Yellow striations on some of the leaves

I have 3 White Widows and 3 Blackjacks (all Nirvana) all of which were put into flowering about 6 days ago. They are about 2 months old and are under a 600 watt HPS light.

All are growing in FFOF soil & using FF nutes in 5 gal buckets. I switched the nutes from FF Grow Big to FF Big Bloom when I put them into flower. They get plenty of fresh air and air circulation around them.

Have a look at the pix below, note the yellow streaking on the leaves. This problem is showing up on just one of the White Widows, which happens to be the largest of the Widows. These streaks of yellowing are on some of the top leaves and a few of the lower leaves. This streaking started about a week or two before being put into flower and has been slowly getting more prevalent.

The plant seems quite healthy otherwise. All the other plants are healthy. To the touch the leaves feel and seem fine. Temps are 75-80 and the humidity is about 60%; I am working on reducing the humidity during flowering. PH is about 6.7, I use distilled water.

I have looked at many pix of sick plants on this and other sites and cannot find one which shows these symptoms.

Any ideas anyone?

Any help would be aprpeciated!

Nitrogen diff?? im pretty sure i remember reading that in a grow guide.. yellow = nitrogen? thats just my 2 cents though.. dont have enough grow experience so best to take a vets adivce..

it looks like some sort of burn but not particularly nitrogen though nitrogen tends to affect the entire leaf in solid spots not streaks and tends to only affect older leaves first is there any brown or necrotic spots anywhere on the yellow leaves? its really tuff to tell is it on the older growth or newer growth of the plant?

Kart0oN said:

it looks like some sort of burn but not particularly nitrogen though nitrogen tends to affect the entire leaf in solid spots not streaks and tends to only affect older leaves first is there any brown or necrotic spots anywhere on the yellow leaves? its really tuff to tell is it on the older growth or newer growth of the plant?

Click to expand...

Thanks Kartoon. I went in and took a real good look at the plant in order to answer your question. None of the leaves which have the streaks have any necro or brown spots. The streaks are on young/new growth as well as the old growth although it seems to be more new growth leaves which are streaked than the old growth. Of course the yellow area is much larger on the old growth since those leaves are much larger. It's tough to tell exactly since this plant is in a SOG. The streaked leaves seem to be almost exclusively leaves which are on the top third of the plant. Not only are these streaks strange but none of the other plants have them and it's interresting to note that this plant has grown about 20% larger than the other Widows planted at the same time, and treated just the same as this plant has been. So the only obvious differences between this plant and the others is that this one is about 20% larger (differences not counting the differences in phenotypes that is).

k i pulled out my book "Marijuana Garden Saver: Handbook to healthy plants" the closest things i could find are potassium def, phosphorous def, or copper def, the only problem with this is that pot/phosh def both develop necro or brown spots thats why i asked, as for copper def, it looks alot like nitro def but is more streaky and occurs in younger leaves then older leaves downfall to that is leaves curl and tips die which you dont have, its really hard to pinpoint what exactly it is because its just yellow with no other symptoms and most all deficiancies include yellowing in leaves heh idk those 3 would probably be my best bet try a lil research on them if u'd like tell me what you think i mean i guess it could be a crazy form of nitro def but i really dont think it is like i said before nitro def generally happends in old fan leaves first,

well i continued reading a little further and check this out for iron def, and i quote "Iron def, starts in the new leaves which lack chlorophyll but have no necrotic spots. this causes them to turn bright yellow except for the veins, which remain green. New leaves start to experience chlorotic molting; first new the base of the leaflets, so the middle of the leaf appears to have a brown mark. The veins remain dark green. Note the Fe def. looks similar to Mg def. except for its location. Fe def. affects the new growth but not the lower leaves while mg def. affects the middle and lower leaves first." straight from the book.

