HELP - 1st time growing in DWC = Multiple mixed signals issues.

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labomba

labomba

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Good day Y'all.
About 4 weeks ago I've started growing in DWC and so far, pretty much nothing has worked as expected.
I have germinated 5 seeds with few days difference in between them just so I could correct issues that showed up on the first plants, all of them went on serious issues within the first 2 weeks, my last seedling came out decent but now is experiencing necrosis, tip curl and few burn. So for I will focus on the last one for now.

For starters, the set up:
Light: 2x Samsung LM301H 3500k +660nm +UV +IR (measuring by lux where the sun is 80k, ive started them out at 12k lux and slowlay increased to what is around 20-22k)
Water: Tap aired out coming out at around 130ppm
Temperature: 21 - 26 c
5gl Buckets (only 3.5 filled)
PPM: set at around 480 (2ml cal/mag + 7.5 GHmicro (Hardwater) + 15 GHbloom (Lucas))
Humidity always around 50-60%
PH: checked daily and kept on the 5.6 - 6.1 range, very rarely drifiting and needing adjustment.
Some H202 added and rez change recently as some slime showed up.
Clay pebbles and rockwool medium
Plenty of bubbles 24/7
2-3" distance from water to net cup

This should cover most of the techs.
Now to the fun part, EVERY plant has showed mixed signs. My first seedlings were germinated and planted in rockwool placed inside a bag for humidity, they developed very slowly. Opposed to my last 2 seeds, which had spent 2 weeks in a heated chamber and they sprouted MUCH quicker than the first ones. I've watered them with plain water for start and after couple set of fan leaves showed up, I started watering the rockwools with a solution around 400ppm (140 from tap) but only around 20mls of solution to each plant.

They all look okay until they are put into their buckets.
My first ones after only couple of days starting showing signs of what it seems to be overwatering, Very pale, broopy leaves and some tip burns that are eating the plant from bottom up, which tells me could be some sort of deficiency, but I don't think they would be showing deficiencies within couple of weeks of sprouting, its got to be something else. Overfeeding? possible, but Im going very conservative on nutes, even flushed one of them and introduced to a 350ppm but there was no development.
Since i've increased lights, ppm's are increasing, but I believe its from evaporation rather than a tiny plant with couple leaves leeching 50+ ppm within 24 hours.

1650804451220.png
1650804479316.png


This one is my #4, was the best looking but started showing brown spots, looking like necrosis, leafes turning yellow and a slight tip burn with it curling up, the new leaves growing don't look bad but my guess is that they will be soon.

This one and my previous ones, were all in the same environment and taking pretty much similar feeding and etc...
But the issues the previous ones showed were much severe, from week 2 leaves were dying, deformed, no coloration at all, despite having a nice long root string already in water. Ill post couple of their pictures as I think despite looking different, the issues are stemming from the same trigger, which i can't pinpoint.



This here is #1 and #2, #1 roots hit water pretty quickly and they are just over a week older than 4# but they never actually got to grow, very stunted with.... well you can see the pictures:
1650804829168.png
Help   1st time growing in dwc  multiple mixed signals issues 4



Can anyone help pinpoint an issue here?
I'm very suspect of my tap water (140ppm) but i've seen people using much worse stuff and not getting into problems as early as i did. I did however ordered an RO system which won't be here for another 2 weeks.
I live at an odd spot in Europe and much of the water used here is from rain collection/ RO or desalination.

I have no idea of calcium or mg levels, just that ppm is always around 120-150. I haven't fed the first one no calmag at all and they all ran into problems, added a bit of cal mag to them but it surely did not help.

#4 looks a lot like a phosprus deficiency but again, im unsure this should be happening at this age especially using Lucas Formula, there should be plenty of it. A consideration is that calcium and phosphorus act together inside a plant, so maybe an imbalance there?

