Hey guys, I wanted to post this here instead of the sick plant forum because of the organic nature of the soil, figured you guys would know best. Should I be worried at all? There are a few spots where the VERY very tip of the leaf is red, with sometimes a little yellow before it, sometimes reddish/brick red/(rarer) almost brown. The branches do seem to lean toward the purple side, as well as the veins underneath leaves. I know this can be strain dependent, though, and also due to cold temps. So I don't think I'm as worried about that. Also, the new growth does seem a little lighter green than the rest? Not sure if my lights have been too close, or possibly the soil needs more magnesium (just from searching)? Not really sure, which is why I come to you guys. Humidity has been a constant problem the whole grow, too.. ranging anywhere from 18-30%. I'm trying to remedy that. This winter is killing me. Here are some pics: Here you can see some of the red tips. It is not on every leaf. The majority of the plant seems good, but there are definitely a bunch of leaves with this red tip, even new growth: It seems like they are mostly toward the top of the plant, with the lower leaves that show any symptoms have slightly yellow tips instead of red. Again, I'd say at least 60-70% of the crop seems to be green and just dandy. Even the red-tipped leaves look good in lieu of this. Some leaves have a very very very tiny amount of red or yellow to the tip, but most seem pretty green and fine. I should also note I did use a flash on my camera, so it does look like the green between the veins is lighter than it is in real life (maybe the angle/shadow?), but there may be an ever so slight lighter green between veins on a few of the leaves... most are just a nice even green color, though. Here is the underside of the leaf with purple stem/veins... not as worried about this as perhaps it's genetic (unknown strain). I will also mention that it HAS been really cold lately, my temps have been in the mid to high 70's (higher in veg.. low 80's), but my today digital thermometer says my lowest has been like 65 degrees (I imagine overnight last night [without lights on, now that she's in flower], I think the digital thermometer resets by day for high/low temp).. I believe this is only in the last few days, though.. temps dropped a lot around here recently. This red tip thing has been going on earlier than that, though.. I should've posted sooner. Hoping it's just genetic, possibly also the cold weather? And here is an overall top view of the plant. Everything has been looking pretty good from what I can tell, if anything the new growth seems a little light in color, though. Combined with some red tips. The bulk of practically every single leaf looks green and good, though, other than the ones with this red tip. (edit: the yellowing on the left and right is a result of the 2700k side lighting I have there, they are the same green color, not yellow! I should have turned them off.) Anything I should worry about? The red tips have been around for a little bit... they don't kill the leaf or travel down the leaf at all, they all stay at the very tips. I don't think any of the leaf tips broke off or shriveled away or anything. My soil is basically the recipe on the first page of the Beginner's Soil Mix thread (although I received the young plant that was in Miracle Grow Organic.. I get worried about the soil that's still trapped in her roots, but I imagine by now it's all settled down into a consistent soil, or I hope - I transplanted from a much smaller pot into a 5 gallon smart pot). Haven't done/added a whole lot to it... a little extra EWC/soil, aloe+coconut water on some waterings.. once or twice did a very small dose of TM-7 and once did FulPower in veg. Did a nice kelp tea before putting her into flower 2 days ago. It's been MOSTLY just water though, maybe with a bit of aloe and coconut here and there. Thoughts/suggestions? Anything to worry about? Should I top dress with anything specific if this could be a problem? I mean overall she looks fine and will probably make it just fine to harvest, but I just want to nip this in the bud in case it is some sort of deficiency/problem. She is in 5 gallon smart pots, vegged for a long time, though.. maybe 8 weeks including what they grew before I vegged? I really should have flowered her sooner but... here I am. It took quite a bit of work and time to get the plant they gave me back to a good health, so growth was slowed down for a bit there. I hope I haven't set myself up for failure! Thanks guys and gals!
i suspect this is or will be a problem. as for the tips, looks like slight nute burn, nothing too alarming. just tone down all the inputs for now, especially the tm-7 and fulvic which can cause problems if applied too much. i wouldnt worry about the purple stems.
