Circus Grow ‘21

Hi all! I have plants at all stages here, so I’m calling it a circus grow. Different strains, and different stages. I hope to gain some good insight here, this is a great network. These seeds came from two sources. The GCSE came from a plant that showed male expression in its late flower, and produced seeds. The others I refer to as “IDK”, and “Eddie”. I got them from a friend who had saved them / had forgotten about them in his sock drawer for maybe over 10 years from bag seed! He doesn’t know their genetics. The oldest plants are around day 35 in their vegetative cycle. One GSCE is growing much larger than all the others and is starting to show female sex. I typically top my plants- but this is my first experience with a full outdoor grow, and I’m hesitant to top them for some reason... suggestions welcome! Seedlings are on day 4, and the GSCE clones were cut and dipped in rooting hormone, they’re are on day 2. Thanks for stopping in to my diary!

Figured out these girls are in their 8th week of veg. They sprouted between 4/13- 4/15. Found a grasshopper munching on “Eddies’” leaves, I guess it’s expected with an outdoor grow.. I’m not using any pesticides -although I have a bottle of Captain Jacks Dead Bug on hand in case of an aphid or fly attack. On 6/1 I supercropped the largest GSCE, and “Eddie”. This was my first attempt at supercropping... this plants’ resilience is always astonishing. The stem on the GSCE is a 1/2 inch thick, so it was hard not to break the exterior skin a bit. Also noticing a possible nitrogen deficiency with some yellowing at the bottom of the one GSCE. I fed with full strength nutrients of 1 Tbs/gal. Hope it helps.

Things are chugging along still. Lots of rain lately. They’re starting to develop a (more) even canopy after supercropping. Here is the “Eddie” which might be a male?? I haven’t seen calyx development this elongated... The GSCE stem split a bit more after a bad rainstorm, but I think she’ll be alright. Everything else is slowly growing..

This week began flowering via the solstice! All of the plants have hairs coming from their calyxes so they are all female, hooray. I’m noticing that outdoors, they develop slower and clearly from the top down. The “Eddie” still has elongated calyx development... if anyone has seen something similar, I’d love to hear about it in the comments. I don’t know if it’s odd or not..maybe a sativa thing? Anyway, both GSCE are growing strong and the largest is developing a nice canopy after some LST on the main stem that was wanting to stretch back up after its supercropping. I was noticing grasshoppers chomping on the leaves of all the plants pretty hard. A praying mantis has come to the rescue and is happy to viciously tear them to shreds- leaving carcasses of their heads and legs strewn about. I’m leaving the remains, hoping to deter others. The white residue you see in the photos was my lazyass attempt of using my natural deodorant which has neem oil as the first ingredient as a bug deterrent- which is working surprisingly well, but the mantis is better! There is some yellowing on the lowest of fan leaves on all plants. I have always experienced this in the past... and never know what to do about it other than more nutrients, which I have switched to Jack’s Blossom Booster 10-30-30. If anyone was wondering what happened to the two clones, I’ve given them to friends :) I’m happy to be entering flowering period! Happy growing y’all!

The stretch is starting, and the girls are growing dense with leaves. I have not done any defoliation this week. Yellowing is continuing and worsening at the bottom of the Girl Scout cookies, and I also added a full dose of CalMag for good measure. Some of the leaves on Eddie are folding inwards not sure what this is about, but I’ll be keeping an eye on it.

The girls are continuing to grow taller still. I’ve done some light LST on the largest GSCE to get some air and light into the canopy. I’m assuming the praying mantis are still in the plants somewhere, though I don’t see them. The bugs are only chewing a few leaves here and there. We’ve had a hot week without any rain. I was away recently and didn’t post on the log. The girls were thirsty by the time I returned and I gave them a good watering. I’m hoping to get some rain within the next few days!

7/20 We had a short storm with heavy rain at the end of last week. I’ve been watering nearly everyday since with the extra collected rain water with added Jacks Bloom Booster. The girls are growing nicely and certainly stretching. What used to be the shorter GSCE is now the tallest at 43”. The other GSCE with LST is bushing out beautifully. Both Eddie and the Unknown are growing strong too. The yellowing has lessened in all of them. Bugs are completely everywhere in the garden this time of year. They’re still munching on a number of leaves on all of the plants, but it doesn’t seem to be negatively affecting them.. yet. We’ll see. Just coasting along and enjoying the growth for now!

I topped dressed with about 2 inches of fresh compost from my compost bin on all the girls. They are impressing me with their size. I suppose I should call them “women” now 😁 The trained GSCE is very dense and bushy, showing pistulate preflowers. I can tell the plant is preparing to stack some flowers on! The untrained/natural growing GSCE is skyrocketing upwards, now at 48 inches. We’ve had periods of heavy rain throughout the week. Recently had flash flood warnings, hail, and dangerously high winds. I thought my plants were going to be broken by the gusts.. but thankfully they were unharmed.. Such resilience! The yellowing has not shown up this week. I’m watering 1 gal to each Eddie, and GSCE 1 and splitting a second gallon between GSCE 2 and Idk. This will have to raise to all one gallon daily if they keep growing at this pace. Also, I have fed them all 1 ml/gal of SuperThrive this week. I also performed some very minor defoliation on the largest GSCE to keep some airflow going through it’s dense foliage.

