Spiked up leaves

Hey folks,

I need your help to diagnose one of my plant. It's RQS northernlights auto 46 days old.

I have started growing couple of plants so far, would say I am a novince grower.

Using 11L fabric pots, filled %50 coco, %20 perlite, %20 worm castings, %10 spagnum moss. On top I put 4gr Mycorrhiza Mix and 25gr easy boost.

I only give them ph balanced (citric acid) avg 6.5ph plain water around 180ppm. I do check run off couple of times monthly, if any pot run off water ph goes beyond 8 or ppm gets higher than 1500, I do flush untill I get desired readings.

Using 4x2 grow tent with bava 240w, PPFD 800, DLI max 55. They are on 6h on 2h off schedule.

Room temp 22-26, RH 70
With this setup I already harvested 2 plants without any issue. But this northern light startted to look spiky. I did some research and conculuded thatmy room temp is high altough I disagree.

Its been almost 40 hours now they sit on temp around 19 and RH 60 but there is no improvement on how it looks.

So question is should I concern about her? Or do you guys think she is ok?

Looks mildly overwatered, leaves are plump and full .

SBBCal said:

Looks mildly overwatered, leaves are plump and full .

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I have flushed them before environment change, soon it will be normal again. But that spiky look was there before they are over watered

groweee said:

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So question is should I concern about her? Or do you guys think she is ok?

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That first picture does look like it has some heat stress with the ways the leaves are curling up. There are also some burnt tips on leaves in the background which could be heat/light or hot nutes. Personally, that plant is pretty well established so I wouldn’t be too freaked if the problem has stabilized and isn’t getting worse. Disclaimer: I’ve only got a few grows under my belt so I’m not an expert.

Ultimately though if you have done something that plausibly addresses a problem you see and it’s not getting worse I think you are better off letting it sit rather than flailing by changing a million things and potentially making it worse.

Room temperature is not too high but there’s obvious heat stress. Try increasing air flow over and under the canopy.

Thanks for the quick replies!

@Fordprefect42 I guess the camera was a bit shaky when I took the pic, indeed there is no burnt leaf on the plant, I defoliated it a lot and up until this stage, it grew super nice. Also, nice tip not to try too many things.

@hotrodharley This may be the reason, I don't have under airflow but pots sit on the mesh, I only added top air flow coming from a small fan. I am using a 10'' extractor fan on low settings. Fresh air comes back and the left bottom of the tent.

Maybe you can comment on my set up?

I don't like the fan pointed down it's blowing the heat down from the light , I would lower the fan to blow across the canopy. Do you have the vents on the bottom of the tent open to pull air in ?

Yes, fresh air comes from the left and back of the tent.
There is a radiator that is close to the left air vent. But I do monitor the air in the tent so far I think I am in a good range.
The plant on right is big bang vegging for 70 days and it is super happy, the left side small plants are the cuttings from her.

The fan was hanging low previously, exactly as you suggest, and first thought it might be wind stress since it was blowing to center, so I rased it.

I will try lowering it down thanks.

try 18/6 why would you do 6 and 2 thats not natures way plus the light is pretty high up do you have a lux meter the farther from the light the more it dissipates exponentially

otherwise what he said about the fan you need one or 2 blowing across the canopy but the setup itself is very nice and clean

groweee said:

Yes, fresh air comes from the left and back of the tent.
There is a radiator that is close to the left air vent. But I do monitor the air in the tent so far I think I am in a good range.
The plant on right is big bang vegging for 70 days and it is super happy, the left side small plants are the cuttings from her.

The fan was hanging low previously, exactly as you suggest, and first thought it might be wind stress since it was blowing to center, so I rased it.

I will try lowering it down thanks.

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wait a minute did you say vegging 70 DAYS ? no offense but they should be a lot bigger for 70 days i think the light is to high

groweee said:

Thanks for the quick replies!

@Fordprefect42 I guess the camera was a bit shaky when I took the pic, indeed there is no burnt leaf on the plant, I defoliated it a lot and up until this stage, it grew super nice. Also, nice tip not to try too many things.

