Please help with Canna Coco

[anynameisok]

What type of medium; soil or hydro? HYDRO

What brand and type of soil? CANNA COCO IN POTS

Indoors or outdoors? INDOORS

What strain? ED ROSENTHAL SUPERBUD, PINEAPPLE PUNCH, PSYCHEDELIA DELICIOSA

How old are the plants? ALMOST 1 MONTH

What type of lights and how many watts? 1 HPS 400W AND 1 MH 400W

How far from the lights? ABOUT 2 FEET

What, how much and when was it fed? NPK? CANNA COCO A+B, VARYING CONCENTRATION FROM 0.4 TO 1.0 EC. RECENTLY ADDED RHIZOTONIC AND CANNAZYM, WHICH DO NOT AFFECT THE EC (or, apparently, the plants).

What is the medium/runoff pH? MEDIUM INSTRUCTIONS SAY RUNOFF INACCURATE

What are the temps and humidity in the room? AROUND 70F AND 55-60%

What size pots? 1 TO 3 GALLON

Any bugs? Look real close. NO. NOT THAT I CAN SEE.

Any other pertinent info? I LOVE BOOBIES.

 

 

These plants were started in peat moss jiffy pods and transplanted to potted coco with 5% nutes in the 6.5 pH range. They grew slow and had floppy leaves, which I attributed to overwatering. I have since then tried everything from 50% to 100% of the Canna-recommended 1.0 EC, but the are looking pretty rough. The leaves are still floppy. Some curl under at the end. Others curl over at the edges of the leaves. Most of the lower leaves show yellowing.

 

Some sources say that coco is impossible to overwater with. Other people say to water once or twice a week. Others say everything in between. pH levels are the same story. Source A says 6 to 7, source B says 5 to 6. Canna says 5.2 to 5.8, so I've been sticking with that for the past couple of weeks, against the advise of standard NPK charts.

 

So what is it? Are these plant being overwatered or over-nuted? They have so many signs of different deficiencies and toxicities that I'm starting to run out of idead. Any help would be greatly appreciated! I have used aeroponics before, in which you can dump and change the nutrient instantly. With coco, though, it's soaked up in the medium and hard to figure out what's going on.

 

Do these plants need more water or less water? More nute or less nute? Why are the edges curled? Is that a nute thing or a humidity thing? Are the leaves droopy because of too much water or too little nute? Are you supposed to flood coco every time you water? whew, light one up!

 

Help!

[Naycha]

I think your problem is the pH. Here is a pic of my plants looking very similar to yours, the problem was corrected after fiddling with the pH.

 

Someone with coco experience should be able to set you straight, but I think the pH should be higher.

 

As far as watering goes, I would let the medium dry out as much as possible in between waterings.

 

Good luck

[greenreaper]

Mate to me they dont look like they have a ph problem,unless the plants have dead spots on the leaves which i cant see in the photos that would indicate the ph to be too acidic,they would also wilt like in the photos thou your better off checking the ph after 4 to 5 hours, when the lights have been turned on.the coco nutrient should be given to them every day at the recommended dilution rate per 1 litre,use a ph stabilizer in your nutrient that will help maintain a safe ph level.as for the curling of the leaves if they curl downwards that is normal if the edges curl they have either too much nutrient or not enough go easy on the nutrient concentration give alittle less and as for the lights they seem too far away put them 40 to 50 cm away the closer the better,thou then you will have heating problems just use a fan to keep the foliage cool.

[thedarkestone]

I have a few coco grows under my belt and have found that less is more a lot of the time. Several things I have found with coco:

• Don't treat coco as if it is soil - it's an organic hydro medium.
  
• Keep the pH around 5.5 - seems to work really well.
  
• When watering, aways have 10% - 15% run-off (stops salts building up).
  
• Less is more - start with less nurients and work your way up as the plants need it.
  

Ok then, looking at your pics the coco looks dry. If the pots are super light then the medium is too dry. Keep the coco moist at all times but not saturated.

Chlorine can be a problem in coco as it can kill off good bacteria. Letting the water sit in a bucket for 24 hours will take care of the chlorine. I find that using an air pump and bubbling the nutrient solution is very beneficial.

Cannazyme doesn't really need to be used until the plants are older and their roots have spread throughout the medium. Introduce this slowly at a weaker strength initially and work up to full strength.

Watch your plants and learn to give them what they need. Ask lots of questions from growers with experience. It might take a little while but you should get the hang of it.

I hope this helps.

[anynameisok]

Thanks for the responses. I've posted this all over the place and nobody else is saying anything. Maybe I need to find a UK site.

 

Now I'm giving the plants weak nutes at 5.0 to 5.5. I have this urge to give them more nutes because of the yellow leaves and the slow growth, but the leaf tips make me think that they're already overdosed on nutes.