This week I ran out of Jacks Bloom Booster! The local shop should have it in this week. I did feed with 1 Tbs/ gl of blackstrap molasses. The lower leaves are becoming yellow from the outside inward.. maybe because of the lack of food. The PH of the filtered water I gave them was still around 6.5 as usual (I use a colored coded meter for reading). Growth is slowing and little preflowers are forming on the largest GSCE. The Eddie is not showing preflowers yet; likely because of the sativa genetics? During the end of last week, I pulled off a leaf with necrosis on Eddie. Underneath were around a dozen translucent, fuzzy tiny caterpillars…I believe they were young Spilosoma Virginica, also known as the Virginian Tiger Moth. Let’s hope no others will try that again! I’m very pleased with this grow so far. Looking good!

This week has been smooth sailing. The garden center did not receive a new shipment of Jack’s Blossom Booster, so I switched to Fox Farms Tiger Bloom. It has nearly identical ingredients which is comforting. They’ve had two feedings so far. The leaves on all the GSCE are yellowing again at the base. I hope they respond well to their new nutrients. The praying mantis is well camouflaged, but I did find it’s shedded casting, pretty cool. It’s getting bigger somewhere in the plants! The largest GSCE is seriously dense. I’ve performed some defoliation of the yellowing leaves. The Eddie smells just like Arby’s roast beef…or a peppery salami… hah it’s bizarre! Anyone know what strain this might be? Excited to watch the flowers develop!

This weeks weather has been mostly overcast with an average temperature of 75 degrees Fahrenheit and 80% average humidity. It has been cooler but with stagnant air. Almost no wind, or very light breezes during this week. After a rain during the night, I find a few spots here and there of what I believe to be powdery mildew where the leaves overlap and trap water. I removed the leaves that had it, although I know this is not how you prevent this issue. I just hope it doesn’t become an issue in the buds. Now, in the morning when there is condensation on the leaves, I direct a box fan into the canopy of the largest GSCE to get airflow through. Still getting some yellow leaves, so I defoliated the yellowing leaves on all. Seeing some purple edging starting on the GCSE 1. Eddie is also showing slight purpling stems on the fan leaves. 8/21- watered with collected rain water mixed with Tiger Bloom. To Ph range 6.5-7, and at 1220 ppm. 8/22- I top dressed with compost from my bin, and wood ash from my fire pit. Scent: distinguishing smells is a very exciting part of a grow for me. I will be recording how the smells change throughout flowering. GSCE 1 (the largest) is beginning to show trichomes on its sugar leaves. Scent is sweet, and tart like smelling into a bag of sour gummy worms. Also, a bold scent of citrusy bitterness like the white part of lemon rinds. The other two GSCEs are sweet smelling, but not as complex yet. More “green” and younger smelling.. Eddie- Scent is still peppery and meaty. Like salami. Also a “green” scent still. It does have a familiar sharpness to it… hard to put my finger on… so I side-by side compared it to the rubber tires on my car, and it’s very similar. Not sweet. More spicy and sharp. Very unique so far and no trichome production yet. On to another week!

It was hot and humid for week 19. Days number 131-137. Sunlight hours have dipped to 13.08. Rain at night has been contributing to some mildew in spots on the largest GSCE. Many of the leaves are yellowing still, although the plants don’t seem to be struggling at all. They are really increasing in smell. I will be reporting more about that next week.

Oops. I don’t know how to change last weeks report from veg. to flower but we’re definitely not in veg anymore. Days 138-144 12:50 of darkness High: 88 Low: 48 humidity ~79% Hurricane Ida brought loads of torrential rain Tuesday night and through Wednesday with tornado warnings. I went to bed saying my “goodbyes” thinking they very well might be goners with potential high winds. The next morning, they were absolutely fine, again such resilience! Day 139 and day 144 found a rotten bud and clipped it off. Day 143: watered mixture of rain water and nutrients. Defoliated the dead leaves only. Sunday day 144: noticed PM on one of the center colas on the largest GSCE. I gently wiped the area of a 3:1 ratio of filtered h20 and hydrogen peroxide… I don’t have much hope of combatting it as I know it’s vicious, but I’m crossing my fingers. The trichs are increasing in numbers daily. Glittering outward across the sugar leaves too. All the GSCEs have so many already, it’s amazing to witness. I’m noticing Eddie is slower to mature. All trichs are nearly all clear except some on the tips of the colas clouding up. Day 144 scents: GSCE is getting nicely complex. Theres a deep, earthy warm funk underneath a blast of a powerful sugary sweet aroma. The “meatiness” of Eddie is reducing and turning more fruity.. something tropical perhaps of mango skin. Or like the fruity bitterness of the smell of an uncut lime… The peppery smell is still strong and sharp to the nose, I love it, very different profile than the GSCE. Well, I love them both. On to another week

