Leaves dying, working up the plant <pics included>

Hey, first time grow here. I have some bag seed that I was trying out, just getting a hang for growing and not really caring if it was male or female.

About a week and a half ago my lowest leaves started to turn a bit light from the tip and sides and worked inward. the leaves dried up and I cut them off with a sharp, sterilized knife. This started happening right after the cotyledon fell off. Now the large fan leaves one node up are doing the same.

I was thinking it could be a nitrogen or potassium deficiency since the tops of the stems are red, however I am feeding them at 100% recommended fox farm Grow Big schedule.

Just wondering what you guys think, I have pics below. Keep in mind this is my first time, any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks so much.

Plant info:
Nutes: Fox Farm Grow Big 100% rec. schedule every 4 days with watering (distilled water)
Height: 13 inches
Age: almost 5 weeks
Soil PH: 7.2 (little high for my liking should I add a little lemon juice on next watering?)
Growing medium: Soil (cant remember the name, it was recommended at the hydro store. Most expensive one there haha probably a rip off)
Medium container: 7 gallon pot.(transplanted from 1 gallon about 3 weeks ago)
Lighting: 1 45 watt CFL, 2 20 watt CFL (for one plant it seems to do the job)
Strain: Obvious indica (was told it was "purple trainwreck")

Thanks, hope I provided you with enough info.

The pictures show the leaves I had to cut off, the next leaves starting to dye and the plant as a whole from the top.

common mistake people think its a burn when causeing the tips to go that color but in reality give them a strong shot of nutes and things should work out for you

Torkken said:

Hey, first time grow here. I have some bag seed that I was trying out, just getting a hang for growing and not really caring if it was male or female.

About a week and a half ago my lowest leaves started to turn a bit light from the tip and sides and worked inward. the leaves dried up and I cut them off with a sharp, sterilized knife. This started happening right after the cotyledon fell off. Now the large fan leaves one node up are doing the same.

I was thinking it could be a nitrogen or potassium deficiency since the tops of the stems are red, however I am feeding them at 100% recommended fox farm Grow Big schedule.

Just wondering what you guys think, I have pics below. Keep in mind this is my first time, any advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks so much.

Plant info:
Nutes: Fox Farm Grow Big 100% rec. schedule every 4 days with watering (distilled water)
Height: 13 inches
Age: almost 5 weeks
Soil PH: 7.2 (little high for my liking should I add a little lemon juice on next watering?)
Growing medium: Soil (cant remember the name, it was recommended at the hydro store. Most expensive one there haha probably a rip off)
Medium container: 7 gallon pot.(transplanted from 1 gallon about 3 weeks ago)
Lighting: 1 45 watt CFL, 2 20 watt CFL (for one plant it seems to do the job)
Strain: Obvious indica (was told it was "purple trainwreck")

Thanks, hope I provided you with enough info.

The pictures show the leaves I had to cut off, the next leaves starting to dye and the plant as a whole from the top.

Click to expand...

distilled water, that's no good

Why is distilled water no good?
My tap is really hard. I measured its PH at 8.2. Actually should have mentioned this, I believe my tap was stunting its growth early on thats why I switched to distilled.
Tap water contains a lot of things like fluorine which can kill a plant, when distilled contains none of those. I use distilled for growing many different types of plants and it works wonders?
Like I said im inexperienced, Id love explanations allong with your advice.
Thanks!

distilled is missing alot of things you need, like calcium,magnesium and iron. MAybe try a 50/50 distilled/tap, or add some cal mag

Wow, okay didn't even take that into account. Thanks! You're right actually it could be partially a bit of calcium deficiency. Looking at some spotting on the leaves it looks a lot like examples ive seen of Cal. def. Thanks again, Ill try that out.

hi , all i can say is i used to use ro water but as i was in bio bizz mg suffered, so started using fridge filtered water as takes out chlorine and chloramene etc and whilst better i now use tap water as it still has a lot of trace elements that filters take out, now from what i can gather what soil etc can make a difference with what water!!! if you go to your local water companys site it should give you a read out of there mg cal ppm etc, wouldnt help me as im useless with all that!!! but by leaving the water for 24 hours youll get rid of the chlorine etc whilst keeping some elements, some even use stuff from the fish shop that takes out chlorine etc, if ph is high then ph down, i dont profess to fully understand it all but thats the idea from what ive read, hope it helps

