true leaves shriveling and falling

[svalli]

What could be the problems with my tomato plants? The true leaves are shriveling and falling off starting from the bottom leaves. Some plants have lost their cotyledons too, but many have them still on. Potato leaved plants seem to be affected worst, their leaves started to fall first. Plants have been transplanted with their jiffy pellets to 1 cup sized plastic cups, which have holes in bottoms. Soil is mixture of peat and sand (that's the only seed starting mix here). I have them under fluorescent lights by a window in a room which stays about 70°F and air humidity is about 25%. I have used seaweed, some organic fertilizer and Epsom salt when watering. Plants are getting leggy and leaves are light green and curving down (cupped?).I have now started to run a fan in the room for couple of hours every day.

Could this be disease or environmental? I'm hoping that it is not a disease. I read about the CRUD, but this seems to be different. Could low light and too much watering and ferts cause this?

One plant is in solitary confinement after its leaves started to roll upwards. None of the other ones have shown such symptom.

[amideutch]

svalli, any chance of getting some photo's. I would stop feeding them altogether until we figure out what you have. What kind of light setup do you have and is the window south facing. I would plant some more seeds ASAP in case your seedlings all go belly up. You still have enough time. Ami

[barkeater]

Svali,

Overwatering could be your problem. Jiffy pellets can easily stay way too soggy.

Pull one up and see how wet the pellets are and if any roots are protuding out of the peat pellets into the cup. If the roots are dark they are drowning and need to be removed from the pellets.

If no roots are protruding, it's also bad. Carefully remove the outer part of the pellet and transplant back into the pot. Personally, I would do this in any case to improve the drainage and aeration.

[svalli]

Thanks Ami and Barkeater,
If you click above thumbnails, you'll see the bigger pictures.
I have had two 21W tubes above both shelves as close to plants as possible. Now I added three desk lamps with 11W ESLs. When the fan is not on, the mylar goes on three sides of the frame and should reflect also the natural light from the window to the plants. There is also a mirror facing down on the top shelf.
Sari

[amideutch]

Cut back on your watering as Barkeater has suggested and those plants are leggy from lack of sufficient light. I would only use the seaweed for now as a foliar. If you can I would try giving them the cold treatment by turning down the heater and cracking open a window to get the room temperature down to 50-60deg F in the night and bring the temps back up in the day. If you can get some aspirin tablets that dissolve in water, dilute in a couple liters of water and use as a foliar spray for your plants. That might help as well. Ami

[dice]

It looks like too much plant and not enough roots to me.

Sometimes what happens with a seedling with an abundant
water supply plus fertilizer under low light is that the plant
grows big while the roots stay small. One would expect the
kelp to compensate for that (stimulate root growth), so I do
not know why your plants would still have a tiny root system.
No matter how wet the soil is, the plant reaches a point where
the roots cannot supply it with enough moisture to keep all
of the leaves hydrated, because there is so much more leaf
area than root volume.

(It could be other things: salt, something toxic in the potting
mix or fertilizer, etc, but I would suspect an imbalance between
the plant and roots first.)

I would just pinch off the dead leaves and water less, so that
the plant has some incentive to grow more roots. And no more
fertilizer other than the kelp, in case they are getting an excess
of some trace mineral for the size of the plant.

[svalli]

I took a peek at the roots and it seems that dice is correct about the root system. The roots are alive, but there is not yet much of them.
I will get the corner room to cool down by closing the door overnight, so the warm air from hall does not get there. Room's heater has been off all the time, but rest of the house has been kept a bit too warm with heated floors and two NFPs. We still had freezing and snow last night, so I do not dare to leave a window open yet.

[amideutch]

svalli, don't know what you have for drainage holes in your cups but you might wan't to put a couple on the sides just above the base of the cup. Ami

[svalli]

I make holes on the plastic cups by snipping slits in the edges of the bottoms with scissors. I should maybe cut them so that pieces actually come off. I do mostly water from a tray under the cups. Some have been watered from the top too. My first watering after potting may have been too generous and the peat pellets were also way too wet.

[clara]

Svalli, if you have a soldering iron, you could easily use it for the holes - but do it outside because of the smell. As I see in the pics, you use the same cups as me. You can even put two cups together for making the holes. I think it took me about 20 minutes this afternoon for preparing 50 more cups.
clara

[dice]

The curve on the leaves is probably just them bending down
to get light from the window and mylar (the light coming in
sideways during the day is stronger than the overhead light).

You do have to keep a close eye on them when you first cut
back on watering. They will dry from the top down, and they
can get to a state where none of the roots are in moist soil,
but the cup/pot still feels like it has plenty of water, and a
moisture meter would even show that it is plenty moist half
way down into it. If they start to wilt, just give them a little
water, and see how they look the next day.

After a week or so of getting on the dry side right up to the
point of wilting, they should have grown roots down into the
moister soil lower in the cup and will more easily support the
water needs of the whole plant.

[Vince]

Since no body it yet I will suggest to transplant to bigger containers and burry deep, unless you plan on putting them in the ground in the next week or so. It looks like the plants could use some airy potting soil now, instead of just peat and sand. I agree with the others that they need more light and may be overwatered. Once they get used to the fan you can have it on for more than two hours a day. I leave mine on 16-24h, this also helps to dry out the soil and let air in(more air more roots, to a point). JMHO.

[svalli]

I may need to transplant the taller ones to bigger containers, since it may be a month or more before planting to my MIL's greenhouses. Problem with bigger containers is the limited room indoors by the window. My own Harbor Freight 10x12 GH is still in the box and I have only such temporary GH here in the city and it can not be heated. If DH would allow, I would get more lights and setup better area downstairs in our empty indoor swimming pool. The pool area has only small glass tile windows, so I would need good lights to get healthy plants there.

I noticed that the tallest plats have got white bumps on the stems, so they are trying to grow more roots. Deeper containers are really needed.

Finding good potting mix here is a real problem. It is either seed starting mixes made with peat and sand or potting soil made from peat, compost and sand. Some of them are way too heavy and rich. A big garden center opened finally week ago and I was so thrilled to find perlite there. None of the other stores have had it so far. I can mix my own potting mixes from now on.

[amideutch]

svalli, if they have do-it-yourself stores up there, like Home Depot in the states, I'm sure they sell perlite for insulation in big bags at very reasonable prices. That is where I get mine here in Germany. Ami

[svalli]

Originally Posted by amideutch

svalli, if they have do-it-yourself stores up there, like Home Depot in the states,

Oh, I wish we had places like Home Depot. The hardware stores here have limited selection, high prices and are closed early. My DH keeps daydreaming about HD.

I have not realized to look perlite as insulation. In the garden center the perlite costs about 5 Euros for 6 liters bag. I wonder if the local builder centers sell perlite in reasonable sized bags. Is it safe to use perlite meant for insulation for plants?

Now I am worried about a new problem with my babies. I have been looking them really close now and noticed that some of them have a bit purple or reddish on the veins and stems of new growth. Is this normal or some nutrient deficiency?