Fat Yappas's Grow #1!

Had first sight of the Bruce Banner Auto's from fastbuds at around 1am on Tuesday 15th Feb. which was pretty much exactly 72 hours after they were planted straight out of the packet into the soil. I went to check on them before bed and noticed the back left seedling almost out of the soil, then on closer inspection I noticed a stitch like glimpse of a stem in the front right pot, and a tiny speck of green poking through in the middle pot. By the morning I had 3 sprouts running diagonally across the tent from right to left, incidentally along the same line as my intake fan was pointing, but the latter of the three to sprout through still had their helmets on. I managed to remove one later that day with a cotton bud, but the other took another 24 hours and that plant is a little smaller than the other two, but has slowly been catching up. I'm no expert by any means, this is my first ever grow, but I'm fairly pleased with how these three plants are coming along. I have had to purchase a small 1.5L humidifier because although the temps have been fairly bang on thanks to my central heating, the humidity was stuck down around 40-45% which I believe is a bit low for the plants at this stage. This has improved things, adding 10-15% humidity to the 4x4 when its running on full, but needs to be filled twice a day to last the 18 hour light cycle. I have been turning the humidity off before the dark cycle as it seemed to drop the temp a little low I had given up the ghost on ever seeing the other two seeds again by Wednesday night of last week, having had three seedlings for two days by that point, and I ordered another two Wedding Cheesecake Auto seeds from fastbuds, which I hope, taking a week less to flower, that they will be ready pretty much together. I received the seeds Monday, two days delayed due to the weather and set them off to germinate in coco coir pellets as per the recommendation on the fastbuds website. Merely hours later however, I saw a familiar stitch poking through the soil in one of the empty pots and by yesterday I had a fairly sick looking, yellowish white coloured seedling with only one complete true leaf, 10 days after she was planted. When I had a look in this morning she looks much improved and had a big thick stem so I am positively hopeful she might pull round. If this wasn't an auto I would definitely persevere with her but with her being so, and having two new seeds currently germinating I'm not sure if its worth it. Any advice in that regard would be greatly appreciated. I've only got 5 pots and no spare soil so if I do giver her a chance I think I will have to grab some coco coir and perlite and a new pot tomorrow and try growing one of the Wedding Cheesecakes in that with the same dry amendments I am using with the living soil. Hopefully they will not get too cramped in there. only other slight issue is the smaller one of the three established seedlings has a slight lean on her and a slightly thinner stem, but its not something I'm concerned about at the moment. I have wet the soil through twice this week with little to no run off but gave them a little drink from the bottom too and the plants seemed to appreciate it, certainly the first time and I have been rotating them round a bit inside to encourage even growth with one of the plants being a bit smaller than the other two, and have introduced a 6 inch clip fan at canopy level to put a gentle breeze over them and all seems well. NB. The nutrients named are the dry amendments added to the soil before germination, and not in addition too. Thanks for taking the time to follow my grow and I hope everyone is enjoying their own.

Day 15 out of the soil for the 3 large Bruce Banner Auto's from Fastbuds. They seem to be doing great. I can literally see them grow every day. Two of these ladies are very similar in size and height, standing about 3.5 inches above the surface, with the third, the one which took 1-2 days to shed her helmet is still slightly smaller at 3 inches. These three all have the first 5 fingered leaves now, and I have seen a massive thickening of their stems in the past 2-3 days. The one that took an extra week to break soil is still hanging in their and looking much healthier but growth seems very slow, but she is progressing. They have only been watered once this week, at PH 6.5, lights on time Sunday, which was 5 days after their last watering. The plants themselves didn't seem to be unhappy about the lack of water, and didn't seem to be displaying and signs above the ground that they were thirsting, but the soil was starting to get a bit dry so I gave it a good soaking through til a slight run off, and gave them a drink from the bottom but they drank it all up in minutes. The smaller plant, currently standing at just 1 inch tall, I just wet the soil through with no run off, but also gave her a drink from the saucer, as I did with the two Wedding Cheesecake Auto's, also from Fastbuds which these ladies share their tent with, which are 9 days behind these three, more progressed plants, but have shot up faster than the runt of the Bruce Banners which has been above the ground two days longer.

