4) FastBuds / Lemon Pie Auto / MicroGrow

Please refer to my first three diaries for more technical details about how I grow, including my feed schedule, LST/ScrOG strategy, etc. It's all the same always, basically. Flowering lamp was brought in on Day 42. If you know my general growing strategy by now, you know this means I wanted a smallish plant this time. I want to take a few weeks off in the summer after this grow from growing so that I don't have to run my AC into the ground, running it all day. Also, it's been a long but fun and rewarding year of growing. Need a break. So a small plant of a strain I had never grown before seemed fine to me. I had been wondering if a small plants gave me higher quality buds, anyway, so I wanted to test that. We'll see. And most importantly, if installing on Day 42 as opposed to say Day 35 like my prior grow led to a small plant, than the theory blue/red spectrum management was a way to control plant size would seem a pretty viable one by now - considering that this strain is supposed to be a slightly larger strain than all the others I've grown so far. So that's what went into the Day 42 installation decision. I think by looking at the pictures and videos above, you'll see this went as planned. Plant doing well. She had a bout with light burn, or LED-light-induced-deficiency, depending on which theory you believe. 😂 It looked like septoria. But it wasn't. It never turned brown, never saw spores, and it stopped spreading. It stopped progressing when I raised the lamp from 12 inches (a test I was doing) to about 14 inches, so I then figured it was light burn. This had me watching MIGRO videos on YouTube out of curiosity, since they seemed to be well-versed in "lamp logic." Daily Light Integral. Interesting concept. Made me wonder if a 95W can REALLY drive a good quality monster-grow? Just not enough PPFD? My logic goes like this: Sure, you can flood the plant with red spectrum light in the beginning of the stretch - a time when, from what I've recently read, the DLI requirements are relatively low, and get a plant with long branches and stacked buds. But a few weeks later when DLI needs rise, if the plant had a mouth, it would say, "Excuse me, sir, but what's with this baby lamp?" So weeks later, when she reaches "maturity" she has some airy buds. Yeah, that last grow gave me, like, 40% airy buds, despite the yield. Makes sense. I mean, if PPFD is on the lower end of acceptable when it hits the canopy, the light that reaches, say, 10 inches lower is prolly unacceptable. So you end up with beautifully dense buds up top, but less dense further down the branch. The buds from my second grow were still the best of all. And my second grow was a shorter plant. I'm thinking, because she was a smaller plant, her DLI requirements were lower, so her ability to fill out was better (and faster). And since the colas were shorter, light penetration was good enough. Know what I mean? Easier to blow a birthday balloon than a hot air balloon. Right? Larger size requires more energy? Maybe. Dunno. Makes me wonder. So I might be sticking to this size plant from now on. Let's see how this one goes. But I'm encouraged by her chunky buds and frostiness, so far, and I think she won't be harvested until Day 98. I want to go long with this one. See what I find out. Running 20 hour schedule at this stage because I found a "Target DLI" curve at DeBacco University, and when I ran DLI calculations for my lamp, I figured that 20 hours were appropriate at this time. Have a great grow day! Check out my YouTube page at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtLdjlvS0mK9Pu3pkumUu-w

I like how circular this plant turned out to be. I didn't plan it that way. I swear I didn't. Yeah, I'm a little obsessive-compulsive about my girls, but no, I didn't plan that. It's technically fortunate. When you look at a PPFD chart for a lamp, the corners are the weakest spots (btw, discovered some interesting "high uniformity" LED lamps, yesterday. Give that a google search. Is that the next wave of LED lamp technology?). So to have the plant grow in a circle when you look at her from above like that means she's getting a more uniform, higher quality, and more intense part of the PPFD chart. When I did my DLI calculations, I accounted for this by raising the average PPFD for the space by 10%, about. Yeah, I've been enjoying what I've learned about lighting lately. MIGRO himself was on a live YouTube podcast yesterday and I wanted to give him a direct thank you on the chat....But I slept through the podcast (Wedding Cake from second grow is to blame.) 