I'm an admitted total novice to cultivation, and I am struggling right now with a couple of plants that look magnesium deficient. I wanted to know if someone could be a friend and tell me if I'm preparing and feeding my nutrient solutions correctly. First, I'm using General Hydroponics Flora Duo. Here is the feeding chart. I'm following simple drain to waste. http://generalhydroponics.com/site/gh/docs/feeding_sched/GH-FloraDuo-DTW-Charts.pdf Second, I'm using a mixture of 75% cana coco and 25% perlite in five gallon pots. My plants are about a month old and were started from seed in rockwool. I feed about every three days, and alternate watering and feeding so water-feed-water-feed. I wait till the pots feel light, and carefully break up the top layer of medium with a fork. Then I water with a mister and by pouring from a cup, and stop when I see it run through the bottom of the plant. I make my solution by starting with RO water and adding my nutrients with a dropper. This week was 7.5ml of Part A, 2.5ml Part B, 2.5ml Rapid Start, 5ml CaliMagic, and 10ml of Liquid Karma per gallon of RO water vegetative solution. Then I check the PPM's with a meter. It was about 1000. That seemed high, so I add distilled water until the PPM's are about 750. Then I test the pH with a meter and adjust with pH up or down until I'm at a solid 5.8 every time. Usually it's too low and I need to add only pH up. Then I check the ppm's again and feed. Is this right? I'm thinking that this might be the cause of my deficiency, because my plants are getting fertilizer at half strength and more water, and that maybe I should cut out the liquid karma altogether and just go Part A, Part B, CaliMagic, and Rapid Start and I'd end up in the ballpark of the ppm's I need without diluting further. They guy at the store says I should be able to feed-feed-water and that my plants would do better if I had about 30% runoff than just stopping watering when I see it come out the bottom. Any thoughts?
how big are they? once the roots are established you should water once a day to get the full benefit of coco..some even water 2 or 3 but im doing 50/50 coco in 3 gallons and once a day seems to be good (mine are big) so maybe every other day for you...you dont want it to dry out just moist or it holds the cal and mag and once they are bigger you dont have to worry about over watering at all..i also feed every time so you could try that too..you can check the runoff ppm and compare it to whats going it...if its higher then thats whats not getting ate and you can adjust accordingly
They're about ten inches tall and getting huge and I'm starting to have problems. They're under a 1000w HPS on a dimmable ballast at 50%. I'm thinking that they aren't being fed enough and that I'm not perparing the solution correctly, mainly because I'm diluting it after mixing it to get the recommended PPM. The petioles are red and the leaf tips look magnesium deficient. PPM of the runoff is close to what I put in, and the ph was a little lower at 5.5. I have read that the pH of runoff in coco isn't necessarily a good indicator of medium ph, so I'm going to dissolve an ounce of medium in 2.5 ounces of water and measure.
your ppm sounds a little high actually for 10" but if ppm is about the same theyre eating it...yea ph isnt good to measure by runoff but 5.5 is fine...you getting rust spots on the tips or are they burnt? any pics would help
I have interveinal chlorosis of older growth, red petioles, and the tips of the affected lower large fan leaves have turned yellow, then brown spots, now are curling upward. I don't think I'm feeding them often enough or preparing the solution correctly by diluting it after mixing it but I'm kind of lost as to how to move forward and solve this problem. View attachment 5622
Here's a thread I started about this that nobody has replied to yet. http://forum.grasscity.com/sick-plants-problems/1281590-help-sick-plants-yellowing-older-leaves-few-brown-spots-tips-redish-petioles-yellow-tips-new-growth.html
yea you got some mag def and see some burn on the tips of that one leaf...you should probably back down to like 500-600 ppm and feed every time...also you might have some over watering cant tell if some of those leaves have small wrinkles or not..if they do its only small so keep watering like you are until they get bigger and then you can up it to every other day then every day
Thanks for all the help! So what do you think I should do right now? I was thinking flush them, foliar feed with super mild calimagic maybe 1ml per gallon, and remix a solution to give them immediately after the flush?
they really dont look bad but missed the part your in 5 gallon pots so you def are getting some over watering..next time keep them in one gallon until bigger then transplant...over watering can lockout nutes also so you can probably go even longer than 3 days till they need more water...I would just foliar feed with your floraduo as it has a complete nute profile and let them dry out more and feed them every time...found this for ya Grower's Tip: Part B can be used alone as a bloom booster for garden plants, foliar feeding and hydroponic reservoir top-up for the bloom phase. Add 1-3 tsp of B per gallon of water. i would do 1tsp for foliar (5ml)
I checked my journal and misspoke. I am actually watering every 5 days since transplanting , waiting till the medium begins to dry on top, feeling the weight compared to a bone dry pot. When it's easy to tip, I water. That has been on average every five days. So for now, should I leave them alone or flush them? It seems to have gotten worse on the troubled leaves since I fed yesterday.
Also, thanks so much for helping out man. This has made my day much easier. I was kinda stressing this.
you should leave them alone until they dry out again...im pretty sure its your watering i could see wrinkles on some of the leaves..coco is great for not over watering when they're bigger but that small in that big of pot makes it hard to regulate since they dont have the roots to drink it...good news is once they have roots established they will take off..you can foliar feed to green em up a bit and help with the mag but i wouldnt do anything else until the soil drys...you can get one of those cheap soil moisture meters that will tell you exactly when its wet, normal, or dry...i use a sunleaves digital one and it works good for ph also
