1st dwc experiance...trial and error

yes, they are in 1.5" rockwool and then in hydroton. 3.5" netpots...

it makes sence that its coming from spraying them, i got some nute water on my lower leaves of a old plant and they definetly turned brown where it was hitting the leaves.

corykindbud said:

it makes sence that its coming from spraying them, i got some nute water on my lower leaves of a old plant and they definetly turned brown where it was hitting the leaves.

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so here we are now...things are getting worst..just flushed the plants with 5.6 ph water and changed 90% of the res. res is at 36ppm and water started at 19ppm. temps are all the same. ph is 5.6 give or take .1 Its really hard to tell with the drops. Im really hoping that this is not ph related.............Im almost thinking about re-planting in soil. any advice?

I honestly think you're doing too much and not getting anywhere. I've never had to do so many changes to my plants in a given period. When I mix nutes, I mix all of them the day I drain and replenish. After that, I don't add any more (no tsps. here or tsps. there). I add straight water to the nute mix during the week that is not pH adjusted at all. RO water pH adjusts really easy and when added to my nutrient solution in the reservoir it just buffers right to 5.8 to 6.0. You should drain the rez and refill it with plain water until the plants start to recover. I've just now upped my nutrient mix to 1/2 strength of the FF schedule. 1/4 strength was almost too much then they started. I don't recognize any of the nutes you are using. I think you're complicating things too much for a beginner. Just look at my grow and see where the basics can get you man.

...and get a digital pH meter. Best investment I made so far.

you could have grown plants to this point without adding nutes at all

re plant to soil while you still can, itll pay off

I have a digital ph meter...it craped out after 2 days. It really hasnt been that complicated... i set the res up with some b+ and after a week i added some root stimulators at eighth strength. once a day i have been adjusting ph back to 5.6ish ..it seems to sneak up to 6.2-6.4 over 24 hours. Im asuming that they have a bit of nute burn from those micro nutes.

Today I changed the res out with plain phd RO water... c what happens.

So far so good... Out of the 6 plants that where put into dwc, 4 remain. The Other two are in a mixture of organic soil and perlite. I put them back under the cfls and flushed them out really well. They got burned pretty bad but I think they may survive. Only time wil tell.

Just about 3 weeks for these little mutants I think. No longer getting any Nute burn, however plants are really droopy....I think I had the water in the res too high and the rockwool was too wet. Not sure about that, but from what i have been reading it makes sense. Light is now 12" from top of plants and temp is around 80*. Humidity is @ 30-40%. I dropped the res level to 1 1/2" below net pots and there are 3 * 4" air stones in res. Still no nutes in res, just ph balanced RO water.... I belive some of the nutes were transfered from air stones to new res because TDS went from 19ppm to 49ppm as soon as i added air stones. Still, I dont think that 49ppm is bad at this point in time.
Oh ya the ph is somewhere between 5.5 and 6.( I have a good quality digital ph meter on its way)





I am hoping that over the next day or two the leaves will straighten out again....or no? What else could it be besides rockwool remaining too wet. Any Ideas? Are these 4 plants going to rebound and become healthy ladies?

Here is a pic of the two Grow doc seeds I removed from DWC and put in soil..... looking not too bad I think. Larger one looks like it could use some nutes, but im waiting for soil to dry out a bit 1st.



Lets hear some feedback peeps....Thanks.

I wouldn't worry about it. Most of my seeds start off slow and droopy. Keep a fan on them and you should see faster stronger root growth. Once they get a bit bigger the leaves will pick up. Usually they will droop more towards lights out. I keep floros on little guys 24/7 you will see drooping some hours of the day and other hours you should see the leaves reaching up more. Perfectly normal.

SIV3L said:

I wouldn't worry about it. Most of my seeds start off slow and droopy. Keep a fan on them and you should see faster stronger root growth. Once they get a bit bigger the leaves will pick up. Usually they will droop more towards lights out. I keep floros on little guys 24/7 you will see drooping some hours of the day and other hours you should see the leaves reaching up more. Perfectly normal.

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ya I had them on 18/6 but switched to 24hrs of light yesterday. hopefully they will perk up with more light/less water

Lookin good man, I was a little aprehensive at first and very impatient. Once things get going for a while you will see how easy it is and things start to really take off after the 3rd-4th week of nute feeding. Keep up the good work, looking forward to a pic update!

You should be able to go 1/4 strength nutes by now...I bet they'll start to look better now that you have an air gap from the res level and the bottom of the net pots, 1-2" should be good.

Thanks for the encouragement ZEP. Eventhough the growth has been seriously stunted, I think they may pull through.

