Hey professionals!
So last time I killed all my coco plants is when I followed the well known “multiple fertigation coco guide” that everyone knows. They just straight up rotted away. Not hating on the guide, but it somehow didn’t work in my setup. User error.
This time I went the “forbidden” way. Yes, I let coco dry out. And it worked AMAZINGLY well for the roots and the plant, at least… in the beginning. Anyways, here are some infos first of all:
- Canna Coco Professional Plus 70 / 30 Perlite
- 3 gallon cloth pot
- Canna Coco A+B, GH PH Down, Sensi CalMag
- Dechlorinated tapwater 0.3EC by nature
- Apera PH20 Pen / Generic EC Pen
- 300W MarsHydro LED 100% / 600PPFD
- 75-78°F / 60% hum day (not perfect but stable)
- 65-68°F / 65% hum night (yes, a tad too low but I can’t change it)
- 26 days old since germination
- Oscillating fan for air movement, static fan to push hot air from top to bottom, inline fan to refresh air
- Photoperiod plant, fem (Barney’s Farm Runtz x Layer Cake)
So here’s the journey so far in short:
3 plants in 16oz solo cups, lots of holes on the bottom. 70/30 coco/perlite. 1 died after a few days, second one just stopped growing after day 10, and never changed. Third plant did amazingly well. I did a wet / dry cycle with the solo cup plants, feeding 5.8PH and 0.6EC including 0.3 from the tap. It grew like crazy, the solo cup was 80% roots in the end.
As soon as the last survivor drank the whole cup in not even 12 hours, I transplanted. Sadly into its final 3gal already, as I had no other option. Transplant went well, as I did the “put empty cup into the substrate first” trick.
At this time, the plant was around 15 days old from germ. 4 nodes already, insanely healthy, but the first true 3 finger leaves had a “mushy crinkled” tip on the longest finger. Not burnt, but just crinkled. Hard to explain. After transplant, I watered around the transplant circle with 5.8PH / 0.8EC and around 500ml of solution (~0.15 gallons, oh god how I hate gallons). I didn’t want to wet the whole pot because I was scared of the last run, where all the roots rotted away. But maybe this was a mistake again.
I only watered every second to third day for around a week this way, enlarging the circle, to give the roots some work. But sadly, as expected, I f-ed up as it seems. Many leaves start showing weird symptoms, the tips are burning away in strange ways, most of the leaves tips are clawing downwards, but only the tips, not the whole leaf. They tips are just pointing down. All the leaves are losing a bit of color, they seem to be yellowing. The growth is very VERY slow, too. The plant also stretched a ton without showing actual growth in itself, rather just the main stem stretching.
I currently feed every second day with around 800ml of solution at 1.0 EC and 5.8-6.0 PH, little runoff.
Where did I F up? I know my way of growing is questionable right now, but the last “guided” grow completely killed all 3 plants I had in a few weeks with severe overwatering issues and root rot. Yes, in coco.
The brand of my coco also recommends to let the substrate dry out, which is why I did the wet / dry cycles this time (Canna). It seems to be very fine coco peat, so maybe I followed the completely wrong guides for this kind substrate?
I just need some help here. I know I’m stupid, I know I f-ed up, I know I am the problem. But I need help, because this is my last seed, I paid lots of money for these plants, and I’m just falling into a hopeless pit of sadness.
