impossible problem

[WantDaChronic]

normally i would say to anyone presenting this issue that they musnt have looked hard enough for the bugs eating the plants as they must be there somewhere, but over the past week i have noticed my jack the ripper lemon pheno mother plant being eaten alive by something. i sprayed the room down heavily only a couple of months ago which nearly wiped out my mother plants because the bug killer was made too strong and i have searched each and every single leaf in the vege room looking for anything that looks like a bug. so far all i have found has been fungus gnats and since i have lived with them off and on for years and never seen anything like this it has me worried

 

i have taken photos of the damage, im sorry about their quality but i kept them their original size so you can still see whats going on. in the first picture just right of the middle is a shade leaf thats half eaten. one day it was fine, the next it looked like that. the second picture is a lower leaf that went yellow due to being rootbound. it was the very first leaf i discovered the problem on as it was pretty noticeable. the last picture is what i believe the damage starts off as. i made a red rectangle around a hole in a leaf, but i wouldnt have a clue if im right or not, only time will tell.

 

 

one possiblility is my cat, lord knows that fucking bastard cat loves pot more than i do. infact i even caught her in my cat proofed flowering room today. i have no clue how she managed to get in there, she didnt eat much, but she got 1/3 of a bucket of water thrown on her on her way out for her efforts next time she loses all her whiskers and body fur which i still doubt will deter her from going in there, but hopefully i havent smoked myself so retarded i can be constantly out smarted by theiving cat and will come up with a way to properly keep her out of the grow rooms but in all seriousness only the one plant in the vege room has this issue, its sister the mango pheno of jtr is my best looking mother and the cat has only been in that room once which was weeks ago before i put a wardrobe next to the door which stopped her from being able to sqeeze past. unfortunately i cant do the same for my flowering room, there just isnt enough room in the bedroom for another wardrobe in there

 

so excluding the mull thief cat and magical slugs that can turn invisible when they sense a human is appraoching, what could be eating my plants? im doubfounded by this issue and while i have heaps of jtr lemon cuttings vegging 1m away from the original mother which are all fine atm, i would still like to find out what could be causing this issue just incase it presents itself again in the future...

 

oh and its being grown in a 50/50 mix of perlite, hand watered pH adjusted water every 3 days and fed once a week at 5mL to 1.25L of water using dutchmaster gold vege nutes which are about a month old. they also get superthrive and a small amount of budlink which are about 4 months old, but as all my other larger plants are getting exactly the same feeding schedule as the jtr lemon and its still looking great apart from the damaged leaves, i dont think my nutes or water have anything to do with it

 

thanks for your help everyone, its highly appriciated

[bufo marinus]

Shoot the cat

[stinky]

by the look of it i would say there is a catapilla in your room sum where, if you carnt find it mabe the cat did

take plant out of room and give a gentel shake you might be lucky enough to shake him loose.thats if it is still there

just my 2 cents

[bufo marinus]

yes, I think it looks like a caterpillar too, but shoot the cat anyway

[freddie]

I'm with stinky on this. Caterpillars can be really hard to see. They tend to drop as soon as disturbed. Look around the base of the plant.

 

On the bright side, the more it eats the bigger it will get and the better the chance of finding it.

[mull]

Hey wdc, magic slugs..

 

never seen them indoors, but if looking for them outdoors they're always under the pots.

[Reverend]

Little green caterpillars are a bastard to find so you'll have to be a real and virtually go under every leaf.

[spaceleaf]

hey wdc ,ive found baby snails in my grow room before and those chew marks look exactly like a snail has snuck in somehow...spaceleaf...

[stinky]

a good surface spray around vents and doors once a week helps but it allso kills good bugs too, as i found out

(been catching ladybirds and putting them in my room as i read sumwhere they eat mites, but sadly i killed the lot) oops

[WantDaChronic]

i've looked at every single leaf in the garden and the only thing that resembled a clue was what im assuming was bug shit on top of one of the leaves. it was like someone cut up a grain of brain rice into a dozen bits or so which fell off when i touched the leaf so i didnt think much of it at the time.

 

there has been no evidence of snails or slugs as there isnt a slime trail anywhere in the room. because of that my guess would be a caterpillar as well, but i havent been able to see one at all

 

the only place i havent looked is under the pots. i'll go in the vege room after i finish my reply, shake the shit out of the plant to see if anything falls off and then i'll look under the pot....i'll reply soon if i find anything

 

thanks everyone