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Freebie run: title tells it all... I don't take free seeds anymore when buying from general seedbanks. Choosing a strain to grow requires some research and is done with goals: potency, taste, resistance, height, difficulty level, and the list goes on. (..This gets different when you buy straight from your favourite breeder as you already have some interest in their work ..💪👽👌😍)
Anyway I have those seeds for quite some time.
About Phoenix: I love this breeder witch gave me good to outstanding results.
About Barney: I've heard mixed reviews. I don't consider complainers for bad germination rate but some pros told me good, and others have bad reviews.
Every seed sprouted. A small fan was added yesterday to strengthen the stems and reduce stretch. It's a little late but all my fans were in the tent with the Bublawi until chop day (yesterday). Nothing else to report.
Not exactly a week has gone by. New work schedule this week so this would be week 2 update...
Everyone is alive and progress goes on. I don't plan to vegde them for too long.
They went back in the closet, as light cycle in the tent got swapped. Everything is going fine. They are all about the same height, the White Widow would be the smallest so far. Nice vigour on the Critical...
All 3 got topped 2 days ago and are recovering nicely. Will be transplanting in the next coming days.
White Widow was the least promising until she got topped, now she have better stature.
On the other hand Bad Azz seems to be dropping for a few days. I suspect she is more water sensitive. She is now the smallest.
Critical is a so far a revelation!: nice skunky smell and awesome vigour and energy!
Plants all got transplanted 3 days ago. ...Again, I had to remodel my bathroom as a backyard... 💩💩 I always make a mess!! 👍 (When I started growing I followed CocoForCannabis tutorial: the guy use is bathroom as well but he keeps it so clean!! I have never made a neat job like he does..) Anyway, soil was amended with Gaia green Power bloom, rock dust blend, left over of the rootball and some crumbled dried leaves from previous crop. I let it sit, then add some Potassium sulphate.
Calling out my organic growmies on this one: I am using this same soil to germinate new seeds. Is this *too strong* or *too much* of living organisms? I am having germinating issues... See last picture, a 6inch container (with new seedling) was put on top of this soil for 2 days. Fresh miscelium. Is this good and healthy?
White Widow was kindly moved to the flower tent after re-pot in a 7 gallons. First time I ever sent a plant this small under 12-12. Had to make some room.
Critical grows nicely. Still under 24hrs light with Bad Azz. Bad Azz started to smell, so that was the main reason I kept her to veg longer. Also Bad Azz is light sensible and does not like Samsung diodes. Both are in 15 gallons containers.
The White Widow in the flower tent is just about to start blooming!! We can almost see the first pre-flowers!! Always an exciting time! She had an haircut, bottom of plant was cleaned, a few nodes and leaves were removed.
Critical have just the right size, ready to flip. Beautiful structure, vigour and a kushy smell. Dear Lord of Ganja, please reward me with a killer pheno !!🙏😍
The Bad Azz is just recovering from K def. I've voluntary let her go has I knew fresh soil was loaded and packed of everything she needs. Only had to gave the roots time to expend to the new food source. Because of that I will wait 2-3 days before I flip them.
White widow is flowering, stretch is mostly done. I got surprised by some dankness in her smell.
Critical got a little bigger than I'd like. I hope she is still OK for the space.
Bad Azz bounced back from K def and shows some energy (finally!)
Last day in the grow box: Critical Kush is outgrowing it and real stretch is just about to begin. She is just starting to show pre flowers. Awesome vigour and strength with strong branches and dank smell.
Bad Azz is a few days behind, giving me good reasons to believe she could end up taller.
Both have an hybrid sativa leaning hybrid structure. I am always dreaming of a powerful sativa with a dank kushy taste.
The White widow in the tent is in full flowering mode and this little plant is growing 3 nice donkey dick colas plus a few other promising shoots. She smells like a champion too.
New decor.
Critical keeps it's vigour.
White widow have a very addictive smell of decaying rotten petals, bubblegum and orange.
Bad Azz is not showing anything special so far.
Only 2 plants remains as Bad Azz got kicked out for being a full blown hermie.
White Widow continues to impress, pungent smell of decaying petals, grape and grapefruit. Pretty legit and addictive.
Critical lost is dankness and smell is turning sweet and fruity.
Both remaining plants have great vigour. I expect they got pollinated by the Bad Azz.
Its cold up in here. I swapped a led board for a 250w hps old school fixture to take advantage of the heat. It works pretty well and help to keep soil warmer.
