Black Cream Micro Soil

Week 1 went mostly smoothly. No nutrients applied this week. Using a spray bottle daily to apply a small amount of water, without overwatering. seem to be ticking along nicely. Day 7: Accidentally damaged seedling with spray bottle, was a bit distracted while spraying and knocked seedling over a bit with the water jet. Hopefully haven't damaged root structure too much. I've added some plant tie to give it some stability for the coming days. Switching to 20/4 lighting tomorrow and increasing power on dimmer switch. DLI this week has been ~11, gonna begin ramping this up to ~25 by the end of next week. Following the values below for my lighting intensities, well, roughly anyway. LED Light Intensities for Auto Flower Cannabis Recommended LED PPF/PAR Values / DLI Based on 20 hours of light. Seedlings 150 - 200 umol / DLI 10.80 - 14.4 moles per day Veg up to 9" 450 umol / DLI 32.40 moles per day Early bloom 500 umol / DLI 36.00 moles per day Mid bloom 650 umol / DLI 46.80 moles per day Late bloom 750 umol / DLI 54.00 moles per day Ripen 400 umol / DLI 28.80 moles per day Thanks for reading!

Day 8: adjusted light cycle to 20/4 and increased power, sitting around 14 DLI at the moment. Day 12: looking good! Still using a spray bottle for watering, very gently in a circular motion. Will think about giving a bigger drink in the next few days, but all ticking over nicely so far. Could be a bit warmer but oh well. Day 13: first application of plant magic Evolution spray. Held plant by stem and sprayed top and bottom until saturated. Sprayed some directly on the medium for good measure. It's mostly fulvic/humic/amino acids as far as I can tell, but let's see how she reacts. Removed plant tie briefly yesterday. Noticed the stem is still a bit weak and still leaning to one side, so will keep plant ties in place for another week or so. Likely to begin LST in the next 7-10 days so hopefully she will be a bit sturdier by then. Also gave a slightly larger watering today, still with spray bottle but I saturated entire top layer of soil to keep the microbes happy. Light is at ~300 PPFD for a DLI of ~21.5 running 20/4. A tad on the high side but I'll keep an eye out for any signs of stress. Day 14: end of week 2 and everything looking pretty good. A little on the slow side but it's a big ol' pot, and temps are a touch on the cooler side. Will begin LST once the plant grows another little bit, and begin applying nutrients in the next week. Thanks for reading!

Day 15: looking a bit droopy and in need of a drink, so figured I might as well give the first light feeding. I made a mix of ~1.5ml fish mix and ~2ml alg-a-mic per litre, and gave a total of about 200ml to the bigger pot. Didn't need the pH- in the end as this mixture came out around pH 6.4 when mixed. Keeping a 500ml spray bottle of the stuff for application over the next week. I'll probably stick a Biotab in the pot at the end of the week and move away from fish mix. it really really really stinks. Day 17; gave a small spray of the aforementioned fish/algamic mix to moisten things up. new growth looking great. Day 18: more watering today with the same mix, gave a more thorough soaking today. removed supporting plant tie too, she's leaning a bit but appears stable. looking super healthy, really pleased so far. Day 19: hottest day of the year so far and temps in the tent reflected it a bit. gave her more water as the pot was feeling a bit crispy. re-attached plant support, not keeping her upright any more but just to keep her from leaning too far over as she grows up. Day 20: applied PM Evolution spray again before lights out. will probably do another week of this and then once flowering is underway I will cut it out, as it can apparently affect taste/development of buds. noticing some very mild signs of over-fert on the newest growth, some very slightly burnt tips. perhaps the fish mix is a bit too much for this plant at this stage, or maybe I went a bit hard on it. gonna hold off and just use a plain water for the next few days, then once I insert the biotab I'll use the biotabs nutes (orgatrex, bactrex), plus a lil bit of alg-a-mic weekly. I have some CalMag ready to go, but my water is pretty high in calcium anyway and the alg-a-mic should supply sufficient magnesium. I also have some non-organic PK booster for when the time comes, as I think I can get better end product that way than just relying on biotabs - but I will keep the grow "leaning" organic for the next few weeks anyway. Day 21: began LST today. very lightly bent the main stem over and secured with a ground hook. will continue tying down with safety pins/twine as the plant grows, but this is the first step to creating an even canopy. definitely noticing some very mild over-fert at the tips of the newer leaves, looks like the fish mix was a bit much but it shouldn't be too detrimental to the plant's health. I'm gonna give her a day or two to recover from LST and then add a biotab plus biotab nutes to the pot. Pot is feeling a bit dry I will likely give her some plain water/alg-a-mic water later today after lights out period. still really hot here, sitting comfortably at 24c in the tent. Another week in the books. Growth picking up dramatically in the last few days. I expect her to fill out a bit more over the next week and then for the flowering stretch to begin. Looking pretty healthy overall, really pleased with the development. Surprisingly stinky in the tent already! Nothing to concern me or make me worry for my stealth, but a lovely pungent vegetative aroma greets me every time I open the tent door. Thanks for reading, see you next week!

