brown/yellow spots on lower leaves

[str8jacket secure]

my plant is about 4 weeks old. the other day i turned off the small fan i have in my box. i sprayed the plant with some water and left it alone for a day, next time i visit it i notice these brown spots on a few of the lower fan leaves. at first i thought that because i sprayed water it might have puddled on the larger leaves and with no fan to help it evaporate, maybe it just sat too long and caused the lights to magnify and burn the plant, but after turning the fan back on, i haven't misted again yet, but the problem seems to persist. it has progressed slowly since then and i'm beginning to think it may be a different problem entirely. i haven't added any nutes to the watering schedule yet, should I? (at least i know it's not nute burn). i have no way of knowing what the soil ph is, but it does have a fairly good amount of peat moss in it. about 50% potting soil from wal mart, (i'm pretty sure it doesn't have any nutes or anything in it, its not MG, expert gardener i think), prolly 30% peat moss and 20% perlite. i've been watering with bottled water, ph level is around 6-6.5, also, i've started to LST the plant a few days before this problem started. on one side of the plant the large lower fan leaves are pushing against the soil, the other side are up in the air a little more, not touching the soil. the problem started on the leaves that are in the air, and is worst here, they feel burnt, crispy, dry. but now it's starting to move to the other side as well, to the leaves that don't get much light, so like i said, i don't think it's light damage or anything. should i remove the affected leaves? i know they're not supposed to be touching the soil, but everyone says don't trim leaves off, esp. in veg. the temps stay between 60-80F and humidity stays around 30-40% any help will be greatly appreciated

[daisley2005]

do you have a pic of the whole plant, it will be alot eaiser to tell if you can see the whole plant, how close ar your lights?

[str8jacket secure]

i'm using a homemade reflector with 7 26 watt cfl's (6500k) 1600 lumens each, they are 2-3 inches from the top of the plant, but don't give off very much heat, the effected leaves are at the bottom of the plant, top leaves seem fine to me. i'll try to get a good whole plant pic, it's an aggrevating process posting pictures right now as i'm using a cell phone...

[str8jacket secure]

k, here's a few full plant pics, crappy quality, like i said, cell phone, but maybe these'll do the job, you can see what i mean when i say one side is touching the dirt and one side is up in the air more. the problem started with the more exposed leaves that are up. but now i's spread to the lower, more hidden leaves on the other side.

[Mr. Clandestine]

It doesn't look like bleaching/burning from the lights being too close to me.

I've heard of people running into wild calcium fluctuations from using distilled water, but I'm not entirely sure how this may vary with bottled water. While you wait for a more accurate diagnosis, it would be a good idea to at least get a liquid pH test kit and find out the pH of your soil. The kits are inexpensive, and they're easy to find at pet stores, Walmart, and the like. Water your plant with enough pH-neutral water to produce runoff at the bottom of the pot. Collect that excess water, and test the pH of it. That's your soil pH. It's not exact, but it's a good start. Soils high in peat generally lower the pH unless something was added to stabilize it.

Best of luck, and try to be patient while you wait for the renowned CannCom 'green-thumbs' to show up. They'll be here. :jointsmile:

[Weedhound]

they look overnuted and perhaps overwatered as well.

[str8jacket secure]

it's possible that it's overwatering i guess, didn't really look like it to me, but i'm no expert. definitely not over nuted because i haven't started adding nutrients to the plants water yet

[stinkyattic]

Couple things.
-The pots you are using- clay pots- are those the ones with built-in drain trays? If so, you MUST re-pot or you will end up with drainage problems, pH problems from sodden peaty soil, and likely root rot. Trust me on this one.
-The soil. Expert Gardener is the Shultz brand soil. Some types contain ferts. Read the label and see what the NPK is listed at.
-The new growth. It looks good. I don't see a reason to do much besides re-pot into a pot with correct drainage. Low leaves do that often. It looks like a K or Ca deficiency, but those are old leaves that get little light AND are close to the soil surface so they are in a more humid part of the plant and get less air circulation.
Remove the leaves when they come off with a slight tug, and watch to make certain that the next set doesn't show the same symptoms. But you NEED to re-pot and let your soil dry out slightly between waterings. Oh, and use tap water.

[str8jacket secure]

it's not a clay pot, it's a 3.5 gallon plastic one, with a separate drain tray. oh and it's not expert gardener soil, my bad on that, it's some other brand, i'll have to go back and remind myself what the name was. i checked the bag for anything resembling an npk level, there's nothing on there. last night i started feeding 1/4 strength schultz nutes. the water with the nutes had a PH of around 6.8. i watered til it started to drain out then checked the PH of the run off which was around 6.6. use tap water? why would you say to use tap water, i just mixed some "drinking water" with some "spring water" the drinking water had a low ph level, just the opposite with the spring water, used about 2 parts drinking to 1 part spring and it brought ph to around 7.0, and when i added the ferts it brought it down a little more, around 6.8, what would the benefits of using tap water be?

[stinkyattic]

Oh man I've written out the explanation for that like 5 times in the last week... okay here goes. Drinking water (bottled) has minerals added for flavor, and higher sodium than you want. Tap water would be more likely to contain calcium and magnesium and lower sodium. Plants need Ca and Mg.
If the tray is attached, remove it from the pot, otherwise, you're good to go on that.
Your pH sounds decent; using tap water will help keep it that way.

