Pro Grow - Autos

So far so good! Some of the seedlings have "drooped" after I've accidentally hit them with a little water rather than just hitting the soil around them, but they've seemed to perk back up as soon as the grow light has come back on. The reason the plant on the upper-right in the black pot isn't labeled and doesn't have fan leaves yet is because that's a tomato plant seedling! I'm growing two tomato plants and one basil plant as companions.

Down to 6 healthy plants now. One of the GSC's sets of leaves started to curl in, and it got worse day-to-day so today I just threw it out. Space in the grow tent is prime real estate, and I don't have room for dying plants! So what I'll probably do is start germinating two new seeds today and start a new grow diary for those two since they'll be 2 weeks behind this lot. In case anyone cares, my tomato seedlings and basil (also in the grow tent) are doing just fine! Average height I would say is 4.5 inches since Bruce Banner is the tallest around 6 inches although several are as short as 4 inches.

Plants grew an average of 4.5 inches to 7 inches this week. I low-stress trained the Bruce Banner by pulling it over to the side with a plant tie because it was getting a lot taller than the others, and it seems to be handling it well. One of the Gorrilla Glue's seems a lot yellower than all my other plants and I have no idea why since it's in the same soil, and on the same light and watering schedule. Some gnats showed up in the grow tent, and they were mostly interested in my tomato plants than my weed plants, so I basically skipped a day of watering them to dry out the soil, and it may have worked, but just to be safe I ordered some yellow sticky pads to put in the pots to attract and kill them.

Grew from 7 inches tall to 10.5 inches tall on average, and more importantly more bushy than ever! These photos aren't great, although I'm very pleased with how these are growing so far. WHAT A DIFFERENCE a grow light and a tent make, as compared to trying to grow out in the wild and depend on the sun and deal with pests. Continued low-stress training Bruce Banner since it's the tallest and am trying to make it as short as the others and train it to grow in a "spiral" up. So far it hasn't had any issues with the training. I would try to train the others also but they're too damn bushy and I can't really bend them over without them butting into another nearby plant. Noticed yellow tips on the end of a couple, so lifted the grow light up a couple inches in case that's what did it and reduced the light intensity from 75% to 60%. The yellowing on top of one of the Gorilla Glue's last week just went away on its own. Still not giving these a single nutrient. They love Fox Farm Happy Frog soil, so "If it's not broke, don't try to fix it!" Seems the cold nights are finally gone so the weather has definitely been great the past week.

Temperatures this past week were crazy. Ranged from 40 degrees to 80 degrees. Thank goodness the grow tent somewhat regulates the temperature inside, otherwise these plants would be confused as hell. Anyway, these grew explosively over the past week an average of about 5.5 inches vertically to an average of about 16 inches. They're only in 2 gallon pots, and are autoflowers, so I'm surprised they've gotten this tall. Also, the first white pistols started showing up! Wasn't the case for my past grows on week 5 as it took them until weeks 7 or 8 to start flowering, so I presume in this case the grow light is making the big difference, and possibly better temperatures and no pest damage but to a lesser extent. Bruce Banner, the only one I've been low-stress-training in a spiral design is now much shorter than all the others. I bumped the grow light intensity back up from 60% to 75% and the plants seem to be handling it fine. Still haven't added any nutes whatsoever. They're still perfectly fine in the Fox Farm Happy Frog soil. The plants in the corners of some of the photos with different looking leaves are my tomato plants! Their stems look good but their leaves are looking kind of pathetic.

Great week! Grew about 4 inches tall to 20 inches on average. Nice and bushy too. Definitely a warmer week than last with outside temperatures getting up to 85 degrees, and nights only as cool as about 60 degrees. Some of the lower leaves started to turn yellow, so I plucked off the ones that looked totally dead. Also since these are budding now and lower leaves are starting to turn yellow, I started light nutes this week (Fox Farm big bloom & calmag). I stopped LST training Bruce Banner since it is budding now. My LST efforts successfully made it "spiral" but UN-successfully configured it where fan leaves are now on top of fan leaves which may have done more harm than good. I added a photo of it. Also I hung up some gnat catchers (yellow sticky pads) to catch and kill the gnats that somehow found their way into the tent and went for the tomato plants, and it seems to be working. The tomato plants started looking really unhappy so I pulled them out of the grow tent and just put them outside.

