Too many Yellow Fan Leaves

[Stuntman Mike]

So my girls were 100% healthy right into pre-flower, but as soon as flowering started proper, both of my plants started yellowing from the bottom up. They look to be around week three of flowering right now, so have a way to go still and are losing way too many leaves for such an early stage.

They are Dinafem Original Amnesia, with Freedom Farms soil (The clay pellets are just a cover layer) in 40L pots using Biobizz Grow and Bloom and using rainwater from my JoJo tank.

So it looked like textbook N deficiency to me, even though I was feeding with 3 ml per liter of Grow during Veg and then started with an additional 1ml Bloom in pre-flower ramping up to 3 ml over the following two weeks. The only other thing they have received is Epsom Salts fed as a foliar feed (stopped since flowering) and a couple of worm teas.

I did read some growers on uk420 not being happy with Biobizz Grow, so for the last 3 feeds I have swapped it out for some Seagrow at 5 ml per liter to see whether that made a difference. I also filled up the pots to max capacity as I had a good 10-15 cm free space at the top. This has not worked and the yellowing has continued/got worse.

What I'm thinking of doing next is giving a good flush with PH adjusted water as I now think the problem might be a nutrient lockout. My PH pen is broken (I have a new one on order now), so I have not been checking the PH of what is going in, but I figured the soil should be able to buffer adequately by itself, perhaps an error in hindsight?

The other thing I thought it could be is some root-bound symptoms. I did think 40L fabric pots would have been more than big enough to support plants this size, but maybe I'm wrong? Notice how some of the lower fan leaves are pointing straight down. They are about 1.2M tall trained with a combo of HST/LST.

What do you guys think, flush, root-bound or am I missing some other micro-nutrient or something?

Plant 1: More yellow, seem to be losing around 10 leaves per day:

 

 

 

Plant 2: Not as yellow, but notice the lower fan leaves that seem to just droop downwards:

 

Buds still seem to be growing fine at this stage:

 

[Pat999]

My soil I always pH bru. Sucks not having a pen but I'd say get the pH sorted first because alot of cases it's the problem. But if not then try add some calmag?

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[SkunkPharm]

Luuks pretty normal to me. Old fan leaves yellowing as your plant starts putting out.

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[Stuntman Mike]

4 hours ago, Pat999 said:

My soil I always pH bru. Sucks not having a pen but I'd say get the pH sorted first because alot of cases it's the problem. But if not then try add some calmag?

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Cheers, the PEN is on it's way. I did consider calmag, but I was giving Epsom Salts and it didn't look like Cal deficiency so I wasn't too sure.

[Stuntman Mike]

Quote

Luuks pretty normal to me. Old fan leaves yellowing as your plant starts putting out.

That's the bit I'm a little unsure of. I know it's normal late in flowering, but this just seems too much and too early. I've seen plenty of pics here and elsewhere of plants near harvest that don't have much yellowing at all.

[SkunkPharm]

Luuks pretty normal to me. Old fan leaves yellowing as your plant starts putting out.

That's the bit I'm a little unsure of. I know it's normal late in flowering, but this just seems too much and too early. I've seen plenty of pics here and elsewhere of plants near harvest that don't have much yellowing at all.
I feed my plants on a daily basis. Mix 40l water with 80ml biobizz bloom weekly and have drip irrigation running for 40 minutes a day. No pH correction they seem to be doing fine. Your plants are big and they are feeding heavily. Are you feeding enough?

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[Totemic]

39 minutes ago, SkunkPharm said:

That's the bit I'm a little unsure of. I know it's normal late in flowering, but this just seems too much and too early. I've seen plenty of pics here and elsewhere of plants near harvest that don't have much yellowing at all.
I feed my plants on a daily basis. Mix 40l water with 80ml biobizz bloom weekly and have drip irrigation running for 40 minutes a day. No pH correction they seem to be doing fine. Your plants are big and they are feeding heavily. Are you feeding enough?

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I agree. Once plants hit peak flowering they are like machines and need plenty food. Plants also make use of quite a bit of N while transitioning. If there isnt enough at the roots the plant will cannibalise N from the oldest parts of the plants.

I would however caution trying a good N feed to fix it. The plant wont take the N where you want it but to the growing tips. N toxicity is easy to step into now.

Also I read you saying something about epsom salts. Keep it away from your girls. It will wreck your medium. 

[Stuntman Mike]

1 hour ago, Totemic said:

I agree. Once plants hit peak flowering they are like machines and need plenty food. Plants also make use of quite a bit of N while transitioning. If there isnt enough at the roots the plant will cannibalise N from the oldest parts of the plants.

I would however caution trying a good N feed to fix it. The plant wont take the N where you want it but to the growing tips. N toxicity is easy to step into now.

Also I read you saying something about epsom salts. Keep it away from your girls. It will wreck your medium. 

So I'm feeding every 2/3 days depending on how much transpiration I get due to sunshine levels/heat etc. About 10 liters each, which usually gives me a fair amount of runoff.

In those 10 liters I have: 30ml Grow OR 50ml seagrow (last two feeds) AND 30ml Bloom.

So in an average week each plant gets: 25 liters water with 75ml Grow OR 125ml seagrow AND 75ml Bloom.

Should I back-off, hold steady and sacrifice a lot of fan leaves or go for broke and up the feed?

[Totemic]

I would say carry on with your planned feeding schedule and start pushing more bloom, less grow.

Think of it this way. In nature the plant grew those fan leaves to provide energy for the plant to continue to develop. Out there, there is nobody feeding her so its normal for her to dive into the reserves she kept for this. 

