Seedlings advice appreciated

Hey guys, so I’ve been a member for a while, read a lot of the newbie threads and advice. Grown outdoor over the years and recently got a 1m x 1m tent. It has a closed MH 400w air cooled or vented whatever moving to a 600w at a later stage. Temps are between 24 and 30 we have had some hotter days recently. Humidity 50/60 %. Grown in a mix of 50/50 coco perlite and some organic vermigro that was suggested to me to mix in with the grow medium and flush / let stand for a few days. Nutrients flora coco grow.

Not sure if I should have just planted the seedlings in the 50/50 mix and not added the vermingro...

Seeds went into jars on the 8th Jan, 24h later into tissue and on the 10th into their small pot out the soil by the 12th. Water every 4 ish days depending on container weight and feel of medium. No nutrients until the 22nd and then just gave them a quarter of what was recommended for starters. As I was trying to fix the leaves being yellow thought maybe lack of nutrients.
Ph of water in is around 6.
The 400 I’ve slowly lowered from around 90cm away to about 60 over the last few weeks and heat above plants is more than fine or so I think.
Issue is slow growth as they are 25 or so days old. Lower yellow leaves with new growth looking more green. Trial and error being my first proper indoor grow any ideas? Can’t figure out what it is? Mottled lower leaves a bit yellow with slow growth. Maybe wrong starter mix of soil, nutrients too early, no idea. Help appreciated.

Coco has no food. When I used coco id
Charge it with cal/mag and a light feeding. Usually around 150pPm feed with a balanced NPK ratio.

They look hungry to me!

Actually reading again I saw u fed. So no improvement since the feeding?

If so then the pH is outta whack.

Pretty sure 5.5-6 is the ph range for coco.

Too much perlite -what makes coco great is it’s aeration. So no need to add 50% perlite. 20% will be fine.

The bigger plants in these pics are 20 days old under a 600mh.

So something really isn’t right and as I said it’s probably pH related if u have fed and seen no improvement.

I will up the feeding a bit and double check the PH going in and runoff and see. Yea I mean we had some super hot humid weather thought it may have been they at the start but these just aren’t liking something. Cheers man

TwistedReaction said:

Hey guys, so I’ve been a member for a while, read a lot of the newbie threads and advice. Grown outdoor over the years and recently got a 1m x 1m tent. It has a closed MH 400w air cooled or vented whatever moving to a 600w at a later stage. Temps are between 24 and 30 we have had some hotter days recently. Humidity 50/60 %. Grown in a mix of 50/50 coco perlite and some organic vermigro that was suggested to me to mix in with the grow medium and flush / let stand for a few days. Nutrients flora coco grow.

Not sure if I should have just planted the seedlings in the 50/50 mix and not added the vermingro...

Seeds went into jars on the 8th Jan, 24h later into tissue and on the 10th into their small pot out the soil by the 12th. Water every 4 ish days depending on container weight and feel of medium. No nutrients until the 22nd and then just gave them a quarter of what was recommended for starters. As I was trying to fix the leaves being yellow thought maybe lack of nutrients.
Ph of water in is around 6.
The 400 I’ve slowly lowered from around 90cm away to about 60 over the last few weeks and heat above plants is more than fine or so I think.
Issue is slow growth as they are 25 or so days old. Lower yellow leaves with new growth looking more green. Trial and error being my first proper indoor grow any ideas? Can’t figure out what it is? Mottled lower leaves a bit yellow with slow growth. Maybe wrong starter mix of soil, nutrients too early, no idea. Help appreciated.

Click to expand...

You can't treat coco like soil. I would not have added that Vermigro as you need to water and feed coco daily, not every 4th day or when dry. 50/50 coco perlite is fine (that's what I run in) and your nutrients are fine but your pH is a little high. Coco seems to respond best at about 5.8. I try to keep it 5.6 to 6.0 (not about, exactly). Don't worry about run off pH get an exact reading of what you put in.