Almost no change in height so these may be finished growing vertically. A lot of lower fan leaves have been turning yellow and some have been covering up buds from the light, so I've been plucking those off almost daily. I bumped the grow light up to MAX intensity. Unfortunately it has been heating up the grow tent a little, but only to a maximum temperature of about 82F and only when the light is on. The upper leaves on Bruce Banner are thinner than the others, and I don't know whether that's because of my LST'ing or because it is a sativa-dominant strain. Maybe a little of both? The last Bruce Banner that I grew re-vegged due to a lighting change, so I don't really have another healthy one to compare it to. The humidity hasn't gotten higher than about 60% this week, although I bought a dehumidifier and put it right outside the tent since the summer months typically bring a lot of rain and I'll need it more for then than now, but nice to have now if I can get it to bring the humidity down from about 60 (or higher) to about 50 when necessary. *** 4/15/23 EDIT *** Now it seems lower leaves are yellowing at a somewhat alarming rate, SO I've ordered a pH testing pen, pH Up, and pH Down to find out what pH my watering solution has been in case it has been too high or too low and I need to adjust it. ETA is about a week, although hopefully Amazon sends it sooner. If there IS a pH problem, it's a good thing that these are weeds after all, and autoflowers tend to be more forgiving! Also I tried putting the dehumidifier INSIDE the tent, and noticed today that the basil plant nearest to it looks incredibly "drained". Also, Bruce Banner's leaves are incredibly "droopy" now, almost ALL of them, so I'm wondering whether the dehumidifier was actually sucking the humidity out of my plants instead of the air, and I put it back OUTSIDE the grow tent to be safe, and gave the plants a little extra water.

Happy 420, everyone! Crazy outside temperature fluctuations this week of 40F to 90F, although in the grow tent my fan and ventilation system were able to keep the inside temperature in a range of about 65F to 85F. Smell is STRONG now. Smell it just slightly now outside the exhaust vent with the carbon filter, so may be time to vacuum or replace the cloth pre-filter. Decided to start checking pH and found that the tap water that I've been watering these with has had a pH of about 7.4, and with nutes has been about 8.4. Thank goodness these are "weeds" and the alkaline water up to this point hasn't killed them. So for the past couple days I started adding pH down drops to the water mixture till the pH gets down to about 6.2-6.4 and feeding the plants then. These are fabric pots just sitting on the bottom of the grow tent so I don't know how I could collect runoff water, but I figured if anything these are too alkaline so feeding them SLIGHTLY more acidic water will help balance it out. Other than the yellowing leaves, these seem to be coming along nicely! One of the Northern Lights plants seems to be blooming the fastest. Close-up photo of its top bud posted. Bruce Banner's buds are a little funny in that they're mostly green instead of white. Wonder if that's because its growth is stunted, it's genetically slower to flower, it typically has greener buds anyway, or its somehow still mad at me for the LST attempt.