You can safely remove those fan leaves and in doing so allow for more light to reach in. 

Let her dry out a bit longer in flowering. The fungi that make the P available to your plant need a drier environment in the soil compared to the bacteria rich veg environment.

[SkunkPharm]

So I'm feeding every 2/3 days depending on how much transpiration I get due to sunshine levels/heat etc. About 10 liters each, which usually gives me a fair amount of runoff.
In those 10 liters I have: 30ml Grow OR 50ml seagrow (last two feeds) AND 30ml Bloom.
So in an average week each plant gets: 25 liters water with 75ml Grow OR 125ml seagrow AND 75ml Bloom.
Should I back-off, hold steady and sacrifice a lot of fan leaves or go for broke and up the feed?

I feed on a daily basis. With much less water. I don't have any run off.

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[CG420za]

2 hours ago, Totemic said:

Also I read you saying something about epsom salts. Keep it away from your girls. It will wreck your medium.

Please explain bruv, coz I use epsom instead of Calmag in FF organic soil with BioBizz nutes as well. Maak ons kak?

[Totemic]

My bru, if youve learnt just how little you need and use it then great. Ive just seen so many people mess up their soil forever by adding too much that I automatically warn. Lol. 

Mg has a lot of clout when it comes to cation exchange and can cause a range of lockouts at once.

Edited March 5, 2019 by Totemic

[Stuntman Mike]

Thanks for the replies everybody. I'm going to tweak the feed slightly more towards bloom now and try not to worry too much about all the dying fan leaves. Buds are fattening up nicely now and I'm starting to get a slight whiff from my desk inside.

I only used the Epsom Salts as a foliar feed and stopped a while back, but good to know about not adding too much.

[CG420za]

10 minutes ago, Totemic said:

My bru, if youve learnt just how little you need and use it then great. Ive just seen so many people mess up their soil forever by adding too much that I automatically warn. Lol. 

Mg has a lot of clout when it comes to cation exchange and can cause a range of lockouts at once.

I usually only feed 1tsp to 4L water when i see the branches going very purple/yellowing leaves. That's maybe 3 times in veg

[Budwizer]

That’s a Ca deficiency. Calmag could work, but it isn’t organic, and can mess with your pH. You’ll also be adding N, since “Calmag” is actually Calcium Magnesium Nitrate.  

You need a fast acting organic Ca. 

 

 

[Q9550]

9 hours ago, CG420za said:

Please explain bruv, coz I use epsom instead of Calmag in FF organic soil with BioBizz nutes as well. Maak ons kak?

If you are using the Epsom salt as a substitute for calmag, that won't work. Epsom does not contain any calcium but it's good for magnesium deficiency.

[Stuntman Mike]

Quick update:

So the day after I posted was the worst day as far as lost leaves went. Since then it seems to have stopped - no more yellowing.

All I changed was moving back to the Biobizz Grow and changing the feeding to 2ml Grow per liter and
4ml Bloom per liter. I'm not sure whether that was what did it or maybe the cooler weather and rain in CT this week played a role? Or maybe just the end of the stretch? Cautiously optimistic...

Anyway, here they are now:

[Stinger96]

Great stuff. Happy its going better... My yellowing went into over drive.. Not to worried as she is pregnant thnx to the neighbor's male...

[Breadinator]

From what I understand it is "normal" for leaves to start yellowing and falling off during flowering. The plant is using its reserves to power the buds.

I think that you wouldn't want yellowing leaves the first few weeks of flowering, as this could indicate a lack in nutrients. On the other hand, you would like to see leaves yellowing and diying the last few weeks, as this indicates that the nutrients in your medium is used up.

[Stuntman Mike]

1 hour ago, Stinger96 said:

Great stuff. Happy its going better... My yellowing went into over drive.. Not to worried as she is pregnant thnx to the neighbor's male...

That sucks! I been expecting the same thing, but so far so good. Either my neighbours are prudes or they know their shit. 

[Stuntman Mike]

43 minutes ago, Breadinator said:

From what I understand it is "normal" for leaves to start yellowing and falling off during flowering. The plant is using its reserves to power the buds.

I think that you wouldn't want yellowing leaves the first few weeks of flowering, as this could indicate a lack in nutrients. On the other hand, you would like to see leaves yellowing and diying the last few weeks, as this indicates that the nutrients in your medium is used up.

Agreed, problem is I'm only 3-4 weeks into flowering now. Sativa dominant strain that's most likely going to go quite late into the season.

[Stuntman Mike]

Update: Girls are looking pretty strong, still some yellowing, but it slowed down a lot and getting quite deep into flowering now so not worried at all. Fattening up nicely. 

Bigger plant is about 2 weeks behind. I did hear there was a longer flowering pheno, so maybe that's what I've got.

 

 

[Stuntman Mike]

So I think I'm getting pretty close to harvest. I did think I had another two weeks to go, but now I'm not so sure. In the past I've harvested at about this point, but I can't shake the feeling I'm harvesting a little early and missing out on some extra growth and stickiness. What do you guys think?

No sign of any mold or botrytis yet, even with the rain and cold weather. Pistols at least 50% brown:

 

Best trich pics I could get. Left pics seems mostly cloudy/clear, but pic on the right has some brown. The brown mostly seems to be on the outer sugar leave, probably older triches:

Edited April 2, 2019 by Stuntman Mike

[Totemic]

Let her go. Shes not done.

[Stuntman Mike]

35 minutes ago, Totemic said:

Let her go. Shes not done.

Cheers, if the nasties stay away, I'll give her a couple weeks longer.