Hello everyone, I hope you all are having phat day!!
I recently embarked on growing again after a 15+ year break. Man it is amazing at how much I seemed to have forgotten.
My previous adventures was hydro based (original bubbler buckets post from 1997-98 on the original overgrow). After leaving the USA I migrated to a coir, Zeolite and worm casting medium and fed them the CanaCoco nutrients.
I decided to go full on organic this time around and I am struggling and not sure if it is the medium I chose to use or the water, nutrients, climate.
Problem Plants:
Auto-Flowering: Blue Dream and Moby Dick
Planted July 18:
Problems started first yellowing at the bottom; then this burnt look on the tips from the top. I have been battling for weeks now. They are definitely stunted and only about 6-8 inches tall. Other than the sick looking leaves they seem to be flowering ok. I have ruled all the large fan leaves as they were pretty sickly looking
Next up are Indian Bubblegum and Princess 88 from FDM.
Planted August 03:
They are doing much better than the auto flowers however in the last 48 hours the lowest leaves have this burnt look. I have not fed them at all at this point
Looks like you’re off to a great start with that setup. Maybe the problem is you’re growing autos. I find photos more user friendly and intuitive especially for those of us with experience getting back on the horse.
Grow on.
$0.02
Thanks Bayarea: I thought they would be easier… LOL so much has changed in 15 years.
Mr Green:
They do not provide the NPK of the soil mix but the dude has a shit load of videos telling you how they make it and whats in it. If you look in the top right corner of photo it has the list of ingredients.
I agree with what’s been said, looks like a nutrient burn to me, that soil is too hot, specially for the youngin, I would give them just water and even flush them.
Thanks fellas… I have been giving them water only for weeks. soil ph seems stable so I guess “too hot” makes sense. I plan to make my own mix; I went with this mob to just get started, trusting it uses on young plants…
I also understand auto’s are finicky with under/over watering and any type of root disturbance.
Hey George that’s just the wrapped in cotton wool Aussie culture. They think they can protect everyone from everything including ones own stupidity.
Hi @nl420, first of all good to see another antipodean here!
That TurboDirt from Scott is a good mix, basically a coots base with some extras. I’ve grown both autos and photos in it before with good results, but prefer to make my own “soil” now for the reasons of cost and control over what goes in.
The first thing that stands out to me with your current grow, is that you’re feeding RO water. I did the same on my first try with TD and found after a couple of weeks I got all kinds of problems with my grow. I switched up to good old tap water and the problems went away, TD must be lacking in some trace elements/minerals? The other upside is not having to bother with RO saves a lot of piss farting about too.
Also IMHO pH 6 is a little low for TD and while the “soil” will buffer it, it will have a hard time doing it in such small volume pots (200mm?). I would recommend watering / fertigating @ 6.5 pH for his mix.
Your RH is a little lower than ideal also, but not terrible. Other than that I would mention that as a general rule it’s recommend to use 50L pots (minimum) if you want to see a grow go to completion with TD (even then it will require multiple top dressings before harvest). Anything below and I’ve found the soil biology just doesn’t get up and going properly.
To be honest TurboDirt and MrGT isn’t a great place to start out if you don’t have previous “organic gardening” experience. I still think coco is the best place to start out, but if you want that “soil” feel I’d go with Canna Terra+ if you want to stay in smaller pots and feed salts.
The bad news is that sadly the autos are toast! If they’ve already started flowering at that size and in that condition then you’re better off ripping them out an starting again, as they will yield nothing, but (Importantly) they still count as a plant should officer plod pay you a visit, so not worth the risk for no payoff IMO.
Bugger about wasting the seeds, but I guess it’s never a waste if it’s part of learning! If you don’t have anymore auto seeds, let me know and I can send you some more FEM autos to play with.
Dude thanks a lot for the detailed response. I figured another Aussie would chime in who knew about Scotts and Coots mixes. I should have just re-started with what I knew but I always loved the idea of organics and the challenges that come with it.
I am going to let them run the course; part of the learning experience.
The pots those 6 are in are old 120mm hydro pots for flood and drain. They hold a bit less than 2 litres.
I recently mixed up my own. Coir-WC-compost-perlite and started 4 more auto’s. 2 Blue Dream and 2 Moby Dicks and transplanted into this mix 2 days ago. These 4 went into 1 gallon/4litre felt grow bags.
12 Gallon Pots for TD? Really??? I’ll go with my own then…
I forgot how painful it was starting from seed when it comes to regular photo period. The IB and P88 just started to show signs. Is worth transplanting them out of the TD and into a larger pots why they are still young?
Thanks for the seed offer, I just may take you up on that. I figured I would burn through lots of seeds and multiple grows before I got it right.
Forgot to add: Interesting on the water info… here are my stats
RO Water
PH 5.8-6.1
EC 10
TDS/PPM 5
Salnity % 0.00
SG 1.000 (no clue about this)
ORP 347mV
Tap Water
PH 6.2-6.3
EC 178
TDS/PPM 89
Salnity % 0.00
SG 1.000 (no clue about this)
ORP 403mV
Could be nitrogen and potassium deficiency, the lower leaves yellowing first is normally a sign of mobile nutrients being sucked up.
The company says it has enough nutrients for 9-10 weeks so you should still be fine but I would have expected to see issues sooner if it’s was nutrient burn
, maybe you should rise humidity so they will be more in the comfort zone regarding VPD …
