First Outdoor Grow - Please Diagnose(pics)

So, I just started my first outdoor grow. All my other grows have been indoors and hydroponic, so a lot of this is new to me. I dig about 2'x2'x2' holes, and mixed miracle grow moisture control 50/50 with the local dirt. The weather's been cloudy with a little bit of light rain. 65-75 during the day, and 40ish at night. I planted my rooted clones 5 days ago, and this is the first chance I've had to check on them. The leaves on all my plants have started to turn white. I don't think it's a mildew, because in all cases, it starts on the outside of the leaf and works its way in, instead of being splotchy. The leaves are also curling up. They're not dry/crisp like they look, but actually very soft to the touch, and the whiteness doesn't seem to wipe off.

These two pics are of the worst plant. Sorry about the poor lighting, but the sun was going down. Here's another pic of one of the other plants that isn't quite so bad.

Please help me figure out what's going on. I have more plants ready to go in the ground when I figure out what the problem is, and I'm hoping these are still salvageable.

Thanks

Did you harden these plants to the outdoor elements before you placed them outside? Even being cloudy this may have shocked them alot. Let me think about this while I go get a new fridge mine took a shit on me.

i donno where you live , but where i live its still a little too soon to be putting plants outside , could be to early for your plants , but its just a sugestion , im no expert lol

Figure 12 shows Phosphorus (P) deficiency during vegatative growth. Many people mistaken this for a fungus, but look for the damage to occur near the end of leave, and leaves the color dull greyish with a very brittle texture.

Taken from a very helpfull section for diagnosing problems.
https://www.rollitup.org/marijuana-plant-problems/157345-have-plant-problem-check-here.html

I'm no expert (as you can tell since i just posted my own yellowing problem), but I got some info from another site. I'll include link below. Hopefully it helps. I was looking under nitrogen deficiencies myself.

http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=11688

I sure hope you find something on this anywhere, I do hate to see those ladies so sick, I wanna hug them lolz.

i think purplekrunchie may b on to something with the phosphorous def.

thwack said:

i think purplekrunchie may b on to something with the phosphorous def.

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Although, correct me if im wrong, they seem too young to show such a def. This would have to be a byproduct of an overdose of something else.
Too much of one thing can cause too little of another, or too much of the one thing could be the hidden problem.
If it was a later stage it could show it on its own, however, these were clones, but my understanding from his post is that these clones started out healthy before they were planted. Its a starting point though.

Purplekrunchie said:

Did you harden these plants to the outdoor elements before you placed them outside? Even being cloudy this may have shocked them alot. Let me think about this while I go get a new fridge mine took a shit on me.

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I didn't. What's the best way to do this, and would not doing it give these kinds of results?

JohnWayneCFC said:

i donno where you live , but where i live its still a little too soon to be putting plants outside , could be to early for your plants , but its just a sugestion , im no expert lol

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This could be the case. I am worried about a random frost, but so far that hasn't happened. They've only been in the ground a few days and the weather's been really mild... although, they are slightly higher elevation than where I'm at. Could a frost have done this kind of damage?

Purplekrunchie said:

Figure 12 shows Phosphorus (P) deficiency during vegatative growth. Many people mistaken this for a fungus, but look for the damage to occur near the end of leave, and leaves the color dull greyish with a very brittle texture.

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Yeah, I saw that, but they're not brittle at all, and it's definitely white, as opposed to gray. I couldn't find anything in that section, or http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=11688 that matches my plants.

Purplekrunchie said:

Too much of one thing can cause too little of another, or too much of the one thing could be the hidden problem.
If it was a later stage it could show it on its own, however, these were clones, but my understanding from his post is that these clones started out healthy before they were planted. Its a starting point though.

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Yeah, these started out healthy, and I'm with you... it seems too soon for a deficiency to show up. I know that miracle grow isn't necessarily on the top of peoples' list, but I wouldn't think it would screw plants up this badly, this fast. All I can think is that it may be something in the local soil... but there are healthy plants of many types growing in the same area.

So, the two possibilities I have it narrowed down to are frost, or something in the local soil that's messing with them. The frost, I guess I just have to cross my fingers on these ladies and wait to plant the rest... if it's an imbalance in the soil, I guess I can try flushing, and plant my others in a more pure mix, without using local dirt directly around the plant.

As far as acclimatizing goes, I don't know what to do. It's over an hour drive to where these are planted, so it's not like I can just set them out for the day, and then bring them in at night or anything. At least, not conveniently. I guess I could put them in the fridge for awhile to get them used to cold temps. Anything else?

