Hydro Tomato - Leaf Curl, Roll, Drooping

15 years ago

Hi,

This forum seemed more appropriate for my post since I believe the source of my problem stems from my hydroponics setup, however, all opinions are greatly appreciated. Also, I am a rookie grower (lettuce, tomatoes, and hydroponics).

Here is some info regarding my setup:

Light Source: HPS 1000w (started on 18/6, now on 12/12 for flowering purposes - query: is that necessary since they flowered during 18/6, but some poster said they won't set fruit without a 12/12 cycle).

Room Temp: Day: 70F Night: 60F

Room RH: 50-60%

Water Temp: Approx 65F

Water pH: between 6-6.5, note early on I think it was closer to 7 often.

Exhaust and Fan: Box fan blows softly on plants for stem strength and to pollinate (necessary?). Standard bathroom exhaust vent fan that shares the dryer exhaust.

Medium: Ughhhh, I want to do all organic vegetables and did not want to pay for coconut coir, so I went perlite and vermiculite with cocotex planters. I used, as recommended by the guy at the store, a 50/50 mix. I think this was a mistake, the vermiculite holds water forever and clogs everything. The perlite also likes to break down and develop properties similar to the vermiculite.

Setup:

Containers: This is where I really should have do some more due diligence. B/c I had seen hydroton used, I thought everything drained that way (moron). So, I have 3" pvc tubes with holes drilled out to hold the planters (my planters are either 1.5" or 3" diameter). I also filled the entire tube with the medium (mistake, right?, I could have just allowed the roots to grow out of the planters into the pvc? now I have major drainage issues which require semi-manual feeding to prevent overflow. I also have two K style pvc gutters full of the medium with younger plants in them (exposed surface like a flood table, work great, but soil stays wet, see below). I also have one pvc tube with only perlite in it (still has overflow probs).

Feeding System: 18 gl reservoir using a 1/6 hp sump pump connected to 3/4" pvc irrigation pipe that runs to 6 couplers where it meets 1/2 o.d. vinyl which connects to Rain Bird Mushroom Bubblers.

Water Source: tap, often feed right away, not anymore, now wait until water heats up b/c I use cold.

Feeding Schedule: Once per day in the morning heavily. Should it be two days or more?

nutrients: organic grow and bloom, hydrozyme, and calplex.

airstone: yes

Plants: Tomatoes: brandywine: grow well, but sick now, cherry: never grown well, beefsteak: grows well, now very sick and confused. Lettuce: all types I have tried grow great. Baby Tomatoes are all healthy: roma, brandywine, super sweet 100, fourth of july, organic sweety and brandywine.

Problems:

Leaf Curl/Yellow/Purple lower: Slight upward cupping existed always in the lower mature leaves and they turned yellow on top and purple on the bottom but not on the veins. I have seen many pics of sick tomato leaves, I think it was magnesium or iron for the yellowing, purple - phos?, leaf curl: I don't know what caused it. Also the cherry was generally yellow throughout, and the beefsteak grew like crazy (determinate), but was purple and dark green all over, stems had a purple hew and leaves are dark green top/purple underneath.

Leaf/Stem Roll: I upped the nutrients without much forethought or ruling out of potential problems (Like I said, pH was prob 7). So I jacked the nutrients (aggressive fruiting with the bloom fert) and pretended their was an extra gl of water b/c I wanted to catch up (I had under feed them at least once and had messed with their feeding cycle often b/c of h2o dist. issues, now solved). And everything was great, yellow going away, plants growing like mad, everything going green, even the cherry's were coming back, and then the leaves, all of them began to roll, downward into tube shapes, then the stems began to roll into spiral shapes, then the stems began to droop down, and everything is now drooped down. The edges and tips of the leaves are dead. Some branches have now died.

Ram's Horn/Downward Cup: The leaf sides cup downward along the center of the leaves, both looking droopy and forcefully cupping down The leaf also bend under and backward, like a ram's horn as some poster's call it.

Color: All leaves became dark, dark green (too much nitrogen?).

So, I read up and thought I had nutrient burn. I flushed for five days, in that time the upward cup began to get much worse while the leaf/stem roll and ram's horn improved on new growth and stabilized or worsened or old growth. I waited until the leaves began to turn yellow, then started them with a weak nute mixture (six days).

They don't seem to be coming back. The perlite tomatoes are in the worst shape. The 50/50 pvc is in better, but still bad. All the above are 6 weeks old and 2-3 ft tall or less if sick. The young ones, two weeks are in the gutters and all healthy, with some slight down leaf cup/ram's horn.

