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Well for my first grow ever i have setup a small tent DWC system. I am very fortunate to get my hands on these ladies. This is a clone from a Barney's Farm Critical Kush mother that i have had the pleasure of smoking for the past 5 years. They are well rooted and look great so a nice head start for me. I mixed up some light nutes (300ppm) and gave them a dip, and set them on my heating mat. Tomorrow they go into the DWC.
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Day 2: DWC reservoir setup inside my 3x2 tent. The girls were planted and we are off.
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Day 3: Quickly found my drip system to be completely unnecessary, so i removed it, lol.
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Day 4: PH was creeping up to 6.61 so 2ml ph down took it to 5.81
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Day 7: Gingers largest fan leaf was getting crusty, I'm guessing from the stress of cloning, so both girls got the 2 largest fan leaves trimmed. It Really opened up the light to the new growth below.
These girls are needing to be topped, but since i just put them into the dwc system should i wait untill the roots have reached down into the water? Or is the rootball in the rockwool good enough to go ahead and top them, so they can get on with recovering from the stress?
Hi @Cultus! In this scenario, I would act by priority, and give them a few days to build strong roots. When you top, you can remove as many nodes as you want, it's even better to wait for 1-2 nodes to develop above the topped node, plants will recover faster. If your goal was to top at node 3 [for example], you could do it now and take the risk of a long recovery time, or you can do it in a week, by removing a bigger part of the plant, but with a shorter recovery time and a strong root system. Hope this will help, keep us up-to-date and happy growing 👊
Day 8: Roots are through and looking great!
Day 10: with the roots sucking up nutes now, i was starting to see some nute burn on the largest oldest fan leaves so a water change and reduction of ppm to 400. trimmed a few of the old leaves.
Day 11: Roots are exploding and the girls are stretching, overdue for a topping! These girls took it like a champ, never skipped a beat.
Day 12: Began LST, mostly on Mary Ann, she has been 2 days ahead from the start
Day 15: Wow they are really responding to the training. Ginger got more training today and recovered in a matter of hours. Both girls looking great, time to step up the nutes a bit.
Its been a great week for the girls. Training and adjustments every other day with a little defoliation and they have responded very well.
They seem to be sucking back alot of water and now i have to do regular top offs. Did a water change today, got a good look at eh roots and Voodoo Juice seems to be doing a great job. Tonite i think i will flip them to 12/12
First week of Flowering in the books!
Added Sensizym to help breakdown dead root material and Bud Candy for carbohydrates. New rez mixture at 800ppm and they seemed to love that all week, sucking back over a litre of water a day, adding ph adjust RO water only. By the end of the week i was down to 678ppm.
Stem structure is looking thick and strong, and the girls have filled out really well. Lots of bud sites starting to stretch out. The smell is very pleasant now and will fill the room if i leave the tent open for 5 min. Roots continue to look good. I am excited to start week 2 of flowering, and adding Bid Bud to the mix. I hope to see some buds develop soon!
What a week! Congrats to all my fellow Canadians with legalization on 10-17. I celebrated by standing in line with like like minded people, got some swag from a tweed rep and picked up an 1/8 of Blue Dream. A very nice sativa with a great energetic high. But still a bit expensive, so i ended the day ordering a 1/2 ounce each of Wappa and White Shark from my medical provider, LOL
Second week of flowering has me at full strength nutes finally, and added Big Bud to the line up.
And the girls are just loving the Advanced Nutrients lineup, really soaking up alot of water every day. PH has been really stable now that i am at full strength, and i have just had to top off with RO water.
they have added about 4 inches this week and gotten very full. It seems like i am raising the lamp every other day.
Lots of buds are starting to form. I cleared some room for them by defoliating quite a few of the older fan leaves. Getting Excited!
Another week of flowering done and the girls are looking fantastic! Soooo many buds! One day after the reservoir change my pH had climbed up to about 6.6. The water going in tested good, so i'm not sure why but after adjusting it held good all week. A bit more light defoliation and both girls are developing tons of trichomes!
Flowering day 33 brings an end to this week and the girls seem primed to fatten up! The root structure looks great and has become enormous. Some leaves discolored from pH fluctuations. The smell has become so strong, i have to resist the urge to leave the tent open too long because it will quickly fill the room.
