health What is wrong with all of my plants?

[SuburbanFowl]

"Normal" Neem oil is 3400 ppm average. If it's lower, it's been processed, or diluted. If it's a product that's anything less than pure neem, you won't know what you get, unless it's declared.  But ~3400 is what any cold pressed neem should be.  Unless somebody, somewhere, is growing "neem lite".  Who knows, could happen...

 
Hi Solid, thank you for your reply.
 
I wasn't aware of this until recently. Last season I bought neem oil from a hydroponics shop and it was a liquid. It worked okay but I ended up mainly using synthetic pyrethrins because they were more effective.
 
Neem is hard to find in my country but this season I bought some from a guy who specialises in gardening (He sells things like neem oil, neem granules, biochar, humic/fulvic acid liquid, mycorrhizal fungi stimulator, etc). As soon as I opened the bottle I realised that the "neem" oil I bought from the hydroponics shop was actually watered down.
 
The neem from this season came solidified in the bottle, almost like proper cooking coil that solidifies when the temperature gets low. The bottle had to be placed in the hot water to "melt" it.
 
The real stuff has a strong smell compared to the watered down version. The smell hits you as soon as the bottle is opened and it's overpowering. It smells amazing when it is being sprayed.
 

Any neem that doesn't solidify in cooler temps, isn't real neem, either.  It's a saturated fat, like coconut oil.  (unless it's not)

 
I falsely assumed that a hydroponics shop would sell only the highest of quality products but it turns out this was not true.
 

Also, I'd strongly caution you to refrain from using sulfur after your neem application.  That is a recipe for instant death.

 
Yes, I googled it after my OP and realised this combination would be likely to cause phytotoxicity.
 

Let's talk, instead, about why you have the pests.  You're using one of my favorite substrates.  But it has quirks.  Did you "pre-charge" the coir?  If your plant is overfertilized, or if it's not taking up nutrients optimally, that's a very good reason why pests move in.  So speak to the coco issue...

 
The pest issue was not severe but I was worried that it would compound if the spraying was stopped. It was (is) mainly aphids, whiteflies, thrips and gnats. There was never any infestation, I just didn't like seeing bugs on the plants.
 
In hindsight, plant hypochondria may have been the cause of the excessive spraying and (indirectly) the cause of this post.
 
We're living on a small property about 150 metres away from the beach. The property is surrounded by trees and plants. A huge grape vine also runs along our fence and there are a lot of bugs around. Perhaps (to an extent) the pests need to be accepted rather than eradicated. Their presence around the pepper plants can be mitigated but not completely controlled. That's what I'm just only now recognising.
 
As for your last point, I didn't pre-charge the coco coir. The manufacturer pre-buffered it. I (perhaps erroneously) assumed that pre-charging it wouldn't be necessary.
 
Before this happened all of my annuum plants (They were started last, once I had learned more about coco and growing peppers in coco) looked great. No sign of any toxicities or deficiencies, no deformed growth and some were developing buds. The other plants were looking okay, they were finally starting to look healthy in the new growth.
 
I don't believe the plants are overfertilised (They get 1.4 EC max).
 
This year has been a huge learning curve for me and there have been a lot of setbacks which I view as learning experiences rather than failures. Coco coir is a substrate which I will continue to learn about and use.
 
These following questions come from a place of legitimate curiosity. I am very eager to learn and you've obviously successfully grown hot peppers in coco coir.

• How does overfertilisation manifest? I observed no signs of toxicities.
• Are there any symptoms that may indicate overfertilising apart from visible symptoms (discolouration on the leaves, slow growth, deformed growth, etc)?
• How about plants not taking up nutrients optimally? Would this create visible deficiencies? Slow or deformed growth?
• How do either of these issues contribute to pests?

 
Thank you.
 

 

 

[SuburbanFowl]

 Did you "pre-charge" the coir?

How do you pre-charge your coco? Calmag at low ppm? Calmag + base nutes?

 

[The_NorthEast_ChileMan]

How do you pre-charge your coco? Calmag at low ppm? Calmag + base nutes?

 
 
A guide to growing peppers in coco coir
 
 

 

[SuburbanFowl]

 A guide to growing peppers in coco coir

Thanks mate. I was under the impression that bagged coco didn't need pre-charging. I did sieve it, however. I think I will replant one plant and try pre charging the coco first because I expanded then sieved a canna brick recently.

