This deficiency happens every cycle

Dr.Pecker said:

Didn't I tell you what I thought it was? Check your res for slime, what are the water temps? Did you fix the condensation problem? You're growing in a bag in a pot maybe your roots are rotten causing bacteria and dropping the ph. How do the roots look are they brown dead or slimy? Ro water needs calmag. If the ph is too low all the calmag in the world won't help you.

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icybryce said:

Looks like a Mg problem. RO water, ph, and just lack of Mg in general can cause this. I use diluted MgSO4 (aka epsom salts) as a cheap additive for Mg. Dilute it ahead of time in something like a 1 gallon jug. I do a 1% solution and that comes out to about 1/3 tsp per 15ml if i remember correctly. 10-15ml per gallon should be enough. You could also foliar at this rate if you aren't too far into flower. The solution is highly soluble.

All that being said I'm kind of surprised this doesn't show up until mid flower if it is Mg. Check your nute line and see what the molecular composition is. Maybe they drop Mg when they switch over to bloom nutes. A lot of lines will not have nearly enough Ca and Mg in them for RO water because they are assuming you are getting enough for the plant from tap water and they don't want to add unneeded ec to the line.

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Dr. Who said:

You have a multitude of problems.
Many from pH and those are fighting each other....

Lets start easy.

I see brown roots too @Dr.Pecker. (He called me in for a house call - lol)

Tell me how they SMELL! Yes smell.....

Do you have any small fliers or little tiny black spots ON the roots anywhere? Any "odd" looking white build up near the little black spots on the roots or forming a ring or slime on the bucket?

Did your res get over 70F at any time?

Do the roots feel slimy ?

The thing here is the "dropping" pH. That says root problem.

Lets discuss the water.......I strongly disagree with Darth! USE RO!
Get a new filter/membrane and change it! Once a membrane gets overly blocked it simply begins to bypass some of the things you want to filter out...Till it simply bypasses everything......It should be changed every year or 6 months depending on how hard your water is to start.

Rule #1 for RO.....ADD A Ca/Mg at 5ml per gallon of RO......this is your "buffer" for pH stability and your main source OF Ca and Mg..

Your adding a Si (silica). ALWAYS add the Si first to any nutrient mix.......It can "bind" to the Ca and lock both out.....For you, maybe mix your Si and your nutrient (add the Si to the water and stir well - THEN add the nutrient) to HALF of your needed water and the Ca/Mg ALONE (again - stir well) to the other half.....Pour in the Si mix first and the Ca/Mg half last.....VERY IMPORTANT!

Now, about that pH meter.....How do you store the probe end?

The answers to these questions will tell me just what the problem is.......

Doc

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Mjaylover said:

Sorry I didn't even see your post and didn't receive a notification.


Roots do not smell. when I took the pic the other day of the roots I smelled them and the smell like a growing plant. Nothing odd

Little fliers? not sure what you mean here but I didn't see any black spots on the roots or white build up. Once again, I pull a another bucket and take some better pics when lights turn on tonight
The res does get over 70 and ranges from 70-74 depending how cool the outside of the tent (room) is
Ok all pick up another membrane from the hydro store tomorrow. my tap water is 195 (checked yesterday) out the faucet so its not too hard

I always tried using 5mls of calmag but I've always fought this problem. Last grow in my 8 bucket RDWc ph was dropping quick like 6.2 to 5.5 in a day. I had the 1/2 hp aqua water chiller set at 68 degrees so temps weren't a problem that grow and still saw issues and the roots were light brown, no slime. I was using flora nova then too so I'm sure they stained the roots that color

I haven't used silica every time. Should I?

Ph meter is kept in 7.0 solution. I here its bad from some and some say its fine.

"Your adding a Si (silica). ALWAYS add the Si first to any nutrient mix.......It can "bind" to the Ca and lock both out.....For you, maybe mix your Si and your nutrient (add the Si to the water and stir well - THEN add the nutrient) to HALF of your needed water and the Ca/Mg ALONE (again - stir well) to the other half.....Pour in the Si mix first and the Ca/Mg half last.....VERY IMPORTANT!"

So half the nutrients mix first with Si (si first) then other half of TOTAL water mix with Calmag then combine to halves of water together? Did I get that right?

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Mjaylover said:

If you said it, I missed it. Ill check for slime in the res. Temps are 22c-24c. And I originally switched from DWC so that I wouldn't have to worry about res temps since I thought it didn't matter with Ebb and Flow setups. One grow I was using 7mls of calmag to try and correct the problem and it never fixed it so I assumed calmag was not the issue. I'm aware of the ph being to low it locks out mag so my res ph is at 6.1 now. The grow bags were added only because the plants were stretching and the roots were only growing between the two buckets casings that area to get filled with roots so I added the bags to try and help confine the roots to the upper bucket. obviously from the pic they still grew through the bag and into the area between buckets.




I'm in flower and I would rather not spray anything in the tent right now since the other part of the 5x9 has plants that are days from finishing. It is strange that it shows up early through flower. Makes me think the hps light gives off too much heat and heat was related to my issue. Not sure, but just thinking out loud here

Below is the nutrient line I was using but I saw problems and I then switched to Lucas Formula to see if things would fix themselves using 5mls of flora nova bloom istead of the recommended 8ml (couldn't use more because ph dropped and ppm rose)

http://www.mbferts.com/Bloom-Part-A-High-Performance-Hydroponic-Coco-Soil-Formula-102.htm

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Dr.Pecker said:

You can trim your roots. I see this quite often 4 foot plant 7 foot roots in a dwc only fit about 1 gallon of water in a 5 gallon bucket because of massive roots. You can trim them off to a v shape and put them back in the bucket.

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Mjaylover said:

This happened to me last deep water grow. I kept putting the normal amount of water back in the res and came back the next day to water slowly bubbling out the top. The root ball in the 5 gallon buckets filled the whole bucket to the brim

Are you suggesting cutting the roots out that are between the two buckets on my current setup?

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Dr.Pecker said:

Yes and ditch the ph pen get the gh dropper test kit its $14 and will never be wrong. another thing you were saying your plants were sweating at night and the spotting was around the lighted area. when water pools up on plants and the light comes on it will burn spots on your plants.

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Mjaylover said:

Now that I placed another fan on the other side. Temps and humidity seem to be a lot more stable be issue of air movement

I'm going by the store tomorrow for RO filter. I'll grab the test strips. You said general hydroponics makes them?

On a side note. You think I should up the co2 levels in the tent. I have it set around 900-1000. Everyone mentions 1500 but I've also read it's a waste

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Dr.Pecker said:

No. get this stuff View attachment 3505647 Your tent probably leaks co2 I don't see how you could keep it in the room. air exchange would be fine but Its not really a waste if you see results.

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Dr.Pecker said:

I see the root of the problem.

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Dr.Pecker said:

View attachment 3506008 Sorry to hear man. well you learned from this. ph is everything. Cleanliness helps a ton. moisture control. You learned a years worth of shit in a few days. read the thread again. Try again and good luck.

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