18 gallon DWC

Twerkle said:

Bro, your roots are covered in slime and you have zero new root growth.

I've provided you the solution to your problem multiple times.

H2O2 is not going to do anything, I explained why in my previous posts.

Also you are running Flora Nova which has ORGANICS in it, so you are basically feeding your sludge every time you give it nutes.

http://generalhydroponics.com/nutrient-questions/

Is FloraNova series organic?
FloraNova Grow and Bloom contain 3-5% organic substances creating the marriage between mineral and organic gardening.
​

You need.

-Advanced nutrients
-Brew Compost Tea
-Physan20


Blast it with Physan for 24 hrs while you brew your tea. Give it tea till grow is over. Only use Advanced Nutes.

It's that simple. Take it or leave it but I had a grow with your exact issues and I am the only person in this entire thread to give you info on how to fix with supporting links. Not just some anecdotal remarks.


Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

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firsttimeARE said:

Looks good @Yesdog

You should think about a spray cloner. I use it for starting seeds and clones. It is so much easier than RW and can be made for like $35 with 1/2" cpvc fittings and piping, 360 and 180 degree sprayers, a bucket and seal tight lid like home depot or lowes (i prefer the blue lowes, like 1/3 the price of hydro store black buckets), 2" netcups and 1/4" thick 2" neoprene collars and a cheap pump.

Near 100% clone success rate. Seeds work out quite well. No time wasted letting them fill in the rockwool. You just germinate the seeds prior so the tap root can stick thru the 1/4" neoprene collars and then you put that in the lid that you drilled holes into to seat the netpots into. I leave the seed side up sitting on the other side so it knows where the light is and can grow up.

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Olympus Mons said:

You are going to get root rot (cyanobacteria) in your res unless you use beneficial bacteria to eat it up. Just trust me on this one. Hydrogen peroxide is old school. It's bad for your rootzone in the same way it's bad to use it as mouthwash. It kills EVERYTHING including beneficial microbes. NEVER use organic anything in your res (except the beneficial bacteria tea). If FloraNova is organic, don't use it. No Hygrozyme, Biocozyme or any of that shit. You want sterile nutrients like regular old General Hydroponics, Advanced Nutrients (three part), House and Garden etc. GH works just fine with the Lucas Formula. At this point you might be able to save your grow but it's on the edge of disaster. I would soak them for a night in some diluted Physan-20 to kill the slime and while you're doing that brew some compost tea. There is a thread on RIU that explains how the compost tea works.

https://www.rollitup.org/t/dwc-root-slime-cure-aka-how-to-breed-beneficial-microbes.361430/page-2

But I also put together a quick guide over at MMMA. Just follow the instructions. I have been doing DWC for years and this is the only way I've been able to keep a perfectly clean res and white roots. Plus your plants will better absorb nutrients.

http://michiganmedicalmarijuana.org/topic/38275-tutorial-kill-hydro-slime-w-compost-tea/?hl=+ancient++forest

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firsttimeARE said:

Doing nothing but keeping water cold and oxygenated does it for me.

Must be lucky. Never root rot in 4 years of DWC.

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Yesdog said:

One day when I get temps truly under control, I can hopefully get there.

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Yesdog said:

I just can't bring myself to run sterile. The tea has been working GREAT for me so far on this new grow, and I'm supplementing with a root-zone inoculant made of the tea, and some straight great white. The tea is great for brewing beneficial bacteria, but it apparently kills most Myc sources. So tea goes in the rez (where bacteria can live just fine), and the great white goes straight to the root zone (I use *some* great white in the tea for the bacteria, but also use some directly to preserve the mycs).

Also, if you want to use organics of any kind- use them in the tea, and make sure they're microbe friendly (most are, no point in organics if it kills microbes). The tea itself includes straight sugar which is one of the most hazardous things to your rez, but by brewing it with the tea you're making sure that any organics that make it to the rez are accompanied by BILLIONS of bennies, you're making sure they're the ones that use the organics most.

I used floralicious+ in my last grow, which im 90% certain brought me to root rot. I was using only hydroguard at the time. Now I use the F+ in the tea, and after a tea/inoculant treatment, the next day my rez smells like a beautiful mushroom garden growing on the forest floor. Every day after, the rez smells less like sugar/kelp and more like mushrooms (the right things are eating the organics).

F+ (kelp + humics) also contains a ton of stuff that is GREAT for microbes, and is only useful to plants after being digested by micros (plants cant use kelp directly). The additional humic acid also helps chelate the microbe 'waste' and makes it more available to the plant, while also benefitting the microbes directly. This kind of tea is probably the closest to 'liquid dirt' you can get. kelp/humics are popular for normal compost teas, and provide a rich (and more stable) microbial life while being rich in chelated nutrients and plant hormones (from the kelp). The extra humic chelation can apparently more regulate nutrient uptake by almost 'buffering' the nutrient concentrations and can make immobile nutrients more mobile (this is mostly fulvics tho) and help prevent lockout by basically 'stashing' some of your metal ions for later use.

Humics themselves in raw form (diamond nectar) can actually also be a food source on their own for microbes, so adding any humics to your rez solo is putting you at danger for infection. Humics also arent as effective (maybe not at all?) in a sterile rez. The point of a sterile rez is to keep your ORP (oxidization/reduction potential) high. Oxidizers are great at destroying organic material, including humics. The roots can only survive because of the thick non-organic cell walls, but the ORP can interfere with sugar production in high amounts. It is absolutely insane that GH recommends using any organics in hydroponics as it requires bennies, or a sterile rez to keep uninfected (and a sterile rez just destroys the organics anyways).

It's definitely more of an experiment currently, but I figure if you can brew sugar via tea and add it to the rez just fine, then that's the place/time for your other organics. I think the real danger is adding organics to your rez when it's 'sick', or otherwise not chock-full of bennies. Then you provide the foothold needed for explosive pathogen growth. With the tea, you're adding a guaranteed massive concentration of bennies, plus organic matter that has mostly already been stripped of the sugars, leaving more complex organics that won't as easily give pathogens an advantage.

EDIT: hah, unless you leave your water chlorinated when making tea.... then you're just adding sugar and you're f*d lol

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