HELP! .`k10

[ganjaman]

I don't understand why every time I have tried to grow hydro inside on small scale I can't get out of seedling stage this time though I had the extra money to get state of the art LED lighting kind xl750 followed GWE step by step Bubbleponics chapter medium is hydro-ton with rapid rooters and i'm using GH nutes that are suggested by website at 1/2 strength and a 73 x 73 x 73 grow tent (there went my bedroom lol) I had at the time a single 6 inch 440 cfm air circulation fan with charcoal scrubber with 2 16 inch osculating fans and a LTL element 2 environment controller and 3 18 gal hefty reservoirs with the lids wrapped with reflective alum duct tape. when I germinated my seeds I put seeds directly into rapid rooters and in a Germination station with heat pad let me mention at first I just used non ph balanced tap water in bottom of germ station and within 24 hrs I started seeing 4 of 12 had broke the surface I was so happy so I transferred the 4 sprouts directly to the tent and started a 16 - 8 light schedule then I put 1/2 strength nutes into germ station after I transferred the 4 sprouts to the tent 4 more sprouted after 3 days and added them to the tent after 1 wk 2 more broke surface and same thing to tent the remaining 2 the seed cracked open but the sprout only partially came out of seed and never did fully germinate at this point even my ignorant A_S is seeing issues as shown below.

1. seedlings are getting long and only have first leaves this has been going on in both germ station and in tent my solution was to prop them up w/ twisty ties as they st tarted leaning.learned from website that maybe I started the led light schedule mentioned above to strong and to long for new seedlings but cant find anything on GWE abouwhen to start light schedule on newly sprouted plants I think this is partially to blame on what killed the plants tried to call kind tech support but it is so hard to get a hold of them as they only have 2 people taking calls for entire company but they did call me back and showed me how to adjust spectrum to mimic morning afternoon and night

2. On reservoirs 3 inch net pots are not seating properly and accidentally over cut a few of the holes read Nebula's article about light leaking on reservoirs and issues it causes such as root rot mold ect and showed a few items available to fix over-cutting and help with net pots not seating my fix bought hydro-guard and cali-magic and realized my riser from water pump was way to long as well as my water lines to each pot so fixed them and i'm going to be buying some 2 inch rubber wire grommet so I can fit my water temp sensor and 2 air lines and power from pump through side of each reservoir without worry of light leaking through

3.Heat wasn't a real issue but with the summer here and because my apt has a swamp cooler for AC which is damp anyway and 15% of the time humidity is a issue in my city this is why I have purchased another 440 cfm air mover 1 for exhaust and 1 for intake and programmed into LtL element 2 controller to exchange air every minute and tent is light and air tight and ready for me to upgrade to Co2 in future.

In closing by this time plants are pretty much gone and i have been noticing a few things that concern me such as stems are pale brown and long and weak 1st leaves are moist but brown reminds me of Nebula's example video of root-rot but it's not on roots it's on leaves roots really never took except the main one I have each pot with ph balanced nute water at 1/2 strength in top and bottom feed system and let me mention each water line trickles nute water directly onto top and bottom of rapid rooter but i feel like i was keeping the rapid rooter to wet in directions it mentioned damp not soaking and mine where soaked I feel this and the lack of hydro-guard and and a passive circulation system is why this tragedy happened ok lets start with this I'm sorry its long but please any insight into why this tragedy took place would be greatly appreciated I will monitor forum and will answer any questions you may have let me mention when i emptied the reservoirs i didn't clean and sanitize them till the following morning and noticed on bottom of each reservoir was covered in like a white powder substance like salt maybe from nutes also noticed this in Germination station and noticed this on top of each rapid rooter.

[Jacobs528177]

Do you use air stones in your reservoirs?? Do you wait until roots are showing out the bottom of your rapid roosters or transplanting as soon as they pop?? Have you considered using pool shock to keep your reservoir sterile so you dont have to worry about root problems??

