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This is my first grow and I'm just kind of stumbling along. I don't have photos from the very start of it. I germinated 8 seeds and 7 of them sprouted. I planted all 7 seeds into a starter plug and put them all in a plug tray. I used a heated mat and a humidity dome and sprayed the seedlings as they sprouted with RO water. Of the 7 planted seeds 6 sprouted.
When the seedlings outgrew the starter plugs I planted each in a 2 gallon bucket with Fox Farms Ocean Forest. I'm not using any nutrients at this point - watering as needed with RO water.
Transplanted to 5 gallon pots, applied mycorrhizae liberally. Fox Farms Ocean Forest soil. 2 days after transplanting I noticed slightly yellow tips on some leaves. I added nutrients to the water - 3 part general hydroponics floraseries. I used the "light feed" for "early vegitative".
I fertilized again this week - this time "medium feed" for "late vegetative" Yeah... I don't know what I'm doing with fertilizer and didn't realize you were only supposed to use like half of the strength on the bottle and then only every other watering. No signs of distress at least that I can see, thankfully.
I'd never seen a cannabis plant in person until these sprouted. I worry that I won't have enough room in this 4x4 tent to flower all 6 - this is a common mistake new growers make, I've read. I don't know how much they will increase in size during flower. I'm considering purchasing another 4x4 tent and having 3 in one tent, 3 in the other.
I noticed brown spots on the leaves on #6, my smallest, poorest growing plant. I notice the spots on the leaves of other plants, but not all of them and not as bad. From looking at pictures and videos it looks like cal/mag deficiency. I watered with 5ml/gal with just Cal-Mag ph adjusted down to 6.8. While watering, I noticed a dead/dying yellow leaf at the bottom of #4.
This week I'm installing an air conditioner in my garage, where the plants are housed. This will let me keep a consistent temp in the desert summer.
I've purchased a second 4x4 grow tent because I think I vegged too many plants too long for a single 4x4. I'm putting a better light (Grower's Choice ROI-E680S) in this one. For this harvest I'm going to flower 3 plants in each tent. In the future, My plan is to use one tent for veg and the tent with the better light for flower to speed up harvests.
The run off TDS is still too high on most of the plants for fertilizer. I transplanted into fresh fox farms ocean forest, then added nutrients twice in a row based on what was on the bottle. The plants didn't catch on fire or anything, but the TDS was in the 2000's and has been gradually decreasing on them - some faster than others.
No major issues except for obvious nitrogen deficiency in #1 and #2. #2 also exhibits droopy leaves and I don't know why. The runoff PH for both of these plants has been persistently low - 5.8, 5.9. That's odd to me since I've PH balanced everything the plant has ever received. Must be some sort of soil/plant/chemistry thing? I raised the PH of the nutrient solution to 6.8 to compensate. The resulting runoff was 6.1/6.2
I've ordered a Medic Grow Fold-6 which will arrive today. Both tents will then have decent lights - the difference between the ROI-E680S and the quantum boards is remarkable in terms of obvious plant growth.
#6 still looks like lettuce - totally different from the others. It's starting to show bud sites. I'm still think it may actually be lettuce or something.
Surprisingly, humidity has been an issue. After watering and when the lights come on humidity climbs from 50% up to 60-65%. I put a dehumidifier in the grow space and in one tent plugged into the InkBird - not the success I had hoped for. I have another model dehumidifier coming today. Summer will be here soon, hopefully no issues then.
Coming along okay - the largest plants are showing signs of nutrient deficiency or PH imbalance. I flushed and fed full strength - hopefully that resets things. Light in second tent upgraded to a MedicGrow Fold-6.
I think I must not have been using enough calmag. I was adding 1 ml/gal to RO water and I'm still getting brown spots and yellowing leaves on some plants. I'm now adding 5ml/gal calimagic and I did a foliar spray with the same concentration. All water/nutrients are PH tested to be 6.5-6.7 and runoff for all plants ranges from 6.2 to 6.7. So, I'm assuming it's a nutrient/calcium issue vs. a PH issue.
