DIY UC plant problems. Bad H2O, Pests or Nutes???

whiskeygirl · Feb 14, 2011

First run in a DIY UC. My plants are about 2.5 weeks into veg in this UC system. They went in at about 5" tall. Roots poked out in just a few days and growth seemed to be taking off. In the last week it seems that alll growth has come to a halt. And just in the past few days the leaves have begun to dry out and crinkle (see pics from today). Root growth has just about stopped. Roots appear crystal white on all plants (this pic makes them look a little brown, but they are white).

We think these plants shoud be twice as tall 2.5 weeks into a UC veg!

Here are the vitals:

100 gallon DIY UC
5.5 inch net pots with Hydroton
Hydrologic RO with sediment prefilter. RO water comes out at 0 PPM. (Well water to start at 240ppm, very hard, stinky, rusty!)
PH in UC stable 6.2
250 PPM DM A & B. Started plants at about 165ppm.
1.5 ml Zone/gallon
Room temp range 75-82
Res temp range 64-68 (chiller)
Humidity range 35-50%

My plants in my Hempy buckets are doing well. We cant seem to figure it out. We are kindof leaning toward our well water. It does go through the RO systems and comes out at 0 ppm.

Or maybe root aphids. We do see a few very small bugs flying around every once in a while. We never see any on the leaves themselves or on the roots.

Has anybody had issues with well water and RO?? Someone said that we may be taking all of the needed nutes out of the water to start??

I dont know??

brd · Feb 14, 2011

Can root aphids live on the roots in the water or only in the net pot where it is just moist. What do they look like can they be seen with the naked eye.

dextr0 · Feb 14, 2011

are u feeding the hempys the same water?

brd · Feb 14, 2011

Yup same water but we have always had issues with young plants.

Smokey503ski · Feb 14, 2011

Wondering how you are adding nutes to the res? Explain this please.

Why I am asking you this is? Nutrients are very fragile to which order you put them in the res. If you just dump them all in and stir them up. That is your problem. Nutrient Fallout.
Most nutes you need to fill up the res half way to 3/4ths with plain water. Add part A, fill up a little more with water. Add part B, fill with more water. Then do the same for your other stuff you add in.
When it comes to adjust the PH, this is where alot of people mess up. And do not realize what they are doing wrong.
When you add any PH up or down. You need to water it down before adding it to your res. I do at least 10 parts water, to 1 part PH up or down. After the res is full with nutes and water, and has had a chance to settle. You then want to add the PH up or down slowly to the res. This might take a half hour or a hour.
By adding the PH slow allows the nutes to settle and buffer the PH. You want to avoid dumping the PH up or down in fast. When pouring the PH in if it clouds up, dump the whole res and start over. If you see clouding in your res while adding the PH, this means you added the PH at the wrong ratio and added it too fast. Leaving Nutrient Fallout.

If I were you, I would dump your res and all water in your system. Follow what I metioned above. I really believe you are adding the Nutes and PH at the wrong times and messing up your res. You cannot fix a res with Nutrien Fallout. Only way is to dump and start over.
Hope my rambling post helps.

dextr0 · Feb 14, 2011

r u feeding them strongly from the get go??...how have ph levels been?

brd · Feb 14, 2011

Smokey thanks for the reply. I have not been that careful. I added Zone first then A then B. We started with nutes the first 10 days at 165 ppm. We started to notice very small dark spots on the older leaves. And some small blotchy lighter colored areas on the leaves. We were not using Cal Mag and we thought we would add that and up the PPM a little. So I put 15 gal of fresh RO water in the top off rez and added 1.5 Zone mixed added part A mixed part B mixed and then enough Magical at half strength to treat the entire 100 gal system. I then let that water enter the system slowly over about four hours.

brd · Feb 14, 2011

dextr0 said:
r u feeding them strongly from the get go??...how have ph levels been?

No I dont think so any ways 2ml per gal of A and B for a total of 160 ppm. Ph has been real steady. I did not use any PH adjuster in the initial system fill and it landed at 6.8 I let it ride like that for a while and brought it down with the top off rez that had only PH down and Zone. I let this drain in slowly and it ultimately only lowered it to 6.5. I let it ride at 6.5 for about 5 or 6 days till I tried to add the cal mag, and up the nute levels to a total ppm of about 260 some of which is cal mag.

dextr0 · Feb 14, 2011

do u see bugs?
Did u wash those rocks good? The brownish red sediment always fucks up my plants growth, Ive learned u have to clean them good. Im just askin.

whiskeygirl · Feb 15, 2011

We are only seeing a very small number of bugs "FLYING" around. We put out a yellow and blue pest stickey cards and have caught maybe 5-10 total on the yellow only. We see no bugs on the plants or in the roots.

