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HELP! Rotten egg smell

A

acouplacorkaz

New member
Hi there. I’m having some trouble with my hydro. They were about 3 weeks into flower when I noticed all the symptoms of root rot. I spoke to someone at the garden centre (who are currently closed for 2 weeks) that I bought the setup from. he agreed that it sounded like root rot he suggested I lift the pots out of the nutrient to allow for some dieback until I receive the root rot solution in the post, which was only two days.
(As I’m still learning, I wasn’t even aware root rot and the guy at the garden shop said I’m probably very lucky I haven’t had a problem in the past and that I should always include the additive from the very start. Next time I will be using beneficial bacteria in the hope to prevent it.)
I cleaned and flushed the entire system and added some root rot treatment to the nutrient solution, and also flushed it through the pots. About a week later they’re not looking too good, and if I lift the pot up, I can smell a rotten egg smell. Usually by this stage, you can smell the sweet, sweet aroma of weed in and around the tent but this time it just smells kind of leafy.

I feel that maybe it’s due to some dead roots in the bottom of the pot that are festering. I’m tempted to pull the plant out, rinse the roots and put new growing medium in, but I’m worried that I will shock them too much and they will die. As you can see, the leaves look bad, and I feel it’s due to its inability to uptake the nutrients because the roots are unhappy.

Please help I don’t know what’s going on. I’ve had approx a dozen successful outdoor grows, but I’m reasonably new to indoor. However, have had six successful grows. The only thing different this time is it’s the second grow I’ve used LEDs and the first time I’ve used auto flower. You may notice that I have two plants per pot. I have done that in the past without an issue.



Strain: Guerilla Glue Auto

Environment: 4x4x6 tent

Avg temperature: 22deg Celsius

Lighting: 480W Mars Hydro LED

Growing medium: equal parts PERLITE/VERMICULITE

PH: 6

EC: 1200ppm

Nutrients: MILLS (organic/synthetic) A+B. +R (until week 1 of flower) +C after week 2

Water: Pure filtered rainwater

(thanks to gingerbread for the advice. I’m unsure what WWED means)

if there’s anything useful that I haven’t already included, please let me know and I will do so.

thanks heaps in advance zz0.ehb75c4birgzz
 

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There they are.
WWED is What Would Elon Do in honor of the folks Boeing has stuck on the ISS, and his later nod to bring down the ISS. Everything you read in that line is tongue-in-cheek.
 
What are your water temps? Are the roots slimy? That's usually a pretty good sign. DWC in the summer is tough and recovery takes time but you need something like HydroGuard to keep that from happening in the future. Did you cut off the dead slimy roots? In my experience they diont get better. so I cut them. For me in a DWC setup your PPM is a bit high and I am betting the water temps are over 85° F. You can add frozen bottles of water periodically during the day to bring the water temps down.
 
I should have mentioned I’m in Australia so we are in the middle of winter. Water temps around 15-20 celcius. I use a system called “autopot” very similar to DWC but the pots have a root control mat at the bottom which prevents roots from exiting the bottom of the pot. And the trailer they sit in as an And the tray they sit in as a special valve that only lets nutrient solution in as the plants use it. About an inch of the bottom of the pot sits in the nutrient solution. Which is why I think that there might be a bunch of dead ones down in there and they are just rotting. Worried I’ll kill the plant if I pull it out to check. I included a photo of the root rot stuff that I added
 

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EC is quite high. Typically 5.8 pH is the target. Are you aerating your tank? My understanding is that nutrient solution temps should be around 20-25⁰C. 15⁰C seems very low
 
Hmmm. Interesting Bluey. Thanks heaps for taking time out of your day to share all that super valuable info. No I’m not aerating the tank but I think I should get onto that. The nutrient header tank is outside the tent. I’ve got it wrapped in an old blanket to try and prevent it from getting too cold. The nutrients go through a couple of feet of tube before it reaches the reservoir that the pot sits in, and if I take a temperature reading inside that reservoir, it’s 22°C. Do you think I’d be better off putting the header tank inside the tent?

Like I said, I’m still pretty new and still learning I thought I was aiming for an EC of 1200 ppm. What should I actually be aiming for?

do you think it’ll be a good idea or bad idea to lift the whole plan out of the pot, rinse off and cut off any dead roots and put it back in with some new growing medium.
 
And thanks to you also allenpro. I couldn’t figure out how to reply to your comment, but totally understand that you needed to pretend to be listening to your wife haha
 
You may not have root rot. You may.

If you mix incompatible nutes (in that they cause a reaction) you can get rotten egg smell. It happened to me but it occurred in my tank which was a drain to waste system though.

You must aerate your solution and adjust the pH daily.

What is happening to the pH of the solution in the tank atm? Is it steady or rising/falling?
 
Always learning.
I’ve done some investigating. The pH in the header tank was 6.4 and in the reservoir the pots sit in was 6.5. I’ve dropped it to 5.8.

I also purchased an aerator, for aquariums, but I think it’s the right one.

It’s a two pot system. I can only smell the eggy smell at the bottom of one of the pots. Interestingly, it’s the pot with the worst looking plant in it. The header tank and reservoir don’t really smell of anything.

Like the guy at the garden shop said I’m probably lucky I haven’t had problems in the past. I don’t doubt they could’ve been even better, but the attached picture is of a couple of the better colas from my last grow. I was starting to think I was getting the hang of it
 

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Just click on comment. I was thinking DWC setup but your roots must be in some kind of solid media, soil or coco and I have never had root rot with a solid media. Are you sure there isn't some stagnant water laying someplace? Some of the root microbes smell like Tijuana sewer water too like this stuff Microbe Life Hydroponics or liquid Kelp
 
I lived in Ensenada for 9 years, I will remember the smell of driving through TJ and the fish processing plants on the north side of Ensenada for the rest of my life
 
If you care to do any googling, TJR is small-time national news for pollution. Our beach has been closed for well over 900 days for high bacteria.
Growing in TJ River biochar. Aerated fecal matter for a foliar feeding. Household dust as a soil topper. And coco.
 
Rotten egg smell indicates hydrogen sulfide is forming, and that points to that very anaerobic conditions are present. Roots aren't getting enough oxygen. Aeration will solve that.
 
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