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i am frustrated and don't know what to do...

Emald001

Emald001

A couple of weeks back (3 to be exact) my reaper plants and a couple of other were doing well it seemed.  One of my plans was teeming with flowers, but then its just dropped them.  I figured I had been overwatering and there was not enough ventilation in the pots.  I drilled some holes in the 4,3, and 2 gallon pots so the water can better drain and dry a lot quicker.  The leaves kept falling.  We had a small heat wave here in California ( 100+), and even though my plants are in the shade throughout the day, they were still affected by it.  At this time after the hear wave I fertilized them since I had not done anything since I transplanted them from the peat moss in which they grew in.  Now it looks like some plants are starting to get the "bushy" look and rare starting to look greener.  My reapers however are not.  I though that they were not getting enough sun so now when I get home I put them under the T5 for about 4 hours extra. Please help, should I just take the dirt out and replant them unto a better dirt? should I wait? am I being too critical?  
 
Here is what I have used thus far.
1) grown in peat moss under T5 lights and a heat mat to stimulate germination
2) kept inside the garage under T5, they seem to started getting a lot of knats and also mushrooms at this time.  So I began to take them outside, and give them more and more natural sunlight.
3) transplanted them into 4,3,2 gallon pots with .....Miracle grow "organic" soil.  This medium seemed to give them a lot of mushrooms.  
I had kept them outside, and I have watered them weekly.  (this is when I found out that there was not enough drainage so I drilled some holes in it.,I also bought a water meter just to make sure.
4) put some organic fertilizer 2 weeks ago... this is what they look like now.....
 
http://i.imgur.com/xwEHPiY.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/Y3gGred.jpg
 
 
 
Im sorry to see that man, grab yourself some hydro nutrients (think General hydroponics flora series) and use like 1/4 strength, water with that
 
Pex thanks man for answering.. what do I do with the nutrients that I just put in 2 weeks ago?  What do you think is causing this?
 
Hi. Most of your plants look ok, but as you say there are a couple that have been over watered.

First off, don't worry, it can be put right. I say overwatering as you spoke about having to drill extra drainage holes and having mushrooms and lower leaf drop. I would do the following:

Get some perlite or grit or similar and make a better free draining compost that doesn't hold on to the water as much, some sort of compost for pots. Add 3 parts compost, 2 parts Perlite and 1 part Vermiculite. Mix it up and use this mix instead.

Pot on into the new mix and get a fair bit of the old compost off the roots, so they can start fresh.

Consider bottom watering and water only when the plant starts to wilt very slightly. Get used to the weight of a dry pot, that needs water and a freshly watered pot. Feel the difference and use this as a method of knowing when to water.

Alternatively get a cheap moisture meter that you insert into the compost and use that.

Add some CalMag to your next feed at the recommended dose to help green the leaves back up. New leaves will grow from the nodes on the lower main stem in time.

Good luck.
 
Solid advice up above. I do want to add this bit. Worrying and doing too much is just as bad as pure neglect. You would basically be putting them through more stress than they are already going through. So once you have taken corrective measures, back off a bit and let them do their thing.
 
I don't know if it's similar, but all my plants (40 seedlings and 10 OWs) got yellow leaves that started falling when the weather changed. They were outside for about a month in crappy weather (cold and wet) and then it sudently got hot and dry (really hot). The problem was affecting all the plants, but only on older leaves - new growth was fine.
 
I didn't do anything to the plants to fix this and they are all fine now (minus the leaves that fell) and are flowering.
 
they look fine besides the fact they lost some leaves. Nice and green. That spot doesn't really look like it gets much light?
The soil is fine you don't need to completely transplant lol
 
I'd be tempted to nuke them with dynagro foliage pro + cal mag.
 
heefy said:
Hi. Most of your plants look ok, but as you say there are a couple that have been over watered.

First off, don't worry, it can be put right. I say overwatering as you spoke about having to drill extra drainage holes and having mushrooms and lower leaf drop. I would do the following:

Get some perlite or grit or similar and make a better free draining compost that doesn't hold on to the water as much, some sort of compost for pots. Add 3 parts compost, 2 parts Perlite and 1 part Vermiculite. Mix it up and use this mix instead.

Pot on into the new mix and get a fair bit of the old compost off the roots, so they can start fresh.

Consider bottom watering and water only when the plant starts to wilt very slightly. Get used to the weight of a dry pot, that needs water and a freshly watered pot. Feel the difference and use this as a method of knowing when to water.

Alternatively get a cheap moisture meter that you insert into the compost and use that.

Add some CalMag to your next feed at the recommended dose to help green the leaves back up. New leaves will grow from the nodes on the lower main stem in time.

Good luck.
Click to expand...
That sounds good thank you much.  I was thinking about repotting them into something like fox farm, i think that is better draining soil.  I would also add vermiculite.  and dumb question.. but how do I bottom water?
Also, the leaves seemed to be all curled up.  I think when the plant was young it definitely had some gnats or something.  Also the picure was taken at night , those were the T5 lights, in the daytime however they get about 5 hours of sun and i supplement it with the t5 at night. . 
 
Just dip the plant pot in a dish of water or water/feed mix for 1 minute or so. It will draw up enough water for a while. Your climate is massively different to mine. Wait for the leaves to start to wilt then water again. If you are doing it too often, leave them in the water longer. Swings and roundabouts.
 
Just got some fox farm to transplant these bad boys and start fresh.  I have a gnat problem due to muisture retention in the pots.  DO you think I need to add more vermiculite? or the fox farm with a layer of little rocks (cant remember the name) at the base will be enough ?
 
Scoville DeVille said:
Plants have survived in nature on their own for longer than humans in less than perfect conditions.

A good dose of leavethemthehellalone is sometimes the best medicine.
Click to expand...
 
I had a Yellow 7 next to a compost pile that I dosed with leaveitthehellalone... One of my biggest so far
 
Just got some fox farm to transplant these bad boys and start fresh. I have a gnat problem due to muisture retention in the pots. DO you think I need to add more vermiculite? or the fox farm with a layer of little rocks (cant remember the name) at the base will be enough ?

So how are they doing now?
 
Emald001 said:
Just got some fox farm to transplant these bad boys and start fresh.  I have a gnat problem due to muisture retention in the pots.  DO you think I need to add more vermiculite? or the fox farm with a layer of little rocks (cant remember the name) at the base will be enough ?
Click to expand...
 
Got a few people asking how they're doing now, and no reply from the OP.  Hope he didn't add more vermiculite to deal with the moisture retention problem...
 
THey look awesome.. Pex, knows. ive shown plenty of pic.  My knowledge has increased by leaps and bounds from when I planted these and repotted tham. Its crazy, they were very nout deficient wheni look at the pics I had originally posted.  My plants are huge now and they all have buds and pods.  I even had to give one away cause its too big at almost 3 feet (reaper).  What I did was the following.  I repotted them on some FFOC, I traded a wolverine comic book (a repeat duplicate i had) for a 4 foot by 2 foot T5 system.  Shortly after that the plants just went nuts and grew.. 4 weeks ago i started them on a fox farms feeding schedule with big bloom, grow big, tiger bloom, microbe brew and cleaning them every 4 weeks with sledgehammer.  right now they look amazing.  If i was not at work id post a few pics.
 
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