DWC Root Slime Cure aka How to Breed Beneficial Microbes

I sometimes got a bit of foam, and had no problems. It went away after I started using pondzyme.

By the way, my electric company is doing some works and I'll have no power (AKA no air pumps) for 7 hours. Can bennies survive that long without a pump? I hope that shit des not mess up my grow...

I've lost 2 grows to rot now and have been fighting it for about 3 mo.. At the moment I have a grow going in soil cuz fighting the rot was getting me no where! I did try some aquashield but after going through about a half a bottle and seeing new roots develop and rot developing I tossed that plant in soil (this seems to do the trick) and will be making the tea! I hope this works guys if it does it will be a miracle!

This may have been asked and answered somewhere in this thread but I have 4 55 gal res's for my hydro setup (flo n gro). This is the first time in over 2 years I have had root rot but I seem to have it now somehow (res temps are 66-70 and have the largest air pump local hydro store sell with 4" hydrofarm air stones, makes ALOT of bubbles in my reses) I also changed recently from 6" grodans and perlite to hydroton as my medium and changed nutes from house and gardens to cyco line. How do people handle making a batch of tea large enough to handle this size reses? Should I just get another brute container (holds like 44 gals) and just make a batch this large? I would need about 4 gallons of tea per res every 3 days, so make a new 40 gallons batch every week or something I would guess. Is this possible to make batches this large? What would the cost be per batch? thanks all

**Also what are some substitutes to ZHO powder? looking at my local grow stores website they do not seem to sell ZHO powder (although they do carry botanicare nutrients, I use aquashield actually with the cyco nute line), ill check in store when I go later. I do have some great white I purchased like 2 years ago that I never really used, can I use this instead of zho powder?

After reading some more I am not sure its root rot, its dark brown slimy looking stuff on some of my roots, my PH rises .2 - .5 each day in my reses requiring me to use ph down daily. root rot would cause ph to go down correct?

thanks again!

linky said:

This may have been asked and answered somewhere in this thread but I have 4 55 gal res's for my hydro setup (flo n gro). This is the first time in over 2 years I have had root rot but I seem to have it now somehow (res temps are 66-70 and have the largest air pump local hydro store sell with 4" hydrofarm air stones, makes ALOT of bubbles in my reses) I also changed recently from 6" grodans and perlite to hydroton as my medium and changed nutes from house and gardens to cyco line. How do people handle making a batch of tea large enough to handle this size reses? Should I just get another brute container (holds like 44 gals) and just make a batch this large? I would need about 4 gallons of tea per res every 3 days, so make a new 40 gallons batch every week or something I would guess. Is this possible to make batches this large? What would the cost be per batch? thanks all

**Also what are some substitutes to ZHO powder? looking at my local grow stores website they do not seem to sell ZHO powder (although they do carry botanicare nutrients, I use aquashield actually with the cyco nute line), ill check in store when I go later. I do have some great white I purchased like 2 years ago that I never really used, can I use this instead of zho powder?

After reading some more I am not sure its root rot, its dark brown slimy looking stuff on some of my roots, my PH rises .2 - .5 each day in my reses requiring me to use ph down daily. root rot would cause ph to go down correct?

thanks again!

Click to expand...

Im no expert, but it sounds like the brown slime, doesn't mind cool water, likes oxygen, ext... I made my last batch of tea with great white, aqua shield and EWC (ancient forest) and molasses, seems to be doing the trick, new white roots growing and no slime ATM. I would think you could brew as large a batch of tea as necessary, just do the math accordingly. You will find a starting ratio in the first page of this thread. Hope this helps!

I made the batch today in a 44 gal brute, local grow store did not have ZHO but I used aquashield, great white, malasses and ancient forest. In 2 days when I add it to my res's can I have nutrients in them or should I drain them and use straight ph'd ro water?

I had to put an aquarium heater in order to get the water to 75 for the tea (was at 66-6. All my res's are at 66-68 as well though, will it be okay to put the tea in at those temps?

Linky, look for ZHO on ebay. I got it there quite cheap.

