Hi, Please see the attached picture of one of my silk floss tree seedlings. I transplanted it 4 days ago from a little bio-dome cell into a pot and gave it a light dose of Medina HasTaGrow... The leaves have started crinkling up.. See picture. What shd I do?
-Jack
I can think of three possibilities--the humidity change from removing the dome, the fertilizer, and transplant shock if you damaged the roots at all when you were transplanting. Some seedlings can handle the humidity change with no problem, but others need to be babied along a bit--I'll typically wean them off the dome over the course of about a week to avoid issues. And with the fertilizer, I've never heard of that one so I have no idea what's in it or how much you used--for seedlings this size I would give them a very dilute dose, not more than 1/4 strength, then when they're a little bigger I'll go to 1/2 strength. But even if you used a very dilute dose it could still be problematic--even with full grown plants you're not supposed to fertilize right after you transplant, and with a little tiny plant like this I would think fertilizing right after transplanting you could easily burn the roots a bit.
Thanks much but... OUCH. What can I do to try and save the seedling?
-Jack
Unless you think you gave it way too much fertilizer, I think the best thing to do is leave it alone and hope for the best--it's not clear exactly what caused the problem--you don't want to transplant it again since the damage to the roots from a 2nd transplanting would probably be worse than the damage of the fertilizer. If it's the humidity, after 4 days it should be used to your current humidity level and the leaf symptoms should stop getting worse. And if it's just a bit of transplant shock again the best thing to do is leave it alone.
Thanks much!
I don't think it was too much fertilizer. This guy's "brother" was transplanted at the same time and he looks great.
My guess then is that this one's roots just got a little more damaged in the transplanting process, hopefully it should recover fine.