[str8jacket secure]

unfortunately, i can't use the tap water here, it's well water from a well that was never drilled deep enough in the first place and has a horrible rotten egg smell... i guess wal mart water will have to do for now.... would distilled water be any better by chance? also, should i empty the runoff tray as soon as i water? i'm trying to keep my hopes high, but it does kinda look like this problem may be moving to the next set of leaves up.... the edges of the leaves look like they're just starting to curl a little bit and have a tiny bit of yellow in them.. i guess if worst comes to worst i'll just have to suck it up and transplant into a little better soil mix.

[stinkyattic]

Ahh. Sulfur in your well water. That's not great.
I would trust distilled or RO water over any bottled 'drinking water' and you will have to use CalMag Plus.
Set your runoff tray at a slant so it all drains to one corner and you can let it drain into a bucket. Standing water means fungus gnats... eww.

[str8jacket secure]

so where can i find some calmag plus? what is RO water? also, i thought i should add that some of the new top leaves are looking twisted, like corkscrewed, not sure if this is part of the same problem or something else entirely, hell, might be normal for all i know (first grow)

[str8jacket secure]

bump

[Mr. Clandestine]

so where can i find some calmag plus? what is RO water?

You can probably pick up some Calmag Plus at your local hydro store. I know mine carries it, but I've never had to use it. RO water is water that has been purified through a process known as 'reverse osmosis', and a lot of people like using it and distilled water because there are no, or few, impurities.

I can't get all technical about it as many of our other forumites can, so I'll let Wikipedia break it down for ya: Reverse osmosis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_osmosis). Looks kinda like your plant may be getting too much nitrogen, but without knowing what you've fed it since you first posted, it's not easy to tell. Have you tested the pH of your soil runoff? I've seen pH lead to plants getting that characteristic claw shape.

[str8jacket secure]

well, there are no hydro shops around here, i've heard that molasses is a source of calcium, is this true? and if so can i use the stuff from wal mart or does it have to be special molasses just for plants?

[stinkyattic]

Molasses has iron and potassium if I'm not mistaken. As long as the bottle reads 'unsulfured', you're fine. Don't overdo it- a tablespoon or 2 per gallon is PLENTY!
For an alternate source of calcium if you can't find CalMag, you can try making a tea using bone meal (Calcium phosphate). I've never done this personally, but in theory you'd want to do it in a bucket with an airstone, and set the pH of the liquid at around 6 initially to aid in dissolving the solids. It should theoretically rise over time, but check before use and set pH back to 6.8 for a soil grow. Again, I've never done this, and it doesn't supply Magnesium and other micros the way calmag does. Try ordering the stuff off the internet.

[str8jacket secure]

word :thumbsup:

[str8jacket secure]

ok, just went out and bought a bottle of grandma's old fashioned unsulphured molasses, 4% calcium, it has iron and potassium too. bought some ph up too so no more mixing waters to find the right ph. added some ph up to a gallon of distilled water, about 10 drops, which was way too much unfortunately, brought the ph up to dark blue on the liquid meter, the highest it goes to is 7.8 i think. added some molasses to it and it turned it all yellow. tried testing ph again and it just stayed yellow, i'm hoping the molasses lowers the ph some, but not that much ya know. should i add ferts to the same water? or use a different jug and just use half of each or something when i water?

[str8jacket secure]

bump. i'm not sure how to tell the PH if the molasses turns the water so yellow

[str8jacket secure]

bump.......somebody

[JeffersonBud]

time to get yourself a real ph meter. Ebay is your best choice. got my Milwaukee 3-1 TDS, PH, EC meter on there for a little over $140 with a weeks worth of the buffer solution. Overwater and lack of calcium are my .02 cents. Don't spray those puppies with just water. It messes with their calcium and looks just like that after a while with no use of ferts. seems like they are trying to perspire the rest of the water out by the edges of the leaves and thus they are curling upwards. thats also a sign that they are too hot and perspiring as well.

look bushy though!

Cheers

[str8jacket secure]

just a follow up if anyone's interested, growth has been steady, all new growth looks awesome, runoff ph is good, been using some ph up with the molasses water, it's rediculous though, i had to add like 15 drops to about 3/4 of a gallon to get just a hint of green in the water.... hope it works like that. anyway, here's some update pics taken with a little bit higher resolution camera. comments welcome.

:cool:

[str8jacket secure]

so another source of calcium is bone meal huh? do i have to make it to a tea for it to be properly absorbed? or can i just apply it to the top of the soil?

[str8jacket secure]

bump

[stinkyattic]

Seriously enough with the bumping. Please.

Calcium phosphate is not soluble in water and even though as a chemist I believe you could leach it with an acidic solution and then try to correct it later, the RIGHT way to apply it is as a soil amendment.
Hit up the hydro shop for calmag plus.

[str8jacket secure]

enough with the bumping already? no responses after 10 days deserves a bump, how else am i supposed to get anyone's attention? you're the one who told me to make a tea out of it in the first place, that's why i asked.

[Ausguy]

enough with the bumping already? no responses after 10 days deserves a bump,

No, it means the topic is dead, you have had your answers for this topic.. Which I believe you were wondering why their was yellow spots on your leaves?

ANSWERED. No need to bump up a thread if you just want casual comments on your grow or asking other questions unrelated to your initial thread topic..

Nothing deserves a bump. If no one is answering your questions then the answers you seek have already been answered in previous topics. So search and read the forums.