Leaf tips dying-Need help! ( pics+ info.)

Ok, The tips of the new growth ( shoots ) on most of my little plants are dying.I think this just started last night as I didn't notice it yesterday.When I pulled them out of their dark room ( a bedroom closet ) I saw what was going on. The tips on the tops and side shoots are all affected. Some are brownish, some are more copper colored, some are grey/necrotic. For the most part it is only the first 1/8-1/4 inch of the tips that are affected. As you can see in the pics, many of these tips are starting to curl under themselves. I will provide every single piece of info. here to get an answer....Most of the pics are pretty good, but some of the color is washed out. I circled problem areas. After a bit of research I am going to have to say it looks like a P def. The only plant not affected is the one I have already been flowering for 9 days or so- it is larger and leafier than the rest.

Strain: Master Kush ( Nirvana )

Light- Sunlight, about 11 hours/day direct sun ( 15.5 hours/day total )

Soil - organic mix from OSH.

Water- I only use distilled water purchased in 1 gal. jugs at the store. I
water them when the pots feel light and the soil is dry 2 knuckles down.
Right now they seem to need water about every 3-4 days.

Ph- I Ph my water to about 6.5 using a test/correction kit. I admit the Ph may
fluctuate a little bit from water to water.Usually stays between 6.2-6.6.

Temp./Humidity: Daytime is about 77-85F+ 55% humidity. Nighttime is
about 65-73F + 48-53% Humidity in the closet- I keep a small fan running
in the closet when I put them in there. There is very little FRESH air except for
any passive air being sucked in by the fan. It pretty much just keeps whats in
there moving.

Nutes: Since I started the grow, I have only fed them about 3 times. They
grew slowly and stayed kinda small so I thought the soil still had some life
left in it.. I have fed them with ironite ( 7-6-6 ) at half strength 2 times in the last
2 months and I just gave them all shultz's orchid food( 19-31-17 )at half strength a
couple of days ago as I just started flowering them-of course the big one has been
flowering for almost 10 days now.

Pests: I had(have) a minor pest problem- I used neem a couple of times
with poor results, and in the last week I sprayed them down with safer
brand vegetable insecticide. That seems to be working better.

Overall Health: I included a pic of the plants so you can see their overall
appearance. THey look good for the most part-some of the plants have a
little yellowing on lower leaves, I assume this is due to my light feeding.
Some of the tips on the plants are healthy but point down at a 90 deg.
angle. There are some minor blemishes on the leaves from past pest probs.

Anyhow please look at the attachments and give me some help! My best
guess at this point is P def. but that seems funny since i just fed them a high P
food....lockout maybe?

Thanks

I think it could be

the start of nute burn

effects from the Safer spray. There's another poster here who hit his plants and they went brown..so you might wanna check around and see WTF happened there/if you may be seeing early stages of the same problem they had.

possibly a mg deficiency/lockout.

Honestly..it doesn't look all that bad..yet..but keep an eye on it.

good luck

bt dt

Looks normal to me. Plants will shed leaves they don't need anymore. In nature the wind and rain would knock them off. VV

VictorVIcious said:

Looks normal to me. Plants will shed leaves they don't need anymore. In nature the wind and rain would knock them off. VV

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....This is happening to the new growth primarly.....I see no sense in your answer.


Anyone?

VictorVIcious said:

Looks normal to me. Plants will shed leaves they don't need anymore. In nature the wind and rain would knock them off. VV

Click to expand...

as soon as a leaf begins it's life it also starts to end it it's the whole life cyle. the tips look fine. if the whole leaf wilted and died then you have a problem. Try a couple feedings with just water if it is the start of nute burn that will help flush it out

lil nuted out but not to bad, lighten up a bit the doses and everything will fine

shamegame said:

....This is happening to the new growth primarly.....I see no sense in your answer.

Click to expand...

Hiya Shamegame

Firstly, thank you for the detailed description of your setup and plants it really does help in trying to diagnose what the problem might be.

Having said that, I have to be honest with you in the sense that trying to figure out what the problem is here is quite tricky.

I'm not convinced in my mind that it is P def, for a number of reasons. Firstly, because P def would not show on new growth first, but on early previous growth and this would show on lower leaves. Now, your lower yellowing leaves could be connected, but is more likely to be Mg or N def than P. Secondly, because it simply doesn't look like a P deficiency.

The other option could be nutrient burn, but again, for me that's not really consistent with the feeding regime, although the leaf tips and the curling down of those leaf tips is consistent with over-feeding.

The more likely scenario (for me) is heat stress. Switching from a dark closet to high intensity sunlight, which the plant needs to adjust to could be causing the problem. How strain genetics adapt and adjust to this depends entirely on the strain. Those genetics derived from landrace genetics, in terms of its recent genetic parentage (ie, all Canna plants are derived in some form or another from landrace genetics at some point in their lineage) will be able to adjust to the sunlight intensities far better than say genetics that have been developed inside and indoors under artificial lighting. Unfortunately, most strains now being bred and coming out of Holland will be in this category.

My suggestion to you therefore is to allow the plants to adjust to that bright sunlight gradually. In the morning, put them in a shaded area for a couple of hours and then move them into the direct sunlight for the majority of the day then move them back into the shade for the last couple of hours. Be aware though that much higher light intensities provided by the sun will mean higher water and nutrient feeding rates and this may well be tied in with your problem.

As I mentioned earlier, this is a tricky problem, mostly because there's no 'obvious cause' and everything I've written here is my 'best guess' on your problem based on the information you've provided. It's highly likely that it's a combination of things - and actually narrowing down the exact cause will involve you making small changes one at a time until you've 'triangulated' the cause.

I'd start out with easing the plants into the sunlight gradually, if you see no improvement after about a week, I'd repot all the plants into a fresh set of soil. Watch your watering carefully, your watering schedule seems a bit long for plants in those size pots in direct sunlight. 1/2 strength of your bloom fertiliser seems too high to me, I'd start off at about 1/4 recommended dose - but only when you need to feed it!

Hope this helps in some way.

Thank you all for your help.I just wanted to try to find out what was wrong
because I didn't know how far it would go or how fast. I admit having an issue that looks like possible nute burn AND N def, looking lower leaves can be frusterating!

Anyhow thanks again, I'll just keep an eye on them an take it ez with nutes.