Dave's First Grow - started Dec 8, 2010

Threw out the old plant, which was a failure. Better luck next time.

01-14:

pH=5.79
EC=1086
ppm=543

01-15:

Late changing the water. Smells a little raunchy, like it might have bacteria growing in it. Dumped it out and washed the inside of the tub with soap, along with the water pumps & air stone. Put in fresh H20 & nutes.

Plants are growing nice & roots are getting longer. But the leaves are getting just a bit yellow. Doesn't surprise me, since the nute levels were low to keep from burning the plants. So I increased the nute levels to about 3/4 strength.

Sensi-Grow A.. 33 ml
Sensi-Grow B.. 33 ml
B-52.............. 22 ml (full strength)
VooDoo Juice.. 22 ml (full strength)

pH=5.75
EC=1572
ppm=782

I changed the watering schedule to:
I think this might be good, since the water is aerated by the air stone. Sprinkling every 5 minutes will replace the water in contact with the roots with freshly-aerated water and fresh nutes. Want to see how this works.

01-16:

pH=6.06
EC=1579
ppm=789
water temp=69

It doesn't take long for a plant in hydro to really go downhill! I guess there's not much wiggle room when something's wrong in the plant's environment. They both are getting more yellow, which usually means a nutrient deficiency. But I wonder if that could be caused by drowning the roots? I'm really confused.

01-17:

Lowered the lights today, so that they're much closer to the plants. Also covered the reservoir lid with aluminum foil tape, to keep light out & reflect it back up to plants.

Added nutes:

11 ml Sensi-Grow A
11 ml Sensi-Grow B

so that they're all at full strength now:

pH=5.98
EC=2060
ppm=1015
water temp=69.5

Pics:

Humidity dome:

01-18:

I changed the watering schedule yesterday to only once every 3 hours, but the plants got much worse overnight. I think that they really weren't overwatered (I hope). I'll watch the pH closely and make sure the EC & ppm levels are full strength.

Changed the watering schedule again, this time to 5 minutes on, 20 minutes off. Maybe I'll turn off the sprinklers during the 6 hours of darkness, since the plants don't need nutes then.

Here are some pics from today:



Lots of leaf damage in the first plant...
and you can see the beginnings of the same in the second one:



I pruned the damaged leaves off the first plant and it looks good for now:



Also connected the water pumps to the day/night timer, so that the roots won't be sprayed when the lights are off (12am-6am). No need to feed then and I figure it will give the roots a chance to breathe some O2.

After adjusting the pH,

pH=5.84
EC=2045
ppm=1022
water temp=68 F

looks like nutrient burn brotha.

bluntly hell said:

looks like nutrient burn brotha.

Click to expand...

Could be... But they aren't really as green as they look in the pics. They're pretty yellow. So I'm not sure whether it's nutrient burn or the opposite extreme which is nute deficiency. I think I need to find out the hard way by picking one of those possibilities and doing what I can to treat it. I'll probably pick nutrient deficiency this time, since the last time I treated it as though the plant had nutrient burn (and it died). If I'm wrong, at least maybe I'll learn something.

Today's pics:



I put some dirt saturated with water in with the plants, in an attempt to raise the humidity in my grow cabinet. It's been under 20% for about a week now with the furnace running all the time in our house. But it doesn't seem to be working so far. Might have to get a humidifier for the whole room.

Today the plants don't look worse and they've grown a bit since yesterday. The roots are growing very well. Had been spraying them for 5 min every 25 minutes. Today changed it again to 10 min on, 20 min off. If the plants were being underfed, this will give them more nutes.

Checked the pH. Was over 6.2, so adjusted it down.

pH=5.80
EC=2188
ppm=1093
water temp=71.3 F (a bit too high, but not enough to worry about)

Dave, they look fine... walk away for a bit - watch some family guy and take a nap or something.

I think this grow is consuming you! (lol, I hover over mine too)

Rickybobby0007 said:

Dave, they look fine... walk away for a bit - watch some family guy and take a nap or something.

I think this grow is consuming you! (lol, I hover over mine too)

Click to expand...

HA! LOL!

Maybe you're right. I'm just worried because my first plant died and I'm new at this. But I think your advice is good. Thanks!

Pics from this morning:


The leaves are a little droopier today, which I think is probably a sign of over-watering. So cut back watering a bit to 5 min on, 20 min off.


Roots are doing great.

I also bought a humidifier and set it up in the bedroom, to raise the humidity in the whole room. So far it's 22%. It had been only 16%. I want to get it up to at least 30%.

Plants are looking a bit better tonight than they were this morning. The leaves aren't as droopy and are maybe a little greener already. I think I hit upon a good watering schedule: 5 minutes on, 20 minutes off. I also put a humidifier in the cabinet:



Removed the humidity domes and set up fan to blow on the plants gently. They look happier now!

