Root Rot

[Gjohnstone]

I am really struggling with root rot in my DWC buckets. My PH is 6, water temp is 67-69. I am running Advanced Nutrients Sensi A + B, Vodoo Juice and cal mag. Any ideas or best practices on keeping root rot away?

[Scarletwhitewidow]

Rot root isn't from water from bacteria or fungi. So you have germs in your resivous cause root

[DW2]

Howdy Gjohnstone, root rot is brown algae and can grow when the temperatures are high enough and when there are light leaks. I fought root rot until I blocked all of the places where light was leaking into the reservoir, even to the extent of covering the Hydrotron pebbles with aluminum foil! Just to clarify, germs are bacteria.

[Gjohnstone]

Thanks Everyone, so would I be best to switch out my plants into some clean fresh buckets, clean the roots, new water, nuts etc and put some foil over the Hydroton pebbles and see how it goes?

[DW2]

If You are not using Hydroguard (or some other beneficial microbe product) applying a generous amount of hydrogen per oxide will clean out the infestation, along with blocking the light leaks and aerating the water. The H2O2 at the pharmacy (for wound care) is only around a three percent solution, when I had the last out break, I used a quart in each of the six gallon reservoirs without any harm to the plants.

[Gjohnstone]

Thanks, Voodoo Juice I thought had some of the benefits of hydroguard. I live in Canada and hydroguard is not allowed here.

[HappyDaze]

Last root scum problem I had seemed to be caused by Grozyme (Hygrozyme in the U.S.)...additives have caused more problems for me than they've cured. I'd ditch the VoodooJjuice, clean everything with 10% bleach /water solution, add some H2O2 as other have suggested... Also, may I ask how much air you're circulating through your buckets? If I'm not mistaken, a lot of algae is anaerobic, so a highly O2 saturated environment isn't what they like.

[alltatup]

Gjohnstone Hi there; I've dealt with root rot, and it isn't fun!! If your water temps are 67-69, that's good; that's what I keep mine at. I had to get down on my back on the floor and look up under my reservoir lid to discover the light leaks that were causing root rot. So make sure that your containers allow NO light to penetrate into the reservoir.

If you've caught it quickly enough, you can just rinse the gunky stuff off the roots and still find nice roots underneath that haven't been killed yet. I had to take my plants and rinse them under the faucet, gently getting rid of the gunk with my fingers, and the roots were intact for the most part underneath. Not my funnest grow.