Day 22 - It's a girl! Adjusted LST a little bit. My fat fingers aren't great at it but all looking good for now. Some mildly burnt tips so have removed fish mix from feeding solution. Currently watering with Alg-A-Mic @ 2ml/L, and will probably add a biotab today or tomorrow. This takes a few days to become available to the plant so hopefully won't exacerbate the burnt tips at that stage. Light running at about 375 PPFD for a DLI of 27 on 20/4 schedule. Aiming for about 450 PPFD/33 DLI by the end of the week. Day 23 - added a biotab to the soil and soaked the pot with a mix of 5ml Orgatrex/1g Bactrex per litre, and gave a litre total. Biotabs recommend 2 for a 12L pot but in my experience that's too much for autos. Would rather add one and amend as necessary, Day 26 - looking good, seems the plant is recovering from mild over fert. Clawing tips no longer as claw-like. Trimmed a couple of particularly awkward fan leaves to try and create more light penetration and encourage side branches to grow a bit more. Day 27 - first signs of purpling appear at bracts/calyxes. Been going heavy on LST to try and create an even canopy. Pot was feeling a bit dry so gave about 800ml of water with 0.4ml calmag/L (pHd to 6.1) - gonna go easy on the calmag as my water has a fair bit of calcium as is, but I have noticed Mag deficiencies on all my grows with this setup so will see how this goes. A little of this and a little alg-a-mic should see me right. Day 28 - all looking nice and healthy. continuing to apply LST and leaf tucking as necessary. Another week in the books. Plant is responding well to LST and light feeding schedule. I expect another week or so of veg-like growth, then a week or so of stretch and then full on flowering. With this in mind, I'll probably keep feeding to a minimum next week while the biotab takes effect, just alg-a-mic and water, and perhaps another calmag feed in 6-7 days. I will continue with LST to try and keep an even canopy as the growth continues to explode. I will apply plant magic evolution spray one more time, likely tomorrow. Light is currently at ~ 450 umol, running 20/4 for a DLI of ~ 32.4. Thanks for reading, see you next week!

Day 29 - final application of evolution spray just before lights out. Day 31 - gave about 1L water with 3ml/L alg-a-mic. this didn't quite give me runoff but not far off it. plant was a bit droopy but perked up a couple of hours later. Day 33 - did some defoliation, mostly fan leaves blocking the central growth to encourage higher quality buds to develop. it doesn't seem like the lower branches are going to stretch to the canopy so I will do everything I can to help them out. BONUS ROUND: started another Black Cream Auto in a 500ml pot. Day 35 - was planning to water again today but the pot is still a bit heavy and plant looks happy enough. the baby Black Cream has sprouted and is in the tent alongside her sister. Another one down. This plant is looking like it will be on the small side, but I'm still hopeful for a good yield. The main stem is shaping up to have a nice fat cola, but we'll see what happens. I'll be adding more nutes next week. Light is currently at ~525umol @ 20/4, giving a DLI of ~ 36 Thanks for reading!

