First Grow - Yellowish/Brown Leaf Tips on 13 Day Old Plant (pics)

Hey guys, first grow and first post here. First week went fine, growth seemed quick (but like i said its my first grow) and ran into a few small problems such as my lights being too close, a little bit overwatered, nothing too major. Moved it away from the lights and let up on the water a little bit, but now its getting yellowish/brown on the tips of the leaves. I have been looking up all the information that I can the past few days, but a lot of the information is a little conflicting/confusing. So I figured I might as well throw up a thread and hopefully you more experienced guys can help me out a little bit and let me know if its a nute burn or deficiency.

A little more info:
I did read that FFOF and FFHF ran a little hot, but I was willing to take that chance as my other option was miracle grow or trying to throw something together myself (a little inexperienced for that I think) I'm thinking it may just be a nute burn from the FF soil as I haven't added and other nutes at all. I also read that FF soils need added perlite, but again my only perlite option was miracle grow perlite so I didn't want to use it. Maybe the water isn't draining well enough?

Soil PH has been at around 6-7 so I dont think its a PH problem (although my meter was one of the crappy cheap probe ones, going to invest in a better one.) I watered the first week with tap water that had sat out at room temperature for 24 hours, but switched to distilled water about 4-5 days ago (would the switch to distilled water cause something like this?)

Strain: Advanced Seeds Auto Somango (Jack Herrer x Big Skunk x Ruderalis)
Lighting: 6x 23w CFL's (4x 6500k 2x 2700k)
Soil: 2/3 FFHF 1/3 FFOF (in a 3 gal pot)
Water: was watering a little too much early on, a little bit of tap water (sat out for 24hrs) each day with no runoff. Since then I have been going 3-4 days in between waterings (distilled water) with ~20% runoff.
Temps: temps have stayed between 79-82 degrees the whole time, humidity between 40-50%

I can provide any more info you guys should need (granted I have the tools to do so) to help diagnose this issue. As of now with the research I've done I am thinking it is a combination of FF soil running hot with poor drainage, was thinking maybe a flush would help? But like I said, any input here is welcome. Thanks!

Any ideas? the spots are actually more of an orange/rust looking color the more I look at it now. It isnt affecting much of the newer leaves that bad. Overall growth seems a little stunted though. Would I need to start feeding this early? (2 weeks).

I'd say its the OF soil.its a tad hot but that girl is gonna loooove it real soon. Don't stress over pH in soil ...its a natural oh balancer. Unless your throwing super acid or alkaline water at it. At the tap 7 or 6 ....the soil will balance it out.

Seedlings always complain about one thing or another. But you won't need to feed her at all for at least 45 days if she's in ffof. Believe me less is always more .... Unless were talking about light

All comments and pictures posted by the entity known as packetloss314 are completely fiction and at times outright lies. All content was copied from the internet and all statements are from the mind of a lunatic

Thanks for the reply! I was thinking it was a nute burn, but also saw some deficiencies that looked like that. Is it normal for seedlings to recover from burns like this? (keep in mind its an autoflower). Would it hurt to do a good flush to get the nute build up off of the roots? When would it be safe to start using low dosage of ff grow big on it for veg, keeping in mind its supposed to seed->harvest in ~60-70 days. Sorry for all the questions, trying to gather as much info as I can for my first grow!

definitely burnt

A little more info, checked on them today and it's still there! (Wasn't expecting it to just go away lol) the tips are starting to curl up on the burned leaves, if that helps anyone figuring out what's wrong. Also the burn spots on the tips appear a little worse/bigger. I was hoping it would just stay at the tips as I have read as long as it's only the tip of the leaf that's burnt and not the whole leaf it isn't as bad. Any info at all is appreciated!

So essentially you have 600w of light on them ? They need about 200 at this stage. May be why you are getting burnage. Should have started with a seed starter soil, then onto HF and OF

Diabolical666 said:

So essentially you have 600w of light on them ? They need about 200 at this stage. May be why you are getting burnage. Should have started with a seed starter soil, then onto HF and OF

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I have 138w of light on them, they are cfls. I am definitely going to look into a better soil mix next time that isn't as hot. I read that you don't want to transplant autos, but I'll look into it. Are you thinking this looks more like light burn than nute burn?

Ok a couple of things, the brown burnt tips is nute burn, ffof is a tad hot,.. that by itself not a problem she'll bounce back. the wrinkling, leaves is a result of too much water so with those two together might be enough to put her in shock. Just let her sit and do not water till soil is feels lighter, let her roots search for water,BUT don't let it go so far as to dry her out..After a couple of weeks she will be thriving in ffof, You're giving her too much too fast slow down and let her do her thing..

