Def? Help ASAP! PICS.

Information

Two plants, 5 weeks into flower.

Height: 17.5"
Schedule: 12/12
Temp, lights on: Avg 77, 48% (max 84F, min 38%)
Temp, lights off: Avg 65, ?% (min 63F, max 62%)

Soil 6.5-6.7
Water 6.0-6.5

This is affecting two plants. A NL and a bagseed plant. The bagseeder, her name is Ai-Ling, is about to loose ALL of her fan leaves if this isn't solved.

Pictures

Pic 1: Curling NL leaves. Brown/gold on the inside. Very Brittle. Curling sides.
Pic 2: Another curling leaf. So brittle they snapped in half when bent.
Pic3: Red Stigmas/"Pistils", what the fuck! This has to be diagnosable!
Pic4: Sticky NL Cola

Ok, I don't know myself, because I've never had this problem, but the pics of your plant leaves curling like that reminded me of something I read in the Cannabis Grow Bible

"Plants with Mg problems exhibit boh yellowing and leaf curl, especially leaves that curls upwards at the base of the plant. This is where the saying -- 'The plant is praying for magnesium' comes from." ~p. 77

And since the CGB mentioned it, I thought I'd check out the growfaq

Magnesium (Mg) - Micronutrient and Mobile Element
Magnesium helps supports healthy veins while keeping a healthy leaf production and its structure. Magnesium is significant for chlorophyll-production and enzyme break downs. Magnesium which must be present in relatively large quantities for the plant to survive, but yet not to much to where it will cause the plant to show a toxicity.

Magnesium is one of the easiest deficiencies to tell… the green veins along with the yellowness of the entire surrounding leave is a dead giveaway, but sometimes that’s not always the case here. In case you have one of those where it doesn’t show the green veins, sometimes leaf tips and edges may discolor and curl upward. The growing tips can turn lime green when the deficiency progresses to the top of the plant. The edges will feel like dry and crispy and usually affects the lower leaves in younger plants, then will affect the middle to upper half when it gets older, but It can also happen on older leaves as well. The deficiency will start at the tip then will take over the entire outer left and right sides of the leaves. The inner part will be yellow and or brownish in color, followed by leaves falling without withering. The tips can also twist and turn as well as curving upwards as if you curl your tongues.

Excessive levels of magnesium in your plants will exhibit a buildup of toxic salts that will kill the leaves and lock out other nutrients like Calcium (Ca). Mg can get locked out by having too much Calcium, Chlorine or ammonium in your soil/water.

One of the worst problems a person can have is a magnesium def caused by a ph lockout. By giving it more magnesium to cure the problem when you are thinking you are doing good, but actually you are doing more harm then good. When the plants can’t take in a nutrient because of the ph being off for that element, the plant will not absorb it but it will be in the soil… therefore causing a buildup. A buildup will be noticed by the outer parts of the plant becoming whitish and or a yellowish color. The tips and part way in on the inner leaves will die and feel like glass. Parts affected by Magnesium deficiency are: space between the veins (Interveinal) of older leaves; may begin around interior perimeter of leaf.

Problems with Magnesium being locked out by PH troubles
Light Acid Soils, soils with excessive potassium, calcium and or phosphorus

Soil
Magnesium gets locked out of soil growing at ph levels of 2.0-6.4
Magnesium is absorbed best in soil at a ph level of 6.5-9.1 . (Wouldn’t recommend having a ph of over 7.0 in soil) anything out of the ranges listed will contribute to a Magnesium deficiency.

Hydro and Soil less Mediums
Magnesium gets locked out of Hydro and Soil less Mediums at ph levels of 2.0-5.7
Magnesium is absorbed best in Hydro and Soil less Mediums at ph levels of 5.8-9.1
(Wouldn’t recommend having a ph over 6.5 in hydro and soil less mediums.) Best range for hydro and soil less mediums is 5.0 to 6.0. Anything out of the ranges listed will contribute to a Magnesium deficiency.

Solution to fixing a Magnesium deficiency
Any Chemical/Organic nutrients that have Magnesium in them will fix a Magnesium deficiency. (Only mixing at ½ strength when using chemical nutrients or it will cause nutrient burn!)

Other nutrients that have magnesium in them are: Epsom salts, which is fast absorption. Dolomite lime and or garden lime (same thing just called different) which is slow absorption. Sulfate of Potash, Magnesia which is medium absorption. Worm Castings, which is slow absorption. Crabshell which is slow absorption. Earth Juice Mircoblast, which is fast acting. (a must buy!! Has lots of 2ndary nutrients).

Now if you added to much chemical nutrients and or organics,( which is hard to burn your plants when using organics) You need to Flush the soil with plain water. You need to use 2 times as much water as the size of the pot, for example: If you have a 5 gallon pot and need to flush it, you need to use 10 gallons of water to rinse out the soil good enough to get rid of excessive nutrients.



I'm not saying that's what it is, maybe someone will look at your pics and just know, but thought i'd at least give you what I could...

Wikidbchofthewst gave you an excellent post and perhaps that is your problem; however, in my experience almost any kind of nutrient deficiency is very rare in this day and age - nutrient overdose, not so rare, but under-fed plants, or plants lacking specific nutrients would be a rare experience, or at least it should be. Just my opinion and we all have one of those.