Soil Drainage Issue/Question: Is this the source of my prob, the bottom half of the medium stays wet in the tube forever, but the top half dries every 24hr period. It's always seemingly wet though. Looked at some roots yesterday, they looked pretty white, not brilliant white, but maybe a little brownish. There is some algae growing. Nutrient solution likes to drain out at closer to 7pH.

One last thing, the flowers and tomatoes seem to be pollinating and growing fine on the mature beefsteak and brandywine.

Sorry for the novel, I would love to hear your thoughts and really appreciate it. Thanks. I have lots of pic's but don't know how to post them here.

Featured Answer

biochemical

9 years ago

last modified: 9 years ago

Old topic but wanted to share my input.

I'm growing hydroponic tomatoes (various strains) at university in a lab setting (indoors under HID lights) and outdoors in a greenhouse.

In one of my greenhouse NFT systems, i recently had a similar problem on 1 tomato plant (total 9 plants that share the same res and tubes). But im gonna try to diagnose your issue by mentioning what others missed out on.

1 major cause of leaf curl is compaction of root system (i.e. roots are compressed or dont have enough space to expand). This risk is exacerbated in hydroponic systems that use tubes. This was the problem i had and had to replace tubes with square tubings that have a liftable top. Once you have access to roots, you must seperate them strand by strand (i.e. so they arent sticking together). In your setup, this risk will further be exacerbated because you filled the entire pvc tube with hydroton (right?). Remove hydroton from tube and place the plant in a net cup with hydroton.

Nitrogen burns usually cause browning/yellowing of leaves (similar to sun/heat burn) and not purpling. Test your solution for each chemical if possible, or use a commonly employed aggregated measuring device that shows total concentration in ppm (dont let it exceed 2500).

In my system, only one plant was affected. Coincidentally, it was the largest of all plants with the most root mass. I let another normal one grow to its size to see whether it would undergo the same problem, and it did.

Viral and bacterial infections that cause leaf roll usually cause it to roll up. Same with the physiological roll. If your leafs roll down AND if your stems bend, this is caused by a diminishing turgor pressure (read: not enough water reaching afflicted area). Mist several times when lights are off (no photosysnthesis) and observe increasing turgor pressure (unbending). Or, untangle roots and remove hydroton from from pipes.

I tested various growing methods including fully and partially submerged roots. They all work but a submerged root cannot intake oxygen; it has to borrow oxygen from another part of the plant (i.e. a root part that isnt submerged or above ground stem). This requires energy for transportion and isnt the most efficient (optimal) way for growth and cellular processes.

Lastly, an airstone in the reservoir is useless unless the reservoir is completely airtight all the way up to the plant holes. Better to keep small airstones in the pipes right under the plant roots. Those that say aerating the res prevents bacterial development.. is false. If you dont have air in res, you will get anaerobic bacteria (they grow/accumulate slowly but acidify the solution); if you have air in res, you get aerobic bacteria (not acidifying but grow extremely fast). Most bacteria prefer aerobic environments for optimum growth.

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Comments (12)

danielfp
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Well, your story was very good and it gave me enough information to diagnose your problem. According to everything you tell me I believe your tomatoes are not being affected by a nutritional deficiency, I think they are infected with tomato leaf curl virus, which can cause all the symptoms you describe (obviously the downward leaf curl was an important point!). This is not curable so you may need to sterilize everything and start again with resistant varieties. Hope this helped !

Here is a link that might be useful: Everything Hydroponics
garysgarden
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Tomatoes are susceptible to a wide range of diseases, which is a big part of the reason that humans have cultivated so many different hybrid varieties (to create strains resistant to one or more diseases).

Like danielfp says, the best course of action is to change to a resistant variety or to wipe out the disease and start over.

To erradicate something like that you have to take some pretty drastic actions. First, get rid of all the plants you have in the grow room, even if they're not victims of the disease they can carry it.

Get rid of any dirt you have, if you use hydroton or a similar sterile growing media disinfect it with bleach, and use bleach or a similar very strong anti-bacterial/fungicide on everything in the room, including the room itself. I mean EVERYTHING. Pots, tanks, walls, floors, everything.

