Soil To Coco?

Hey guys I am having some problems starting seedling in coco. I killed 8 autoflower seedlings not sure how? Not over watered they are in solo cups under T5 lighting. The coco was pre buffed and washed mixed it with PL. Ph water was all good so not sure why they wouldn't grow. They will get a inch or 2 tall stop growing and turn yellow/brown.

I have always started seedlings in soil with no issues for years now!

I was wondering if i could grow the seedlings in solo cups of soil and move them to the 15lt pots once they get big and some root mass?

Will the soil be a issue setting in the coco?

How many sets of leaves if any were they getting before turning yellow/brown and dying?

Does your coco have any nutrients mixed into it?

Seedlings do not need nutrients until after their first set of true leaves, however unlike soil, coco needs nutrients provided to it.

You should start them on a low feeding and work your way up.

The risk of starting in soil and then going to coco, is that most soil contains fertilizer and coco needs nutrients added to it, this could cause imbalances and overloads of nutrients to your plant.

Lost Species said:

How many sets of leaves if any were they getting before turning yellow/brown and dying?

Does your coco have any nutrients mixed into it?

Seedlings do not need nutrients until after their first set of true leaves, however unlike soil, coco needs nutrients provided to it.

You should start them on a low feeding and work your way up.

The risk of starting in soil and then going to coco, is that most soil contains fertilizer and coco needs nutrients added to it, this could cause imbalances and overloads of nutrients to your plant.

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They had 1st set of leaves and could see the second set starting.

My coco has no nutes mixed into it. and i am not adding any nutes just ph water.

I didn't think I was suppose to feed untell the plants got alot bigger?

I have Advanced Nutes grow/micro/bloom and also have calmag

Where did you get the seeds, what strains?

How much perlite in your coco? What is the pH of the run off? Was your coco buffered? If not, did you do any rinsing or pre-charging? Were you using a humidity dome?

I use a 70/30 coco/perlite mix and start feeding 1/4 strength nutes pH'd to 6.0 every day to run off from the day it sprouts.

ChronBonz said:

Where did you get the seeds, what strains?

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I got the seeds from cropkingseeds White Widow Auto and Northern Lights Auto

MickFoster said:

How much perlite in your coco? What is the pH of the run off? Was your coco buffered? If not, did you do any rinsing or pre-charging? Were you using a humidity dome?

I use a 70/30 coco/perlite mix and start feeding 1/4 strength nutes pH'd to 6.0 every day to run off from the day it sprouts.

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I am doing around a 70/30 mix run offs are 6.1 ph. Coco was buffed. Not using any domes

speed420 said:

They had 1st set of leaves and could see the second set starting.

My coco has no nutes mixed into it. and i am not adding any nutes just ph water.

I didn't think I was suppose to feed untell the plants got alot bigger?

I have Advanced Nutes grow/micro/bloom and also have calmag

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I forgot to ask about the coco, but I assumed you were using a coco that came properly prewashed and free of the salts that some brands come with that need hours or washing?

I think it's fine to feed from the first set of serrated leaves, but by experimenting, you'll find what works best for you and your plants.

I don't know much about cropking, but a quick search reveals that they are garbage in my opinion.

Eitherway I recommend sticking with reputable seedbanks like attitude and reputable breeders.

coco is buffed and pre washed. maybe its because i am not giving any nutes? Or maybe I am overwatering? I am using solo cups the red ones with tons of holes in them i dont give them much water maybe once every 2 or 3 days. I dont even water tell run offs because scared to overwater them

Coco has a lot better aeration than soil, which means that the coco holds more oxygen.
A mix of coco and perlite is much harder to over water than soil

It seems as though maybe the watering practices could be contributing.

Watering the solo cups until run off before putting the seed in, should provide enough water until the seed gets up and running - first set of leaves.

This way no need to water them again or worry about the cup drying out before the seed sprouts.

After that, once the coco starts to lose moisture - not dry up to the extent of soil, but not completely wet (around 50%)
you can water again.

As for nutes at the beginning, if you have seeds to play with, you can do a side by side and see which works best for you:
One soaked with 1/4 nutrients and one with plain water.

speed420 said:

coco is buffed and pre washed. maybe its because i am not giving any nutes? Or maybe I am overwatering? I am using solo cups the red ones with tons of holes in them i dont give them much water maybe once every 2 or 3 days. I dont even water tell run offs because scared to overwater them

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If you have a 70/30 coco/perlite mix like you claim, then it's impossible to over water in a solo cup. And you should always feed to run off - it refreshes the nutes, pulls in fresh oxygen to the roots, and prevents salt build up. As mentioned in an earlier post - I feed 1/4 strength nutes daily to run off as soon as it sprouts, and have never had a problem, and been doing it for years. Good luck.

Coco is inert. You starved them. You can feed 1/8 - 1/4 strength from the very start. I don't advise to a new grower, but I've even done full strength nutes less than a week from sprout. Feed your babies

Definitely just starved them...grab some compost and worm poop and cut it to equal parts of coco, perlite, and the compost/castings...a little bit of kelp meal wouldnt hurt...or just start your seeds in a potting mix like Gardner & Bloome

You definitely can start seeds in small containers of soil and move to coco. I do it all the time because I've had issues starting seeds in coco as well. Now I start them in small nursery pots of a homemade seed starting mix and am at close to 100% germination. I start them in smaller containers than solo cups. I like the small square nursery pots that are 2.5" x2.5" x 4" deep. I wait until the roots are coming out the holes on the bottom and then transplant into 3 gallon fabric pots of 100% coco. The small amount of soil doesn't effect anything. A solo cup is probably more soil than you would want.

There are numerous reasons why seedlings die off. Over watering and use of domes can lead to dampening off.

These are the size pots I'm talking about.

IIReignManII said:

Definitely just starved them...grab some compost and worm poop and cut it to equal parts of coco, perlite, and the compost/castings...a little bit of kelp meal wouldnt hurt...or just start your seeds in a potting mix like Gardner & Bloome

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I use promix, worm castings, and a little vermiculite. Works like a charm, isn't too hot, and has enough nutrients to last for the seedling to put on a couple sets of leaves.

xtsho said:

I use promix, worm castings, and a little vermiculite. Works like a charm, isn't too hot, and has enough nutrients to last for the seedling to put on a couple sets of leaves.

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I had an issue with one of my plants because I tried to pot it from its cup into a 1 gallon bag of just castings, perlite and coco.. I may have banged the roots up a little bit trying to get it out of the cup...it wilted and drooped pretty bad but once it started getting lighter in color I figured it needed more nutes. Mixed up a teaspoon (or maybe a tablespoon I dont really remember lmao) each of what I had, alfalfa, blood, bone, kelp, and some oregonism XL and topdressed it in...bounced right back after a couple days