😂 Oh well.. I've found the right numbers to set my AC and dehumidifier and AC Infinity exhaust fan in order to maintain an average/stable temperature of about 81 degrees in my tent (more like 80.3, prolly) and have good humidity control. That's very comforting. I guess it's the benefit of having one year as a grower under your belt. A year ago, with my first attempts at germinating, I was having so many problems. Temperature and humidity control would eventually be a struggle, too. Well, you guys know what the first few steps are like. I must concede that my flowering stage lighting strategy of reducing hours in order to reduce heat stress risk and mimic nature's day/night cycle into autumn may have been faulty and foolhardy. If the Target DLI curve I've recently discovered from a very reputable source (DeBacco University) is reality, than I've been doing things wrong. I'm happy to change my mind if it helps the cause, so... Stay tuned if you find the journey interesting. Want another curveball/slider? I'm not flushing this time. When I become a Guru grower, I'll start flushing. But for now, no flushing. I need to give myself the room to continue a grow an extra three weeks if I need to because my newb ass might just get it THAT wrong. So if I start FLUSHING three weeks too soon... well there's no hope anymore is there. Otherwise, when you don't flush, you realize your mistake on "harvest day", say, and instead of cutting her down, you keep going. See what I mean? The benefits that not flushing gives you from a risk-management perspective outweigh, in my opinion, the miniscule (some say non-existent) benefits you get from flushing from a "smoke quality" perspective. At least at this stage in my growing career. Flushing is for REAL growers. I'm not there yet. Enough breaking pitches. Checked her trichs recently, like Day 68. Very glassy. I'd say she was at most 15% to 20% cloudy, which lines up well with a Day 98/105 harvest from my prior yet limited experiences. Still some white pistils, but not many, in the top canopy. Much more white pistil action under the canopy. Strangely, like prior grow, there were buds down there getting direct light that were still very white-pistils and undeveloped, and there were some in total darkness that were thick and juicy like small strawberries. 🤔 Checked the plant again on Day 73. At this point, the cloudiness of the trichs had increased but milky-ness wasn't visible anywhere yet. Looking more closely, I noticed that almost all the buds had at least a few tiny tiny white pistils, so all of these buds wanted to safely grow a tiny bit more. She wasn't done yet. Slightly more advanced by Day 76. Day 98 harvest seemed plausible, but I didn't have to worry about that anymore, cuz I wasn't going to start flushing. More relaxing this way. I'm already liking not flushing. And she was quite chunky already in some places. Lollipopping was impossible on this girl. Her four-or-so main branches were super close to the coco coir in the pot. So close that when I water the plant, the pooling of the water partially submerges those branches. I wouldn't be surprised if some grew roots, they are that close. I can't fit my hand or clippers under the plant to do any defoliating. If I want to defoliate down there, I need to come from above and down - not from the sides and under. I'll try to take a picture under there at some.... if she lets me. All I got for now. Have a great grow day! Check out my YouTube page at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtLdjlvS0mK9Pu3pkumUu-w

Checked trichs on Day 79. Like 50% cloud-ing (not even cloud-y, really), 50% clear. Waiting patiently. Smooth easy sailing. Nice chunkiness, frostiness and color around. Very happy with the progression. She was starting to look like a plant, that although I wasn't really aiming for it, might just be the best one I'd come across yet. I mean, when you compared the plant's bud development to its trichome development at this stage, it made you wonder, "Girl, how big are your boobies gonna be when this is all finished? I mean, DAMN!!" 😛 😄 So chunky already and it was still pretty glassy in the loupe. The trichomes were long and DENSELY packed on each bud. With patience, this plant could be all around amazing - a good efficient yielder with beautiful buds with a juicy THC/terpene profile - as promised. There were so many trichomes. They were even growing on the edges of the fan leaves coming out of the bud. Trimming this trichmonster would be flavored with regret as trichomes must be forsaken in such a case. Right? Gotta hand it to Fast Buds. Another great strain to grow. (Been trying to figure out where to put the sticker. It'll happen before harvest, I promise.) Would reduce light schedule to 18/6 around Day 81. Checked trichs again on Day 84. You could see some milkiness around now. Even a little ambering on the edges of sugar leaves. I put the general ratio at about 70% cloudy to 30% clear at that stage. As you can see from the reading of this page, the trichs were developing well and quickly. This girl was looking mighty scrumptious. Beautiful colors and shapes. So many sugary crystals. The buds looked powdered in the LED light. (I couldn't capture that with my camera, sorry.) Best looking girl I'd had yet. She didn't look as high yielding as my prior grow, but that was alright. She was certainly going to be yielding enough. Beauty was overall becoming a greater goal for me than yield. Giving consideration though that doing a high yielder might be necessary from time to time. Have a great grow day! Check out my YouTube page at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtLdjlvS0mK9Pu3pkumUu-w

