Lost in Veg-as I struggle solve this plant problem mystery

What is your experience level? 5 years success â?? 5 years dismal failure

What type of hydro set-up are you running? Flood and drain for grow and mothers â?? aeroponic clones

Your Equipment:
A) Type and wattage of lights. 368W LED have same problem with 400HPS.
B) Distance from tops? Tried 2 foot to 4 foot
C) Reflector type? None
D) what are the bulb wattages, kelvin ratings, and schedule? 368W is adjustable tried 24 and 18/6.
E) Is there a consistent fresh air supply? Yes.
F) Do you have an exhaust fan and a circulation fan? Yes to both.
G) Size of reservoir? 40 gallon for grow.
H) What medium if applicable? Hydroton.

Your nutrients and water:
I) No rock wool.
J) Source of water. (Tap or filtered) What's its ph? Tap 7.0 also tried filtered.
K) Specific brand and N-P-K ratio for each bottle. List dosages (quantity per gallon) and current feeding schedule. Currently Botanicare Power Plant 3.1.4 Liquid Karma .1-.1-.5 various combinations 2 OZ to 16 OZ per 40 gallon.
L) What is the ec/ppm of your unadjusted tap (or filtered) water? 55ppm
M) What is the ec/ppm of your nutrient solution? Tried 100-500ppm
N) What is the temperature of your nutrient solution? 72-76F
O) Does your ec/ppm show a rise or fall when you do your daily PPM check? Slight or no decrease.
P) Does the ph fluctuate? No.
Q) Do you foliar feed? I have tried with and without foliar feeding.
R) How often do you replace reservoir water/nutrients? What does it look like before changes? (clear, foamy, green, brown...) tried 7-10-15 or none â?? water appears same as start.

Your grow room:
S) What size of closet, room or hut? 4FT wide 12FT long 10FT high.
T) What are the temps and humidity levels while lights are on? ...With lights off? On 78-82 F. Off 75-78 F. Humidity constant 70-80%.
U) Have you seen signs of insects in the grow room? None
V) Are the roots long and white, or brown and slimy? Start white then turn brown.

Your strain:
W) What strain are you growing? Indica
X) From seeds or clones? Clones
Y) Is this an auto-flower strain? No
Tried different lights, water, nutrients, rocks and strains - nothing changes the final results. Plants grow slow after transplanting, donâ??t bush up and roots stop. Lower fan leave tips turn brown then edges yellow inward. I have tried transplanting clones at different stages and trimming or not trimming roots. Tried using H2O2 (not with others) Hygrozyme, Zho, Clearex. Light backed way off and air too with same conclusion. Mothers and clones are healthy nearby using same water, air and nutrients under fluorescents. Pushing to bloom sometimes sees improvement enough to produce small yield. Weary of all the work resetting many times over with little or no reward.

Brown roots in hydro means you've got algae growing in your reservior. No good. Light should not be getting to your water at all. I suggest you change methods to DWC using black 5 gallon buckets and black lids, to minimize the amount of light getting to the water. Also, varying your nutes like 2 oz here, 40 ounces there, probably isn't a good idea. In DWC usually around 1000 ppm works pretty well, lesser when they're young and raise the ppm over time to a max of about 1100 ppm or so. You'll have to experiment a little and see how they do. Give less to start with and if they look light green or yellowing, chances are good you can raise the ppm some. Once you find a nute amount that works, stick with it. There's nothing about nutrients that will make the plants provide a greater effect upon use. In DWC, they will grow quickly and abundantly if done right. I think your ppm as it is, is too low, but your brown roots indicate algae growth, so if you want to stay with flood and drain, you've got to clean the res and tubing and everything, with some bleach/water mix. Just dump it down the tub when done. DWC requires either small air pumps for each bucket or a larger one that will provide enough air for all your plants.

Response is much appreciated polishpollack. Hereby nominate you for President of the DWC fan club. May consider a method change but not likely. No light is getting through to 40 gallon reservoir and there is no sign of algae there. When reset, all components get thorough bleach solution/rinse/dry. Tubing and pumps are cleaned and have also been replaced. Running a second pump to circulate water along with air pumped into a stone as well. Using jumbo pots has reduced sites from 28 to 24 but better blocks light to tray. The only sign of algae is the at fill/drain area of tray. I will get some panda liner to cover that spot to see if it makes any difference.

Well, there is a reason people like ebb and flow and/or flood and drain - And there is a reason people like me will never touch it, haha....

I have had issues in the past where my RDWC would produce a browning, and typically it was when my water res was too low and too much air was getting to the roots. Whats your flood and drain timer at? Is the timer different in veg than it is in bloom?

I'll help you find your problem ;)

Grateful low_rdr for input and may your hope reach God's ears. Timer had been every 3 hours just moved to every 2 this grow. When I move light to 12 hours I have kept feeding time the same as veg. Not much blooming going on. Determined to solve this and have been restarting once plants reach a zombie state 14-21 days in.

Try adjusting your timer to every 1.5 hours

Convinced it is pythium root rot. In spite of best efforts to disinfect I must have contamination. It's the only thing that explains failures. Time to break down and reset. Looking to try Wilt Guard after I lather rinse and repeat again with bleach.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MikeyPython

Convinced it is pythium root rot. In spite of best efforts to disinfect I must have contamination. It's the only thing that explains failures. Time to break down and reset. Looking to try Wilt Guard after I lather rinse and repeat again with bleach.

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I've dealt with this on a small scale. You gotta bleach/vinegar everything, including your pumps, hoses, nozzels, and throw out your hydroton, baskets, etc. Just a fraction of a tablespoon will spread and infect everything quickly.

If your indeed seeing dampening off (I'm not seeing that in your above posted pictures) and it's spreading, then this is indeed a severe danger to your entire grow. However.... I think we need to talk more about your water on/off timers.... This can also be caused by not enough air circulation, ie: water on every 2 hours for 1.5 hours... I know your probably not doing that, but before you break everything down, and throw everything out (including your stakes) this is a good topic to cover, first.

At any rate man, my heart broke a little when you posted that - I hate those pesky microscopic organisms, how often are you rotating your water?

all other things aside, the pH for your grow should be quite a bit lower, 5.6-6.0?

May I make a suggestion? Guess I'm gonna...go low tech 1st. Kiss (keep it simple stupid) no dis, stop the co co coir aeroponic & go with a good home made soil mix, lighting, fan & white walls in a closet? While all of the advanced techniques are cool ya need to stick with the basics before ya run? Peace


:thumbsup:

Esteban has a good idea. I was going to post something similar, but don't want to step on toes at all. I suggested DWC because when you have a problem, it remains isolated to one bucket, one plant. The problem with recirc systems and aero is that these methods require good knowledge and maintenance. You'd like to think you can put a recirc system on and ignore it for a week, but that isn't realistic unless it's a self-adjusting system. Potting soil reduces the need for lots of maintenance. Hydro is great but you've got to do it right as there's not much room for error.

The fancier you get the more important your part becomes.

Honestly, i never thought of any of the above suggestions. I figured it was a given when you go hydro that your constantly monitoring your PH, PPM's Co2 and waste. If you haven't been doing this 2-3 times a day, I would highly suggest taking the above suggestions as well.

Getting a good pH/ppm meter is important for hydro, unless you just want to wing it and can accept the rate of error. Unfortunately, they're kind of expensive. Soil works, but takes longer.