I got 2 tents, connected to each other: on this one, lights are on at night time, and the other one at daytime. I exhaust first tent straight into the 2nd one, and then air is sent outside. Many advantages doing this, having more uniform temps between days and night, recuperating C02 from sleeping plants for the ones awake, but mostly exhausting less air than if both tents where connected to outside. This winter is pretty cold. And extracting 390cfm outside sure cranks up the electricity bill...
Critical Kush still impress with it's vigour. Smell keeps being fruity and bubblegum .She have 4 decent chunky colas and a few satellite buds. So far I am pleased with her.
White Widow is very similar in shape and vigour than the CK. She is just starting to swell up. Smell is somehow rotten petals, grape, undertones of orange, very addictive and complex.
I voluntary skipped a week. These 2 are easy to grow and really of low maintenance. Nothing special to report. Those 2 are finishing in beauty.
Phoenix's White Widow was sent to flower 15 days sooner. This will be her last week. 3 to 4 chunky colas with 2 other branches that budded prodigiously! Final smell is Peach, Cream, and Mandarin, not what I'm used to. Resin production is at it's best, and flowers are solid. Very, very impressed with this one. I Love Phoenix.
Barney's Farm Critical Kush is one of the strongest and most resilient cannabis plant I've ever grown. Exceptional vigour and adaptability, she is growing 4 huge identical colas the size of a 600ml coca cola, with a few satellite. Smell is Tropical and Pineapple. At least 2 more weeks.
Phoenix White Widow took about 60 days after flower formation began to finish. Honestly, she could have used an other week. But she was pushing a few bananas, and I really did not want to pollinate my Zamaldelicas just a few feet away. Giving it 8 stars is the max I can give to strain that is hermiying.
Buds are rock hard, lime green, very sticky, packed with oil and resin, smelly with fruity notes, pine and cheese (rotten blue cheese). Trichome production remain on the low level, despite what genetic was meant to be. Trichs are small and mostly at the base of sugar leaves. Plant was a charm to trim, job was done in 10 minutes. Very impressed with the potential yield, despite it is the last thing I care about.
Smoke test will be performed next week. She was kindly hung to dry yesterday. Update will be posted lately =) It looks pretty legit and finger hash was abundant at trimming.
Critical Kush from Barney, is the living definition of vigour. Great adaptability to the growing environment, strong adaptation and resistance, very stable. Even at chop day she was looking strong.
This week, she was kind enough to welcome me home with an overall kushy smell coming from the exhaust. But the plant itself during trim had zero gazzy skunky smell. This is the only reason I have not to give her the perfect score. If a strain is named with the Kush word, it gotta have some dankness.
During trimming, hands got rapidly covered with a coat of oil, and fingers got shinny and sticky. Flowers where huge, with medium density. Smell was fruity, with backgrounds of mint and rotten. Calyx to leaf ratio was about average. This phenotype showed some beautiful fall colours caused by low temps soil, and strong QB style LED.
Smoke test will be performed next week. She was kindly hung to dry yesterday. Update will be posted lately =) It looks pretty legit and finger hash was abundant at trimming.
I agree with you about the freebies now.
I used to love them and the amount of freebies would heavily influence my purchase.
But I now think they are more trouble than they are worth. I had a heap laying around as well, and decided to do a freebie run this year too.
The germination rate was terrible, and the ones I wanted didn’t do well enough.
It leaves you in a conundrum as to whether to persist with them, as the results may not be good enough for the time invested.
I think in future, I will look for freebie offers where they offer 3+1 or 5+2 etc, instead of a handful of shit ones.
Nice diaries sativaman
Cheers bro
The critical is holding its leaves out damn near perfectly horizontal, very aesthetically pleasing! I use a very airy mix for germinating seedlings and have very low failure rates. I mix equal parts of compost, vermiculite and perlite and keep the humidity nice and high until they're established. I am still using commercial compost as my main substrate though, which I would like to move away from at some point. Peat-based products are... problematic.
@sativaman, Ah, I am not from your fair lands - I don't know much about the Canadian peat industry and it might well be sustainable over there! I wouldn't know know how though - peat takes about 10 years to form 10mm of peat. Though Canada is bloody massive so it might work sustainably over there. I know it's not managed sustainably in the UK.
I've not switched over to coir because I am at heart an organic grower and I like the "chuck it in some mud and wait" methodologies. Inert mediums like 100% coir is a step towards hyroponics which just isn't for me. I'm also under the impression that coco is slightly more difficult in that it's easier to make mistakes with your nutrient levels etc. The solution for me is to start buying bags of horse manure / worm casings / etc and mix up my own peat-free compost but I really don't have room for bags of horse shit in my flat :)
@wrongleverkronk, I though (Canadian) peat was sustainable. Plus it was a local product, compare to coco.. Well now I know better. Coco is great too.. sorry to ask but, then why not use only coco? Theoretically they are both inert...
