DWC Overwatering or Underwatering?

Hi,

I'm having difficulties getting past the seedling stage.

I've been handwatering the rockwool cubes when the top feels somewhat dry because the roots haven't reached the water level yet.

Also, the surface of the leaves are uneven and embossy.

What kind of problem am I facing here?

I will appreciate any input!

eldinrhee said:

View attachment 4113983 View attachment 4113984 View attachment 4113985

Hi,

I'm having difficulties getting past the seedling stage.

I've been handwatering the rockwool cubes when the top feels somewhat dry because the roots haven't reached the water level yet.

Also, the surface of the leaves are uneven and embossy.

What kind of problem am I facing here?

I will appreciate any input!

Click to expand...

What's the humidity in the room your growing?

overwatering

HarryCooter said:

What's the humidity in the room your growing?

Click to expand...

It's in a small closet, ambient temp is in the low 80s.
Humidity is pretty low somewhere around 30. Where I live we have extremely dry winters. Recently I've seen rise in humidity as the weather gets warmer, but still on the low side compared to other locations

raise the water level so the bubbles/water is touching the bottom of the cubes... then drop the water level back down once the roots grow out of the net cup into the tote. also highly recommend you use hydroguard, its a cheap way to basically guarantee you wont get root rot. id give them a light feed too probably like 3-400 ppm

eldinrhee said:

It's in a small closet, ambient temp is in the low 80s.
Humidity is pretty low somewhere around 30. Where I live we have extremely dry winters. Recently I've seen rise in humidity as the weather gets warmer, but still on the low side compared to other locations

Click to expand...

The temp isn't bad as long as your root zone isn't experiencing the same. Your humidity is low which will exacerbate any watering issues which is clearly the case here. Little ones can lose a lot of moisture through their leaves in low humidity. I'm a big fan of foliar spraying in early veg to keep plants from drying out. This will definitely help perk them back up quickly.

HarryCooter said:

The temp isn't bad as long as your root zone isn't experiencing the same. Your humidity is low which will exacerbate any watering issues which is clearly the case here. Little ones can lose a lot of moisture through their leaves in low humidity. I'm a big fan of foliar spraying in early veg to keep plants from drying out. This will definitely help perk them back up quickly.

Click to expand...

The plant has grown about this much during the past 12 days.

They're about 4 weeks old now. I know they won't yield very much but I want to salvage them considering it a learning experience.

When I posted those pictures last time it was going thru some serious stagnation and didn't have any roots growing out of the net pot. Luckily I've seen some (although slow) root growth this week.

But now I see lower leaves turning yellow and crispy, and I'm confused as hell whether I'm feeding them too much or not enough. Tab water is 100 ppm, Nute solution 150 ppm
Total 250 ppm. I've been very conservative with nutes so far considering they're stunted.

I'm also growing a catnip plant(last picture). I just put it in a tiny(maybe like 10 ounces) bottle and fill it up with same solution from my reservoir and leave it be. It's growing really nicely, even though I'm clipping a few leaves every other day for the cat.

What do you think I should do with ppm at this point? Anything else you see from the picture?

..talk about your pH ?

Beachwalker said:

..talk about your pH ?

Click to expand...

5.8 pH been staying in optimal range

eldinrhee said:

The plant has grown about this much during the past 12 days.

They're about 4 weeks old now. I know they won't yield very much but I want to salvage them considering it a learning experience.

When I posted those pictures last time it was going thru some serious stagnation and didn't have any roots growing out of the net pot. Luckily I've seen some (although slow) root growth this week.

But now I see lower leaves turning yellow and crispy, and I'm confused as hell whether I'm feeding them too much or not enough. Tab water is 100 ppm, Nute solution 150 ppm
Total 250 ppm. I've been very conservative with nutes so far considering they're stunted.

I'm also growing a catnip plant(last picture). I just put it in a tiny(maybe like 10 ounces) bottle and fill it up with same solution from my reservoir and leave it be. It's growing really nicely, even though I'm clipping a few leaves every other day for the cat.

What do you think I should do with ppm at this point? Anything else you see from the picture?

Click to expand...

The yellowing of the lower leaves is a sign of nitrogen deficiency or lockout. It's pulling nutrients from the lower leaves. If your ph has been stable I would slowly step up ppm and watch close. One of the pictures looks like the inner roots had root rot and the plant managed to pull through it so that's a good sign.

^I second that. The third pic - the brownish/purplish colour on the top set of leaves possibly looks like the result of root rot. By the looks of the roots they seem to be doing okay now!

Boost your ppm to 300+ actual nute strength. I always just used a turkey baster to suck up some nutes and flush it thru the pots. 3 days to a week to get roots out the bottom usually. I just had to rescue some plants from two DWC tubs done in the new RubberMaid pots made to stay soft in the cold. Zero nute growth in almost a month. Some chemical in the plastic I think. 3 different CBD strains, 6 plants in one tub and 3 large Critical Mass rooted clones in the other.

I've done 50 tubs worth and never had this happen. All in pots of soil/soilless and doing fine now except for the two CBD babies that died. Have copies of those so no great loss.

