New, higher leaves canoeing into a "V"

[PippinTook]

Hey all, I'll make this short and sweet and hopefully someone can help me.

Strain: White Widow, photoperiod
Temps: At the moment its cold, I know - 19 to 21 celcius
Lights: 100w LED
pH of nutrient solution: 5.8 - 6.2
Siemens of nutrient solution: +-1500
22L material pot with a premix the store recommended and I've had nothing but success with in the past.

So as you can see in pictures 01 and 03, the leaves are bending into a "V" shape. There is none of the common "claw" where the edges of the leaves curl inwards. These pictures show leaves that were less than a pencil length from the lights.
05 shows the distance AFTER I'VE ALREADY MOVED THE LIGHTS UP, but is this still too close? Are the lights being too close + the cold responsible? Is this even something to be worried about? The plant looks super healthy with no other signs of stress at all.

Hopefully someone could just pitch in their 2c and set my mind at ease.

Thanks in advance, and it's great to be here.

[PippinTook]

Watering: I do a full 5l watering every 3 days

[CreX]

i agree with @PippinTook, that looks like an over watering issue.

try raise your pot off the floor to get some airflow underneath it.

crates work great for this if you have one.

[The_StonedTrooper]

38 minutes ago, CreX said:

i agree with @PippinTook, that looks like an over watering issue.

try raise your pot off the floor to get some airflow underneath it.

crates work great for this if you have one.

That is @PippinTookpost, to add the details to the original post, as to how he waters.

Crex, is right though, its a little bit of overwatering.

Your fan, remove the box under it, and have it blowing through the canopy of the plant.

Both will fix that.

[CreX]

15 minutes ago, The_StonedTrooper said:

That is @PippinTookpost, to add the details to the original post, as to how he waters.

Crex, is right though, its a little bit of overwatering.

Your fan, remove the box under it, and have it blowing through the canopy of the plant.

Both will fix that.

HAHAHA... maybe one day ill learn to read properly

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

is this organic or synthetic grow?

don't water untill medium is dry, oxygen is super important to your roots brother, lift the pot if it's got very little weight to it, only then water. 

and only enough water to bring the medium to field capacity, you really don't want any excessive water, IF organic NO runoff. IF synthetic you can have run off when you give pure water when you alternate between feeds. 

how big is that pot?

looks like a 20L?

I would give 1L at a time, if you have to water everyday then and that doesn't suit you, try 1.5L. I would really not go over 2L in a 20L pot, only when they big girls and in full flower I will perhaps give a 3L when they start drinking up the 3L in a days time.

[The_StonedTrooper]

35 minutes ago, CreX said:

HAHAHA... maybe one day ill learn to read properly

Even me

[PippinTook]

Thanks for the replies guys and girls.
I'll try lift the pot and direct the inlet fan towards the underneath of the canopy. 
As for the watering, I've always been told to water and keep watering until I start seeing runoff. Is it better in general to water smaller amounts more frequently as @Naughty.Psychonaut mentioned, as opposed to a full saturation less frequently? I've heard a lot about roots needing oxygen and water displaces oxygen, but I thought with sufficient drainage a heavy watering would be fine.

I'll have to take another look at my watering schedule as well as the nutrients required. Speaking of which, @Naughty.Psychonaut, I use Terra Aquatica (aka General Hydroponics) 3 part series (the one with Bloom, Micro and Grow). I don't even know if this is considered synthetic or organic. I'm guessing synthetic. I also use pH- solution as well as a liquid CalMag supplement. It's a 22L material pot. And would you mind very much explaining what you meant when you mentioned "alternating between feeds"? Are you suggesting alternating between nutrient rich water and plain pH'd water every feed?

[CreX]

12 minutes ago, PippinTook said:

Thanks for the replies guys and girls.
I'll try lift the pot and direct the inlet fan towards the underneath of the canopy. 
As for the watering, I've always been told to water and keep watering until I start seeing runoff. Is it better in general to water smaller amounts more frequently as @Naughty.Psychonaut mentioned, as opposed to a full saturation less frequently? I've heard a lot about roots needing oxygen and water displaces oxygen, but I thought with sufficient drainage a heavy watering would be fine.

I'll have to take another look at my watering schedule as well as the nutrients required. Speaking of which, @Naughty.Psychonaut, I use Terra Aquatica (aka General Hydroponics) 3 part series (the one with Bloom, Micro and Grow). I don't even know if this is considered synthetic or organic. I'm guessing synthetic. I also use pH- solution as well as a liquid CalMag supplement. It's a 22L material pot. And would you mind very much explaining what you meant when you mentioned "alternating between feeds"? Are you suggesting alternating between nutrient rich water and plain pH'd water every feed?