I am still seeing a rise in pH immediately following a reservoir change. I am letting my mix sit for several hours before the change and it tests perfect at 5.8 before the test, the old mix tests good at 5.9 But over the next 12-24 hours it will rise to about 6.5, i adjust it and it stays good for the rest of the week. I am seeing some discoloring of the leaves from the pH swing but nothing too bad. I will continue to keep a close eye on it.
Well my pH challenges continue. The leaves continue to get brown spots and seem to be getting darker green. I was trying too hard to keep the pH at 5.8 and not letting it swing within the 5.5 to 6.5 range, so i have started to only make adjustments when it approaches those numbers. Too compound my own mistakes my cheap Chinese pH meter is a piece of shit, and i have no faith it whatsoever. It behaves weirdly, initially reading high then very slowly it lowers. it can take a minute before it gets to the final reading. Needless to say i am fed up with it and i have ordered a Blue Labs pen.
So hopefully i have not caused too much damage as the girls enter the final 15-20 days of flowering. New pH meter will be here soon and i will do all i can to keep it stable for the final push. The smell is amazing and they are very sticky, plus the root system looks fantastic. Definitely looking forward to harvest! Which also has me getting ready for my second grow, more Barney's Farm goodness in Laughing Buddha, which i am hoping with be the sativa i am looking for!
Sorry for the late post, thanks for looking!
Sorry for another laste posting, i have 2 weeks to update now lol.
Well spotting continues and expected with pH issues. The Blue Labs meter showed up this week and wow, what a difference. The quality is obvious, and so far it has been worth every penny, i only wish i had gotten one sooner! So after a reservoir change my pH would rise by the next day and i would (incorrectly) lower it and it would seem to be good, but with the new meter i was quite low and had to raise the pH for the last few days. So unfortunately damage done at a critical time, but i am gonna do my best for their last 2 weeks, scaling back the nutes to 3/4 for the last week then the flush. Thanks all
Well it gets worse before it can get better. Mostly spotted and crusty fan leaves, and bud development mostly slowing to a crawl are clear evidence of my extended low pH issues. The day after a rez change the pH still rises a bit, but i am no longer correcting that. Then each morning after that it would be low in the 5.4 range, so i add a touch of pH up to get to 6.2 and next day its back to 5.5, but they are drinking healthy and the ppm stays about the same despite adding ph+ daily.
The girls are much happier now and despite looking like crap, have started to fatten up their buds again. Flush starts now and i plan to give them as long as possible and wait for quite a few amber trichomes. I have been so impressed with Blue Labs pH pen i have ordered the ppm pen to go with it. I need this to be successful in order to be able to afford what i need medically, so having the right tools is critical to help mitigate my inexperience! The girls may not be magazine cover material any more but they are still beautiful and smell amazing! Thanks for looking!
Harvest is just days away and i am still unsure what to do. Please give me your best advise on cutting and drying. Should i cut and hang the whole plant or individual branches? Trim fan leaves immediately or wait? How long do i hang it to dry? What about the popcorn and shake?
hey man starts with the flush, one day or two just plain water 12 hours of darkness not more than 24hours , then chop + hang the whole plant why? so that the photosynthesis chemicals go to the stem and the stalks and leaves, drying it is important, most commercial grows dry it over 12-14 days with no cure, at our level we still want to dry it slow, whatever you can do to keep the RH relatively high + the room cool 20-22 °C is the best, basically the plant will tell you when it's done : just select a popcorn nug and pull until it snaps off audibly from the plant. that's when it's ready if it's not ready you'll get stringyness to it or it won't really snap. All you have to do then is trim then straight into miron glass jars. i noticed real nice results with the miron glass , cures the trykes better somehow they stay intact better. The first week you want to inspect the bud daily, completely remove it from the jar then re-jar. the second week throw in a boveda 58 or 62% and keep inspecting daily the second week (even though you don't really need to do that with the boveda in there...) then only inspect once a week for 4 more weeks and you should have perfectly cured bud ! hope this helps my friend , wish i could TASTE ! 🚀
I hope everyone had a great christmas! Sorry to be so far behind in updates, harvest, dry, and cure is pretty much done, this week is the flush and i still need to start my second grow diary of Laughing Buddha, so i will get on with it already!
