Flowering plants burning? With photos

HI everyone. I have 16 plants under a 1,000 HPS at 12 and 12 in soil. The plants are five weeks into flowering and were looking great until I went on a trip for two days and forgot to keep the fan on. The four closest plants to the light were very yellow and then turn crispy and brown. Only the top 1/3 was burned. One of the plants is so badly burned that there are no more healthy leaves along the cola. The highest plants were about 12" from the hooded 1,000, which did have glass under it.

I immediately turned the fan back on and lowered the tops to about 16" to 24" from the light.

I've attached photos of the worst plant. They seem to be getting a little worse, even though the problem, I thought, was corrected last week.

Is there anything I can do to limit the problem? Should I cut the burned, crispy leaves that aren't fans? Is my cola in danger?

Unfortunately I don't have a ph reader right now. I am getting one very soon.

My nutes are Big Grow and Tiger Bloom. I apply every other flowering and at half the recommended dosage.

Thanks for any help!

ouchhhhhhhhh.. that hurts .. i feel your pain....... i am all upset because i burned a few leaves.. i don't know what i would do if i burnt my buds like that..
it sounds like there is more going on then just some light burn, as if it was just light burn, i can't see it getting worse as time goes on... get yourself that ph meter and check the ph of your nutes... also, i always start off on a lower dose of the ff nutes when my plants are smaller, but i gradually build it up to full strength as they get bigger..
once you get the ph meter, i would say flush them pretty good, and ph the runoff water and see what it is reading... also, only ph the nute/water combo after you added the nutes.. i have found that the ff nutes lower my ph by a full two points.. so adjusting it before adding the ff's would more than likely mean that you will have to do double the ph'ing..
hope this helps you out some... and i hope they recover...oh yah.. i wouldn't cut that bud off unless it looks like it is getting some mold on it, otherwise i would just leave it, or maybe just cut the affected areas off...

racerboy71 said:

ouchhhhhhhhh.. that hurts .. i feel your pain....... i am all upset because i burned a few leaves.. i don't know what i would do if i burnt my buds like that..
it sounds like there is more going on then just some light burn, as if it was just light burn, i can't see it getting worse as time goes on... get yourself that ph meter and check the ph of your nutes... also, i always start off on a lower dose of the ff nutes when my plants are smaller, but i gradually build it up to full strength as they get bigger..
once you get the ph meter, i would say flush them pretty good, and ph the runoff water and see what it is reading... also, only ph the nute/water combo after you added the nutes.. i have found that the ff nutes lower my ph by a full two points.. so adjusting it before adding the ff's would more than likely mean that you will have to do double the ph'ing..
hope this helps you out some... and i hope they recover...oh yah.. i wouldn't cut that bud off unless it looks like it is getting some mold on it, otherwise i would just leave it, or maybe just cut the affected areas off...

Click to expand...

Thanks a lot for your help. This is my first indoor grow as a legal caregiver, and everything was looking great. But you're right: I don't think the problem is limited to leaf burn. I had some evidence before of nute burn but it would quickly go away after a nute-free watering. Because my problems were minimal, I never bought a ph tester to replace my old one. I will buy tomorrow and post the readings.

If FF lowers ph so much, should I use a different fertilizer. Money isn't an issue. I want healthy buds.

Thanks again!

Went to the grow shop and got some new stuff. The PH tester indicated 5.6 to 5.8 from the runoff. I added a calcium-magnesium mix in hopes of getting some nutes to the tops that are yellowing and browning. I added nothing else.

The guy at the grow shop pointed out that I was probably growing too close to the 1,000 lamp. Some of the plants were 12 inches away. He suggested 18-24 inches.

He also questioned my watering method, which is every five days, apx. I nute every other watering. He said I should be watering every two days. I really doubt that's my issue.

Whatever happened to my plants is now over. They have recovered quite nicely. PH has been normal, and I'm finding that my biggest problems are the close proximity to the 1,000 light. The leaves burn very easily.

Anyway, here are some pics.

flow & racer boy, i almost shit my pants with happiness when i finally found this post after searching for atleast a week on this site & others. this is also my first indoor grow and my pl3 females(super girl) are doing the same thing, exactly to the tee. its effected justabout half the tree so far which is about 3' tall and has close to 5 colas on it. ive been using organic soil and sph. moss mixture( 3/4 to 1/4) and it makes the soill nice. i had flushed it twice an the past week and a half and it got worse. so yest. i figured the only thing left was the soil/ph test, of which i did and found out that every nute i tested was extremely low. ph was just a lil under 7, think it 6.8. so i gave it a mixture of 2 teasp. of floragrow bloom and 1 teasp. of floragrow to make sure it got all the nutrients it needed. damn, i hope that was smart move!.i guess i'll see in a couple days. also, i had the fan in the bottom of the closet floor, which used to be up top but had ran out of room, and its pretty jammed up down there so it was probly also getting hot up top. i owe you guys one! thanks for the post