I'm not so sure your method is wrong... But your religious every 3 days could be the problem... Lift the pot, and if it's lighter than it looks... Then give it a feed... If it's as heavy as it looks or heavier.. Then leave it for another day. Do you collect the run off? As long as the plants not siting in the run off water it will be fine... 

[PippinTook]

2 minutes ago, CreX said:

I'm not so sure your method is wrong... But your religious every 3 days could be the problem... Lift the pot, and if it's lighter than it looks... Then give it a feed... If it's as heavy as it looks or heavier.. Then leave it for another day. Do you collect the run off? As long as the plants not siting in the run off water it will be fine... 

The pot does sit in the runoff which is actually kinda dumb of me to do now that I think of it. I've already found a plastic crate I need to clean first that the pot will sit on top of.

I don't collect any runoff, I'm not even sure how I would go about doing that. Why would I need to collect runoff?

Also if my method of watering isn't fundamentally bad then perhaps I should look at watering every 4 or 5 days. I'm just so scared of underwatering! I'll try the weighing method and gauge the watering schedule like that.

[Prom]

23 minutes ago, PippinTook said:

The pot does sit in the runoff which is actually kinda dumb of me to do now that I think of it. I've already found a plastic crate I need to clean first that the pot will sit on top of.

I don't collect any runoff, I'm not even sure how I would go about doing that. Why would I need to collect runoff?

Also if my method of watering isn't fundamentally bad then perhaps I should look at watering every 4 or 5 days. I'm just so scared of underwatering! I'll try the weighing method and gauge the watering schedule like that.

Is not a good idea to let the pot stand in run off for over 5 hours. Empty and clean the tray if needed.

Lifting the pot will tell you if you need to feed.. no guessing, what is the really helpful part  When you can talk "plant" and can ask her if she needs water.. best way.. but if you do not let the root dry up in regular intervals, they become weaker and your plant more stressed. You have to fear overwatering.. it takes a really dry pot to let them hang their leaves.. but just 10 mins after watering, they will be back to normal. If you swamped your roots.. that will take a lot longer to fix, days to weeks. Fear overwatering  not underwatering.  

 

Addon

I give my 22L fabric pots 2L per feeding. Usually takes 2 days till they need again. 

Edited May 25, 2021 by Prom
addon

[Marzcanna]

36 minutes ago, PippinTook said:

The pot does sit in the runoff which is actually kinda dumb of me to do now that I think of it. I've already found a plastic crate I need to clean first that the pot will sit on top of.

I don't collect any runoff, I'm not even sure how I would go about doing that. Why would I need to collect runoff?

Also if my method of watering isn't fundamentally bad then perhaps I should look at watering every 4 or 5 days. I'm just so scared of underwatering! I'll try the weighing method and gauge the watering schedule like that.

Don't worry to much about underwatering, that's how mistakes happen we worry to much about underwatering so we overwater and vice versa we worry about overwatering so we underwater, gota find that balance . A few dry cycles are good and you will learn to read your plants, they will tell you when they hungry or thirsty. The pot lift is the way most of us do it but anther easy way when in doubt  is to put your finger about an inch down the medium if it's dry you can water lightly. Also your plants will not die if you go a few days without watering. If your leaves seem droppy and lifeless after a few days of no watering than it's a sign they need it. They will spring back to life after a few mins of watering. Feeling the pot and and reading your plants is the best way to know when to water. You can't go with a fixed schedule such as watering every 3 days because not all phenos are the same some might be heavier feeders than others while others not so much that will require frequent / less feeding/watering for different phenotypes

Edited May 25, 2021 by Marzcanna

[CreX]

Although, if you are in coco and running synthetic nutes, then there should be no harm in watering every 3-4 days, as long as you water till runn off,... I think the main issue you had was the pot chilling in the runoff, and you have addressed that so you should be good again... Depending on how long and how deep the water was... The plant may continue to develop poor or weird growth for a while...  a week is common.... So don't expect a miracle haha... 

But also... The plant looks in good shape, so it will be fine

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

just a question from a organic grower here, 

would he not be at risk for salt build up aswell? remember, the 5L he gives is feeding. the plant would not be able to use that much nutes and some would be left in the medium bu the time he gives again. 

and to my knowledge, watering till runoff with feed just means there are nutes being pissed away?

so by overwatering, in any case synthetic or organic, risks are oxygen deprevation nutrient build up AND you pay for nutes you just pissing away? 

