First Grow: ‘Ophelia’ Orange Bud (Auto)

Nov 7 (day 78): Start of week 12. Checking trichomes again and giving the plant a full inspection. The buds have been packing on lots of weight and the flowers joining together at different points on the branch to make those long finger type buds. Its funny as I never realised thats how they would get that long shape, that it would be lots of buds joining together. I just assumed that the bud would grow upwards to make one long bud. Such an interesting process and experience all round. Checking the trichomes up close makes you realise how strong they are smelling though...WOW 😷 The pistils on the top flowers are all amber now, but I've noticed a few smaller flowers at the bottom of the plant that still have white pistils. Not sure if this means I should wait until their pistils turn amber too?! Trichomes are 60% Clear, 40% Cloudy now. Beginning to panic that I may miss my flush window and end up with a heavily amber plant and couch lock city!!! Confusion level 10/10 😵 Nov 8 (day 79): More reading has shown that different strains have different ideal harvesting times, plus differences between Sativa vs Indica plants. I cant seem to find anything that definitively tells me when I should start a one week flush, as most people do a 2 week one. I decided to call Dutch Passion and ask them! The kind man on the phone stated that when the pistils are mostly amber, I should look to harvest. That means I am due to harvest now and have no week to flush! He did say they would probably be ok to wait another week whilst I flush though, but to start now. Went down to the grow shop to look at drying state options (more on that later) and got a second opinion off the shop owner. He said they are looking good and I should be fine to harvest in a weeks time, so I guess it is time to flush after all. So, she got to the end of week 8 on the nute schedule and will skip weeks 9 and 10 in favour of starting the one week flush now. Weeks 8-10 of the nute schedule are the same amounts anyway, so hopefully it doesn't matter too much. Prepared 2 watering cans of PH balanced water (6.4) and did the flush. I read different things on how much water to use and also about measuring run off etc. One article said 3 x your pot size.....which is 60 litres! Ridiculous, I will be here all night PH balancing water and going back and forth out to the greenhouse. Another article said to water until you get to 50PPM run off. However, I've also read that measuring run off and PPM doesn't really work for organic growing. Also that flushing too heavily (if at all) will destroy the microclimate of organic grown plants. Bloody hell, no straight answer again for a change! So I went with my gut and gave her 10 litres of the water. Given its organic and some people don't flush at all, I shouldn't end up with chemical tasting, headache inducing weed either way.....hopefully! Nov 9 (day 80): She's looking good today after her first bath and has a number of leaves praying upwards. Makes me wonder if the 2 litres I was feeding her wasn't enough and if I should have watered until run off each time. Its really difficult with airpots though as unless you water really slowly, it all comes out of the side holes. So you have to water in the middle of the pot and very slowly. If I feed all 4 plants in the same period, it takes 30-40 minutes. Another aspect is that I have tried different ways of watering before. If I water too quickly or with the watering can shower head, a lot of water comes out of the sides of the pot. This is good in the long run as the plants won't get waterlogged, but all the excess water on the floor of the greenhouse spikes the humidity levels by at least 10%! As I don't want bud rot, I don't want that excess water causing issues. I also tried taking the plants out of the greenhouse and watering them there, so any excess water isn't inside the greenhouse. Issue with that is that its now getting really cold outside. 5 degrees or so in the evenings when I am finished with work. I think I may have caused cold shock to one of the plants (see Wanda's diary), so have knocked that on the head. I bought a huge tray to capture excess water from the flush and this worked well. Ahem - until I couldn't lift the tray full of water out of the greenhouse without spilling it all over myself and the floor that is. Humidity spiked 10% FFS. The joys of greenhouse growing eh 😰 I also decided that as I am now in the final week or two, that I would give her a little trim! I cut away a lot of old fan leaves and also a lot of new growth on the stem. It seems to me that if she has only a week left (max 2 weeks), that new flowers on the base of the stem are not going to get anywhere! I felt it would be best to trim them off and allow all her energy to focus on the existing buds. I also cut away a lot of extra leaves that were covering the lower flowers, just to get light to them for the final push! Nov 