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Today we decided to finally cover Nitrogen deficiency on Cannabis. I’ve been wanting to do this article for months now, but you know how it is.. procrastination ^^
Nitrogen Deficiency is pretty tricky, during the vegetative stage and most of the flowering stage it’s definitely not a good thing, but by the end of the flowering stage it’s actually something you want going on.
In this article we’re going to cover each case so don’t worry 😉
As the name indicates this deficiency is the plant showing that it doesn’t have enough Nitrogen to grow. How does she solve this situation? By sucking it out of the older sections of the plant (aka lower leaves). This is why you see the leaves change color and crisp up.
If you’re seeing this don’t worry, Nitrogen Deficiency is one of the most common deficiencies that indoor growers of all levels cross. The fix is generally pretty straight forward.
Nitrogen (N) is one of the 3 main vital elements to Marijuana (the 2 others being Potassium and Phosphorous).Its usage is mainly present during the Vegetation Stage since its the major component of Chlorophyll, the compound used by plant for photosynthesis. It’s also one of the main components of Amino Acids, the building blocks of Proteins, making Nitrogen necessary for a plant to grow.
Since usages are mainly focused to vegetative stage tasks, the plant will basically stop in-taking Nitrogen once flower production has started, so you don’t want to get into Nitrogen Deficiency too early in the Flowering stage.
Here’s a recap of the usages :
| STAGE OF LIFE | USAGE OF NITROGEN |
|---|---|
| Vegetation Stage |
|
| Flowering Stage |
|
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As most ways of spotting deficiencies with Weed the leaves of the plant is where you should be looking.
The most recognizable sign is the yellowing, crisping then falling of the leaves. We’ll cover this in 2 sections:
These are the main signs that your plant is suffering from Nitrogen deficiency. Now, I know it’s kind of hard to match words with symptoms so here’s the evolution of it in pictures 😉
As always, you can click on the images to get the full view.
As we started saying in the first section on this page your action won’t be the same whether your plant is in the vegetative or flowering stage.
In order to be able to bring the answer to each stage we will divide this section into 3 parts:
During the vegetative stage the Marijuana plant intakes the most Nitrogen as she can, using it to grow new sections of the plant. As the plant grows so does her need for it.
If she cannot extract enough from the medium the plant will start pulling out the Nitrogen from the lower sections, that generally receive less light, in order to reuse it in the growth of the higher sections.
So it’s definitely not cool to be having Nitrogen Issues but you can easily recover, all you need to do is increase the nutrients in your next mix and you should see the spreading of the symptoms gradually stop.
Note that, as with most deficiencies, the affected leaves will not recover.
Once the plant has finished its vegetative growth, sometime during the stretch, she will naturally reduce (in some cases even stop) absorbing Nitrogen from the medium.
This makes Nitrogen issues a little more serious since you can lose a large amount of leaf mass.
What you can do is spray your plant with a water/nitrogen mix about 15 minutes before lights out. Depending on where you’re at in the flowering stage, your plant might absorb the Nitrogen through her leaves.
Be aware though, if you do this make sure it isn’t a long release solution.
The plant on the image on the right here had started the Nitrogen deficiency after the stretch giving her a real hard time to produce energy from photo-synthesis and develop her buds.. They were sweat but one of the smallest yields ever…
If you get caught in Nitrogen deficiency early on, definitely act on it!
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During the last 2/3 weeks of the flowering stage, while you’re flushing your plants, you want there to be this deficiency going on.
If you don’t do this your buds won’t have a very great taste, might sparkle a little but will weigh much more. Quality wise you’re really loosing a lot.
There are two main causes of weed nitrogen deficiency in :
Checkout out all our articles on Cannabis Deficiencies
Further below we’ve grouped together all the questions we’ve seen often about Nitrogen Deficiency (ND).
If you don’t see what you’re looking for send us a email (contact in the top right) and we’ll get right back to you and add it to the site for others.
Here’s what we got so far:
That is a big negative! Cannabis only absorbs this Nutrient during the vegetative stage and up to the stretch.
After this point the nutrient that will be brought up will be very low in Nitrogen. Spraying the plant with an enriched solution can help solve the issue, but it may be too late if you’re ways into the flowering stage.
Alright folks that’s it for this one! Hope you found everything you need, don’t hesitate to contact us if that’s not the case
Until next time,
Be safe and grow easy
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