THOUGHTS: The concept of Daily Light Integral was helping me understand another reason, other than size, why the autoflower plant is important to micro-growing. Autoflowers, I was thinking, help microgrowers by allowing them to have lower wattage lamps that run cooler - important for growing in a small space - by allowing them to run a lamp longer instead of brighter/hotter. Was thinking, if you run a 12/12 cycle, like you need to for photos, you need more photons per second in order to satisfy the plant than when you run a lamp for 18 hours or 24 hours. So in other words, if you go 12/12 with a photo under a 95 watt lamp like mine, you'd prolly get worse results than what you'd otherwise get from an autoflower under the same lamp that can run 18/6 during flower. Know what I mean? Alternatively, run a 300 watt lamp in my tent for 12 hours during flower in order to get the juice you need, and I'd guess you'd have crispy, deep-fried buds. Pour some barbecue sauce on them. Diaries are for sharing thoughts, so I wanted to share that. I guess this means I'm never growing photos under this arrangement - unless I do a perpetual (not likely anytime soon.) If I'm misunderstanding something about growing photos, here, please let me know. I'm still a newb. I could be wrong. Maybe 12/12 from seed might work? THE WEEK: By Day 88, it was pretty clear that trichomes were now firmly in the cloudy stage. They looked like they needed just a little more time to look like plastic milk berries. And then on Day 90 I saw a greater deal of cloudiness, including some milkiness around. Looking like plastic now, but still mostly standing up. And it was all around the plant. Even the buds on the lower branches. So on Day 90, this plant was approaching peak. As such, I wanted a week or so after peak for harvest, so I officially decided at that moment that harvesting on Day 102, would be the best idea, given my work schedule and things like that (can't tell my boss I need a day off to harvest/trim my weed. ya know?) Temps were running hot outside, so my AC was hitting it pretty hard. I was glad there were only a couple weeks or so left of growing before I packed it in for the summer. Light schedule would be reduced to 17 hours on Day 86 and to 16 hours on Day 91 as per the DLI curve I was trying out. Was liking the results, so no reason to get off the DLI curve idea. Given rising temps outside, reducing hours was a welcome idea for this reason as well. Have a great grow day! Check out my YouTube page at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtLdjlvS0mK9Pu3pkumUu-w

Trichomes were definitely still around peak (almost all cloudy) at Day 92. Still committed to the Day 102/103 harvest concept. Saw a rare amber trichome here and there. But I still thought I should wait as long as I could.. because 4 grows in, I deserved to see more about trichome/bud development than I had.. Let's put it that way. By Day 95, amber trichs were visible more around the plant. It had me panicking oh-so-slightly -a subconscious feeling - which meant I prolly was entering unchartered territory now (yeah, I think I harvested some of my earlier grows too early. There, you got me to say it. 😂) So I put it in my notes - "Harvest no earlier than Day 102." As if to convince myself to resist the temptation. On Day 97, I checked the trichomes again and this time the trichs on the top of the plant were about where I needed them to be for harvest. There were small patches of ambering trichs there. But when I looked to the trichs furhter away from the lamp around the edge of the plant (Can't really check the center or center-bottom, obviously. Neck doesn't stretch that way.), I noticed that those trichs, though thankfully all quite cloudy, they were virtually free of amber trichs. This is important, because if 102/103 as target harvest day (only 5 days away at this point), did she seem harvestable overall yet? I decided no. So minimum Day 102 harvest was proven a good rule. Once I see a good but small pattern of amber on the lower buds. harvest will be imminent. It will be a matter of a handful of days after that. As for pistils, this plant lived up to its to description on the website - short pistils. I like the idea. Please breed them ALL this way now. This is my first non-hairy grow. 😂 I'm so excited. This one actually shaves her legs. Classy girl. 😍 Movin' on up. I challenged myself to read trichs this time instead of pistils. Glad I did. Have a great grow day.