The first pic looks like a potassium deficiency. Take look at this link it really helped me out to Diagnos my plants. https://www.rollitup.org/marijuana-plant-problems/216537-self-diagnose-your-plants.html

Thanks Spartan, thats actually the thread I was looking at when I came up with the conclusion that it looked like nitrogen or potassium deficiency. Maybe ill up my nutes slightly , shes a hungry little bugger, and start in using my tap again. Since im using organic im not terribly worried about over fertilizing at the moment and she does look like she needs some potassium, calcium, and nitrogen to me. Hopefully ill see some positive results. Any other advice is greatly appreciated.
Thanks so much guys.

VICTORYGARDENSHYDRO said:

distilled is missing alot of things you need, like calcium,magnesium and iron. MAybe try a 50/50 distilled/tap, or add some cal mag

Click to expand...

I like to use ph balanced tap water for a few weeks, and then switch to RO water for a few weeks, etc. These photos clearly indicate elevated ph, and perhaps some over watering too.

One thing people really forget when they are trying to correct these issues is that the plant is not going to grow as vigorously during that healing process as it would otherwise, and therefore you need to keep the lights a little higher (or the plants a little lower) or it will never seem to get better. Something like this will slow down your grow cycle and you need to be patient with it now.

Okay so if its elevated PH, what is your recommendation? Can I use lemon juice to lower it, how much would you recommend? Like I said I have tested PH and its 7.2, not ideal but not terribly high.
As for over watering, I sort of doubt it. I let the top of my soil dry out , I then check deeper soil to make sure it is barely damp before watering again. Its never muddy except immediately after watering.

So Punk, you dont think these photos show anything else like a potassium, nitrogen, magnesium or calcium deficiency? From all my research (which for a beginner is pretty decent I'd say) my plant doesn't look over watered, to me at least. The leaves are perky and not drooping at all. I also aerate the soil to make sure there is sufficient oxygen getting to the root system.

My leaves arent twisting at all either which I believe is a sign of high PH before lockout.

Thanks.

Lemon juice is not what you want bro. You must invest the $11 in a bottle of ph up and down, it's paramont. Lemon juice is not stable enough, not soluable enough. Even when I use ph down on tap water, I have to hit my tub of water a few times with phdown to finally level it off. BTW, if you haven't noticed, when you test you ph, it can still change over a few days time. So another common mistake is to test it once and think you're good, then you have problems and think, "well shit, can't be a ph problem, I tested it"

The discoloration is actually not from the any of the N-P-K macronutrients. It's actually an iron deficiency. Which is a micronutrient deficiency. And here's where I teach how you fish, instead of giving you the fish: With high ph, micronutes (primarily iron in cannabis growing, but not limited to) precipitate into a solid state and are unavailable to the roots. Could also be boron, but who fuck'n cares.

How to fix? well, what I would do, is the next time it needs watering, give it opposite of what you've been giving it, RO / TAP ...make sure its balanced (not lemon juice) and make sure your water temps are good and warm with this flush. Yes, every good fix starts with a flush. Also, ditch the FF trio, it's shit, too much bat guano = ammonia toxicity.

From here you just need to really watch your ph, get on top of it and get the right chemicals and testers.

Are these plants in the right sized containers for their roots? i.e. needs daily watering, or barely any water at all. Too big or small can be tricky to manage sometimes.

Hey punk, Thanks for the reply.
Okay, Ive heard people using lemon juice before but I had my doubts, thanks for the clarification.
I actually tested my PH while writing the post but Im starting to not trust my tester. How would you go about testing your PH. Would you use a probe or a kit of some sort? Any recommended brands?

Good to know about the iron deficiency. At what point does iron start to precipitate into a solid state, if my PH actually IS 7.2 is it possible for it to happen at this level? So to correct the problem I should continue on using regular ph balanced tap, and look for a different type of fert?

Curious about why the tops of my stems are still red though, possible it could be the strain but could it also be a macronutrient deficiency?

Could I possibly be over fertilizing it, meaning the excess P is locking out iron?

