Killing Root Rot

Sexxxy Beast said:

Ok guys,

This is what Ive been doing to try to kill my mild case of root rot. I originally bought 35% peroxide and removed my plants from the res and dipped them into a gallon container with an 10ml dose of peroxide. I obcourse exchanged the water with new water and added a few mls of peroxide to that along with an extra air stone, a total of 3 then. I came back a couple days later and the water was dirty and the roots were still not growing or changing color. So I decided that airstones are crap because they normally dont distribute the bubbles evenly. I went and built this DIY super bubbler DWC. 4 air curtains and a large 60gal air pump power this 18 gal res. I filled it with well water (200ppm) and 10 drops per gallon of clorox and I hacked off half of my root ball, stripped the small dead finger roots and left the larger main columns, and put them in.

Then I did some trimming VERY IMPORTANT, when you dont have a good root system you gotta cut the larger fan leaves so the plant doesn't have to try to support all that growth. I previously trimmed my large GDP that got a bad case of root rot, I had to cut the roots back up to the stem of my 15in tall plant! It is surviving and in fact doing the best in spite of it not having a root cluster. It had all the large fan leaves trimmed off when I noticed them yellowing and dying. Now its doing "OK".

The problem now is that the plant still isnt growing roots. What gives? Should I change the res and back off the clorox?

Here are some pics of my plant roots and my setup...

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fatman7574 said:

Like I said. The MDS said 5 to 10% Sodium Hypochlorite. Maybe I just got the bad luck of their worse posted MSDS. The calculations are based upon your saying 5.75%. And I calculated based upon 5.75% sodium hypochlorite as chlorox bleach is made with sodium hypochlorite. The calculations merely show that if it is 5.75% sodium chlorite then only 3.9% is actually available as chlorine. I can go to probably 10 differnt sites and be told 10 different amounts in various term as to how much chlorine is in house hold Chlorox Bleach. What I see most often is the number 5.25% on sites that say how to mix chlorox for restaurant surface disinfection. Honestly I don't think Chlorox runs a tight control on the chlorine content of most of their products. As long as they provide the minimum of what they advertise they just plug away with mixing and bottling their at least 50 different products containing sodium hypochlorite. Considering that the caactual material cost of producing their products is their smallest expense I do not think they care a lot.

The ppm concentration is 39675 ppm if the Chlorox was 5.75% sodium hypochlorite. If it was 5.75% aviailble Chlorine then it is 57500 ppm. You want 1 ppm.

That means the Chlorox straight from the bottle will treat either 39675 gallons or 57500 gallons. There are 3785 ml to a gallon. So a ml from the bottle will treat either: (39675/3785) = 10.48 gallons or (57500/3785)= 15.19 gallons As 2 ppm is the maximum allowed residual level of chlorine and the residual is how much is left over after all organics are oxidized that means those water treatment plants started out with adding about 4 ppm. Yes there are that much crap still in our water after water treatment plants are through with it. When who look at a treatment report and it gives a list of things like Bromodichloromethane, Chlorodibromomethane, Chloroform, and Trihalonethanes the ose are all compounds formed by chlorine oxidizing organic compounds in the water.

Many people have used chlororinated tap water on their plants for decades without killing their plants. Chlorine harm to plants iis grossly exaggerated. The commercial green house industry has been using chlorine at the residual 0.5 ppm to 1 ppm rate for decades with the food they grow that we eat. Obviously it is not killing the plants or us. They inject chlorine by auto control to keep the residual level between 0.5 ppm and 1 ppm continously. they do not wait for a problem to arrive first, the use those levels as a preventative against Pythh. So whether 10.48 or 15.19 is the proper number does not matter much as Pythh is easily killed by chlorine at levels as low as 0.2 ppm at tempertures of 75 degrees F. It is even more effective at higher temps but the chlorine out gasses quicker as the temperture increases so it must be added more often.

Personally I would use the 1 ml per 10 gallon number. That means a teaspoon of chlorox straight from the bottle is good for 50 gallons of nutrient water.

The use of bleach is the cheapest aspect of my growing. Thats why I find the cost of retail products sucha s Pythoff so AN ish. Flairform charges something like $10 for a 1 quart bottle of RO water with a few cents of Chlorox added to it sold as Pythoff. Reminds me so much of Advanced Nutrients prices.

