Any air stones/pump? I don't see any in the picture. That's also a problem if you are relying on your waterfall to provide your DO then it needs to be a longer vertical drop for DO to be absorbed.Not organic. Hydroton hydro with nutes and additives.
The water level was about an inch above where the bottom of the net pot is, ive lowered tank levels to bet a about where the net pot touches the water. Haven't but H2O2 in to the root zone yet, wont that kill bacteria? Is there a safer dilution % of H2O2 that can be used in lieu of the 29% (diluted from 35%)? I can't use cheap pharmaceutical 3% H2O2? I don't want to burn the roots by accident if the hydro strength of it as a cleaner is so caustic that I need gloves to handle it. Also, will this kill root zone bennies like microbes, bacteria, and fungi? The roots themselves look nice and stringy with mini branches but some have dirt/pellet clods stuck to them. Not sure what it could be, but before I go down the peroxide path, just want to make sure I'm using the right strength for the right purpose. No aquarium smell that I can tell of. Just smells like nutes.It looks like the roots are being suffocated AKA not enough DO/water level too high or the light leaks have slowly aided a pathogen. But you said it wasnt slimy so I doubt the pathogen/light leak theory at this point now. Does the water have an aquarium smell to it?
Your tin foil doesn't reflect light but rather re-directs it. This re-directed light turns into heat spots on plants xDI know I've had clay dust from my pellets even collecting on the tin foil I have around my baskets if the nutrients solution stream is flowing across it. But it's never colored my roots. I use two large cylinder air stones and every time I change my res water once a week I add a tsp of Hydroguard to each gallon and Ph at 5.8. Haven't had a problem.