Stunted seedlings?

Here is a link to my grow journal, https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/620309-my-grow-2-5-400-a.html

Okay so i am a noob with 1 grow under my belt in super soil, I've since decided to go with hempy and i think i am having some problems with my seedlings on the 23rd of feb i had 2 seedlings break the surface of the rock wool i immediately transplanted them into solo cup hempys, they have been in there under 4 27 actual watt 6500k cfls for 10 days now and while i could see quite a bit of growth in the beginning it seems like they have pretty much halted altogether. They are in a pure perlite medium, they have not been fed anything, and i am watered once a day with RO water, if anyone could offer any advice i would really appreciate it, these are my last seeds and if i lose them it will probably be a while before i can grow again...

Just a few days ago i noticed the yellowing of the cotyledons and then i started paying more attention to them and realized they seem to have stopped growing to me, i raised the light up from about 1 inch to 3 inches because i thought i may have burnt the plants with the lights and they still don't seem to have reacted to that no stretching at all, i became concerned and i started looking up the seedling stage and read that you don't see much up top for the first few weeks because they are growing out there root system, but the growth rate of these plants seems so slow to me, so yeah I'm not sure if I'm over watering or under watering or if I've got a PH issue or if this is how things are supposed to be going, because i cant really remember the seedling stage from my first grow and i have no pictures lol.

So yeah what do you guys think are these doing alright for 10 day old plants or do i have something to worry about?

veneno 4 days ago


veneno yesterday


burmese kush 4 days ago


burmese kush yesterday
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Are they in only perlite? seems to me that using just ro water may be your problem, there are no minerals in it to feed the seedling, try using tap water after a day it sat to evaporate the chlorine.

DeeTee said:

Are they in only perlite? seems to me that using just ro water may be your problem, there are no minerals in it to feed the seedling, try using tap water after a day it sat to evaporate the chlorine.

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Yeah I have never seen the point in spending hundreds of dollars to buy an RO system to take all the trace minerals out of water just to buy expensive nutes to put trace minerals in the ro water. LOL

Go here and ask Moebius.

https://www.rollitup.org/hydroponics-aeroponics/546006-world-hempy.html

Yellowed seed leaves /cotelydon are a sign that you need to start adding a light dose of fertilizer. Most often that stasis in growth is the plant putting roots down. After they lay good roots then vegetative growth explodes.

DeeTee said:

Are they in only perlite? seems to me that using just ro water may be your problem, there are no minerals in it to feed the seedling, try using tap water after a day it sat to evaporate the chlorine.

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Correct they are only in perlite, as far as i know the cotyledon should have every thing the plants need to grow for a few weeks.

bigv1976 said:

Yeah I have never seen the point in spending hundreds of dollars to buy an RO system to take all the trace minerals out of water just to buy expensive nutes to put trace minerals in the ro water. LOL

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The main reason i am using RO is to keep things pure, i didn't want anything that may be harmful in my tap water causing problems with my seedlings on my first hempy run.

Shivaskunk said:

Yellowed seed leaves /cotelydon are a sign that you need to start adding a light dose of fertilizer. Most often that stasis in growth is the plant putting roots down. After they lay good roots then vegetative growth explodes.

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I know that the cotyledons usually fall off and die after about the 4th or 5th node but I'm on my first leaf here so this is quite worrysome to me.

By aiming to keep things pure, you are starving your plants.

I do understand that man but wouldnt that be once the cotyledons have fallen off? I had my super soil seedlings in jiffy seed starting mix for weeks before i transplanted to nutrients and i was only giving them RO water.

Here are some pictures from today, the veneno appears to be leaning a little more and have its leaves more tilted, the burmese kush's leaves are twisting and the critical + seems to be doing fine...

All


Veneno


Burmese Kush


Critical + automatic

So i finally found my PH meter manual which tells me how to calibrate it, and i gotta say i should have had this shit done the day i started germinating my plants, the water i have been watering my plants with came in at 4.5-4.7, i don't know how this is possible i was under the assumption that pure water which RO is supposed to be should measure about 7.0, so i checked the TDS and its less than 5 ppm, i guess the lesson here is never assume always test. I guess now the real question is which is better watering now and risking over watering or letting the plants set in the wrong PH water for the next 12 hours, and what do i do if the cotyledons fall off...

I got up today and took a look at the plants and they didn't look any better so i started typing in the same old thing that i have been typing into google for days now, trying to get some type of answers for what was going on and i did find something new, i found people complaining about perlite drying out to quickly and saying that noobs should start with a mix of perlite and vermiculite because perlite does not retain that much water. So that got me paranoid about the possibility that i and shag could be mistaking over watering for under watering so i obsessed about this until i got brave enough and decided to check on the roots, i was extremely careful to not damage anything and i was successful, and when i pulled out the perlite boy was i surprised both my veneno and burmese kush have pretty much a solo cup sized root ball, full of white healthy looking roots, the critical + still has not reached the bottom of the res but its about 5 days younger...

Starvin marvins....

They are in a pure perlite medium, they have not been fed anything,

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There is your answer they are hungry, there are no nutes in perlite.

boy was i surprised both my veneno and burmese kush have pretty much a solo cup sized root ball, full of white healthy looking roots

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why ? it's starving for nutes so the roots are searching like crazy.

I know the cotyledon are yellowing and dying but technically they are still on the plant so i guess I'm operating under the assumption that they should be feeding the plants a bit? I dunno i know they need something but i don't know what it is, i don't know if my over watering caused the stunted growth or if it was the PH, i dont know if the plants need time to recover, i don't know why the plants didn't just grow normally, and because of there tiny size i don't know if its a good idea to feed them...

So i am starting to wonder when would be a good time to feed these seedlings, they have a pretty big root system but there still isnt a whole lot on top i was thinking about maybe feeding them 1/8 of a tea spoon of the gh series thats 1/2 strength of the reccomended dosage for seedlings, i am really just worried that because of the dying cotyledon's they dont have enough energy to grow at all...

I've been telling people for years on these forums not to fertilize until the cotyledon's fall off, and now here i am contemplating fertilizing my seedlings that look like 5 day old sprouts and still have there cotyledon's on them... I really really want to just transplant them into my super soil but i know even that would probably kill them and i don't want to turn back anyways, i want to tell my self that they have huge root systems and they can handle it, but its the leaves that take the damage and there aren't many... I think i need to slow down here, but i feel like that's a part of the problem, i feel like I'm doing nothing and my seedlings are just setting there dying, i don't know what I'm going to do, a part of me thinks wait it out but another part of me says if i keep waiting they are going to die...

psilocybindude said:

not to fertilize until the cotyledon's fall off

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Yeah. Soilless is different. FEED THEM. 150 PPM maximum, saturate daily.

Cody leaves will get you to the first leaves and some roots. After that they need nutes to keep going. In nature they would be in dirt. Dirt has nutes. So naturally they would have nutes. You have no dirt so they want nutes. The no nutes phillosopy is a soil based fact and many hydro growers mistakenly follow it. Thank you rollitup for teaching me that one

Well actually i used jiffy seed starter mix for weeks before transplanting to super soil and i thought that was supposed to be nutrition free? Anyways thank you guys for chiming in the recommended dose for seedlings is 1/4 tsp of grow bloom and micro from GH should i go 1/8 dose tsp to be safe?

Crap, i missed the part about the jiffy mix AND super soil. My next thought would be overwatering. That will stunt the growth big time, total stall. Some weigh the container dry and then weigh it wet. I just weigh it with my hand. They should be growing with all those good nutrients in the soils so i would say over watering. The container should feel light, like its hollow before you water, sound about right?