This week has been a bit of a difficult one due to family commitments etc, not so much in terms of keeping on top of the garden, but more with keeping up to date with the documentation, all in all the plants still seem to be doing very well. One or two issues are starting to creep in however, and as always, any help or advice from those more knowledgable and experienced would certainly be gratefully received, with this being my first grow. Since the start of the grow these plants have been getting watered every four days on average, and the amount has been increasing each time. The last time I watered, which was day 16, I had a small amount of run off, maybe about 50ml per plant, from two of the plants that stuck around for about 20 minutes so I tipped it out the tray. When I watered again this week I noticed that about five minutes later there was quite a lot of run off on all the plants I am growing in the living soil. Unfortunately, where as as I have been sitting with the plants for a while after watering them, this time I had to dash out as I was already running late. Upon my return about two or three hours later I noticed there was still a lot of run off. Not ideal I thought, but at least it gives me the chance to do a ph check of the run off. The plants were watered at 6.2, and the run off, which was approx. 100ml per plants was also 6.2. I have six plants growing currently, all in five gallon pots, three of them are three weeks old, the other three around two weeks, and I watered 15 litres. In future I will leave more time between watering initially and then assessing whether Ive wet the medium right through and ensure that I tip any run off away before I leave. After sorting out the overwatering mess, I performed my first attempt of low stress training on the three older Bruce Banners. Didn't do much at all, just an anchor on their stems on one side and bent them over from their tallest points. They responded very well to this and after an hour you wouldn't hardly tell. Unfortunately, when I looked in on them just after lights on yesterday, which was day 21, there are a few little splatters of what looked like gold paint at the time, but teems to be turning lighter over time, on just one or two leaves per plant in most of the plants growing in the living soil. One for the plants, a twelve day old Wedding Cheesecake by Fastbuds is showing some more obvious and concerning signs of deficiency. I have re-calibrated my PH Pen, which is from Bluelab, and it was saying it was 0.2 out, but that would have made the water 6.4 instead of 6.2 so not quite sure what is going on there. I have included images of all the plants in the grow in hope that someone may read this and may be able to offer advice. The smallest of these four Bruce Banners, the one that took 10 days to break the surface from having been planted as a seed directly into the soil is still doing ok too. She is quite small, and the two Wedding Cheesecakes I'm growing have shot up past her but she actually looks a fairly healthy plant now. When I started this grow there were supposed to be five Bruce Banners all the same age, but it hasn't worked out like that and so I now have three two week old seedlings and three, three week old veg plants all in five gallon fabric pots, which, down to my complete lack of experience is something which has been on my mind a lot in regard to the different environmental needs of the plants at the different stages, and at the forefront of that has been the lighting. I began the grow with my Spiderfarmer SF4000 set at 200w as per Mr Canucks Grow Weed Easy Autoflowers series which I am using as my go to. I did however notice that one of the seedlings at around seven days old, the one growing in coco coir, which due to a different shaped, taller five gallon pot was about two inches nearer the light, was noticeably bigger. Therefor I decided to turn the lights up to 300w and the plants seemed to like it. Yesterday, which was day 21 for the larger plants, I repeated this and took the lights up to 375w and turned on all my fans. Up til this point I have been running a 4 inch intake fan, and a 6 inch clip on fan at canopy level, adding an 8 inch oscillating fan earlier in the week, also at canopy level. As I had ramped the lights up, I decided to turn my two 40w fans on. This has maintained the temperature and humidity as it was before adding the extra light, and again, when I checked before lights out the plants were looking happy. I also performed some further LST on the three larger plants, as I saw the opportunity to tie down a few more branches, and did some further leaf tucking. The leaf tucking seems a little bit futile at the moment however, because I was finding that by the time I'd tucked on all three, the first plant had at least half untucked herself again, so may need them to get a bit bigger. Lastly, there have been another couple of new additions to the garden this week as I strive to get control over the environment. Following on from last weeks addition of a dehumidifier, this week has seen an 80w tubular heater by dimplex put in there which has been keeping the temps bang on 27c day and 22c at night when running flat out and was very reasonable priced at £25. It is still very wintery here and this heater is certainly more efficient than having my central heating blasted right up. Secondly, at my third attempt at trying to buy an oscillating fan I actually succeeded. Initially the error being mine, not thinking