Is this what over-fertilizing looks like?
Posted: Tue Mar 30, 2021 2:33 pm
Hello,
My wife and I are growing seedling starts indoors this year, under grow lights. Most of the starters are doing well, but we're having problems with two varieties of Kale. Some of the kale is growing well and then about 2 weeks in some of the leaves are drying up on the tips, and slowly drying towards the stem of the start. At first, we thought maybe it was from overwatering or being too close to the lights. We don't have our starts very close to our lights, probably 5-6 inches away from the lights, so I don't think that's it. The average temp in the house is 65 degrees, so I figure it's not getting too hot for them. We do water from the top using a mister as well as bottom water somewhat frequently. We think we're watering too often, and it seems like based on other posts on this forum that it's a bad idea to top water once your starts begin to develop roots, due to the risk of damping off. We also use a PH down to drop our tap water from a neutral ph to a 6.0 or so, but I figured that this wouldn't be a problem because most plants we're growing prefer a lower ph. We're using OceanSolution 2-0-3 mixed at the proper ratio, but we use it every time we bottom water, which is as often as once a day. Is this too often to be fertilizing? I've included some photos of the Kale, hopefully they are good enough to see the dried out leaves.
Thanks!
My wife and I are growing seedling starts indoors this year, under grow lights. Most of the starters are doing well, but we're having problems with two varieties of Kale. Some of the kale is growing well and then about 2 weeks in some of the leaves are drying up on the tips, and slowly drying towards the stem of the start. At first, we thought maybe it was from overwatering or being too close to the lights. We don't have our starts very close to our lights, probably 5-6 inches away from the lights, so I don't think that's it. The average temp in the house is 65 degrees, so I figure it's not getting too hot for them. We do water from the top using a mister as well as bottom water somewhat frequently. We think we're watering too often, and it seems like based on other posts on this forum that it's a bad idea to top water once your starts begin to develop roots, due to the risk of damping off. We also use a PH down to drop our tap water from a neutral ph to a 6.0 or so, but I figured that this wouldn't be a problem because most plants we're growing prefer a lower ph. We're using OceanSolution 2-0-3 mixed at the proper ratio, but we use it every time we bottom water, which is as often as once a day. Is this too often to be fertilizing? I've included some photos of the Kale, hopefully they are good enough to see the dried out leaves.
Thanks!