THE FINAL WEEK? As of Day 99, was still not absolutely sure when harvest would be. I was sure it wouldn't be going out to Day 120, but it could have ended in a few days or another week and a half or so. The trichs at the top of the plant that were getting all the light were indicating they were pretty ready to go (milky trichs, some ambering in small patches, trich stem degradation), but the ones towards the bottom were indicating they were not quite ready yet, but inside the harvest window - near peak (all cloudy). Day 104/105 now seemed most likely, but we'd have to wait and see. At this point I had about a day or two of feed left before I had to mix another batch. (I mix a highly concentrated batch of feed about once a week, that I then dilute with very low EC purified bottle water at every feed to the desired EC level - as advised by CocoforCannabis.) I thought it wouldn't be likely I would make another batch, because she could prolly live on what was in the pot from then on.. So only water from then. And it wouldn't be flushing, technically, because the amounts of water I would provide would not only be less than I normally would for flush, but it would be less than I offered at every feed, because I wanted to minimize runoff at this point.. On top of that, the water would be ph set so that the plant COULD use the nutrients in the pot. I wanted her to eat. I just didn't want to waste any more nutes on this girl. She had enough in the pot to eat for her last meals. Day 99 10pm: NEWS FLASH: Disaster has struck this grow. White fungus around the plant. Seems to be coming from dead stems from defoliation around the plant. Seems there wasn't enough air circulation around the plant. Seems I also should have removed some bud sites, but who does that? She's just too bushy with too much stuff huddled together. I have no idea what to do. Do I harvest? Do I throw her away? Those spores. They must be all over the tent. The net especially. My friend is coming over to help me sort this out. It's so late in the process for this. Have a great grow day!

She was harvested on Day 100 because I noticed some white fuzzy stuff under the canopy. On some leaves and on some buds. Yep, mold. Don't know when it started. Noticed it when I was feeling around and noticed one section of the plant was really wet. So I looked around and started noticing white stuff I was sure wasn't trichome related. Then I started noticing it was in a few places. She was a very bushy and compact plant. I had been concerned about mold possibly happening, but didn't know what I could/should do to prevent it. I might need more fans, maybe. Not sure that fixes this problem, because the wetness was caused by foliage and buds stuck together. Will more air fix that? Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe I should remove some buds? Maybe my LST was too low. There are so many potential reasons why this went wrong, but her bushiness (which is not a flaw by any means) was the main issue. Why did that make me harvest? I didn't know what else to do honestly. I removed some of the buds that had the problem (they looked alright inside), but I prolly didn't get every affected bud and much less, every spore. But being right before harvest time, I don't have much time to monitor the situation even if I did try to remedy the mold somehow. And I have a job, so I don't have time to pre-trim this plant on a whim. Even considered just throwing the whole plant out. I'm not excited about putting a plant that already shows mold signs inside a dark tent to dry slowly at 75 degrees/60% humidity. But harvesting is a better idea than a garbage can, so why not? That was the logic. This way we’re closer to the end and the problem has less time to progress. When I trim, I’ll have a better chance to assess the damage. Rotten buds will be thrown out. If that’s the whole plant, oh well. Yes, I'm a little heartbroken. And yes, this has my head spinning about what I could do better next time. I'm taking some time off after this (possibly failed) grow, so I'll have time to reconsider everything I did and will do going forward. Harvest time is usually a happy time for me, but this one isn't too much. 