to check if the fan that was recommended to me oscillated, I then did an amazon search for oscillating fan and bought a very highly recommended one to find out upon arrival that that didn't oscillate either. Therefore I had three excellent fans in the garden but none of them oscillated and I wanted a fan that oscillated god damn it! So finally, at the third attempt, I have a 20w Secret Jardin Oscillating Monkey Clip Fan in the garden, which also seems to be a very good fan. Unfortunately I have found it to be louder than everything else in the grow setup combined. Nether the less, I am sure it will get me through this grow and then hopefully those new AC Infinity fans will be out that I saw on Mr Growit's YouTube Chanel and I'll give one of those a try. If you would like to check out my other grow diaries, I have the two Wedding Cheesecakes growing, one in living soil, and one in Coco Coir and the results so far have been interesting to say the least. Thanks for taking the time to read this and please feel free to comment and advise as any help is very welcome

Its been a busy week in Fat Zappa's Garden, hence another late update. I am no longer concerned about the gold patches on the plants, there has been a little more since the past update, particularly around the edges of some of the leaves but not much at all and it certainly doesn't appear to be anything serious so my fears have eased much in that regard. The three older ladies in this grow are coming to the end of day 32 as I type this update, and have grown into fairly big plants over the past week or so. Despite having low stress training applied every two or three days they now stand around a foot tall. Not quite as tall as their Fastbuds label mate, the Wedding Cheesecake I am growing in Canna Coco and the same dry amendments, which stands an inch taller than these three sisters, but then she is nine days younger. These three girls are certainly more fuller plants though, and the past few days have seen the white hairs begin to appear, particularly on the bud sites, which have also began to turn light green, and the stem on one of these girls begin to turn more 'vine like' in texture. Remaining on a schedule of about 2.5 litres of dechlorinated, aerated water of PH 6.4, day 28 also saw the garden revitalised by their usual tipple being replaced for an aerated compost tea of 2 cups of Worm Castings, 2 tablespoons of Alfalfa Meal, 2 tablespoons of Kelp Meal, and 1 tablespoon of Bat Guano in a cheese cloth bag, and placed in a UK 5 Gallon bucket with 2 tablespoons of Molasses mixed into the dechlorinated water I had aerated for 24 hours, and then brewed it for about 26 hours. It may just have been a well timed coincidence, but I do feel like the plants have shown a spurt of growth since receiving it, particularly the runt of these Mrs Banners, who received her first session of low stress training on day 30. Prior to this spurt of growth I was not going to perform any LST on her cos she just seemed way to small but has really filled out in the past week, although remains a very short specimen compared to her sisters, and the Wedding Cheesecakes who are 2 days younger than her. I am starting to think something may have gone awry when I mixed my soil up, as the two pots which I struggled to germinate the initial seeds in, one which failed completely, have not seemed to thrive as much as the other four plants. When I mixed the initial mix into the 5 Gallon pots I did it in two batches, yet filled the all the pots a scoop at a time along a row so it does seem strange. I think next time I will mixed the medium with the dry amendments and castings a pot at a time to gain more control and see if things improve. Also, in preparation for feeding the compost tea I did have a trim around the bottom of the larger plants as watering has become more difficult with all my wires and tucked leaves etc, which I immediately regretted, but actually, like I say, the plants seemed to have had a boost over the past few days so I am happy no harm has been done. The lights are now running at the full 450w and set to around 25 inches from the top of the canopy. I have also increased the airflow through the intake fan, the canopy fans are both on high, my two 40 watt fans are now running on medium, and my AC Infinity T6 turned up to three on the OFF setting. My heater and humidifier remain on full on the environment has remained stable despite the ramping up of the light to full blast. Lastly, day 32 began with a top dressing for all these plants, with the larger ladies showing signs of pre-flower. They got heaped portions of 1/2 cup of Worm Castings, 1/3 cup Dr Forest Organics 284 Bloom, and a table spoon of Dr Forest Organics Veg dry amendments which I mixed in as best I could with all my LST wires etc, and then watered at PH level 6.4. I'd like to mix the PH up a little more between 6.2 and 6.8 but it always seems to come out 6.4. I will endeavour to update the pages for the two Wedding Cheesecakes as soon as time allows. Thanks for following my grow, and I hope yours are going well too

Not much to report for this entry as it was due days after the previous update, but I will catch up next week. I have also decided it is too much effort to keep updating 3 separate diaries for the same grow, I don't know why I thought that would be a good idea tbh. In future I will provide picture updates for the two Wedding cheesecake grows and continue to provide the main updates to this diary.