Alright that's kinda what I was thinking, nute burn and I know I overwatered early. I'm going to let the soil dry out a bit more in between waterings. Thanks for the reply chilly, Ima take your advice and let her do her thing. But is there anything I could do to help with water drainage (soil seems to hold way too much water deep down) outside of transplanting into something with more perlite?

I have a little update and a few questions to add, the burn is progressing down the edges of the affected leaves a bit, and some of the newer leaves are starting to burn at the tip too. The leaves that have been burnt the longest are curling up really bad also. A question I have is why didn't the seedling burn earlier on? And why is it just starting to burn (it's been in the same soil)? Sorry if that's a noob question, just trying to learn all I can!

The leaves that are already burnt will not recover. Those burnt leaves will either get worse or eventually stop. As for transplanting, that's not going to be an option for you I don't think. The plant is too young and since it's already in a 3 gallon pot the root ball/system won't be compact enough to transfer. You can consider flushing, but the plant is really young and there is some risk involved with that. If you have really good drainage, you'll probably be OK to flush, just gotta be careful. Autoflowers are sensitive, you're suppose to use a light soil mix with them. To be honest, this will probably stunt the growth significantly. If you have new growth with tips that are burnt, I think you need to flush like I mentioned. Make sure you have really good airflow going across the plant afterwards.

Post some updated and closer pics. That will help too.

Also, what's the PH of your tap water, not the soil? And temps?

Triplec said:

Post some updated and closer pics. That will help too.

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Thanks for the info triplec. I will post some pics when I get home. I'm from a small town with like no gardening stores at all, had to drive an hour away just to find the fox farm, but I think the place I got the FF had some other mixes that are probably lighter. I'll plan a trip that way soon. Now that you bring it up I should really work on getting more air flow into the box, I could use more intake. Im afraid to flush because in all honestly the soil doesn't drain all that well (enough to get runoff but I really should've added perlite). I'm not sure of the ph of my tap water, or the distilled water. I checked walmart and lowes for water ph strips and they didn't have them in stock. The temp of the water has been room temperature, maybe on the cold side as it sat in my basement.

DatDudeJT said:

Thanks for the info triplec. I will post some pics when I get home. I'm from a small town with like no gardening stores at all, had to drive an hour away just to find the fox farm, but I think the place I got the FF had some other mixes that are probably lighter. I'll plan a trip that way soon. Now that you bring it up I should really work on getting more air flow into the box, I could use more intake. Im afraid to flush because in all honestly the soil doesn't drain all that well (enough to get runoff but I really should've added perlite). I'm not sure of the ph of my tap water, or the distilled water. I checked walmart and lowes for water ph strips and they didn't have them in stock. The temp of the water has been room temperature, maybe on the cold side as it sat in my basement.

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Yep, perlite is essential to drainage. Knowing that flushing would be risky at this stage IMO. You could try and re-pot it into a lighter soil but that could just stress her out more and cause more problems. It's just hard to transplant or repot with out having a tight and compact rootball. You take a big risk damaging roots I think. Also, I know my tap water's PH is pretty high. I only use distilled. I'd recommend getting a $10 digital PH meter off amazon and use distilled water until you can check your tap.

What meter would you recommend? Are there any cheaper ones that can test water and soil? I'll definitely get a better tester than this probe one. As for the perlite, I don't think I'm going to mess with transplanting or flushing on this grow, unless it's my last resort. But with this being my first grow I was expecting issues. Worst case I will lose this plant and start over in a lighter soil with perlite.

DatDudeJT said:

What meter would you recommend? Are there any cheaper ones that can test water and soil? I'll definitely get a better tester than this probe one. As for the perlite, I don't think I'm going to mess with transplanting or flushing on this grow, unless it's my last resort. But with this being my first grow I was expecting issues. Worst case I will lose this plant and start over in a lighter soil with perlite.

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This is the one I have and it works great. IMO, there's really no point to test the PH of the soil. Just test the water/feed and the run off. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CH3QZSE/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_uvSnub1BGZ9HX

Here are some updated pictures Triplec. I'll look to order that meter in the next few days!

Edit: that first picture is actually from yesterday morning, not today. The other 2 pics are from today.

DatDudeJT said:

Here are some updated pictures Triplec. I'll look to order that meter in the next few days!

Edit: that first picture is actually from yesterday morning, not today. The other 2 pics are from today.

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Thanks, yea that soil must be pretty hot. Are the leaves/tips of new growth looking burnt too?