Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

After 3 weeks of strong growth my cucumbers leaves are starting dry out. Any suggestions on what is happening? I think my pH may be high for cucumbers.

Ammonia: 2.0
NO3: 20
NO2: 10
Hardness: 300
Chlorine : 0
Alkaline: 40
pH: 7.0

Any pics?

Have you added any salt to your system?

Your pH is fine for Cucumbers.

Firstly, Have you got any fish in the system yet?

Secondly, are you are dosing the system with Seasol, Maxicrop or similar?... or an Ammonia source?

Thrirdly, like Arbe said, have you added any salt?... and if so, how much to how many litres?

No, I did not add any salt to the system. Also, I don't have any fish currently I was wanting to wait until the Ammonia to get a little lower. After I found the leaves drying out I did add a bit more BioWeed. Unfortunately I can't find Seasol. I can however find Maxicrop.

I was going to wait to see if the BioWeed would help, but I thought I would query you all at the same time.

The cucumber is not quite in focus but here is what one looks like.

Are you using flood and drain or continuous flood?

It's hard to give a definitive answer from the info and photo's.

I notice in the photo's that it's been raining... is it only the lower leaves that are in contact with the expanded clay?... and has it only occurred since you've received some rain?

It is a flood and drain system.

Also, it is not rain I have my system in the basement. I'm new to this and this is my first test system with only a 35 gallon tank and a small grow bed and I was concerned that maybe it needed more moister on top. So I watered it on top using water from the fish tank. The drying has occurred since I stopped watering on top of my system. The only reason I started watering the top of my system is because my water only comes up to an inch below the expanded clay, and when the plants were just seeds I was concerned that I did not put the seeds low enough to allow them to start growing.

Another thing, my basement has had a bit of flooding, and in the room with the system I have a dehumidifier running in the room. Could that be a little counter productive? I think I will move it to the other room.

Reading this 76 page document on cucumbers (http://www.haifa-group.com/files/Guides/Cucumber.pdf) I am beginning to wonder if I have a calcium or magnesium.

It looks like my choice in Bio-Weed was not a good choice for starting. It does not look like it has these elements in it. Unless someone strongly recommend that I shouldn't I think for the next couple of weeks I might switch to MaxiCrop with iron. The leaves on the carrots are starting to yellow.

I can't see pic, so ignore if this is not the case....

Given the system is in ur basement. Could you be burning/baking the leaves with ur grow lights?

Maxicrop switch is probably a good idea. Why was ur ammonia high in the first place? I guess u dosed with he bioweed and it contains ammonia?

I just finished my cycle this week. During the cycle where I had 5+ nitrite, I lost 30% of my plants. The rest took a beating. Cycle done and no more nitrite, everything is making a major comeback

DLuke, Currently I am only using a pair of T5 cool white fluorescent lights. I don't feel any heat on the medium so I was not thinking that it was the grow lights. I adules the ammonia was from the BioWeed.

toefo, Thank you for the words of encouragement. I've been wondering if I had an aptitude for this or not.

Either I was too late with the MaxiCrop, or it is not what I need. The cucumbers did not bounce back. I decided to pull the plants and start over.