Dr, I would like a diagnosis please

First, what is the best reference for garden disease and pests? Books, Web?

Second, My pole beans look this this:

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Any diagnosis?

I didn't see any pests, weather has not been hot, and these were started from seeds in the garden and not transplants.

Mine are looking the same. I am curious as well.

FYI. Actually, my DW corrected me that this group were transplants from seeds, started indoors and transplanted about 4 weeks ago. Most of my seed-started and transplanted plants did not survive the transition to outdoors. I see this condition on the older plants. I'm in central Ca. where weather has been 68-75 and clears for 3 weeks.. and no frost for over a month and a half. night did get in the mid forties back then.

Disco, did you harden off the seedlings before planting them outside?

Transplanting is difficult enough, but if the seedlings were started indoors and then do not get a chance to acclimate to the outdoor temps and conditions, they often fail to thrive.

Hardening off is accomplished by taking the seedlings outdoors into a shaded spot for an hour the first day, then each subsequent day you increase the time they are outside, and slowly allow them to get a bit of sun. It really takes about a full week to harden the plants off and ready to live in the outdoors.

hardening was done.

It looks like a nutrition deficiency to me. Some other folks will chime in here soon.

I am with Camp on this one....

many options to see what could perk them up. Fish emulsion or a little blood and bone meal sprinkled at the base and watered in...right camp?

Just started a Prescription of Fish Emulsion. I also noticed my DW likes to "rain" the little guys while watering. Gunna adjust the watering method to avoid soaking the greens and getting the water on the ground as well.

Funny, nature provides water to plants during rain; so why do some plants not tolerate getting wet?

We shall see. This is the 1st year with SFG'ing. I see so many great photos of other gardens, I don't want to be the brown thumb guy!

So to the original post, my best guess is nitrogen deficiency. My second best guess is manganese deficiency. If you have any compost, top dress around the plant with a good handfull or 2 and water it well, but don't drown the poor thing then leave it be for 2 days and water it again. See if the yellowing starts to diminish. Let us know how it goes.

Nutrient deficiencies? This is the first year of my mighty Mel's mix, the super growing medium; its new, fresh, and rich. How can it be deficient? The evidence is in the plants, but I guess something was off.

DiscoGardener wrote: The evidence is in the plants

Indeed, that's a fact!.

DiscoGardener wrote:Nutrient deficiencies? This is the first year of my mighty Mel's mix, the super growing medium; its new, fresh, and rich. How can it be deficient? The evidence is in the plants, but I guess something was off.

- Bad compost?
- Too much unfluffed peat?
- Too much peat?
- Dry peat in the MM?
- MM not thoroughly mixed?
- Peat moss IN your compost sources? That would increase the peat content of your MM and decrease the compost portion.
- Could possibly be nitrogen burn from compost not completely cycled? Too rich in raw manure, for example.

The reasons your first batch of MM is nutrient deficient could be many. These are just some I come up with off the top of my head. Certainly, ALL of them could be incorrect, too. Just food for thought.

No one is going to like this, but I would grab some MiracleGro (or compost tea if you have a pile already started) and water the plants both on and below the leaves. I would wait a couple weeks and see if they perk up. If they do, you have your problem isolated to nutrition deficiency. Now, you can work on fixing the problem....granted you checked the questions directly involving the composition of your MM.

Adding compost is great. And, it's likely to take care of any nutrient problems. But, compost is a relatively slow-release solution, too. You need quick results if your plants are suffering this early imo.

DiscoGardener wrote:Nutrient deficiencies? This is the first year of my mighty Mel's mix, the super growing medium; its new, fresh, and rich. How can it be deficient? The evidence is in the plants, but I guess something was off.

I was wondering that, too. At the same time, sometimes newly transplanted plants (or plants that suddenly start growing quickly) take a while to start pulling in enough nutrients to meet demand. It may not be an actual deficiency of the Mel's Mix, but that the plants have not begun sufficiently utilizing it.

A compost tea or fish emulsion would provide loads of nutrients in a way that is very easy for the plants to pull out.

As far as the plants getting wet is concerned, it is true that they can handle rain just fine, so why not watering? I wondered about this as well. It seems that plants can handle being wet now and then with no problem (the usual timing of rain), but when they get wet daily for an extended period of time, they are more prone to fungus and other diseases -- just like anything is that is very frequently wet. It isn't normal for it to rain every day, and when it does (three solid weeks in Delaware I remember...), you would expect to see the same problems that crop up when you shower the plants every day. They can't take it from Mother Nature, either.

In areas that are humid much of the time, showering the plants is that much more of a problem for them. They never get to dry off.

http://www.ag.auburn.edu/hort/amywright/hort3000/pictures.htm

I'll only respond to the raining part since the rest has been mentioned.

Rain is nature's way of feeding but too much rain can also cause plant diseases to start on leaves and blossoms due to excessive wetness, humidity, no air circulation, etc. So even rain is not without its problems.

When one waters from above as well, getting leaves wet, one magnifies the wetness problems. That's why watering around the stem itself is best. It also gets the water more quickly where its needed, to the roots.

Thanks doctors! where do I send my co-pay?

I knew this new hobby would provide for hours of satisfaction... and now I'm addicted to the learning process. How can I quit my day job and just SFG as a career?