First Grow: ‘Ophelia’ Orange Bud (Auto)

Oct 31 (day 71): Start of week 11. Buds are really thickening up now and more pistils turning orange. Going to need to get a magnifying glass to start inspecting the trichomes more closely. Fed her with 2L of water and week 8 of the nute schedule. Nov 1 (day 72): Ordered a jewellers loupe as I hear thats what most people use to inspect trichomes. Cant wait for it to arrive and take a look at them more closely. She's continuing to fatten her buds and even out the canopy, with some of the smaller flowers lower down catching up height wise. I continue to rotate the plant to put the lower flowers under the hottest part of the light to aid growth. Nov 2 (day 73): Greenhouse is consistently warm, but with the humidity dropping the girls are getting thirsty quicker. I don't want to overdo the nutes and the younger plants Wanda and Orla are showing signs of potential nute burn (or something?!), so played it safe and fed her with 1L of water today. Jewellers loupe arrived. What a disappointment! Its a standard one, but they are so small and you have to get so close to the plant to magnify them that the slightest shake of the hand or gust from the fan makes it impossible!!! Can see jack shit clearly and got a face full of resin for the privilege. Going to do some research on other alternatives! Annoyance level 8/10 😤 Nov 3 (day 74): Thanks to Amazon next day delivery, I now have a handheld pocket microscope device which was recommended on a few sites. It has a built in LED light and is longer than the jewellers loupe, so at least you don't need to get quite as close! Still suffer from the shaky hand and fan issues as you have to stay super still to get a good position and view of the bud. Saw some trichomes however and whilst majority are clear, there's quite a lot where the heads are transitioning to cloudy. They aren't opaque yet or fully milky, but the head has a kind of misty look. Now I need to do some research on when this means I should flush. The Biobizz nute schedule suggests that even though it is organic, you should flush for the last week before harvest. Will need to figure out my timings quite quickly. As always, every stage brings a new challenge as a newbie and I already have a list of things I would do differently with my next grow. Confusion level 9/10 😰 Nov 4 (day 75): Buds still packing on the weight. Fed her with 2L of water and week 8 of the nute schedule, including microbes and calmag. Nov 5 (day 76): Checked trichomes again today and most buds on the top canopy are part clear, part cloudy. As before, no pure opaque ones yet, just those misty looking heads. Been doing lots of research and understand that the colour of the trichomes at the time of harvest leads to a different effect. Clear = head high, Cloudy = maximum THC levels - head and body high, Amber = couch lock. I am not a huge fan of couch lock and would prefer either the head high or in-between level. So I am looking to harvest when majority are cloudy, but still have no idea how quick they turn and when to start flushing. Confusion level 9/10 😰 Nov 6 (day 77): End of week 11. Been looking at some other diaries on here for the same strain and my plants look pretty different. They have long, full, fat colas! I know different factors come into play like the lights and feeds and environment, but I've now decided that I think she has a couple more weeks to go before harvest. Will hold off on the flush for now. A good but confusing week in all! NOTE: Nutrient amount is the total amount of nutes given during the week.