One challenge after another
The last two months have been a rough patch. After my last harvest, I was in the process of reamending my new bed. I unintentionally introduced aphids and whiteflies, likely from outdoors in preparation of my garden.
I was able to eliminate them with a rotation of Beauveria Bassiana, horticultural oil, and Castile soap. I scout daily and haven’t seen a trace of them in 4 weeks.
Fast forward to 2 weeks ago roughly, I see my plant leaves being chewed up!! It happened quick within a matter of a day or two. Came here, someone recommended BT for caterpillars. Took care of that problem quickly. Haven’t seen anymore damage.
Fast forward to yesterday!! Crazy distorted new growth (see pics). What is wild is the plants are still showing some nice growth. They’ve almost tripled in size over the last few weeks. Stems and leaves (minus distorted new growth) looking pretty good imo.
Everything I’m reading is pointing me to broad mites or physiological stress - maybe something with the roots?
Some other good info - I just gave a nice spray down on Sunday with sulfur and Castile soap. This makes me think maybe not broad mites, but I’ve never dealt with them before so I could be very wrong. I had to get a better microscope so I can inspect up to 60x. Planning to do some scouting tonight on the new growth to see if I can find any traces of mites.
Temp is steady around 73-74, humidity is stable between 65-68%. I water every 2-3 days. The water is RO, comes out at 7.0. I add mikrobs once a week to water, otherwise it’s just straight RO water unless I make a compost tea. Last compost tea was last Friday, had some bloom nutes mixed in as I was prepping to flip this week. Holding off on flip till I figure this out.
Let me know what you think. I’m open to feedback, criticism and everything. I’ve learned a lot the last two months so I welcome these rough patches. Last 3 pics are from 3-4 days ago.