Well the leaves show alot of damage and they pretty much stopped growing for a week or 2 but by the flush they did start to swell again thankfully! Just makes me think of what could have been, but i am still very happy with how they turned around. I let them flush for almost 2 weeks and waited till i had a few amber trichomes, maybe 10% and OMG the smell was GLORIOUS, such a stinky weed ! Harvest coming ASAP!
I've tried 12 strains in 2018 and Critical Kush is definitely my favorite and highly recommended. It provides a great body high that really helps me forget about the neuropathy in my hands and feet.
The flavour is earthy and it smokes very smooth for a high THC strain. It is one of the stinkiest strains ive smoked, and everyone i have shared it with, mentions the smell.
Equipment issues combined with my noobness limited my harvest, but in the end i was happy to get 2 ounces. My buds were smallish and my tent was warm and dry so i only hung them for 4 days and after a couple weeks of curing they are tasting excellent! I have learned a great deal during this grow and i am very excited for bigger and better things with my next one! I am attempting to tame a sativa beast in Barney's Laughing Buddha with mainlining. Thank you all for following!
Thank you @OutForReal, @CRiSPrGrow and @CrazyDiamond, all great info.
I am concerned with drying too fast since my buds are small and the outside temp here have dropped to -17C which drops the RH in the house to 35% at best.
In the tent with the lights on and ventilation it can drop below 30% I have a humidifier in the house and it will run as much as i can keep it filled, but what RH do you guys think i should aim for?
@CrazyDiamond, yeah miron glass is my little discovery from this summer, i used it and i can tell it cures the trykes really differently, they sort of retain their "structural integrity" better... cool beans ! 🚀
@Cultus, what matters is the RH of the bud itself not the outside RH....so you want to dry until the bud has an RH of around 62-55 %... problem is that you can't really tell the RH of inside the bud unless you have a really fancy hygrometer, but I'm guessing the 1500 investment is not on the cards 😂, the best is to do the snap test like @crazydiamond said , when small buds audibly snap off, you're ready to jar. It's nerve racking, but as long as they end up in jars you'll be okay.... only so much you can really do at our level you know....
@Cultus, 35% its OK. If you cut whole the plant, without triming leafs, with temps 20-22*C it will dry for a month, untill you'll heare the "crack" of stems, may be more. But bud mold and decomposition of organic material take a place as well. The lower humidity and higher temps - the dry is faster. Fast dry, - means no bud mold, less organic decomposition, unless you dry in real high temps, like 40*C and higher. Curing its another story, apesialy with miron glass jars and boveda, minimal organic decomposition and stable humitity alows you to provide maximum convertion of cannabinods to THC. Its realy high quality stuff! You can cure it for two - three month in that conditions! Tanks to Bulbi i've lerned somthig new today...
Ph meters are the bain of my life, drive me nuts , i have 2 at all times that i know are correct , i used to use AN but i had issues, mainly with ph fluctuation, looks good tho so make sure you give it a good flush :)
im sure that they also say to use too much on bottle, i used 3/4 strength, and i reckon they need a cal mag even tho they say they dont :)
@BigDaddyK, I use AN as well mate. Their products do have a ph of 5.5 but when adding it to water you would need a lot of nutrients to get it to 5.5 so you would probably still need to lower it in hydro. In soil I’ve never adjusted my ph with AN products as it sits at 6.5 with them. Also there isn’t enough micro nutrients in them. Avoid cal mag as it tends to have high nitrogen. I use ‘mono Calcium’ and mono magnesium. It’s strong so I water 0.1 per litre every watering and I’ve never had any issues with either. Hope this helps!
@BigDaddyK, some great advice there there! I have dropped back to 3/4 for the last week of nutes and will definitely be more conservative with it for my second grow. It's just nice to have one meter i can have faith in!
@Cultus, I moved my 3 Samsquach OG to a friends tent as I have to move at the end of Jan. They are doing ok, but I can hardly call it my grow any longer. I will get something going in Feb possibly.
If you drop them bases down to about 10ml/g your kush will really appreciate you! Probably help you with pH too. To see what I mean go look at the budsize on my Zombie kush (fed heavy) then look at the fat buds on my LA Confidential (fed light).
