Post trip nutrient issue: Salvageable or is this grow hosed?

[nugchaser]

Hey everyone,

So I'm doing my first ever grow in coco using dry amendments. Coco was washed and buffered properly, loaded with worm castings /mycorrhizae/ dry organics. Had absolutely stunning growth during veg with tap water pH'd to 6-6.5. I did two toppings in two weeks and it grew so fast I flipped on week 4 of veg to keep it in my tent boundary. Before flipping I transplanted to a new pot with fresh mix, and here is my guess at mistake 1: All of the fresh mix was concentrated towards the very bottom of the pot, and often did not get wet enough. I think I was overwatering in terms of frequency but not quantity, meaning I was only watering the top half of the coco and roots never grew into the new mix. I've fixed this by bottom feeding the pot and running a light flush every 3 days.

Issue 2: pH fluctuations in time

So things were going great, 2 weeks into flower I set up an auto watering system and leave for a week to take a trip. I come back and the plant has done this:

I didn't know it yet because I didn't test it right away, but the water in the res had drifted up to 7.5 pH. I later ran an experiment and found that my tap water drifts all the way from pH 7.x to 8.5 if left to sit out, not sure why this happens but it does

Like a dumbass take the first advice I got, which was calmag. I did 1 watering at 5 mL/gal, and I believe that caused this burning:

The clear light pics are from Jul 18 and the blurple from today (7/25). From what I can tell my improved watering routine with corrected pH (I leave another bucket of water out overnight and pH from 8.5 to 6 then water with that) have slowed the bleeding but not stopped it. The pistils are starting to turn orange but the buds are very weak so I'm wondering if I can or should even try to save this or just save the 2-3 weeks and replant? It's gotten super frosty but the density just isn't there yet

 

[freezeland2]

At this point you are growing flowers not leaves. Correct the cause of the issue, lockout from high ph. They won’t have pretty leafs but what is lost by letting to finish flowering?

 

[nugchaser]

what is lost by letting to finish flowering?

I don't know since this is my first grow, hoping to understand that aspect of things better with this thread. I don't wanna invest another 3 weeks into this just to get something I can't smoke, that's my main concern. I'm not experienced enough to know since I don't have any prior harvests to compare to

 

[visajoe1]

its definitely salvageable. unfortunately, I'm not a coco guy tho. in any medium tho, if ec and ph are within range for the strain it will recover.

sounds like you know what the problem is and what caused it. part of the learning process. you'll be a better grower going forward.

accept the challenge. you can do it

 

[Ponky]

At least there is no fungus. They will still give you smoke if you finish them well. Use a clearing solution if you have one. You might lose some yield. Might not taste great. I'm more of a when in doubt flush them out person.

 

[LexLuthor]

Adding more fertilizer is almost always the wrong first step to take in most situations.

All you can do is fix the pH issues, go back to your nutrient schedule before you added the cal-mag, and it will recover.

The damaged leaves will not heal, but you can remove them and keep an eye on healthy leaves to make sure new damage doesn't occur.

I would reduce the lights intensity or lift the light higher about 20% for a few days to slow things down until they recover.

You should still get smokable buds, it might reduce the total yield you would of gotten, but probably not by much if it's corrected quickly, so they should be ok, good luck!