flowering issue (2 in same pot)

ok i know i have asked many different questions on here but hey thats what a forum is for! anyway this is my sinario:
i have a huge bucket (60 litre) approx and have 2 mother plants flowering. they are now both 4 weeks and 4 days into flower at the time of this post but one seems to be doing great and the other is well lets just say shit :D

i have them in an original Budbox size 1.0 x 1.0 x 1.8
im using a 400watt grolux with an open shade (not cooled) which means the heat does get rather hot (often over 80 degrees)
i have a very powerful exhause fan with new filter and thats it.

anyway one of the mothers which is same age seems to have about 80% yellow leaves and the buds look like they are about 2 weeks into flower whilst the other looks great with no yellow leaves and big buds. the poorly looking mother was very slow to grow the buds and they are still growing real slow. also the new leaves around the buds are very small and dark green.
im using soil fro a standard growbag which already has all the nutes and can be used for any plant age. i did add about 1 table spoon of potash mixed with the soil prior to transplanting so not sure if that was the prob and i did flush with 5 times the bucket size with clean water.
dunno if its gonna be a waste of electric now but i was wondering what others might make of the pooly one and what i shoudl really do. thanks

Off it, when you have 2 plants in the same container more than likely one's roots will strangle the others and kill it off. Seems to be what's going on here. Must not have asked that question before, eh?

But, from what I heard, this is what is happening. Any pics?

the lights are off at the moment but tomorrow i can post pics. its a shame really because ive had no luck at all this year and growing them where i live is 'really' risky as we get lots of trouble with teenagers here :(
i thought about digging the bad one out and repotting it but to be honist i dont wanna disturb the other one or i might lose everything.
i will take some pics tomorrow and post the here

Sounds good, also wait for more majority votes. That is just my opinion.

yup i will do that, i think pics will help others decide better too. i will take a few shots and some real closeups. i also forgot to mention i have a MAJOR issue with spider mites :mad: ive been spraying the plants from underneath soaking them last few days with slightly soapy water. seems to be working but mush of the damage is already done now. you will see from the pics

ok im back again and this time armed with pics :D just hope they are clear enough as i dont have a very steady hand. thanks

there's one more pic, i could only upload five at a time so here is the last one...

I agree the stronger healthier plant is killing off the other. I have seen this many times. I tried working with a phototron many times and you put 6 plants in a 21 inch space container. The dominant plant will kill the others and fill the space. Kind of wierd to watch the strongest survive.

ok im back again with an update, i left it a while as i wanted to see what would happen over a longer period of time. from today they are both 6 weeks and 2 days into flower.
the larger one seems to be budding okish and the other one well :D there really isnt much on there at all lol the buds are really thin, i could get the whole of the biggest bud in a noraml size rizzla and thats while its still on the stem growing :D the other plant does have much bigger buds but nowhere as big as they should be.
lastly but not least i have a MAJOR infestation of spider mites which has well basically ruined the whole lot. a total flop really :(
I'll never grow more than one plant in one pot again, it was another lesson ive learn through trial and error but at least i have learnt from it. i guess once they are chopped i should sterilise the whole growroom, i 'really' dont want those spider mites back ever again :D thanks for the tips peeps it was much appreciated :thumbsup:

you can also take care of some pests pretty easily using Neem oil.

its best used as a preventative, but you can use it to clear up infested plants as well though... i think you are probably too far along to start using it though, i believe the cutoff for it is around 3 weeks before harvest.

you could still use it after that as its organic and nothing that will harm you... but it will also make everything taste like shit if you use it too far along.

you can get neem oil is pre-mixed spray bottles, but i prefer to buy neem oil concentrate and mix it myself... its really cheap that way too.

if you think the second plant is totally done for and your not going to get anything usable from it - you might want to consider chopping it down to the top of the soil now... this may cause it from getting nutes that the healthy plant could take better advantage of... on the flip side, this could also be a horrible idea, as it will cause the roots of the already-dying plant to rot, and possibly spread some of that to the healthy plant... i have no idea how long that would take, but it would be worth doing some research into IMO.

i will have a quick look on ebay for some neem oil, thanks for the advice :) i did also think about chopping the plant that isnt doing so well and still might. to be honist it still looks like it does inthe pic i posted weeks ago. its a shame really because it seems to be a really potent strain as i grew these last time. on another note :) i was curious about growing two plants in one pot and wanted to see if they would do well but now i know. i will be lucky to get a quarter of an ounce from that bad one lol it really is that bad :D
im still hoping the other wil fill out now its around week 6 but to he honist it doesnt look like its going too and many of the leaves have turned yellow n died but i asume a lot of that is down to the mites.
anyway i strongly believe the spider mites come from the cheap growbag i bought, i really didnt have any money to buy the good soil so i tried to do things cheaply but cost me more in the long run especially on electric. i will try that neem oil thanks once agai for that tip its much appreciated :thumbsup:

back again :)
i harvested my infested 2 plants, one was okish and the other wasnt worth looking at so i trashed it lol. buds didnt develope properly and the tiny flowers were still white plus it was seriously infested wit spider mites.
i have a few clones about 2 weeks into flower now and they also seem to have a few spider mites on them grrrrrrr lol these things are imposible. i bought some neem oil (100ml bottle) but no directions for use? how much neem oil do i add per liter of water? also i noticed when adding the oil it just sits on top of the water even after i shake it well.
another question about spraying the plants: how long should i leave the plants after taking them out from under the lights before i can spray them? i dont want to burn the leaves and also how long after they have been sprayed can i put them back under the lights?
last time i took them out and spayed them with waterright away and it seemed to have burnt the leaves all over.
thanks :thumbsup:

