Please Validate My Diagnosis

I have 8 bagseed plants growing under CFL, 4 of which are 14 days old and 4 of which are about 10 days old. The older ones were in 4" clay pots and the others in red solo cups. They were not receiving nearly the recommended amount of light, but seemed to be thriving and healthy, although perhaps a bit stretched. They were all living in Miracle Gro potting soil.

48 hours ago I transplanted all 8 of them to some nice deep 10" pots and Grannies organic sterilized potting soil. I was as gentle as I could be in the process of transplanting them. I noticed that most but not all had roots visible on the outside of the soil. All plants were watered with bottled spring water until water just barely seeped out of the bottom of the pot.

At the same time, I also finalized my lighting situation and now have what I believe to be plenty of lighting. During the transition, for a 12-24 hour period of time, the plants were still under lights but even less than before due to the larger pots.

Not a single plant has shown any noticable growth since the transition. The leaves, while solid green and healthy looking, appear droopy. A couple of the plants have some brownish color on the surface of the tiny new growths at the top of the plant only.

My diagnosis is as follows, please tell me if you agree:

1) The plants are suffering from transplant shock.
2) The drooping leaves and lack of growth are direct side-effects of the shock.
3) The browning on the tops is a result of the plants sensitivity to the new lighting due to shock.
4) I should be patient and ride this out and will notice improvements within the next couple of days.
5) I should continue to abide by the rule that the plants should not be watered until the top 2-4 inches of soil is completely dry.

Waddya think? Thanks in advance...

I agree with your diagnosis. Just be patient.

wbd said:

Waddya think? Thanks in advance...

Click to expand...

I think you've not given enough information (as per usual, for questions of this type) to be able to give you an informed opinion.

You have repotted your plants too early though, before the root ball has developed properly, I can tell you that. I'd have left them in the same pots for another couple of weeks.

Regarding your diagnosis, it's possible they're suffering from transplant shock, but not knowing what you've done, it's impossible to say.

Drooping leaves? Again without more information it's impossible to say, did you water them in the new pot? I suspect it's probably lack of oxygen to the root zone.

Browing tops of leaves? That could be anything, without pics I wouldn't even guess at what's causing that.

Need more information to answer your question.

Do you ph test? Too young to transplant. You aren't adding ferts yet are you?

Hey, thanks for the responses. In answer to your questions, and I apologize for not providing enuff info (this is the newbie forum, right?), here you go:

1) Yes I did water the new pots until water just barely overflowed thru the holes in the bottom.

2) No I do not pH test, and I've not supplied any nutes except for the time-release balls that come with the Miracle Gro potting soil, which was in the original soil only.

3) (@babygrow) What more information can I provide you? Pics would be unhelpful I think because of how small the new top growth is and how subtle the color change is.

Thanks!

EDIT: really, I'm most interested to know if I should take evasive action at this point. My gut feeling (and roseman concurred) is that I should just be patient and ride this out. If any of you have strong feelings that I should re-pot, add nutes of any kind, etc., please let me know! Thanks!

Pic attached for your review!

oh no, that is from that shitty Miracle Gro potting soil, so you really got nute burns here. never grow with time released nutes or you grow with time released killers in your ground! big plant killer!

repot them into normal soil with perlite added to it but no added nutes! this will improve your plants health with in days if it is not to late already.

green_nobody said:

oh no, that is from that shitty Miracle Gro potting soil, so you really got nute burns here. never grow with time released nutes or you grow with time released killers in your ground! big plant killer!

repot them into normal soil with perlite added to it but no added nutes! this will improve your plants health with in days if it is not to late already.

Click to expand...

You think? I know that is a popular opinion, but others seem to think the MG soil is OK. Regardless of popular opinion, these guys were fine until the transplant. Being a noob sucks.

wbd said:

You think? I know that is a popular opinion, but others seem to think the MG soil is OK. Regardless of popular opinion, these guys were fine until the transplant. Being a noob sucks.

Click to expand...

that is the problem with those time released nutes. see, thy are build in a way that you got pellets that consist out of several layers, a coating for timing and then a nutes layer. now this timing coats as well as the nutes layer are never equally strong, so calculation of the nutes contained released into soil is impossible. my guess is that the first coating layer was quiet strong with this batch and took about 15 days to dissolve and now the nuts are kicking in and burning up your plant cells.

get them out of this shit fast

Hehe, how? The MG was the original soil, so the roots are gonna be all up in that. Sounds like trying to swap that out would cause more harm than good?

wbd said:

Hehe, how? The MG was the original soil, so the roots are gonna be all up in that. Sounds like trying to swap that out would cause more harm than good?

Click to expand...

noop, what you should try is to fill up your sink with hand warm water and wash the m-shit slowly of the roots and then plant it in again in good soil.
and more harm isn't really possible anymore then that m-shit did already to your babies, or?