@Sc00byD00bie Yeah I won't use them the rest of the grow.. didn't realize how much they might burn a plant! Will definitely keep that in mind, thanks! Pretty much will do straight water the rest of the grow.. possibly another layer of EWC (that shouldn't cause any problems right? a thin topdress? Maybe Kelp halfway through? Or just stick to water? And yeah I didn't realize it had been so long in veg until I went back and looked at the date of my first photo.. definitely regret waiting so long! I was mostly LSTing this tall lanky plant the whole time which kinda screwed a lot of it up for me... This is why I need to keep a damn journal! Think my yields will be diminished by this? Or worse yet, that she won't make it through a full flower cycle? I think I'll just go straight water from here on out unless I see something else strange pop up. I won't be making that mistake again, of the extra long veg time... it took a while for the plant to recover from what I received, that is partially to blame, but also on me for waiting too long initially, with wanting to trim more, I shoulda just popped in flower and dealt with the lower fluffy nugs.. I guess you live and learn!
Atmo, plant looks very healthy overall. Few burnt tips wont hurt your yields. Back off on the acids (humic/fulvic) and you should see that tip issue resolve itself. If you did an organic mix you really don't need all that top dressing unless you plan on no tilling it, than you should defiantly keep adding EWC and Kelp but again let the tips settle down before adding anything. Good luck.
I don't see anything wrong with that plant. The tip burn is certainly nothing to get concerned about nor are the purple stems, etc. The thing looks perfectly healthy to me. It's got a lot of tops so you're not going to get a great amount of size in them as far as that goes...more tops means less size, but if you've got the light to flower that thing on out with, you'll get a nice haul off of it. As long as the overall coloring of the plant stays that nice rich blue/green, you don't have to worry about adding much of anything to it. If it's color starts to get washed out (in the new growth) to a more yellow/green, that's usually a sign it's root bound and has used up the nutrients in the soil. But I repot these things all the way through veg and flower. If I think they need it, I just let the plant dry out real good and pop it over into a bit larger container with some fresh soil. The soil will pick up and feed the plant from that point on. We run a 10 week veg/flower cycle and I generally try to repot them right before I put them into the flower room. I don't even give nutes anymore. If you use good soil, the soil will more than do the job. Looks like you've done a pretty good job to me. TWW
Thanks guys. I don't plan on no-tilling yet, only using 5 gallons for now, a bit too small for that. I will keep an eye on it and see how it goes through flowering. Do you guys think the 5 gallon pot is a bit too small for this? The top down pic makes it look a little bigger than it is, though... underneath the canopy is pretty much cleared so all those tops are really the main things growing right now at least. I am afraid of root bound, but the veg time is a little wonky because a lot of that time was devoted to bringing this tall lanky plant grown in a windowsill up to speed and saving it which added on a bunch of time, so hopefully I won't have that problem. It's been in flower for 2 days, so I dunno if it's too late to even transplant or not (if I absolutely HAD to.. what size should I go up from 5 gallons? Obviously it would be awesome not having to transplant ). It is at least in a fabric pot, though, right? As far as major root bound is concerned? If it comes to that, would I be able to simple top dress or make teas to help finish her along through to harvest? I definitely won't be doing a "charity windowsill grow" again haha, I will be growing from seed/clone and veg for a much shorter time in the future. I guess the best course of action is to just keep an eye on it and simply water her (pending any emergency transplanting). Thanks guys!
Size of container is growers choice. I have a 6.5' plant in a 7 pot. Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
5 would be too small for no-till, you want 7 at the minimum and bigger is even better. ideally 15-20g and up for good results. since cannabis can double or triple (or more) its size during flower you need to take it in to account with your veg time and how big you let it go before you flip. ive started rooted clones on 12/12 and got monsters, granted they were sativas but still i didnt expect it. now my moto is less is more, start small and grow as you learn. you cant learn to drive on a formula 1 machine. remember, compost is all a plant really needs to thrive, so if your soil has good compost you can relax and let the soil take care of your plant.
I'm honestly not seeing anything detrimental here. Purple stems can be a trait of the strain. The tips has me slightly concerned. What have you changed as far as nutes? I could be wrong but burn mostly comes from excessive nitrogen. In organics this usually isn't a problem unless you are way overdoing it. Cut feedings to half dose or skip them next feed or 2. If you made amendments there are still plenty of available nutrients as long as your container is large enough for the plant. You said 6'. Rule of thumb is 1 gallon per foot. A plant becoming root bound can cause all kinds of funky symptoms. Don't do anything too dramatic. Don't try to transplant or anything crazy until this issue has been corrected because it could cause the plant to totally shock if this is in fact an issue but like I've said never seen purple tips on new growth.