If you couldnt tell from the photos the plant looks pretty great other then the lower leaves.

It very well could be in too large a pot. 7 gallons. its about 13 inches tall and its roots do go all the way to the bottom of the pot and stick out the drainage holes a bit. It definitely doesnt need daily watering, even when it was in a 1 gallon pot (definitely cramped) it wouldn't need daily watering. My climate is sort of cold and humid at the moment, which im sure is leading to this. It has good ventilation and I could get my small dehumidifier in the room if need be. I'd say I water ever 4 days, definitely not daily. =/

Thanks so much for your time and effort in these responses, I really appreciate it. + Rep

Any other advice from anyone?
I seem to be getting advice across the board, from macronutrient deficiencies, to micronutrient deficiencies, to PH issues, to overwatering. Not really sure what I should be thinking at this point.

in testing the ph, the best way is to make sure EVERYTHING you put in it is already tested and balanced. I don't test my soil, I know that my ph soil is good b/c everything i put in it is good - you are what you eat. So I just sample my water and use aquarium test drops.

I also give mini flushes throughout my grow to proactively disolve salts building up. The trick is to use warm water(just slightly colder than what you would wash an infant child in), give it about half the water you plan to flush then wait a half hour to let it work the dirt and loosen your toxins and then another repeat the flush, you can get away with using less water.

Watering 1 time every four days? Probably the temps and humidity keeping it from drying as quickly as it normally would, tackling that would help your overall plant health, but not the cause of these particular problems you have.

You must correct this before you plan to bud. The chlorosis is bad enough that it may be too late for a lot of those leaves and I know this because it happened to me all the time the first year I grew.

DrFever said:

common mistake people think its a burn when causeing the tips to go that color but in reality give them a strong shot of nutes and things should work out for you

Click to expand...

feeding them more isn't going to help. your ph is too high. Should be around 6.0 make sure you feed at half strength with the fox farm until you find a safe maximum for your plant by slowly increasing the amount of feed and documenting the results over a couple weeks.

Thanks for the replies guys.

Okay so I got a real soil testing kit instead of the probe. Apparently the probes can be very inaccurate (I had my suspicions). The PH is NOT too high. I got soil from 2-5 inches down in the pot in 5 different places (I may do one more test later to be sure). Reading came out to be about 6.6-6.7.

I'm doing the N/P/K test now, it takes about 30 min to let the soil settle out of the water, then ill take the reading.

Talked to some people at the local hydroponics store and they said I definitely had minor Calcium def. on some leaves (not really shown in the picture).
As for it being "too late for a lot of [the] leaves" that's alright, its only relatively bad on 1 leaf and noticeable on 1-2 more. If I can correct the problem I'd be happy.

For waiting to flower until this is fixed, I absolutely agree. I have plenty of time and I'd like it to get a little taller anyways.

BTW if this means anything, it averages growth of about an inch a day now. It was 11.5 inches yesterday and its 13 inches today (biggest growth I've seen yet). Sorry I should correct myself, thats 11.5 in. at 10PM and 13 in. at 3:00 PM so thats actually not even close to a full day.

She (hopefully lol) is doing pretty good other then those lower leaves there. new growth looks pretty healthy other then the growth thats about 5 days old (couple bumps on the leaves not sure what they are).

What do you think of me bringing a small dehumidifier and placing it in the same room as the plant? This would keep it a little dryer and probably would be good to prevent mold too. It's not very powerful either, its for small rooms. Just dont want to use it if it could damage the plant. Thanks again.

Keeping my fingers crossed that my N/P/K test comes back alright. Glad I'm able to eliminate these variables.

Thanks guys, Ill keep you updated. I appreciate the advice.

Edit: Sorry for the torrent of questions. Isn't chlorosis evident by the yellowing of leaves before they die, due to insufficient chlorophyll being produced? My leaves don't turn yellow. They are still green but "crispy" for lack of a better word.

Test back. All macronutrents (N/P/K) show a very high "surplus". Looks like probably a deficiency of micronutrients due to lockout. Gunna flush tonight.
Thanks guys. Ill be back with an update later. I still would love any advice you could give me as a beginner grower, other then dont overfertilize haha!

Thanks again.