PippinTook

Hi guys, I'll try keep this short and quick: I've always been super happy with my bud after harvest; super dense and frosty, even the small wispy buds lower down will turn your brain to mush. But for some reason I have a persistent problem of the spaces between flower nodes stretching to eternity when I flower. I never see this issue during veg!

I've attached some images, the first three being of my indoor photoperiod plants and the 4th being of my casual outdoor autoflower. You can clearly see the density of buds on the autoflower is significantly higher than the photoperiods and I swear I didn't do anything different between each of them!

Indoor
Strains: 2x OG Kush and 2x King Kong
Days in flower: 14 days
Light: 8 year old purple spectrum Mars Hydro 600w equivalent LED
Light distance from canopy: Moved to around 35-40cm from canopy during flower
Nutrients: Terra Aquatica 3 part (Micro, Grow, Bloom). And a dash of Diatomaceous Earth every feed for the Silica
pH: Generally around 6-6.3
Growing Medium: Freedom Farms 70/30 Coco Perlite Buffered

Outdoor
Strain: Zkittles Auto
Days in flower: No idea to be honest I wasn't paying that much attention to this plant
Light: Good old fashioned sun
Amount of light: I actively move the plant around to chase the sun as much as possible.
Nutrients: Exactly the same as above but more diluted as you can see some burn going on there
pH: As above.
Growing Medium: Freedom Farms 70/30 Coco Perlite Buffered

We're 39 days since germination. Growth is strong but a tad off, where the new growth is quite pale and some of the fingers become inverted so that part of the finger is turned upside down. It looks rather spindly. They eventually grow into good looking but skinny leaves.
Many leaves lower down end in a curled Claw. This is apparently due to me using nutrient-enriched soil as well as "salt nutrients" resulting in nutrient toxicity. 

Anyway I took some photos. They're perfectly good plants just need a bit more attention

I've only ever grown this way, so I appreciate all the knowledge being shared, thank you.

What I'm going to do: I'm going to feed straight pH'd water for 5 feeds. Then I'll resume feeding with a 20% diluted nutrient solution. Maybe I'll be able to uncurl the clawed leaves a little, I don't know I guess I'll see.

In the meantime while I try salvage the grow I'll be doing more research on the correct growing medium for me and the supplements that need to go with them. Coco has always interested me.

Am I missing anything else important? Probably haha. 

Also now's a good a time as ever to do a grow diary, so I'll do that too and we'll see where the grow goes
 

3 minutes ago, Ill_Evan said:

I wouldn't change anything on this grow. You have mentioned you've done three grows already so I would just finish up the current one and make changes on the next. Don't lower your salt feed, I don't think that's necessary. There's a chance the salt nutrients have already disrupted the microbiology within the soil already to the point that your plants are only feeding off the salt nutrients. 

I think you will quickly find that switching to coco will be much, much more affordable than switching to liquid organic nutrients. 

Plants just don't look healthy and it makes me sad. It's still early on and I'd like to be proactive if at all possible without being hasty

1 minute ago, Totemic said:

Also, what are you adjusting your pH to? Salts in coco usually needs adjust to 5.8, organics is 6.2. 

If you switch to organic nutes the need to pH will also fall away. FF premium buffers its own pH at 6.2-6.5

pH adjusted to as close to 6 as possible

2 minutes ago, Totemic said:

Yes FF premium classic is an amended soil and has enough nutrients to sustain a vegging plant for more than a month. By adding salt nutrients you are overloading the soil. 

The Biobizz range works well with FF premium. 

Changing anything for this grow will likely mess it all up. What you can do is to stop with the calmag and the Nitrogen. Just give plain water for 2 or 3 waterings. 

You far into flower are you? 

 

 

They were germinated on the 13th Jan 2023 so they are currently only 39 days old. Still need to fill out the scrog so it will be a short while til flower.
If I'm able, would you recommend I plain water for 2 - 3 waterings, and then switch to a mix of BioBizz nutrients? I've found a feeding schedule for Biobizz nutes specifically for Freedom Farms soil. Plus the price of the Biobizz nutes was surprisingly lower than I expected, and I believe switching nutes is an option.

@Totemic@Ill_Evan

Damn, always surprises me how little I actually know about growing cannabis.

