Rust? Or deficiencies?

I've got 4 plants in one tent. 2 are perfect, 1 has mildly burnt tips and the plant in question has orange/rust spots on several of the sugar leaves on the buds that are closest to the lights.
I tend to lean away from this being a fungus as the other 3 plants are not seeing the same... But maybe they are just resistant?
I've been following dosage suggestions for the (locally made) 3 part that I use... And I ad in cal mag. I feel like she's getting enough phosphorus and magnesium, but maybe in wrong. Anyways... Pics speak volumes...
 

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curious2garden

Well-Known Mod
Staff member
I've got 4 plants in one tent. 2 are perfect, 1 has mildly burnt tips and the plant in question has orange/rust spots on several of the sugar leaves on the buds that are closest to the lights.
I tend to lean away from this being a fungus as the other 3 plants are not seeing the same... But maybe they are just resistant?
I've been following dosage suggestions for the (locally made) 3 part that I use... And I ad in cal mag. I feel like she's getting enough phosphorus and magnesium, but maybe in wrong. Anyways... Pics speak volumes...
I'm with @Renfro it isn't in the right position to be Ca and it doesn't look like Mg def.
 
Does it make sense that it's rust and the other 3 plants don't have it? They are literally touching this plant as my tent is apparently too small for 4 plants.
 

Renfro

Well-Known Member
I was able to zoom in on the effected areas and it doesn't appear fuzzy and it doesn't seem to cover the trichomes so I will shelve the rust fungus idea. Is there a chance that something was splashed on that plant?

zoom1.PNG
 

Renfro

Well-Known Member
If it doesn't appear to be spreading and other plants aren't effected I wouldn't be making any feed changes.
 
I was able to zoom in on the effected areas and it doesn't appear fuzzy and it doesn't seem to cover the trichomes so I will shelve the rust fungus idea. Is there a chance that something was splashed on that plant?

View attachment 4494387
Hmmmm.... I really can't see that being possible... But stranger things have happened.
Through my extensive google image searches, the 2 pics that most closely represent what I see have been diagnosed as lockout and flushes seem to have fixed the issues for them.
This would make sense as bud growth has slowed a little on this plant in the last week or 10 days. Also... Ph of the waste water came out lower than normal at 5.9. Ppm of the waste water was also very high this week... Normally about 2000 out after 1700 in, this week was 3800 out after 1700 in. In retrospect I should have clued in to this earlier.... But alas, I'm a newb. This is my 2nd round.

Tomorrow, I'll give her a mega flush, then top dress with a splash of dolomite lime to up the pH a little, and then give her the normal 1700ppm/6.1ph for food and we'll see what happens.
 

cannabineer

Ursus marijanus
Hmmmm.... I really can't see that being possible... But stranger things have happened.
Through my extensive google image searches, the 2 pics that most closely represent what I see have been diagnosed as lockout and flushes seem to have fixed the issues for them.
This would make sense as bud growth has slowed a little on this plant in the last week or 10 days. Also... Ph of the waste water came out lower than normal at 5.9. Ppm of the waste water was also very high this week... Normally about 2000 out after 1700 in, this week was 3800 out after 1700 in. In retrospect I should have clued in to this earlier.... But alas, I'm a newb. This is my 2nd round.

Tomorrow, I'll give her a mega flush, then top dress with a splash of dolomite lime to up the pH a little, and then give her the normal 1700ppm/6.1ph for food and we'll see what happens.
Those are very high ppm values. I would halve that 1700ppm feed. What are the ppm of your tap water? Are you using tap water?

This is one instance where I believe a high-volume flush is necessary to get your wastewater well below 1000 ppm. I don’t think your local nutrient maker’s feed schedule is effective. That is root-pickling ionic strength there, which makes lockout a viable explanation.
 

Renfro

Well-Known Member
1700 PPM @ what conversion rate from EC?

If it's 0.5 then it's high, if 0.7 then still kinda high not so bad but on the high end of good, equivalent to 1214 PPM @ 0.5 conversion from mircosiemens.
 
Those are very high ppm values. I would halve that 1700ppm feed. What are the ppm of your tap water? Are you using tap water?

This is one instance where I believe a high-volume flush is necessary to get your wastewater well below 1000 ppm. I don’t think your local nutrient maker’s feed schedule is effective. That is root-pickling ionic strength there, which makes lockout a viable explanation.
My tap water is roughly 300ppm.

I'm not saying that you're wrong (I assume you have far more experience than I), but I will provide my reasoning for not dropping my ppm. All of the way through this grow my waste ppm has been roughly 300 above what I'm putting in... Quite consistently. It's just this last water that it was skewed so high. Correct me if I'm wrong, but +300ppm above in is pretty decent, yeah? Says that the plant is using almost all of the nutes and is being efficient?
My veg nutes were somewhere in the realm of 700ppm, 1000ppm out. Flower nutes end up double that and then some. Worth mentioning (and I forgot this), on top of the local shop's nutes (which come recommended by a guy who runs a seed bank) I also add a healthy dose of bud fuel pro (grotek) on the shop's recommendation. I'm not sure what the ppm is be without this additional. I'll test that tomorrow.
 