Welcome back to Fat Yappa's ladies and gentlemen, its been another mad week in the garden. This week these girls have began to produce some serious quantities of bud sites, but the transition into flower has not been without its adversity to be conquered. Gone is the humidifier, and the battle with humidity has commenced. All of a sudden the three larger Banner ladies, together with their Wedding Cheesecake Fastbuds cousin in Coco Coir have levelled up from 2.5L per plant ever four days, to 2.5L every two days, which has increased the humidity substantially, and this week has mostly been a battle to get the RH down to 50% or below, which has meant the tent door has been open as much as situations have allowed for that, the grow tent heater has been turned off, and my central heating has been ramped back up to 21c in an endeavour to dry the air some what, and the room in which the grow tent is situated has seen the addition of an old but reasonable dehumidifier on loan from my parents. I have also had to put some further serious thought into air circulation, and the T6 has been ramped up to level 6 as a constant, the intake fan has been increased, and Ive lowered one of my 40w fans closer to canopy level. The other 40w fan is situated in the top back corner, opposite the carbon filter to try and prevent stale air from building up in there, and I did try and lower this one also, but the way I have it wired, the plug flex would only allow me to gain a couple of inches. Circulation has improved, but is still not ideal across the entire canopy and this has caused some anxiety in regard to humidity and mould etc. To counteract this, and now that bud sites are developing, gaining a clear vision of which fan leaves could be removed, there have been a few defoliation session this week. Nothing major, maybe a couple of handfuls off the the older Bruce Banners, yet compared to the Wedding Cheesecake in Coco, which stands at a whopping 28 inches, towering over everything else in the tent by almost a foot now, despite the LST, which is much less of a leafy specimen and has only lost a dying leaf or two. In terms of LST, I have continued to perform the technique two or three times a week on all the plants, yet have stopped on the four larger plants in the past few days as I fear their stems are becoming too rigid for it now, and to further add to this, there is literally no more space for them to go besides up. The Wedding Cheesecake in Coco is a concern, with it being so high above the rest of the canopy, but there is literally nowhere else to tie her down. I will continue on the smaller Wedding Cheesecake, growing in living soil, and the Bruce Banner runt for another week or so, which at the moment I would describe as being in pre flower, and seem to be about a week behind the other four, until I feel the same fears in regard to the technique damaging them. As hinted at above, space is becoming an issue, housing these six big autoflowers in a 4x4, and the five plants that were originally intended would have been more than adequate to fill the space, and things have become so tight in there that I have had to remove the intake fan and place it on the outside of the tent, but the increase in sound from this has left me dissatisfied with this as a permanent solution. The increase in intake and out take fans, and the edition of the noisy old dehumidifier has caused noise to become a slight issue, but I will be ordering a good, modern, efficient 20L dehumidifier tomorrow and hopefully this will aid significantly toward solving a number of this weeks issues. With most adequate timing, the click from the timer on the sf4000 signals lights out on another day in Fat Yappa's Garden, its time for me to zip these ladies up and tuck them in for the night, so I must bid you all farewell for another week, and wish that all is growing well for you too