@hotrodharley This may be the reason, I don't have under airflow but pots sit on the mesh, I only added top air flow coming from a small fan. I am using a 10'' extractor fan on low settings. Fresh air comes back and the left bottom of the tent.

Maybe you can comment on my set up?
View attachment 4784077

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What’s the temperature at canopy level? I like the risers.

osowhom said:

wait a minute did you say vegging 70 DAYS ? no offense but they should be a lot bigger for 70 days I think the light is too high

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Thanks for the tips and compliments.
I am not sure about 3x6h vs 18h, I have read a couple of places where people see good results. I can not say much right now. But eventually, I did return to 18h schedule, I will watch my timelapse recordings to see how they will react in the upcoming days. But, either way, it's not the natural Sun spectrum so I don't hesitate to make some experiments. I wouldn't say they grow naturally.

When I posted I have mistyped it as 70 days that was a mistake it was 50 days old, hardly trimmed, and gave birth to 3 clones.
Hope clones will catch up soon and it will be flowering.

I don't have a separate environment for different light schedules and I have not synced flowering times, which made things a bit harder.

hotrodharley said:

What’s the temperature at canopy level? I like the risers.

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I am getting the temp reading from a thermometer that I have double taped to the side of the tent around 120cm high.
Fluctuates between 22-26.

I will post the latest state, where there is some improvement but that looks not fully gone.

I bought the risers from IKEA https://www.ikea.com/nl/en/p/grejig-shoe-rack-40329868/
Cheap, strong, and perfect size.

So far I start to aerate the room better, lower the temp a little as well as humidity.
I have lower the fan away from the lights. Now it blows over the canopy, not on plants

Spiky look got better, but now around the flowers, it started becoming a little bit yellowish if I compare with the clones.
Maybe this is some sort of deficiency. It's strange that I only experience problems/cosmetics on this plant.

groweee said:

Thanks for the tips and compliments.
I am not sure about 3x6h vs 18h, I have read a couple of places where people see good results. I can not say much right now. But eventually, I did return to 18h schedule, I will watch my timelapse recordings to see how they will react in the upcoming days. But, either way, it's not the natural Sun spectrum so I don't hesitate to make some experiments. I wouldn't say they grow naturally.

When I posted I have mistyped it as 70 days that was a mistake it was 50 days old, hardly trimmed, and gave birth to 3 clones.
Hope clones will catch up soon and it will be flowering.

I don't have a separate environment for different light schedules and I have not synced flowering times, which made things a bit harder.

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me neither i have to move my young vegging plants out of the flower room every night and put them in the bathroom under just led light bulbs keeps them growing slow enough that the clones go right into the flower room at harvest time for a 2 week good veg then flip then repeat 4 harvest a year

osowhom said:

try 18/6 why would you do 6 and 2 thats not natures way plus the light is pretty high up do you have a lux meter the farther from the light the more it dissipates exponentially

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Since I have mentioned I have switched to 18/6 and lower my PPFD to 600 from 800 and watched the timelapse videos... Thanks for the tip!

Northern light definitely reacts better to 18/6.
She starts perfectly and at the last couple of hours of the day period, I see that she start dropping I guess this means I would get the same results even with 16/8.
With a 6h x 3 schedule, I see that she does well with the first 6h but with 2h of darkness, she drops suddenly and never be up like 18h.

However big bang and her clones are looking happy both ways.

But that spiky look still exists on Northern light.

groweee said:

Since I have mentioned I have switched to 18/6 and lower my PPFD to 600 from 800 and watched the timelapse videos... Thanks for the tip!

Northern light definitely reacts better to 18/6.
She starts perfectly and at the last couple of hours of the day period, I see that she start dropping I guess this means I would get the same results even with 16/8.
With a 6h x 3 schedule, I see that she does well with the first 6h but with 2h of darkness, she drops suddenly and never be up like 18h.

However big bang and her clones are looking happy both ways.

But that spiky look still exists on Northern light.

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that always happens in the 18th hour they are ready for bed but it is a proven schedule almost a golden rule lol i am a newbie but thats my opinion

So time has passed and she is dying with still spiky leaves

groweee said:

So time has passed and she is dying with still spiky leaves

View attachment 4815078

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She still has a ways to go. Do NOT chop now or you will be very disappointed.