can much more easily attend my plants. It is really great having that space.
What caused it? I think overwatering and...
Last year my number 1 plant, the Mulanje, crapped out in a not dissimiliar manner. At the time the finger was pointed at the top dressing, that somehow the Mulanje was stressed about it and it became a mortal stress. At the time I held some suspicions about the watering, as all 4 plants on that grow were being given similar amounts but yet perhaps the Mulanje was the first to become mortally wounded!
At that time, we had lots of hot days where the stone tiles on the balcony would radiate the heat back to the plants and the thermometer would easily and regularly go over 50C or 120F. So, I convinced myself that as it was very hot, and as my pots were heavily drilled out on the sides and bottoms, that giving extra water would be OK and good.
Now in hindsight, I think perhaps a lot of the overwatering issue is giving them more water 2 - 3 hours after the last watering, instead of just a single good watering once a day that allows them to 'dry out' sufficiently for the next one.
I had thought, that because on most afternoons the top leaves would lose their rigidity and hang upside down in the heat, it was telling me that some more water would be OK. I found I could re-water and yet in another couple of hours the plant's leaves would be drooping again.
So my last year's grow, after the Mulanje's demise I stopped being generous with the watering for the remaining 3 plants.
So why did I take the risk of over watering on this grow?
Well, this grow I have included 'aeration chambers' in my pots. They aren't SIPS because they don't have reservoirs, and yet the SIPS growers are finding their plants drink lots of water and grow a lot. So I thought, the soil of each of my containers has a big bubble of fresh air in it for the roots to still get oxygen, so hopefully the plant finds any excess water to be less of a problem.
Yeah nah, from now on I think I will water once a day only, and if they droop then, that's ok because it's not like they'll die when they'll still get watered again the next day.
Was top dressing an issue?
I'm going to say that I don't think so. They were top dressed 1.5 weeks before this 'event' and I don't think there was any adverse signs from that.
But what about the age of the plants and the training as they approach flowering?
I am a bit suspicious about this. These were started in off as seeds in late September, they are approaching 6 months old now, that is a long time to be in cramped containers with dodgy watering and harsh heat.
The smallest plant, the Mulanje Sherbert, measured over 4 foot across, and the 2 sativas were over 4.5 foot at their widest. I think that is probably stressful for the plant, little feet and a disproportionately wide canopy.
Most of my training was supercropping and LST
My feeling now after doing this training over several grows, is that it is very easy when the plant is in veg mode. I easily did over a 100 supercroppings this grow (with pliers) without breaking one single stem. But once early flowering occurs, the plant's stems get more woody and yes they can bend fine for LST, but there can be a hell of lot of energy/stress stored up in those bends, particularly plants that are bigger, because they have been grown for longer. One plant I think last year, the canopy was holding so much tension from the training, that I accidentally 'bumped' it as I was trying to do something, and at that moment, 'bang' the mainstem just split down the middle from the tension stored in the plant from it's training.
I now have the strong suspicion that the plants do not like strong tension within them. It is possible better to simply supercrop where there is no energy/tension forcibly stored in the plant's stems, and instead with supercropping there is just a crushing injury that the plant will build a knuckle and heal.
With wide canopies at early flowering, I almost always find that I have to do 'canopy reduction' training so there can be some space left for me on the balcony. And each time I do this I 'feel' that the plants don't like it, that they really don't look so happy afterwards, I felt that with the Mulanje ME this time. I bent some of her stems back towards her centre, which allowed more space, but yeah the resulting tension/stored energy in those bent stems I don't think is good.
After I cut off the obviously dying stems from the Mulanje ME, I saw that one had cracked at the base. I can't be sure that it occurred from the training a few days earlier but I guess so, and then the overwatering was the straw that broke the camel's back?
At times like this a 'training mistress' is needed, altho I am not sure if this would help me from doing it again
Anyway, luckily I had a backyard menagerie and support group that I was able to lean on. They were all initially very shocked, stunned, and like me disappointed, but they soon kicked and scratched around at the problem. And unless the wee stem I left on the chopped Mulanje ME survives this present rainy weather bout, then I'll write it off as yet another learning experience ,and hope that I can guide the remaining 2 plants on to a safe harvest.