Was a hotter week than last with highs still about 90 but lows only down to about 60. With the fan and exhaust system, the temperature in the grow tent only got up to about 82. It was also much more humid than last week with humidity outside getting up to 99% but humidity in the grow tent only got up to about 70%. In summary, so far so good. One of the Northern Lights plants, the shorter one, is probably looking the best. Buds are continuing to fatten, although still lots of white pistols on the lower buds so probably still has several weeks to harvest. Which means the others even have longer! The shorter Gorilla Glue plant's buds are also starting to turn amber and look good so I included a close-up photo of that too. However, some of the middle fan leaves' edges are turning yellow/brown. Could be light stress, but it's the only plant out of 8 in the tent starting to really show this. This is the shorter Gorilla Glue plant, and the taller one that's even closer to the light doesn't seem to be showing it at all. I moved the grow light up a couple inches so its average distance to the tops of the buds is only about 14 inches, whereas before it was closer. Can't pull the light up might higher since it's basically up against the exhaust fan assembly now. Good thing these are autoflowers and shouldn't get much taller. Bruce Banner still has greener pistols while the others are all clearly white, so it might just be growing more slowly than the others. Might be playing "catch up" if my earlier LST attempts slowed it down. Was trying to grow it in a spiral shape, and since I quit the LST it has definitely been straightening itself out and getting taller as a result. Included a close-up photo. I'm still having to pull off yellow leaves every once in a while, although not nearly as often as before I started paying attention to and adjusting the pH of the water. The smell is starting to come through outside my grow tent, so I replaced the carbon filter's pre-filter in case that might help. Reminded me of the times in college when I tried to pull a condom on and off as quickly as possible, haha. If it still starts to smell then it might not be the PRE-filter and instead be the carbon filter itself getting used up. I have 8 total cannabis plants and a basil plant in the grow tent, so it's working hard!

This week got hot as hell. Up to 90 degrees even in the grow tent several days. Didn't help that I was out of town for a couple days and didn't have the chance to give these a little extra water. Moved the grow light up as far as it would go, bumping up into the exhaust system, since some of the other older plants in the grow tent looked to be showing signs of light/heat stress. Almost all of them have yellowing/browing leaves in the middle, and I'm continuing to pluck or snip off the leaves that look useless. One of the Northern Lights plants that has been maturing faster than all of the others now has some amber colored trichomes on the top bud, so I'll probably harvest it this week even though many of the pistols on the lower buds are still white and haven't turned amber and curled in yet. 9 plants in one 2x4 grow tent is a lot, so maybe it'll free up some light for the others! None of the others seem ready and will probably take a couple more weeks. The main cola for Bruce Banner still has a lot of green pistols rather than white. Took photos of each plant's top cola individually this time.

It was another hot week with high's around 90F so I suppose summer is in full swing. Nights got warmer than last week with lows only about 65F. The exhaust fan in my grow tent is set to come on at 79F so it has been running almost constantly. Good news is no rain, so humidity hasn't been too bad. Have had my heart broken by bud rot TOO MANY times! Continuing to remove yellow leaves when they either look really bad or pull off the plant easily with 2 fingers, since at that point they aren't really serving a purpose and so that light can get to the buds underneath better. I bumped the Fox Farm Big Bloom nutes up from 1 tsp/gal to 2 tsp/gal, which is still way lower than the recommended concentration, since these haven't shown any signs of nute burn. Bruce Banner is the only one that I'm still giving nutes; the others are only getting pH'ed water as part of their "flush" before harvest. While I thought last week that one of the Northern Lights would be ready to harvest, it isn't yet. The top bud has SOME amber trichomes, although almost none of the other buds do, and the buds nearest to the bottom actually still have some clear trichomes. So I'm going to sit back and let it grow another week and check it again then. It's clearly further along than the others so the others aren't even worth checking (even though out of curiosity I checked some of their trichomes anyway). The Northern Lights plants are showing a nice frostiness to the buds. The Girl Scout Cookies' bud leaves have a nice vibrant green color and its buds are noticeably more airy than Northern Lights. Bruce Banner is taking longer than the others to grow, as expected as a sativa-dominant hybrid, and also as expected its leaves are starting to show their sativa-like ridges. Also it is taller than all the others. Both Gorilla Glue plants quite frankly are kind of ugly, and do NOT like the heat (or wind from the fan?) as is evident by more of their leaves turning brown/yellow than the others, but hey it's not a beauty contest, I'm growing them couch lock!

Not much new this week. Continued plucking or snipping yellow/brown leaves. HARVESTED Northern Lights 1 and got 47.5g net weight which is about what I expected considering it has been in a 2 gallon pot and sharing the grow light with 8 other plants. No bud rot and no pest problems though so it's a win!

