Wedding Cake: An Unkillable Clone's Tale

The Backstory- first attempt at propagating clones from my first grow did not go well. Equipment logistics led to the only available light for the clones less than what I wanted - 300 PPFD max at 8" with a STEEP dropoff. I basically gave up on them, I left the light on 24/7, figuring they needed all the light they could get. I also planted a bagseed earlier that was starting to take over and I didn't do much to correct it. Fast forward a bit, the tent and light arrive finally. I place my now-FLOWERING 8 wedding cake clones and the bagseed that had grown tall from reaching for more light into the tent and set it up, sans a proper humidifier for now. I turned the lights on 24/7 at 250-ish PPFD. After a couple of weeks nothing was looking very good and there were no signs of revegging. This, along with other personal issues at the time, caused me to literally give up on the entire tent. I didn't touch it for 2 weeks. No watering, no environment check, nothing. The first picture is the aftermath. I took a picture of the moment I opened the tent after ignoring it for so long. Surely after two weeks under 24/7 lights they would be dead. Not all, the bagseed and two clones lived on. A surprising selection from #1 and a healthy looking clone from #3. They will be the only survivors from this failed experiment as I culled the rest of the tent beside the two clones. Week ?: Finally watered. That's it. Probably should have transplanted. But I never do, no lie.

Week 2 (I guess): #1 Didn't make it. Just wasn't making any recovery, kept getting worse. I culled it. #3 is going strongish, now that it is being watered. I should transplant, but I never do.

Week 1 (yeah, we're starting over now): It revegged finally, or started to, not sure of the exact terminology. But growth is going great, and the single and 3 leaf pattern is a sign of recovery. Now we wait until normal leaf pattern returns, plans are to use this as a mom plant currently. She was Watered, the EB was treated with some goodies, and I still haven't transplanted and I won't.

Week 2: Well since the successful reveg I got back into taking care of this plant, a bit.. No amendments, still top watering at this point, as I am watering away from "the corner" to get the roots to stretch. Yes, mistakes were made, the poor thing was never transplanted. Oh well, I told you from the start I wouldn't ever transplant. Stick around to see how it goes.

Week 3, I guess: So there was unexpected growth in the last six days since pictured and I went right into defoliating and supercropping before remembering to take any pictures. Added a top dress of kashi, craft blend, and top watered with saponin and big 6 micros. Then I chopped up the defoliated leaves and added as additional mulch since I cant use the provided cover without a bunch of messing around. Just kind of letting this one roll at this point. Happy to have one survivor from the first grow, though in hindsight, this plant was the odd one out of the 3. #3 has more spice and pepper than berries, and little to no purpling compared to #1 and #2. Then again, #3 hits a little harder for some reason, so I'm not complaining.

Week whatever: I am just having fun with this grow at this point. Like, this is dumb, why did I never transplant it? This has got to affect and possibly limit the plant in some way right? Documented the amendment top-off this time, same as usual. Kashi and craft blend, worked in to top inch, covered with optional mulched defoliated leaves, wetted a bit. This time I ripped up some more defoliated leaves to add on top to keep the topsoil moist. Obviously I can't transplant it now, so no point in mentioning it anymore. This is how she will live.

Week: Didn't do much different this week. Less pics, maybe a busy week. No updates to speak of. She was watered and fed like normal, though I don't think there was any defoliation done this week.

Week Something: Behold - The Floating Wedding Cake. I should have tossed a pumpkin in the picture to finish the ghostly floating theme. Anyways. Shit, this got tall. Had to install the 2' extension on the tent, which should have been done already. Defoiliated to let some light through below, still more to do. Amended the top soil with the full pre-flower set - kashi, BoS Big 6, craft blend, Buildaflower, wetted with saponin laced water. Then I decided to just flip it. So I guess it's day 1 of flower I just remembered. Currently under the effects of the donor plant this clone came from. Set the lights to 12 hours when I got everything placed back correctly, I also set the PPFD to 600-ish max on center. I plan to raise the light as she goes and watch to see what stops me first, heat stress from not being able to cool it (temps dropping soon hopefully help) or not feeding up front enough (soil = slower from input to reaction) or something else I can't think of right now. Took a cheeky pic and the rest for the journal. I then remembered I needed to net it to hold back what I can and use for support later. I tried with the nylon stretch stuff and hated it. Ripped it down in the first grow, which was a mistake. This stuff is harder to prep and work with, but cheaper and ultimately I won't care if I need to cut it to keep the whole plants to hang to dry. Wish me luck, I am sure I will need it for the rest of this grow. Later days, buuuddy.