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fatman7574 said:

The dosage of 8 drops per gallon is ytypically enoughto both treat Phyth cause (root rot) and as a preventative used to keep levels ofthe different types of Pythium at zero. If your water comes from a water treatment center or from a deep well the level of Pyth would have started at zero so your just using the chlorine to keep those levels at zero and also to oxidize the dead root matter so it will sluff of from the good part of the root mass there by preventing root rot caused by putrefication of dead roots. If your water is coming form an untreated water source such as a pond, lake, ditch beside your house or a very shallow well in an agricultural area then the levels of Pyth and types of Pyth that could be present could require a dosage of 16 drops of chlorine per gallon as an initial dose. After that initial killing dose the dosage would be 8 drops of chlorine per gallon as a preventative. I do not assume there are any people using untreated water from a pond or ditch so I did not address that earlier. Some open bodies of water can have Pyth strains that require 2 ppm concentrations for twenty to thirty minutes before they are eliminated. I doubt anyone uses anything but tap water or water from a deep well but it is possible someone does.

I do not use H2O2 for root rot as it has no residual effect. It does not have a residual effect and its results can not be readily measures as can the results from chlorine usage. It is also much easier to over dose H2O2 and therefore kill living roots and oxidize nutrient compounds. H2O2 is a very strong oxidizer.

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RickWhite said:

Your roots don't look bad - but mine don't either. Try to take clones and see if they take root. My plants are able to deal with the fungi but it kills my clones. The problem is that it gets in the stem.

To prevent it keep your water around 68 deg and don't let anything fall in.

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EvasiveGrower said:

Hey everyone, great read/rant. too bad fatman is gone...anyhow is Dutch Master Zone organic? can you run this in conjunction with the chlorine treatment?

MAYDAY I screwed up good this time. Maybe chlorine will be my answer.

Notice the yellow spotting on the leaves, this began 3 days ago. 7 days ago realized something was wrong, pH spiked from constant 5.8 to 6.5+ all the sudden and I've been using AN pH perfect with no ph issues until now. Ppm's became constant (before they were eating 50ppms a day), and then the smell came. This is when I realized the dreaded root rot was back

I'm week 4 of 12/12, roots are brown as hell. Just hit them with clorine, azamax, physan 20, and H2O2 tonight, Final phase (clearex basically), dropped in a 13 watt UV sterilization light to my res, re-rigged my setup, and dropped the water temp from 68 to 64. No nutes in res currently, will continue this for 3 days? (advise)

My buckets (2 gal waterfarms, bucket in bucket with hydroton) WERE running RDWC (very retarded way now that i read a little more), I had water pumping in (1/2") the bottom of the buckets and would return to an overflow (3/4") i bulk headed 6 inches above see pic pump running 24/7. Roots always in water :-/ blah should've known, now reading I think I've got things setup right and solved what CAUSED the issue, now 'Houston we have a problem' and I'm on a mission to SAVE them from the root rot invaders!

Now I modified the setup, both lines serve as returns and I have drip feed rings [15 minutes] on [15 minutes off]. Which basically floods out the buckets for 15 minutes and water freely flows back to the res through both the 1/2" and 3/4" returns, and then the buckets are drained for 15.

My 1st question is, is the 15/15 interval good? I'm thinking thats too much but dunno here. Maybe: 15 on / 45 off? EDIT:I just switched to 15 minutes on, 1 hour 45 mins off before I head to bed.

2nd Question, will this system change help 'kill' the root rot by allowing air to reach the roots for 15 minutes?

3rd, I have an army of beneficial bacteria, Great White, ZHO, Tarantula. At this point in flowering should I try to eradicate with chlorine or hit them with the bennies and nix the chlorine physan this late into flowering?

I've been in this battle before and have not won, I need to WIN FOR ONCE! haha. Thanks in advance for your responses.

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karmeron said:

wow thats a lot of products mentioned lol

only way i have fixed it before was, wash the whole system out with bleach, then run a few ml's bleach, I had white roots in a few days, H2O2 wouldnt fix it, thats just my experience

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