At this point i can't even pinpoint if its a mobile or immobile nute doing this as the first plants showed issues from the bottom up wheres my #4 the issues were more porminent in the younger set of leaves.
As a fact ill only keep the #4 for now, as looks it can be saved, but with the others since they will die i can use for experiments to try narrow down my issue.
 
theNedster

theNedster

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Yes. the solution needs to touch the bottom of those net cups. Shoot for 6.0 on you PH. Lower than that is too low IMO unless you are using rockwool as your medium.
 
labomba

labomba

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Yes, rockwool is the medium. Touching water into the netcups might drown the plants? Im guessing water level isn't the issue since roots are already in with a nice breathing gap.
I would love if someone could elighten me on the firs 3-4 weeks veg issues especifically since im sure some deficiencies sus can be discarded due to plants being very young or some toxicites may be more likely at this age.

Cashmeh

thanks for fast reply:


This is the ''good'' one #4, others have roots but not half as long or think as these.
I did have problem with slime couple days ago, which treated with 15ml h202 and a res change. The issues i've ran into far outdate the slime tho.
 
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Cashmeh

Cashmeh

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For sure a nutrient uptake issue. Question is it caused by the root rot your combating, or impropper mixing of nutrients.

Idk what jacks321 is but since you have calmag, flora micro grow and blooms. . I'd calmag ur tapwater to 250. Then add equal ratios of micro grow and bloom to 600ppm. This assures you are giving it what it needs. The transition blend aka equal ratios is great for troubleshooting.

As for overfeeding i dont see signs of it. The plant looks like its not being fed enough.

What's your water temps?

Also since your blasting them with h202 you might want to look into enzymes. The rot is using your plants nutrients then your blasting it all back into plasma and now the plant cant uptake it.
 
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labomba

labomba

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Thanks again.
It is not the slime combat, because the issues outdate the slime. My water temps were okay up until last week when i've increased lights, they were normally at around or just above 20c, now It seem to have increased to 25-27 C.
Water temp is my next issue to be tackled as I start finding what is wrong at the moment.
Plan is to freeze 2.5L water bottles and change them around daily.

Re nutes, I don't have grow, only micro and bloom which im using at 1:2.
But thanks for the nutes advice. To recap, by taking my 140ppm tap and bumping with calmag to 250, then adding 1: GHMicro hardwater to 2: Bloom? or should i keep 1:1 micro to bloom?

On my #1 I've considered being underfeeding and last week i've bumped its feeding to something very similar to what you've recommended.
It had 7.5 micro, 15 bloom and 14 cal mag in total (for 3.5 Gl), but if anything it made worse. and I've had it flushed one or two days after.
 
Cashmeh

Cashmeh

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To keep your temps down make sure your air pump is outside the room in a cool area. It will chill the water. You can also wrap a bath towel around your bucket for insulation. Both are quick and easy methods. Most people who grow using sterile methods run a chiller and keep their temps at 68.

Id recommend using hydroguard instead of h202 since its cheaper than a water chiller.

With both methods you can fully submerge your rockwool once enough have broken through. Your air gap since your not chilled is pretty warm. So in my eyes I see just a little bit of root mass under water, then those nutrients have to travel up through a hot zone with slime and h202 attacking the roots. I would dunk them. Ive been on rdwc for over a year and i never leave an air gap. Not to mention rockwool is not suppose to be used as wicking. The unused nutrients that travel up it get trapped. The ppms in the cube will become higher overtime if its not submerged in mixing water.

As for your nutrient blend. . i cant really aid on that. You need someone like runs sterile systems, but they wont like your water temps.

If I were at your spot i would be using .7ml per gallon of micro grow and bloom. And 1.1ml of calmag per gallon. Idk how you can grow in veg using the trio series without the grow bottle. The grow bottle is what you should be using the most of right now and you say you dont have it. Again i dont understand how jacks 321 works, but I thought it used epsom salt and was for coco methods. Most hydro nutrients are not as thick.

Again I hope something I said aids you. Give it time and im sure others will help.
 