Any plant that makes it to harvest without bud rot nor pest problems along the way, I consider a win! 47.5g wet weight is about what I expected considering this was sharing the grow light and tent with 8 other plants, and only grown in a 2 gallon pot. This is actually my largest harvest yet, and first harvest where the plant was grown completely from seed to harvest in a grow tent and with an LED grow light. *** 5/25/23 UPDATE *** 12.7g dry weight

Realized that I'm probably still a week or two away from harvest for the rest of these so I stopped the flush and started giving them nutes again, and will for at least another week. Still lots of white pistols on most of these, and trichomes are all milky or clear; no amber. GSC is getting a nice purple to it. BB still all white pistols, no signs of amber yet. Getting bloody close to the grow light and I'm hoping it doesn't get any taller! Was a slightly cooler week with highs around 85 instead of 90.

Harvested 45.2g wet weight, which is about what I expected considering its similar height and growing conditions as my recent harvest of a Northern Lights plant. Buds stuck to each other much more than Northern Lights though so the harvested buds on average are larger. There were a couple very small buds near the bottom that I could have harvested but didn't bother since I didn't want to go through the trimming process for all of them. If I get 10g dry weight from this that'll be just fine. The very top cola was starting to turn brownish and the very bottom colas had mostly white pistols, so I suppose it was a perfect time to harvest with the top being "past ready" and the bottom being "not ready." Look forward to trying it after drying and curing!

Buds stuck together well so it was quick harvest. More wet weight than I was expecting, although also more vegetative material when I was trimming than expected. Hopefully it isn't a harsh or un-potent smoke, although suppose I won't find out until after drying and curing. Trimming wasn't as sticky as expected either. Pistols were mostly darkened and trichomes were mostly milky, so that's why I harvested when I did. Also its height was on the short side like the others that were ready for harvest around this time. Also it has been flowering for 10 weeks now. Has a nice vibrant green color, so it gets an A+ for that. Like with one of the Gorilla Glue plants that I also harvested, there were 10 or so small "popcorn" buds left over that I didn't even bother harvesting because of the extra trimming required and potency likely being low.

Harvested one of the Gorilla Glue's and the Girl Scout Cookies so see the separate journal entries for those. There was basically no change week-to-week for those; most of the pistols had darkened and most of the trichomes were milky white, so I went ahead and chopped them. The others as you can see (especially Bruce Banner) still have mostly white pistols so they aren't ready for harvest yet. I'm considering reducing their light schedule from 18/6 to 12/12 to hurry them along. Also it's getting hot out and they've been drinking a lot of water. It was a HOT week with highs around 90F and lows only around 70F. And when the LED light is on it the tent, that heats it up the tent about 10-15 degrees. Worth mentioning is that these remaining 3 plants have an average height of 30 inches (NL 28", GG 28", and BB 34") which is 8 inches taller on average than the previous average of 23 inches which might explain why they are taking longer to "ripen".

Reduced the lighting schedule from 18/6 to 12/12 to hopefully help these finish flowering faster. At this point I care less about yield and more about finishing these so I can start another set of seeds. Still a lot of white pistols and not a lot of amber trichomes. Bruce Banner stubbornly still has all white pistols. Gorilla Glue's buds have been thickening! Was out of town this past week for 3 days where these got no water but they seemed to survive fine. For fun I threw in a photo of a tomato that I recently harvested. Started two tomato plants at the same time as these in the grow tent. I recently learned that fans should ideally be positioned on the floor of the tent and facing up to blow the underside of the canopies, so I bought a second 6" fan and placed them both at the bottom corners of one side of the tent blowing upward.

