Hi, I'm really confused, first time grow however, I'm a moderately seasoned gardener of 5-10 years. Here's what I've got and why I'm baffled: What - 6 AK-47 auto flower plants and 1 NYC diesel, all aerated pots How long - 6 weeks in, I've now transplanted them once and still having issues Medium - I used 2 dif types of organic soils from Miracle Grow, realizing that one organic bag was not for potting, which may have hurt these plants. First few weeks, I had no problems. Then, I was seeing yellow and leaves dying. So worried that my organic soil was not ok, I transplanted these plants to more perlite, peatmoss, potting soil, and organic Miracle-Gro Organic Choice Potting Mix - Scotts Miracle-Gro Current medium - Miracle-Gro® Organic Choice® Potting Mix (for plants and containers), potting soil, perlite, some soil from compost/outdoor soil. Lighting - 2 105W CFLs and 1 blackstar 240w LED Temps - room is 74-84, certainly seems ok/reasonable, fan blowing on them and fan venting Nutes - I've put no nutes in, this soil should be safe, should be nutrient rich, is largely like at least 3/4 of it brand new from bag. Problem - the plants are barely growing, the leaves are dying day after day, I'm really confused as to why they seem to be in bad shape. Bugs - yes I have some small flys, they've been weak plants for weeks now, however I don't see anything on the plant or them attacking them. Bottom Line - I'd like to salvage these plants, can that be done? Here's what I have that I can offer to save them: 1)homemade aeroponics rubbermaid bin - air stone, water pump, netting pots, technaflora nutes, the same lighting/box setup 2)I bought macro plugs and root stimulator from Bcuzz 3)I have PH 6 water, containers, and options to save them ------- What can I do? What is wrong with them, can I transplant these to aeroponic setup and just put fresh water on them for a week? I'm sure I'm wrong here, but my guess is I want to wash the plants in PH water, dip them in root growth water, put them in the aeroponic system with just water, wait a week and see what happens. Now I'm asking nicely, can anyone give me the quick 1-2 punch that I need to save these plants. What is wrong, what should I do, I have options to put them back in soil or in a hydroton medium aeroponic system or I can put them in a nursery bin to revive them to proper health before I transplant them into a new medium. Thanks, I really appreciate the help on the problem and the long term transition/solution.
Any help or thoughts on this? I really just want to know can I save these and what are my best options to save them. I can offer putting them in PH water for a few days, an aeroponic system with fresh PH water, or I can keep them in the soil and find a solution to helping them. I can say this, the soil PH was 7ish, I just tried to lower it closer to 6 by putting 4/5 PH water in it. I'm not sure if the PH was the problem, but I really don't understand why this is happening. Thanks for any help/advice
You are lacking in nutrients. Potting soil is usually only good for a month or so. At this point i would trim the dead leaves and apply half the nutrients to the plants. Until they begin to repair and thrive. DO NOT BURN THEM. They are struggling now and they will really struggle if you force nutes on them. Let me know if you have any questions id be glad to help you out.
Also i forgot to ask. Do you have red stems? the yellow leaves tell me that your phosphorus and nitrogen levels are really low, but red stems and yellow leaves are almost a sure sign of low nitrogen. The problem with organic soils is that they have a real medium level of nitrients and the plants tend to use them up quickly.
I have the same sort of setup in leui of a big drip pan. Hydro stores want 115 bucks for a 4x4 black plastic one, so I use one of those big blue city recycling bins. I think we're both creating too damp of an environment, for one. Transpiration is a vital process of photosynthesis that allows the plant to utilize water and efficiently vent it through the leaves into the (hopefully) dryer air. With 60+% humidity, the plants have some difficulty. I'm terrified to suggest nutes, because it COULD be nute burn with Miracle Grow's products being so full of nitrogen designed to make flowers bloom hard, and the plants don't even look much more than a month old, so how could they have leached all the nutes out already? Bottom line, this is only further proof to me that I should never purchase MG products ever again. Fox Farms and Perlite all the way. Another thing to consider: Where was your potting soil stored? Without giving too much away, I work at one of the two big box hardware farm/garden retail outlets, and specifically, in the lawn and garden area, and we give literally zero shits about maintaining the quality of the product. We store that crap anywhere, out in direct sunlight, under a puddle of rancid water that's collected in the plastic on top of the pallet, and with borderline retarded kids jumping on forklifts to move them around and tear giant holes in the sides that leak soils and let in parasites, fungal growth, and rot. This has worked out well for me in some areas, and not so well in others. I got several bags of torn potting soil for next to nothing, but now about 1.5 months into my grow I'm getting tiny little mushrooms randomly growing out of my soil, and my drainage really sucks way worse than it should. My concern is this: They're so small! What the hell could have possibly happened already to damage these poor things so early? Nutrient burn at a level able to obliterate so much fresh (very fresh) growth wouldn't just turn the leaves yellow like that, they'd straight up kill it. But theyre weeds dude, they wouldnt be revolting this strongly against mediocre nutrient levels lol. The problem is bigger. Root damage? Root rot? Some of the pots are wetter looking than others, and one of the ones in the middle had tiny green puddle, like moss was forming in the center? That's too damp, dude. Get a cheapo hygrometer, Home Depot/Lowe's sells one near the birdseed and shit for 7 bucks, thermometer/hygrometer combo. Take those big totes out for drip pans, and use smaller individual drip pans that the fan can blow air over to dry off. This will also provide a place to test runoff PH. How often do you water? Stop for a while. Let that soil dry out some while you switch to a different drip pan strategy. I'm done with soil. This is my first grow, and I'm done. I'm going hydroton. I don't know if you can just pull your plants up, rinse off the root ball, and switch at this point, but I don't think that sort of shock would be healthy for these babies.
And good luck. Don't give up or despair, every single bit of experience you gain in this is only knowledge that will be applied to your greatest harvest ever, and with a bit of luck, that harvest will be very soon. It looks like you have an awesome tent and decent lighting, and the hunger to succeed. Keep it up.
A buddy grew some autoflower plants. His first attempt did not fare well. He discovered he did not have enough soil depth to accommodate the long taproot on the autos. His second attempt, he used deep growbags instead of shallower smart pots. The additional depth provided by the deep bag was the solution.