Our Hydroton has been washed/rinsed/washed/soaked/rinsed...lol! No matter what you do to that stuff a "little" brown residue always seems to leach out.

dextr0 · Feb 15, 2011

Ok, have u tried just feeding water? Your plants look big enough to were even if you were overfeeding in beginning they should have grown out of it. Unless u are still over feeding and there is nute lock up. Your ph seems fine, you say you arnt ph uping and downing...I guess the next question is what do the ones in hempy look like? If u are feeding same thing and they look good then i would assume environment. Maybe something as simple as your water...idk. Im trying though, see if someone else will pop in and help.

brd · Feb 15, 2011

dextr0 said:
Ok, have u tried just feeding water? Your plants look big enough to were even if you were overfeeding in beginning they should have grown out of it. Unless u are still over feeding and there is nute lock up. Your ph seems fine, you say you arnt ph uping and downing...I guess the next question is what do the ones in hempy look like? If u are feeding same thing and they look good then i would assume environment. Maybe something as simple as your water...idk. Im trying though, see if someone else will pop in and help.

Thanks for the help.
We use different nutes with the hempys but the same water. The environment is pretty stable. Maybe a little low with the humidity. But everything else is stable.

dextr0 · Feb 15, 2011

Ok, environment includes the water their roots are setting in also. If the hempys look good then I would say the problem in the UC is nutrients. If they are both looking bad I would definitely look at the water once again. Those roots in that picture look scraggly as hell, no offense intended. They just do not look like strong healthy growth. Find out why they are not happy.

brd · Feb 15, 2011

I pulled one of the plants out of the net pot today to inspect for bugs and I found nothing. I looked at the rockwool and roots through a microscope and could not see a thing. The roots in the net pot looked ok. These plants are quite small about 6" tall. The root growth was great the first week and a half they poked through the net pot in 3 days and grew rapidly for a few days and then slowed down. I noticed they were slowing down a bit. And had blotches of light yellow on the leaves so I was thinking a deficiency of some sort. At that point I was only using 2ml per gal A and B and zone. That put me at 160ppm with my meter (Sharps/Milwaukee). I started to think that was a bit low and I was thinking A little cal mag might be in order being that I was using RO water. So using the top off I added half strength Migical and about 60 additional PPM of nutes for a total of 260. I was reading the DM web sight and they say do not add cal mag. Not sure the side affects of to much cal mag but if they are wrinkly mutated curling leafs than I might be on to something.

Smokey503ski · Feb 15, 2011

I believe Zone needs to be added last. Alway put part A in, make sure the res is half full of water only. Then put part B in, fill up 3/4 with more water. Then put your rest of the nutes in by adding water each time you add something in.
I bet ya, you are having nutrient fallout. If you are dumping the nutes in carelessly, then most likely this is your problem.
Try starting over with a fresh res clean. Try my way of setting up a res. You cannot just dump nutes in the res or bad things will happen.

I would also lower the PPM's in your res by about 1/4 strength untill you see better growth.

brd · Feb 15, 2011

Smokey503ski said:
I believe Zone needs to be added last. Alway put part A in, make sure the res is half full of water only. Then put part B in, fill up 3/4 with more water. Then put your rest of the nutes in by adding water each time you add something in.
I bet ya, you are having nutrient fallout. If you are dumping the nutes in carelessly, then most likely this is your problem.
Try starting over with a fresh res clean. Try my way of setting up a res. You cannot just dump nutes in the res or bad things will happen.

I would also lower the PPM's in your res by about 1/4 strength untill you see better growth.

Appreciate the reply. I was reading the DM web site and it says to add the Zone first then A and B the way you describe. I really have not been to careless with the way I mix nutes. The only difference is I am mixing in 30 gal containers and I have been adding Zone mixing with a drill motor, then A and mixing then B. I am going to try your method from this point on however.

Thanks.

googolplexs · Feb 22, 2011

Your ppm is to low for that size plant, I'm runnig 1200ppm deep water 3 weeks.

Chris1 · Feb 23, 2011

When is the last time you calibrated your meters? Do that if you haven't....

250 ppm seems low. I have some cuts that are about your size that I'm running at 450 which is 1/3 of the GH formula, with zone and floralicious +. 2nd pic looks like a possible deficiency

lazarus718 · Feb 23, 2011

Is this the same thread twice???? I know I've replied to this issue before, were you guys not getting the answers you wanted in your 1st thread? Here's the link:

DIY UC plant problems. Bad H2O, Pests or Nutes???

DIY UC plant problems. Bad H2O, Pests or Nutes???

whiskeygirl

brd

dextr0

brd

Smokey503ski

dextr0

brd

brd

dextr0

whiskeygirl

dextr0

brd

dextr0

brd

Smokey503ski

brd

googolplexs

Chris1

lazarus718

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