Dammit! Damping

[Token LaRoche]

Any thoughts on this one?

Here's the short-form of the setup:
Germination: wet paper towel in a baggie in a warm place
Soil: Coco Coir & Perlite mix
Lighting: 6400K T5

After sprouting, seeds were placed in Solo cups with Coco/Perlite mix.
Then watered with water only (pH = 7.0 or real close)

Plant grows to maybe a little over 1" and then just falls over.

Plant #2 does the same a day or two later.

Must be the soil, right? Any ideas? Had two do this out of my last batch of 5, but also got two plants that did very well.

Token LaRoche Reviewed by Token LaRoche on 09-16-2013. Dammit! Damping Any thoughts on this one? Here's the short-form of the setup: Germination: wet paper towel in a baggie in a warm place Soil: Coco Coir & Perlite mix Lighting: 6400K T5 After sprouting, seeds were placed in Solo cups with Coco/Perlite mix. Then watered with water only (pH = 7.0 or real close) Rating: 5

[Shovelhandle]

spray a little diluted hydrogen peroxide on the soil. I also put a couple of drops in the water I use for sprouting the seed, when I think of it.

[Token LaRoche]

Thanks, Shov. By diluted, do you mean a few drops in a gallon, or more like half and half?

[Shovelhandle]

it comes in 3% strength and I put about 8oz ( a cup) to a quart. Or about 4:1 water

[Token LaRoche]

Ah, thanks again, Shov. Just got some Rockwool and am toying with using that, but either way need to have something in germination over the weekend. Think I'm going to use bastard seeds until I can figure this out. Got some freebies to play with and if they work, cool.

[Token LaRoche]

Moving to "Plant Problems." I'm skunked.

[Shovelhandle]

sorry I missed the coco coir on the first post. I answered on the other thread. good luck, TLR

[Token LaRoche]

Haven't been around in awhile; too busy!

Started a couple seeds about a month ago and they're doing well. Difference? Replaced the coco coir with Ocean Forest. If this works out (and it's looking good so far), I'm done with the coco. Used to take forever to mix the ferts, balance the pH, etc. With OF, I just pH balance the water; takes a minute or two, and I bet it would be fine with tap water. I'll try to get some pics up this week.

These seeds are TH Seeds Darkstar Fem. Anyone try it?

[Weezard]

"After sprouting, seeds were placed in Solo cups with Coco/Perlite mix.
Then watered with water only (pH = 7.0 or real close)"


Got two comments.

Coco is often called solid state hydro.
It works very well but does require a much lower PH, (There's no buffering)
It's best with a PH of 5.2 - 5.8.


My local nursery was out of Botanicare bricks.
So, I decided to try a bag of Black Gold uncompressed coco.

Wiped me out!
Killed everything I tried to sprout in it!

Tasted OK, (I always taste the medium), smelled fine, no visible critters, even under 400x magnification.
Rinsed it well, though I've never had to rinse Botanicare.
No clues in the runoff.
Had me scratchin' new holes in my head.

All I can figure is microbial critters.

My Mickey mouse microscope only goes to 400x.
Baked some of the BG coco in the oven and stunk up my kitchen.
Tried "flushing" with boiling water.
Old, same, shit!
Tossed the rest of the BG and sterilized everything.
Bought a Botanicare brick and started over.

Immediately reinfected!
That's the problem with microbes, one itty speck of coco can harbor millions of spores.

So, I hired some "hit-bugs" from OGbiowar.
Germ warfare!
Got umpty-million goodguy minions on the job.
The battle rages in the underground.

All my yellow, sickly, veggies immediately perked up and sprouted new, healthy, green leaf.
After a week they looked like healthy plants grafted to fuckulated mutant stock.

Now I add some "good wee beasties" to my coco during re-hydration.
My sprouts are looking good so far.

Disclaimer:

This is all guesswork born of desperation.

I don't own any stock in OGbiowar.
Don't even know if it's that kind of company
If I had any cash, I'd look into it though.

Aloha,
Weezard

[Token LaRoche]

Man, thanks for the comments, Weez.

I kept thinking "there's just something I'm not seeing." Tried just about everything I could think of except the research path you took (wink).

Man, nothing worked. I was using a brick of CocoTek, mixed with perlite. Same exact stuff I used for a successful grow earlier this year. Everything I put in it died and everything I tried failed. Seems like you're onto something with the tiny critters. I'll learn more as I go, but for now, the OF is workin (and I'm behind schedule).