Newbie Dwc Problems !!!

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The water is to hot not enought air get to the root even with air Stone. Im at 25 celcius .But i think hydroguard could still save you .they are good bacteria they could save your plant from dying i had same issue like almost evryone wo try hydro.

And if i was u ill get à ppm reader help à lot Im sure you over feed them

colvic21 said:

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You need to use a sterilizer or a beneficial bacteria or you are pretty much guaranteed to get root rot. I use hydroguard (beneficial) in my rdwc system with a chiller. Sterilizers are H2o2, bleach, zone, or pool shock. Beneficials are hydroguard or brew a tea. You must have one or the other. I would use h2o2 to kill everything over a couple doses/days then with a fresh change out add hydroguard. If not, you can continue to use h2o2 every 2-3 days. Hydroguard lasts about a week, but don't use the two together.

Also remember nit to freak out just because your roots go brown. Mine have, but that's because some of the nutes I'm using stain them.

Have a light feel. Do they feel slimey? If not, its probably just stained.

I would recommend running hydrogen peroxide or some other bennies

Hi all

Swedsteven i used a glass thermometer today and left it in there for 5 minutes i had a reading of 24c

my PPm meter arrived today and i have checked this its at 1030ppm now, 3rd week of veg

Blackforest i was looking at these last night was tempted to run with cannazyme but would you rate hydroguard over this?


Kiwipaulie thats what i keep telling myself don' freak i had a feel of them today they don't feel slimy i would say its more powdery it seemed to come away on my fingers easily the best way to describe it is muddy water. theres no smell the water is clear and everything is exploding with growth.

the only other thing i can think of is that the i have not washed the stones enough and some of the dirt has been coming through from the net pot, could this explain it ?

I've been there done that. I found it such a frustrating battling it for a month before I swapped away from RDWC. At this stage into flower you need to power through the next 5-6 weeks til harvest; but you may have a reduced yield.

You have 2 options: Sterilise or fight with bennies (... or sterilise and then fight with bennies!)

I would change your nute solution now. Make up 1/2 strength nute solution and add hydrogen peroxide 35% @ 1.5ml per litre (or work out the equivalent dosage if you have a lower % peroxide soln). The bad bacteria use the nutes as fuel so running a lower strength for a couple days helps to get rid of them. The peroxide kills bacteria and will hopefully give you a clean slate (bacteria wise) to start from.

After 2 days of running this solution I would swap out your nutes again. This time go back to your full strength and add hydroguard too (I would not trust any other commercial benny product currently, go with what is tried and tested). Don't add any more peroxide as it kills the bennies in the hydroguard. A cheaper alternative would be brewing EWC tea (search and you'll find some massive threads on brewing it). Hopefully the bennies will take hold and keep the rot at bay now.

Don't run cannazyme or any other enzyme product. They just eat away damaged roots adding more fuel for bacteria to your nute solution and can make things worse. After 3 weeks in flower your roots are going to have almost stopped growing now so you want to preserve as much root mass as possible.

Fingers crossed for you.

Edit: I thought I read you were 3 weeks into flower... but I notice it's 3 weeks into veg! In that case give my suggestions a try. If you can't fight it off consider a transplant into coco or hempies. I moved to hempies and it was definitely the right move for me.

colvic21 said:

Hi all

Swedsteven i used a glass thermometer today and left it in there for 5 minutes i had a reading of 24c

my PPm meter arrived today and i have checked this its at 1030ppm now, 3rd week of veg

Blackforest i was looking at these last night was tempted to run with cannazyme but would you rate hydroguard over this?


Kiwipaulie thats what i keep telling myself don' freak i had a feel of them today they don't feel slimy i would say its more powdery it seemed to come away on my fingers easily the best way to describe it is muddy water. theres no smell the water is clear and everything is exploding with growth.

the only other thing i can think of is that the i have not washed the stones enough and some of the dirt has been coming through from the net pot, could this explain it ?

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Sorry just noticed you started in soil. Personally I wouldn't have transferred into dwc from soil, but you have so just run with it. What ever happens. Just treat it as a learning curve.