I don't see why we would just help the oak to understand that your roots should almost never be saturated. if it spends few hours of a day saturated it's fine, because it's drinking up some of that water. I would say, keeping it saturated over 12hrs would be testing the limits.

I agree with this 100%

10 hours ago, Prom said:

Fear overwatering  not underwatering.  . 

only time to it's OK to see runoff with synthetic nutes is when you flush with clean ph'd water, to reduce the chances of salt build up?

also, when you give clean water and in few days plat looks hungry, easier to feed. than to over feed the whole time then have to deal with a lock out issue.

 

[PippinTook]

Thank you all for the helpful advice and discussion. 
From here on, this is what I'll be doing:

1. Lifting the pot off the ground so that it doesn't sit in any runoff.
2. Reduce the amount that I water to 4L at a time.
3. Gauging whether to water or not by lifting the pot and weighing it + using the first few cm of my finger to check if the top layer of soil is dry

4. Would you guys recommend watering with plain pH'd water every 2nd or 3rd feed? From the sounds of things, this is a good idea to prevent salt/nutrient build up around the roots. I've never done this and my plants never showed any signs of stress that could be related to salt buildup, by my standards at least. That may be true but it might not have been optimal even if there were no signs of stress and I don't want my plants to be acceptable, I want them to be exceptional, which is why I'm talking to people who know better than me

Also, would it be okay to update this thread in a couple weeks, after we can see some potential changes? I don't know if I need to go to a different section or something.

[Marzcanna]

2 hours ago, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

just a question from a organic grower here, 

would he not be at risk for salt build up aswell? remember, the 5L he gives is feeding. the plant would not be able to use that much nutes and some would be left in the medium bu the time he gives again. 

and to my knowledge, watering till runoff with feed just means there are nutes being pissed away?

so by overwatering, in any case synthetic or organic, risks are oxygen deprevation nutrient build up AND you pay for nutes you just pissing away? 

I don't see why we would just help the oak to understand that your roots should almost never be saturated. if it spends few hours of a day saturated it's fine, because it's drinking up some of that water. I would say, keeping it saturated over 12hrs would be testing the limits.

I agree with this 100%

only time to it's OK to see runoff with synthetic nutes is when you flush with clean ph'd water, to reduce the chances of salt build up?

also, when you give clean water and in few days plat looks hungry, easier to feed. than to over feed the whole time then have to deal with a lock out issue.

 

I agree with you, it really depends on the grower, I prefer runoff with water rather than with feed like you mentioned before but when i grew with synthetics & coco there were grows i did a hydro style feeding 4 times a day every day, so i would feed until run-off & that was only because i wasn't giving plain water like the traditional ("water / feed / water") method. But if @PippinTook isnt feeding everyday and can squeeze water days into the schedule than I would do it to push out the salt build up & save on nutes. At least to my understanding

Edited May 26, 2021 by Marzcanna

[Marzcanna]

27 minutes ago, PippinTook said:

Would you guys recommend watering with plain pH'd water every 2nd or 3rd feed?

 

I would suggest that, altho i would give it water after every feed eg. feed/water/feed as my personal preference but you can also do feed/feed/water

[CreX]

4 hours ago, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

just a question from a organic grower here, 

would he not be at risk for salt build up aswell? remember, the 5L he gives is feeding. the plant would not be able to use that much nutes and some would be left in the medium bu the time he gives again. 

and to my knowledge, watering till runoff with feed just means there are nutes being pissed away?

so by overwatering, in any case synthetic or organic, risks are oxygen deprevation nutrient build up AND you pay for nutes you just pissing away? 

I don't see why we would just help the oak to understand that your roots should almost never be saturated. if it spends few hours of a day saturated it's fine, because it's drinking up some of that water. I would say, keeping it saturated over 12hrs would be testing the limits.

I agree with this 100%

only time to it's OK to see runoff with synthetic nutes is when you flush with clean ph'd water, to reduce the chances of salt build up?

also, when you give clean water and in few days plat looks hungry, easier to feed. than to over feed the whole time then have to deal with a lock out issue.