10 (day 81): She's looking good today. Still hydrated from the large watering (which I am going to call 'flush lite'), so no need for any more water yet. She also seems fine after yesterdays trim. I decided to call upon Amazon for another gadget and order a handheld microscope that connects to your phone wirelessly. The pocket microscope is way better than the jewellers loupe, but still requires a steady hand and a face full of resin 😷 This way I can take pictures of the trichomes too 😍 I've added photos today of the different buds I photographed with it. I can now definitively say she is part clear, part cloudy. A very helpful grower called KingSalomonsWeed has also given me some advice on trichomes and thinks she could go another couple of weeks! I'm going to continue with PH balanced water from now on and that way she can can be harvested with no further delays, either this weekend, or add another week on if necessary. Exciting stuff! Nov 11 (day 82): Looking good and still hydrated, so no more water required as of yet. I think tomorrow she will be ready. I've ordered a giant syringe to collect the excess water in the tray to save myself further soakings, spillage and humidity spikes 😠 First signs of a purpling leaf on the top cola today, so she is definitely starting to look like other grows I have seen. I need to get my act together and sort out where I am going to dry her. Obviously it cant be in the greenhouse with the other plants, but where?! I still have the small grow tent where they started life, so that seems the most obvious choice. However, the heater and the de-humidifier are both in use in the greenhouse and cant be moved yet, which means more expense if I have to buy additional ones. I have put the second thermostat in the tent so I can see the current temperatures in there and it ranges from 17-20 degrees. This might end up being ok, but average humidity is 47% and when I add the branches it will no doubt shoot up. I am going to need another de-humidifier at least. I'm also worried about the smell if its moving back into the house, so would possibly need an extraction kit - more expense 😤 I may try without it first and if it gets too stinky, add the extraction kit then. My daughter has told me that if her room starts to smell of weed, she will NOT be happy. Ahem. Bad Mummy 😳Also read yesterday that some random snow may be arriving in a weeks time which has worried me! May need a heater for the drying process too and I hope the greenhouse will be able to maintain its temperature also. UGH bloody weather - its almost as unpredictable as my plants 😂😂 Nov 12 (day 83): She’s looking good still and the top of the buds are purpling now on the main cola. Gave her a good 6L watering with PH balanced water. Tried out my new giant syringe, which holds 1/2 a litre. It allowed me to suck up the water from the large tray and squirt it out of the greenhouse door 💦I also wasn’t drenched and the humidity is now coming back down to 40% finally! Took more photos with the microscope. Quite a few ambers now and majority of the remaining trichomes are cloudy. I’m not going to let her go too much longer because I want to harvest when the majority are cloudy and not too much Amber. Even the smallest buds at the bottom are mostly cloudy now. I can always let her sister Orla go longer if I decide too. I prefer the happy upbeat high where possible and don’t want couch lock. Orange bud is strong enough as it is 😵 The greenhouse is proper stinky now, I tell you that much! You can smell it on me even if I have just been in there and not touched anything! Got a plan for drying now and will be clearing a space in the cellar tomorrow to house a bigger tent with extraction kit. Nov 13 (day 84): End of week 12. So here it is, her last full day before harvest. I’ve been clearing the cellar out today. Can’t believe how much crap we had down there, but I’ve cleared a nice big space for my new kit. It’s so dusty and musty down there, but it’s had a fair old clean where possible. My back is bloody aching, I will tell you that much Went down the grow shop and was there for a good while getting all my new kit. I will likely do my next grow down there as it’s going to start costing a fortune to keep the greenhouse warm when it gets even colder. She’ll be back in business next spring! Showed the grow shop owner my trichome and other photos. Based on my preference of high, he said to harvest this weekend. So, after much hullabaloo we managed to get all the kit into my 2 seater car 🙈 Will set it up and cut her down tomorrow. Went out to the greenhouse to take some photos and shed a little tear. I’ve grown so attached to her over the last 3 months and I feel so guilty cutting her down. Maybe it’s just because it’s my first grow and will get easier going forwards. I guess I won’t feel so bad when I’m smoking her in 4 weeks time 😰 NOTE: Nutrient amount is the total amount of nutes given during the week.