I Think I have a magnesium any ideas?

Lennut said:

I am not trying to produce high yields yet. This is a hobby for me kind of like my fish tanks and I just want to create a new environment and make things grow and live in it. I started with one plant because I want to understand not make money or high yield.

Stink bug I came up with a flush because the grow schedule say to flush every 4 weeks. Is this . something you do or is it needed?

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I didn't realize you were that far in so flush if you feel the need. K build up in coco can be an issue. But if you remember from the article Ca helps break the K bond releasing it and replacing it with Ca. You are on the right track. Be patient and stick with a plan. Continually making changes make it hard to know what's working and what's not.

Just think of your anions as well. You need them in healthy amounts to buffer the cations and create the ions that feed your plant. Otherwise you lockout.
Thats why people now are using veg nutes too with coco. Nitrogen is an anion. Just think of your calmag. The calmag needs the nitrogen otherwise the ions cant form. They're all antagonists.
Calmag is an additive, just like any other. You have to know when you need it.
All plants are different right? Well so is coco. Do you have Australian, Thai, Indian, African coconut etc etc. The CEC from coir to coir varies, and you need to figure out yours.

Because the cations on the exchange sites are held reasonably tight, washing coco does little to change the makeup of the cations on the exchange sites. The washing will change the EC but not the CEC. CEC sites have a preference for some cations over others.

If the cations of Ca, Mg, Na and K are all present in the solution at the same concentration, they will be adsorbed at different levels, with calcium and magnesium being adsorbed at double the rate as they both have a double-positive charge, while potassium and sodium have a single-positive charge (Ca++, Mg++, K+, Na+).

I believe this is why I have a deficiency in the first place. Knowing this means the cal mag I am adding is being absorbed and making it unavailable to my plant.

How to correct is the next issue. Since my coco is known unbuffered removing cal mag is not the answer but adding more will not help my plant until the coco is full which took 4 months of feeding at 500 ppm in the study.
I decided to try my grandmothers way and foiler feed my plant with epsom salt.

I did this last night and my plant looks great this morning (Not Dead) and we will want to see if the spot slow or stop.
Thanks for all the help!

https://growdiaries.com/diaries/8001-lennuts-first-grow

Epsoms salt does not contain calcium. Only magnesium and sulfur.
Do you have any new pictures? Even better would be pictures taken under natural light.
In the day 11 picture the plant looks great. As I mentioned before the damage on the first set of leaves will not recover. Those spots were caused by a calcium deficiency, not magnesium. And I see no signs of it spreading.
But you seem bound and determined you still have an issue. For the love of Sam relax and stop fretting so much.

Yes its moving look at my new pictures

If my soil is absorbing the cal mag I am adding then I need to feed another way. Can I foiler feed cal mag?

Steams changed some what but still have purple. First set of leaves are covered second set are covered and now I can see spots on the 3rd set

Tim1987 said:

Just think of your anions as well. You need them in healthy amounts to buffer the cations and create the ions that feed your plant. Otherwise you lockout.
Thats why people now are using veg nutes too with coco. Nitrogen is an anion. Just think of your calmag. The calmag needs the nitrogen otherwise the ions cant form. They're all antagonists.
Calmag is an additive, just like any other. You have to know when you need it.
All plants are different right? Well so is coco. Do you have Australian, Thai, Indian, African coconut etc etc. The CEC from coir to coir varies, and you need to figure out yours.

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I love when pot growers become fledgling chemists! Stoners talkin cations! Such good stuff! Growing will elevate us all!

ClassicT said:

I love when pot growers become fledgling chemists! Stoners talkin cations! Such good stuff! Growing will elevate us all!

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Na! I am copying and pasting and trying to understand enough to correct the issues I have. I had a two part fix first was the epsom salt for the mag and I have Calcarb foiler spray for the Calcium part that I plan the apply tonight. But giving the different answers I have been given I read what I could find and make a call.

If you are still experiencing a calcium deficiency then you need more calcium. The calcium you are adding now is not enough to reach the CEC capacity of the medium. What calcium you are adding is being locked up by the medium. You must exceed this capacity before any calcium will become available to the plant.

CalMag and Grow Big gives you a 7-4-4. But once you exceed the CEC capacity with CalMag. You not only get the calcium your plants need. You also release additional K from the medium for your plants. I'm not sure why this is so hard to understand.

Don't panic and think you will cause a K toxicity issue. It's a rare occurrence too do so. If too much K was locking out you Ca now the leaves most likely would be presenting other symptoms other than the rust spots. That's my final two cents.

Stink Bug said:

If you are still experiencing a calcium deficiency then you need more calcium. The calcium you are adding now is not enough to reach the CEC capacity of the medium. What calcium you are adding is being locked up by the medium. You must exceed this capacity before any calcium will become available to the plant.

CalMag and Grow Big gives you a 7-4-4. But once you exceed the CEC capacity with CalMag. You not only get the calcium your plants need. You also release additional K from the medium for your plants. I'm not sure why this is so hard to understand.

Don't panic and think you will cause a K toxicity issue. It's a rare occurrence too do so. If too much K was locking out you Ca now the leaves most likely would be presenting other symptoms other than the rust spots. That's my final two cents.

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I think I do understand. I went up on my cal mag and down on the grow to keep my ppm about the same but until the coco gets full I was going to add foiler spray so that the plant would get what it needed

The buffering study took 4 months before they saw a difference in the amount of cal mag being available to the plant.
My plant will be done with her life in 4 months

Do you have a link to the study? I would like to read it. Sounds like a good read.

Do you have a link to the study? I would like to read it. Sounds like a good read.

You can certainly mist them with a weak CalMag mix. Just don't go overboard. Once every 4 or 5 days will suffice. And keep your nutrients the same.

About 15 years ago, I was growing roses in coco and we did a weekly chemical analysis of our feed and drain water. The first time we used coco, we noticed the Ca in our drain water was less than 40 ppm (we would have normally expected the Ca to read 100-150 ppm in the drain water), and we were feeding Ca at a rate of about 200 ppm.

For the next two weeks, we had the same result, so we doubled our Ca to 400 ppm. The analysis of our drain water went up to about 50 ppm of Ca. We watched that for about three weeks and then started feeding Ca at about 500 ppm and still had very little change in the Ca ppm in our drain water. It took about four months for our drain water Ca analysis to read about 100 ppm.

The loss of the Ca and Mg is one thing, but you also get an increase of K and Na. High levels of K will hinder the uptake of Mg by plants. Sodium can negatively impact plant health even at low levels and is toxic to some plants starting at 50 ppm.

The widespread use of calcium and magnesium supplements in the indoor gardening industry is an indication that many have experienced the CEC phenomenon in coco that I am talking about here.

The deficiencies are observed and can be corrected to a certain extent with calcium and magnesium supplements, but there are also coco products out there buffered to a higher level, which don’t need the calcium and magnesium supplements.

And by gosh you may get through this yet! Just be patient.

It was your link

https://www.maximumyield.com/buffering-up-adjusting-the-cation-exchange-capacity-in-coco-growing-media/2/1318

Stink Bug said:

And by gosh you may get through this yet! Just be patient.

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I take some close up picture and then post them. give me a min

Oh ok. I thought you may have found another study.