Over watered?

[jalapeno]

3 10 gal Root Trapper II pots with vigorously growing 'Ringo's Gift' plants (AC/DC x Harle Tsu). Soil is bottom 1/3 Ocean Forest enriched with Natures Living Soil Concentrate (Super Soil). Middle third is Ocean Forest, top third is Happy Frog (b/c both the local GrowBiz store and I ran out of Ocean Forest).

Watering with pH adjusted 6.5 - 6.9, (tap water is 8+. ~1/4 tsp of citric acid crystals per ~4.5 gal water fixes that) using Blumats. Garden on my roof, because it's the only place sunny enough to grow anything.

Leaves on the highest Colas droop. Lower leaves look OK to me. No obvious pests or disease. My guess is that they are over watered, which is really easy to do with the Blumats. I turned off the watering system Yesterday, Jully 1, and today, poked a lot of holes in the soil about 10" deep (pots are 14" deep) to hopefully get more air to the roots. Using a hand held analog moisture probe the top 1 -2" are borderline 'dry' (about 4/10). Bottom 2" are wet (9-10/10), and the middle 6 - 8/10. I'm pretty sure that the drooping is not caused by lack of moisture.

So, I'll see if there's any improvement by tomorrow. Any other suggestions for cause or cure will be appreciated. Here are photos...

 

[crucialbunny]

How is your runoff when you water? When I read your description of layering your mediums my first thought went to a damming problem. Creating strata within your bags could possibly lead to water filtration issues. Just throwing the idea out there.

 

[Toker1]

The watering seems to be the problem. When you turned off the watering system, did the drooping of the leaves get worse or remain the same?
I saw the layered soil, but I did not see any perlite added. You want to add extra pearlite to prevent the soil from clumping and creating poor drainage. I mix mine 40% perlite and 60% soil minimum.
Yeah, the soil needs to go through a wet/dry cycle. Try lifting the containers before watering, they should feel light. Or stick your finger in the soil, it should feel dry up to the first knuckle. Do not water wet soil.

 

[jalapeno]

When using 'super soil', instead of adding nutrients ongoing, they don't recommend watering until run-off, as it leaches out to much nutrients. I've grown in the same pots before with similar soil before. Had other problems, but not the droopy leaves, and gotten good yields.

 

[jalapeno]

Thanks! to soon to tell on the drooping leaves. I'll give it another day or two and see if anything changes. Both the Happy Frog and Ocean Forest soil come with perlite already mixed in. Maybe more would be worth a try next time, though I've not found it necessary in the past. Yeah, it's dry up to the first knuckle and then some, but no way I can lift the 10 gal bags full of soil and big plants. Watering is controlled by 'Blumats'. They are porous ceramic bulbs that sit in the soil and allow water to pass through a small rubber tube when the soil dries out, and shut off when it gets wet again. They have an adjustment screw to control how dry and how wet, they turn 'on' and 'off'. They can be finicky, but once dialed in, you can go away, and know that your plants are getting appropriately watered. Now that we're essentially in lock down here anyway, I may just bypass them, and turn the water on and off manually.

 

[Toker1]

I use HF and OF. I always add perlite. The bulbs tend to over water. If you shut them off and everything looks the same. It’s overwatering for sure.

 

[jalapeno]

Tokert: Kinda hoping that the leaves would perk up, not just be the same. 2 days with the blumat's shut off. Soil moisture is definitely going down, but is still plenty moist at 8" + down by my probe. Looks the same, I think. Lower leaves look healthy, but the taller colas are distinctly stressed looking. Weather here is cool and humid, but breezy (typical North CA coastal summer). Can it be anything else? I can't imagine that they're under watered, as the roots should be well into the wetter parts of the pot. In fact the whole transplanted root ball was buried pretty deep because the clones were tall and spindly to start with. I'm using the long (8") Blumats in 14" deep pots. Pot's are still too heavy to lift without hurting myself, so that says something. Wait it out and keep on eye on them, I guess.

 

[Toker1]

Give it time. She will respond. The same droop means they are not under watered. Hard to tell the difference at a particular stage. I was trying to establish which it was. If they were under-watered the droop would only get worse after the water got shut off. The same droop after water got shut off means they were def overwatered. The soil needs to dry out before they perk up. After 3 days, my 10 gallons outdoors in the SF Bay Area need a drink. Adding perlite next grow will improve drainage. Makes for happier ladies.

 

[jalapeno]

Thanks!

 

[Toker1]

No prob.

 

[jalapeno]

An update. In brief, looks like it was under watering after all. By 3 days, they seemed a little worse, but it was hard to judge. I gave the one that seemed the 'most worse' a drink. Next day, the other 2 looked ' even more worse', while the 1st one looked tiny bit mo-betta. So, gave the other 2 a little bigger drink and topped off the 1st one to match. Again 2 days later, and now again 3 more days later. They are not 'all better', but definitely improving. I've been a bit cautious on how much drink they get, so as not to over compensate, and as long as they're OK, I'll probably water nor more than every 3rd day. Opened the Blumats all the way, so they don't get in the way. 3 plants in the same location, same size, same strain, and virtually 0 likelihood of rain, means I don't really need to rely on the Blumats. Just figure out what's a good amount of water every 3 days. The water is pumped up to the roof from a 5 gal. bucket at street level using a demand (pressure) controlled RV pump, and distributed through drippers on the roof, so it's easy to see how much is being delivered (i.e in inches out of the bucket). I use the reservoir and pump because our tap water is ~pH 8.5 +, and high alkalinity. That's even too out of range to work well with super soil, so I adjust the pH in the reservoir when it gets refilled.

 

[Toker1]

Right on. Usually with under watering a good soak will get those leaves perking up again with in a few hours. I have not had much experience with those types of drippers, but I use a standard drip that connects to my regular sprinkler piping. Ph is only an issue when I don’t feed. I find that the low ph of the feed and the high ph of the water makes for a great root zone ph for my plants. I’m lucky In that sense I guess.

 

[jalapeno]

The drippers are just ordinary 4gph 'flag' drippers (ring of 6 in each 10g pot). Since I'm using Super Soil, I don't add any nutes, and I've gotten good crops that way, as long as I water with pH ≤ 7.0. With the 'Blumats' opened all the way as they are now, it's just like not having them. I've had some success with them in the past, but getting them 'dialed in' so that they don't either over or under water can be a headache. After 2+ years of indoor tent growing, the roof grow has been a revelation of ease, yield, and economy. The tradeoff, is it's somewhat inconvenient to visit the girls often. The plants on the roof are visible from the street, but I assume no one notices them, unless there's some dude walking around up there.... Not that I think any of my neighbors really care., but still....

 

[Toker1]

That’s about how many I use in my 10 gal. Only mine are on the ground. So sun exposure and wind climate might be different. Also, some strains drink and react to the elements more than others.