Top-Dressed for Flower, Leaves Look Burned and Crunchy

A

Absolem The Blue

Member
Hello everyone. I'll try to keep this short and sweet.

At around Week 3 of flower here. All organic, peat based mix. In the original mix I had peat, compost, perlite, EWC, kelp meal, fish bone meal, fish meal, shrimp & crab meal, gypsum, oyster shell flour, and glacial rock dust. She was growing wonderfully through veg. Switched to 12/12, and towards the end of the stretch (about a week or two) I had a couple yellowing fan leaves that were falling off. No big deal, as the flowering phase is beginning. These leaves were soft and yellow, no spots or warning signs on them. The only other thing I noticed was the dark green color beginning to lighten across the whole plant. Seeing as it was getting into flower, I didn't think much of it.

I decided to top dress in some fertilizers to keep her happy during flower. She's in a 16 quart container, and I threw in a handful of Neem seed meal and alfalfa meal, and covered the surface of the soil (not sure on measurements, I think I used a few tablespoons worth of each). Then, I top dressed with EWC, added 3 or 4 tablespoons of kelp meal, a couple tablespoons of gypsum, and 3 tablespoons of Espoma's Tomato Tone. I spread it evenly across the soil surface and mixed it into the top inch or two.

Information on Espoma's Tomato Tone (3-4-6):

Total Nitrogen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.0%
0.2%. . . . Ammoniacal Nitrogen
0.7%. . . . Water Soluble Nitrogen
2.1%. . . . Water Insoluble Nitrogen
Available Phosphate (P2O5) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.0%
Soluble Potash (K2O). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.0%
Calcium (Ca) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.0%
Sulfur (S). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.0%

Derived from: Hydrolyzed Feather Meal, Pasteurized Poultry Manure, Bone Meal, Alfalfa Meal, Greensand, Humates, Sulfate of Potash, and Gypsum.
*Contains 2.1% Slow Release Nitrogen.


Moving on..

It's been about a week since I top dressed. I water every 3 or 4 days, and I do not overwater - I usually stop before even a small trickle runs out of the container. Yesterday I opened the cab to see what looks like a nearly dead plant. The bud sites are still relatively okay. But nearly every leaf on the plant is suddenly crunchy, even the one's that are still green. There are yellow leaves showing necrosis, leaves that have crumpled up, leaf tips that go upwards, leaf tips that go downwards - everything is all over the place, and this seemed to happen rather quickly. Either there was ongoing problem already in the works, or I used too much fertilizers.

I was so happy with how she was coming along, now I'm not even sure if she's going to make it. What do you guys take of it, and what do you suggest, if anything?

Thanks everyone.
 

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Dr.Botany

Dr.Botany

Well-Known Member
Haha i think it might just be over fertilization??
I would just water for right now seeing how you got most of what she needs already in the compost, but id just leave her be for a while and see what she does. Sometimes less is more
 
cindysid

cindysid

Well-Known Member
I also think you overdid it on the fertilizer. I would suggest flushing, but it might make it worse. Remove the worst looking leaves. The ones that are totally crunchy or totally collapsed won't do anything to help the plant anyway. The prognosis isn't good.
 
Johnei

Johnei

Well-Known Member
Complete nutrient lockout from too much nuitrients and fried. Look at the size of that plant and let me recap what you've done...

First, for that little plant in that little pot, the soil contains:

compost, EWC, kelp meal, fish bone meal, fish meal, shrimp & crab meal, gypsum, oyster shell flour, and glacial rock dust.

And then you added unmeasured handfuls of neem seed meal, alfalfa meal more EWC more kelp meal, gypsum, and a complete nutrient Espoma Tomato Tone.

Do you see where this is going.....

for that size plant... in that little pot.. nuts.

and sry buddy, you are overwatering, I can see. on top of everything else.


Your best bet would be carefully get her out of there and scratch away as much old soil as possible and just put her in a 1gal pot with just peat moss, 2cups of perlite, 1 cup of worm castings, and 1TBSP of dolomite powder. that's it and clean waterings until you see new healthy growth again.

Good luck.


(and 1teaspoon of glacial rock dust, I forgot.)
 
Johnei

Johnei

Well-Known Member
You will definitely fuck up your yeild, it's already fucked, so either can do wht i said and get something, wont be much but plant will survive, or just start again, it's kind of really bad.
 