Week 2 Flower: Grows tall and thick. I ignored for too long, didn't want to stunt anything by defoliating. Started pulling top leaves. I am used to a larger tent with better access to all side of the plant so that is part of the reason I didn't tend to this plant. Autos only in this 2x2.5 from now on. Amendments arent all accurate, as the sizes are just the recommended amounts on the bags. Additionally, I didn't use KashiBLEND this week, instead I bought and used their new Kashi BLOOM. I did not use the peach fertilizer either, I got the watermelon type but same application in the soil. Both of those stink pretty strongly btw. Bloom saponin and big 6 went into the top watering jug and everything was top dressed. There is not much space left to grow height wise, but this strain didn't stratch much last time. Guess we'll see ...

Sh*t. I guess we weren't in flower. Apparently the light has been on 24/7 since what I thought was day 1 of flower, so 2 weeks. I hate my lights little display controller on their lights. And since the T22 won't connect and be controlled through my controller 69Pro, and I don't know why not, I am forced to set my schedule and light setting through the simple led display interface. You have to change the power level in the "ON" mode. But changing that setting also means you just put your light into "ON" mode. Why can't I change my settings without changing the current light configuration to whatever mode I am editing? So I change the settings and then forget to cycle back through to the "schedule 1" display, leaving the lights just "ON." Which I knew. so it's my fault for ignoring this tent so much and not being familiar with the equipment. Anyways.. Flower, WEEK 1 I GUESS. No wonder this thing was a forest. Amended for bloom again. Watermelon liquid ferment instead of peach, Kashi BLOOM instead of blend. Added the freeze dried coconut to the top watering with the saponin this time. Smells amazing. PPFD: 750 - 1000 (range from lowest to highest point across canopy) I guess I titled this diary correct at least, she is so far unkillable. After going through less than 200 PPFD for over a month as a clone sitting in an open basement at 20% Rh, going into flower, getting overshadowed by a larger plant in a new grow tent under 24 hours of light, enduring 2 straight weeks with no water at all under 24 hours of light, Revegging, then randomly going to 24 hours of light (she's a photoperiod still) under 600+ PPFD for 2 weeks before switching to 12/12, and all that while NEVER being transplanted from her seedling container. Amazed. You know what else is amazing, I let the clones flower again. I even had the little cloner thing I got from ACInfinity. Still in the packaging next to more mistakes. I wasn't going to run any clones next anyways. After the 2 clone fiascos and the $2 seeds that have not been smooth running, I am going reputable breeder and strain from seed for the next run in this tent. I will see if I can't course correct this plant. I may need to harvest in stages, which will force me to dry not using the tent, which may prove interesting to figure out. Plan will be to remove the skinny piddly lower growth next week, a lighter feeding may still be needed next week. Honestly, this thing is massive and the Earthbox still has some space on top, so 1 or 2 more full feedings would still fit. As always, my mistakes are on display for you to witness and learn from. Or at least be entertained.

Water only this week. Apparently that's not acceptable for this site so I made sure to add H20 as a nutrient... Flower, Week 3.. technically: Not correcting the journal right now, since I want to document the screw up accurately and so far this works. But I will label days into flower correctly. I fed 2 rounds of ferment before and fed heavily up to the this point so I feel good giving her a week before 1 or 2 last feeding(s). Light intensity: 1000 PPFD at highest point in canopy. I was able to get in there and raise the light up another 2"-3" (5cm-8cm). I also corrected a slight misalignment and angle on the light. Need to heavily defoliate. This will be done on day 19-21 of flower, depending on my availability. I did pluck a few fan leaves near the fan and raise the fan up a little. Found some weird white-opaque hollow things that were attached to at least 2 of the biggest and oldest fan leaves. Will post a question with the pics. Will load pics and update details if I figure it out. Update: Stink bug eggs. Gotta be. Going to lollipop and defoiliate a day early to clear out the foliage and get a better view of the internals of the plant. Just gotta walk this one to the finish line already.

