Diagnostic and treatment help needed please.

[Serapium]

Quick update to those following along.

After clearing the facility earlier this week of all plant material we underwent a thorough decontamination and sterilization regimen, including the following:

1) Eradication of all plant material.

2) Full cleaning of the entire 10,000 square feet. This was not a minor undertaking. Several people for 6 days including the following:

3) First we went nuclear and bug bombed the entire facility (no plants present.) While this situation was not related to a pest infestation, we took this opportunity of no plants being present to do a full decontamination.

4) Following that all walls and ceilings were washed, all floors swept and mopped. With 6 large rooms in a 10K sq ft facility... Washing all walls, ceilings, and floors is not something I'd wish on my worst enemy. That sucked nasty donkey wang.

5) Next came full spraying of the entire facility with an airborne dessicant via an electric fogger (used green cure.)

6) Next came disassembly and sterilization with a bleach solution of all drain tables, irrigation lines, and reservoirs. That was more than a little time consuming.

7) All pots, humidity domes, tools, and trays were washed in a bleach solution.

8) Changing of all air filters.

9) Decontamination of entire facility via multiple high level doses of ozone via an ozone generator.

10) Reassembly of all systems, followed by a thorough purge with RO to remove any traces of chloramines and other contaminants from the sterilization process.

11) Repopulation of the veg room with ten small clones sourced from a known healthy facility. All ten plants inspected in minute detail prior to being imported to the facility, and all ten treated with Green Cure and a mild neem solution prior to importation. I am typically against the use of neem based products, but in this case I relented and used a mild foliar application.

That's where we sit currently, and all ten new plants have now been in the facility for two days. All ten continue to look healthy and vibrant, and are growing rapidly (see attached pic.) Provided no signs of contamination are present by the end of the week, we will repopulate.

Given the magnitude of the undertaking this week I haven't had an opportunity to further diagnose the underlying condition. I do have some plant material stored under strict quarantine for future analysis if such becomes possible.

The overall dollar impact is staggering. Lost plants, lost labor expenses and time, lost materials (cloth pots and growing media), hundreds of dollars in just cleaning supplies... and more importantly the lost time to harvest. All in all it's a six figure impact.

I don't ever want to experience anything like this again.

In the future, I will be much more gun shy when I identify plants with strange growth characteristics. Immediate removal of anything suspect upon the slightest indication of abnormality will now be the norm.

This whole experience has been humbling. I'm certainly not the cannabis expert of the world, but I'm more knowledgeable than most. I'm usually the guy that people come to for help when they have issues. It's been a long time since I reached out for help from anyone with a problem of my own. I suppose the fact that none of the many experts I contacted were able to offer efficacious solutions I hadn't tried is at least somewhat vindicating and blunts the blow a little.

In retrospect, if I had acted just a few days sooner in eradication suspect plants I likely could have saved a significant portion of the loss. It's kind of eerie going through this process of viral eradication at the same time that most of the world is on lockdown due to viral contamination among the human populace.

I sure hope similar measures to what I've had to do here are not required where covid-19 is concerned!

[Jordann]

What a damn shame though. Hurts us all.

[Serapium]

Yeah, definitely not a pest infestation of any kind. The infection vector is viral. It's entirely possible that the initial infection came from a single small pest that did not replicate within the system but allowed for viral transmission once the plant was infected.

[Serapium]

Ooooh good idea. I'll do that with a sample.

[Rwise]

I have gnats also, and no damage like that from them, I will buy predator bugs to combat them this year. I use spinosad indoor.

[Jordann]

I have them and it would take a hell of an infection do do that. That's forsure.

[tropa]

Hello Serapium did you already consider fungus gnats

[Rwise]

For the ag center tell them its hemp, they are fed backed (they still may not do it). I too hate to here this, very sad, a ton of work and all loss.

[Daskahn]

Going off that.. and idk why this popped in my head.. but a fellow member said he had a gorilla grow and the feds sprayed the area he was growing in with something that killed only his plants.. is it possible you were a victim of a state or government attack? Or attack from a competitor someone sprayed your air system with a “weed” killer

[Toker1]

Dang man. Sorry to come into this discussion so late. Also sorry to read about your loss.
Well, they look overwatered (judging from the original pictures first post). The clawing with leaves pointing downward is usually a tell tale sign.
were they going through a wet-dry cycle?

[SoOrbudgal]

Our prayers are with you in you time of loss man that's a huge hit. I feel for you.

[Serapium]

To everyone following along, I thank you for the kind words. You've made some wonderful observations and asked some great questions, and I will address them tomorrow after I've had a chance to digest this week's events.

I did save a few samples for later diagnosis, so hopefully I'll be able to eventually provide an answer.

For now I'm going to heavily medicate and try to forget things for a few hours.

Tomorrow starts full decontamination and sterilization.

[Korn]

An afterthought. I hope you saved some material for diagnostic purposes. I know the concern about destroying the possible pathogen, but it’s important that your affected plants be examined in a diagnostic lab. I’m sure there is a lab in the US that can and will do it. If not, that would be a great business to start. I’m thinking if you submit some material to a private lab and ask for testing for whatever parameters, I believe they will test it. If you are worried tell them it is spinach or roselle so they’ll have plausible deniability. Where there’s a will there’s a way. By pursuing this not only will you benefit but also the industry. Thanks!

[Korn]

Yep. Sorry to hear about the loss of your crop too. I would still want to know what happened, as I’m sure you do. It may be a new thing that can affect the whole industry. It’s important to log/document what happed, when it happened, who it happened to, who escaped the problem, etc. all info would be helpful in trying to diagnose the problem correctly. One flag for me was the fact that it occurred in only one green house. A good thing yet a puzzling thing if you all share the same water, air, ventilation, rooting medium, etc. What are the attitudes of your fellow competitors? Are you comparing notes and sharing information? What does your gut tell you? You seem to be an astute and conscientious individual. At this point, I would entertain all possibilities with an open mind. Cautious, but not paranoid. I believe there is some hanky panky going on. Something just doesn’t feel right. Look for the outliers in the data. Sometimes the outliers reveal another way of looking at things, sometimes they lead to the truth. Good luck my friend. Keep us in the loop, OK? Many minds coming at a problem from different perspectives can achieve positive results. Korn

[BR2K]

Serapium Do you have any communication channels with other local growers? I'd ask around, to see if anyone else has been affected. Please let us know if that's the case. My sincere condolences on the loss of your crop.