New Grower Mephisto Strawberry Nuggets, 4 Assed Monkey & Fantasmo Express x Sour Stomper

[Mañ'O'Green]

I've returned home to find that they're beginning to take off a little more, but we also have a problem which hopefully someone will be able to help me diagnose.

There are little brown spots appearing on the leaves, the worst of it is on one of the Strawberry Nuggets:

The other SN is looking OK:

4 AM still has it's scraggy leaves but otherwise seems alright and new growth looks a bit healthier:

Not sure what could be causing the issues, all they've had is plain water and a little cal-mag (could that be the culprit?) I've never had any issues this early on, I'm a little stumped.

I just gave them their first proper feed today, hopefully it's just a N def from not giving nutes early enough?

Get a 5000k CFL/LED bulb on the end of an extension cord to take pictures. We need to see true colors for diagnostics.

 

[Froot n Fuel]

mystery spots, eh? seems tough to diagnose when they're young
looks like it started on the first set of true leaves going by the first photo. very early for a deficiency...
slight pH imbalance maybe?

 

[NiceOption]

OK so... here she is in natural light, hopefully that give you all a better idea of what's going on. I've just shot the worst affected plant.

As the new growth looks OK, i thought it was for sure a def in something or other, although in natural light, you can see the new growth isn't perfect. It's a little crinkly and maybe looks like heat stress, but temps, RH and airflow are all good.

On closer inspection, you can see that the perlite has some kind of algae on it, it's going green. I was stumped as to how this could have happened as if anything, they've been kept on the dry side and THEN i saw that the bottle I'd been using to spray them has gone completely green, so I suppose there was something living in there beforehand that is only showing itself now.

So, I'm not sure if this is a fungal problem or indeed a def which I've hopefully now corrected by starting their feeding schedule properly. I'm open to suggestions. if it is a fungal problem, do you think it's something that could be fixed with Neem oil? Or will more drastic measures need to be taken?

 

[NiceOption]

mystery spots, eh? seems tough to diagnose when they're young
looks like it started on the first set of true leaves going by the first photo. very early for a deficiency...
slight pH imbalance maybe?

That was my first thought but I've been keeping tabs on it. They were fine when I left them on Thursday, these appeared very quickly on Saturday when I was back to check on them. My GF didn't notice it whilst I was away, but I'm sure started on Friday.

 

[Froot n Fuel]

well she's keeping up with the other two in terms of growth - that's a good sign.
it's not always so black and white in growing i'm sure, but odd the other two haven't been effected by the suspect water bottle.
latest leaves look good and no sign of stall so you might be good just monitoring. that's what i'd do, but keep in mind i'm a savage living in the dark ages without pH monitoring

 

[NiceOption]

well she's keeping up with the other two in terms of growth - that's a good sign.
it's not always so black and white in growing i'm sure, but odd the other two haven't been effected by the suspect water bottle.
latest leaves look good and no sign of stall so you might be good just monitoring. that's what i'd do, but keep in mind i'm a savage living in the dark ages without pH monitoring

There is a little, but much less on the other Strawberry Nuggets but the 4 Assed Monkey is fine. Yep, growth is equal across all three plants so whatever is going on, although it looks rather dramatic to me, it doesn't seem to be stunting them. I'm at a loss

 

[Froot n Fuel]

wish i was more help...just a soil dweller, me.

@Mañ'O'Green already looking in here so you in good hands
@Slater a pro at coco, might have some wisdom nuggets

don't bash that brick wall too hard, we'll get there

 

[Medimadness]

It's not what you want to see I know lol

I see that the leaves are crinkling and also cupping upwards a little yeah? And also brown spots with yellowing tips and edges a bit?

Because of the way the leaves are crinkling up at the serrated edge inclines me to believe its a light/heat stress issue. Especially since you're an LED user, I've seen it on my first personal grow (and last till now) years ago.

But then that perlite doesn't look great either so who knows.

As @Froot n Fuel said I'm a soil grower too so we'll need some other chimes to ring. Though I do have a pH monitor *bragging rights* it's called non-bleeding reaction test strips and my nan because I'm colourblind

 

[NiceOption]

It's not what you want to see I know lol

I see that the leaves are crinkling and also cupping upwards a little yeah? And also brown spots with yellowing tips and edges a bit?

Because of the way the leaves are crinkling up at the serrated edge inclines me to believe its a light/heat stress issue. Especially since you're an LED user, I've seen it on my first personal grow (and last till now) years ago.

But then that perlite doesn't look great either so who knows.

As @Froot n Fuel said I'm a soil grower too so we'll need some other chimes to ring. Though I do have a pH monitor *bragging rights* it's called non-bleeding reaction test strips and my nan because I'm colourblind

Hey, I'm under HPS not LED but the heat is pretty minimal and the light is only at 400w. I dunno... I've not experienced anything like this before. At this point I don't know what to do other than keep going as I am and hope for the best... As the new growth looks OK I guess I'll just keep on with low nutes and see how she gets on.
I actually don't have a PH meter but have been testing each feed/water before it goes in with liquid PH tester. Hopefully it was a PH error as that's easily corrected. I've done a bit of research on algae and I don't think it would cause this much of a problem and certainly not so quickly but there's not a lot of info on it other than specifically in DWC set ups.

I guess i could raise the light a little and see if that helps... it's driving me nuts!

 

[Slater]

OK so... here she is in natural light, hopefully that give you all a better idea of what's going on. I've just shot the worst affected plant.

As the new growth looks OK, i thought it was for sure a def in something or other, although in natural light, you can see the new growth isn't perfect. It's a little crinkly and maybe looks like heat stress, but temps, RH and airflow are all good.

On closer inspection, you can see that the perlite has some kind of algae on it, it's going green. I was stumped as to how this could have happened as if anything, they've been kept on the dry side and THEN i saw that the bottle I'd been using to spray them has gone completely green, so I suppose there was something living in there beforehand that is only showing itself now.

So, I'm not sure if this is a fungal problem or indeed a def which I've hopefully now corrected by starting their feeding schedule properly. I'm open to suggestions. if it is a fungal problem, do you think it's something that could be fixed with Neem oil? Or will more drastic measures need to be taken?

quick question before I chime in... I'm guessing that is a coco / perlite mix and at what ratio have you mixed it up?