BUD ROT! To harvest or attempt to salvage?

Hey everyone
I looked away from my children for just a moment and boom one of them has quite bad bud rot that seems to have almost taken the WHOLE top of my plant. This is my first grow and I noticed this particular plant started to smell strange a few weeks ago but I was not familiar with the smell of rot, i assumed it was strain related. I don't know what the strains are as it was a random seed drawing for the winners but most of them came from a batch of Cheisel. Anyhow the whole top of the plant was inspected and doesn't seem to have rot but I am no professional so I seek your advice. What should I do with this poor plant?

I am currently on day 54 of flowering and have thoroughly attempted to remove as much as possible while ensure no other parts were affected.

Cloudian said:

Hey everyone
I looked away from my children for just a moment and boom one of them has quite bad bud rot that seems to have almost taken the WHOLE top of my plant. This is my first grow and I noticed this particular plant started to smell strange a few weeks ago but I was not familiar with the smell of rot, i assumed it was strain related. I don't know what the strains are as it was a random seed drawing for the winners but most of them came from a batch of Cheisel. Anyhow the whole top of the plant was inspected and doesn't seem to have rot but I am no professional so I seek your advice. What should I do with this poor plant?

I am currently on day 54 of flowering and have thoroughly attempted to remove as much as possible while ensure no other parts were affected.

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Doesn't look that much like bud rot, except for that ate out part of the stem. When there's bud rot I always see that part of the bud and surrounding small leaves turn gray/brown and wilted. The first sign is the gray/brown small bud leaves. That alerts you to pull the bud open and look inside, there's usually rot in there. I do see wilted leaves in your pics but they're not gray or brown. You could have a different type of fungal infection or fungus gnats eating the roots. Could be fusarium wilt or something like that. Bud rot is usually from poor ventilation and air movement. A fan blowing air around the buds generally fixes it, though not too much or they'll dry out. Your pics actually look a lot like overwatering too. Anything that kills roots will cause leaves to wilt like that.

IF it is bud and if you have other girls in your garden I'd probably just chop this one and call it a day. The worst thing would be if it spread, if it is actually bud rot, but if you feel like you got most of it you could try letting it go a little longer and see if the rot progresses or not, it's a bit of a risk though...

BobCajun said:

Doesn't look that much like bud rot, except for that ate out part of the stem. When there's bud rot I always see that part of the bud and surrounding small leaves turn gray/brown and wilted. The first sign is the gray/brown small bud leaves. That alerts you to pull the bud open and look inside, there's usually rot in there. I do see wilted leaves in your pics but they're not gray or brown. You could have a different type of fungal infection or fungus gnats eating the roots. Could be fusarium wilt or something like that. Bud rot is usually from poor ventilation and air movement. A fan blowing air around the buds generally fixes it, though not too much or they'll dry out. Your pics actually look a lot like overwatering too. Anything that kills roots will cause leaves to wilt like that.

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Thanks for the through reply. So I don't have a fan running at night during the 12 hours of dark, and lately it's been really cold and wet here. I assume leaving the exhaust fan running 24 hours wouldn't be too much air? Or would it be better to use a small oscillation fan on the inside?

The buds I removed were almost gray, all of the material was very wet feeling and gray like cotton very deep near the stem. They have probably been nuked with nutes as well, the past few feedings i've really loaded them up with bloom and calmg. The stem still barely holds it self up and I will continue to monitor it very closely.

astronautrob said:

IF it is bud and if you have other girls in your garden I'd probably just chop this one and call it a day. The worst thing would be if it spread, if it is actually bud rot, but if you feel like you got most of it you could try letting it go a little longer and see if the rot progresses or not, it's a bit of a risk though...

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Well these are in 3 gallon pots and I may leave it isolated for a few days just to see what happens. I really dont want it to spread because of other plants are extremely healthy.

that's rot it doesn't stop until bud is dry git that shit out of the room now it is alive and spreading as u read this

Cloudian said:

Well these are in 3 gallon pots and I may leave it isolated for a few days just to see what happens. I really dont want it to spread because of other plants are extremely healthy.

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Yea dude if you got healthy plants in there I wouldn't take the chance. I'd either isolate the sick plant or chop it and start to dry it. You do not what it to spread to your healthy plants, that would be the worst

Cloudian said:

Thanks for the through reply. So I don't have a fan running at night during the 12 hours of dark, and lately it's been really cold and wet here. I assume leaving the exhaust fan running 24 hours wouldn't be too much air? Or would it be better to use a small oscillation fan on the inside?

The buds I removed were almost gray, all of the material was very wet feeling and gray like cotton very deep near the stem. They have probably been nuked with nutes as well, the past few feedings i've really loaded them up with bloom and calmg. The stem still barely holds it self up and I will continue to monitor it very closely.

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Yup, that's exactly the problem, lack of night ventilation and air movement. When they respire at night they produce water vapor and oxygen. The water vapor is going to condense in the buds if there's no air movement. I had the same problem using fairly small cabs, I figured oh this is so small that I don't need to use fans. Bud rot was the result. I still only use one 4" PC fan for exhaust and another hanging between the canopy and the lights blowing air around the buds because the exhaust fan alone wasn't enough to stop the rot. But it's a thin line between enough air movement to prevent rot and so much that it causes bud drying. I had to try various positionings of the fan to get it just right. Interesting thing about a PC fan; if it's hanging from it's wire it will naturally oscillate to a fair degree just from the blade movement. It'll swing one way until the wire reaches it's twisting limit and then it bounces back the other way and repeats.

