Dying from bottom up

Hey whats up my dudes, this is my first post. heres my situation:

I started growing without any knowledge other than what were doing in bio class, my plants are probably a little more than a month old.

i had them in some jugs or whatever until i got some pots, then i transplanted them.
3 in 1 12 inch pot and 2 in another 12 inch pot.

everything was cool after the transplant i watered them once, and they were fine.
i watered them again, probably sooner than i should have.

my plants looked sickly and start dying from the bottom up, i quickly removed the bottom to find stagnant gross stinky water.
i immediatly drained everything put some holes in the soild and lifted the bottom and put a fan on it to dry it.
ive been letting them dry out for days now, and i think its about time to water them again

i was thinking about flushing either ice cold, or cold distilled water tonight.
and leaving them outisde in the kinda chilly weather.

i either have an bad PH from the stagnant water, a humidity problem, maybe over nute, or god forbid... rot root.

newbie fuck up to not have a good run off for them, i thought i could be an exception.

any advice or pointers would be awesome, cause im going to be pissed if i water them again and they die off, and my electric bill is sky high for nothing, ill probably just smoke them anyways haha.
thanks in advance.

oh and also they stopped dying after i removed the excess stangnat water, i ran my fingers across the dead leaves and they fell off with ease. since i stopped watering them theyve begin to become more green and healthy. so im thinking PH, but im a n00b

Sounds like overwatering. If you were sick would you take an ice cold bath then spend the night out in chilly weather? I don't think your plants would either and I wouldnt recomend that as a fix. Get a ph kit from any local store that carries them, usually in the pet/aquarium supplies.

Your ph is what it is, stagnant has nothing to do with it, water going from cold to hot will flucuate it however. Guessing ph does no good if your not testing, next time the plants medium (soil) has been allowed thorough dry time re water and gather some of the runoff at the bottom and test it. test the water ph before you water them as well, maybe you have bad water to begin with, one way to know.

Next grow do not plant more than any single plant in a single pot. That will lead to problems down the road to which there is no remedy. Before your next grow I'd advise a basic marijuanan bible book as well, it isnt rocket science after you get the knowledge but walking into it with no experience will lead you from one problem to the next no doubt. most all of the literature can be found online as well.

without pics, feeding schedule, make up of medium, and ph stats I don't think your going to get a thorough answer to your prob, though if i were to take a shot in the dark from the description and the no drainage/stagnant water i would say you were drowning the roots. If that clears up (sounds like it may be) and you properly feel them your next problem is going to be rootbound issues and the too little room you gave them each, to which there isnt a solution aside from a very large pot to transplant, even then, I dont think they will like fighting other plants roots, maybe I'm wrong. Regardless once the roots have intermingled there is no seperating them without killing roots and shocking them 3/4 to death. Hope that helps.

yeah i figured as much as them drowning in a bad PH, and ive used the same water to grow them thus far, but who knows im pretty far south texas i wouldnt drink the water personally. but i heard that often cold water can help if your having root problems, or atleast just to flush them. should i flush? or just go about my business and watch out for ignorant moves like not having a run off.

I would avoid a flush until checking the ph, abnormal ph reads or overfertilization would be the main reasons to flush, but without pics it is hard to say. I do know that a drowned root system probably doesn't want flushed, especially if you arent seeing signs of overfertilization. Are you growing with nutrients or just soil with nutrients added? If they were fed plant food i could see that collecting if there wasnt a runoff, but at a month old i would doubt they were in need of a flush more than proper drainage. Are the tips of the leaves burnt and or curling?

Pictures are key in diagnosis, as is the ph/fertilizer test. If they seem to be recovering with the new holes added for drainage you may want to give it a day or so and watch them, if it was soggy water which would be my guess they will need recovery time and the shocked roots have to regrow completely if they were killed off.