Weeks are getting hotter, with only a 75F low this week. Bruce Banner still has 95% or so white pistols so it's taking forever to mature compared to the others. Has to be genetic. About 50% white pistols for the others so probably a couple more weeks before they're ready for harvest. Gorilla glue is continuing to fatten, which is interesting because the other gorilla glue plant was shorter, thinner, and ready to harvest earlier. Perks of growing multiple plants: One ready to smoke sooner and the other with eventually a higher yield! As you'll notice from all the yellow leaves these might all be nitrogen deficient, but at this stage I'm not concerned with that at all, as the plants need to focus on bud development anyway.

Week got even hotter with highs around 95, but temperature in the tent didn't get higher than 85. Rained a lot also and humidity outside was basically 99% all week, but the humidity inside the tent didn't get above 80%. I think Northern Lights will be the next one to harvest, but still a lot of white pistols and I checked the trichomes and none are amber colored yet. Noticed some brownish coloring near the top, so I checked it closely to make sure it wasn't bud rot, and it appears to just be really old dead fan leaves. Harvested one of my other plants this week so I was basically able to line the rest of these up directly centered under the grow light.

Another hot week with the highs around 95F. This week unfortunately the temperature in the grow tent got up to about 91F even with the LED light off during peak heat and despite the exhaust and two fans. Might explain the fox-tailing going on with Gorilla Glue. Still a bunch of white pistols on these so couple more weeks to go till harvest. This week I learned that organic grows take longer to mature than non-organic and grows with coco as a medium, which makes me less discouraged that these are taking a while. Only concern is that if these take TOO long I won't be able to start a second grow this year without worrying about it going past December for harvest time and getting too cold out. Then again, last year the weather in December was actually beautiful and not cold at all.

Outside temperature got up to 100F this week. Northern Lights seems to be coming along the most. Looked at the trichomes and there are plenty on the top cola that have darkened, but not near the bottom, so it probably has 2+ weeks to go. Bruce Banner has a lot of what looks like new vegetative growth, strangely, unless those are just new sugar leaves with no trichomes yet. The pistols are starting to darken, but I can't really see any trichomes with the naked eye yet. Hopefully it's not re-vegging since it has been growing for so long already. A lot of the old fan leaves are finally crispy enough for me to just pull off so I've been doing that as needed. For Gorilla Glue the pistols are finally darkening, but it continues to foxtail, probably because of the heat outside. I'm not really concerned about foxtailing as long as it eventually gets ready to harvest.

Looked at the trichomes and Northern Lights and Gorilla Glue look ready to harvest, so will begin to flush and plan on harvesting next week. Bruce Banner has me really puzzled. Most of the pistols have darkened, but under the endoscope the trichomes are very few and very tiny. Will post a grow question about it for some feedback. *** 7/14/23 update *** Chopped and tossed Bruce Banner on the consensus that it is over done. Went to try some Gorilla Glue from the first plant I harvested and found some seeds. Found some in Girl Scout Cookies also. *** 7/17/23 update *** Harvested the second and final Gorilla Glue plant. Planned on waiting till Wednesday or Thursday, but finding seeds in the others recently has me spooked. Harvested 60.5g wet weight. The buds were nice and frosty and sticky, so harvesting it was a pleasure! Found a couple seeds, but not many. My thoughts are the reason these strains have grown some seeds is because it has been so damn hot outside the past couple weeks. Also harvested the second and final Northern Lights plant. Harvested wet weight 65.7g. Buds were nice and dense compared to the other plants. Much less frosty and sticky than Gorilla Glue, and also had more "lettuce like" vegetative growth and dead leaves in the buds that I did my best picking out. Similarly, only found two seeds. *** 7/22/23 update *** Dry weights: Gorilla Glue: 19.7g, Northern Lights: 19.3g Up to this point my wet-to-dry conversion rate has been about 4, although for these it was closer to 3. Don't know if that's because I've become a better grower, because these yields are higher than my average, or because of the environmental conditions. It also could have something to do with these flowering for longer than the others. Who knows, but I'm not complaining! I broke apart the Northern Lights buds before putting in a jar to try to get rid of some of the dead brown leaves that were stuck between buds.