I have Damping Off Disease. Here is my research and my current solution/workaround to save my remaining seedlings. Damping Off is basically a fungus which eats the stalk of your seedlings at or right below the soil line and then moves along the stalk. It affects many plants, not just cannabis. And once your seedling has it, it dies. I have found no cure, only fixes to soil or coir to get rid of the fungus once it is apparent in the grow. Also it is contagious within the seedling space traveling from container to container. From Wikipedia (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damping_off):
A number of different fungi and fungi-like organisms cause the symptoms of damping off, including:
Alternaria species. Cause leaf spotting.
Botrytis cinerea – also known as “grey mould”. Symptoms caused by this often accompany other symptoms.
Fusarium
Macrophomina phaseoli – a plant pathogen that causes charcoal rot on many plant species including Zea mays and Pinus elliottii
Phytophthora – a genus of plant-damaging [oomycetes (Water_mold) whose member species are capable of causing enormous economic losses on crops worldwide, as well as environmental damage in natural
Pseudomonas. Cause leaf spotting.
Pythium – a genus of [parasitic] oomycete. Once classified as fungi, and consequently sometimes still treated as such. Along with Rhizoctonia solani , attacks by Pythium are most associated with producing roughly circular patches of dead seedlings.
Rhizoctonia solani– a plant pathogenic fungus with a wide host range and worldwide distribution.
Sclerotium rolfsii– a corticioid fungus in the family Atheliaceae. It is a facultative plant pathogen and is the causal agent of “southern blight” disease in crops
Thielaviopsis– a small genus
of fungi in the order Microascales. The genus includes several important agricultural pathogens.
Late last night watched quite a few non-cannabis, agricultural videos looking for a solution to save my remaining seedlings, as well as going to mushroom cultivation sites to find out about sterilizing my coco coir.
Notice in the picture at the upper part of the stem by the cotylidon leaves, there is still remaining broad healthy stem for about a millimeter. But below to the roots, it is hair thin shrunken. This plant event occurred in less than 6 hours last night. So the next post has my solution effort.
I couldn’t even find any. I’m running into the same problem now, because I read that hydrogen peroxide and water can be used to combat powdery mildew, which I have been having a problem with for the first time. New genetics, combined with flowering plants in July and August in New York. I’m guessing you start your plants low in the container so that when they finally stop their seedling stretch, they come out about even with the top of the cup? I’ve been doing the same thing for 30 years. I never had a problem due only to low seedling depth, (I don’t think)but coupled with soil/compost that can hold a lot of water, seems to be a recipe for disaster depending on the genetics you use. The heirloom variety that’s from this area that I grow would never get damp off regardless of the conditions. However, my old Afghani line from northern Washington certainly does. I have to make sure the soil thoroughly dries out between each watering for the first couple weeks. By the way, this worked for my Moroccan as well… as I said I had no hydrogen peroxide, and I didn’t even have any other soil I could put the seedlings in that wasn’t Frozen at the time. I just let the soil get and stay very very dry, and that did the trick. I watered once just a little bit too early, and I lost one or two more. Following that, I kept the soil very dry. I just gave them enough to live . I’m looking forward to seeing how your peroxide wash works. I’m guessing it will work very well. Sorry you have this problem too, but I’m glad you’re writing about it so I can learn as well. Thanks for posting this thread.