Are you guys basically saying that there are nutrients already in the soil which are being taken up by the plants along with the salt nutrients and this is causing a nutrient toxicity?
I'm pretty strapped for cash at the moment, and switching them over to coco isn't an option (they're already established in the soil). Are brand new, organic nutrients absolutely necessary or can I just tone down the amount of salt nutrients I'm using until I can afford organic nutes? Let's say a 20% dilution? 
Could you perhaps drop me a brand of tried and tested organic nutes that I can go do my own research on? To me it sounds like organic nutes are the right way to go so I might just bite the bullet.

What confuses me as well is that there is a recommended dilution ratio for Soil on the side of the Tera Aquatica nute bottles.
 

29 minutes ago, Ill_Evan said:

Is it the same strain?

Yes they are 4 Blue Dream photoperiod plants. By Atlas Seeds I believe.

Hi all as the title says I've been dealing with cases of The Claw, or Nitrogen Toxicity I believe. The plants have always harvested fine though I suspect they weren't at the highest quality they could be for this clawing reason.

Growing medium: soil - Freedom Farms Premium Classic

Nutrients: Terra Aquatica 3 Part Flora series (Micro, Grow, Bloom), Kushy brand Cal-Mag granules supplement. I use a generic pH down solution to pH the water.

I am currently working on a 60% strength dilution already which makes the nutrient toxicity so puzzling. The N-P-K of each:

Micro: 5-0-1

Grow: 3-1-6

Bloom: 0-5-4

Have I missed any info?

I've attached images of my nutrient solution chart and leaves of the plants.

Thanks all for your time trying to help me out.

1 hour ago, CoolJ said:

I use a 10% bleach water solution to clean my tent. 

Thanks for the tip, never thought to use a bleach solution.

Howdy good people. I'll keep this short and sweet.

I'm just about to harvest a crop that had a late Thrips infestation. I know these buggers are tiny and there are probably thousands of them all over the grow space. 

Id like to ask for suggestions on how to properly clean/debug my grow room once the plants have been harvested? I'd like to try and avoid this situation with my next batch of plant-babies.

I've got a pump spray bottle with a Neem Oil solution. Was thinking of pumping up the concentration and just going ham from floor to ceiling.

Thanks in advance for your time.

5 hours ago, Ill_Evan said:

I would let the pots dry out properly over the course of maybe 4 days after your last watering, then check the weight of the pots and also prod your finger into the top soil and feel how wet the medium is. If the pots still feel heavy and wet, then you've definitely been over watering. If this is the case, let the pots continue to dry out until the weight of the pots feel significantly lighter, you'll definitely feel it. 

Otherwise if after 4 days you can feel it is lighter you can maybe just water a little less with each feed and avoid runoff altogether. I seldom feed until runoff. 

Hey there, thanks for the input! Ill start with watering 2L (from original 3L) per plant and see how they react, if the same thing happens I'll begin watering every 4 days and take it from there.
I'll also see if i can get one of those handy probes that measure soil saturation. I cant lift the pots unfortunately as they are under a scrog at the moment

Hello good people,

I hope you are all doing well. I have what seems to be a very specific problem (I can't find anything on Google), which is my plants' leaves will significantly droop/curl downwards sometimes as much as 90 degrees immediately after watering. This is not the same curling caused by Nitrogen toxicity (I know this because my Critical Orange Punch is actually showing "the Claw". I've reduced the nutrients as of last feed) I'm talking 2 different symptoms here.
Odd thing is, a few hours later they're perked right back up into their "praying" position looking healthier than ever. 
Thankfully this isn't a catastrophic issue but I'm worried I'm holding my plants back and not enabling them to grow to their full potential I.e. this doesn't look like healthy stress.

My watering regime is as follows: I drench the soil with 3.5L of nutrient solution once every 3 days. They are in 22L fabric pots and there is maybe 1 or 2 cups worth of runoff if I had to guess.

My ideas so far: I may be watering too heavily, even if the frequency is fine. From my own research I know that oxygen is also super important for healthy root function. Maybe I'm basically waterboarding my plants, and only when the excess water has drained will the roots find their oxygen. Might explain why they seem to perk right back up a couple hours later.

Apologies for not providing pictures, I watered yesterday and didn't think to post here until today. But if anyone's ever done any heavy pruning/lollypopping then you'll know what symptoms I'm talking about regarding the leaf drooping/curling.

Thanks in advance for reading

On 7/7/2021 at 2:01 PM, PsyCLown said:

@PippinTook Ahh man, no clue what that Garden Gun is - but the active ingredient is not the same as the Insect Control spray.