I just got a really good quality PH meter today so no more estimating the PH...YAY. Just did a full checkup and here are the results...

TDS 69
PH 6.59
Cabinet temp 74F
Canopy temp 82F
res temp 69.3F
RH 35%
Low Night Time Temp 62F

Im going to adjust the ph back to 5.6 right away and im wondering if I should add just a little Iguana juice grow.....very small amount. 1/8 recommended maybe....see how they react to that and then in a cppl weeks start to introduce the micro nutes and root stimulators. what do u guys think? Right now they are in just ph adjusted water with the xtra TDS coming from the nutes on the air stones from last res....
Here are some pics of the mutants.....Notice the extreme drooping, the lime green coloring and the purple haze around the edges of the leaves. Im hoping all these things improve with a good PH lvl.









Here is the infirmary.....the failed DWC attempts. For all the shit and abuse they are still alive








These last two are of the same plant...the only OP(original plant). this poor little plant is just over a month old....but suffered from serious fluctuating PH due to well water. 1st lesson

I think they are hungry that is why they are drooping?? Everything I've read says that you go 1/4 strength after the 2nd set of leaves (not counting the starter leaf set) and thats what I did...no problems I had a funky looking white widow but its back on track. I dont know the feed scedule of your nutes but whatever it is for grow or veg cycle, just quater it and you should be good to go. keep the ph good and an air gap from your net pots to your water level (as long as the roots are touching the water), enviroment looks good, I kept the light about 16" away and once they get a little bigger you can keep it between 8-10 inches away as long as you have a fan blowing at canopy level. I checked mine this morning and the plant had grown to about 6 inches away with no problem (250 watt HPS). I hope this helps, give them a little snack and they might pick up, It'll be slow until 2-3 weeks after you started feeding them. Once you give them 1/4 strength keep an eye on them and you can give them a little more a few days later, keep track of your ppm and you can brign it back up after a few days, Then on your next change out add 1/2 strength and keep an eye on them a few days later add another dose of 1/4 strength and then on your next res change add 2/3 strength then a few days later add the other 1/3 and keep increasing what you start with at your res changes. Thats what I am doing and it seems to be working great. Keep your res changes to about 10 days or so.
Hope this helps...

remember when you add ph up or down it will increase your ppm.

For your nutes, are you supposed to use the grow and micro together? If so, you should at 1/4 strength...

Again thanks for the advice. Right now 250watt MH is 15" above plants. Here is a list of the nutes I plan on using ..............

















I just added 2L of water and adjusted the ph down to 5.6...........my res is 12L and tomorrow i will add 1.5ml of grow which is 1/4 strength of week 1. AN nute calculator gives amount for grow, tarantula and piranha in week 1(they consider week 1 to be when you get 3rd or 4th set of true leaves)... So between the nutes and the proper ph, lets hope we see some improvement!! in week 1 they recomend 250ppm.

I just checked out thier calculator and it looks pretty good as far as guiding you through the process. I have very limited experience and I know nothing about AN nutes, I would follow thier schedule or ask around to see if anyone uses the same stuff as you. Start slow for the 1st week and see if you can get up to 250 ppm by the end of week 1 using the proper ratios of your nutes. Then do the same pace for the next week try to get up to 500 ppm but start at 250 ppm and work your way up. Hope to see some improvement by the end of next week keep us posted. Thanks for the rep...
Peace out

my last grow i only used iguana juice grow and bloom, the only extra i added was molasses. it worked really good just by itsself, i asked the guy @ the hydro shop what else i could add to it and he showed me one additive, that you only add in the end of flowering. Idk if your supposed to add more stuff to iguana juice. but check into it

corykindbud said:

my last grow i only used iguana juice grow and bloom, the only extra i added was molasses. it worked really good just by itsself, i asked the guy @ the hydro shop what else i could add to it and he showed me one additive, that you only add in the end of flowering. Idk if your supposed to add more stuff to iguana juice. but check into it

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Ya I just did a res change and I added Iguana juice grow, piranha and tarantula at 1/2 the strength of what they recommended for seedlings with 3 true leaf sets... so that was 3.1 ml of grow 1/16 tsp tarantula and piranha in a 12L res.....adjusted ph down to 5.54. TDS is sitting at 40ppm. Im going to see how it goes and then add the other 1/2 of the nutes later on in the week....

AN's organic calculator for hydro has all three of these additives plus more being added at this point in time...

Once I get this nute thing all sorted out im sure things will go well.....everything is there, its just a matter of getting it all perfected

cool man, do you have a link for that chart? the AN site is really stupid