A

Absolem The Blue

Member
It's been a few years since I've had one going, the whole "less is more" thing totally slipped my mind and I just followed the application rates on the bags like I do for my vegetables like a jackass. Sucks.

Hey Johnei, given the size of my cab, low but wide containers work better, which is why I don't have regular pots but a 16 qt storage container instead. Given the size of the container, are you suggesting (next time) I just stick with peat, good compost, EWC, dolomite (oyster shell flour here), and rock dust? I don't think having the kelp, alfalfa, etc. in there is too much (the amount of them that I used on the other hand..), then again I'm the one that just killed it.

Meanwhile my tomato plants are 8 feet tall. I wish I could just stick the damn thing outside in the ground.

Watch my next plant will end up being a male.
 
Johnei

Johnei

Well-Known Member
adding the alfalfa especially needs soil composting time to be broken down into 'smoother' forms for plant root uptake, if you just mix up a soil with alfalfa you will most likely burn anything you put in there. Need microbial/enzymatic digestion action down there. Same with Kelp Meal, except the problem with the kelp meal is not that is will burn, it just takes a while to actually be available to the plants, so again, needs soil composting time letting the soil 'bake' sitting in a rubbermaid or something like that. moist not soggy oversoaked, and few small drilled holes in the container for air flow so bad anaerobic shit doesn't grow in too low oxygen conditions in there.

If you prepare the soil properly min. 2 weeks composting, 1month+ much better, the longer the better and more nutrients will be available in non-burning forms for uptake, then alfalfa and kelp meal are fabulous ammendments, the best, and i use them as well. Oyster shell does work, but if you dont want Mg issues, dolomite works well in a peat based mix, I'd use a bit of both. dolomite p[owdered form, not pellets. pellets take too long to do their thing.

(If you compost the soil beforehand, you can add all kinds of ammendments that will create a very rich, and non-burning slow long release of NPK Ca Mg and all trace minerals, that you'll never have to pH.)

(Rock dusts, glacial rock dust or azomite type products are fabulous as well, no real risk of burning with those. less is more.)
 
Johnei

Johnei

Well-Known Member
If you were to transplant that plant, and while doing it clean off as much old soil as possible, then put it in that light mix with only mainly EWC and rock dusts and dolomite for pH stabilization, in a new fresh soil slightly bigger pot, it will survive provided you dont overwater it or add or do anything crazy to it. And if the transplant doesn't shock the crap out of it.
 
A

Absolem The Blue

Member
Johnei said:
adding the alfalfa especially needs soil composting time to be broken down into 'smoother' forms for plant root uptake, if you just mix up a soil with alfalfa you will most likely burn anything you put in there. Need microbial/enzymatic digestion action down there. Same with Kelp Meal, except the problem with the kelp meal is not that is will burn, it just takes a while to actually be available to the plants, so again, needs soil composting time letting the soil 'bake' sitting in a rubbermaid or something like that. moist not soggy oversoaked, and few small drilled holes in the container for air flow so bad anaerobic shit doesn't grow in too low oxygen conditions in there.

If you prepare the soil properly min. 2 weeks composting, 1month+ much better, the longer the better and more nutrients will be available in non-burning forms for uptake, then alfalfa and kelp meal are fabulous ammendments, the best, and i use them as well. Oyster shell does work, but if you dont want Mg issues, dolomite works well in a peat based mix, I'd use a bit of both. dolomite p[owdered form, not pellets. pellets take too long to do their thing.

(If you compost the soil beforehand, you can add all kinds of ammendments that will create a very rich, and non-burning slow long release of NPK Ca Mg and all trace minerals, that you'll never have to pH.)

(Rock dusts, glacial rock dust or azomite type products are fabulous as well, no real risk of burning with those. less is more.)
Click to expand...

Yes I'm familiar with cycling the soil - burned seedlings by not following those rules years ago. I did the same with my veggie garden, let it sit about 3 weeks after mixing in all of the above stuff. I guess I just didn't think the alfalfa would burn it like it did. Lesson learned. I need to treat Mary the same way I treat the tomatoes and peppers. Every time, I treat her like she's this mysterious plant from outer space that needs extra shit all the time, instead of just primarily giving her what she needs and leaving her alone.

It's a small plant, and I wasn't expecting to get a huge yield from it. If I could at least save a few colas from it, I would be extremely happy. However, I realize it isn't looking too well at the moment. I will try to get her out of there and into something "cooler." Appreciate your responses, sir.
 
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