If you have slime, it's usually used in pure RO water for a day or two. Temps sound fine.

how to keep my indentation correctly when posting in a forum.
I typed what I had to say, pressed enter twice to give a space between paragraphs and it just mashed it all up into one large block of text!?

And a google search turned up nothing...

I would like to put my two cents in (first post and all). Not sure if anyone has ever addressed this, but 88 pages into the forum I feel that this bit of information might help people out a bit in activating the good guys!
I sometimes make my own wine at home, and in dealing with yeast I find that instead of putting raw food (that can sometimes clump) into my brew, why not make a syrup!! You take that unsulphured molasses and one cup of distilled/RO water and mix it in a small pot on the stove over medium heat JUST until the molasses is of the same consistency: liquid! No chunks, just liquid.
The logic behind this: when putting a glob of sugar into a mix for the yeast to feed on, the yeast will form a layer on the food where everyone is "fighting for a bite". By making a syrup we can spread the food out evenly for everyone! My brew was foaming in roughly 6 hours Not tons of foam, that came at the 18-24 hour mark. I have a 10lpm airpump feeding four of the smallest blue air stones (i can't remember the size, but they were from walmart) i could find.
For my brew: Knee-high pantyhose with 1.5 handfuls of Big Worm EWC Subculture M Aquashield Unsulphured molasses made into a syrup 2 gallons of distilled water The air bubbles agitate the water quite a bit, and the air alone makes bubbles. But after about 6 hours I had foam and a good "earthy" smell (isn't that the goal?)
When making wine, the yeast would take about that long to start REALLY feeding on the syrup (even though it wasn't unsulphured molasses (honey, brown sugar and organic cane sugar)) and the co2 they produced was fizzing like crazy! I did a side-by-side comparison (though sadly, the video is on my old phone....the dead one) with raw ingredients (listed prior) vs syrup and the syrup was the winner hands down (for co2 production, which is indicative of efficient sugar consumption).
So my advice is to make it easy on your guys; the easier they can eat, the easier it should be to attain the diversity sought through activation!
My 20 gal reservoirs (x2) are running 15 gallons of nutrients each with the water right up to the netpots. I had the dreaded "brown algae" slime that coated my roots and stunted growth for both of my babies. I used bleach to sterilize and h2o2 to clean up the roots via a 1 hour soak and cut all of the roots off within .5 inch below the netpots. I had root growth overnight (over an inch!) but the bleach solution was not a "cure" as I am finding out through making it to page 88 of the forum!
After much consideration (I was adamant about going sterile) I decided to brew er up!
At the 12 hour mark, as I was seeing a significant amount of foaming action and deciding that was due to the syrup idea (thank you Self for getting into wine making ) I added voodoo juice and RE to the mix with rapid start (overkill? ). 6 hours later I added a cup to each bin to start early propagation. At the 36 hour mark (I know I know, 48 is the magic number!) I added the other 13 cups to each reservoir. There is that rebound slime of the initial treatment, and there are not any large particulates floating from the EWC because of the knee-high nylon socks, and the roots are all brownish, but not slimy. But there is new root growth at the tips of the old roots and around the edges of the net pot! Like half an inch of growth since I dosed them! (Btw, it is currently 12:50 am, and I had my son inoculate the reservoirs yesterday morning at 8:30)

Heisenberg, I have been dying (all day) to thank you for deciding to change it up from the whole sterile environment and finding an economical method of displacing and ultimately consuming a very common (and easily obtained) infestation, and subsequently sharing that information with the masses! The whole idea of organisms and their symbiotic relationship with plants is not new to this world, yet in all of the web surfing and reading I have done I have not come across the EWC tea.
I wish I had beFORE I started my bubbleponics setup....truly.