 

I wouldn't have sprayed the Garden Gun stuff, one needs to be careful and specific with what is being sprayed. Not everything is safe to spray during flower. A bit late now though, what is done is done. Cannabis is also unique in the sense that we heat it and smoke it, we do not eat it like most other crops.

Some sprays are fine for crops which are eaten, but not necessarily safe to smoke.

 

The Garden Gun stuff says not to spray on edible crops...

I figured "Heating and smoking" isn't the same as eating haha. Plus I was hoping that because the buds haven't formed yet it would be okay because they will form after I spray and therefore not have any pesticide on them. I have no hard science to back this up, I'm just desperate and I'm looking for any shred of hope here.

Here are a couple images 3 days after the spray: https://imgur.com/a/l9MSQ85
Some leaves are still turning yellow by the day but the biggest change I've noticed is many of the white tendril pistils have actually turned brown, it looks as if there is +-2 weeks left until harvest.

I don't know how this plant is going to turn out but it will at least be a learning experience for me but damn am I going to be annoyed if she dies on me

1 hour ago, PippinTook said:

Thank you all for the advice, it seems there are multiple things I can do to combat the thrips. Its good to hear that my entire harvest isn't completely ruined. I'm going to go get Effekto Insect Control spray today and ill probably spend an hour or two trying to do each leaf individually. I'm also going to prune all the worst affected leaves. I'll keep this thread updated as things happen

https://imgur.com/a/wzH2Zlf

So I went to the nursery and got myself the closest thing I could find to Effekto's Insect Control. I came home and gave the plant a proper pruning, trying to get the worst affected leaves out of there. I then sprayed the plant thoroughly, from above as well as from below to try get the undersides of as many leaves as possible. The leaves were basically dripping when I was done, I hope I didn't over do it. I watered her before doing anything because I didn't want any pesticide to filter down through to the roots if any of it landed/dripped onto the soil. I just have 2 questions:
1. It doesn't say on the pesticide how often I need to use it, is there a general rule for these things or do i need to do some more research on that?
2. How do I prevent this from happening again? I was thinking of placing a layer of muslin cloth over the intake fan(I know thrips are tiny tiny but this has gotta help even a little bit?) As well as trying to take better precautions when coming from outside I.E. changing clothes and washing hands before opening the tent. 

17 hours ago, PsyCLown said:

I say spray with Efecto Insect Control, it is safe to use - you're only a month into flower so that is perfect. A single spray will do and get your through to harvest time.

I wouldn't spray Neem. Pyrol might work but more than one application would be required.

 

@The_StonedTrooper Thrips multiply like crazy and will destroy the leaves completely, in turn killing the plant. I had such an issue once when trying to be lazy and not spray - I think I was actually waiting for stuff to spray to arrive and was delayed in ordering some. Didn't turn out well for me, plants leaves were f&*ked and they were in flower, so the plants weren't very happy for the remainder of flower and some died before maturing.

Thank you all for the advice, it seems there are multiple things I can do to combat the thrips. Its good to hear that my entire harvest isn't completely ruined. I'm going to go get Effekto Insect Control spray today and ill probably spend an hour or two trying to do each leaf individually. I'm also going to prune all the worst affected leaves. I'll keep this thread updated as things happen

Im seeing Neem oil as the go to treatment for this

25 minutes ago, CreX said:

hey @PippinTook! sadly that is all to familiar to me. you have thrips. you could pick off one of those leaves and you will have to look ultra close to see anything. thrips range from about 0.5mm to 1.5mm and they will chow your whole plant fucked.

as for the yellowing, thats likely just normal nitrogen def. i wouldnt add too much in flower, but it does need a smidge.

 

what have you got in your stores for IPM management?

Does this mean my whole harvest is fucked? How much damage can can they do in another 40 days of flowering? This taking into account many leaves dont even look affected so perhaps its still early days?

I dont have anything on hand right now. I need too look up a safe recipe for a "pesticide" that i can just drench the plant in. 

Hey guys and girls! I'm back again with an update!

https://imgur.com/a/qaRW85U

Things have been going well, just a few small things that mare making me concerned. We are +- 30 days into flowering. In the images, you can see that some of the fan leaves are beginning to turn yellow. This seems a bit premature? You can also see that some of the lower fan leaves seem to have gotten "burnt" around the tips and edges. I've never had this issue before and I haven't changed anything in terms of feeding/lighting schedule etc.

