What is wrong with my plants?

[RayRay747]

What could my issues be?

Light: 600W LED Viaspectra Light
Soil/pots: Stonington's Blend "Super Soil" in 5G cloth pots

In order of images listed:

1. Dark Devil (Img 7441) - they look ok I think so far. Growing pretty decent. I feel they are growing even faster and catching up to the Meph vs Alien.
2. Diesel (Img 7445) - I am thinking it is light burn. I think I had the lights a little too close.
3. Meph vs Alien (Img 7446) - Thinking light burn as well and maybe a little nute burn. I also think this one is stunted. I had issues with this one since germination but I did not give up on it and kept trying to keep it going. I do have another seed germing now to take this ones place if the consensus says so. Just need to know if I should ditch my plant-saving mission?

Any ideas? I dont think the diesel and meph vs alien are doing great. Maybe I am just being too picky and a perfectionist.

 

[caveman117]

The first pic looks ok to me. The other two pics look like a cal/mag issue to me. Either deficiency or lockout . Are you feeding with any nutes?
Also you said your using a super soil, did you add all that perlite in the.pics?

 

[RayRay747]

The first pic looks ok to me. The other two pics look like a cal/mag issue to me. Either deficiency or lockout . Are you feeding with any nutes?
Also you said your using a super soil, did you add all that perlite in the.pics?

Hey Caveman - the white stuff is actually Gnat nix. Have not added anything to the soil. Just straight from the bag (Stonington Blend Growers Mix).

Now I know I probably jumped the gun a lot and gave the DIES and the Meph vs Alien some Coast of Maine Organic
Premium Lobster & Kelp Plant Food (5-2-4) last week. I don't use any "bottle nutes". And I only gave them the plant food once. To add, my water run-off after giving the plant food, was around 7.80pH. Before giving them the plant food, the water runoff was around 7.0pH. The last watering (about 2 days ago), I gave them just water to try and get the runoff pH down and it came down to 7.45-7.50. I was going to just give water this whole week and no more plant food until (to be honest not sure - maybe you can give me some pointers on when I should start the plant food) until I was able to get the pH back down to under 6.5-7.0 range.

I had a feeling that could have been the possible issue but was not too sure as I felt the soil would just correct the issue. Maybe its a lockout issue since the pH is so high. Is the best way to fix a lockout to get the pH back down to its true pH level (6.5-7.0)?

 

[caveman117]

I'm not very familiar with the stonington mix. But I would say you don't need to be feeding at all right now.
I mix 1 bale of park mix, 2 bags of coast of maine lobster compost (1cu) , 2.5-3 pounds of espoma tomato tone, 1-1.5 pounds of espoma tree tone and about
.5-1 pound of espoma bio tone. Mix it all up and i dont feed until around week 4-5 of flower. Some strains go through it quicker than others, so sometimes ill feed very lightly in the stretch period.

Hope this helps in someway.

 

[RayRay747]

I'm not very familiar with the stonington mix. But I would say you don't need to be feeding at all right now.
I mix 1 bale of park mix, 2 bags of coast of maine lobster compost (1cu) , 2.5-3 pounds of espoma tomato tone, 1-1.5 pounds of espoma tree tone and about
.5-1 pound of espoma bio tone. Mix it all up and i dont feed until around week 4-5 of flower. Some strains go through it quicker than others, so sometimes ill feed very lightly in the stretch period.

Hope this helps in someway.

Def does. thanks much. So you are thinking right now its a lockout issue for those 2 other plants versus light burn? Would the high runoff water reading of 7.80 cause any issues like what those images are showing or is that a normal pH to see from runoff after feeding it plant food? I guess Ill find out if I can lower that after this week with just the feeding of plain water.

 

[caveman117]

Correct I do not think its light burn. The ph being off may have been causing some issues. And generally in my experience feeding drops ph with most nutrients.

Just out of curiosity what's your temp/rh at? I've seen somewhat similar things happen from low rh for the temp. I've noticed plants dont feed the same when the temp/rh are out of balance.

If you havent already you shod look into VPD (vapor pressure deficit).

 

[RayRay747]

Correct I do not think its light burn. The ph being off may have been causing some issues. And generally in my experience feeding drops ph with most nutrients.

