Vegetative Growth & Supercropping (update 3 February)
The plants have really started growing now, so I decided to start the supercropping on Sunday, day 22 for the older plants. For the Cream Caramel Auto and the Ice Cool Auto I was happy to pinch the stem and bend them over between the third and fourth node
I wasn’t gentle. I learned to pinch them hard, to allow them to bend without snapping. They recover quickly and the healed stems will soon be thick and hard. Within 24 hours they were stood up straight again. I took pictures again yesterday, 48 hours after bending them over.
The Ice Cool Auto responded really well to supercropping, and is producing vigorous side-growth already.
The Dark Devil Auto is the plant which most needed supercropping, despite being three days younger. On Sunday I gave her a squeeze and bent her over like the other two, between nodes three and four, though she was only 19 day old but taller than the others.
I should mention here, all the plants are now showing pistils, I could see them clearly on all plants by Sunday. Although they are all now producing pistils, the growth is still directed towards leaves and roots so I’m still calling this the vegetative growth stage, though it all merges together with autos as it’s so fast. Dark Devil Auto won the pistil race really, being this developed by 19 days from sprout.
All straightened up yesterday, I've given her a few pinches lower down to limit height too.
For the sake of the video, I did not want to bend the Gorilla Girl XL Auto over, but I did give the stem a good squeeze on Sunday when I supercropped the others. She’s doing great really, but she’s very short and squat, so far any way. I took a picture of her yesterday, too.
I did not bend the Red Poison Auto either, but I did give a gentle squeeze to the stem. She’s doing ok, the new growth looks alright. She’s a bit sparse and pale, and slightly slow, but still not that far off where the Dark Devil Auto is really.
She’s been following the slightly more relaxed feeding plan, so her nutrient solution was increased to 1.2 EC on day 22, and I’m delaying the move to a 48 hour cycle slightly for her as well, since she has less foliage. The others are all following the new plan in my most recent update to the letter. I also sprayed all the plants with Epsom salts solution again yesterday, sticking to the 4 day spray cycle.
The tent has been fairly stable since my last update, usually around 25°C, up to a maximum of 27°C. When I get a chance I crank up the oil filled radiator shortly before the light goes off, and the minimum only reaches 22°C, so the environment stays within a 4°C range, which is fantastic. But this isn’t always possible, and some days it gets a bit cooler, and the minimum recorded since Saturday has been 19°C from the times I didn't. Humidity has been between 35-51%. I will usually find it reading 40% at 25°C which is a little dry but OK.
I’ve rearranged the tent again slightly. I had to work out how to regularly get the runoff out from under the Gorilla Girl XL Auto without moving it. Normally I move the plants around in the tent, swap positions etc, and take the plants out to remove the runoff, but I want to keep her in position for the video. To solve this, I have raised her rack onto some storage tins, so the Tupperware box can be slid out from underneath.
I did this rearrangement on Monday, which gave me an opportunity to get the pictures from the timelapse camera up until then. I put it together with the first couple of weeks footage, and I eventually found some music licenced under Creative Commons which I was happy to use. https://youtu.be/WlbLjBAJJ3U
Looking good and sweet photo shots !!!!
Please feel free to check out/show love on some of my recent grows (Tropicana cookiez/Venom OG/Banana Mango )
Also I have a lots of growing tips on my profile page (comments section)