[Jsimo]

I'm running the same nutes as you using rapid rooters in hydro. Also have leds as well. What i learned from my first grow, cfl work best for early stages, keep it close to try to prevent stretch, but i still got stretch on one this round so i just propped it up with a twisty tie by sticking one end in the rapid router, and the other end i made a loop around the stem to hold it up. (Looks like you handled that). My first grow went under leds right away but i had to keep some distance.

Just from what your saying the i think you're way too heavy on the nutes. After mine sprouted i waited until i saw roots coming out of the rapid rooter to put into my system. While waiting for that i would damp the rooter with plain water if it was looking a little dry.

Now after roots were coming out of the rapid rooter i would put it on top of a single layer of hydroton on the bottom of the net pot and fill around it with hydroton. The system itself i would use 1/4tsp /gal of each of the gh bottles (less than half strength I'm pretty sure) until my roots are pretty established and I'm seeing some growing. Afterwards i went to 1/2 tsp/gal and i pretty much stick with that all through veg. Seems like a small amount but my plants looked 10x better this round than my first when i was for some reason pushing nutrients further and further. Less seems to be more, i was running that much with 2ft tall plants without any signs of deficiency.

There's a nutrient guide on this site i started following and it worked a lot better for me.

[oldjarhead100]

Ganjaman you are running to heavy nutes for seedlings ,I do my seeds in rapid rooter and when the root shows through the root riot I plant in 1 gallon pots and put them under t5s ,for the first week I give them about a 1/4 cup Daily of voodoo juice at strength and a very weak grow solution (Like if the manufacture says 20 ml for 5 gallons I would give them a tsp in 5 gallons), after a week of this you can up the water amount to a cup then water as needed, The reason your seedlings were long and weak is your lights are to far away ,I keep my t5s 5 to 8 inches away from the seedlings If you continue to get the white mold you will have to treat for white powdery mildew ,neem oil is good for this , I water my seedlings if the root riot turns from a dark brown to a light brown , maybe the top feeder is giving to much water . It sounds like you didn't give the seedling enough time to grow healthy white roots , do you have any bag seed to experiment with before growing seeds that cost $.

[ganjaman]

To jacob I do use air stones 12 inch and a 4 port air pump dont know psi can find out though and I transplanted as soon as the poped ty for replying if any other questions let me know

[FlyingDutchPaddy]

Hi ganjaman ,

i'm growing hydro since i started... on my 3rd grow now.

So, what i usually do:
- soak seeds first for 24 hrs (this time i did that in water + kelp / 65ml water + 1ml kelp/seaweed).
- after 24 hrs soak, goto wet paper towel to let the seeds sprout (all 5 germinated).
- after seeds are showing about 3cm of root, then i carefully place them in the netports with hydroton.
- my LED light initially is as high as I can place it for a week, then I drop it down by about 20cm (or more).

Water level is high enough so that the netpots are 'swimming' in the water but low enough to just have the small roots in contact with the bubbling water (through the pebbles).

first 3 days I don't add any nutes to the system.
after that, just a little for a week, to ramp up bit by bit.

Kind has a setup page for their lights: https://www.kindledgrowlights.com/pages/k5-setup


you mentioned seeing "white powder substance like salt" after a while, would you have 'hard' water?
just wondering what your baseline for pH and ppm is for the water you use.

[Jacobs528177]

Let the roots show through the bottom next time. Oxygenated water doesnt flow through the rooters so I imagine they're oxygen deprived. May not be what's wrong but it's worth practicing

[HappyDaze]

Agreed...I've only just started using Rapid Rooters, but they don't seem to drain like a RW cube would. I just drowned a couple of Green Crk seeds in them.

I've got bare stem clones in a spray bucket that I'm running side by side with cuttings in Rapid Rooters. I'll post pics as they come along, but so far, I'm not really impressed with Rapid Rooter plugs.

[HappyDaze]

Hi gangaman. It sounds like you have all the right gear for a successful grow. Following the feeding schedule that Jsimo suggested should get you where you want to go. The most common problem people seem to be having is overfeeding and toxicity from too many additives. My clones and seedlings don't get anything but a light fulvic solution until they have a couple of inches of roots.