Cheatp Ph pen vs BlueLab Guardian

Update...

Not sure what's going on with my plant. Probably because of the whole mess up of pH over night due to bluelabs malfunctioning, but can anyone give me advice on what to do? The plant is no longer droopy. But it's damaged leaves are getting worse and worse even though the pH is correct at 5.8

The smaller orange looking dots were there BEFORE the pH mess up.. But it got worse after the pH mess up. The other discolourations are new...

And... The plant is 1 month and 2 weeks old blackberry gum auto. Doesn't it look too small?
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I have struggled with a stable pH quite a bit. In my experience after a big swing in pH you are going to get those spots on the leaves for a couple days. Not all the leaves but a few.
 
If you use pH indicator drops then you never need worry about calibration again. Yellow = 6, slightly greenish/yellow = 6.2; slightly reddish/yellow 5.8. what's not to like? This is more intuitive than reading numbers as well, you get a better feel for what's going on.
 
Update...

Not sure what's going on with my plant. Probably because of the whole mess up of pH over night due to bluelabs malfunctioning, but can anyone give me advice on what to do? The plant is no longer droopy. But it's damaged leaves are getting worse and worse even though the pH is correct at 5.8

The smaller orange looking dots were there BEFORE the pH mess up.. But it got worse after the pH mess up. The other discolourations are new...

And... The plant is 1 month and 2 weeks old blackberry gum auto. Doesn't it look too small?
View attachment 1301566

Doesn't look too bad, nothing unusual about getting a few early leaves with those type of spots. Yes, for 6+ weeks she does look a bit small.
 
If you use pH indicator drops then you never need worry about calibration again. Yellow = 6, slightly greenish/yellow = 6.2; slightly reddish/yellow 5.8. what's not to like? This is more intuitive than reading numbers as well, you get a better feel for what's going on.
That’s always my backup. If I ever question my pens reading I pull out the old school.
 
That’s always my backup. If I ever question my pens reading I pull out the old school.

Exactly that's like using your Ferrari to go shopping and having backup Range Rover when it breaks down, just use the range rover and be done with it. You'd never use a pH pen to check the accuracy of the indicator fluid!. For me it's all about simplicity and peace of mind and getting out of the rabbit hole, by whatever means possible.

Any time you get a sudden anomalous reading you have to double check by rechecking the calibration on the pH meter, so it sort of defeats the purpose. Plus you can't even keep the pH buffer for long because it goes mouldy. If you get a sudden pH shift with the indicator drops or it's going the opposite way that you expect, you never suspect the indicator drops so you have immediate knowledge. With a pen, you always have doubts.
 
This is what I did, coming from a background is colour laboratories and colour printing I am very aware of nuances of tint, and the human eye though is quite sensitive to tiny shifts in colour even under LED... Mix up some 5.8, 6 and 6.2 solutions of water or more. You use a calibrated pen for this. This was good enough for me, I would then use the drops and then test myself against the pen, I did this for a few months until the pen stopped working by which time I was pretty confident I could get within a .1 pH and more often than not spot on. Which is all you ever need because in a normal grow you're going to have a bit of drift.

So in effect, instead of using buffers to calibrate the pen, and then running to check the recalibration all the time, you instead use the pen to calibrate your brain to the colour of the pH tint. Once you've done that it's permanent, you never have to recalibrate or check your brain again. It become so much second nature that as soon as the drop hits the test tube you know, it doesn't even need to mix, because when the drop hits the nutrient it's immediately a dark orange and there's some dark green swirled in in a concentrated blob like ink. After a while just how that looks is enough. Although of course you do always mix it. You can see where I'm going with this, it's actually fun to use the indicator drops, and unnecessary not fun work, to use the pen.

You can make up little indicator drop games, you have a glass of pH 4 water, and a glass of dilute ph Up and Down. How quickly can you get it to a 6.3 using the indicator drops. It's very satisfying to see the tint and feel the pH rather than see meaningless numbers.

I should mention at this stage that I would stay well away from any kind of indicator strip, or stick. Drops only.
 
Plant is getting worse by day.. pH is at 5.8 and drifts to 5.6 each morning... any suggestions?

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correct me if im wrong.. but i think it appears to be calcium excess... i was tld to add 50ppm of calmag every watering.. but maybe thats wrong?

i use DutchPro Cal-Mag, which on the website says "N-P-K: 5 - 0,1 - 0,1"

This is how much cal-mag is in my local tap water. should i have added cal mag? do i REALLY need it?

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every plant i grow seems to have THIS exact browning/redding/oranging issue. and EVERYTIME people say its cal mag defic... but when i add more..it doesnt rectify the issue.. so maybe.. it is EXCESS of calcium thus calcium toxicity...?
 
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