@MajorToker I don't use bottled nutes (if that's what you mean), I have a living organic soil and feed the soil. Mostly just good compost and EWC. I've been keeping it fairly mild, but I'm going to attribute it to the fulvic acid I previously added and will just use water from here on out and see how she responds. Not sure what you mean by 6', that mighta been the other dude who posted. As for the pot size, is there a cubic foot type of measurement for pot size? Height isn't really a good factor, at least when LSTing/lollipopping/Scrogging - My plant is super short but its footprint is probably like... (guessing) 19" x 16" with the canopy something like 5-6 inches at most... full plant stem to canopy maybe 9-10"? Hard to guess but that's probably fairly accurate. I'd have to measure it, though. I do worry about pot size. If 5 gallons will be enough for after the stretch and into the end of flower.
As of now I've got full LED going on, about 40w per square foot (probably more than that considering I'm rounding up on my box size). My box is a little smaller, but rounded up to 1.5' x 2' footprint. I've got an Area 51 RW-75 and 4x 9.5 w 2700k Cree bulbs as supplements. I've been thinking of grabbing a couple more. I might do 4 more 9.5 watters, or check out the floodlights they have. With these I'm unsure of how far from the canopy they should be.. I would imagine I would want to maximize footprint but I also don't want them too far. Right now I have 2x 9.5w bulbs on the left and right, I could fit another 4 in the back, but the floodlights are worth checking out and I believe they have 2700k ones. I read that more smaller bulbs is better than the bigger ones, though. But this also was 2 years ago, so I dunno if things have changed. From what I read about LED light sq foot/watt I am in a good zone right now, but I'd still like more. If I get 4 more Cree 9.5w 2700k bulbs in the back I would be around 65w per sq foot.. which honestly probably wouldn't even hit that number if you take falloff into account on the supplemental lighting. I'm gonna see how she does for now with what I have, then maybe do a bit more research into LED, watts per sq foot, Cree Floodlights/bulbs etc. I think I'm pretty comfortable with this amount right now, unless things have changed since I put all this together. From what I remember I think 40w per sq foot of LED was "minimum" and 65 watt per sq foot was "max" (although I'm still on the fence about this "maximum" amount... I dunno)
My plant looks just like that and is doing great! I wouldn't stress over it. I've used only water but when I transplanted from 7 gal to 15 gal into soil that had only been cooking for 30 days (with added alfalfa) that's when I saw the tips start change color, nothing detrimental though, I also didn't use any lime to offset the PH of the peatmoss but it's been doing great Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Grasscity Forum mobile app
The only thing I can think of is that I had a nice wonderful cooked up soil, and then let it dry out for like 2 years. I moistened it for a few days, then soaked it in kelp/alfalfa tea.. brought it back to life.. but this was obviously way before transplant. There were some little yellowings here and there, nothing major.. I'm talking like..a yellow leaf or a few spots here and there, no biggie, and this isn't anything major either... I doubt this problem can even be attributed to the original kelp/alfalfa. I'm gonna go with the TM-7 and FulPower.. I think I gave 2 applications of the TM-7 so I'm just gonna hold off on that... I sent myself an email with all sorts of quotes form threads I read and TM-7 was someones like.. Bi-Weekly water routine. I DEFINITELY didn't use it every other watering that's for sure. I'm trying to think, but MAYBE 3 times at the MOST. And a low concentration at that.. but perhaps it was just too much for it. I hadn't realized it was so powerful enough to give a "nute burn." I still have a LOT of learning to do, but I did learn a lot from this grow so far! My only fear is the whole 5 gallon smart pot for this size plant. And curious about adding more supplemental lighting. But otherwise really everything seems to be going good! Thanks! Another thing to note is my tap water IS 8.0pH, but I was told not to worry about pH with organic soil, and that it will all level out with the lime.. but maybe I should use a little citric acid to get that water down a touch anyway? I need a better pH meter.. right now I'm just using those basic chemistry strips.