Help with mother plant!?

6 months

6 months

5 months 1 week
This is my mother plant, it started out as a closet grow from a clone I got from someone else. It thrived for a very long time in half gallon then 3 gallon and now I transplanted to 5 gallon. It was stressed like this before the transplant, it’s a mixture of potting soil, fox farm, compost and manure, I would have not used this mixture if it was my choice but at the time I only was able to use left over bags I had around my house. Now I’m upgraded to a tent and have much better equipment and I just want this thing to come back to healthy. I feed it with mills when I think it needs it, I trim frequently

Looks like magnesium deficency.

thisusernameisnottaken said:

Looks like magnesium deficency.

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I thought it was too, I looked at the nutes I use (mills) and it’s super high in magnesium and phosphorus which is what it looks like. I broke up the root ball and it’s already looking healthier so I think it was root bound.

Luda12 said:

I thought it was too, I looked at the nutes I use (mills) and it’s super high in magnesium and phosphorus which is what it looks like. I broke up the root ball and it’s already looking healthier so I think it was root bound.

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yep

crimsonecho said:

yep

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I transplanted into a 5 gal last week from a 3 gal, I just ordered a 10 gal, anything else I should do?

Luda12 said:

I transplanted into a 5 gal last week from a 3 gal, I just ordered a 10 gal, anything else I should do?

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you cant keep up potting can you? so you either take another clone to start over with a fresh clone in .5 gal and flower the mother or cull it. or you can look up root pruning. but at this point i’d just wait for it to get super healthy and growing vigorously and then take new cuts and when they root i’d flower this one.

crimsonecho said:

you cant keep up potting can you? so you either take another clone to start over with a fresh clone in .5 gal and flower the mother or cull it. or you can look up root pruning. but at this point i’d just wait for it to get super healthy and growing vigorously and then take new cuts and when they root i’d flower this one.

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That’s my plan, only reason I said about the 10 gal is you don’t think the flowering stage will outgrow the 5 gal?

crimsonecho said:

you cant keep up potting can you? so you either take another clone to start over with a fresh clone in .5 gal and flower the mother or cull it. or you can look up root pruning. but at this point i’d just wait for it to get super healthy and growing vigorously and then take new cuts and when they root i’d flower this one.

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I may be wrong but as long as you let it recover from the stress in between you can up pot as much as you want

Do a pH test of the runoff. That looks very familiar to a problem I just got through with my grow...couldn't figure it out because I knew the soil mix I was using had plenty of nutrients in it...As a last resort and because I couldn't figure out what to do (besides running for the bottle of cal-mag), I did a runoff test and also a slurry test...Turns out the pH was in ~4.0! I immediately top dressed with some dolomite lime and also watered it in with water that I had to pH up. I flushed and flushed until I finally got the runoff in an acceptable range. Once that was established, I mixed up some Jack's 3-2-1 solution, pH'd it to around 6.5 and I've been monitoring the runoff pH very closely. So far, so good.

And yes I KNOW that a runoff test isn't perfectly accurate. But, it DID work for me and it helped me to solve my problem. I also did a slurry test with distilled water and got similar results. Sure, it's not a $400 pH pen, but it at least gets you in the ballpark.

tstick said:

Do a pH test of the runoff. That looks very familiar to a problem I just got through with my grow...couldn't figure it out because I knew the soil mix I was using had plenty of nutrients in it...As a last resort and because I couldn't figure out what to do (besides running for the bottle of cal-mag), I did a runoff test and also a slurry test...Turns out the pH was in ~4.0! I immediately top dressed with some dolomite lime and also watered it in with water that I had to pH up. I flushed and flushed until I finally got the runoff in an acceptable range. Once that was established, I mixed up some Jack's 3-2-1 solution, pH'd it to around 6.5 and I've been monitoring the runoff pH very closely. So far, so good.

And yes I KNOW that a runoff test isn't perfectly accurate. But, it DID work for me and it helped me to solve my problem. I also did a slurry test with distilled water and got similar results. Sure, it's not a $400 pH pen, but it at least gets you in the ballpark.

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I been wanting to do a run off test but I’ve been super busy I’m going to as soon as I get a chance. I usually water very slowly little by little and it takes a long time, what is a slurry test?

Do you keep this mom for cuts? You don't have to keep a big old mom plant. You can take cuts of cuts and keep everything small until you're ready to fully veg and flower. Either way works, but in small spaces I find it impossible to keep a large mother going.

MtRainDog said:

Do you keep this mom for cuts? You don't have to keep a big old mom plant. You can take cuts of cuts and keep everything small until you're ready to fully veg and flower. Either way works, but in small spaces I find it impossible to keep a large mother going.