Here are my girls (50/50 coco/xlg perlite) watered and fed daily since inception, General Hydroponics three part Flora Series

Bummer. Hope you can solve this problem, if it's not grow media and / or amendment caused, other possibilities to consider...

Seeds? Are these a strain you're familiar with, known to create decent seedlings ? Do other seedlings from a different source thrive under similar conditions compared to the struggling ones?

I think you did the right thing by checking the water ph. Is it possible your water ph fluctuates with rain or snow melt run off ? How do you water? Is it possible there's residue of something unfriendly in your water container? Seedlings don't need much water.

I'm not claiming it is bugs, but whenever I have bugs or suspect them as even a possibility on seedlings, I like to hold the seedling cups upside down under a faucet and rinse them really well. Then give them a shot of pepper spray, which doesn't fuck them up like neem or other stuff can with young seedlings.

curious2garden said:

You can't treat coco like soil. I would not have added that Vermigro as you need to water and feed coco daily, not every 4th day or when dry. 50/50 coco perlite is fine (that's what I run in) and your nutrients are fine but your pH is a little high. Coco seems to respond best at about 5.8. I try to keep it 5.6 to 6.0 (not about, exactly). Don't worry about run off pH get an exact reading of what you put in.

Here are my girls (50/50 coco/xlg perlite) watered and fed daily since inception, General Hydroponics three part Flora Series
View attachment 4473828

Click to expand...

Cheers for the reply I will most definitely just stick to the coco/per mix next time and not add anything extra to it. Will bring the PH down of the water going in as you said and hopefully that also helps, shot.

Those look incredible! Excited to get it all correct, love the art of growing just some indoor beginner speed bumps haha, cheers for the advice!

Rob Roy said:

Bummer. Hope you can solve this problem, if it's not grow media and / or amendment caused, other possibilities to consider...

Seeds? Are these a strain you're familiar with, known to create decent seedlings ? Do other seedlings from a different source thrive under similar conditions compared to the struggling ones?

I think you did the right thing by checking the water ph. Is it possible your water ph fluctuates with rain or snow melt run off ? How do you water? Is it possible there's residue of something unfriendly in your water container? Seedlings don't need much water.

I'm not claiming it is bugs, but whenever I have bugs or suspect them as even a possibility on seedlings, I like to hold the seedling cups upside down under a faucet and rinse them really well. Then give them a shot of pepper spray, which doesn't fuck them up like neem or other stuff can with young seedlings.

Click to expand...

Hey, thanks for the reply. I think as the other guy said I'm going to ph my water a little lower, feed more often and next time just add my 50/50 medium and nothing else to the mix.

The seeds I got from a company in the US but it is the first time I'm trying this specific strain. No snow here but I'm going to be a little more focused on checking each time until I get a reliable reading and it doesn't differ for sure.

Will post an update here in a bit if anything changes.

Nutty sKunK said:

Actually reading again I saw u fed. So no improvement since the feeding?

If so then the pH is outta whack.

Pretty sure 5.5-6 is the ph range for coco.

Too much perlite -what makes coco great is it’s aeration. So no need to add 50% perlite. 20% will be fine.

The bigger plants in these pics are 20 days old under a 600mh.

So something really isn’t right and as I said it’s probably pH related if u have fed and seen no improvement.
View attachment 4473743

Click to expand...

I agree, they definitely look hungry. If the nutes are present and no improvement is seen, then the roots aren't capable of absorbing them...aka a ph problem.

Whatsup guys, appreciate the advice. A couple of days later and they are at least three times the size. I started watering them every second day with added nutrients and they took off.

Think I got so wrapped in the soil grow over/under watering vibe that I waited far too long between water and feeding. I see now how the medium is almost closer to hydro then soil if you get me.

Anyways really cool seeing them growing, thanks again. Thought I would update as often I find forums with no updates.

Today