Okay - Now I need to know if the bud on top is smokeable? the whole top portion dried out over night and fell off, would the infection destroy the rest of the cola even to the top? It doesnt appear to have much signs of bud rot and inside near the steam is green.

most likely that whole plant is infected, id throw it out and disinfect everything quickly and get some Green Cure fungicide on the rest of the plants , like yesterday...

yar u got it bad don't smoke it chop chop chop

Cloudian said:

Okay - Now I need to know if the bud on top is smokeable? the whole top portion dried out over night and fell off, would the infection destroy the rest of the cola even to the top? It doesnt appear to have much signs of bud rot and inside near the steam is green.

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I just pick out the affected parts. The rest is perfectly good. Why would anyone want to throw out perfectly good bud. It won't help save the others anyway because apparently bud rot fungus is always around. It just waits for the right conditions to come along. I do flush the moldy parts I pick out though. Don't want spores coming off it. Rinsing the good buds with water, preferably pure, would be a good idea though, as long as you get most of the water off quickly. Not real cold water, because you don't want resin heads snapping off.

if its got mold do not smoke u can realy damage ur self , i would suggest removing all moldy buds and get rid far away , drop your humidity aslong as u can for the rest

good luck

joejoe4444 said:

if its got mold do not smoke u can realy damage ur self , i would suggest removing all moldy buds and get rid far away , drop your humidity aslong as u can for the rest

good luck

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Gray mold (bud rot) is not toxic. No page about it said anything about toxicity. It's the molds that grow on weed after it's harvested that's the worst kind, like Aspergillus. One page says temps above 80 and low humidity will kill it off (gray mold).

well u maybe be right but u would not catch me smoking any kind of mold or fungi / spores , at the end of the day its up to the individual ,

joejoe4444 said:

well u maybe be right but u would not catch me smoking any kind of mold or fungi / spores , at the end of the day its up to the individual ,

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have u ever smoked brick weed

So dealing with mold is a tough one but it aint that bad if you can stay ahead of it. The most important thing you need is lower humidity. You 100% need a dehumidifier, or a better one, or a bigger one. The other thing you need is better air flow like mentioned above.

The bud isnt garbage but its going to keep moving through the plant until it gets the whole plant. Its likes the dense cloas first and then it will move to the lower smaller ones. It will also move to all the other plants if the conditions stay the same. The other plants have a better chance if the colas arent the long dense banana style too. Pop corn style plants have a much better chance in resisting mold.

Youre at 54 days and its looking okay so id take the top of that plant off. Pull the buds that make up that cola out a bit so you can see down to the stem to see if theres more mold. If there is throw those parts out. Then you want to wash your hands and check the other plants one by one. Itll almost always start in the top colas but sometimes if theres a bunch of branches leaning on one bud you can find it there. Once you see even the faintest sign of mold take the top of the plant off and hang it after removing the mold. Then when the bud is dried dont leave it as a big cola. Break it down to smaller pieces and check for mold in them as you go.

Lots of times the mold is just there already and you dont know it. Hot humid rooms and cold outside can produce wall sweat from the condensation under the insulation and mold. One major one is mini splits. Mini splits can develop mold if not cleaned regularly and then blow all that out over the plants. It could even be from the garbage can full of old coffee cups or soda cans with a little left in them in the corner of the room.

Make sure after the run is over that you bleach all your stuff. Wipe down fan blades, wash floors and walls, you know the drill. Also get affected plant matter out of the growing area. Id rather pull the plant tops early than throwing them In the trash so keep checking the new plants, and even if you have to go buy a dehu from home depot and return the thing after 85 days of the 90 day return policy, do it. A dehu will get the problem slowed right down.

joejoe4444 said:

well u maybe be right but u would not catch me smoking any kind of mold or fungi / spores , at the end of the day its up to the individual ,

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It's not entire buds that have the mold on em, just certain parts of buds. Just means you have to harvest the moldy buds earlier than expected.

joejoe4444 said:

well u maybe be right but u would not catch me smoking any kind of mold or fungi / spores , at the end of the day its up to the individual ,

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Mold and mildew tests almost never come back as a zero. Theres usually always some spores in what your smoking you just dont know.

Urghhh... fucking bud rot... I feel your pain mate. Just had this through my main football sized colas. The dehumid on my split system packed it in and I didn't notice for at least a week (maybe 2 ). Smelt old stinky socks in my tent and well, I cried on the inside that day

Managed to pull the rest through fine. Bought a dehumidifier which keeps my room pegged at 35-40%, 24/7 no matter how much rain we get. It's our wet season here so we can get weeks of rain and RH not dropping below 90. Fairly normal for us to hit 95% every night here too. My new dehumid extracts 10 litres overnight easy. It does raise temps a bit so you may find one handy for those cooler rainy days/nights.

Some good info on bud rot here too mate, if you haven't read already: http://www.growweedeasy.com/bud-rot

Main thing to pull the rest through is to keep the climate in-check. Do that and the stuff should not spread. As for killing the spores. Well that's another story. I am yet to find anything other than bleach + hot water to stop mould in my sub-tropical climate. Even that will be temporary if the conditions favour its growth.