Welcome back all, following a week that has been a fairly straight forward seven days or so in Fat Yappa's Garden, as the older Bruce Banners reach day 51, day 44 for the runt of the sisters, planted on the same day but that took a week longer to germinate, and day 42 for the two Wedding Cheesecake's, one growing in Coco Coir, the other in the same living soil as her Bruce Banner Fastbuds cousins. The week began with last weeks humidity issues brought well and truly into hand with the addition of the new 20L dehumidifier from Meaco, specifically designed for the UK weather. However a shift in the aforementioned from the falls dawn of an early spring, to a return to more usual climate conditions for this time of year through things off kilter once again. Despite pulling around 6L of water out the air a day, she was struggling to keep the RH down to around 50% with my central heating returned to its usual position of 18c, but an increase to 20c has taken things back in line, and the humidity has returned to the mid 40's I was aiming for. Humidity concerns during this off period however, and a subsequent inspection below the top layer of the canopy, which resulted in the discovery of quite a lot of whitish, moist growth, prompted a mass defoliation, mostly of the Bruce Banners. I had been performing very light defoliation up until this point, only removing dead/almost dead leaves, and very select leaves from the top of the canopy that were blocking what looked like bud sites, but the lack of light and air getting through past the top layer, together with the fact that now bud sites are far clearer to a novice such as I, lead me to the conclusion that the time was right. Besides the runt, all these plants have not even skipped a beat. The runt has been a bit droopier in her leaves than the others all in all, but I have looked in on them and seen her with leaves pointing up and praying a few times since so I trust all is well. Following the defoliaton on day 47, the plants stuck to their two day watering schedule, but di threatened to need an increase to daily, as day 50 saw waterings a mere 24hrs after the previous day, but feeling the weight of the pots yesterday I elected to wait til 48 hours to water again. The water amounts per plant has also become more erratic than previously, so I have been watering more carefully. Other than that the week has been pretty much plain sailing, and what look like to be some big looking flowers coming up all over the canopy, as all bar the Wedding Cheesecake in living soil are now fully in flower, but she will be there by next week. The Bruce banner I accidentally snapped the top off from the second node down doing LST a few weeks ago seems to be about half a week ahead of the other two of the same age, and trichomes have began to appear on the leaves around the buds. The biggest plant in the tent is still the wedding Cheesecake in Coco coir, as she now stand a metre tall and her top is the same level as the light now. Her size is a concern because it has caused me to neglect her in favour of the other plants, certainly in terms of light, but she doesn't seem to have any more bud sites than the other plants, and for the time being at least, her older cousins are leaving her to shame in this department, but she still has a week to catch up. Lastly, day 39 saw another compost tea feeding, the same recipe as last time. Happy growing everyone, and I will catch you all again next week.

Not much to report this week from the garden. All the plants received a top dressing of about 300ml worm castings and 80ml Dr Forest Organic 284 Bloom just before the start of week eight, and will most likely be their last feeding. The plants have stuck to the usual watering schedule of 2.5l every two days. The huge Wedding Cheesecake growing in Coco Coir appears to me to be showing signs of cal/mag deficiency so yesterday I top dressed with Cal/Mag again from Dr Forest Organics. Keeping humidity under 45% has been a battle well and truly lost this week, and has varied wildly and constantly between around 41% and 57% but has been most often found to be around 47%. The battle rages on. I have been defoliating once a week, mainly just removing stuff covering bud sites, and trichome production on all four Bruce Banners has really taken off. After only a fairly light defoliation session, my hands were so sticky they were almost glued together and I rolled all I could remove from my hands into a sausage and smoked it mixed in with my other stuff, but that was only about 1/2 to 2/3rds of what was stuck to my hands, and I have to wash my hands in isopropyl alcohol and soap and fairly liquid 3 times before the best part of it was removed.