Start over using only new or freshly disinfected materials and you should hopefully see the end of that problem. Oh, and don't forget to rinse off the bleach from the growing media. Roots don't like bleach.
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Calcium deficiency can be provoked by Magnesium excess, even when there is plenty of Ca around, you need to check out this possibility. You are using the percents on the label which makes perfect sense to a logical person, but industry enjoys exaggerating and confusing, or something like that. The N-P-K numbers are only for elements in the first case of N. P is "expressed as P2O5" and K as "K20" which inflates the phosphorus and potassium by adding some hypothetical oxygen that actually isn't in your hydroponic fertilizer. Don't ask why. No sense on reinventing the wheel, here's what Wikipedia has to say about this: The factors for converting from P2O5 and K2O values to their respective P and K elemental values are as follows: P2O5 consists of 56.4% oxygen and 43.6% elemental phosphorus. The percentage (mass fraction) of elemental phosphorus is 43.6% so elemental P = 0.436 x P2O5 K2O consists of 17% oxygen and 83% elemental potassium. The percentage (mass fraction) of elemental potassium is 83% so elemental K = 0.83 x K2O Nitrogen values represent actual nitrogen content so these numbers do not need to be converted. To convert 2.73% nitrogen to express as ppm when dissolved in water, just specify how much 2.73% fertilizer is in how much water. For 300 *grams* in 17 gallons, the ppms are estimated for the working solution by the weight of nitrogen/ weight of water. A gallon is 3785 grams. In this case 8.19g/64,345g = 0.0001273 To convert fractional part to parts per milliom (ppm) instead of percent, multiply by 1,000,000 instead of 100. That comes out to 127 ppm for N. P and K need to be adjusted by the factors mentioned to get the pure element and then calculated the same way. That's all I did. The absolute percentages in the fertilizer as you have them are not as relevant as their ratio to each other since a more concentrated fertilizer uses less weight of fertilizer to get to the same point. I do suspect that you have a nutrient problem though and my thinking base on the limited info is that there may be too much magnesium in there locking out potassium. That I got from the generalitities you've mentioned. However the symptoms as discussed sound more like nitrogen deficiency and there are no more limbs to go out on without real quantitative info and this will all make sense as you get into it more. For example, if the plants with more light are growing faster, they may have a greater nutrient demand and the plant may do what yours are doing by sapping nutrients from old growth to support and favor younger growth and reproductive tissue (tomatoes!). The last picture seems to be far more pronounced and not limited to the older growth though, not sure, the tones seem to be saturated in yellow (maybe on another monitor is shows up better but I have a cheapo monitor that freaks washing out with saturating colors) making it harder...
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The crucial point in your other post was that this plant was supposedly "several months old" (so it is really approx. 1 1/2 to 2 months old, correct?) and only "18 inches tall". That is the real problem I fear. A Celebrity, even tho it is a semi-determinate variety, that is even 2 months old should be much bigger plant - at least 3 feet tall. This is especially true with all the feeding you have given it. Now I see the problem. (1) Compacted soil - it sounds like you didn't use a soil-less potting mix but maybe used Miracle Grow Garden Soil for Vegetables. Correct? It is not intended for use in containers. And (2) no holes for drainage in the container so the water "collects in the bottom", correct? Size of the container - if it is a 5-7 gallon should be fairly ok but the combination of poorly draining soil and water collecting in the bottom of the pot which causes root rot may explain the small size. And the very stressed plant with the high temps explains the blossom drop. My suggestion would be to find a bigger container that has room for you to add some good quality soil-less mix to and still have room for this plant and then transplant this plant into it. Make sure it has drain holes in it. I'd pinch off all or most of the current blooms - they aren't going to amount to anything anyway so no loss - and keep it in the shade for 3-4 days. I think you should see a marked improvement in the plant within that time. Keep the plant alive and healthy until the air temps cool and you'll get some fruit set. I hope this helps get you some tomatoes. Dave
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freemangreens
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Just a quick intervention: Before you trash your entire growing effort, you might want to try merely aerating your nutrient solution and also the places where the roots are submerged in water using a standard fish tank air pump and an air stone.

I've successfully grown several cultivars of tomato using the "RAMP" technique, which is completely submerged roots 24/7 -- but each container had its own air stone bubbling away 24/7.

Free oxygen in the nutrient is its own magic!

Hope my suggestion is not too late!
disinmtl
Original Author
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Hey Thanks for the replies, I really appreciate it. Okay, so I am on vaca and only just checked the postings (so the plants are still alive).

My thoughts and updates:

I obviously don't want to have a virus, so I am going to be a little stubborn going down that road. Did I mention I am completely indoor - can I still get the virus?

I did notice that some kind of grass will sua sponte (i.e., on its own) grow out of the medium (perlite/vermiculite). Does this mean its not sterile or my basement is not?

Additionally, I did some more research on account of the drooping stems. I found a scientist who said this:

-not enough o2 in the soil causes anaerobic conditions, which causes the plants to increase ethylene production, which causes epinasty. Epinastic symptoms manifest themselves as drooping stems and leaves - he did not mention curl, but others have.

