Leaves Growing Out of Buds and Pistils Turning Brown

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crezzymann

crezzymann

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Hello there, so I'm in my 5th week of flower, first time growing, and I'm having a couple problems.

The first thing I noticed was leaves growing out of the buds. Its happening to pretty much every bud - directly under the light, off to the side, ones up high, ones down low, all of them, on all the plants. Growing four different strains - Northern Lights, a CBD/White Widow cross, a freebie called Blue Cindy and another freebie called Starcake. All started from seed, all seeds feminized.

Leafy bud 3
Leafy bud 2
Leafy bud 1


The second thing I noticed was some of my pistils are turning brown. It's actually really hard to capture on a camera, as they're really just a few shades off from white at this point, but they're definitely starting to go brown. This is happening to at least a couple strains, Northern Lights and CBD Widow for sure, couldn't really see anything on the other two. This is again affecting a few of the buds, regardless of how much light they're getting. It's not happening on all of the buds yet, but it's definitely happening to some of them.

The plants seem relatively healthy for the most part, other than those two issues.

Leaves growing out of buds and pistils turning brown


Northern Lights is supposed to be a 7 week strain according to the breeder, the rest of them should go for 8-9 weeks.

My current set up is 3x 240W quantum board lights in a 4x4 tent, dimmed down to about 75%, so pulling about 500 watts from the wall.

Exhaust fan is set to come on if temps go above 77 at the canopy, or humidity goes above 68%. It pretty much runs constantly, pulling in ~60% RH air all the time. Also have two circulating fans inside the tent, which run all the time.

Growing in Canna Coco bricks, rehydrated with 2g/gal Mega Crop, and 2.5g/gal Recharge. Added ~30% perlite. Growing in fabric pots.

Automatic watering system, waters 6x/day. Once 45 minutes before lights on, once at lights on, every 3 hours after that. Getting runoff at the lights on watering and every watering after that. Pots tend to dry out overnight, so don't really get any runoff from the first watering. Have an air stone and stir pump in the reservoir for the automatic watering set up, air stone runs all the time, stir pump runs for 10 minutes before each watering.

Plants were vegged for about two months before flipping to flower.

Current nutrients are 1.75 grams/gallon Mega Crop, 0.4g/gal Bud Explosion, 0.5g/gal Epsom salt. I'm on well water, which is fairly hard (~0.5-0.7 EC baseline, depending on the day). Using Epsom salt to ward off excess calcium problems, but could probably drop it at this point. Also should probably note, I have to use about 2ml/gal of 33% sulfuric acid (battery acid) to get the pH down to around 6.0 with my water, so there's quite a bit of sulfur in there too. EC with this set up comes out to ~1.3 EC normally. Also use 2.5g of Recharge once a week, normally added to 4-5 gallons of nutrient mix, so it comes out to like 0.5g/gallon of Recharge once per week. Not sure if it actually helps at that low of a dose, but it normally still foams up in the res, so it might be doing something.

From what I've read, the leaves on the buds can be caused by excess nitrogen, and I'm pretty sure I have way too much nitrogen for this stage of flower. Current plan is to drop Mega Crop from 1.75g/gal to 1g/gal and see how the plants respond, working back up if needed.

Only thing I'm kind of worried about with that is, I'm already at 1/3rd the recommended dose for this stage of flower, and I'll be dropping to 1/6th the recommended dose. But it seems like my plants just sweat a lot, so maybe the nutrients will still balance out? Just worried about running into micro nutrient deficiencies from running such a low dosage.

Is there anything else I should be doing to fix this? Are the browning pistils normal, or should I start looking for pollen sacs? Any help would be greatly appreciated!
 
Nugg

Nugg

702
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When I grow with a lot of blue during flower..I'll get a leafier bud... could be strain..light distance...side note..with that hard water there no need to put Epsom salt in...ever for that matter..
 
Anthem

Anthem

4,155
263
The browning is normal as the plant matures. It should grow some more new white hairs in you add a PK buster. Also they look like they are just NOT getting enough light. I would start turning the lights up at least 5 percent a day.
 
the rrock

the rrock

1,405
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Never heard of NL as a 7 week strain,where were they gotten at?
 
crezzymann

crezzymann

8
3
When I grow with a lot of blue during flower..I'll get a leafier bud... could be strain..light distance...side note..with that hard water there no need to put Epsom salt in...ever for that matter..


I'll drop the Epsom next time I fill the res. I thought I had seen a Mag deficiency somewhere along the line, but it was probably something else. Eventually went away either way.

Lights are 3500k color, so not a ton of blue in there, but some. Distance could be a problem, they're currently about 2 feet above the canopy. Lower them? Or I could just turn them up some more. Have another 200 watts or so I could be using.

The browning is normal as the plant matures. It should grow some more new white hairs in you add a PK buster. Also they look like they are just NOT getting enough light. I would start turning the lights up at least 5 percent a day.


That's great to hear about the browning! Had me freaking out there for a minute.

I recently got a cheap lux meter on Amazon, it reads ~50k lux at the canopy, though I'm not sure how accurate it is. From what I've read, I'm probably on the "low" end of flowering lighting levels, which seem to be recommended at 45k-75k lux. I'll definitely try turning up the lights and/or lowering them! Thank you!

Never heard of NL as a 7 week strain,where were they gotten at?

Seeds are Northern Lights Feminized by 00 Seeds, they say "Flowering period: 50 days" on the site I got them from, so 7.1 weeks really. How long does Northern Lights normally flower for?
 
MIMedGrower

MIMedGrower

17,190
438
I'll drop the Epsom next time I fill the res. I thought I had seen a Mag deficiency somewhere along the line, but it was probably something else. Eventually went away either way.

Lights are 3500k color, so not a ton of blue in there, but some. Distance could be a problem, they're currently about 2 feet above the canopy. Lower them? Or I could just turn them up some more. Have another 200 watts or so I could be using.




That's great to hear about the browning! Had me freaking out there for a minute.

I recently got a cheap lux meter on Amazon, it reads ~50k lux at the canopy, though I'm not sure how accurate it is. From what I've read, I'm probably on the "low" end of flowering lighting levels, which seem to be recommended at 45k-75k lux. I'll definitely try turning up the lights and/or lowering them! Thank you!



Seeds are Northern Lights Feminized by 00 Seeds, they say "Flowering period: 50 days" on the site I got them from, so 7.1 weeks really. How long does Northern Lights normally flower for?


Until its done. Figure at least 2 weeks longer than the silly breeder estimate on average from my experience.

I have supposedly 7-8 week seeds that always need 9.5 to 12 weeks to be perfect. Thats in potting soil under 600’s hps’.
 
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