How many hypocalcemia symptoms do you recognize?
The brown dots only come through when photosynthesis is poor. This is a writeup detailing calcium deficiency in various other situations.
Cannabis seeds can store enough phosphorus for 2-3 weeks, but do not store much calcium. To give you an idea how deficient a cannabis seed is in early life, modern varieties use more Calcium than Phosphorus throughout the grow.
https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/food-details/170148/nutrients
Calcium sufficient start
Hypocalcemic start
Other than damping off or over watering, calcium shortage is going to be the problem you see prior to day 14. Tons of new growers give up by day 10 because their seedling never had enough calcium.
Dark blotches, glossy blotches. Boron>Cal>Phos issue. Boron moves lipids calcium and phosphorus. If this start is not boron deficient, and they never are, it’s either Calcium or Phosphorus deficient. Purple stems and dark color near petiole shows that phosphorus is available but is stalled, restricting root expansion, which allows the calcium deficiency to continue until this plant is topped, transplanted or fed a solute calcium source.
Past the seedling stage, we induce total calcium deficiency and see drastic curling of midribs. The plant can obviously not function. Short petioles, poor branching, fishing pole midribs, kinks, cups. These mismatches between flesh and skeletal growth are the symptoms of calcium deficiency in modern Cannabis cultivation.
Many of these symptoms show as boron and phosphorus deficiencies, however Boron and Phosphorus were in adequate supply in all of these photos.
Blue margins indicate photosynthates being stalled. Leaf color always evens out after an application of soluble calcium:
Even when color is restored, calcium deficiency can be detected in the sideways pull of the leaf blades. Cannabis leaves should be flat and straight. They should not look like a black widow or magnetic flux. If your leaves look like they have fish on the lines, you have a transport issue, most likely calcium related. Also note the accompanying purple petioles.
Left untreated, the symptom can consolidate, as the plant shuts off extremities:
Or the symptom can disperse evenly and go undiagnosed:
Retarded finger development is often paired with mild pulling tips. I have seen many “duckfoot” varieties gain fingers when put in healthy, chalky soil…
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Leaf clawing at stretch is common, when calcium demand is at its peak.
Moments after feeding soluble Calcium, the clawing begins to reverse and the darkness begins leaving the tips.
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Treating to minimize the symptom: If a minute amount of calcium is added, and all symptoms vanish, am I now abundant in calcium? This metal has been completely underestimated and overlooked in Cannabis cultivation.
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Typical -Cal cupping on narrow leaf variety. The margin is completely folded under.
-Cal cupping/clawing with nitrogen deficiency. Cutting nitrogen is never a solution for -Cal cupping. The majority of this “bud” will be downfolded sugar leaf posing as calyx.
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Undiagnosed Hypocalcemia on a mature plant. Dwarfed growth, large parachuted leaves below, small banana leaves up top. You can see the moment that photosynthesis levels dropped, as phosphorus became more and more restricted, while there was sufficient phosphorus in the soil, had the roots been able to continue growth. I see many plants in this situation being put into flower.
Untreated Calcium deficiency brought to flower. This plant will yield only a partial harvest. The grower will likely make it even worse by cutting N as buds are trying to form.
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Blossom end rot in Cannabis seed. Phosphorus, made unavailable by a boron-calcium deficit, was scavenged from the seed to create new buds. Phosphorus was in ample supply, it simply could not be transported.
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Hypocalcemia Causes:
Grow stores.
Forums.
Grow talks.
Calcium hog genetics.
Insoluble calcium.
Low transpiration.
Bad temperature.
Bagged soils.
Poor water source.
Solutions:
Stay away from grow stores.
Avoid Trollitup/DEAmag/thcscammer.
Ignore Cannabis growing seminars and anyone who speaks at them.
Grow ditch weed if you can’t keep up with calcium hogs.
Top dressing lime isn’t a solution. Foliar calcium is a good bandaid.
Raising humidity can increase boron-calcium uptake.
Raising temperature can increase boron-calcium uptake.
Bagged soils contain very little calcium.
Calcium carbonate should be available in irrigation water, but it needs broken down before its available.
Almost every quirk of Cannabis is related to its heavy calcium diet that exists throughout the entire grow cycle. This issue has negatively affected breeding and production choices in ways that will continue to haunt this scene for decades. It’s time for the average Cannabis grower to start bringing their gardens to full potential and stop being victimized by the cannabis industry who’s routinely wrecked things for the average grower.
It’s the same in every plant… This is not some magic discovery, just the revealing the commercial half of the Cannabis industry for what it is: packaged lies.
Tell everyone you know. The Cannabis experts have been lying about this plant for 8 decades, they never stopped.