Cheers for dropping in, these things happen, good to learn from them!
Tend to agree that you were overwatering after reading your post. It makes sense, what you were assuming, that with all that oxygenation from the chambers the additional water could be a good thing. Add in heat, and the plants could've just succumbed to suffocation from sitting in water. After all, we know that cannabis roots need aeration, and aeration is what your aeration chambers were supposed to provide. In fact, they had us all thinking there was so much aeration that the plants would use -- or tolerate -- more water. Well, you know what happens when we assume.
I am sorry this happened, and I agree that the root of the problem may be the aeration chamber itself. It was an untested and innovative technique. A @Stunger original. No one thought it could end up hurting the plants, but whether the chamber actually added oxygen to the root zone is now a big question. I think you'll want to carefully look at how the roots in fact responded to the chamber after harvest. Did the roots managed to "tap" into that air and send roots growing into the interior of the chamber? Or did they just cling to the outside of the vessel and thus not get any advantage as far as oxygenation is concerned?
I am a bit skeptical about your theory that was the training, super cropping and LST that contributed to this. A stem split would weaken the plant, yes. And a weak plant might suffer from overwatering more readily than one without a stem split. If so, then that is a complicated problem: overwatering, heat, plus an injury that weakens the plant.
If the training is part of the problem, then perhaps you could restrict vertical growth (and need less drastic training sessions) but changing something else: Grow in smaller pots. In smaller pots, the plants will naturally stay shorter.
Looking forward to hearing more of your understanding of what happened.
- Thread starter
- #607
Thanks Emeraldo, it is of course disappointing to lose her. I had intentionally started the grow early to produce bigger plants (if you can call a plant no taller than 2 feet big, haha). I also sprouted extra seeds so I wouldn't lose time if any seeds failed to sprout. And I trained them to where their canopies took over most of the available space of the balcony which made it hard for me to 'get in there'.
I have witnessed the result multiple times of when 'firm' LST training is carried out to reduce and contain the size of a horizontal canopy, only for the plants to not look very happy afterwards. I hadn't previously considered that 'stored energy/tension' could be a problem after carrying out firm LST in early flowering when the plants are big and getting woody. Now I feel that was a contributing factor. Something like this..
Strong LST carried out where there is a lot of tension being held in the plant
V
A branch breaks from the tension and maybe allows an infection to occur while plant is stressed from above LST?
V
In the meantime, I had been giving maybe 3 waterings a day (whenever I saw leaves wilting in the heat)
V
Within minutes of that last watering the leaves just collapsed.
That is how I am currently viewing it from my own observational biases.
re the Aeration Chambers; they have a down pipe entering them which allows fresh air to circulate. The chambers have multiple holes drilled in them. I assumed some holes will have roots entering them and potentially block them, but I was hoping that there would be enough holes to allow both water and air to enter via the down pipes and exit the chambers via the drilled holes. As far as I can tell, they do work like this, because when I pour water into the downpipes it backfills the rubber funnel I use and I have to wait a few seconds till it goes down and I hear it gurgling down and out of the chamber, so it seems clear to me that so far the chambers are all allowing water to exit as designed, and I assume the air also gets to the roots too as the soil moistness changes and the atmospheric pressure also changes to 'push' air into or draw it from the soil. In spite of using them, I am only describing their functioning as a theory. I can't vouch that they actually behave like this and benefit the plant, that is merely my hope!
I never intended that the roots would have to enter the chambers to get air/oxygen. I don't think that is necessary, some roots presumably would of course, but I would hope that as the moistness of the container soil fluctuates that the air/oxygen would still be available to any roots that are on the soil side of the chamber too.
It is possible that the chambers could allow a pathogen to harbour in them that goes on to weaken the plant in times of stress. But as far as I can tell, I think they're working fine. I still feel having such an 'air chamber' in the soil is a good thing altho it is hard to validate it. My plants are bigger than those in my previous grows, but in saying that, for this grow I started them earlier, they are now 10 days from being 6 months old so it is hard to say how much that contributes against the contribution of the aeration chambers. They may not do much, but I subjectively feel they are good and that they are contributing positively to the plant's growth.
