Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi, I have been dealing with an issue for about a month now and have tried everything I could think of. At first I thought it might be aphids or spider mites killing the plants but after buying some azamax and using it on all the plants it helped only a select few. The tomato and pepper plants are doing great with near zero aphids or spider mites, but the plants listed in the title have never changed so I'm thinking it may be something else. So here are a few pictures of each of the plants.

You will undoubtedly recieve several requests for more information before anyone attempts to diagnose the issue. I.e. What are your water parameters? Do you add micro nutrients? How long since you treated for pests? Have you noticed new damage since treating for pests? Have you actually seen any pests?

Water levels are at
PH : 8.1
NH : 0
Nitrite : 0
Nitrate : 10-20 ppm

I apply maxicrop liquid seaweed plus iron every once in awhile when it looks like they may need it.

It has been 5 days since applying azamax. I have applied it once a week as instructed on bottle because I have continued to have this problem for over a month.

I have seen no aphids since applying to my tomatoes which were infested with them. So I'm assuming it worked. I see no aphids on squash/cucumber/zucchini plants and I cant see spider mites due to them being small.

I think it's a nutrient/s deficiency, perhaps potassium or nitrogen but it looks like a non-mobile nutrient since it's in the older growth worse than the new growth. Maxicrop plus iron has some potassium so you could apply this in a spray more often and see if it helps. You could also try spray applying potassium bicarbonate for this. Tomatoes are pretty bad nutrient hogs and might be sucking up a lot of the nutrients these plants need. Sprinkling blood and bone meal at the base of the plants might help provide some of the missing nutrients in more of a shotgun approach that gets them going.

I will go with Scotty on Potassium,just looking through the pics it looks tell tale signs for this,if possible check root growth,in potassium deficient plants root formation is hindered as well. Your PH is on the high side for good uptake of K so as posted Foliar is the way to go,Potassium Chloride would be my first choice for this.

Without seeing the other leaves, or the whole plant, its hard to suggest anything.

But what I see so far is that they are old leaves, since most of the pics are close to the bottom of the plants. Or if all the leaves on the plants are the same then there is a nutrient deficiency, If the leaves of the canopy are affected then most likely its Sun-Scaled.

Just may be a case of older leaves drying up and falling off.

As for aphids if you have them check the surroundings for ants, especially at night.

As for spider mites, if you see a fine mess of webs at the base of the plants or under the canopy, then you have them.
Their webbing is similar to a Black Widow spider, the web doesn't have a symmetrical appearance to it.

By the way, treating for a nutrient decifiency after the damage is done, won't correct the affected leaves.

Depends on what type of deficiency and how long the problem has gone on. Certainly when the tissue is dead like the margins of some of these leaves, they won't recover but the problem won't progress and some of the leaves that have just yellowed can come back (they don't always though).

Yep,signs of chlorosis/yellowing disappearing from the leaves is a great sign your approach to the deficiency is correct.