timmko

My plants were 9ft and larger this fall when I had to cut them down to fit inside. They grew for about a month then they have stalled. I have a humidifer keeping the humidity about 50% and the temp at 72degrees. I have 6t-6 plant bulbs, a 400watt MH and a 200W Compact flourescent bulb running about 10hrs a day plus natural sunlight from a large window. I was watering once a week but cut back to every other week. I also bought a moisture meter and it seems like that is even a bit much as the soil comes up holding a quite a bit of moisture. I had a spider mite issue which I took care of thanks to someone elses recipe on here, of a mixture of 3/4 water, 1/2 cup of alcohol, and 1" or so of cooking oil in a quart bottle. This took care of them right away and they haven't come back. That was only a week ago so this problem with the growing has been for a few months now. As they quit growing I noticed that wherever there used to be a leaf (cut off) the plants were getting "squishy" and I have also read that they produce a kind of "sap" so I didn't worry much at first. After the problem seemed to get worse I stripped the outer layer of the stem down to good solid stem hopin that would get rid of the problem. But 2 weeks later they are getting squishy again in the same areas and I don't know what to do with them. They are very large plants and I hate to lose all of them. They have stopped growing completely and they few leaves left are turning brown also. Last year when they were first year plants and still small I had no problem with them at all and they grew like weeds. Does anyone have any ideas on what I should do. I have some elephant ears that are growing really slow but they are still growing unlike the banana's...???

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