Stunted clone development, curling, tight foliage?

[The Professor]

I have some clones on the go, all seemed well, raised them in a warmed propagator, in root riot, as usual, with just water and a mist now and again, transferred to the rockwool cubes in my green trays, and added a light feed using formulex. Now as for lighting, originally I was using a CFL light, blue spectrum, but there were 3 of the tubes out, so I expect the lumens were a bit low, not that this should be too much of a problem? Anyway, I got a new, well second hand, canopy light, with 2 grow fluoro tubes, the 55w type, again blue spectrum, as it should be, and lowered the light to a suitable height. I still kept on the cfl, even though it only has about 4 tubes working now, better than nothing I thought, and the more the merrier and all that. So the lux reading at the plant level seems fine. I have good root formation, pushing out through the rockwool, and they appear nice and healthy, but the top side is a disapointment. In the pics you will see at the base some of them have larger leaves, which were initiated in the propagator, but since then the leaves have been small, tightly bunched, and curling up! The only thing going for them is that they are green! Some are better than others though, the clones are from 2 mother plants, snow white, from an earlier crop, which appear to be healthy enough, and they were from seed (Nirvanna) good results btw.

All the clones, as they were developing in the rockwool became a dark green. I read conflicting reports on that, some seemed to say, that's ok, others hinted at over feed of nitrogen. So, to be safe, I decided to flush the cubes one by one, preparing some water, I used ordinary tap water at this point, on the basis that I would need some Mg and Fe in there, I have an RO set up as well, which I had at first used, but felt that with early clones, that might be detrimental, as the RO water may well be lacking in essential base elements. This indedd may have started the problem. So, I took each cube and plant, and soaked the cube, dunking in the water, and gently squeezed out the excess. It seemed to have made a difference after a day or two, they did lose that dark green colour, well, most of them did. I watered for a further 2 days with tap water, Soft water by the way, Ph 5.8. then reintroduced a light formulex mix to 600ppm I occasionaly spray with a Nitrozyme mix as well.

I have a couple of theories It might be that they have been over fed from the start, (too much foliar feeding ) hence the dark green, or, there may have been a lack of calcium and Mg, and Iron, in using the RO water in the first place. Or the Ph has been too high, rockwool common problem, although I did soak them prior to using, and checked the run off, approx 6.3 last time I checked. Although that was after I flushed the cubes, so there may have initially been a build up of nutes / salts, = high Ph. (Am i answering my own question here unsure.gif ) Probably all of the aforementioned!! cry.gif Or, I may have transplanted them too soon from the propagator, into the rockwool in the trays, looking at them right now, I may have based the decision to move to rockwool on seeing a good root formation, but ignoring the fact that the foliage was a little on the under developed side.
So what do you think, oh yeah, another thing I did try was adding another light to the mix, a 400w (430) poot light, witha son t agro bulb, 30% blue light, and the rest red spectrum. It provided somewarmth in the room, it was a tad on the cool side, but in retrospect, that probably didn't matter too much at this stage. Anyway, it was drying them out too quickly, and I decided was too much for the young plants, so I have turned that one off. Besides, over the room, there is a 400w above the 2 mothers keeping them happy, so it is probably warm enough, the room is light enough, a cellar, with white washed walls.
I am now wondering if I should start some more clones in a aeroponic prop I have, then dispose of the weakest of the ones I have right now, and start afresh, with good tap water, and letting them really establish before putting into the rockwool cubes, I want to get them into a DW system fairly soon you see. Although that is running enzymes through the system right now, so I have time to play with.


I have banged on too much, sorry, (passion) wink.gif Anyway, any input from anyone?? Thanks

 

[The Professor]

Now don't all rush at once,:rolleyes3

 

[BWC BayArea]

I didn't read the whole post but the green on the top of the cubes is algae. I'm not home so I don't have all of my resources to look up the possible adverse affects of algae growing on rockwool. I've never dealt with it but most people I've heard of that encounter this try to prevent it. Let me read the rest and see what else is going on. This is a long ass post and most of us are lazy or stoners, some are both. Too much to read after reading for hours. People get intimidated by the length b4 even beginning to read.
As far as RO water lacking base elements thats what Cal/Mag and nutrients are for. Add them, PH ur solution and ur good to go. RO water didn't do this unless ur PH is off from what I c. Are u keeping ur rockwool cubes moist? When misting I recommend misting with H2O once or twice a day until u see roots emerge. If u don't use a humidity dome try one. The algae grows when there is light and water, eliminate one and the problem is gone. Hydro stores sell Grodan Cube covers (to cover the tops of cubes) just for this purpose. Looks like the algae started on the plugs u started them in and not the rockwool. I've seen algae on the plugs b4.