Re watering; clearly having aeration chambers doesn't mean you can water freely without risking overwatering. I would now tend to view watering as only a once a day event in future.
Re training; Now, I feel that once a plant is in early flowering and getting woody, that it is better to wound the plant by supercropping or pruning when training it, rather than restraining it's branches under tension. I am forming the opinion now that such tension stress on the plant is not a good thing. Perhaps it is ok as long as no breaks eventuate, but my feeling is they don't like being held in strong tension. And I will probably look to avoid this in future.
Jungle Joseph
Well-Known Member
Bummer dude.
On the bright side, more room, and happy chooks...
On the bright side, more room, and happy chooks...
- Thread starter
- #609
Hey Joe, haha, yes exactly. And also, I have gained some good experience here, I'll adjust and make changes in my future grows from this, so that is a valuable positive thing, and plus I still have 2 plants to get towards harvest and now I have also got a decent amount of maintenance room. Yay!
Hopefully you are getting back on your feet and formulating ideas for the future.
That shit makes me cry. I hardly ever cry, but, that right there is brutal.
I've strapped down really hard as you know. Not had that before. I've had a 5 foot malawi that did the same as yours has done. Reason for mine was digging into the soil with spikes to try get water to actually flow through the beach sand that covers everything. She just gave up completely. I was using a lot of water trying to get the soil wet.
To me that looks like root issues. Maybe something moulded up in the air pipe? Or something crawled in or laid eggs in there.
Just thoughts at this point
I've strapped down really hard as you know. Not had that before. I've had a 5 foot malawi that did the same as yours has done. Reason for mine was digging into the soil with spikes to try get water to actually flow through the beach sand that covers everything. She just gave up completely. I was using a lot of water trying to get the soil wet.
To me that looks like root issues. Maybe something moulded up in the air pipe? Or something crawled in or laid eggs in there.
Just thoughts at this point
So sorry to hear that you lost one of the balcony girls, Stunger...
You've got more room to work now, so the silver lining... such as it is..
If you give that fill pipe a sniff, it might tell you if there's any rot or other bad stuff going on in that rez...
You've got more room to work now, so the silver lining... such as it is..
If you give that fill pipe a sniff, it might tell you if there's any rot or other bad stuff going on in that rez...
I had trouble with a Mimosa a year or so ago. You could see it tracking too. My son who is in the know problem solved it. I brought the problem here but no one had ever seen it before. It was shocking. Alive one day, total portion droop the next. I’m in the tropics and we’d had heat and rain, apparently a lot of growers lost crops here with it. Thankfully the mimosa was the only affected plant.
Hmmmm
I don’t think training. I think a disease. And roots.
It looks systemic. Rotting from the inside out rather than rotting from the outside in. I’ve learned (over and over) a mortal supercrop crack will only cause the death of that limb. Even cracking a stem as long as it’s not a complete break the plant rallies.
Look that’s just my take.
jonoldstyle
Well-Known Member
I’m gutted to read this, Stunger. My sincere condolences. The bright side — you’ve two monsters remaining.
You are 100x the grower I am, but I did have a thought: to reduce the chance of overwatering, have you considered switching to giant fabric pots?
You are 100x the grower I am, but I did have a thought: to reduce the chance of overwatering, have you considered switching to giant fabric pots?
- Thread starter
- #616
Thanks Lerugged! I don't think anything is rotted down the downpipes. In fact today the remainder of the plant is looking like it is recovering a bit after being collapsed for days, so we'll see, maybe it still gives me a little bud and even something to make a few seeds with too.
Thanks Carcass! No, the downpipe has no bad smells coming from it, but rather the sticky Mulanje Sherbert gave me a bit of tacky coating as I moved it aside to smell.So sorry to hear that you lost one of the balcony girls, Stunger...
You've got more room to work now, so the silver lining... such as it is..
If you give that fill pipe a sniff, it might tell you if there's any rot or other bad stuff going on in that rez...