Thanks @Tazard, i enjoy checking out your grows, very impressive! Do you shoot for a target ppm? I need to get my next week posted but i did take it down to about 950ppm for the last week before flush. I will be much lighter with my second grow of Laughing Buddha, seedlings are doing very well! ( another thing i need to get posted)
@Cultus Glad you got that PH issue sorted :) mate, I had a sample of my critical kush, i'm about a week behind with my updates, so i stripped off a few lower buds for airflow and due to me being impatient to try.
Well i kid you not, I've smoked some good bud, generally i prefer the Blueberry Indica's and AK sativa leaning hybrids. but the girl.. wow - heavy heavy hitter.
I was on a couple of days off work and on my own, so i thought lets have a blast before i take the dog - dog in in yard at this point and it's 5:45am - one bowl - a good 8 inch steamroller bowl.. bang I'm out like a light on the couch for three hours, poor dog! so quick walk, lots of dog treats and a nice fire in the burner to say sorry for leaving him hanging for three hours. another bowl and wtf three more hours on the couch spark-O.. oh yeah very frigging nice smoke, but it's going in the fireup and forget (everything) jar! lol - remember this is early bud sample I'd have said 75% cloudy 25% clear.
IDK what she going to do come Easter when she is cured out and i'm back on the smoke - but can't wait to forget all about it! :) - (I'm now on a four month T-Break 25yrs chronic smoking catches up eventually so now i take T-breaks every once in a while but proper, pee strip self testing need to reset my CB1 and CB2 receptors occasionally.. :) "This girls is so good one bowls will last yer four months!! haha" )
Hope you are as impressed with your ladies, looking like yours will recover to nice fat heavy nugs - may the herb be by your side.
Happy Smokes
box
@SlimJamie, yes, nearly daily with the cheap chinese pen, lol
Seriously i was calibrating it every 2 weeks and more often after having issues. It just behaved weird. it would get a reading in say 10-20 seconds. And i have since learned that it will continue to drift for several minutes before it came to a reasonably acurate value which was quite a bit off from what i though was the reading. At least i am learning alot with this grow, lol
@Cultus, 3 things: one, awesome diy bucket you have there! Two, it's not a waste to have top water as you can use it for smaller plants/seedlings some day. Three, and most importantly I strongly suggest you order some hydroguard and put it in your basin asap. You have some high temps there and hydroguard will help pythium which creates root rot.It will help keep your roots nice and white with the higher temp water/air. Good luck with your grow!
@BeefWellingtons, thanks bud, that is some great advice and root rot is something i want to keep a close eye out for. The B52 does make the mix a bit brown, so maybe some of that is coming through in my pics, but so far the Voodoo Juice seems to be doing a great job, i added a couple pics from this morning. My res temps are only slightly above the ideal range and definitly something i am monitoring daily.
Hi @Cultus! In this scenario, I would act by priority, and give them a few days to build strong roots. When you top, you can remove as many nodes as you want, it's even better to wait for 1-2 nodes to develop above the topped node, plants will recover faster. If your goal was to top at node 3 [for example], you could do it now and take the risk of a long recovery time, or you can do it in a week, by removing a bigger part of the plant, but with a shorter recovery time and a strong root system. Hope this will help, keep us up-to-date and happy growing 👊
@Cultus They are looking real nice, looking sharp after their trim 😎 i waiting to see the stretch, they look like they are going to by chunky ass ladies though 😍
Looking nice and full there! I'm loving the healthy green color. I'm curious to see what they look like in a week from now as they finish the stretch. Best of luck Cultus! 😎
Well i seem to be guilty of being TOO strict with mt pH.
I am continuing to get more brown spots on my leaves which i believe to be a calcium deficiency, but not because my nutrient solution is lacking, but rather i have been locking it out keeping the pH right at 5.8 and not letting it drift over 6 to get access to the calcium.
So from now on i will only make adjustments when it drifts outside of the 5.5 to 6.5 range and for now i adjusted it to 6.1 for a couple days till next rez change. Bud growth seems to have slowed a bit, so hopefully this will improve things and make my girls happy!
Cultus
