Yellowing seedlings

[Tom Bombadil]

Do you recommend testing soil pH? Seeing the high pH runoff seemed like a reasonable explanation for my apparent nute lockout/hungry plants. I’ve been researching since posting, and I’ve certainly seen not to aggressively “chase” runoff numbers, but then how do I “fix” my clearly-not-thriving plants? I’ve been very consistent with pHing every drop that goes in at 6.3-6.5.

as a last ditch attempt to salvage these,
Ide water the entire pots with some worm casting tea if i was in the position..and keep them evenly moist after that..
the soil needs to break down asap and it cant if its dry. Odds are you will have to start over in a different soil.. that stuff isnt good.

GL!

 

[LearningMore]

That is all you can really do at this point. Without lab equipment there is no way to know what is in the pot. You may read run-off at 600 PPM but what is the make-up of that PPM 500 Nitrogen 50 Phosphorus 50 Potassium, or 50 Nitrogen 400 Phosphorus 150 Potassium?????????????????

A good tool to read the PH in the root zone is a Accurate 8 Soil probe. It is a good tool and can be useful. Do not buy cheap ones as the do not work and of course there are better ones that cost more. I do not think your problem has anything to do with PH. Soil normally runs 6.4 to 7 PH. Your lock-out is from too much of something.

View attachment 1294076

Just plain water. If they do not pull out of it in a week dump that soil and get something made for cannabis.

HF purchased today. Will keep watering-only and give them a week. Thanks.

 

[LearningMore]

as a last ditch attempt to salvage these,
Ide water the entire pots with some worm casting tea if i was in the position..and keep them evenly moist after that..
the soil needs to break down asap and it cant if its dry.

GL!

I’ll be sure not to let it get dry. I have trio and boomerang, but no worm-casting tea. Will focus on adequate hydration for now. Thank you.

 

[Mañ'O'Green]

as a last ditch attempt to salvage these,
Ide water the entire pots with some worm casting tea if i was in the position..and keep them evenly moist after that..
the soil needs to break down asap and it cant if its dry. Odds are you will have to start over in a different soil.. that stuff isnt good.

GL!

@Tom Bombadil what indicates the need for more nutrients? The plants are burning up now!

 

[Tom Bombadil]

HF purchased today. Will keep watering-only and give them a week. Thanks.

Good top dress that wont hurt your plants:

BuildASoil Craft Blend - Nutrient Pack

BuildASoil Craft Blend started with a big workshop full of the best and cleanest soil amendments available. I quickly became spoiled and would use all of the BuildASoil ingredients together and in different combinations that aren't available here online. After discussing re-amending with a...

buildasoil.com

Build-A-Flower Top Dress Kit

Build-A-Flower is available again!!. Malibu Compost is delayed in reaching us, causing production delays on the Build-A-Flower, so the recipe is changing. The product page still states the old recipe, but will be updated soon. We thank you for your patience, understanding and choosing...

buildasoil.com

You can use these two items alone and do pretty well. Ide mix a little build a flower right into the happy frog at the start and maybe some rice hulls or perlite or pumice for aeration ...then at 3-4 weeks start top dressing with both every couple weeks. probably at 2 parts build a flower to 1 part craft blend tops... Water with purified water and some mollases every other watering at 1 tbsp per gallon. Keep pots hydrated as evenly as possible.


Cover the top of you pots with a layer of this straw so the top dressing stays hydrated so it can break down as needed:

Barley Straw Mulch

Wondering where to buy straw mulch? Organic Barley Straw for sale at BuildASoil is mulch ready. Get ready to Mulch with Straw.

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Viola!, buds galore.