The information you provided sounded fine, but it doesn't cover everything of course so it's hard to tell. I've seen plants that look like that from both heat burn and nutrient overdose. Although your room temp is within reason, it doesn't mean much if it's 150 degrees at the top of the plant and 60 degrees by the window - you get the idea. Also, are you feeding according to the lighting you have or by what it says on the bottle? There are a number of variables that can turn a plant into the mess you have now, but I'll go with heat or nutrient burn for this post. If you can rule those out then you'll have to dig deeper, including the magnesium deficiency. I'll think on it, but it's damn hard to tell at a distance.

EDIT: I didn't mention under-watering because I thought that would be obvious, but on second thought, maybe not. Again, as with the nutrient thing, I find people rarely under-water and often over-water, but, who knows, maybe ... how have you been watering your plants?

EDIT 2: After taking another look at the pics, am I correct that the top of the plant is okay and the 'messed up' leaves are further down? That would help with a diagnosis also.

Ativas said:

Wikidbchofthewst gave you an excellent post and perhaps that is your problem; however, in my experience almost any kind of nutrient deficiency is very rare in this day and age - nutrient overdose, not so rare, but under-fed plants, or plants lacking specific nutrients would be a rare experience, or at least it should be. Just my opinion and we all have one of those.

EDIT: I didn't mention under-watering because I thought that would be obvious, but on second thought, maybe not. Again, as with the nutrient thing, I find people rarely under-water and often over-water, but, who knows, maybe ... how have you been watering your plants?

EDIT 2: After taking another look at the pics, am I correct that the top of the plant is okay and the 'messed up' leaves are further down? That would help with a diagnosis also.

Click to expand...

I think nutes defs and underwatering are more common than you think. Nute defs happen not because of some inadequacy of our nute juice, but because of nute lockout which happens frequently in my experience. People thinking ph is only for advanced growers and their water is fine, etc.

Underwatering happens not because we don't try, but some people go a little overboard with perlite and fans and low humidity and they can end up underwatering even if they try and overwater like a noob.

Update: Yellow & slightly burnt tips. Increasing amt. of yellowing leaves.

so... burnt = too much nutes but yellow leaves = too little N? ?

The Phosphorus Def pictures in the GrowFAQ look REALLY similar to the issues these plants have. However, I believe that's due to PH flux and these plants have been pretty stable. Should they maybz be fed some kind of P nute? Flushed? More below. Thanks so much RIU.

Wkd

Magnesium Deficiency looks like a possibility but some of the symptoms aren't matching up. There are no yellow leaves. No green veins. It shouldn't be lockout b/c the PH is in the Mg absorption range. The curling and inner-leaf-coloring is right on though. So, I'll keep magnesium on the checklist but put it a little further down.

Ativas

It starts effecting the leaves on the bottom and slowly moves up the plant through the fan leaves. This makes me believe it's definitely soil related, not heat or mold or anything. They were transplanted about 3 weeks ago so I'm sure there's a decent amount of nutrients being given to the plants from the new soil. Perhaps the new soil is the problem? Same type, two different bags.

The plants are watered about every 3-4 days, till the soil is pretty dry. I think they may be under watered. Is there a certain height to gallon ratio or anything that could be used as a general rule of thumb? They're watered till it starts to drip out of the drain holes but that's happens as soon as 1L water.

Picasso

Hey bro. Yea, I'm really starting to wonder about under watering as a likely aspect of all this. I don't think lockout is because the PH levels of the soil and water seem stable.

I wish I had an answer for you. For underwatering bad enough to fry those leaves like that, your whole plant would have to be wilted like a mother and I don't see that.

What are you doing for nutes and what soil are they in?

Picasso345 said:

I wish I had an answer for you. For underwatering bad enough to fry those leaves like that, your whole plant would have to be wilted like a mother and I don't see that.

What are you doing for nutes and what soil are they in?

Click to expand...

Word... any advice about the yellow leaves? Maybe they should just be flushed and restart with light nutes... what do you think?

It's expert gardener all purpose soil.

Fed like every 2 weeks with canadian Mother Earth Organic Super Tea Bloom fert which is .50 - 1.50 - 2.0

I just don't know. This is a mystery. Everything looks good. I guess I have to wonder about the nutes, those are the wild card. AN has a help line, I've never called, but maybe run it by them and see what they say? Looks like they have a live chat on their website for questions too. I think this number is for Americans, but I can't get back to the Canadian page - it must have dropped a cookie on me.

Tech Support:
1 (800) 640-9605 (8am - 4pm PST)
https://www.advancednutrients.com/catalog/us/product_info.php?products_id=82

Picasso

yea.. right? It looks a lot like phosphorus def which should be solved by the nutes... I think trying a foliar feed is going to be my next step. Is foliar usually 1/4 recommended strength? Yo, thanks man, i really appreciate it.

Anyone

An unrelated topic, yellowing leaves are normal during the middle or late stages of the flowering stage right? Nothing to worry about or do they need additional nitrogen?

how close is ur light? to me it looks like either lite was too clsoe or its too hott, But i'm not expert. just throwing ideas out there. I read somewhere down there phorphous well . u got a purple stem it looks like, maybe

mmclean

Word, I actually saw you post that link for someone else and gave you props on it cuz (even tho it's not RIU) it's put together really well. The confusing issue here is that the visuals on the GrowFAQ/that link match the problems with these plants pretty well but not all the information is accurate and some of it is quite contradictory.

MM To answer your questions - thanks for the help you guys btw

400W HPS (found one for $30 off craigslist!!!)
The actual bulb is located about 20-22in above the queen cola. Temperature is never over 84F, average 77F high and 63F low.

I think that the next step might be to increase the amount of water they're given and start with a light foliar feed with mother earth bloom.

Any comments on that? Good idea? Poor idea?