Root rot victims: keep or cull

[YYCannabis]

Little update.

the girls are recovering well from the treatment. Last water change I used another 1/4 dose and had almost no foaming action. This implies that the bad crap has been beaten into submission by the good crap. WIN!



Most of the leaves that were seriously affected have been slowly plucked away. Any leaves left that are still spotted will be left until a big defoliation.

Runty, on the other hand, is still spotted like a kindergarten classroom with chicken pox 🤣



Since her pistils quickly browned a shriveled, and her leaves are weak, I can’t do much to help her out. She’s going to weather the storm until her demise...next week.

And if you’re wondering why I call her Runty, have a look at her sister, Big Sis.



Big Sis was the fastest one out of seed with a taproot that was big enough to make a horse blush 😂. Since Big Sis and two other twins were never affected by root issues and the painful treatment, they have grown very nicely.

Cheers
YYC

[alltatup]

She doesn't look so bad, YY, just skinnier on top, but that looks like a decent bud!!

[YYCannabis]

The little ladies are in mixed conditions of health.

I can’t say that the treatment was the full cause of the collapse of plant health. From what I can now clearly see, the all the plants I treated went through a lockout of phosphorus. One plant I also treated was Runty, which is one of the first 4 plants that are almost 16 wks. Runty has always had a hard life for some reason...right from seed.

Anyways, she was flowering along nicely with plenty of large clusters of pistils. Since the treatment and subsequent phosphorus lockout, all her pistils have browned and shriveled. Not sure what to expect next.



Thoughts?!

Cheers
YYC

[Tersky]

Being a hydro grower, root rot is my boogie monster. I ran into issues with it early on in my growing history and have used hydroguard and have not had problems since. Only thing i dont like about hydroguard is it has a 6 month shelf life after being opened and i can never use that much hydroguard in 6 months. Im glad you found an alternative and it seems to be working. I think growing this plant to completion is smart. Even if it doesn't produce the yields you are wanting, the experience from identifying, addressing and correcting an issue gives invaluable experience which as alltatup said, nothing takes the place of growing experience. Good job man!

[YYCannabis]

The girls are looking better tonight. All three have their leaves back up towards the light, not fully up, but much happier.

I decided to continue treatment. I dosed 2ml to 2.5 gal just to keep things in check. Pulled another leaf from one of them. Remaining damaged leaves don’t look to be getting worse and top growth looks strong.

[Mr.furley]

Not to sure about Thrips being directly in your water for hydro but they get in your coco and soil.
Down with the Thrips!

[YYCannabis]

Thanks Mr. F for the bleach advice. I did not think of that. 👍 I didn’t think that thrips could cause root issues, but it does make sense that it could lead to root issues.

I checked leaves tonight and couldn’t find any thrips. Plucked some leaves from the 4 bigger plants and only found a couple of my predatory mites (cucumeris) wandering on some leaves. In a few more days I can hopefully call the thrip outbreak done. Once I can no longer find any good mites I know I won the war. 😁👍

[Mr.furley]

Make sure you are throwing your cut leaf in some bleach water or vinegar water to help insure the control of Thrips. Most of the damage from Thrips will start low on the plant and move upwards, some of the damage may be a residual effect from the bugs and/or the treatment as well as the root problem you are having.
Good luck!

[YYCannabis]

Did a full water change and fresh nutes tonight. No added additives or treatments, just nutes. Gave the pails a good peroxide bath.

Taking a good look at the roots tonight, they look and feel much better. No more dark roots (comparative to the color of the rest of the roots).

For what’s above ground...I noticed that the worst looking leaves were mid-stem. Not the bottom branches or even node 2...it was node 3 and 4 that had the nastiest looking fan leaves. Nodes at 5+ were minimally impacted but still showing some signs of unhappiness. I plucked 4-5 of the worst dried-out leaves from each plant. No point having the plant waste energy trying to heal them. If I see some good response from the girls, I’ll try to wait a week then take off the rest of the damaged leaves.

Im hesitant to use the treatment again, but I know that if I quit using it now, there could easily be a reemergence of the root rot. I might cut back to a 1/4 dose just to be safe.

The adventure continues!

Cheers
YYC

[alltatup]

YYCannabis That actually sounds like a good plan, because nothing takes the place of our own growing experiences. I'm watching, and I'll be interested to see what happens. Just give em lots of love and affection and TLC. It's actually amazing sometimes how a runt can turn around and surprise you. And I seriously never underestimate the impact of my attention and concern on the plants' growth. Cannabis loves to be loved by homo sapiens.

[YYCannabis]

It’s crossed my mind.

[starramus]

If you can't discover the source of the root rot maybe you should switch to soil next time.

[YYCannabis]

That was my thoughts as well. But as a new grower, I need to rely on the experience and wisdom of others who have been through something like this. With that said, I’ll probably let these girls do what their gunna do and hope I can still reap a small reward from them so i can gain my own experience from this.

Once they are done, I’ll be shutting down my tent until the really cold part of winter is over...mid-March or somewhere there about.

[starramus]

I'd say onward, and upward what have you got to lose? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJ2hJezvd2I

[alltatup]

I have mixed feelings about saying keep em since they're already starting to flower. With the problems you've had, I wonder if you're going to get any kind of strong bud development at all. If it were me, I'd be mighty tempted to let em go and start again.

I'll be interested to hear what others have to say about this. I'm never in a hurry to let a plant go, but I consider how much energy, time and money I'll be putting into the rest of the grow and what are my chances of harvesting good bud: if I'm not gonna get good bud, I'll pull a plant.