slow growing with only top leaves

[Wanderlust320]

Strawberry Cough - Dutch Passion

I started this plant in September from seeds along with 2 others. This is only one to sprout just starting to grow with a mix of 2 60w cfls at night and natural sunlight during the day. Average temperature here is about 78F. My medium is 50/50 peat soil and perlite mix using general hydroponics in distilled water pH 6.7. I'm watering every 2 to 3 days. I've changed the soil from a large home improvement center (realized it had a lot of clay) to my current medium. It has never had thick foliage. bottom leafs always seem to dry out and die after new leafs start to form. The stem is strong and the roots appear to be well during transfer.

[Waltermelon]

That's a LOT of peat for a medical grow IMHO. I've never heard anyone using that much. You definitely have something, or a host of things not making it to the plant. I would suspect your substrate is the issue here. My recommendation, and you don't seem to have many options at this point.... Would be to get those plants out of there and into a new media. You're using a reasonable nute regimen, but I think peat holds too much moisture and the pH range is different? Correct me if I'm wrong folks.
i would personally go get a small block of coco, home Depot even has it as burpee seed starting mix for $3. Use a hose on low and wash the media away from the year roots (insert common sense at this point) CAREFULLY. You don't want to damage the roots too much if you want to save these Lady's. But keeping them in that media, to me looks like certain doom.
wait for a second opinion though. You def have some nute issues, but the root cause of the issues is what you need to know. The nutes you're using are the right nutes, but why they aren't making it to the plant is what you need to know.

[Wanderlust320]

I'm in Brazil and it has been EXTREMELY difficult to find a quality medium. I actually just changed the plant to peat about a week ago. The drainage is much better now compared to the "high" quality soil that i bought in one of big stores here that are similar to home depot. In I'm avoiding them all together now. I just found some grow shops here and they pretty much only have 50/50 mix or coco. Also I'm having friends bring me nutes when they from the states. the GH trio is over 100 dollars here compared to the 25 i paid on amazon.

[Campesino]

I am also leaning towards it being related to the grow medium. When did you last transplant it? Is it 4 months old from seed?

[Wanderlust320]

yea about 4 months. I transplanted from generic soil to 50/50 about a week ago

[Waltermelon]

That may complicate things being in a nation I don't know much about. I would opt for the straight coco. I am a bit partial to straight coco though. It's the only media I've ever grown in and to me, is the simplest most user
friendly way to grow and diagnose issues. You just follow the instructions on the bottles. Maybe tweak it here and there but for the most part, it's very straight forward.

[Wanderlust320]

She recovered nicely.