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Cashmeh

Cashmeh

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Lets me add that when i say your not overfeeding it i can tell due to the color of your stems. Generally the stalks become dark red or even purple when overfeeding. That light green is perfect in my eyes. Which is also why I say its lacking nutrients. Id say whatever is in the grow blend your not using is what its missing. I use testing equipment to test npk levels individually. My batches last the entire grow without dumping any and no res changes. Yet i use hydroguard and not the h202. All cell walls intact. . no enzymes needed lol. . anyways thats alot to take in
 
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Cashmeh

Cashmeh

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@PK1 get this guy on the correct sterile path without a chiller plz
 
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labomba

labomba

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Can't thank you enough for that.
Dropping Grow seems to be very common, its a a simple Lucas formula where you compensate the grow with more bloom since their composition is similar, it is a very simplified schedule that should work everytime (tho it's not going to push you to 100% eff. but it will keep things simple with no room for mistakes, that was the reason i've chosen it, i just wanted something simple that worked Im not looking to produce a hulk on my first try).

Regarding Hydroguard, as i've mentioned I live in an odd EU spot, its not easy to get quality or american stuff over here, but i can order it from German / UK Markets i suppose (any reliable substitutes easily found on EU market?). Hydro guard and benef. bacteria is something i've been looking into as it was hiighly recommended for slime, and yes you are right h202 killing the good guys is something i've heard a lot, i've only used 3.5ml per gallon and it cleared brown spots within couple hours. couple days after, still looking good and growing.

Now to the interesting part, for these last 20 days i've spent hours reading evey thread on related issues, you would be amazed how many people has ran into similar issues, and LARGE part of them were with GH (either Lucas or Trio), threads all died before the owner came back with more clarity, with my RO water arriving, Im surely gonna test a GH vs Canna in two different plants and see if shine a bit of light for me, Im not discarding being the GH nutes not matching something on my tap.

Quality of rockwool/ hydroton also not discarded as i don't expect them to be top quality.
Seems some growers are using only a tiny bit of rockwool or planting straight into hydroton, this is something im tempted to try, to see how it goes by removing the rockwool outta equation.

Couple more spicific question for experienced dwc.
1 - Whats the earliest age you can run into P or K defficiencies?
2- Assuming this is a cal-mag deff. The new set of leaves only have couple of tiny brown spots, as it develops if the browning keeps spreading and I bump up its cal mag, should the browning stop immediately or how long should you wait to expect development?

I will surely try tweak its cal-mag today or tomorrow as you recommended and update back here.
 
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PK1

PK1

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just to clarify, are you using Jacks321 or General Hydroponics?
GH has three bottles and to me it seems like you arn't even using the grow bottle which is needed. Follow their schedule
@Cashmeh Jack 321 is exactly like Mega Crop.

couple notes based on what i've read.
5Gallon buckets are too small and imo difficult to stabilize it. However, the one picture that was showing the root looked pretty good.
You also mentioned your ph is stable and you don't have to adjust too frequently. Yes, when water levels drop, the acidity and ppm levels will rise. Add some water and your ph will adjust it self while the ppm will drop.

120ppm well or rain water is not bad, but @Aquaman is the guy that can explain water quality better.

another note, there is no point of getting Canna products, while you have GH products. No point to see which plant those what. Your issue is not knowing your water qualities or how to mix your nuts.
The problem is not the type of product you are using.

Water chiller are good, i never used one. I did try the ice bottle but in all honesty with my enzyme i didn't have to worry about that neither.
What i did do is grabbing a 4" airduct and connected it to my AC which was pushing cold air to outside wall of my rez. That made the water temps get around 73f.

To me it looks like your plants have been on a long pause. They aren't up taking anything. 1st figure out your water quality and if you need Cal/Mag. Than understand how to mix the nutrients with the products you have.
 
labomba

labomba

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just to clarify, are you using Jacks321 or General Hydroponics?
GH has three bottles and to me it seems like you arn't even using the grow bottle which is needed. Follow their schedule
@Cashmeh Jack 321 is exactly like Mega Crop.

couple notes based on what i've read.
5Gallon buckets are too small and imo difficult to stabilize it. However, the one picture that was showing the root looked pretty good.
You also mentioned your ph is stable and you don't have to adjust too frequently. Yes, when water levels drop, the acidity and ppm levels will rise. Add some water and your ph will adjust it self while the ppm will drop.

120ppm well or rain water is not bad, but @Aquaman is the guy that can explain water quality better.

another note, there is no point of getting Canna products, while you have GH products. No point to see which plant those what. Your issue is not knowing your water qualities or how to mix your nuts.
The problem is not the type of product you are using.