Thanks Tra! Yay for 'life of Brian'. I don't think it is rotting, the remaining branch seems to be carrying out a recovery today, which I wouldn't expect if there was a root disease going on.
Thanks Jon! My pots are already heavily drilled out with dozens of extra holes. On reflection I think it is probably not so much overwatering in one go, but overwatering by doing it multiple times, like 3 times over the day. I had been doing that because the leaves would wilt in the sun perhaps because of the wide canopy, and as I have aeration chambers in the soil and I had already been watering like that on the hot days I felt it seemed fine, until it wasn't!
ZebraCat
Well-Known Member
it’s a damn shame when the dreaded collapse at a rate of knots happens. Like a friggin steam trainUpdate - The Meatloaf 2 out of 3 ain't bad post - music here!
Greetings 420 enthusiasts! After the recent loss, it is onward and upward. Here's a quick pictorial on where the balcony's at now.
Mulanje HP
Mulanje Sherbert
I will give them both a modest topdressing with some liquified worm casting shortly as the Mulanje HP is showing some fade, and altho the Mulanje Sherbert is probably only a month away, she looks like she could do with a little feed too.
Thanks for dropping in, wishing you and your gardens all the best!
.Been there, done that and enough. It’s gutting but at least you have two stunners going very well.
Fingers crossed
for a calm run into harvest. Happy gardening and if in doubt leave it out 
.- Thread starter
- #618
Thanks Zeb! Yeah a damn shame alright but that's the way the cookie crumbled unfortunately.it’s a damn shame when the dreaded collapse at a rate of knots happens. Like a friggin steam train
Been there, done that and enough. It’s gutting but at least you have two stunners going very well.
Fingers crossed
But there seems to be a little bit of life left in the remaining branch, it is currently getting beaten into submission from the sun but who knows, maybe tomorrow it will recover a little more.
Just because I wilted doesn't mean your MME was supposed to. Didn't your plants all get rained on day after day on and off for weeks? That's got to be more water than a second watering of a morning, no?
Also, don't roots die when they hit air (like the air gap in SIPs and air pruned roots in cloth bags)? How would putting a sealed air chamber inside the pot encourage root/plant growth if you're not using it to always water the plants through the tube? I think I thought that the tube was for watering rather than an attempt to get air into the rootball.
Either way, I'm sorry to hear about the downfall of that beauty, but it will save you money on the mechanic's dolly you don't need any more!
Didn't your plants all get rained on day after day on and off for weeks? That's got to be more water than a second watering of a morning, no?Also, don't roots die when they hit air (like the air gap in SIPs and air pruned roots in cloth bags)? How would putting a sealed air chamber inside the pot encourage root/plant growth if you're not using it to always water the plants through the tube? I think I thought that the tube was for watering rather than an attempt to get air into the rootball.
Either way, I'm sorry to hear about the downfall of that beauty, but it will save you money on the mechanic's dolly you don't need any more!
- Thread starter
- #620
They did, their positioning on the balcony probably means the right most gets the most rainfall.
Today was the first time that the remainder of the plant was showing life, it is getting beaten in the sun now, and the Mulanje HP is also showing leaf drooping in the heat but I won't give it another watering. But I'll be interested in how that remainder is looking tomorrow morning.
Some people say that. I think mostly they do, but I recall when I grew a tomato in a SIPS container how it would drink it's 10 litre water reservoir empty twice in a day and it had long white roots hanging in the air, several inches of them.
However, depending on the humidity of the chambers, the roots could very well enter the holes and be quite comfortable without getting air pruned. If the air was dry then they'd certainly get air pruned but if not...
I also don't think it would do anything if it was sealed. Mine all have lots of holes drilled into them so the water can permeate into the soil and the air too. Every day I have watered via the down pipe, and now and then top watering too, and after topdressing I have been also top watering to help take the amendments down.
Thanks Shed! It's a bummer but these things happen and hopefully some good things to learn from. And it now shows me how nice it is to have 'maintenance space' on the balcony. Cheers and I hope you are feeling well on the mend now!