Week like 3-4 of flower I think (lights left on 24/7 when I tried to flip. Didn't notice until 2 weeks later-ish, hence the unplanned-extra stretch): I thought I saw a web a while back and then those odd little pearls on the stems of the leaves were weird. This thing is also very tall, and in the shorty tent with the extension it makes it difficult to look at the entire plant at the same time. I usually access the lower from the front of the tent and the canopy from the back. All that to say I didn't look at the canopy for 2 weeks. I basically just watered and gave her whatever I gave the Nutter Butter x Pistachio's from my other growdiary. Some liquid Watermelon ferment added today, same day as defol and all the pics. Seeing the roots poke up under the mulch. So I accessed the front of the tent to add water and the amendments. Cleaned up a little of the extra foliage that was super low before starting from the top. Around back, I half expected an infestation or something bad. But, I mean, they are looking pretty stacked. The smell is so strong. It's like I walked into some dessert bakery's final prep area. Pure sugar, with that touch of spice that was so prevalent in the smoke of the donor plant of this clone. PPFD is 1100 in spots, 500 in the corners. So as long as she doesn't respond terribly to the defoiliation, I am cautiously optimistic. I will remove those wire hanger things from the light and just attach it to the ceiling poles, which should give me 3 more inches of clearance, and some better coverage. It really is amazing to think this was a flowered clone destined for the trash. And to add irony to the story: I took clones of this just in case I wanna run it a third time....and they ended up flowering (Didn't use the cloner, my fault)..... So I am Revegging a clone of this Revegged clone currently. I'm most interested to see the difference between this and the donor plant's bud. Some fancier amendments added this time, but definitely mistreated, and under a different light. Update: Did one last defoiliation as there was still so much left that won't turn out and will steal energy from the rest. Got a pic of the entire thing. It's terrible and I wasn't going to post it but I am chucking it at a contest. During the defol a visitor commented that the house stank like diesel. PAR Map added of light measurement at canopy. See Week 5 flower of my Nutter Budder x Pistachio diary for details on how I get my light measurements all for less than $20-ish. 'til next time

Week 4-ish of flower, I think: No change to lights since last week. Ran out of Buildaflower, still waiting for the shipment. Used Malibu worm compost as topdress to cover the KashiBloom. Wetted in with buildabloom, saponin, big6, and coconut powder. Its interesting to see the structure vs the donor plants structure. Also, the clone of this is healthy and in need of pruning. I just realized how stupid this thing is going to be to try and flip to hang dry as a whole plant.

The usual feeding except some worm compost to help replace the Buildaflower I am waiting on. Some chunky colas, probably 4 good sized, have started to really stand out. Smells like I remember, sugar not too sweet though, there is some spice. A pretty hands off sort of week for this one again.

Week 7: Watered in water soluble amendments. Filled with tap water when resevoirs were dry. She is getting chonky on a few branches. Didn't move the light up because they haven't given me any sign I need to. I'd have better spread if I did but at this point I'm letting her ride. Might pose some difficulty trying to hang the entire plant by the stalk, it's very tall. Probably another 2 weeks at least. The mother plant was harvested on day 69F. But that shouldn't mean much since this one is in a different tent, under a different light, grown in a different season, vegged for longer, treated poorly, fed different and more amendments. So I am interested to see how different this cultivar strays from the mother plant's phenotypical expression I saw in my first grow. It's insane to think that this thing has probably been alive for close to 6 months. Might miss next week. Or it'll be a picture palooza, who knows. Happy Holidays, Growmies!

Probably closer to week 26 or something because this thing has been alive for too damn long. But no longer, she has been cut down. To no one's surprise, it was a pain to flip this and hang the entire plant. About 8-9 solid chunky colas, the rest of the canopy is 50% smaller but dense tops, and 50% airy popcorn that I will press. I didn't do any formal training or have any goal in mind so I am happy with the result. This was more of a learning experience for me than anything. I intend to keep better care of the cultivars that go through this tent going forward. But I am glad to have grown out this one, it'll hold a special spot in my heart. Weights are N/A, btw. Still need to trim and I don't weigh the entire plant when I hang it to dry, don't have a fish scale.