hope any of that helped good luck man

Kart0oN said:

k i pulled out my book "Marijuana Garden Saver: Handbook to healthy plants" the closest things i could find are potassium def, phosphorous def, or copper def, the only problem with this is that pot/phosh def both develop necro or brown spots thats why i asked, as for copper def, it looks alot like nitro def but is more streaky and occurs in younger leaves then older leaves downfall to that is leaves curl and tips die which you dont have, its really hard to pinpoint what exactly it is because its just yellow with no other symptoms and most all deficiancies include yellowing in leaves heh idk those 3 would probably be my best bet try a lil research on them if u'd like tell me what you think i mean i guess it could be a crazy form of nitro def but i really dont think it is like i said before nitro def generally happends in old fan leaves first,

well i continued reading a little further and check this out for iron def, and i quote "Iron def, starts in the new leaves which lack chlorophyll but have no necrotic spots. this causes them to turn bright yellow except for the veins, which remain green. New leaves start to experience chlorotic molting; first new the base of the leaflets, so the middle of the leaf appears to have a brown mark. The veins remain dark green. Note the Fe def. looks similar to Mg def. except for its location. Fe def. affects the new growth but not the lower leaves while mg def. affects the middle and lower leaves first." straight from the book.

hope any of that helped good luck man

Click to expand...

REALLY appreciated Kartoon! Rep to you.

I just went in to look to see how they compare to what you wrote and it went lights out for the next 12 hours. Before the lights went out I also see that this Widow that has the leaf problem is not only the largest by far but also is the only with 3 main stems, 3 HUGE main stems. Maybe these stems sucked the nutes up and there was not enough to go around? Now what you said re the tips curling, I checked my log and that happened any number of times on this plant and it drove me nuts until that went away on it's own, sort of, after I got the humidity higher in there, if that is what fixed it. The other thing is that although the FF nutes say to double dose every other feeding but I have never done that for fear of burning them. Maybe the combo of the larger size, triple stems has caused this deficiency (whatever it may be). So what do you think of this, I give her one dose of the FF Grow Big (which was used during vegging) AND I also throw in one dose of the FF Big Bloom (which is what they have been getting since putting into bloom) to give this one plant all at the same time?? Sort of scares the heck out of me that I will burn her but I fear if I don't do something she's gonna take a bad dive at some point not too long from now.....

The other thing I neglected to tell you is that I originally vegged them w/an 8 bulb T5 fluoro setup, then got the 600 watt HPS a couple of weeks prior to putting into flower AND I kept the fluoro running at the same time as the HPS to blast the sides of the plants. Don't know if you think any of that matters but wanted to pass it on.

I'll have a look in the morning when the lights go back on and see how she compares to your various descriptions. Thanks again!

Kart0oN said:

k i pulled out my book "Marijuana Garden Saver: Handbook to healthy plants" the closest things i could find are potassium def, phosphorous def, or copper def, the only problem with this is that pot/phosh def both develop necro or brown spots thats why i asked, as for copper def, it looks alot like nitro def but is more streaky and occurs in younger leaves then older leaves downfall to that is leaves curl and tips die which you dont have, its really hard to pinpoint what exactly it is because its just yellow with no other symptoms and most all deficiancies include yellowing in leaves heh idk those 3 would probably be my best bet try a lil research on them if u'd like tell me what you think i mean i guess it could be a crazy form of nitro def but i really dont think it is like i said before nitro def generally happends in old fan leaves first,

well i continued reading a little further and check this out for iron def, and i quote "Iron def, starts in the new leaves which lack chlorophyll but have no necrotic spots. this causes them to turn bright yellow except for the veins, which remain green. New leaves start to experience chlorotic molting; first new the base of the leaflets, so the middle of the leaf appears to have a brown mark. The veins remain dark green. Note the Fe def. looks similar to Mg def. except for its location. Fe def. affects the new growth but not the lower leaves while mg def. affects the middle and lower leaves first." straight from the book.

hope any of that helped good luck man

Click to expand...