Water chiller are good, i never used one. I did try the ice bottle but in all honesty with my enzyme i didn't have to worry about that neither.
What i did do is grabbing a 4" airduct and connected it to my AC which was pushing cold air to outside wall of my rez. That made the water temps get around 73f.

To me it looks like your plants have been on a long pause. They aren't up taking anything. 1st figure out your water quality and if you need Cal/Mag. Than understand how to mix the nutrients with the products you have.
Good stuff, Im using these exact two, (Micro Hardwater and Bloom)
1650815810902

On bucket size, i've got two type of buckets, one shorter and wider, and a longer, which feels a lot more stable and easy to handle (the one on root picture), i'll eventually swap the others too.

Re my water, i live in an island surronded by sea, suppliers say its a mix of well and desalinated, spoke to local growers and some said that due to filtering process ther is little cal and mag in the water, which aligns with Cashmeh thoughts, either way, an RO system is arriving in couple of weeks, it will give me a lot more feeding control, but until then my focus will be saving #4, I do think my tap is underpinning the failures despite 140ppm not sounding bad, tho people use 250+ water and don't run into issues as early as I did.
Is it possible that from my 140ppm none of it is actual Cal/Mag?

Re Canna, thanks for the advice, i will get the green bottle and give a go. I must be paranoid thinking its the nutes brand, they are used and proofed extensively.

PK1 what are your enzymes? Summers get to 35/40 c easily in here, plus the lights, i can totally see them black buckets reaching melting point. Good colonies seem a smarter way to fight water temps than manual work, my air pump stay outside tent and there is a fan blowing the tubes and buckets directly to help cooldown but it dont seem enough now let alone further down the road.

Thanks all
 
labomba

labomba

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PS, what size is the rockwool and where in the netpot is it located. Top, middle, bottom of netpot?

This is the exact same rockwool and netpots i've used, held in the height its in. I did not remove the film and you can't see any of it from around the pot, its completely covered in pebbles.There is a couple pebbles layer at the bottom and water level about 2" under netcup
1650817595300
 
PK1

PK1

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in canada its called z7 or usa Z9 enzyme. it';s 2 parts. Never had a single problem with rez
is that rockwool 2inch or bigger? based on the above pictures, something tells me your rockwool is causing problems.
You don't want rockwool to be soaked in the rez water 24/7 from bottom. Rockwool is meant to be fed from top so the imbalance nutrients can drain away when feeding.
 
PK1

PK1

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but don't just go buy products. you should figure the systems you want to run
 
labomba

labomba

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but don't just go buy products. you should figure the systems you want to run
Yeah i got it figured out for Lucas formula 2:1 micro bloom, which should work. But if the issue is seems to be nutrient imbalance i might aswell just buy the third part and go by the manufacturer schedule. I dont want to be wasting money too.

in canada its called z7 or usa Z9 enzyme. it';s 2 parts. Never had a single problem with rez
is that rockwool 2inch or bigger? based on the above pictures, something tells me your rockwool is causing problems.
You don't want rockwool to be soaked in the rez water 24/7 from bottom. Rockwool is meant to be fed from top so the imbalance nutrients can drain away when feeding.
^ This makes a lot of sense to me.
Whats recommended here re the rockwool? Dripper? Top ''feed'' plain water daily? At this point i want to add as few things as possible.
Thanks for the enzyme tip, i will look for it.
 
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PK1

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before you do anything, buy the third bottle and just follow the schedule.
 
labomba

labomba

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before you do anything, buy the third bottle and just follow the schedule.
Noted.
I really do appreciate you all taking your own time and replying. Hopefully i can help back one day.

The rockwool thing got me worried then, it makes sense that the roots pulls minerals bottom up, and all this residues gets stuck in the rockwool, which at this point god knows at what PH and ppm it is sitting at also nutrient uptake will pass through rockwool everytime, and there is not ever a doward flow (but gravity) from rockwool back to solution. Does that sound correct?
 
labomba

labomba

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Suppose this is what you mentioned. Its expensive but it says it only needs .5 ml per Gl so 250ml will last a while. Can't get it right now but might go to UK soon, so will keep in mind.

1650822491079
 
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