 

[Tom Bombadil]

@Tom Bombadil what indicates the need for more nutrients? The plants are burning up now!

it wont matter.. once the roots reach into new soil around the edges the problem starts again.. its an emergency solution to a dire situation.. If they pull through and adapt it could work.. albeit unlikely.. Seems he would have to do a traumatic transplant into new soil to remedy this.. which is possible, but not worth the time and subsequent lack luster harvest... Ive had this happen before and had to soak the pot and pull the whole root system out, rinse them and transplant into new soil... but that was with photos i could veg as long as I needed to.. Not feasible with autos. Its part of the game when youre starting out in organics. My hunch is that this soil has a bunch of unavailable nitrogen in it that needs to break down. Probably way too much.

 

[Bill.de.Cat]

Deffinatly gonna watch which way this goes. Always worked from the don't panic and less is more side of the equation. No matter what in soil it's gonna take some time for improvements to show.

 

[Fitzy]

I would say that the ph u got isn't bad but the ppm is high reguardless of wat nutes are there run off should be a last ditch effort as @Mañ'O'Green said it can make things go further out but I've personally had good luck doing so unless it's a living organic soil but, it is a good idea when using fox farms ocean forest for example to use a seedling mix about the size and depth of a solo cup they will have minimal nutes until roots expand out I've had great results like this as some strains/phenos are way more sensitive to nutes then others so a cautionary approach is best. I ran a soil like you have now I flushed the 1 time adding mammoth microbes and they came back although were stunted I can't say for sure how/why they turned around. I've had pretty good luck making my own soil when I have time/space using 1/3 coco 1/3 top soil 1/3 perlite adding a few handfuls of worm castings then mix well it's a great base to build from and if you want a really good soil base for seedling make those measurements 1/4 instead of 1/3 and with the extra 1/4 that's left use vermicapost this ratio can be used per pot or large batch and works well. When using the new ffof soil don't feed to early as they should be able to go till week 3 or 4 post a journal and tag us there are many good ways to grow just need to find wat works best for you also get a note book and rite down as much information as you can so you can look back to see wat works wat doesn't ect it will help keep track of everything.

 

[LearningMore]

@Mañ'O'Green , @Fitzy , @Tom Bombadil @Bill.de.Cat
Update: After reading everyone’s input, and reflecting on what I was seeing, I decided to do a “heavy watering” of plain (filtered) water, pH 6.0: low enough to maybe counteract the apparently-elevated soil pH, but not too drastic to shock the little buggers. I got a little runoff, but not enough that I flushed out too much of the “good stuff” (I hope...). All pots’ runoff pH was a bit over 7, but not as high as with the 6.5 water.

We’re now a couple days later and I see SUBSTANTIVE GROWTH! The first morning, I thought they looked perkier and I swear they had brown, but I couldn’t tell from the “before” pics. So, I measured the tip-to-tip length of the top leaves on a couple. 24 hours later: 1/4” greater diameter! Color seems to be darkening a bit, too (not the cannibalized lowest leaves, of course).

I really appreciate everyone’s help. I have a strong science-based education, so I try to really understand both data and processes. Everyone’s input and discussion really helped me process the situation so much better. I am going to try to save this grow (feeling much more hopeful now), but I still won’t use this soil line ever again. Happy Frog is all set for the next run.

Thanks again.

 

[Experimentgreen]

Plants are 22 days above ground. In big-box potting soil (Kellogg organic potting soil) + 30% perlite. Under HLG 600Rspec at lowest dimmer setting, 24” height, lux ~7200 (20/4). Temps low 70s; humidity 65-73 or so. Watered 5 days ago with 1/2tsp Recharge per gallon (pH 6.4, filtered tap water TDS 150). Have been checking dryness of upper soil/weight of bags and watered 500ml each again today, just before pic. Lower leaves seem to be yellowing, and some feel a bit dry (not quite crunchy). Are the plants telling me I waited too long to water? Time to start nutes? (I have trio, and read to use 1/4 strength starting around 3-4 weeks?). Something else wrong?

I will be spacing these plants out to a second 4x4 tent once (if!) they get bigger. Any suggestions appreciated as this is my first grow.

If you're 22 days in I'd start the ff micro &grow at 1/4 strength.