Kartoon - So having a look here and based on your reading I am going to take a somewhat educated guess that it's an FE issue. So I am going to change my thought and do a double dose of FF Grow Big since the issue started while vegging. It is more clearly prevalent in the newer leaves and involves none of the lower leaves. Any thoughts appreciated! Thanks agian.

I'd give it some cal-mag but it doesn't look that bad. I hope it's not critters eating your roots.

tomatogrowop said:

I'd give it some cal-mag but it doesn't look that bad. I hope it's not critters eating your roots.

Click to expand...

I just gave a double dose of FF Grow Big which has those minerals in it. That would rEALLY suck if I had some sort of bug. For whatever its worth, the plant is pretty healthy otherwise and keeps growing.

Some might not agree with me on this one, but I let my plant go through minor deficiencies and stress without messing around too much about them.

If the plant grows ok and you feeding regime is OK and your pH is OK just let it got for a week and see what happens.
Maybe you've moved from veg to flowering nutes at once and not gradually?

If not I'd go with the cal-mag option as you'r using distilled water.

But just give it a week and see how it goes.

McFonz said:

Some might not agree with me on this one, but I let my plant go through minor deficiencies and stress without messing around too much about them.

If the plant grows ok and you feeding regime is OK and your pH is OK just let it got for a week and see what happens.
Maybe you've moved from veg to flowering nutes at once and not gradually?

If not I'd go with the cal-mag option as you'r using distilled water.

But just give it a week and see how it goes.

Click to expand...

Thanks McFonz. This streaking started about 1-2 weeks before putting into flower so I don't think it was the nute change. However I was not aware of the gradual changeover from one nute type to the other.

I like to take the conservative approach as you mention. Thanks for the nute info and the conservative approach, reps to you McFonz.

tomatogrowop said:

I'd give it some cal-mag but it doesn't look that bad. I hope it's not critters eating your roots.

Click to expand...

Tomatogrowup, thanks again. I am going to try the cal mag in a week if it does not clear up.

Any idea how long it would take to see any results if I end up using the cal-mag?

its a trace element, but which...im betting sulfur...whats ur pH??

Nubby Tubbs said:

its a trace element, but which...im betting sulfur...whats ur pH??

Click to expand...

They are in FFOF soil and the ph has been running between 6.5-6.8.

Newz682 said:

Thanks McFonz. This streaking started about 1-2 weeks before putting into flower so I don't think it was the nute change. However I was not aware of the gradual changeover from one nute type to the other.

I like to take the conservative approach as you mention. Thanks for the nute info and the conservative approach, reps to you McFonz.

Click to expand...

Have you ever checked your EC?
I couldn't ignore the "double dose" phrase you've said. Usually you should only use 1\4-1\2 strength nutrients at most and less when growing soil.
The only time I go over the recommended dose is with the PK when I want to pump a bud that wasn't pumpin. I use Hesi nutrients and when the base calls for 5ml I use 1-1.5ml with tap water and 2-2.5ml with distilled water.

You can use a LOT of fertilizerin your watering if you introduce it gradually (for each fertilizer) but usually a plant only need so much to grow well.


Cheers

McFonz said:

Have you ever checked your EC?
I couldn't ignore the "double dose" phrase you've said. Usually you should only use 1\4-1\2 strength nutrients at most and less when growing soil.
The only time I go over the recommended dose is with the PK when I want to pump a bud that wasn't pumpin. I use Hesi nutrients and when the base calls for 5ml I use 1-1.5ml with tap water and 2-2.5ml with distilled water.

You can use a LOT of fertilizerin your watering if you introduce it gradually (for each fertilizer) but usually a plant only need so much to grow well.


Cheers

Click to expand...

Thanks again McFonz. Appreciate the detail, the site wouldn't let me give you another rep.....it said to "spread it around"!

In any case I have not a clue what "EC" is so I likely have never checked it. Possibly something to do with concentration? If so I do not have that equipment. I have a ph meter, moisture meter, light meter, hygrometer & thermometer and an empty pocketbook.