 

[solid7]

If your coco is pre-buffered, then you're good to go.  No fiddling.  Accept it as gospel.  If you buy the bulk bricks, you're definitely gonna have to charge it.  It not only helps release K by cation exchange, but it does the same for Na, thereby releasing any built up (bad) salt.
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Overfertilization, in the extreme, creates leaves that begin to become necrotic, starting at the tips, and usually they fall off before the damage reaches 50% leaf coverage.  But more commonly, overfertilizing exhibits itself as a general systemic failure.  Small leaves, sometimes they get warped and crooked, as if they have mite infestation, etc.  Usually, if you lock out one thing, you lock out everything.  Pepper plants are so unfussy with nutrients, that we can treat the whole plant holistically.  We don't need to go looking for isolated deficiencies or excesses.  General nutrient issues - when a proper nutrient or fertilizer has been used - don't really manifest as singularities.
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Overfertilizing symptoms can look like deficiencies - as can disruption caused by things like overwatering, lack of transpiration, etc.  It's just very rare that you ever see true deficiencies with a pepper plant.  It can almost always be traced to something that creates the illusion of.
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General rule for coco:  Don't go nuts with fertilizer.  If you want to follow a great regimen for feeding coco, either get CNS17 Grow - no bloom or ripe formulas - and stick with it, 100% of the time.  If you don't have that available, reverse engineer something that has a guaranteed analysis that closely resembles it. 
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Don't get carried away with the "veg" and "bloom" hype that's so pervasive in growing circles.  If for no other reason, than because that coco coir will release all the Potassium that your plant could ever want, if you keep the calcium supplied appropriately.  Container plants need very little phosphorus.  It should be lowest number.  And since peppers vegetate and fruit simultaneously - for indefinite periods of time, as good weather dictates - also do not get tempted to drop your N levels.  This will, over time, create an imbalance somewhere else.  If you're just growing for a single season, and culling, do whatever.  But if your climate permits full season growth, keep your N levels healthy. (dropping N just because your plant starts to bloom, is like telling a pregnant woman to cut back on red meat/iron)  3-1-2 in coco coir is a great NPK ratio.  In the end, the K level (for the reasons mentioned above) is going to edge out K, but even if it didn't, that's still a very good ratio.  
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I'd very much encourage you to also top dress, or when you up pot, mix in 5-10% biochar or worm castings. (total - not extra, if you've already got some in there)

 

[solid7]

As for the pests...  When a plant is not growing optimally, it has a chemical stressor that announces itself to the natural world.  Almost as if it's nature's alert for the clean up crew to come in and lay waste.  I don't fully understand the mechanism, but it's a very real thing. I can personally attest to it.  If you have whitefly or aphid as problem pests in your area, they will definitely let you know when your plant isn't quite right.  Aphids seem to be an indicator of Nitrogen excess (although I don't think that's the exclusive reason they show up - but they'll be more pervasive and persistent) and I haven't quite figured out what it is that brings the whitefly in.  I've never had to deal with thrips as my main pest, but I've seen similar problems with less than ideal growing situations, coinciding with their appearance and contributing to their severity.
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The main point I'd try to make, is to keep your feeding on the lower end.  Let your plant tell you what it needs. it certainly will.

 

[solid7]

Maybe *when it needs* would have been a better choice of words, after all that other stuff I said.

 

[SuburbanFowl]

If your coco is pre-buffered, then you're good to go.  No fiddling.  Accept it as gospel.  If you buy the bulk bricks, you're definitely gonna have to charge it.  It not only helps release K by cation exchange, but it does the same for Na, thereby releasing any built up (bad) salt.

Thanks for your detailed response. How would you recommend pre-charging it?
 
 

General rule for coco:  Don't go nuts with fertilizer.  If you want to follow a great regimen for feeding coco, either get CNS17 Grow - no bloom or ripe formulas - and stick with it, 100% of the time.  If you don't have that available, reverse engineer something that has a guaranteed analysis that closely resembles it.

 
The closest fertiliser available here is Dyna-Gro Foliage-Pro. Have you used it before? Do all in one fertilisers like this require the use of a cal-mag supplement?

 

[SuburbanFowl]

Thanks for all the information Solid.
 
It honestly looks like 3-1-2 may be the way to go. I'll try Dyna-Gro Foliage-Pro mixed with calmag.
 
Foliage pro actually ends up being cheaper than the dry nutes + calmag I have been using which can be simplified to approx 2-1-2.3.
 
Have you got any resources that can back up the 3-1-2 claim? Where did you learn about this?
 
I think I have learned far too much about growing in coco coir from cannabis growers and have come to the realisation that most of them are parroting what they have learned from other growers and may not necessarily be interested in learning about the plants they're growing, the media and the fertilisers they're using (which is fine).
 
Personally, I just want to get the best results.
 
So far, this season has been a failure but hopefully it picks up.
 
At the very least I now have some solid information that I can build on for the next season.
 
 
 
Anyway, back to the original point of the thread, it looks like some of the plants are becoming somewhat healthy again and some of them aren't looking too flash.
 
Only time will tell what happens but fingers crossed they pull through. If some plants die, it is what and this will be viewed as a learning experience and not a failure.

 

[solid7]

Thanks for your detailed response. How would you recommend pre-charging it?
 
 
 
The closest fertiliser available here is Dyna-Gro Foliage-Pro. Have you used it before? Do all in one fertilisers like this require the use of a cal-mag supplement?

