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I agree with Hound here; the part of the roots you see is the same part exposed to the aeration first- so naturally it should be the healthiest. No matter how powerful your airstone, if you have the Tangle of Roots from Jumanji, it's not penetrating right, and the USEABLE root area is not enough for the plant.
You are getting advice from a woman very well versed in DWC cultivation, from construction to troubleshooting, and IMVHO her word should be taken quite seriously.
I have been doing this the same way for 6 years and Cal-Mag did not exist (to my knowledge, epsom salt was the cure) when I first started making my own DWC buckets and aeroponic cloners. Epsom salts are occasionally added at a rate of 1/4 tsp per gal once a week. I do however use the cal-mag for my soil and it seems to lock-up nutes (K) due to the excess levels of more ammonium nitrogen and calcium. I have even talked to botanicare in person about the product and they reccomend to only use it at 1/3 strengh due to lock-outs.
I added a pic of the root system. the only reason they are not white like my veg buckets are because of the increased use of the GH Micro in flower. I use 5 gallon buckets for 1 plant so I have enough room for root expansion.
That plant is about half the size of my normal DWC which are usually 6-7 footers with double the colas. I have never gotten my solution above 1000 ppm even right before a 2 week flush. I just looked through my old overgrow information about the soil vs. hydro debate with the GH nutes used and the person never went over a 950ppm solution with 1/4lb a crop.
She is pretty much a goner, as a similar veg problem occured on a similar size plant a month ago, so I am really just trying to find out why something this drastic would happen and prevent it in the future. same set up I have always done and everything around it is looking great on all the same setup.
I have used hydrozyme before when I had a bad root problem a few years back but it never seemed to do any good on healthy plants. Roots always stayed same color due to GH Micro being purple.
Weedhound - I appreciate all the help and know we all have those frustrating times so, I can look past it this time :rasta: I have been interested in trying the cal-mag in my GH solution but never felt the need for it because of no problems. What zyme product would you recommend? I might add it to half my remaining healthy buckets and see if I can tell a difference.
dab,I am a noobi and you needed help "problems you can't figure out" so I got the Ladies attention and got them over here for you. you can either accept the help or not, but you should be thankful as they definately have lots better things todo,and since something your doing is'nt working rite maybe you should listen, they just might know what they are talking about.
Looking @ your root mass picture,you say you keep it in a 5 gal bucket looks like it would barely fit in a 5gal bucket maybe it needs to be bigger. I know absolutely crap about hydro tho don't listen to me, but those nice Ladies know ALOT. good luck on solving your sudden death syndrome....:jointsmile:
Actually veggi it appears you are quite corrrect and the oxygen and/or root uptake would appear to be rather.....compromised to say the very least.
Dab however, lost me completely with his magnimous offer to so graciously forgive me for not showing him the obvious proper respect he feels he deserves.
I, on the other hand, am not magnimous at all and therefore don't feel the need to expend MY energy into solving his problem at all and so will quite simply wish him all the best. I will also not be back to this thread and I'm sure Dab will be just fine with that as well so it seems to be a win-win situation all around here.
I DID forget to ask the strain and so may have erred there......if they are super light feeders like straight sativas or something then the ppms may be absolutely correct for where they are in depending.........but sorry I digress.
Good luck.
ha, I ask for help and it turns into an emotional issue. All I was getting at was when I do something the same way for six years, and I happen to have one die for no reason, then people jump to the conclusion that it has to be a cal-mag issue. How is that logical I must ask? never had the problem before with the same strain and all.
I thank you for the help and say I will try the cal-mag and a zyme product on a few to compare and you take that as an insult?
My first post when being on here over a year should go to show you I would rather intake information myself rather then bugging people for petty help. This was an issue I have never read about or seen a picture of and it baffled me to see a full grown, healthy, thriving plant beat the dust in 24 hours.
Original Afghani x Maui Haze (goolicious:thumbsup:)
Ok ......normally when I say I won't return to a thread I mean it but my hubby pointed out to me that I am a peanut head since I don't even know how to use a word like magnimous and quite frankly can't even correctly remember how to say it so I put the dunce hat on for that and will pay the price.
One....sorry that I DID turn it into an emotional issue but that's my problem and not yours so I apologize about that again.
Two...no one said your issue was CalMag except you. I mentioned Cal Mag because it's pretty standard to use and you obviously aren't using it. Around here we consider that a "not too knowledgable" way of growing.