When I said "double dose", the directions on the bottle of FF nutes say to have a "heavy feeding" every other feeding (I don't have the bottles in front of me so I am going by memory on the frequency of the heavy feeding but I think I am correct) which really just is a double dose of the normal feeding. And I do use distilled water so seeing as how your Hesie nutes specify nearly double the dosage for distilled water (FF doesn't say that but no doubt the concept must the same as the distilled water of course has no trace elements in it, as you already knew) so I may have been underfertizlinging them for some time since I have always just used anywhere from half to full dosage since they have been getting nutes. Well in any case I double dosed yesterday and so far today the plant in question does not look better or worse.

Any guess how long it takes before you can see changes in the streaked leaves?

Usually a week is enough for changes to show up.

EC stands for Electric Conductivity and usually measured in mS (mili simense).
It tells you how many salts you have in your solution.
A plant can take (\need) so many salts and has a capacity of how much it can take.

EC measuring is the percise way to decide how much nutrient one should add to the feeding solution.


You can ask your hydro shop to perform a check.
You need a EC meter (pen-type usually), a 1L bottle of the water you are using and your nutrients.
You then check how much nutrients you need to add before reaching the proper EC (there are numerous charts around and I could help you with that if you'll post an up-to-date picture) and thats how much you should use on every watering.
You could use less one time and more the next time if you wish, but I don't see a reason to do so.

The recommended dose is usually (unless stated otherwise) if your water reads 0 EC (distilled water).Using more than that is just a waste of nutrients.

Don't forget that you already have nutrients in your medium, you shouldn't need much anyway.

Hey Newz,

I had a very similar problem with a Lemon Skunk I am growing and I hit it with Earth Juice Micros and a little Cal-Mag+ and while I didn't see any new yellow striations it has been 5 weeks and there is still a couple places that the yellow still shows, I am not trying to tell you exactly what your problem is but unlike N deficiancy it takes a LONGGGGGG time to go away if it ever goes totally away. I will try to get pics today for you to compare.

McFonz said:

Usually a week is enough for changes to show up.

EC stands for Electric Conductivity and usually measured in mS (mili simense).
It tells you how many salts you have in your solution.
A plant can take (\need) so many salts and has a capacity of how much it can take.

EC measuring is the percise way to decide how much nutrient one should add to the feeding solution.


You can ask your hydro shop to perform a check.
You need a EC meter (pen-type usually), a 1L bottle of the water you are using and your nutrients.
You then check how much nutrients you need to add before reaching the proper EC (there are numerous charts around and I could help you with that if you'll post an up-to-date picture) and thats how much you should use on every watering.
You could use less one time and more the next time if you wish, but I don't see a reason to do so.

The recommended dose is usually (unless stated otherwise) if your water reads 0 EC (distilled water).Using more than that is just a waste of nutrients.

Don't forget that you already have nutrients in your medium, you shouldn't need much anyway.

Click to expand...

Thanks again McFonz. Is this the device you are speaking of - http://www.gianthydro.com/product_p/HIPRIMO.htm ?

When you say "...post an up-to-date picture" in your post, what picture are you referring to?

As far as the nutes in the medium, I am guessing at this point the only thing laying below the surface is a huge rootball since I can't even stick in the moisture meter past the first inch or so of soil on top. Likely rootbound in the 5 gal pail but nothing I can do about it since I have no more space/lights.

Thanks again!

DJ GreenThumb said:

Hey Newz,

I had a very similar problem with a Lemon Skunk I am growing and I hit it with Earth Juice Micros and a little Cal-Mag+ and while I didn't see any new yellow striations it has been 5 weeks and there is still a couple places that the yellow still shows, I am not trying to tell you exactly what your problem is but unlike N deficiancy it takes a LONGGGGGG time to go away if it ever goes totally away. I will try to get pics today for you to compare.

Click to expand...

DJ - thanks for the post. Any pix would be appreciated. I believe that McFonz also mentioned the Cal-Mag; wonder if "extra" (as in the plant doesn't really need it) Cal-mag would hurt the plant?