😐 Told ya I was a noob. HAHA. Might try giving her a trim or inspection or something later today. Or maybe cut her up into branches, do inspection/removal - instead of whoIe plant dry? I’m at a loss for ideas. Shoot me a message if you have any advice. NEXT MORNING/AFTERNOON: Firstly, I want to thank @bostongirl17 for reminding me that great growers learn from their mistakes and keep going. Thank you @bostongirl17 for your kind and thoughtful support. And thank you GrowDiaries for making that happen. I decided this morning, that what I should do is cut up the plant into sections, search for the moldy spots, remove them, and hang the branches separate from each other in the tent in order to allow all the foliage and buds room to breathe. I’m grateful I went that direction today, because the inspection showed me what the main likely problems were that led to the mold: 1) Too Low LST/ Crisscrossing branches: I didn’t do the best job organizing this plant when she was in her LST days. I was continuing the “Turbo LST” concept I kinda mentioned in my last grow, but I may have gone 2 cm too far this time. I never saw the “tree trunk” of this plant with my eyes because you just couldn’t see it. That’s how low all the branches were tied. I still believe this is a great idea, obviously, for my setup, but since I didn’t give myself enough room to see under the plant, I didn’t/couldn’t organize the plant properly. Or even lollipop, at all. Waterings were difficult. Couldn’t even see where the water was landing. I like to push limits. You learn stuff when you do that. I’ve learned this time that you need to give yourself room to at least SEE under the plant. Then you can diagnose/prevent/organize issues better. You get it. Ok. Done. So as a result, some of the branches were going on an angle up to the canopy instead of straight up like the others. The intersections that caused meant buds and foliage were growing and rubbing against each other the whole time without hope. Seems to me, this is where I could have done something to prevent all this. Lesson learned. 2) She was just a bushy girl: Big buds growing everywhere under the canopy. Very little larf upon early inspection. Beautiful juicy buds. But they and their corresponding leaves were all smooshed together because she’s just that kinda plant. How do you manage a bushy girl? Interesting thing to think about this offseason. You know, none of the buds were “all molded out” or whatever. There were just traces of stringy mold and just a couple places where that mold got fuzzy. So the mold infestation seemed to have just started. It was found more often on necrotic and damp leaf material or on the end of stems that were left after defoliation. Not a terrible tragedy. There should be plenty of salvageable plant in a few days. 3) Too little air circulation? I had the same setup for this grow as I’ve always had, so I’m not confident this was a contributing factor. For the reasons mentioned above, I don’t think air would have made it where it needed to go. But I could try adding more next time. Why not? AFTER 3.5 DAYS IN THE DRY/CURE TENT: Checked her this morning. No weird unexpected smells or sights. She’s looking alright. Did a branch bend test. No snap. A tiny bit of crackle though. Like a stretching sound. Wouldn’t surprise me if she was drying too fast a bit. In addition to not being a whole plant dry as I would have preferred, it’s hot outside these days. That’s a kind of conundrum with regards to room climate strategies for the drying period. I’m trying to keep 75/77 F with 60% to 65% in the tent. The temperature part is easy. 75/77 is easy to get to and stay at if you run the AC reasonably. But the AC also dehumidifies (dries), which is not what you want. Well, at one point yesterday I had the AC, the big de-humid, and the big humid going at the same time. I had the humid going so that it would humidify as the AC was going or quickly repair the damage done by the AC after it was done. The de-humid was just there to catch my mistake if the humid was set too high or too run too long – hard to calibrate. My little system seems to be working well. TRIM BEGAN AFTER 5 DAYS