Man, a dying man in the deep water doesn't mind being rescued and pulled out of the deep, and those plants are drowning in nute posioning and need saving! They would just love to be transplanted. As gently as you can, get them up and into a cup or saucer of water, pure water. let the roots dangle int he clean water for about 30 minutes while you throw that miracle grow dirt outside on your roses. Everytime a root grows a half inch, it will find a little nute ball and eat too much, too fast, and get posioned. I wish you had read up on MG dirt and MG nutes in GROWFAQ first. No one recommends it for pot growing.
Transplant those plants, they will put a day or two and bounce back. AFTER you transplant them, do not feed them for 3 or 4 days, then start HALF nutes.
When I was a kid and got sick, I was bathed, made to rest, I was taken off solid food, and strong spicy food and given lots of water, coke-cola and weak broth. Worked for me!

^^good comparison roseman

Hey guys,

Thanks a ton for the concern. Keeping in mind that I recently transplanted into non-Micracle Gro sterilized organic potting soil, do you think there's a decent chance that I might get away with this without another transplant? I'm thinking that the roots are growing outward into the new soil with no nutes and therefore I might be OK. Then again, what the fuck do I know...

wbd said:

Hey guys,

Thanks a ton for the concern. Keeping in mind that I recently transplanted into non-Micracle Gro sterilized organic potting soil, do you think there's a decent chance that I might get away with this without another transplant? I'm thinking that the roots are growing outward into the new soil with no nutes and therefore I might be OK. Then again, what the fuck do I know...

Click to expand...

if the roots of your plant aren't clotted with m-shit anymore it should be doing better within a few days if the damage done wasn't to bad. if it is clotted with m-shit there is no way around if you want this plant to have a chance, sorry.

That's cool, the reason I ask is because I'd rather start over at this point than hassle with another, more complicated transplant. I'm only 2 weeks in, these are bagseed babies, and I've made other mistakes along the way that I would correct if I had the chance (better lighting from the beginning, not transplanting so early, etc.).

This is a learning process indeed!

oh well then, i guess it would harm to train the procedure then with this one and if nor, oh well it been bagseed in the first place

Would a flush be beneficial at this point? I feel like it might possible do good, or might possible cause more of the time-release nutes to release. Hmmm....

wbd said:

Would a flush be beneficial at this point? I feel like it might possible do good, or might possible cause more of the time-release nutes to release. Hmmm....

Click to expand...

if you flush it away it can't cause any further harm to it, stuff is gone then okay?! then the only harm that can be done is maybe that you crushing it at some point.

wbd said:

Yes I did water the new pots until water just barely overflowed thru the holes in the bottom.

Click to expand...

And that's why the leaves are droopy but it's not the cause of it - that's the soil. That soil does not look like it will drain particularly well, it looks like most organic soils - half composted wood chips with very little chelated nutrients and poor drainage. The cause of the droopiness is the lack of oxygen to the root zone - the soil hasn't drained well and slightly compacted which has shut off oxygen to the roots.

Oh and with the greatest respect, if you're asking for help, please include as much information and pictures as possible, don't assume what information people will need, and pictures are always best as with the best will in the world I'd rather see with my own eyes a problem than having someone relatively inexperienced explain it to me.

wbd said:

2) No I do not pH test, and I've not supplied any nutes except for the time-release balls that come with the Miracle Gro potting soil, which was in the original soil only.

Click to expand...

Well strictly speaking you shouldn't need to ph test water in soil anyway as soil is self buffering to a large extent ie the soil has its own ph and its going to take quite a lot of either very acidic or very alkaline water to move it either way.

wbd said:

3) (@babygrow) What more information can I provide you? Pics would be unhelpful I think because of how small the new top growth is and how subtle the color change is.

Click to expand...

Well the pic was very helpful and with your description things start to make sense. My advice is to repot into some better quality and 'known' soil, rather than Grannys Organic mix, which no-one knows anything about. I agree with Green and Roseman about removing all of the old Miracle Gro soil although I don't think that's the current cause of your problems - that's the new soil.

Unfortunately I know little of American soils for that please follow the advice of someone else. But my advice is to switch back down to the smaller pot and let the roots develop nicely in some nice new fresh soil. You want either a seedling mix or a Multi-purpose compost cut with about 30% perlite or 20/10 vermiculite, as I said earlier follow someone else's advice on brand. Then learn and understand the 'wet/dry' method of watering, ie feel the weight of an unwatered pot of soil mix and the saturate the pot with about 100% run off and feel it's weight. Remember those weights, when the pot feels like the light one again, it's time to water - that's your watering frequency - as the plant grows and gets bigger obviously it will use more water and the frequency will reduce.

I'm sure we'll see the little plant back to health again