HarryCooter said:

The yellowing of the lower leaves is a sign of nitrogen deficiency or lockout. It's pulling nutrients from the lower leaves. If your ph has been stable I would slowly step up ppm and watch close. One of the pictures looks like the inner roots had root rot and the plant managed to pull through it so that's a good sign.

Click to expand...

Hi, here's update.

Thanks to all you guys my plants were showing nice recovery. And I thought they were finally gonna be fine altogether.


This was taken 4 days ago. Still small plants but they were really starting to grow and the leaves had nice colors.





And its roots:




And 4 days later, this is today:





I LSTed only the main stem because these plants went through some serious stress from the beginning and I didn't want to cause another stress by topping them.



The roots are starting to grow really nicely, considering they had almost none just a week ago.



Now I encountered this problem:




Dynagro Foliage Pro @ 350 ppm with negligible amount of Protekt, Hydroguard, and sulfuric acid based pH-down.
After setting pH at 6.0, it drops down to 5.4 after 24 hours with decreased water volume. So I just add some tap water(7.3 pH) and pH returns to 5.8-6.0.

Ambient temp is 85~86F
Water temp is 66F with chiller running
RH is around 35%
Oversize air pump running at half power

I was gonna switch to 12/12 after 10 days, but if this stunts the plants again that can be later.

Regardless, I'm going to salvage these plants and see them bud no matter how small!!

View attachment 4125738
Anyone has idea how I can fix this?

Every after 24 hours pH drops, water level drops(little bit), ppm stays the same

looks like what appears to be Ca def but I'm feeding them enough and I can't think of any other factor that might cause Ca lockout.

Ambient temperature has been on the higher side recently but can it cause this?

The brown color you're seeing resembles heat damage. So yes, high temps can do that, either by air temp or being too close to a warm, strong light. I think your earliest pic might have been more due to lack of roots being able to reach the water/nute mix. I don't know why anyone would say root rot when a plant is so young. Roots don't go from rotting to healthy unless they're treated with something to kill the rot. I suspect you saw growth improvement when roots started really getting into the water. When DWC plants are small, you have to feed them from the top by pouring water/nute mix to the rockwool or root plug. If you don't do this enough the plant will wilt and die. I don't know the strength of your fert, the ratio, but I suspect that 500ppm to start probably would have been okay, and raise it some as the plant gets bigger. I grew a 6 footer one time in DWC and never measured ppm. I just used about half strength Dynagro and raised it to one teaspoon per gallon as the plant got bigger. Never measured pH either. It can be done. The plant suffered when air temp outside hit 100F. Not good.

You had some of that spotting earlier but it's getting a lot worse. Almost looks like some sort of fungal attack. Any fuzzy crap growing on the undersides of the damaged leaves?

Not going to be heat damage without the tops cooking too or even first before bottom leaves.

Low air flow around the base of plants in hydro can get mold or fungus going as there is a lot of moisture from evaporation under those leaves. Sometimes just removing them is the best way to go.

OldMedUser said:

You had some of that spotting earlier but it's getting a lot worse. Almost looks like some sort of fungal attack. Any fuzzy crap growing on the undersides of the damaged leaves?

Not going to be heat damage without the tops cooking too or even first before bottom leaves.

Low air flow around the base of plants in hydro can get mold or fungus going as there is a lot of moisture from evaporation under those leaves. Sometimes just removing them is the best way to go.

Click to expand...

The spotting started to really show at the same time the plants started to grow bigger(roots too).

I looked up some fungal problem examples but it doesn't seem to be the case here(fortunately?) there is nothing fuzzy going on underside of the leaves.

I changed the reservoir water today with just tap water, nutes and a little bit of hydroguard. I didn't add pH down or silica supplement just to see how it would do without those additives. I'll update again in a few days, thanks

I'm sticking with heat damage because the edges are curling up as well. This plant does these things when air temp is too high - the brown spotting and edge curling. People argue against heat damage being possible as they say they grow in the desert where over 100F but they don't see heat damage. Growing indoors seems to be different concerning air temp. In the roots pics, it looks like some roots might be brownish. If so, you have an algae problem, especially if the brown has a slimy texture.

polishpollack said:

I'm sticking with heat damage because the edges are curling up as well. This plant does these things when air temp is too high - the brown spotting and edge curling. People argue against heat damage being possible as they say they grow in the desert where over 100F but they don't see heat damage. Growing indoors seems to be different concerning air temp.

Click to expand...

Yes, I don't like the heat problem I'm having as the weather gets warmer here.

My family members have been growing generations of this wild strain outdoors over ten years at a temperate climate region in northeast asia. just us amateurs breeding our own seeds, seeds from best harvest each year. I don't think it's genetically heat tolerant compared to other stable "brand" seeds.

I might invest in one of those portable ACs for the room it's in, but for now all I can do is raise the light higher so it's closer to the exhaust fan.
It's a 400 true watts COB LED. I can only turn on 2 out of 4 chips, making it a 200W LED, and it does significantly decrease heat. I might do that if i run out of options.

While heat is definitely a problem, I'm wondering if I'm doing anything else wrong. I will see what happens next few days

more pictures