Day 36 - gave a feed/watering with Biotabs nutes. They recommend 20ml Orgatrex and 1ml Bactrex in 500ml water, once. I did a half mix, and put the same amount into 1.2L so it's not too much for the little plant. Watered this in slowly and got a little bit of run off, which the fabric pot soon sucked back up. Looking nice anyway. Day 37 - noticed some discolouration on some lower fan leaves. not sure what to make of it, doesn't look like typical lower leaves dying off as the plant grows. not too concerned yet, but I will keep an eye on it. Day 40 - gave a nice big drink, about 1.5L of water with alg-a-mic at 3ml/L. Also did some defoliation/removal of lower bud sites. As this is quite a small plant, and vertical growth seems to have stopped, it seemed a good idea to nip off the buds that will underdevelop with the aim of promoting growth at the top bud sites instead. Went fairly heavy (in my opinion) on it, hopefully she won't get too stressed. Likely the final time she'll see the snips until harvest. The buds are developing nicely. Lil sis showing some signs of the light being too much for her, moved her lower down in the tent to let her recover. She may be toast though, seedlings are so delicate. If she doesn't look better in a few days I'll start another. Maybe in a slightly larger pot. Day 41 - looking nice today. some lower leaves starting to lose colour and die off. Day 42 - another week wrapped up! The buds are looking great. some weird discolouration still developing - if anyone has any idea what this is likely the result of please let me know. I am thinking possible calcium deficiency or else maybe a disease like rust. Unclear, but I'll ask in the grow questions section and maybe someone can shed some light. I can easily add some CalMag to next watering if it is cal related. Baby plant looking... ok. Still growing. We will see what happens. The plan for next week is to continue as is. I will continue to water with plain water, and maybe another Orgatrex/Bactrex mix towards the end of next week. I will likely utilise some PK 13/14 at some stage - never used the stuff so not sure on how to best approach it. Overall I am pleased with the growth of the plant this week. The buds really smell like hash. At the moment the light is at ~675 umol, giving me a DLI of ~48.6 running on 20/4. This is about as much light as I'm comfortable subjecting this plant too. It will stay at this level for the next two weeks (ish) and then begin to turn back down for the ripening stage. I'll keep an eye for any signs of heat stress in the interim. Thanks for reading!

Day 43 - after some research and checking the plant out in natural light, I'm pretty sure the markings I'm seeing are a result of a calcium deficiency. I took action today and gave her a slightly early drink of water, 1.2L with 0.5ml Calmag/L. We will see if that was the right thing to do or not, but I'm reasonably confident in my diagnosis. My research showed that a) these leaf signals somewhat fit the bill, b) plants under LED lights tend to suffer calmag defs more often than HPS/other types of light. Let's see how this week goes. A bit of calmag at this stage won't do any harm at least. Day 44 - some minor defoliation and removal of lower budsites again. nothing major, maybe 4 popcorn bud sites and a half dozen awkward leaves. The main cola is really getting a chunk on already. might need to get some little pc fans in for more air flow, currently relying only on the negative pressure created by my extraction. I have to go away for a couple of days so will think about setting that up when I return. Day 46 - been away for a few days, plant looks great. some continued yellowing / mottling of leaves which were already affected but doesn't appear like many new leaves are showing this discolouration. will see how it progresses. pot is still quite heavy so won't need to water until probably D48, at which point I will consider adding some PK 13/14. main cola starting to look very tasty. colours are beautiful already. the little plant is looking pretty washed out but there's not much I can do to get her further from the light without a separate "veg" chamber... which is something I am considering. I'll be moving from where I currently live in about 3 months and would love to squeeze another grow in before then. Might be a bit tight but if I begin one next week it should be alright. I'm toying with the idea of a small auto sea-of-green setup, utilising my same grow area but with 3-4 smaller, 1 gallon pots. I'm thinking of a small CFL veg chamber for 2-3 weeks before transferring to main tent, which should be free of this Black Cream Auto in around 4 weeks. we'll see. I'll need to get started soon to make this a reality. Day 48 - was expecting the big girl to need a drink today but the pot is still a bit wet. I am chalking this up to my slight interruption of the regular wet/dry watering when I applied emergency CalMag on D43. The pot wasn't quite dry when I did that so not surprising there's still moisture in the pot today. Tomorrow she'll need it, and I'll give her some PK 13/14 also. I will likely give her 2 feeds of this only - one tomorrow and one in 4-5 days when she needs a drink again. Conflicting info online about how/when to apply, especially with autoflowers. I'll likely go for 0.5ml/L and then maybe 1ml/L for 2nd and final application. the recommended dose is 1.5ml/L so I will err on the side of caution. Starting to get a wonderful aroma now, fruity cheesey goodness. The little girl got a spray of some alg-a-mic mixture today, just to keep things damp. She looks okay apart from being very washed out! Day 49 - gave a feed today with PK13/14 @ 0.5ml/L, 1.5L total. planning to give another hit of about the same in a few days time when the pot dries out, and then likely just water until harvest. maybe continue with alg-a-mic for another week depending on development. I was doing some minor defoliation and got a little bit careless, managed to take off a small fan leaf and also cut into the main stem of one of the developing tops. UGH! Hoping it will end up ok and be like a "super crop" type technique, but man I am annoyed with myself. Should've just left it. It was a tiny leaf! I'll keep a close eye on it over the next couple of days. Fingers crossed. Added a bamboo cane to try and support the affected bud until it heals. It's just resting against the bud holding the wound closed. Thanks for reading!

