Hard, crusty, sticky leaves. Yet soil is dry and seperating from pot sides!? Help pls

Hi all. This is my first time grow. Im growing northern lights in bio bizz all mix soil in 18 litre pots in a Wilma system. Im growin in a 1mX1mX2m grow tent with a 600w hps light, a carbon fan filter running 24hrs and a 6" oscilating fan going in the 18 hrs of light (using 18/6). The temp is always between 75-80 and humidity around 50%.

Its day 25 since i planted and i noticed one of the plants biggest leaves had gone crinkled, hard and was cracking althought it had not lost any colour (still very green). After doing abit of research online the main consensus seemed to be that the plant was over nuted and advised to let the plant dry out abit. For the first three weeks i had been using Root Juice (watering ever other day for 15 minutes) and then switched to Bio-Grow and started watering everyday.

After leavinf the plant for a day or so without water i returned to check the leaf and found that it simply crumbled upon touch and other leaves were starting to 'crust up' a little aswell. I removed the crumbled leaf and checked the other three plants in the tent which seemed fine apart from some yellowin on the leaves of one other plants.

Whats confusing me here is that it seems like a case of over nutrients but the soil is very dry to touch and is also separating from the sides of the pot. I was hoping for some advice on this situation. I can provide more info if needed and pics aswell if someone can explain how to upload them from a samsung galaxy s2.

Please help!

Oh i also started to spray with mineral water and alg-a-mic when i changed to the BioGrow

Two things you should do to get the best answers. Post a pic by clicking on the reply to thread icon on the bottom of this thread. Once that comes up click on the little picture frame icon and from there you should be able to upload from your computer. Second thing that would help would be to copy and paste the troubleshooting form from the plant problem section and either post it here or over in the plant problem section. Hope this helps a little

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Worked?Attachment 280304

Its the plant in the top left of the square also.Attachment 280305

I cant seem to find this form mate. What other info would be needed to help that i havent given? Thanks for reply

Whats the ph of the ingoing water? Tap water or RO? It looks to me like a watering issue. You're using a drip system or something? Im not familiar with that. I personally just water slowly til i see a little runoff then wait til they mostly dry out and repeat. Maybe someone will pipe in that knows about your setup.

Its tap water. however i am unsure of the ph of the ingoing water or of the soil. I will need to get something to test it, whats the best/cheapest thing to get?

Also yes, im using a drip system with 40 litres in the tank mixed with 80ml of BioGrow (bottle recomends 2-5ml per litre of water, so using the minimum)

I use a digital Milwaukee ph600. I think they are on ebay for around 20 bucks plus they come with a small pk of calibration solution. I would advise to always get extra cal solution and keep a little in the cap to keep the electrode wet.

IMO im not seeing any overfert going on in the pics. No burnt tips, etc. Im still going with over/under watering. Most likely under.

Also check out this thread. Its kinda old but it has some good info plus hes using the same soil. http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-log/...s-old-log.html

Ok thanks for that. I also thought that underwatering may be it but then when im reading up online the rule seems to be water every two-three or when the soil seems dry. I am watering everyday however so guessed it would be enough? Although like i said the soil does seem pretty dry and is coming away from the pot edges.

Also the yellowin i mentioned on the other plant is getting abit worse... how do you recon best to proceed with the watering?

Also something to note is im watering for 15 minutes using the drip system. Maybe this is too short a time for an 18 litre pot?...

I would personally just hold off on the drip system and do it by hand. Water til you see a little runoff then wait til its mostly dry and repeat. It could be around 3 days before youd have to water again depending on your setup. Yellowing usually will mean that the plant needs nitrogen. Not always. This could be from not enough nutes or your waters ph is too high or low for the plant to uptake the nutes.
Other than watering, the first thing i would recommend to do is get yourself something to test the ph of your tap water. That digital pen i recommended a couple posts ago works great.

Ok im trying to get hold of a digital ph pen but looks like i may have to get it online.. in the meantime i grabbed another ph tester that has the metal rod and the dial.
The device i got is meant to be for soil however but i did test the ph of the tap water. After a minute or so (the time it says to leave ot in soil) the ph was showin 6.2 however if left longer it would eventually go down to 5.2 at which point it would stop. im guessing this is the true ph of the tap water?
I then checked the ph of the soil and the ph of the water in the tank (with nutes) and both times the dial remained on ph 7.

In the last few days ive done what you said and watered by hand untill i see a little run off and then let it dry out. ive found myself waterin twice a day.
The plants seem to still be growing fine and the new leaves look healthy but the bottom bigger leaves on the main 'bad' plant look in a bad way.

Ill post some recent pics....

Really appreciate the help

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The metal probe ph testers are junk. They are not very accurate at all. You might get a more accurate reading with the aquarium ph test strips (Walmart should have them) until you can get a ph meter.

Ok, now what i meant by letting it dry out. When you water slowly til runoff the pot should be heavy. Take a mental note on weight. When that pot gets light then its time to water again. 18L is almost 5gal i think so it should take at least 3 or 4 days to dry out. Do not water it anymore. Twice a day is way too much. If its drying out that fast you have other problems.

For future reference IMO its better to transplant into different size pots. Dont put little seedlings in a big pot.

Im thinking once you get your ph straight and get a watering schedule down that plant will be doing alot better. Just remember they like a wet dry cycle. Then you can start adding a small amount of nutes once everything is on the right track. If it gets any worse post this in the plant problem section and someone will speak up if im missing something.

Would you suggest transfering them even now at 4 weeks old and about 12" high?

Something else that is confusing me abit is that the three other plants under the same conditions and watering schedule seem to be pretty healthy... One has slightly yellowing leaves near the bottom however that seems to be getting better since i changed the watering schedule. Is it possible that i could of over sprayed that one plant or something like that has made the leaves go hard? Also the new leaves coming through on the bad plant seem ok...?