 

no bad rep for you at all man! but with coco and synthetic nutes - it would then be exactly opposite to what you said.

coco is so light and noncompact, that even fully saturated to the point of runoff it has a substantial amount of oxygen in it.

the reason that you are supposed to water till run off in coco, is to eliminate the salt build up. From your previous feed, you put in say 500ppm, but not till run off. now you know your meduim has 500ppm of nutes in it.... there is no way in the world any weed plant is going to consume all 500ppm out of the meduim... might only use 100ppm for example, so now when you water again at 500ppm at your next feed, also not till run off... you can expect the ppm of the meduim to go way higher than 500...and thats why you water till runoff in coco. 

next thing is when the coco dries out... the water is now less than when you watered it...naturally right? with this info, and the info about the plants not eating everything you give them each feed, what you will find is that the PPM starts to rise withing the water to the point the water can no longer hold all the nutes... and those nutes precipitate out of the water and become a salt again.

so when you water till runoff, what you are actually doing is pushing out a lot of the high ppm solution and replacing it with fresh nutes at the right ppm level.

this doesnt happen to such a great extent in soil and organic nutes as the nutes need to break down before they are available to the plant.

So you are correct in saying you are kinda just pissing nutes away... but you are actually pissing away a high ppm solution which is bad for your plants anyways

and then you get fertigation, which is constant feeding...and honestly...i have never seen amazing weed like @PsyCLown has grown in fertigation... 

i think you think coco and soil are similar...were they are in fact nothing alike.

[CreX]

2 hours ago, PippinTook said:

Thank you all for the helpful advice and discussion. 
From here on, this is what I'll be doing:

1. Lifting the pot off the ground so that it doesn't sit in any runoff.
2. Reduce the amount that I water to 4L at a time.
3. Gauging whether to water or not by lifting the pot and weighing it + using the first few cm of my finger to check if the top layer of soil is dry

4. Would you guys recommend watering with plain pH'd water every 2nd or 3rd feed? From the sounds of things, this is a good idea to prevent salt/nutrient build up around the roots. I've never done this and my plants never showed any signs of stress that could be related to salt buildup, by my standards at least. That may be true but it might not have been optimal even if there were no signs of stress and I don't want my plants to be acceptable, I want them to be exceptional, which is why I'm talking to people who know better than me

Also, would it be okay to update this thread in a couple weeks, after we can see some potential changes? I don't know if I need to go to a different section or something.

yo!! once you have lifted your pot off the ground... i would continue to feed as you are... 5l should be fine for a 20l pot... you should get some run off there which is good now that the plant is lifted. i would even consider saying try 6l of feed to get a bit more run off each time... i know 4.5l in my 20 pots leads to a dribble of runoff .

if you feed this way, you wont need to alternate with clean water.

and by all means report back man! this same thread is the right place!

[GGG]

Just my 2cents
When I did 50/50 Coco/perlite that has more drainage than just coco (I think) I fed in veg when needed . I use to let it dry out till leaves was drooping and then feel the weight of the pot and then I knew where it doesnt need to be , def keep pot of the ground for fresh air underneath. When plants got bigger and moving into flower I gave 1 Litre per day feed. When EC got to 1,5-2 I flushed with a EC of 1 properly once a week , like 3 litres and slowly so build up can desolve and gets squeezed out properly. The reason I flushed with a lower EC is I read that in some way you shock the plant with no feeds and then again feed and plant needs to adjust and you loose Abit of time....... Made sense to me at the time.

Sent from my Hisense Infinity H50 using Tapatalk

[GGG]

And remember that watering pushes out old stale air in the medium and sucks in new fresh air .

Sent from my Hisense Infinity H50 using Tapatalk

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

god damn,, 

good thing I moved away from coco then hahah yeah no, I see I see mr. @CreX and thanks for explaining! 

as I said at the beginning, it's more a question from my side as an organic grower, hopefully I asked something that might have been a problem for others too

my understanding was that when you feed/feed/flush you kinda lean on the flush after the two feeds to get rid of the excess. 

so here's another question, if you guys don't mind?

if you feed 1L at 500ppm and the medium goes to 500ppm (just as an example), does this mean if you water same medium with 5L ppm there are more nutes in the medium or about the same amount? 

because if it's the same amount I don't see any point in mixing 5L of nutes when 1L will do. that's wastefull.

but you're saying giving new nutes pushes out old nutes. how does this work? do they signal to the nutes to make way for new ones? 

to my understanding, the plant can't make use of all 500ppm, like you said, now the medium dries out and can you imagine what happens with synthetic nutes when they dry up on a surface? this is what salt build up is, well to me. this burns the root, causes lock out. when you feed again with 500ppm you feeding a damaged root, it's not taking up nute, nute stays till soil dries out, forms more salt. 

and then, I also don't see how 1L of feed/feed/flush can lead to salt build up quicker than 5L of feed/feed/feed?

that don't make no sence to your Old Uncle Naughty

 

[CreX]

52 minutes ago, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

god damn,, 

good thing I moved away from coco then hahah yeah no, I see I see mr. @CreX and thanks for explaining! 