@sativaman, I love peat for growing in - great water retention, naturally protective for small plants - I've never had any problems with it at all. My issues with it are purely environmental. It's a massive carbon sink and peat bogs and marshes are a really important biomes for many increasingly rare plants and animals.
Outside of nature reseves though, massive areas of our peatlands have been seriously damaged as the living top layer is stripped off so the compost underneath can be extracted, so yes, peat is an amazing substrate for growers but it's really bad for the environment. I am reducing my use of it (I now use a 60:40 coir/peat mix), but ultimately I want to stop using it entirely.
Nice, I also have some freebies from Barney's (Critical Kush) and Phoenix (OG Kush) that I was thinking about popping one or both after my current grow is all cropped up.... but then I look at my pack of Tikal from Ace and suddenly I'm not sure any more. I'll keep an eye on this diary to help me make my mind up :)
@sativaman, I read your diary and review of Phoenix's OG - it's what started me thinking about planting something less sativa-y next time. When I started smoking I was just smoking what I could get my hands on over here - I never had a good connection, then when I moved to growing my own I went straight for the sativas (C99 I think was my first grow) so I am feeling like I need to educate myself a little bit on some of these classics :).
@wrongleverkronk, I ordered and payed for phoenix og kush. It was one of my grow that I've smoked with delight until the very last buds. If you are a fan of classic kushy taste you will love it... I would grow it again.
There are lots of microbes that grow without our intention. And these can kill weaklings.
I had best number of survive seedling by germinating with sterilized (microwaved) soil. Then I added mycorrhiza to the mix. These inadvertent microbes will still later propagate themself. And sterilizing will give seedling one week of friendly environment.
However, the seeds that need laboratory cleanliness may be weak and won't survive my outdoor trial. I think if a seed doesn't survive germaination in living soil, it will be difficult for them to grow later on. So be it.
@Med_in_Tropic,Hehehey! Man you are always fun to read! ..Sounds like a good deal you have there!! Thanks for this advice!
I am luckier this one as the new seeds I've sowed broke soil today! But wasting seeds is a bummer. I will try this simple trick for now on.
Hi @sativaman, normal people would steam the soil mix to sterilize. I microwave for the heat to kill germs. For seedling, there is only small amount of soil. So, I mix them well. And moist the mix a little. My wife does not like to see gardening stuff in her kitchen. This is our boundary. The garden is my but kitchen is her territory. So I wait until my wife is busy with her beauty routine. And I sneak into the kitchen to microwave the soil. It takes only no more than a few minute until everything heat and steam up. Then I use mitten to carry out the container to cool outside the house. Once it is cool enough, I mix in mycorrhizae and plant the seeds.
@Med_in_Tropic, I Like what you say. Especially about over cleaned environment: I expect seeds to carry a minimum of self mechanisms that will bring them thru the first week.
When you microwave your soil are you doing it for the heat or the radiation? how long..to heat it up thoroughly?
@alchemist, Well yes but she is at week 4 of flower so hard to compare with the 2 others. Still I really like what I see as structure and colas! Cheers!!
No vas a tener problemas con el micelio, yo he crecido plántulas con mis Microorganismos Activados sin problema. Pero ahora prefiero, para germinación, un sustrato aireado, con algún enraizante, donde las raíces se expandan cuanto antes.
@wrongleverkronk, problem is, biggest limitation is space: I live in small bachelor. If I push it I can grow in a 4x4 but it eat up some space. If I push it a little more, I can spilt my closet in half and use it as a veg. room like I do ATM. But, if I really push it I can set up an other 4x4, but limitations are on the electric board as I have 15 amps. I can run 2 flower tent 4x4 with opposite light cycle and a veg closet with 250w MH. If I do this, (witch I am about to do again!) I am pretty squeezed up with clothes in the bathroom, and always on the watch for not using too much power!!
Here (in Canada) it's winter and it's naturally dryer and perfect for flowering, as opposite to summer where humidity is too high. I wish I could grow more...
@wrongleverkronk, She is game changer. This crop was an in between until new seeds arrived. I've planed to do short veg., so I would have flip this week without any topping. Thing is, their is 2 things I Love more than the others about ganja: a strong sativa high, and a dank kushy taste. I think she will have a strong kushy profile... And I talked to other (well respected) growers on the grass city forum and I got really good reviews....
So now I plan to veg. as usual, with the goal to finish with plants between 3 to 5 footers. I just looked at them again right before typing this: my call is about 3 weeks before flip, with the first ≈ 10 days counting as veg. time until bud formations.
sativaman
