seedlings ok? curling a bit, slight yellowing. Over/Underwatering?

Cheers! This is my first grow and I think I must be doing something wrong. Please help out a newbie! Love the forum btw, lots of great info and helpful ppl. Here's the rundown of my setup: 2'x8 T5 Lighting Water every 2 to 2.5 days 4 inch pots FF Happy Frog Soil with 30% perlite mixed in No nutes yet Temps are around 84-86 daytime and 77-79 nighttime. 18/6 light schedule I'm thinking I may be watering too much or not enough. Also, I was using tap water filtered through my friends water filter, which I just read removes fluoride with activated alumina, some of which comes out as inert into the water. I wonder if the ppm is too high because of filter residue or just naturally? Don't have ppm meter yet.The ph is around 7. Don't have digital meter but test solution indicates that. Just switched today to distilled/ro water in case that's the issue. Also, I had a fan pretty close to the plants. Maybe that's an issue. I moved it further away. All 4 are showing some slight yellowing. What do you guys think? Do you think also that it's time to add nutes or transplant plant A to my 3 gal pot. Thanks!!

Maybe to much water don't give it more water tell the top soil drys.

Thanks for all the replies so far! My T5's were 9cm away, will try moving a little further away. As for watering, I'm doing it only after the top 1.5" gets really dry. It seems to be drying pretty quick because my room's a little hot during the day.

Seems like your getting the watering right.

People dont seem to realise RO water needs cal/mag supplements, 0ppm water means it has no cal/mag, either make sure your ferts have added cal/mag or for soft water area or buy cal/mag and ppm water to 150ppm to 200ppm. I see no point in using RO water if tap water is allright and water contains the cal/mag a plant needs.

Looks like a low dose of ferts would be good, might not need to transplant for a short while yet, depends if roots have established throughout the soil lots or just a little. Peace

T5's 9cm away is perfect for them plants, put a fan close to the lights to blow of excess heat and ventilate the room, applying a cm of plain soil with no drainage to the top layer of each pot might help keep the moisture in the soil for longer helping out if soil is drying too quick, it will act like a lid to the well drained soil below and help hold water for a day or two more. Peace

Them leaves look great! Like if they have muscles on'em
What kind of steroids you give'em?

MrGhettoGrower said:

Them leaves look great! Like if the have muscles on'em
What kind of steroids you give'em?

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the last picture is a perfectly healthy plant, the three others have suffered from leaf cupping, distortion and purple stems and veins, to say this is a deficiency could be wrong as maybe the plant grew quicker than its roots could provide certain nutrients or maybe there was a small deficiency. The plant obviously looks like it is growing out of this small problem hence new leaves look ok but wether this will be an on going problem or not waits to be seen Either way add cal mag suplement to RO water or amend soil accordingly. Even with amended soil my plants need more than it provides, weed is a cal/mag hungry plant needing a 10:1 calcium magnesium in veg and 3:1 calcium magnesium ratio in flower or so 'Sensi Nutrients' like to say.

Organic ferts have very little cal/mag as oppose to synthetic ferts which are easier to add cal/mag and generally do. Some companies recognise this and some dont. To me leaf cupping and purple stems are somthing to keep an eye on. Peace

Thanks man, actually the 1st 3 pics are the same plant. Just wanted to show a good view of the issue. The other plants are younger. The last pic plant is 2nd to oldest and it's starting to do the same thing but to a lesser extent so far. How much calmg should I add to a gallon? 1/10 gallon?
I will be using general organics biothrive. I think i'll start on 4th strength nutes next water for the larger one and see how that works. It's about 16 days old. What should my nutes be ph'd to? Thanks for all the assistance!

Nutes pH to 6.5 - 6.8,
cal/mag - read the label on the bottle and go from there,
nutes - well judge what the plant needs when it tells you,
PPm of nutes - i dont know your brand but would 600ppm to 700ppm be a good starting point for a 16 day old plant.

Peace

Thanks! I may hold off for a another week or so w/ nutes since it does seem to be more or less ok without them at the moment. I also have to go and find some camg+. Apparently camg is recommended when using general hydro's organic line with distilled/ro water. I'm also wanting to wait for the ph/ppm meter the aquarium shop ordered for me to get here first. The plants seem to have taken off like a rocket in the last 2 days!

