Yikes. Made a mistake

[GpsFrontier]

Hello sander,

My plants were about 8" apart in the nft, so only the very ends of the roots were intertwined

I'm not talking just about the roots being intertwined and pulling them apart. I'm also talking about pulling the baskets out of the holes. Roots don't just grow downward of the baskets, they grow out of the sides of the baskets as well. When you pull the baskets out of the holes, the roots sticking out the side of the baskets tend to be scraped/cut off. I'm trying to determine if there is enough root damage that the plant is having a hard time absorbing enough water and/or oxygen to support the amount of foliage it has to support. So far you haven't told me how much root damage there was, so I cant make an assessment about this possible issue. All you have given me is you tried to be careful.

I meant that my nft didn't have a bubbler and now that I have a bubble stone in each bucket, therefore I would think that oxygen deficiency would not be the issue.

A NFT system and a water culture system are two very different systems. The plants in a NFT system get oxygen two ways that plants in a water culture system don't. You don't need a air pump in a NFT system. But a air pump serves as a very important part in a water culture system because that is the only thing supplying oxygen to the plant in a water culture system.

I'm trying to determine if the drooping is most likely due to root damage, lack of moisture, and/or lack of oxygen to the roots, as well as what the cause is. There is a possibility that it could also be related to water stress due to nutrient concentrations. But that isn't very likely at this point, and I need to rule out the most common possibilities before I go looking for others. The answers to the questions will tell me what's going on, but you haven't answered my questions. I used to spend a lot of time explaining all the possibilities and going through all the scenarios. But I just don't have that kind of time to spend hours writing a book for each post anymore. So now I just ask specific related questions to determine which way to go, and what to look at. So far out of my 6 questions this is what you've told me at this point.

1. When you transplanted them into the buckets, did you damage any of the roots?
Don't know, undetermined. You tried to be careful.

2. What are the water and air temperatures?
You guess about 68 degrees

3. Do you have any pictures of the air pump and stones with bubbles coming out?
Not yet, so I cant' make any determinations.

4. Does the blubber make the water look like water boiling at a heavy rolling boil?
In case you couldn't get pictures of the pump and air bubbles coming out of the air stones. I asked what it looks like, But I still don't know anything here because you didn't answer the this question either, so again I still cant' make any determinations about this possibility.

5. Do the leaves droop when in direct sunlight, and perk back up when their in the shade again?
Not answered. You've told me things like when you put them in the sun, and you use T5's, but you haven't answered the actual question.

6. What's the water level in the buckets in relation to the baskets?
You said originally it was about 2 inches below the baskets, and I think now it's about 1 inch below the baskets.

Fallow up questions

1. How much of the plants root system was underwater before, and now?
Not answered

2. Also how is the growing media getting any moisture?
Not answered.

[sander]

Well good news. All the plants recovered. Perhaps it was a little root damage or just shock. I learned to not move plants once the roots really start growing

[GpsFrontier]

Part of being successful growing hydroponically is learning from your mistakes. But you cant learn from them if you don't know what they are. Transplanting plants isn't a problem if you know what the potential problems are and how to avoid them. You can even cut off roots intentionally, but knowing how much is OK, and knowing what to expect when you do is the important part. Your problem may have even very well been mostly related to your hydroponic system design in the first place rather than the transplant itself. Even if a significant amount of the roots were damaged, knowing how that will affect the plant and why, as well as how to compensate for it to reduce stress on the plant would have been valuable knowledge for you in the future. But since you refused to let me help you, you still don't have any understanding of what went wrong, and/or what you were looking at. Good luck.