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It’s 6 months old I’ve been taking cuts every 6 weeks I don’t have a cloner yet tho so my success rate is very low.

A slurry test is when you take a sample of the soil mix (preferably from a lower part of the pot...like extracted from a drainage hole....not from the top of the soil) and you mix it with some distilled water and then wait and allow the muddy water to settle and separate...then you extract some of the clear water and test it.

I'd almost bet that your pH is low...and likely VERY low. You need to check your pH somehow....doesn't matter how...but you need to get on it!

By the way..I used the General Hydroponics (brand) pH test kit...the one that uses the drops. And I adjust the pH with General Hydroponics pH UP and pH DOWN as needed.

tstick said:

A slurry test is when you take a sample of the soil mix (preferably from a lower part of the pot...like extracted from a drainage hole....not from the top of the soil) and you mix it with some distilled water and then wait and allow the muddy water to settle and separate...then you extract some of the clear water and test it.

I'd almost bet that your pH is low...and likely VERY low. You need to check your pH somehow....doesn't matter how...but you need to get on it!

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I will water it today when I get home from working, I’ve done flushes at 7.0 because of worrying about being too low on ph, should I flush higher than that if my ph comes back testing low?

tstick said:

By the way..I used the General Hydroponics (brand) pH test kit...the one that uses the drops. And I adjust the pH with General Hydroponics pH UP and pH DOWN as needed.

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That’s the same kit I have plus I have a VIVOSUN 12 stick tester seems to always read the same as the drops

Luda12 said:

I will water it today when I get home from working, I’ve done flushes at 7.0 because of worrying about being too low on ph, should I flush higher than that if my ph comes back testing low?

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yes! I had to mix my pH in the ~8 range! I grow in 3-gallon garden pots and what I had to do was set that pot inside of a 5-gallon bucket and then top water until the water level came all the way up to the soil line...and then wait a couple minutes for the bubbling to stop (trapped air pockets in the soil being released). After that, I took the 3-gallon pot out of the 5-gallon bucket and then put it into a different 5-gallon bucket to allow it to drip-drain for 1/2 hour or so. I checked the runoff collected in both 5-gallon buckets and when it started to indicate a pH range in the ~6.0 - 6.5 range, I stopped. I was obviously risking overwatering the plants by doing this, but I use a pretty open and fluffy potting mix that has a lot of perlite and rice hulls in it and it drains very quickly. The roots didn't have to sit in a soggy mix for too long, in other words. But that would be something to keep in mind if you try it. After the flushing, I let the pots get back to an ideal weight (not too heavy and wet) and the plants started to perk up after about 10 days. It was certainly a learning experience for me! Anyway, I hope you get your problem solved. Good luck!

Luda12 said:

I will water it today when I get home from working, I’ve done flushes at 7.0 because of worrying about being too low on ph, should I flush higher than that if my ph comes back testing low?

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Man, there are SO many variables involved...what kind of soil you use....nutes...etc. If you're just guessing and worrying about pH, then you need to ease your worries by doing some solid tests. I'm just giving you something to consider checking. Sometimes, a plant looks like it is deficient in magnesium or calcium, so people rush for the cal-mag. IF it's a pH issue, though, then bombing the plants with cal-mag is just going to make things get worse. Once I got my pH issue corrected, the plants were able to absorb the available nutrients. However, after flushing, I'm sure I depleted a bunch of those nutrients. I use Jack's 3-2-1 solution that is pH'd at ~6.5, now.

tstick said:

Man, there are SO many variables involved...what kind of soil you use....nutes...etc. If you're just guessing and worrying about pH, then you need to ease your worries by doing some solid tests. I'm just giving you something to consider checking. Sometimes, a plant looks like it is deficient in magnesium or calcium, so people rush for the cal-mag. IF it's a pH issue, though, then bombing the plants with cal-mag is just going to make things get worse. Once I got my pH issue corrected, the plants were able to absorb the available nutrients. However, after flushing, I'm sure I depleted a bunch of those nutrients. I use Jack's 3-2-1 solution that is pH'd at ~6.5, now.

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I think you’re right and that’s what I’m leaning towards doing

Luda12 said:

It’s 6 months old I’ve been taking cuts every 6 weeks I don’t have a cloner yet tho so my success rate is very low.

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With that big of a plant you can take a lot of cuttings & play the # game & eventually get some to root. I clone in water bottles under low light, no need for a cloner & I'm about to switch to cloning in straight coco coir & a dome.