Once again, thanks for passing on this information. I'm sure many folks will eventually make the switch seeing as its economically sound, and feels good to know the problem is literally being eaten away.
-DBJ

I made tea and my plants got wayyyyy worse.
I guess the tea wasnt warm enough while brewing 67*F, but man did it ruin my crop!
I have been flushing and washing all the plants everyday for 10 days now, and have gone back to DM Zone, and it seems to be under control for now.
Res doesnt smell.
I am gonna dump res every 2-3 days till this crop is done.
I might not use this ebb n gro ever again,m as this is so wateful!!!


I wish I had the success everyone else has with the tea

I used Earthworm castings, Mycorrhizae and Trichoderma from Kelp4Less, and Unsulpherated molasses.

I didnt have pantyhose, so everything was on the bottom of the bucket.
I used one hose and stone from my 20 watt air pup in the 5 gal bucket.
I brewed it for 36 hrs

Just to update, the tea worked great, and i got lots of new roots again! Leaves are back and 30 days into flowering, I have some nice buds starting, only thing is, that I only have 4 of the six plants left, and 5 of the six hermied. I killed 2, cuz there were balls everywhere, and picked the other ones of as there were only a few here and there. I'm gonna keep em going until pickin balls is too much, cuz i dont have any plants ready for the dwc, so... nuttin better to do. Maybe the seeds i do get will be good. idk. 5,000 bucks later, i got the worst harvest ever comin lol. if they make it to finish with buds i can smoke i will be happy. Thanks again guys for all the help.

Ugh, that's tough luck.

At least now you have all the materials and know how to make your next harvest one of epic proportions.

Just wanted to say thanks. The tea worked when nothing else did. Another success story here.

bassman999 said:

I made tea and my plants got wayyyyy worse.
I guess the tea wasnt warm enough while brewing 67*F, but man did it ruin my crop!
I have been flushing and washing all the plants everyday for 10 days now, and have gone back to DM Zone, and it seems to be under control for now.
Res doesnt smell.
I am gonna dump res every 2-3 days till this crop is done.
I might not use this ebb n gro ever again,m as this is so wateful!!!


I wish I had the success everyone else has with the tea

I used Earthworm castings, Mycorrhizae and Trichoderma from Kelp4Less, and Unsulpherated molasses.

I didnt have pantyhose, so everything was on the bottom of the bucket.
I used one hose and stone from my 20 watt air pup in the 5 gal bucket.
I brewed it for 36 hrs

Click to expand...

Man! Sorry to hear that!
The temperature makes a big difference.
If you can, try my recipe (slightly different than Heisenberg's), put a small airstone in the bottom of pantyhose THEN put the EWC on TOP of it so the air pushes the critters out) and brew in a warmer space, out of direct light with a cover on it.
Brew for at LEAST 48 hours at 70 degrees, or even 60 hours at 68 degrees. Don't use TOO much air, or micropore airstones as the really fine bubbles breaks the fungus apart, pretty much beating them to death.
Here is my recipe:

https://www.rollitup.org/t/dwc-brown-algae-cured-with-ewc-tea.823154/

I hope this helps, brotha!

Happy Growing!

-dbj

Thanx, for the help Jim!

My 1st grow in my ebb n gro will prolly be my last.
Under 2 600s Ill be lucky to get 10 oz when its over.
I am 5-6 weeks 12-12 now and most buds are barely fatter than my thumb.
In soilless at this point they were 2-3" dia easily.

I spent soooo much money to come out like this..

I feel like quitting growing actually as I cant afford this kind of disaster.
I am running a chiller now to keep res cool enough that I dont have to flush every 3 days anymore.
This was supposed to be the weed to last all yr for me lol.

Everyday I think about scrapping this grow,,, and now I have a terrible spedermite problem since the girls are so sick from roots issues they cant fight.
I am spraying neem or something elsew every 3 days and vacuuming webs in between.

One question, Is Floralicious Plus safe in hydro?
I added it todat and added it to my neem and vinegar spray as well.

bassman999 said:

Thanx, for the help Jim!

My 1st grow in my ebb n gro will prolly be my last.
Under 2 600s Ill be lucky to get 10 oz when its over.
I am 5-6 weeks 12-12 now and most buds are barely fatter than my thumb.
In soilless at this point they were 2-3" dia easily.