 
Yes to the Dyna-gro, an absolute NO to the Cal-Mag.  You don't need extra calcium, literally ever, if you go with either CNS17 or Dyna-Gro.  
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If your coco is buffered, you are good to go.  If not, I rinse the ever loving hell out of the coco first, then I give it a double dose of the calcium based fertilizer - or just a calcium supplement, if it's all you have (I've also used calcium acetate from eggshell and vinegar)  I literally just water it in.  It's good to let the coco dry out, if you have time to do so. (after rinsing, before watering with calcium soultion)

 

[solid7]

I think I have learned far too much about growing in coco coir from cannabis growers and have come to the realisation that most of them are parroting what they have learned from other growers

Weed growers, in general, are dumbasses.  They parrot not just what other growers tell them, but also what the grow shops tell them - which is always in the grow shop's best interest (in case you hadn't noticed, hydro gear is super pricey).  Weed isn't half as hard to grow as they make it out to be.  I'll listen to a guy who turns a 7 figure yearly income out of growing.  But not some basement growing dude bro, who couldn't grow a carrot in his backyard, without a "veg" and "bloom" formula.
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One of the reasons that you see me being so staunch and stubborn in my pursuit of simplicity, is because one of the best growers I ever met, was a weed grower.  He was really good at cutting straight through the bullshit.  In fact, I saw him lay down a challenge to a few other growers, to grow better plants than his - using whatever they liked - and all he used was a 3-1-2. (in fact, I think it was Dyna-Gro).  If I'm telling you the story, the outcome should be fairly intuitive...
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Don't fall for growing hype... 

 

[SuburbanFowl]

 
Yes to the Dyna-gro, an absolute NO to the Cal-Mag.  You don't need extra calcium, literally ever, if you go with either CNS17 or Dyna-Gro.  
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If your coco is buffered, you are good to go.  If not, I rinse the ever loving hell out of the coco first, then I give it a double dose of the calcium based fertilizer - or just a calcium supplement, if it's all you have (I've also used calcium acetate from eggshell and vinegar)  I literally just water it in.  It's good to let the coco dry out, if you have time to do so. (after rinsing, before watering with calcium soultion)

That's wild. I've been using products I don't need this whole time (Cal-Mag, Nutrifield Veg Ignitor and Nutrifield Root Nectar).
 
I've been trying to stick to approx 1.4 EC or 700ppm. The additives are taking up a good portion of the allocated EC. No additives would mean more main nutrients and a significantly more balanced nutrient profile at the same EC.
 
What do you suggest I do with all of my plants that are being fed a mix of 4 different nutrients? Should they be put into fresh, unused coco coir?
 
Should I stick to my main nutrient regimen until I can get some Dyna-Gro Foliage Pro? It will be about 2 weeks until it arrives.
 
Thanks a lot for all of the information. This has triggered a lot of research. The hard thing is finding proper answers..  Perhaps this is where critical thinking skills come in... lol

 

[SuburbanFowl]

Results, a few days later. Interestingly, a lot of the plants may survive.
 
A couple did not, all of their growth tips were burnt quite severely by the original neem spraying. Perhaps they would have eventually grown new growth tips but I can't wait and need to plan for my final containers.
 
These have all been re-potted into fresh coco that I pre-charged and some perlite.
 
All of my super hots were planted in very coarse coco chunks (which had been sieved of fine pith).
 
Unfortunately that coarse coco was too coarse and although the root balls were "big", the growth at the top did not reflect that.
 
Some of the roots were trying to grow through the chunks of coco but they weren't having much luck.
 
I trimmed back the roots quite significantly which may have been a mistake in hindsight, but it has happened and in the future I won't need to do this because I will use the correct type of coco .
 
It doesn't matter though, I've learned a lot and next season will hopefully be the best season yet.
 
These super hots have been cut down to the growth tips and most of the dead parts have been removed.
 
 
 
 
I'm not even sure if the plants will grow fruit at this point.
 
We have just over 4 months left in the season. It would be nice to have even 1 pepper from some of these plants.
 
 
Yellow Brain Strain
 

 
Chocolate Bhutlah SM
 

 
Reaper
 

 
JPGS
 

 
 
Red Brain Strain
 
I had actually given up on this plant, originally, but now it's the healthiest.
 

 
CAP1546
 

 
 
 
The lemon drops are looking good, at least.
 

 
 
 
 
My most successful plant this year is the cat nip. The neighbour cats have been topping it and each time it is topped it gets bigger and better looking.
 

 

 

[CaneDog]

Hey SF.  Great to hear that most survived and are bouncing back!  The ones in the pictures look pretty good now with healthy growth points.  They should grow quickly by the looks of them and flowers probably aren't all that far away.
 
Hope you can still pull in some good pods this season!

 

[SuburbanFowl]

I probably could have saved the super hots but ended up culling them because it was going to be too much hassle. The rest of the plants have survived and are doing well in the ground. They probably would be even bigger by now if I watered them more often which I will from now on.
 

 

 
The Bisbas is getting big.
 

 
Serrano that was potted into 8.5litres of coco/perlite
 

 
 
All things considered, even though they were set back (and some outright destroyed), I will get lots of peppers from them