Help!!! What am I doing wrong with these plants????

Hi All,

I successfully completed my first grow of cannabis last year, but am struggling a lot with grow #2. I was looking up nutrient issues here, as well as other places online. I can't tell if I have too much or too little of any nutrients, it's confusing!

I did my first grow with Stepwell soil and water pretty much all the way, but things aren't going so well this time around. I have 38 plants growing right now:

• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Blueberry
• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Northern Lights
• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Northern Berry
• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Kush Berry
• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Kush Northern Lights
• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Skunk Berry
• 4 x PeakSeedsBC Northern Skunk
• 6 x PeakSeedsBC Sweet C99
• 4 x Jordan of the Islands Purple Kush

My room is getting crowded, so last weekend I initiated 12-12 so that I can cull the males asap to make space. The majority of the plants look healthy enough. Not perfect, but quite good. However, 9 of the 38 are having leaf issues now and the problem seems to be getting worse over time.

What's different than in my first grow?

• The seedlings were in Fox Farm Happy Frog this time around. Stepwell last time.
• When I transplanted to 1-gallon pots, I used Stepwell Soil, just like last time. However, Stepwell changed their formula so the soil I'm using isn't the same as last time.
• For I while I thought I was having light-burn issues, so for weeks I turned down the brightness (much lower than in my previous grow). This didn't fix anything.

How can I salvage these plants? Have a look at the pics and I'd really appreciate any help you can give this rookie! Thanks.

Fwiw, last time around I don't recall having any of these issues, if that helps.

With all of the reading I've been doing, it seems like they might be Cal/Mag deficient.
Is this likely? If it is, what's the best organic way to deal with it?

Have you ever taken a look at this? Most guides only have drawings of affected plants but this one has actual photos. This site is far from the final authority on growing, but they have a few helpful pages.
GWE sick plant diagnosis guide

There are some plants here that look like yours.
GWE root problems

Last time my leaves did something like that it was high temps and low RH.
Try moving your meters/hygrometer or what ever and see if all areas are staying equal.
I'm not good at all on deficiencies, but could be calmag prob too.
Good luck and happy grow

My humidity is pretty low at this time of year because my furnace is on a lot, so even with a humidifier in the room, it barely ever gets to 50% RH.

I may try some General Organics Cal Mag supplements for the short term, because I've seen a few pics online very similar to mine which were fixed with Cal Mag supplementation.

I may also try a different super soil when I transplant into larger pots in the next couple of weeks. There's a local company with a soil that seems to have a really good one that I want to try.

This is way easier to preach than to practice but don’t stress. There are so many possibilities but there is joy in learning and fixing and in that being able to avoid and help in the future. One pic looked a bit like heat stress. You could also Try testing the PH of some runoff water and maybe take a temp reading of your soil. Is there a chance it’s too hot (fresh)? I decided to test my runoff last year and it was incredibly acidic. Sometimes it’s simple, sometimes it’s not. Either way a compost tea is always a good thing. You can’t overdo it with compost teas.

Hey GJ,

Saw this over in the peak forum. It does n’t look like cal mag to me... but my choice for fast acting Cal Mag in canada is nature’s nectar cal mag. It’s pretty much organic - just not sure if it carry’s the rating. I’ve used it in soil and coco DTW, but would not recommend for a recirculating rig. But like I said don’t think its Cal- mag.

What are your day/night temps. What is your Relative humidty at? What is your PH going in?

Peace.

I would try to stick to one or two strains personally,
Different strains need different amounts of nutrients. It will be a nightmare to feed them all the right amount every feed

My guess would be too much feed or too much water and not enough light. It's too bad, I'm dying to try some Peak seeds.

I top dressed last night for the first time with earth worm castings and they perked up today!

I guess they were malnourished. I’ll be transplanting into larger pots soon and am going to use a much more potent living soil with no peat moss.

Looks like toxicity which is also causing a bit of lock out. Soil hot maybe?

Never heard of stepwell soil, but while you are trying to get this down, mix up a batch of someones super soil mix, bas, rev sub, coots and let it cook during the rest of your bloom cycle. Throw out the crap soil you are using and start your next cycle with live cooked organic super soil. for starting seeds, clones, just cut your mix in half with castings and aeration so the little ones don't burn. Only good water and transplanting is needed from seed to finish, no flushing, no runoff testing no bullshit liquid nute overfeeding etc. Looks to me yours are over watered and overfed these 2 go hand in hand. Follow one of the mixes exactly, do not alter shit, and don't change anything during the bloom cycle. Just ask peoples here who's mix is best and why, there are a ton of threads on basic organic soil growing, read a few 2nd grow 38 plants? I wouldn't recommend that for anyone.

More pics

Cannasaurus Rex said:

Throw out the crap soil you are using and start your next cycle with live cooked organic super soil.

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There's someone local who mixes and ferments living super soils and apparently their recipe has no fillers in it whatsoever. They're so serious about making the best soil they can, that they purchased an accredited, organic earthworm farm in order to be in control of their castings. As I don't have the time to make my own for this grow, I'm going to try their soil when I transplant into larger pots. I'll rid of as much of the old soil as possible when I do this, to see what happens.

I never had any of these issues during my first grow. I had 35 plants, which produced 17 females. 9 went into my basement, 4 in my backyard and I gifted 4 to a friend. All plants came to harvest nicely. This is why I've been so confused.

I've been reading frantically over the last week or two about this all. I think my watering has been good.

I believe that my plants were undernourished, which I mistakenly diagnosed as light burn. I turned my lights down and then they were starving for both nutrients and light. Two days after topping (and turning up my lights) they look much better.

GiovanniJones said:

There's someone local who mixes and ferments living super soils and apparently their recipe has no fillers in it whatsoever. They're so serious about making the best soil they can, that they purchased an accredited, organic earthworm farm in order to be in control of their castings. As I don't have the time to make my own for this grow, I'm going to try their soil when I transplant into larger pots. I'll rid of as much of the old soil as possible when I do this, to see what happens.

I never had any of these issues during my first grow. I had 35 plants, which produced 17 females. 9 went into my basement, 4 in my backyard and I gifted 4 to a friend. All plants came to harvest nicely. This is why I've been so confused.

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dont try to knock off the old soil as you will damage roots doing this. Transplant and move on with as little disruption as you can.

Harry Bonanza said:

You can’t overdo it with compost teas

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Except when plant is already suffering from nutrient burn.
JD

Harry Bonanza said:

You can’t overdo it with compost teas.

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You just havent made a tea hot enough yet and burnt your plants with it yet I guess,
but yes you can over do it with compost teas.