You can also see from the photos that there are white spots covering some of the leaves. I've had Powdery Mildew before and I distinctly remember being able to rub off some of the power with my fingers. These white spots however do not come off. They also seem to be more abundant on the lower leaves of the plants, with some leaves being affected more than others. These leaves also dont seem to be negatively affected by the white spots specifically with the yellowing mentioned above seeming to be an issue disconnected from the white spots.

I hope I've provided enough information and maybe my mind can be put at ease with a few simple solution. But when is life ever simple?

Thanks again in advance!

Thank you all for the helpful advice and discussion. 
From here on, this is what I'll be doing:

1. Lifting the pot off the ground so that it doesn't sit in any runoff.
2. Reduce the amount that I water to 4L at a time.
3. Gauging whether to water or not by lifting the pot and weighing it + using the first few cm of my finger to check if the top layer of soil is dry

4. Would you guys recommend watering with plain pH'd water every 2nd or 3rd feed? From the sounds of things, this is a good idea to prevent salt/nutrient build up around the roots. I've never done this and my plants never showed any signs of stress that could be related to salt buildup, by my standards at least. That may be true but it might not have been optimal even if there were no signs of stress and I don't want my plants to be acceptable, I want them to be exceptional, which is why I'm talking to people who know better than me

Also, would it be okay to update this thread in a couple weeks, after we can see some potential changes? I don't know if I need to go to a different section or something.

2 minutes ago, CreX said:

I'm not so sure your method is wrong... But your religious every 3 days could be the problem... Lift the pot, and if it's lighter than it looks... Then give it a feed... If it's as heavy as it looks or heavier.. Then leave it for another day. Do you collect the run off? As long as the plants not siting in the run off water it will be fine... 

The pot does sit in the runoff which is actually kinda dumb of me to do now that I think of it. I've already found a plastic crate I need to clean first that the pot will sit on top of.

I don't collect any runoff, I'm not even sure how I would go about doing that. Why would I need to collect runoff?

Also if my method of watering isn't fundamentally bad then perhaps I should look at watering every 4 or 5 days. I'm just so scared of underwatering! I'll try the weighing method and gauge the watering schedule like that.

Thanks for the replies guys and girls.
I'll try lift the pot and direct the inlet fan towards the underneath of the canopy. 
As for the watering, I've always been told to water and keep watering until I start seeing runoff. Is it better in general to water smaller amounts more frequently as @Naughty.Psychonaut mentioned, as opposed to a full saturation less frequently? I've heard a lot about roots needing oxygen and water displaces oxygen, but I thought with sufficient drainage a heavy watering would be fine.

I'll have to take another look at my watering schedule as well as the nutrients required. Speaking of which, @Naughty.Psychonaut, I use Terra Aquatica (aka General Hydroponics) 3 part series (the one with Bloom, Micro and Grow). I don't even know if this is considered synthetic or organic. I'm guessing synthetic. I also use pH- solution as well as a liquid CalMag supplement. It's a 22L material pot. And would you mind very much explaining what you meant when you mentioned "alternating between feeds"? Are you suggesting alternating between nutrient rich water and plain pH'd water every feed?

Watering: I do a full 5l watering every 3 days

Hey all, I'll make this short and sweet and hopefully someone can help me.

Strain: White Widow, photoperiod
Temps: At the moment its cold, I know - 19 to 21 celcius
Lights: 100w LED
pH of nutrient solution: 5.8 - 6.2
Siemens of nutrient solution: +-1500
22L material pot with a premix the store recommended and I've had nothing but success with in the past.

So as you can see in pictures 01 and 03, the leaves are bending into a "V" shape. There is none of the common "claw" where the edges of the leaves curl inwards. These pictures show leaves that were less than a pencil length from the lights.
05 shows the distance AFTER I'VE ALREADY MOVED THE LIGHTS UP, but is this still too close? Are the lights being too close + the cold responsible? Is this even something to be worried about? The plant looks super healthy with no other signs of stress at all.

Hopefully someone could just pitch in their 2c and set my mind at ease.

Thanks in advance, and it's great to be here.

For the setup you have there, i would suggest an oscillating fan to keep the air moving over the plants, strong enough to make the leaves blow. That will make your stems stronger. Then you will also be dealing with smells. Check out some of the DIY grow logs for an idea of what's needed.

Is it necessary to be moving air IN and OUT of the room, like something a exhaust fan would do or do I just need to be moving the air around the room?

Thanks for taking the time to respond and help, by the way <3