Any other suggestions/advice/diagnosis? I really appreciate the help guys, keep it coming.

(This could be the case. I am worried about a random frost, but so far that hasn't happened. They've only been in the ground a few days and the weather's been really mild... although, they are slightly higher elevation than where I'm at. Could a frost have done this kind of damage?)

actually as far as i know , yes frost can do that kind of damage , i put my plants out too early last year and they looked alot worse then what yours does , i had to take them out and i ended up having to start over , but you "could" possibly take them out and grow them indoor till it gets a little nicer out and your plants get back to health and try again.

I agree they are young for such a deficiency (but that makes me wonder, what factors could contribute to an issue like that. Soil imbalance, water purity? (using distilled or tap). Tap water contains chemicals, such as chlorine, that are used to treat the public water supply. These chemicals are damaging to plants. Well water is not a good choice either because of the high levels of salt and potassium from the water softeners, which also kills plants (i found that one out the hard way). Deficiencies can occur during vegetative growth as well. here's an excerpt on nitrogen def from source i pasted earlier. The pictures of your plants match the tip to node yellowing description and still able to be green on top that is described below.

"Nitrogen is the biggest mobile element meaning it can travel anywhere on the plant.
Usually the def will start on the lower to middle part of the plant, and then will usually happen to older leaves first. Then the deficiency will work its way up the plant. Your plant can be green on top, then yellowing on the lower leaves when the deficiency is starting out. Yield will be greatly reduced without good amounts of nitrogen in your plants. Sometimes in bad cases the leaves will turn a purplish color along with the yellowing.

Unlike a magnesium deficiency, nitrogen def will start from the tips and work its way back to the leaf node. Nitrogen and Magnesium get confused. The best way to tell them apart is, nitrogen deficiency starts around the tips and works its way to the back of the leaves, where a magnesium deficiency will cover the entire outer part of the leave and make the entire leaves yellow leaving the veins to stay green. If your plants are having a slow growth rate and have yellowing of the leaves, then most likely it’s a nitrogen deficiency."

Again, I am no expert and until we have an expert "school us" I'm just trying to throw out some ideas and help.

well as far as hardening them to the outdoors you basically put them outside for about 2 hours a day gradually increases outdoor sunlight time and then back inside under your lights. this will prevent shocking and get them ready for their new life outside once they are good and tuned to natural sunlight you should be safe to set them out also 40 degrees outside seems way to cold to me

Whatever happened to the plant and this situation. I apologize, if last post seemed condescending to anyone... was pretty f*cked up at the time i posted. Actually didn't know that I posted it until today.

thwack said:

Whatever happened to the plant and this situation. I apologize, if last post seemed condescending to anyone... was pretty f*cked up at the time i posted. Actually didn't know that I posted it until today.

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I don't know yet. One of the problems with this grow is that it's so far away, and I don't have time to visit it very often. I haven't been able to check on the plants since the last pics I posted, and it's supposed to freeze in the valley tonight, so even colder up where the plants are... I'm pretty much writing them off as a learning experience for now. The good news is, I have another round of seedlings that will be ready to go in the ground soon. I'm pretty sure the problem is shock from the environment, so I'll just try to prep these better, and wait a little longer in the season. Also, the seedlings I have are Northern Lights, which are bred for this type of climate, and I don't know what strain the clones I planted were.

You didn't come off as condescending, but I'm pretty sure I can eliminate any of those suggestions, mostly because the leaves aren't crispy. I really do appreciate the feedback.

Burning your plants leaves with direct sunshine by not hardening them off looks almost exactly like the damage caused by frost, but I think in your case you got a frost because of the severity of the problem. I've seen a thin film of frost on windshields on days that it "didnt get cold enough to frost".. yet there's the frost, so if you KNOW it got down to 40, then frost is probably the culprit.

However, it doesn't matter whether it was sun or frost, the damage is done. Even if you nurse these plants back to health, it's going to take them longer to recover than they're worth. Start over.

You're not going to get such damage in such a short period of time in soil caused by a deficiency. Deficiencies in soil just don't happen overnight like they can in hydro, especially planted outdoors.

So, I counted these plants as a lost cause, abandoned them for 3 weeks, started some seedlings to replace them... then I went out to prep the area for my new plants, and this is what I found.



They shed the white leaves and now seem to be doing fine. They're bigger than the seedlings I was going to replace them with, and 2 of them seem to be thriving... so now I have to find more places to grow.

So, in case anyone ever doubted that weed is a weed... here ya go. 3 weeks of neglect did better than my nagging and worrying.