Need Help... Yellow Leaves, Curling Under (Pictures)

Hello all,

I am having some problems with my first indoor grow. I'm hoping that some veteran growers can help me out.

I have 2 plants that I have grown from bag seeds. I'm fairly certain that one is Chemdawg, I'm not sure about the other.

They are currently in an organic soil mix under 4 CFL lights (the back of the cupboard is a reflective emergency blanket) on 18 hours, off 6. They just got a 12-6-10 fertilizer mix (the best thing I could find at Wal-Mart).

I am fairly certain that they are about 2 months old. To be honest, I wasn't really ready for them to sprout as successfully as they did (I have 3 outside doing well).

They were fine when they were in their Solo cups, but seem to be struggling since they were transferred to pots. The leaves are yellowing and dying from the bottom up. The larger plant had leaves that were nearly white on the bottom before they turned brown. The stems are nearly pure purple and the leaves are twisting and curling in strange ways.

There are a couple of factors that I can't really avoid but I think may be causing the problem. First of all, the room that they are in is where the air conditioner is always on so it stays at about 70 or cooler in there (I put a heat lamp in with the plants to help slightly, stays about 75 to 79 with that). It also gets dry, so I have a humidifier and fan running at all times. I was slacking on that for the past couple of weeks so they dried out a bit from that. I ended up trimming the dead/brown leaves off of the bottom of the plants. I also just completely rinsed them in the tub yesterday.

I have been researching and haven't found a good answer and I'm getting scared for my babies. If you have any idea what the problem might be or, even better, what I can do to fix it, I would appreciate it very much.

Thanks!

What kind of light do you have over them?

4 CFL bulbs. I know it's not ideal, but I have seen/read some others grow with just those. I am thinking that I might need to look at fluorescents. I am just on a bit of a budget and was looking for a cheaper way that wouldn't cost a lot initially or spike my electric bill.

CFL is a fluorescent...

Wow, you are totally right... that's what CFL stands for.

I shouldn't have smoked so much before that post

what strength did you give them on the nutes please don't say full. what kind of soil you got? how well does it drain? what spectrum is you CFLs? 2700, 6500?

The nutes I got were little balls, I put a few in the soil and they are supposed to "work for up to 4 months".

Should I take them out? The symptoms have only gotten worse since I added the nutes.

It is an organic potting mix and drains very well.

I am not sure about the CFL question, to be honest, I didn't know they came in different spectrums. What ones do I need to buy in order to have the right kinds?

Thank you for your help!

Thats a nitrogen def.....yes take the balls out they are very hard to work with because you never know what is being released and when and go easy on the feeding with high npk numbers like that or you will go from one extream to the next and we will be talkin you thru a flush....after you give it a 1/4 dose of nitrogen it will take about 3 days and you will see them getting better.....good luck

lars2458 said:

4 CFL bulbs. I know it's not ideal, but I have seen/read some others grow with just those. I am thinking that I might need to look at fluorescents. I am just on a bit of a budget and was looking for a cheaper way that wouldn't cost a lot initially or spike my electric bill.

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You cant go into it half cocked mate, my hasidic nature almost had me taking the same route. I'd get some HID lighting an d take care of your N deff, which those plants clearly have.
NOTICE- yellowing is from the bottom up: This is a problem not caused by the lighting/environment, but exacerbated by it. You need nutes, kido.

Nitrogen is what I was thinking, I'm glad to hear a solution.

Another dumb question, I live about an hour away from anything but Wal-Mart, do any brick and mortar stores sell a good fertilizer or should I buy one online? Is there anything I could do in the meantime (if I need to wait for it to ship) to keep it alive?

The bigger one is doing much, much better but the Chemdawg is fading fast...

Silly me, my first thought when they sprouted was "well, they are just weeds... weeds grow really easily". Nope, wrong.

Thank you all again, I really appreciate the knowledge and advice!

id say N def as well, but the twisting leaves suggest overfert, i reckon as said above the balls are mucking your girls up releasing all sorts at all different times.

do you have any soil that you can get your hands on? if you go with a basic potting soil it should sort them out,but you will need to start feeding after 1-2 weeks depending on how the plant looks. normally potting soils are good for two weeks, but your girl needs to make up for what shes lacking.

do you have or know anyone with a garden?? if you do and can obtain some soil, look for areas with good plant growth (should indicate good soil)

dig up 5 gallons, and add to 5 gallons of gravel (small as poss) or perlite i prefer gravel, pea gravel.

you now have 10gallons of good soil that will drain well, water it let it sit over nite, turn it then transplant your girls asap!

hope this helps!

No problem bro, i share all ive learned.....you should take some of those balls and melt them in water then feed your plant so it has something because nitrogen def will move really fast up the plant if not.....then go to amazon.com and get some base grow and bloom nutes and they will be at your door in a few days........when you desolve the ball only use a small amount....if you have a tds or ec meter then give it 600ppm or 1.2 ec....and when you get a base nutrient get something that will work for both grow and bloom like a three part grow micro bloom and you can save some money if your kinda tight.....the flora series works great for people and its cheap and can be used for the whole grow ......

Once again, great advice.

I live on the river, so I can find fertile soil near there fairly easily. I will try gathering some and transplanting them into that instead. My bathtub and removable shower head work nicely for doing a nice flush.

I was starting to think I was going to lose them completely, but I figured I could find some experienced guides to help me getting some beautiful buds. After all, even a weakened Chemdawg would be drool-worthy!

(By the way, I'm a "sis" )

Here are the plants as of this morning, I am giving them another flush and trying to get out any of the nutrients from the balls that went in.

It's really, really difficult to duplicate nature... the ones next to the river look awesome!