Possible phosphorus deficiency?

[stayoutofthetunacan]

Hello folks, it's me again, seems like I can barely go two weeks without having to ask for help, sorry about that!

 

The last week the plants seemed to be thriving pretty well and one of them looks like they have started to flower. Based on that and using the suggested doses for nutrients, I adjusted how much I fed them to around 15ml per gallon (90ml) of Humboldts Secret Base A & B.

 

Yesterday I got up to get ready for work and checked on my plants and I noticed some of the leaves were developing brownish scabby looking patches around the middle of the leaves.

 

The plants overall were drooping as well.

I looked it up online and I believe it is phosphorus deficiency.

 

When I checked the water I noticed it was getting a little low, so I topped it off, added some extra nutrients and then checked and adjusted the PH of the water, I've been keeping it around 5.5 (give or take a bit).

 

So far it doesn't seem like the plants have responded much to this, and since the last time I changed out the water and everything was last Friday, I've been simply thinking about pushing it up a day and doing it Thursday morning.

 

With that being said, I am curious on opinion for nutrients. I've been feeding the plants based on recommend doses of nutrients based on gallons of water used, but I started thinking about how I have two plants in the pail and I began to wonder if the plants are basically competing for nutrients at this point and if I should be adding more than what the chart recommends? And if so, how much? I don't want to iust double the nutrients and then risk over feeding them.

 

I would have already moved one of the plants, but I don't have anywhere else to put it. I will definitely be only doing one plant per pail in the future and I regret taking someone else's advice when they told me they had grown FOUR plants in one these pails.

 

Anyways, if you've taken the time to read this far, thanks. If you have any advice on the matter, you have my gratitude.

 

 

 

[Guest]

Looks like a little bit of overfeeding, is that 90ml per litre? try using half the dose recommended on the bottle. 

Also, depending on the grow medium, the pH may be the issue, although there could be many factors for this particular issue in situe.

Edited July 29, 2020 by The Pharm

[stayoutofthetunacan]

1 hour ago, The Pharm said:

Looks like a little bit of overfeeding, is that 90ml per litre? try using half the dose recommended on the bottle. 

Also, depending on the grow medium, the pH may be the issue, although there could be many factors for this particular issue in situe.

 

Thanks for the insight! I looked up nutrient burn and it mentioned one of the signs is the stems turning red or purple. Looks like that may be the case from the picture I posted.

 

I'll probably do what I was planning and move up my water change out to tomorrow. Article also suggested cutting any leaves that already shows nutrient burn. It also recommended that I leave the plant in plain PH balanced water for about a week to flush it. What are your thoughts on that?

[ursus1000]

9 hours ago, The Pharm said:

is that 90ml per litre?

No offence, but, are you serious ?

[HippyHair]

Its a combined unit of ml.

[badbillybob]

yeah, 15ml per gallon which is around 4ml per litre.

if its in dwc, dont just put plain phd water in there, they wont like it at all.

empty your res and go with half dose or around 1.0ec, phd to 5.8 (tell me youve got a ph and ec meter).

 

it soun ds like you are just adding nutrient at what it says on the bottle, and not checking the ec,  -not a good idea.

[stayoutofthetunacan]

1 hour ago, badbillybob said:

yeah, 15ml per gallon which is around 4ml per litre.

if its in dwc, dont just put plain phd water in there, they wont like it at all.

empty your res and go with half dose or around 1.0ec, phd to 5.8 (tell me youve got a ph and ec meter).

 

it soun ds like you are just adding nutrient at what it says on the bottle, and not checking the ec,  -not a good idea.

I got both. Did a quick check after a water change and balanced the PH. I usually leave a little of the old water at the bottom to protect the pump, its around 1.7 right now, I haven't added any new nutrients.

 

Edited July 30, 2020 by stayoutofthetunacan

[badbillybob]

1.7 ec? thats way too high. id reduce it to 1.0. ec and set your ph to 5.8. check it again in an hour as it might go up.

Dont leave any water at the bottom to protect the pump, just switch it off for 5 minutes, while you re-fill it. 

[Guest]

4 hours ago, ursus1000 said:

No offence, but, are you serious ?

Looks like I misread the gallon part, my comment is still valid though.

[stayoutofthetunacan]

I know it's been awhile, but I wasn't able to properly correct this as soon as I wanted to.

 

I think I screwed up my handheld PH reader, so i used some PH strips I had, but they weren't really giving me accurate results, there was a few times I was getting colors that weren't even on the chart.

 

I ended up getting a hydro PH test from my local grow shop that uses a chemical to show you the results and it ended up working really well for me. It measures it on .5 increments.

 

So I flushed out the pail, balanced the PH and then left it alone for a little over 24 hours. The plants perked up, when before they were yellowing and drooping down. Some of them were curling, although none had outright died. 

 

After I flushed it out, I ended up getting some new stuff from my grow shop called PH Perfect nutrients. It's supposed to take the guess work out of managing the PH levels of your water for hydroponics. It's supposed to automatically adjust the PH of your water and claims to work with water water starting with a PH of 10 or less. It also has very simple, basic and clear feeding instructions as well as an online calculator for the nutrients.

 

I went online and a bunch of people had good stuff to say about it, so I'm giving it a shot. So far the plants are doing better. 

 

Once again thanks for the advice. I appreciate the help.

Edited August 7, 2020 by stayoutofthetunacan
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