Another week in Fat Yappa's Garden comes to an end with all the plants still doing well. The Bruce Banner which I snapped the stem just above the second node from the top is pretty much ready for the chop, the other two more mature plants are not too far behind, a week at most, and the Bruce Banner runt has pretty much caught up with her slightly older sisters. The Wedding Cheesecake growing in Canna Coco, which still towers above everything else in the tent at pretty much the same height as the lights, despite her tallest being bent over by LST has developed quite a lot of bud sites but not nearly as chunky as the Bruce Banners, and has started to fade with yellows and purples in the leaves and pistons. Her sister, growing in living soil is probably the furthest behind in the grow but seems to be developing a bit more like the Bruce Banners, and I put this down to the pot of the Coco Coir I used being round and much narrower than the other five, square Viviosun smart pots I used which was a bit of a fail for the LST, especially when combined with the rapid rate this plant took of at, where as I think the other was perhaps stunted a bit by being germinated in a coco coir pellet then placed in soil. I think I will try a peat pellet next time I grow in living soil and see if that improves it. The plants have remained on there same water schedule but I have noticed the more mature plants taking much less water. The most mature plant could probably go three days on 2.5l now, where as a week or two these plants had 2.5l daily over two days and then began to slow down again. I have kept the PH between 6.5 and 6.8 as I read its better for flowering to aim for the higher end of the range, especially when growing with dry amendments. Day 66 saw another compost tea, the same recipe as previously but this time I increased the bat guano from 1 to 2 tablespoons. Other than that I have continued to defoliate once a week, opening up light to the canopy and tried to open it up with a tightening of the LST ties. Stress in regard to the different stages of plant development increase as Harvest nears, as I was previously envisaging me drying in the tent and cutting the plants in a oner, but I have order a ThermPro TP50, and the rest is next weeks problem. Happy Growing one and all, thanks for following my grow and I look forward to updating you all again next week

It is a strange situation in the UK for medical users. Being on the autistic spectrum I have been accepted in the recent past to get medical cannabis on prescription. Unfortunately its about twice the price of illegal stuff. It annoyed me actually, because I feel like its a bit like saying if you are rich enough, you can be a legal user, buy yourself driving exemptions etc. That being said, unless you can afford to buy into such a scheme, the cultivation and smoking of cannabis in the UK is still very much not allowed, so what has happened is, on day 70 above soil, the older three Bruce Banner ladies that I forgot to water for three days until the medium was about 75% dry, and which were showing about 10% amber trichomes got accidentally chopped down by a hacksaw after I almost accidentally chopped them with my trimmers, but thankfully they barely left a graze. Then they almost met disaster when they had a close shave with my Mora Garberg Bushcraft knife as I was testing to see if it was sharp enough to get through some decent size foliage for the up and coming camping season, and I couldn't find any other bushes around to use in the experiment. Turns out, it needs sharpening. Alas my luck ran out running a test on the practicalities of using a hacksaw in a confined space. To compound the problem, without the stability provided by their roots, the premium airflow I have going on in the grow tent, blew the three older Bruce Banner plants clean out the tent, and I swear down, straight onto a passing portable extending garment rail, which, in turn got blown right through my house and into the bathroom, dragging a 60w oscillating floor fan on its lowest setting along behind it, coming to rest alongside my humidifier, which I was using to test the Hydrometer I bought last week. Thank god it wasn't blowing directly at the plants or the smell could have got everywhere as the terpenes evaporated out the bud. For anyone who is interested, as it happens it turns out my bathroom has a temp of 16-19c and a humidity of 55-65% in such conditions, if I take the lightbulb out to keep the extractor fan running in the dark, and keep releasing any excess humidity by leaving the door ajar to varying degrees until it reduces back down to the mid 50s. So, sad as I am in regard to this absolute disaster, it has left the tent a bit tidier, and allows me to concentrate more on the three plants that remain. The Bruce Banner runt, and the two Wedding Cheesecakes, one in living soil, the other in Coco Coir. The extra space in the garden has enabled me to raise the lights up to optimum level for the Wedding Cheesecake in Coco, and raise the smaller plants up the the same kind of height, hence levelling out the canopy somewhat for what remains of the grow. I also had another big defoliation, and have kept to the same watering schedule. My guess is that only the Wedding Cheesecake in living soil will see the next update, but she looks to my untrained and inexperienced eye like she could be about 3 weeks away yet going by the development of the other plants. I've decided to observe 14 days of mourning for the plants that have died, by which time I envisage the moisture content of the plant to be between 10-12%ish, but I will probably run a few experiments with the wood moisture meter I've ordered, just out of a matter of interest then I'll probably just have to chuck em in grove bags cos I'm gonna be too busy for the next 3 to 6 months, then I'll have to dispose of them. Probably just have to burn em on a fire or something. Peace