Three....My attitude was completely bitchy AND I 100% acknowledge that. I even acknowledged it WHILE I was being bitchy as well and apologized for it at the time. YOUR attitude on the other hand ("trust me heh heh....I know what I'm doing") was also rather patronizing but for some reason you seemed to have missed the fact that your haughty manner seems to run very consistently through all your posts as well and JUST MAY be a SLIGHT BIT of the reason not everyone is standing in line to assist you.
Four...Again..no one here except you said the problem was CalMag. If you read through things carefully you would see that Stinky answered your question and most likely solved your problem already in the first post or two. It does not surprise me in the slightest that you've never seen "full grown, healthy, thriving plant beat the dust in 24 hours." You didn't even read through the posts in your thread here carefully ("you said the problem was CalMag") so I have a funny feeling you're not QUITE as knowledgable as you think you are.
Five....now being said for the THIRD time....the problem is most likely just as Stinky, myself and veggi all told you......not enough oxygen for that huge rootball, rootbound as hell, no zyme product being used to prevent root rot issues and therefore disease pops in and kills off your plant.
But you probably already knew this.
Good luck.
Ps...Your ppms could probably go much higher as well.
well I have been doing this the same way so long and used to only use aquarium air pumps with 2 ports that were very weak with no oxygen issues. I now use commercial grade pumps with a lot more air being supplied. Thats why I first did not think about the air issue.
Roots have always been in balls like that... how do you suggest not getting in a ball? I have 6" left to the bottom of the bucket and room on all sides. there is nothing I can really do here. 1 plant for 5 gal is more then enough so I have read on here and other places.
haha ya i was laughing about the whole magnimous word because it is NOT a word. is just made up and put into the urban dictionary. were you trying to say magnanimous?
oh and I tried going up to 700ppm and ya they are now getting tourched at the tops. in 24 hr the reading went to 780ppm. I read the TDS meter and when it continually goes up that means water is being drawn from the solution and not nutes. hence why I am at a low ppm at only my 1/3 point in bloom at 30 days.
This is a 100+ day strain and needs to come on gently with nutes.
sorry, I really do appreciate the help and take in all information that I can. I never meant to seem like the mighty all knowing cultivation technique god. I just get frustrated when something has worked for years and now problems arrise by doing the same practice. I might very well need a zyme product since a location change.
Ok......I don't know if the plant who's root pic you showed me is sick but IF IT IS you need to do as Stinky said and break up that rootball. You need to get 02 and nutrition to the middle of that root mass. Most likely at some point if you want to grow larger plants you will need to go to larger buckets. Your roots need room along with oxygen and nutrients and they aren't going to get it without the proper space to spread out. Both air and water take the path of least resistance.....and the middle of that huge rootball AINT that path.
Please don't ask me why one plant got sick and the next one didn't. If you sit next to a guy on the subway who has a cold why would you get a cold or not get a cold? Whether or not you do get a cold......who really knows why? Same principle here......some plants get sick and some don't. I can make bunch of guesses but that's really all they are so why bother since we can all make guesses on things until the cows come home and it won't truly solve the problem anyway.
I tend to make my long winded points in several posts for a good reason. I absolutely HATE writing a 20 page post and then accidently deleting it before it gets to the boards. This way I know for sure my 20 pages makes it to the thread. :D
So to continue.....there are several things I would suggest to try and hold off root rot but you CANT DO THEM ALL AT once so pick one and use it. I've used hydrogen peroxide to treat root rot successfully. The store bought 3% I use at 2 tsp/gallon and the 35% hydro kind I use 2 mls per gallon every other day. I know others who use stronger doses but that's what works for me.
OR you can use a product like Rhizotonic to help treat and a zyme product (I like Cannazym) to help PREVENT root rot but you can NOT use these products while using
H202 since it will kill off the active enzymes in your Cannazym/Rhizo products.
Most importantly you need more space for the roots and without that nothing else you do will solve the issue. As you have discovered diseases like pythium wilt and such will kill your plant in almost no time at all so prevention is DEFINITELY much better than trying to cure it.
As far as your ppms numbers go......that seems odd to me with such lows ppms numbers but for god sake don't change anything just because I said that. (You probably aren't anyway which is smart but.....) If those numbers are working for you I would HATE to kill off your plants by saying something off the wall like "hey there guy raise your ppms" only to fry your entire crop. So just forget I ever said anything about the ppms there and we'll leave that one at that. ;) :D
Magnanimous........I'm going to go write that one hundred times on the board. :D I'm not even sure I spelled it right THAT time. :wtf:
Good luck......hope that info helps