One of the biggest problems that newbies find with their marijuana plants is the curling or clawing of the leaves on their plants.
It’s often referred to as “the claw.”
While these issues are common, they are often hard to diagnose.
However, armed with the right knowledge, you’ll be able to spot the cause and remedy it.
Some of the most common causes for curling or clawing of leaves are overwatering, nitrogen toxicity, windburn, and bad soil.
In the following guide, we’ll take a closer look at some of these causes and exactly how you can fix them.
What is “clawing”?
Clawing simply refers to the curling up and down of cannabis leaves. This occurrence is also known as “the claw”. Clawing can be caused by different factors and when it occurs, your marijuana plants require special attention. If the plants are not cured, their growth will be hindered or they may die.
What Are The Causes Of Marijuana Leaves Clawing
Curling is a signal or sign that your marijuana plant is sick and requires treatment. Curling or clawing of marijuana leaves may be an indication of a problem. There are several causes of marijuana leaves curling up and down. However, this should not be a cause for alarm because there are many ways of curing your plants. Some of the causes of curling leaves include the following:
Overfertilization Of Cannabis Plants
Overfertilization of your cannabis plants is not good. This is because using an excess concentration of a nitrogen-rich growth base can cause the curling down of leaves. Overdoing any mineral-rich or vitamin-rich feeding can also cause the plants to curl and the tips of the leaves will also scorch.
To cure excessive fertilization of your plants, you need to regulate whatever you are giving to the plants. Ensure that you keep a feeding chart to keep track of every nutrient or vitamin that your plants are getting. Ensure that you go slow and low when using fertilizers on your cannabis plants and increase the dosage with time.
Always check the cannabis leaves each day to determine how the plants are responding to your feeding process. Growers must also ensure that whatever fertilizer you are feeding your plants has the right nutrient solution and pH. The best pH is approximately 5.8 to 6.0pH.
Overwatering Marijuana Plants
Most growers believe that watering their cannabis plants helps to keep them healthy at all times. However, this is not true. Overwatering your plants can be dangerous because it downs the roots of the plant. In addition, it eliminates helpful microbes that your plant needs. Additionally, excessive watering attracts Pythium, which are parasites that cause the rotting of the roots. All these will cause your cannabis plants to have curled down leaves, a sign that the plants are waterlogged.
To cure overwatering, you need to reduce the volume of water you give the plants, by maintaining a wet-dry cycle. You can always determine whether your plants need watering or not based on their weight. You can also check whether your marijuana plants need water or not by pressing the soil to determine whether it is too moist or dry. If the soil is too moist, then you can postpone watering until the next day, but if it is dry then give them just the right amount of water.
Extremely Hot Temperatures
Heat stress is dangerous to your marijuana plants and can occur both in outdoor and indoor cultivation. When temperatures are extremely high, your leaves may curl and have brown tips. These are signs that your plants are suffering from heatstroke and are a distress call that you have to take note of. The best temperature for growing your cannabis plants should not exceed 28 degrees Celsius, because any readings above this will affect your plants and even burn the leaves.
Regulating the grow room temperature can help to cure this problem. Adjusting and lowering the temperatures for indoor growers is quite easy and you can use an air conditioner to lower the temperatures. For outdoor growers, regulating temperature or exposure to heat can be quite a challenge. However, most growers utilize a screen that provides shade and keeps cannabis plants slightly cooler.
Extremely Cold Temperature
Very cold temperatures may also affect your cannabis plants. Cold temperatures also cause the leaves to curl down as well. Exposing your plants to cold temperatures of over 10 degrees for a long time will not only cause curly leaves but can also kill your marijuana plants. The buds will also become moist and can get sick if the problem is not remedied immediately.
To solve this problem, you can increase the temperatures for your indoor cultivation by adding more grow lights. Controlling the temperatures outdoors can be difficult and the best way to deal with this problem is harvesting your buds early. The optimum temperature for the healthy growth of marijuana plants is 20 to 28 degrees Celsius.
The Solutions For Above
About Temperature
The solution to these temperature issues can vary depending on what the exact problem is.
Either way, you need to ensure that your grow room is at the right temperature to support healthy weed growth.
One thing to keep in mind here is that weed plants require different temperatures based on the stage of growth they are in, whether this be the seedling, vegetative, or flowering stage.
Generally speaking, the optimal temperature range for cannabis across all of the growth stages is between 10 and 28 degrees Celsius.
Increase The Amount Of Grow Lights
Increase the amount of grow lights you have present, or replace current grow lights with stronger ones.
The more light you have been produced in the grow room, the hotter the air will get.
Keep in mind that certain types of grow lights put out more heat than others.
Turn Down Ventilation
If you have a lot of ventilation going on in your grow room, try turning that down.
You might have to insulate holes and cracks in walls or doors to reduce airflow and to stop heat from escaping.
You might also have to turn down your fans and ventilation systems, or even turn them off for a few hours.
The more air circulation there is, and the more air can get out, the cooler the grow room will be.
Increase The Number Of Reflective Materials
Increasing the number of reflective materials present in the grow room will help reflect more light, and therefore will also hold more heat in the grow room.
Move Your Plants (If Outside Growing)
If you are growing outside, you might just have to move your plants indoors during the night to stop them from being exposed to the cold.
About Watering
Ok, so the solution here is to start engaging in better watering practices, and this holds true whether you have been giving your cannabis plant too much or too little water. What you should do is a simple finger test.
If you stick your finger in the soil and you have wet soil sticking to your fingers, or if there is just a puddle of mud, it means you are overwatering your plants. Let them dry out until the soil is quite dry until you water them again.
On the other hand, if you can stick your finger down into the soil a few inches and it is bone dry, you are under watering your plants.
A good way to know if you are under watering your weed plants is if the leaves perk up right after you give them some water. (If you need some pointers on the right soil to use, check out our epic guide here).
If you are under watering your plants, another solution may be to turn up the humidity a little bit, although this can be risky, as excessive humidity comes with its own issues.
About fertilization
If you have been following the directions on your plant nutrient bottle in regards to diluting the nutrients in the water, you want to cut back a bit.
For instance, if your nutrient bottle calls for 2 teaspoons of nutrients per 2 gallons of water, cut back to ¼ or ½ a teaspoon per gallon.
You might even want to eliminate nutrients for a couple of days altogether and use only water for feeding, to see if the problem resolves itself.
If this works, remember to use fewer nutrients than before, or else the problem will just start up again.
Conclusion
We’ve covered a lot of information in this post. It’ll likely take a little bit of time to digest and understand, but the main thing you need to keep in mind when diagnosing the source of curling leaves is to check for secondary symptoms. Chances are, curling leaves aren’t the only problem your plant is facing, so check for more symptoms to deduce what exactly is ailing your garden.