Some plants are further along than others - some have orange hairs and cloudy trichomes, others are still clear. I used a pocket microscope to capture some photos of them. On 2 of the plants the leaves are starting to tinge red/purple. 1 other is showing the starting signs of discoloration.
I followed Mule420's advice and defoliated 3 of the 6 plants. Weeks ago, I attempted some "low stress" training late in veg. The branch didn't flex, it just broke and split one of the tops off. I duct taped it together when it happened and it's worked great - I didn't lose the branch and the plant seems happy.
I'm going to switch to plain water for the plants with at least some cloudy trichomes to flush them.
This is the first time I've ever been around flowering cannabis plants - I was expecting them to smell much more strongly. I have carbon filters in both tents, but I expected it to be strong/overpowering at this stage. So far they smell very mild.
Should I expect to harvest in about 2 weeks?
I found I was underfeeding by a lot. I thought I was treating deficiencies or PH issues - no, turned out I was just starving them. I did a soil slurry test on two of them - PH 6.5. Now that I've been feeding them every watering half strength GH floraseries they're looking better. Lost a lot of leaves on 2. I'm thinking I have another 2-3 weeks left in flower. Some trichomes are amber, some are still clear on the same bud. Not sure what to do so I'll just wait.
Odor is still virtually non-existent.
I have 6 plants in this grow. Half of them are showing some amber trichomes on sugar leaves, but none on the buds yet. I've switched those 3 to straight RO water. The other 3 aren't as far along as I'm still feeding those normally.
2 of the 6 plants were ready to harvest this week - drying at 60% RH, 70F. Hopefully 2 more will be ready this week, then the final two perhaps the week after.
This was my first grow and I wound up underfeeding my plants. The WW I grew had a very light smell and was fun to grow. One of the six plants lagged the others and was a bit of a runt.
Lots of updates -
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I've added insulation and an air conditioner to my grow space and the temp is now stable throughout the day and night. I added a second 4x4 tent with a Grower's Choice ROI-E680S. 3 plants in each tent, the biggest of the 3 under the best light. Humidity is being controlled in both tents at 50% with InkBirds IHC-200s and humidifiers. I live in the desert and I'm not planning on needing a dehumidifier until dry time.
I ran the ROI-E680S at 50% for the first few days of flower then upped it to 75%. The plants didn't catch on fire or anything. I'm not sure when to go to 100%. The other tent has two 125W Flexstar quantum boards. I moved those down from about 36 inches to 24. They've always been at 100%.
Runoff TDS is decreasing as it should on most plants after several waterings with calmag added. I'm feeding every other watering with General Hydroponics FloraMicro/FloraGrow/FloraBloom. 1 ml/gal calmag every watering. No apparent PH problems except for #1, the biggest plant of the bunch. #1 had a low PH runoff of 5.8 after being watered with a 6.3 mixture. #2 and #3 both had runoff PH's of 6.3 and 6.4 from the same mixture. #1 is suffering from brown spots on some leaves covering roughly half the area of the plant. I wasn't sure what to do about #1's PH and the next batch of nutrient I mixed up landed at 6.7, so I re-watered #1 with the higher PH mixture. The new runoff for #1 was still at 5.8 and the runoff TDS decreased from 1530 to 1210.
Switching to a dropper for PH up & down has been so much easier than attempting to use some fractional ml. I can dial in the PH I want from 1 gal to 4 gal by adding 5-20 drops, mixing, waiting 5 minutes, then testing. I would always overshoot before.
#6 has always been small and seemed to lag behind the others. It still is. I think it may be actually be lettuce or something.
I've noticed small white hairs sprouting from what I guess will be flower sites. I used a small microscope to take a zoomed in photo of one.
I've decided I love all this and my least favorite part of it is dirt and the watering. After this grow I'm going to be full speed ahead on an RDWC setup.