Day 50 - looking a bit worse for wear today. A lot of the fan leaves on the outer branches are showing pretty severe signs of deficiencies. assuming this is the calmag/whatever defs from last week manifesting fully. The main cola is mostly unaffected and the buds seem to be still doing their thing, so not massively concerned. I will add calmag to next watering in a couple of days and see how it goes from there. Day 51 - removed bamboo cane, the damaged stem seems fine so gonna leave it as is now. The main cola is a monster. Little girl doing her thing still. Day 52 - had a realisation while checking the plant earlier. The damage I've noticed has been mostly to the outer leaves, which I noticed some were touching the walls of the tent. It clicked with me that as it's been unusually hot here, as in a lot of parts of the world, the walls of my tent may be hotter than they have been in other grows. Perhaps there's something to this thinking, since the majority of the other leaves, especially in main cola and centre of plant are unaffected. I choose to forego a circulating fan due to the tiny space/noise restrictions, and it's worked for me in the past with a way bushier plant, but maybe it would have been a good idea this time around with temps a bit higher than usual. Still considering a PC fan at least, some concerns about mold/bud rot on such a stocky plant. Day 53 - gave a drink today and decided to throw some feed in too. Gave 2L water with 5ml Orgatrex and 1g Bactrex per L Day 54 - looks and smells amazing, getting excited. Gonna be about 3 more weeks I think. Day 56 - 8 weeks old.. they grow up so fast. Looking really nice in the tent. buds developing and starting to produce a wonderful aroma. lots of foxtailing going on but I believe that is a characteristic trait. buds look great anyway, I'm very pleased. even the little girl is chugging along nicely - I will begin feeding her soon All in all a fairly uneventful week. I think I got to the bottom of my leaf damage - combo of some deficiencies, no circulating fan and leafs resting on the walls of the tent. The plant has continued to exhibit wonderful growth so not too worried. I don't think I will be feeding the big girl any more. The biotabs in the pot plus orgatrex feed this week should be enough to see her through. Thanks for reading!

Day 57 - looking good, pot still very heavy so won't need to water for a couple of days at least. Day 59 - still fine for water. I have been watering the little girl every other day, will need to increase the frequency now as she grows. Day 60 - gettin frosty. still doesn't need water. guess it is a small plant after all. Day 61 - she finally had a drink, 2L water with 2ml alg-a-mic per litre. also gave the baby girl her first feed, I had some biobizz bio grow hanging around so made up a light mixture and sprayed the tiny pot down thoroughly. Day 62 - looking good. I realised my light was running a tad too hard, checked on my meters and was clocking in ~800 PPFD at the centre - definitely pushing it on a 20/4 light cycle. adjusted it back down to ~650 PPFD average. guessing it was like this for at least the last two weeks. plant doesn't seem too stressed by it, although perhaps the excessive foxtailing is a symptom. who knows, glad I spotted it anyway. I will leave it as it is for the next 5 days or so and then knock it down for some ripening. never done a ripening stage before, and may skip it considering I have another plant on the go and this is my only grow space. we'll see, I might be able to rig something to raise the baby plant closer. Day 63 - oh we are getting so close! the plant looks about 2 weeks out to my eye - some of the trichomes are cloudy already, with some gorgeous purpling as well. mostly clear however. day 75 is a good target in my mind but not making plants just yet. gonna be just water from here til harvest anyway. Another week closer, the plant looks amazing. Obviously a bit of a stressful environment the last couple of weeks with the light running so hard but doesn't seem to have had too much of a negative impact. The plant looks very frosty and getting frostier by the day. I ordered a new vaporiser today so that should be here by harvest time - can't wait to sample her flavours! Thanks for reading, see you next week!