What filter is it, dont sound like ro or is it, ppm meters will tell a lot with ferts and water, may answer a lot of questions, some ferts have cal.mag and some dont, some water has good cal.mag and some dosent. Peace

Kingrow1 said:

What filter is it, dont sound like ro or is it, ppm meters will tell a lot with ferts and water, may answer a lot of questions, some ferts have cal.mag and some dont, some water has good cal.mag and some dosent. Peace

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It's a berkey activated charcoal filter with flouride eliminating post filters. Have been using that and also store bought ro water. Going to the store tomorrow for CaMg and will see how that helps. The other plants are starting to do the same thing, to a little lesser extent. The leaf ends burned on the biggest one on the very bottom leaves and have a few brown spots (see pic). Only on the bottom most leaf though. The others have hard leaf tips. I wonder if heats a factor too. My room has been up to 88 deg in the last few days. Going to try a bigger exhaust fan. Not sure what else to do. AC in the condo is on full blast and the door to the closet is open. All of them are still growing rapidly though, that's the weird thing. I have no experience to draw from but it seems like even if conditions are not 100% optimal, mj plants just keep going. I do wanna keep 'em happy though. Here's a pic of the leaf I mentioned that 's burned. I think the heat/dry did it? I tried cutting back on watering a little too aggressively.

That leaf just looks water or nutrient burn from the heat, t5's dont burn that hot imo, i got a few and a simple fan takes away most of the heat.

yer cal/mag is relatively cheap and easy to apply to water, most ro water needs amending but some ferts have enough cal/mag in them to get past this. Try it and see but take it easy with the stuff, amend all water but without a ppm meter it will be hard to judge the amount you add, follow the lable and keep it low to start with then increase if no bad effects to a recomended level, maybe you dont need much if some in your ferts.

Peace

damn...i have 13 girls that are the same size, and only 10 days from seed...but they are also under a 400w hps...12/12. i really dont see a deficiency, or anything for that matter just typical seedling weirdness, but i would discontinue RO water unless your supplementing with cal/mag, as kingrow has suggested. if not, you will regret it.

Yer not much of a deficiency and some seedlings may struggle for nutes etc etc but i see leaf cupping as cell deformation which leads to the leaf looking cupped in places. Most seem to grow out of it and have no futher problems, i get it on young plants that are a bit cal or mag deficient but cal/mag is determined by lots of other factors, basically the plant needs to be drinking good and plenty of water since calcium is uptaked this way by the plant. If you havent added ferts and they contain good cal/mag levels one might suggest adding ferts and see if that cures it.

Adding a bit of cal/mag shouldnt hurt the plant with ro water anyway. Just another one of them variables i suppose. Peace

It could be ur fan causing the curling. I'm actually having the exact same problem. Your babies are a little further along than mine. But I've had this problem before and used a humidifier instead of a fan and u would not believe the wonders that humidifier did.

summerigrewup said:

It could be ur fan causing the curling. I'm actually having the exact same problem. Your babies are a little further along than mine. But I've had this problem before and used a humidifier instead of a fan and u would not believe the wonders that humidifier did.

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Maybe but i doubt this is the case. Peace

ok, so here's an update on plant A, this thing is huge but still having issues. All my plants are a bit pale looking. I'm guessing not enough nitrogen, or bad ph in soil? I have been watering about every other watering with 1/2 to 3/4 strength nutes with plain water ph'd to 6.4-6.8 in between feedings. It's time to start flowering this thing but I'm not sure its a good idea with it looking so unhealthy. It seems also like its crowding itself out, should I cut some of the fan leaves off that are crowding things do you think? Any other suggestions? Oh, also I have them under 400w metal halide now which is about 12 inches overhead.

Kingrow1 said:

the last picture is a perfectly healthy plant, the three others have suffered from leaf cupping, distortion and purple stems and veins, to say this is a deficiency could be wrong as maybe the plant grew quicker than its roots could provide certain nutrients or maybe there was a small deficiency. The plant obviously looks like it is growing out of this small problem hence new leaves look ok but wether this will be an on going problem or not waits to be seen Either way add cal mag suplement to RO water or amend soil accordingly. Even with amended soil my plants need more than it provides, weed is a cal/mag hungry plant needing a 10:1 calcium magnesium in veg and 3:1 calcium magnesium ratio in flower or so 'Sensi Nutrients' like to say.

Organic ferts have very little cal/mag as oppose to synthetic ferts which are easier to add cal/mag and generally do. Some companies recognise this and some dont. To me leaf cupping and purple stems are somthing to keep an eye on. Peace

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Did you even read my post? I didn't say it's had a deficiency~!

blindguardian...to much N...did u flush her yet? i would before you start with the bloom nutes.