You really don't wanna try to run rdwc or dwc without a chiller it's just sketchy. But if your nute once dissolved is very dark, a lot of times its just stain. I get it with flora trio and use a chiller at 68*F

Maintaining a DWC does not have to be hard. You have three serious things to monitor; temp, PPM, and PH. Google "ice prope chiller" , you will need to convert to a square bucket to be able to use this. It will keep your water anywhere between 66-68f (with an ambient air temp of 85f). I always PH my water to 5.5 before I add my nutes (flouraduo A and Flouraduo B, hydroguard) and the PH always settles at 5.8-6.0. I don't use an Air pump. Google "venturi water pumps" it will oxygenate the water as well as circulate it at the same time, its almost silent too. I think its much better than air stones.

cantbuymeloveuh said:

Maintaining a DWC does not have to be hard. You have three serious things to monitor; temp, PPM, and PH. Google "ice prope chiller" , you will need to convert to a square bucket to be able to use this. It will keep your water anywhere between 66-68f (with an ambient air temp of 85f). I always PH my water to 5.5 before I add my nutes (flouraduo A and Flouraduo B, hydroguard) and the PH always settles at 5.8-6.0. I don't use an Air pump. Google "venturi water pumps" it will oxygenate the water as well as circulate it at the same time, its almost silent too. I think its much better than air stones.

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What does the venturi water pump actually do in a rdwc? I never understood it. I use a submersible from the res to supply waterfalls to each side top of buckets. Returns are gravity fed back to the res. Air stones too.

I'd sterelize the absolute shit out of the water using some chloramine/h202/chlorine/pool shock <--- good stuff.

But I would check if your nutrient line is known to cause brown roots. If so, then don't worry, the nutrients really stain those pearly white roots.

Airwalker16 said:

What does the venturi water pump actually do in a rdwc? I never understood it. I use a submersible from the res to supply waterfalls to each side top of buckets. Returns are gravity fed back to the res. Air stones too.

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Well...in short it can replace your noisy air pump. What happens is a small water pump sits in the bottom of your bucket....the outlet has a T fitting with a small hose that you raise above the water, the other end of the T stays underwater. As water is being pumped thru is creates the "venturi" effect by pulling air from the hose above the water into the hose thats underwater....... I have two pumps in my bucket, one for the aforementioned purpose, one for top feeding.

cantbuymeloveuh said:

Well...in short it can replace your noisy air pump. What happens is a small water pump sits in the bottom of your bucket....the outlet has a T fitting with a small hose that you raise above the water, the other end of the T stays underwater. As water is being pumped thru is creates the "venturi" effect by pulling air from the hose above the water into the hose thats underwater....... I have two pumps in my bucket, one for the aforementioned purpose, one for top feeding.

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In the reservoir right? And only works if you have an under currant system? You have to have the open pipes at the tees jet stream?

Airwalker16 said:

In the reservoir right? And only works if you have an under currant system? You have to have the open pipes at the tees jet stream?

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Under-current? No way. I run a basic DWC w/top feeder.... I think it would make more sense if you got on Youtube and googled "venturi water pumps"...All of your answers will be found.

cantbuymeloveuh said:

Under-current? No way. I run a basic DWC w/top feeder.... I think it would make more sense if you got on Youtube and googled "venturi water pumps"...All of your answers will be found.

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And so how do you utilize that in every site on say a 8-9 bucket set up?

Hello I might be way off topic but I need help. I have dwc setup and I'm a new to this first time But I have organic starter plugs and the seed germinated but it wants to fall over what do I do jus put it in and leave it? Will it grow through the plug ? That's wat I'm wondering is if it will grow through or do I need to transplant ? Please help

HYDROGUARD/AQUASHIELD.

On my second dwc attempt and have not had problems in the res yet.

Matt Kitski said:

HYDROGUARD/AQUASHIELD.

On my second dwc attempt and have not had problems in the res yet.

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I use h2o2 29% by NutraLife.