Day 65 - added a bamboo support for one of the branches. flowers are too heavy. :) Day 67 - chugging along. so hot here but the plant is loving it! Day 68 - even hotter today, about 28c in the tent. cranked the exhaust fan a bit. little girl doing her thing, she's had a drink of biobizz grow and bloom at 2ml and 1ml per litre each, plus some calmag @ 0.5ml per litre. will keep wetting her with this mixture this week and switch to bloom only next week. I gave the big plant a drink of 2L plain water. surprised at how little she drinks, the last two waterings have each been a week apart! i guess cos she is on the petite side she doesn't need quite so much. definitely made this grow a breeze to manage. I did come across some references on the internet suggesting that Pakistani genetics actually prefer it a bit drier. trichome checks showing some clear, some cloudy and even the odd purple stemmed trich which is cool! but not much in the way of amber. this could be a "two more weeks" situation, but will keep checking daily. Day 69 - nice Day 70 - 10 weeks! yowza! looks like this lady will run another week or so at least. glad of that, as the heat here is too much to dry in. looks like the heatwave should break next weekend so we may have a day 80ish harvest. took a little sample from the lower buds to try out. really pleased with how this plant is shaping up so far. home stretch now! the little girl is not looking too hot unfortunately.. some deficiencies appearing, maybe rootbound in the tiny pot. no big deal, it's just an experiment to try and get the last bit of value from my grow space before moving.. but i will try and get her to harvest! Anyway, next update will likely be the final one and then harvest update. Thanks for reading :)

Day 72 - kinda just cruising at this stage. I've been checking the trichomes with my loupe - impossible to get a clear photo. she ain't ready yet anyway! Day 75 - so close! almost all milky and some amber beginning to appear all over the plant now. She could likely come down any day now, but gonna let it go a bit longer. I gave her one last drink of plain water, about 2L, and will cut her down in the next few days Day 76 - little girl got a serious haircut. not sure what the issue is with her but I assume it's to do with the tiny pot. Could be pH, could be root damage, dont know and dont really mind. trimmed all the dead/dying leaves off so she is basically just a stick of flowers now - we'll see how she develops from here! if I get a few grams off her I'll be happy. big girl looking great, took another little sample and just flash drying that at the moment. it is almost jet black. gorgeous strain. Day 77 - pretty much cooked, I'll cut her down in a few days and be back in a couple of weeks with harvest diary, drying method pics and weights... and a smoke report of course! I am very excited to get stuck into this plant, the samples I've taken have been lovely even when flash dried, so I can't wait to see how she turns out with proper dry and cure. Such beautiful colours. Thanks for reading! See you in a couple of weeks

Day 81: I chopped the plant today. Cut the main branches off and separated them. I strung most of the buds up on clothes hangers in my tent, using some pipe cleaners to keep them in place. Will likely change these to pegs during the drying cycle but I didn't have any to hand. What buds wouldn't fit on the hangers have gone into brown paper bags. I used this method last time to dry some popcorn buds and it worked amazingly well, so I'm trying it with premium buds this time to see how it works on them. Very convenient way to dry so hopefully it works out. I trimmed down the main cola into individual buds as there were so many crowding one another I was concerned about mold. Should be ok but will keep an eye on them over the next week as they dry up. Once the branches on hangers are mostly dry they too will receive the brown bag treatment before being jarred up. All buds in bags will be rotated every 12-24 hours to ensure even drying. The temps and humidity in the tent are around 21c and ~60%, with a small fan coming on every few hours to move air around and my extraction/carbon filter running constantly. Lights off always. I'll check in a few days and see how they're doing. Drying update: Been hanging/bagged for about 5 days now. Environment pretty stable at 20c/55%RH. The hanging buds are getting there, I'll likely bag them up tomorrow before they get too dry on the hangers. The buds in the bags are doing great too, no signs of mold and drying a bit slower than the hanging buds - I assume because they are not subject to the circulating fan which comes on every couple of hours. All looking good so far. I've been pinching a few tasters here and there.. very hard to keep away. Update: okay, most of the buds that were hanging have now been bagged. There is one large cola still hanging, it has a chunky stem so taking a bit longer to dry. I'll bag that up soon and the rest will go into jars in a few days. Can't wait to see what weight we ended up with, I'm guessing about 28g.. minus a few samples here and there. Starting to lose the chlorophyll smell and getting it's own distinct pong. Update: so they are all trimmed and jarred now. Ended up with just over 31g, plus a few samples here and there so I'll round up to 34. The buds which were hanging dried a little bit faster than those put straight into bags. The immediately bagged buds are already picking up an amazing scent, and are sticky to the touch. The smell is quite Kush-like, a bit peppery, a bit sweet anise. So complex. The colours are impossible to get an authentic photograph of - you will have to grow this strain yourself to truly appreciate it. I'm very happy with this harvest. I look forward to my next grow already, not sure which @Sweet_seeds strain to try next. I have another Black Cream seed but I think I'd like to try something else for the next one.. Maybe Cream Mandarine. I'll have a diary up and running in a few weeks once I'm settled in my new living arrangement. Thanks to everyone for following along from seed to harvest. Good luck with your grows!