as I said at the beginning, it's more a question from my side as an organic grower, hopefully I asked something that might have been a problem for others too

seems you still missing the point i was trying to make... 

so because the coco is not a fluid meduim... and because water flows toward the earth, when you pour a feed on... it sinks and gets soaked up by the coco... and then the plant drinks in the feed from the suspended feed held by the coco... when the plant drinks the water... the top of the coco becomes dryer while the bottom of the pot is likely still damp or even wet. 

so now you add the next feed. back to the point about the coco not being fluid... if you pour the feed at the top... it does not reach the bottom of the pot until it sinks in... so the new nutes do not mix with the old nutes very well... so when you pour the feed onto the coco... it like... pushes some of the old nute solution out of the bottom of the pot. leaving your meduim with mostly only newer nute solution.

what burns the roots is when the coco is over full with water...and the only way that happens is if your pot sits in the run off...roots then suffocate and die. 

your EC needs to be very high to burn your roots... i have seen EC's of over 4.0 and the plants were okay...ish... 

the uneaten dissolved salts crystalize again when the meduim dries out, and gets washed out when you feed to runoff.

when i test my runnoff, the runnoff is typically always higher than the input feed... unless the meduim is starving and then the runnoff may be lower... but you would know very soon if your plants are hungry... so it is less common.

1 hour ago, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

but you're saying giving new nutes pushes out old nutes. how does this work? do they signal to the nutes to make way for new ones? 

and perhaps you misunderstand how coco and the nutes work together. a quick one you should know is about the cation sites in coco? they get filled up with calcuim and potassuim mostly and leave little space for any other nutrients to get absorbed. Coco is considered an inert meduim that has no nute value to a plant. the synthetic nutes kinda like... float in the meduim... they are held in suspension by the saturated coco. so when a new feed gets fed... it just pushes the old stuff out.... 

kinda like making a triple layer jelly? you put the first colour in and let it set (1st feed) then the second colour you make it and you need to slowly pour it over the back of a teaspoon so that the colours dont mix... same in coco... the spoon is the coco which spreads the new colour evenly over the old colour and that would force the old colour out the pots...- if that analogy makes any sense

1 hour ago, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

so here's another question, if you guys don't mind?

if you feed 1L at 500ppm and the medium goes to 500ppm (just as an example), does this mean if you water same medium with 5L ppm there are more nutes in the medium or about the same amount? 

Shortly... no.. you would have given a 5th of the feed in this case. and if the pot is a 20l pot...1l is greatly underfeeding it... the pot will take 4.5l of water before it starts running out the pot. so you will need 4.5l of correctly mixed feed to saturate the whole meduim.

and honestly... if you are using liquid synthetic nutes... you put a few ml into your feed... the % of nutes in the runoff is so negligible ... hardly even a few rands... i wouldnt call it waste either as it manages an important part of a synthetic grow... the runoff is important if you dont have the correct tools to measure your substrates condition.

 

 

keep the questions coming man!

[CreX]

2 hours ago, GGG said:

Just my 2cents
When I did 50/50 Coco/perlite that has more drainage than just coco (I think) I fed in veg when needed . I use to let it dry out till leaves was drooping and then feel the weight of the pot and then I knew where it doesnt need to be , def keep pot of the ground for fresh air underneath. When plants got bigger and moving into flower I gave 1 Litre per day feed. When EC got to 1,5-2 I flushed with a EC of 1 properly once a week , like 3 litres and slowly so build up can desolve and gets squeezed out properly. The reason I flushed with a lower EC is I read that in some way you shock the plant with no feeds and then again feed and plant needs to adjust and you loose Abit of time....... Made sense to me at the time.

Sent from my Hisense Infinity H50 using Tapatalk
 

correct... in any meduim, you should not flush with clean water unless there is a huge problem.

in soil you can use clean water because the soil has organic material in it that can break down and feed the plant again.

in coco, you will just wash everything out and leave the plant hungry AF... 

you dont have to flush with a lower ec than your standard feed.... if your standard feed is 1.0 ec... then you should flush with 1.0EC too

[CG420za]

1 hour ago, CreX said:

correct... in any meduim, you should not flush with clean water unless there is a huge problem.

in soil you can use clean water because the soil has organic material in it that can break down and feed the plant again.

in coco, you will just wash everything out and leave the plant hungry AF... 

you dont have to flush with a lower ec than your standard feed.... if your standard feed is 1.0 ec... then you should flush with 1.0EC too

I always thought if you're in coco/perlite, you flush with clean water and once you're no longer running off, you'd feed with a weaker mix