1700 PPM @ what conversion rate from EC?

If it's 0.5 then it's high, if 0.7 then still kinda high not so bad but on the high end of good, equivalent to 1214 PPM @ 0.5 conversion from mircosiemens.
I have no idea. I've never put any thought into EC at all.
Not sure why, but my tap water right now is about 100ppm lower than normal. PPM is 180, EC is 360um/cm. Does this make sense?
 

cannabineer

Ursus marijanus
My tap water is roughly 300ppm.

I'm not saying that you're wrong (I assume you have far more experience than I), but I will provide my reasoning for not dropping my ppm. All of the way through this grow my waste ppm has been roughly 300 above what I'm putting in... Quite consistently. It's just this last water that it was skewed so high. Correct me if I'm wrong, but +300ppm above in is pretty decent, yeah? Says that the plant is using almost all of the nutes and is being efficient?
My veg nutes were somewhere in the realm of 700ppm, 1000ppm out. Flower nutes end up double that and then some. Worth mentioning (and I forgot this), on top of the local shop's nutes (which come recommended by a guy who runs a seed bank) I also add a healthy dose of bud fuel pro (grotek) on the shop's recommendation. I'm not sure what the ppm is be without this additional. I'll test that tomorrow.
A gain of ppm in your effluent tells me the plants are receiving too strong a solution. Ideally you want to match nute uptake to transpiration, with little excess/rejected nutrient ions.

It took me a while to embrace that for hydro nutrient, often less is more.

I don’t grow at the moment, but I talk to @curious2garden regularly about her grows. In coco/perlite I’ve watched her find a sweet spot at about 400-500 ppm nute load in veg (700-800 ppm including initial water TDS)
and max. 900 ppm in flower. I might have these numbers a little wrong, but not much.

@Renfro makes a good point about EC/ppm proportion. Different meters will use a different EC to ppm conversion. I’ve never used EC so I cannot comment usefully on it.
 
A gain of ppm in your effluent tells me the plants are receiving too strong a solution. Ideally you want to match nute uptake to transpiration, with little excess/rejected nutrient ions.

It took me a while to embrace that for hydro nutrient, often less is more.

I don’t grow at the moment, but I talk to @curious2garden regularly about her grows. In coco/perlite I’ve watched her find a sweet spot at about 400-500 ppm nute load in veg (700-800 ppm including initial water TDS)
and max. 900 ppm in flower. I might have these numbers a little wrong, but not much.

@Renfro makes a good point about EC/ppm proportion. Different meters will use a different EC to ppm conversion. I’ve never used EC so I cannot comment usefully on it.
Yeah, fair enough. When this grow first started this plant and one other were visably hungry for nutes. I started them slow and they were showing deficiencies so I cranked them up to full strength and they flourished with no signs of leaf issues since... Until now.

As I'm feeding tomorrow I'll likely take your advice and drop the nutes to maybe 900 or so after I flush her down to as close to zero as my time and patience allow. I'll then be out of town for 8 days, so I'll be at the mercy of the Gods (too much Vikings lately it seems... Lol). While I'm gone she'll get an auto dose of fresh water.

I suspect (hope) I've got about 3 weeks left before harvest. Tomorrow will likely be the last dose of food for them before I flush for good. Kinda crappy timing. Oh well... I don't actually smoke much.... I just like growing things and learning, so here's a solid opportunity for learning. Hahaha!
 

cannabineer

Ursus marijanus
Yeah, fair enough. When this grow first started this plant and one other were visably hungry for nutes. I started them slow and they were showing deficiencies so I cranked them up to full strength and they flourished with no signs of leaf issues since... Until now.

As I'm feeding tomorrow I'll likely take your advice and drop the nutes to maybe 900 or so after I flush her down to as close to zero as my time and patience allow. I'll then be out of town for 8 days, so I'll be at the mercy of the Gods (too much Vikings lately it seems... Lol). While I'm gone she'll get an auto dose of fresh water.

I suspect (hope) I've got about 3 weeks left before harvest. Tomorrow will likely be the last dose of food for them before I flush for good. Kinda crappy timing. Oh well... I don't actually smoke much.... I just like growing things and learning, so here's a solid opportunity for learning. Hahaha!
Can you auto-dose with milder nutrient instead? She will need nutrient to repair the damage done, and eight days of famine after a putative lockout deficiency will probably be bad.

I also suggest that you extend your grow window by maybe a week. A setback like this changes how long the plant needs.

Finally, I would deep-six the planned starvation interval at the end. The growers I know and respect feed right up until chop day. IMO terminal flushing does more harm than good.
 
Can you auto-dose with milder nutrient instead? She will need nutrient to repair the damage done, and eight days of famine after a putative lockout deficiency will probably be bad.

I also suggest that you extend your grow window by maybe a week. A setback like this changes how long the plant needs.

Finally, I would deep-six the planned starvation interval at the end. The growers I know and respect feed right up until chop day. IMO terminal flushing does more harm than good.
Well.... I could auto dose with some nutes, but all 4 plants have different needs. Couldn't hurt though I don't think.

As for the grow window, I'm at the mercy of the gods! Once the trichomes are ready, she's coming down. Might be 2 weeks... Maybe 3? Maybe this setback pushes it out to 4? Time will tell.

I've heard both opinions about the final flush. All I know for sure is that my first plant was not flushed and it burnt really weird and was oddly sticky. I'm not opposed to trying it without a final flush again, so maybe this would be a good time to try?
 
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