I spent soooo much money to come out like this..

I feel like quitting growing actually as I cant afford this kind of disaster.
I am running a chiller now to keep res cool enough that I dont have to flush every 3 days anymore.
This was supposed to be the weed to last all yr for me lol.

Everyday I think about scrapping this grow,,, and now I have a terrible spedermite problem since the girls are so sick from roots issues they cant fight.
I am spraying neem or something elsew every 3 days and vacuuming webs in between.
One question, Is Floralicious Plus safe in hydro?
I added it todat and added it to my neem and vinegar spray as well.

Click to expand...

From what I gather, Floralicious+ is safe in hydro. I personally use it as a foliar spray (though I am still in veg) with EWC tea, CALiMAGic and Humboldt Sticky. I also use it in my reservoir as it is supposed to help with nutrient uptake and boost growth.
I have read that people spray Neem oil on their plants and I am questioning whether that is safe to smoke, as a lot of chemical compounds in nature do entirely different things when burned. There are natural methods of keeping spidermites away such as having chives grow in the same room, surrounding your reservoirs. If a spidermite happens to float into the room, they don't want to jive with those chives man! They will find any way to exit the room, its insane!
As to a natural, safe method of treating spidermites in flower you could possibly use an herbal tea:
"
Use a homemade herbal tea. If you want to make your own miticide at home, you can make a herbal teaby mixing a tablespoon of ground cinnamon, a tablespoon of ground cloves and two tablespoons of Italian seasoning in a quart of water.

• Bring the water to a boil, then take off the heat. Once it has cooled slightly add 2 tablespoons of crushed fresh garlic. Leave to sit until the water cools completely, then strain through a cloth or coffee filter.
• Add a squirt of dish soap to the tea, then pour into a spray bottle. Spray the underside of the infested leaves with the tea every three days over a two week period. This should effectively kill the mites"

Might just work

Don't give up man! Keep researching, looking up natural SAFE ways to rid yourself of the spidermites, and I'm sure you'll do fine man!
As for the roots issues, I cannot discern what those are, only guess. Brown crap coating the roots making it impossible for the plant to uptake water and nutrients.

EWC tea for the win, man! My plant was STUNTED for almost 2 weeks, and I tried to sterilize everything with bleach and h2o2.
I didn't have ANY new growth until I used the tea.
Check it out
https://www.rollitup.org/t/dwc-brown-algae-cured-with-ewc-tea.823154/

You might want to give it a try.
Good luck man!

(p.s:if you would like my exact recipe in a step-by-step order, I can write it out no problemo bud. I love helping people!)

Happy Growin!
-dbj

I made tea, but I guess the temp was too low.
Anyway the tea realllly made things worse.

I actually have tea going again, but am keeping the water at 80* this time, going into the res tomorrow.

Ill try that spray, as I need to ratate my sprays, and can do it tomorrow.

Thanx for the help

Right on man! What ingredients are you using for your tea? The ones listed in your previous post? And before you put it in, was the tea brewed for a full 48 hours?
A properly brewed tea, in proper temps (70-75) with proper aeration should work wonders in ebb n grow (from what I hear and have read)
In DWC, it is phenomenal. It is totally meant for SOIL, but works wonders in DWC.

Just my two cents

I wish you the best of luck brotha! Keep us updated

Happy Growin!

-dbj

I am using the Kelp4Less mycos
(Product contains beneficial endo mycorrihal fungi, beneficial ecto mycorrhizal fungi, two (2) trichoderma species and 19 species of beneficial bacteria.), that and raw sugar.

Is 24-30 hrs good enough, I feel desperate to get going here as I am 2/3 through flowering, and have buds like week 2-3 sized.

I need to get these roots going so my buds can try to grow a lil b4 its too late!!

Temps are in the 70s right now...last time I checked 73* in my tea bucket...and it has foam this time, where last time it never made any foam.

i think some times the roots get stale air and they take a dive thats another theory.. of mine but i could be wrong just been in water way to long i pick up on shit that the normal eye wouldnt..