 

Maybe the whole problem is pH, but I don't know how to measure the pH of the coco in the pots without either squeezing out water or taking large samples to steep in distilled water... Which would not be possible with little pots and little plants. The coco is supposed to be self-buffering. I tested this by stirring a clump of coco in a stained sample of neutral water. The water stayed neutral. Then I added some coco that I had just watered with 5.5 water, and the stain stayed neutral. At about 7. I will try this again with a digital meter.

 

Keeping the coco moist is a problem. If I water is more than a every other day, or less, the plants get overwatered and look like little willow trees. If I were to water until 15% drainage, I would have to water even less to keep from drowning the plants. On the other hand, the gap between waterings makes the top inch of the coco dry out. I don't have an automated watering system, and I didn't plan to invest the time or money to set one up.

 

Maybe the pots are too big for plants to be watered efficiently. Sparse rooting makes the coco at the bottom of the pot take too long to get dried out. Maybe the problem will resolve itself as the plants grow?

 

And maybe I should cover the top of the coco with a layer of perlite to keep the light from cooking it dry so fast.

 

Questions:

Do the plants look over or under-nuted?

How do you measure the pH of coco?

Is there any difference between Canna Flush and all the other hydro flushes?

 

Any advice or input from growers who use(d) coco is greatly appreciated!

[humphrey b flaubert]

What's the ventilation like?

[anynameisok]

Celing fan, 2 humidifiers that blow indirectly at the plants. The temp stays 65-80F and the humidity is usually 50-60%.

 

I watered 2 of the plants yesterday until they drained out the bottom with 0.8 EC/5.5pH nutes. One looks better today, the other looks over watered.

 

I watered 2 more today, but poured all the water on one side of the pot to hopefully minimize the over watering effect. One of the bigger plants is showing burn spots in the middle of the fan leaves, which are also yellow and curling. To the best of my knowledge, the burn spots are from nute burn. How can it have nute burn and N deficiency at the same time? I'm missing something here, which I suspect to be either the pH of the coco is wildly different than that of the nutes I pour into it, or there is salt buildup. Thoughts/suggestions appreciated.

 

Where is a good photo reference for problem plants?

[Hector]

Wow mate, your in more strife than Flash Gordon, but nothing that can't be tuned up.

This is what I can think of.

Couple of things, firstly, you've tried nutes at many different pH ranges and strengths.

Stick to pH 5.8 EC 1.0

The reason I say 5.8 is this value is where I have seen the pH settle at with coco. The EC of 1.0 is about 3/4 strength and is a good point to start at. You can experiment going higher once you have the hang of things.

Secondly, your experiencing first hand just how damn tricky the coco is to water by itself, it's a pain in the arse, especially when it gets that hard crust on top. This is the reason you see people putting Hydroton(clay rocks) on top of the coco, to make it easier to water as it breaks the surface tension and allows the water to soak in evenly. Another trick is to mix at least 20% perlite through the coco to stop it compacting and making it even harder to water as the grow progresses.

It is important to soak it thoroughly, this will stop 'hot spots' in the coco where the EC is way higher than in other parts of the same pot.

Then, leave them sit for 2 days. Water thoroughly again, let sit for 2 days. Once a day when they get bigger.

Can coco be over watered? Yes but it will take a continuous drip or the pots sitting in water to do this.

If the pots are well draining and the medium is getting totally saturated each water and drying evenly this is what it likes. Hydroton in the bottom of the pot is an excellent way to ensure drainage.

Don't listen to anyone telling you you can't read the EC of the run-off straight out of the pot, it is NOT like taking a soil EC reading, and is as easy as putting a container under the pot when you water and testing what runs out.

You will be surprised at how the EC climbs steadily in the coco. Correct this by lowering the nutrient strength and pour the lower strength solution through till the run-off reads around 1.2

Checking the run-off and half flushing is the best trick I have found when it comes to keeping things healthy, it evens out the pH and EC swings which in turn will keep the root zone healthy which I think is why you are seeing so many different problems in the one grow.

Good luck and don't get discouraged just yet, once they get going you will be happy enough.

PS, I like boobies too.

[mrsmokey1]

hector does a 70 perlite/30 coco mix normal nutes hand water sound decent??

[blacksunempire]

just a quick question... what sort of coco did you use? if it was the bricks did you flush them out completely when you expanded them, becausr the bricks have a high content of salt in htem, coming from srilanka and they need to be thoroughly flushed before you plant into them. With the canna-coco you can buy already expanded this is not a problem.

 

Usually after 1 month people start having problems. If you used the bricks and didnt flush completely, I would pour a few litres of PH adjusted water through them and test the start of the runoff with an EC PPM meter to see what it reads, this will give you a good indication of that the pots are holding.

 

with your ph its best from 5.7 - 6.3 IMO and I like to float my ph through this range to allow the plant availability to different nurients throughout its grow period. a gentle increase and decrease is needed.

 

hope this helps.