Root rot odor from Hempy drain water

Discussion in 'Pests and Plant Problems' started by OldSmokey, Apr 1, 2016.

  1. OldSmokey

    OldSmokey Registered Users

    Hi All,


    One of my Hempy buckets has a bit of root rot odor in the drain water, but he other two seem fine. At the moment, all the plants look pretty happy, 4 weeks into flower.


    This is the first time that I've had this happen in flower. In the past, when I've had it happen during veg, I was able to flush this odor away with a lot of Ph'd water and 35% H2O2 at 3cc/gal. This time it doesn't seem to be working very well.


    What would you guys recommend?


    Thanks,


    OS
     
  2. nippie

    nippie preachin' and pimpin'

    Plug whole if possible and let the h2o2 water sit in there for 15 minutes drain then flush it again.


    You prob need to use something to help roots, rock nutrient makes something but I can't think of the name right now.


    But I would hold h2o2 water in there then run at least 5 more gallons to flush any funk.


    Gimme a min and I'll tell you the rock product, but you would want to wait a day or two until h2o2 breaks dowb
     
  3. OldSmokey

    OldSmokey Registered Users

    This morning I dumped 2 gallons of ph'd and h202 water through the bucket as fast as I could dump it. Then I refilled with nutes. By the late afternoon feeding, the


    discharge water still smelled pretty good. Tomorrow morning I'll know better if it helped.


    I believe that I caused this mess a couple of weeks ago when I saw some roots sticking out of the drain fitting. I unscrewed the L fitting and removed the offending roots from


    the bucket with a small screwdriver. Of course I just had to poke it into the roots inside the bucket. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea.


    I guess I didn't see your post until this afternoon, Nippie. If today's effort doesn't work, I'll give your suggestion a try.


    Thanks much for your response.


    OS
     
  4. OldSmokey

    OldSmokey Registered Users

    This morning the discharge water smelled like roots, not hydrogen sulfide. Much better. I hope it lasts.
     
  5. Mrgreengenes

    Mrgreengenes Administrator

    Hey OS, sorry I did not respond to the post earlier. I remember when I had the same problem because I messed with the roots near the drain. I did the same thing and flushed the crap out of the plant with ph adjusted water and Hydrogen peroxide. It works. I flushed the plant twice and it took care of it.
     
  6. OldSmokey

    OldSmokey Registered Users

    This morning the stink had returned, so I gave Nippie's advice a go. Didn't quite manage to keep the bucket filled for 15 minutes; after about 10 my finger wasn't happy any more. Anyway, by the afternoon feeding the odor was back. So tomorrow, I'll have another try.


    The plants seem real happy in spite of whatever's going on with the roots.
     
  7. Sad Piggy_Banks

    Sad Piggy_Banks New Member

    I recently had an issue similar to this issue, which is what brought me to digging into a product Physan 20, someone here had a post on running it non-stop in a hydro system, and I know it works for everything else when used as directed, so I read their post. They stated that 1-ml of Physan to 10-gallons of water keeps the rot root, bio-film, etc.. away so 12-hours ago now I did it since I already have Physan on hand and I love the stuff for cleaning anyways. In the 12-hours I have had in in my hydro recirculating system, I have had bio-film being cleaned out of the entire system, my plants have suddenly pulled out of their slump from some algae/bio-film issue with the roots before it actually lead me to any root rot issues. I got that stink you are talking about which I know is the bio-film sickly sweet stinky yuk smell and I know what smells it leads to... so hopefully this information helps you as it helped me.
     
  8. OldSmokey

    OldSmokey Registered Users

    i've been dumping 2 gallons of ph'd and h202 water through the bucket every morning, followed by more nute water and it does seem to work for a little while. I suspect this will work, given enough time. The plant still looks just as good as the others do.


    Piggy-Banks... As much as I'd like to give the Physan 20 a try, I'm a bit afraid of it. Apparently I've become sensitized to quaternary ammonia at work and it messes with my lungs a lot. The thought of it on my plant, even if it's just the roots, gives me the willies. I do appreciate your advice though. And welcome!
     
  9. Sad Piggy_Banks

    Sad Piggy_Banks New Member

    I can understand ammonia messing with someone's lungs, haven't smelled the first smell of any kind by using Physan 20 myself even when working directly with the bottle, and I know the power of ammonia in cleaning so that is what I am looking for as a smell I guess. But it did get me to thinking of these aeration rings I saw in a High Times Magazine for sale in the back... meant for believe it or not soil grows... They make a ring out of 1/4-inch soaker hose, simple enough and then put it at the bottom of the pot fill with soil and then attach an air hose.. .it then aerates the soil as only two things lead to stink... One their is a lack of air in the soil because it is to dense and needs to be broken up by something like Perlite and the other is over watering which displaces all of the oxygen from the soil... In either case the basic rule is this when it comes to stinky verses non-stinky bacteria's... Good bacteria as in the kind which is helpful and good has no smell, and anything that smells foul, rotten, etc... well that is a bad bacteria growing and it is meant to keep you away as it will get you sick. Bad bacteria's need to live outside of an oxygen rich environment while healthy good bacteria need an oxygen rich environment to live and thrive; I thought that was pretty cool to learn.


    I actually learned the cause of my issues if this helps you at all... My plants are in hydro and when the pH got to 6.1 I would drop it back to 5.8 as it was my understanding 5.8 - 6.1 was hydro's sweet spot which I guess the plants want to get up to a pH of 6.5 in hydro because that stopped some issues. My plants got sick from a nutrient lockout because of that, which then led me to some smelly root rot issues, which I knew the smell was a sign of a bigger problem lingering... Then out of no where I got hit by algae and bio-film within 24-hrs from seeing it the first time to being a problem I needed to start fighting right now. Raising my pH, using Physan 20 has stopped the smell and killed off my problems, I do not know if this information will help you, but it solved my issue.
     

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