Day 150 9/5 - 9/12 12.35 daylight hours This week went smoothly except for a gust of wind that knocked over two of the GSCEs. Twice. Nothing snapped or broke. I repositioned them and nestled their smart pots deeper into the soil. They’re top heavy from all the flowers! The cooler nights have started pushing out the purple on the large GSCE, it’s beautiful. Eddie has been drinking a lot of water, I’m giving it around 1.5 gallons now. The untrained GSCE is yellowing all over more in comparison to the others. This could be from the shock of the roots being disturbed from the fall? Nutrients this week were only calimagic and tiger bloom. 9/7 PM was treated with a cotton ball dipped in diluted 60/40 h20 and whole milk.. I’ve never tried this before, honestly putting straight milk on a plant that sits in the sun seems odd- but if it works I’ll be satisfied. I cannot tell if it is spreading into the buds, or is just on the leaves. All pics on day 150 (9/11)

9/12-9/19 Days 151-158 Daylight hours- 12:16 I needed to be away from Sunday to Wed for family matters, but my husband got many brownie points for following my watering ritual in the mornings. He’s a great plant dad. Thanks to him they survived another week. He does not smoke, (but “shotguns” from me often ). He noted that while watering/ inspecting them he got a mild uplifting buzz simply from contact… Interesting. Anyone else relate? Looking at the calendar- I figure we’re within week 7 of flowering. Based on my photo and written documentation, preflowering seems to have been within July 25-31. The two little preflower pistils meeting then, if not before. “Officially” flowering by Aug 2. -determined by pistils multiplying, vegetative growth ceasing, calyxes swollen and trichomes forming. I’m counting august 1 as first day of true flower, that puts us at day 50 flowering. This is advertised as a 10 week flowering strain. No major storms or much rainfall at all this week. HUMID HUMID HUMID. Rain on the evening and night in 9/16. Nutrients were given 9/12 and 9/15. 1300 ppm. Added 2ml Advanced Nutrients “Overdrive”. Sunday day 158 Still very humid weather. I made an emergency chop of rotten bud sites on the tops of two colas. Bummer. I don’t think I’ll risk trying to make hash or anything out of it, mold is freaky. C’mon girls- Let’s make it through a few more weeks!

September 19-26 Days 159-166 Days 51-58 of Flowering / week 8 Each chilly morning is like walking into a version of heaven with the smells going on in the garden! The girls are so sticky and sparkly. GSCEs smell like sweet skittles. And the Eddie is intensifying that funky, rubbery, tropical thing. Mmm. Trichomes are frosting up, but not quite time for harvest yet. Each branch is so heavy from the flowers. This is the time of the season I get reallllly eager to just chop these beautiful plants down already…getting closer to harvest. This plant allows me to practice my patience for sure. I only watered them on Sunday this week after lots of rain Tuesday- Thursday. No nutrients. The powdery mildew situation seems to be better with the milk/h2o treatment I had been strictly providing to each area where I noticed it. The main issue now is bud rot. It has been EXTREMELY HUMID with very little breeze for the past few weeks with an average of around 85% for the week. Bud rot has been removed from three colas on the largest GSCE, as well one “smaller” one from Eddie. I can notice a small leaf wet and browning or wilting from the outside of the bud- then on the inside I can see rotten parts. I removed with clean scissors and dabbed diluted hydrogen peroxide on the cut stem. The good news is that it doesn’t seem to be everywhere (that I can see right now…), just in spots which I check daily. It’s hard to see these rotten buds go into the compost, (especially seeing as my flower stash has been COMPLETELY DRY for over 11 MONTHS…yeh it’s rough) but I’m so thankful for what is still left on the plants finishing up.

Sad day. Plants were stolen in the night. All of it. I don’t feel like discussing the details about it on this platform, but it’s a tremendous heart shattering loss. Every bud (likely pounds)- Viciously, mercilessly, brutally ripped away.. There are no words. Goodbye girls, I loved you, and my only (perhaps overly) compassionate hope is that you’re out there helping someone as you would’ve helped me. I will never stop growing- this plant is my so important in my life, so stay tuned for another grow one day. Thank you all for joining me on this awesome site diary! It has been rewarding to post here, and I truly was able to find a new, deeper relationship and understanding with my plants. Thanks to everyone for the encouragement and kind words.. happy growing! Be Kind. Keep Blazin. Fuck Thieves. Stay on the sunny side, ☀️ SunToker