@TheConstantGardener, yes much better!! You’ll be happy with the outcome. The more light that can penetrate the canopy the better. I wanna be seeing my light shine through to my grow medium. It’ll keep you from having a bunch of larf. Good luck 👍🏻
@TheConstantGardener, Yes start in the center and work your way out leaving the top two maybe three set of fan leaves around your tops. Do your defoliation in 2-3 week intervals. You don’t have to be extreme with it but if it’s blocking a bud site it’s gotta go. And usually if it’s bigger than my hand … see ya lol Youll see the buds eat up that new light!! You’ll get a lot more air moving through there helping with any powdery mildew or any other unwanted issues that might try to show up. I also remove most any leaves that are pointing towards the middle of the plant. Those are just blocking airflow
I just grew 3 of these White Widows out. They are absolutely AMAZING 🤩 Have one pheno that smells like lemon 🍋 cleaner. It’s great for wake n bake. The other has a fruity pebbles taste on the exhale. The bud smells fruity yet creamy🔥🔥🔥💯👊🏻
@TheConstantGardener, I can tell you this. The widows did great under my lights but the pheno that flowered under 750 PPFD was more triched out than the others under the stronger light. Tastes more like fruity pebbles rather than lemon 🍋. I ended up with about 12 ozs or better off these gals!! I wish you the best of luck!! 💯👊🏻
@TheConstantGardener, I had one that was tropical fruit with a definite creamy smell. The second but largest was very floral but skunky. Probably my second favorite too. The last was my lemon pheno, she was pretty amazing!! My favorite for sure💯👊🏻
@Mule420, All of them were very light and I noticed a distinct difference between them as you did. Of the 6 plants, I can't really count 2 of them because I dried them too quickly and they just smell like grass clippings (makes great butter, though!) The other 4 are all variations of what I would describe as "light floral". I can't wait to grow more of them now that I have somewhat of an idea what I'm doing to see if I get a different result.
@KingSalomonsWeed, Thanks! It's good to know the subtle smell is typical of the strain. I personally really like the idea of faint smelling plants but I understand some folks like them really loud.
@TheConstantGardener, haha thanks! and yeah I did the same and got 20 seeds, and had two not germinate and the customer service was quick to reply they would replace any of the seeds that did not germinate so I'd say it's a pretty good deal. Maybe 20 seeds is a bit much of one strain as I'd like to grow other strains too but the deal was too good not to take😅
@Lungboi, Thank you! Lol, yep, I think ILGM recommended it as a good first time strain and I got 20 seeds for like $100 so I knew I could make lots of mistakes! Good luck!
Seems like you're doing pretty well for your first grow , I would take phatbongrips advice & flip these over to flower! Also it seems to me that you're pH levels are to high. Cannabis requires a pH range of between 5.5 & 6.5 if your plants are over or under those numbers what happens is that your plants can't feed properly, they can't take in the correct levels of nutrients & water & wont grow properly or even die. Ive found the sweet spot for my crops is at 5.8 to 6.0, I run hydro so pH levels are very important. But the best thing I could advise you is to look up grow weed easy.com, it is the cannabis growers Bible! , It explains everything about growing for first timers or experienced growers. Grow methods, plant training , equipment advice & comparison. Grow experiments ,EVERY THING there is to know about growing from very experienced people, & you can subscribe to their weekly newsletter which has new & interesting articles , product reviews experiments, photos. Can't say enough good things about this site as I have learnt everything I know about growing & constantly learning more, so thanks GWE & definitely check it out also the gromies on this site will help with helpful advice as well. Feel free to hit me up if you have any questions 👍 happy growing😀 its a great hobby
@HIAZ_urbanbudfarmer,
Thank you! Your setup looks great. I'm planning on doing an RDWC & scrog setup as soon as this grow is done. I really like the idea of having such control over the plant's environment. I'll be watching your current grow closely - I have a whole lot to learn!
@Phatbongrips, thanks - that's really helpful to know. I did just order another 4x4 and I've added air conditioning and insulation to my garage so I'll be able to keep them alive during the summer. I'm planning on applying organoshield because I read it's good to apply a preventative prior to entering the flower stage, then flipping to flower next week. I'm planning on growing 3 in each tent then, when this harvest is done, using one tent for veg and the tent with the much better light for flower. Any advice? Thank you!
It took a few weeks for the different terp profiles to settle in on my White Widow jars I harvested. But it was well worth the wait!! Hope yours does to growmie💯👊🏻
TheConstantGardener