Also, I noticed some of my baby tom's have the beginning of blossom end rot (which is symptomatic of over-watering, right?).

Freemangreens - I have an airstone in my res, but not in my pvc pipes, is their a way to aerate inside the medium - perlite/vermiculite?

And I feel like a moron asking, but point out how to post photo's and I'll get 'em up.

As always, any insight is appreciated, what fun this is, oh, but like everything, it's an all I can eat buffet for my head.
grizzman
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
disinmtl Blossom bottom rot is caused, primarily, by a lack of calcium getting to the fruit. this can be caused by over watering, under watering, and/or a general lack of calcium available.
for directions on how to post images please view the last few posts of theHydroponic Strawberries thread.
freemangreens
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
"Freemangreens - I have an airstone in my res, but not in my pvc pipes, is their a way to aerate inside the medium - perlite/vermiculite?"

You don't have to aerate using perlite; it's 50% open to the air already. Just keep it moist. I use a moisture meter, but if all else fails, just stick your finger into the perlite and shove it down around the roots. If it feels damp, that's enough.

Perlite lets the roots breathe while allowing them to stay moist, grow and transfer nutrient to the rest of the plant. There is no need to aerate the growing medium unless it is 100% liquid. The fact that you have an air stone in your holding tank is sufficient.

I'm trying a brand new strawberry growing concept this weekend. I'll post the results here and on my Web page this weekend or next week. Stay tuned.
garysgarden
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Well there's two reasons to aerate the solution. One is for the plants, and the other is for the health of the solution itself. Aerating the nutrient solution helps prevent the growth of harmful microbes and it should be aerated if for no other reason.

So yes, aerate the reservoir to keep the potential for bad things growing to a minimum. But don't worry about how well it is aerated in the medium. For one thing it takes hours to fully de-gas water, depending on volume.

Regarding the virus question, you can transmit them yourself. Plant viruses can't harm us, but we can carry them on our skin. That's one of the reasons it's important to wash your hands before handling your indoor plants.

A major disease vector for indoor gardens is actually smoking. Smoking can transmit viruses from the tobacco to the skin of the smoker (or directly to the plant if the smoke reaches it). Modern tobacco strains are remarkably hardy and can grow despite many viral infections that would cripple other crops. And since they're not harmful to people, there's no need for the tobacco companies to worry about those viruses entering their product.
disinmtl
Original Author
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Here are my pics, posted on goonies thread, Leaf Curl Pic, since we have the same prob to compare, they like identical. Still my prob continues.

any advice is appreciated.
borndiva2006_yahoo_com
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
This is my 2nd attempt to grow 1 cherry plant in my aerogarden 3. The first on was pathetically short at 5 weeks old it looked like it was 2 weeks old.

Aerogrow was kind enough to send me a new seed pod & so far this plant is having trouble too.

This plant was planted January 15, 2009 (which I believe is 7 weeks ago)

Your pics of 7 weeks look alot different than mine as you can see from the pictures. And there is a problem with the leaves! They keep turning brown & drying up.

As you can see, the plant isnt too close to the grow light. Also I am just using the nutrient tabs that AG sent me.

Today I changed the water and found what looks like green algae & mold in the bowl. I cleaned & sanitized it with bleach & used distilled water & a fresh nutrient. I also cut the brown leaves off.

Do u think my problem will be solved? Will this baby recover & finally grow?

Pic 1 http://www.jessijordan.com/aerogarden/img/Img_0691.jpg

Pic 2 http://www.jessijordan.com/aerogarden/img/Img_0692.jpg

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:999250}}
garysgarden
15 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
I've had the same problem with tomatoes before - not in an aerogarden. I'm not quite sure what causes it.

The algae is a bad sign though, that's a likely cause. As a side note when you want to prune I recommend breaking the leaves off at the stem. Tomatoes have what's called a compound leaf, each of the flat "leaves" on a common stem are actually just part of one leaf.

Look for a leaf that comes straight off the end of a stem. Follow that stem back until it meets another stem. Everything along that is one "leaf". Break the stem off sideways at the stalk it comes out of. This lessens water loss and stress to the plant.
paddyboom
9 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
as you can see, im having a problem..my ph is usally 6-7,my ppm is 1300..60gal tank,bucket system this garden is 4 weeks old.i have rinsed and refilled ..i use chemgro 4-18-38 please help,my plants have lots of blooms,and tom. some are 6ft. tall 3-4 in. a day...

Hydro Tomato - Leaf Curl, Roll, Drooping

biochemical

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