Just out of curiosity what's your temp/rh at? I've seen somewhat similar things happen from low rh for the temp. I've noticed plants dont feed the same when the temp/rh are out of balance.

If you havent already you shod look into VPD (vapor pressure deficit).

Well currently - lights off temp is 74F degrees (it should get down to around 70F degrees) and 64% RH (this typically gets down before lights come back on). When lights are on its around 85F and 50% RH (with veg and bloom switches on) or 80F and 50% RH (with only the veg switched on).

I normally do not let the temps stay in the 85F degree range for more than 15mins if possible.

Right now I just switched to only using the veg switch. I was using the veg and bloom both on but was not able to get the temps down to 80F and below. Im hoping when i take out a HEPA filter in my exhaust ducting that will help solve the temp issue.

I also thought the same about nutes. the pH would normally go down.

Thanks for the VPD link. I read up a little about it before starting but this chart really sums it up. Using the chart on that link and then looking at my current temps I am in the green which is ideal 75F with 65% RH.

During the day using only the VEG, I can almost get into the green. But with the bloom and veg on I dont see how its possible. .

 

[caveman117]

80f and 50% isn't terrible. I've had times when I've worked 80+ hours in a week And have neglected my garden, let it get to 78f and 13% for a.few weeks. Things went south fast haha.

 

[RayRay747]

80f and 50% isn't terrible. I've had times when I've worked 80+ hours in a week And have neglected my garden, let it get to 78f and 13% for a.few weeks. Things went south fast haha.

Wow. yeah thats an extreme situation but could def see that happening. So as suspected, the HEPA filter I put in the flange was impeding the airflow. Man what a HUGE HUGE difference. Temps now with both Bloom and Veg switches on is at 70.6F and 44.8% RH. I disconnected the air flow from outside and am now just pulling from the basement. When it was pulling from the outside, the temps dropped into the high 60s F. So I will connect that during flower to drop the temps down even more to help out with the flower stage.

Im stoked now. lol. It was such a simple oversight on my end. Something I thought was going to help with keeping shyt from exiting the grow box and getting into the basement actually ended up being detrimental. So the only thing I have now is a bug mesh on the end of the 5' ducting that is connected to the exhaust flange. That bug mesh is meant to keep bugs from going into the exhaust ducting. I also have a bug mesh on the exterior vent where I will be pulling air from the outside. I kept the HEPA filters and bug mesh on my intake vents and just added some carbon filters to help with scrubbing the odors that may seep thru the intake vents for any reason. I know the bug mesh, HEPA filter and carbon filter inside the intake vents add some resistance to the fan pulling the air in but I think those filters are good to have.

So right now temps being steady at 70F and RH at 45%, I am guessing the temps will drop to 60F. If I turn off the Vortex at night that will probably keep the temps from dropping so much and will keep the RH on the higher end. My box is insulated very nicely so the heat should stay inside the box as long as a lot of the basement cold air is not coming inside the box (which shouldnt as the vortex is turned off). Ill have to see how it goes tonight. I have the fan and humidifier turning off with the lights now (until flowering - when I will have the fan running 24/7), so lets see how the temps and RH react to that.

Its so funny that I had one problem (heat) and fixed that and now have the opposite problem (cold). just too funny. I am trying to determine the best way to tackle the cold now, since the basement always stays around 55-60F during the winter and 60F during the summer.

 

[RayRay747]

So @caveman117: I am going to just feed the plants just water only this week and see if I can get the soil pH back to 7.0. Checked today from todays watering and it was hovering around 7.40.

Do you see this as causing issues for the plants? I really think using the plant food too quickly and probably too high of a dose really skyrocketed my pH.

Should I get some cal/mag and give them some of that?

Just not sure what to do besides wait it out and not give any more nutes until a week or two. I have been giving them aloe vera, coconut juice and molasses in their water. Do these liquids drop the pH (I noticed today the pH was around 4.8-5.0) after I mixed the 3 above together. I started with a pH around 7.40 and when done was around that 4.8-5.0 range. I was going to water the plants with that pH but I decided to use baking soda and got the pH up to 6.5.

Ok after researching more, I found that Aloe Vera Juice lowers pH.

Should I be doing something different? Should I use baking soda to bring the pH up? Or should I just leave it at the 4.8-5.0 since I am using "super soil"?