Tonight's pics:





Hydro seems to be a little tricky, in that it's a bit sensitive to minor adjustments, but I might be getting the hang of it -- hopefully.

Oh, one more thing... The pics in my previous post show that I pruned off the 2 damaged leaves from the other plant, like I did from the first one.

01-21:

After lowering the pH tonight,

pH=5.72
EC=2342
ppm=1170
water temp=69 F

pH seems to climb quite a bit each day, from about 5.7 up to 6.2.

01-22:

pH=6.03
EC=2401
ppm=1206
water temp=67.5

01-23:

Changed water today with new nutes:

• Sensi-Grow A 44ml
• Sensi-Grow B 44ml
• Voodoo Juice 22 ml
• B-52 22 ml
• 3 gallons pure water

Checked pH, etc immediately after:

• pH=5.73
• EC=2034
• ppm=1016
• water temp=63.7
• room temp=78
• humidity=22%

Noticed a few dark spots on the leaves today. Not sure what it is.

I looked up the dark spots in my pot plant disease book and the one picture in it that looks like my plants is one of a plant that has "Leaf Septoria", which is a fungal disease. The spots developed after I installed the humidifier in the cabinet, so maybe the moist air during the dark of night made the environment good for that fungus to grow.

Today I connected the humidifier to the day/night timer so that it isn't making the air moist when the lights are off. The book said that Neem Oil is good for killing fungi and other plant pests, so I need to get some fast, plus a good wetting agent. I need to use those in a diluted foliar spray to really wipe out the fungus, if that's what it is.

01-24:

Pics:


The two root baskets under the lid.


The left plant has some nice, long, healthy roots.


The right plant's roots haven't grown so much for a while.


Right plant. Has lots of dark spots on the leaves.


Left plant doesn't have so many spots. Maybe the healthy roots are helping the plant to stay healthier than the other one.

After lowering the pH I got these readings:

• pH=5.73
• EC=2117
• ppm=1058
• water temp=71.4
• humidity=25%

01-25:

Sprayed both plants with Neem Oil solution today. Found a bottle at Wal Mart of all places:



Pics of my plants right after spraying them:


Left plant, front & back.


Right plant, front & back.

Starting pH was 6.11, then I lowered it:
pH=5.99
EC=2211
ppm=1106
res water temp=70.4

01-26:

No pics today, but the plants have dry leaves now. I think I lowered the lights too much a few days ago. The air temp was around 80 F and maybe the light was too strong. Not sure. New leaves are still growing.

Starting pH was 6.21. Lowered it to:
pH=5.98
EC=2287
ppm=1138
res water temp=69

01-30:

Changed water & nutes today.
Starting pH=5.54, raised it to:

• pH=5.70
• EC=1916
• ppm=961

Since plants had been pretty dry, increased watering schedule a couple days ago to roughly 10 min on, 10 min off. This turned out to be much better for my plants and I think it saved them. (whew!) Still keeping my fingers crossed, but they've looked good for almost a week now.

Here are some pics from this day:






This is the plant that I used to call the "Left Plant", the one that has longer roots and was generally healthier than the other one. Now I'm labeling this one "A":


Not sure why the leaves are curling so much on this plant now, but otherwise it's growing well:



This is the plant that I used to call the "Right Plant", the one that had shorter roots and got a worse case of fungus than the other one. I labeled this plant "B".


These leaves look really nice to me, without much curling at all. Looks like the Neem Oil killed all of the fungus.


Here's a movie showing the plants blowing in the wind from my PC fan:
[video=youtube;sPfmnWPGL5M]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPfmnWPGL5M[/video]

02-01:

Starting pH=6.35, lowered it to:

• pH=5.85
• EC=2073
• ppm=1036

02-02:

Starting pH=6.16, lowered it to:

• pH=5.86

02-03:

• pH=5.85
• EC=2092
• ppm=1048

02-04:

• pH=5.79
• EC=2113
• ppm=1054

Placed a clear plastic humidity dome over the two plants with the humidifier blowing water vapor directly into it. Here's a video:

[video=youtube;jcqKTwdA394]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcqKTwdA394[/video]

(I wonder if the humidifier would be good for delivering nutrients to roots, too. I could fill it with water and nutes and make it blow the water vapor directly to the roots. It's an ultrasonic humidifier, so doesn't heat the water. One problem I'd have to figure out is how to recycle the water back to the humidifier.)

Was gone for the weekend. Left the wife to take care of the plants.

Pics from last night:




The last shot is a close-up of plant A. The leaves are curled and still a little dry for some reason. Watering schedule is 10 minutes on, 5 minutes off, so they're getting lots of water in the roots. I won't worry about it now. They're both growing nicely and the smell is getting very noticeable.

02-07:

• Initial pH=6.44, then lowered it to:
• pH=5.97
• EC=2242
• ppm=1120
• water temp=72.4