I can;t recall the mix off the top of my head... but when i;m home later i'll check my bottle, I know it has directions on it.... its not alot though, I think mine is 5mL per 1L

Mixing it is a pain... i know I can also tell you from the directions on my bottle it recomends mixing it like this:

1. mix your neem oil with 1 cup of warm/hot water

2. shake vigorously

3. add the remaining water

4. shake vigorously

it also recomends on the bottle that you can microwave the neem oil before mixing it to help it mix.

I know it doesn;t say it the directions for mine, but I also add a couple drops of plain old liquid dish soap (not he bacteria fighting kind... just plain dish soap).

The dish soap helps by emulsifying the oil. The dish soap shouldn't harm the plants as long as you don't overdue it... you don;t need much! I think my mix is normally about 2-3ml neem oil + 0.5L water + 1ml dish soap (sorry if you are use to imperial units, but I don;t know what the imperial equivalent of a ml is! but 1L is almost identical to 1 quart, i know that).

tip: if you are going to add the dish soap in, don't fill your spray bottle right to the top, the soap is going to cause soap bubbles to form inside the bottle when you try to shake it, and it will become difficult to shake if the bubbles fill all the empty space of the bottle.

also, when you spray, make sure you get the under side of the leaves as well, as thats where the pests tend to like to live.

the neem oil i have is almost solid lol however it does turn into a liquid when heated but once i mix it with warm water it just floats on the surface so im not sure if i was adding too much/little. ive never used neem before but from further reading i see its about the best stuff to use. something i never noticed before until about 20 mins ago, i looked in my grow room and looked at the black pots, i could see them walking around the edges of the pots too and they sure move fast. there seems to be a lot of them already but not so many on the leaves just yet so im hoping i have caught them in time before they get to work.
really appreciate the tips as my last little crop was a desaster and i dont want to lose these as well. i just dont know where they come from because i cleaned everything and washed it all down before i put them in the grow room. to be honist there seems to be very little veg on them anyway as they all seem twiggy so it should make life easier to spray and get most of them :)
thanks again

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however it does turn into a liquid when heated but once i mix it with warm water it just floats on the surface so im not sure if i was adding too much/little.

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Don't forget that it separates because oil and water don't mix....They separate out from each other.

Hey the plants look great!! I have quick question how did you get them to become bushy like that and get so many buds?? Did you top them or use another method?? please get back to me when you can looking forward to your rsponse because when i grow its usually never look like yours!!

i think your referring to my avatar pic? if so then that was my crop from last year. yes i topped them 14 days into flowering and used an 600 watt grolux HPS from the start of flowering to the end of flowering. those were infact grown in the cheapest standard growbag soil i could find as i was extreamly short on cash at the time and each growbag only cost me £1.29

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Italiano715

Don't forget that it separates because oil and water don't mix....They separate out from each other.

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yep :) thats why the dish soap helps as an emulisfier!

anyhow... sorry for the late reply, but here is the instructions on my bottle - though it sounds like yours might be a little more concentrated than mine if its almost a solid (either that or you are keeping it in a cooler place than me)... i;m just gunna write it out word for word since its not too long... the stuff in [] brackets is stuff i am adding:

"
Shake well before use. Neem Oil may coagulate and can be microwaved before mixing in hot water. For best results use 4-5 ml (3/4 tsp) in 1 litre [1 litre = 1.06 quarts] of water. Follow these simple steps to make the final solution:

1) Add needed quanitity of neem oil in sprayer.
2) Add 1 cup of hot water (+60C) [ 60C = 140F]
3) Shake vigorously to ensure that oil has completely dissolved in hot water.
4) Add remaining water at normal temperature and shake vigorously again
"

if you find it really hard to mix try just using hotter water... boil it in a kettle first if you have to, just make sure its not boiling hot still when you spray the plants... but if you do it according to those directions, step (4) should bring the water temp down to a normal level anyhow. Also like i said, don;t be afraid to use a few drops of liquid dish soap (plain... not anti-bacteria stuff!)

this is the neem oil i have - http://orgunique.com/documents/Leaf%20Shine.pdf

mine is just in a much much smaller bottle

thanks for posting back, i will try that method and see how it goes :) last time i used a bit of dish soap in my water it kinda burnt the leaves so i will give it a miss this time round.
the bottle of neem oil i got is only 100ml but its definatly had some effect on them. i have noticed that they have moved away from the older leaves and onto the newer leaves where i asume there is no neem oil (because they are new leaves) so i now keep spraying the new leaves in hope they will finally just give up and go away :D