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Followed paper-towel germination instructions from Blimburn to the tee, but only one seed of three popped. Have three more seeds, will have to see if they are equally poor or I just messed up this batch.
Vegged on bottom shelf of setup with lettuce plants. Topped once it had 6 nodes. Growing well, but not a lot of height on the bottom shelf to veg, and top shelf was set to 12/12 for flowering plants which were supposed to be finished by then.
Time to flip, moved to top shelf. Unfortunately other plants were out of control and hogging all the light. Poor little LSD plant didn't get a ton of light. Nutes were also tailored to other plants late-bloom rather than LSD in early bloom.
Defoliated other plants to get enough light down to this little plant. Also added some side LED bars (the blurple ones) to keep it alive. Other plants are almost ready to harvest after a series of mishaps. Removed some lower leaves which weren't doing well due to lack of light. Found out later, my PH pen had drifted so all plants were growing in near-battery-acid conditions (PH ~4.0).
FINALLY harvested the other plants so this plant finally got the space and light it deserved. Distributed the tops gently across the squares of a ScrOG grid. Found and fixed PH pen issue, so PH is now set to actually 6.0, which hopefully unlocks more nutrient access. Plant seems to be responding well to new changes, hopefully it doesn't end up too too stunted from poor conditions before.
How often should I re-calibrate my PH pen? I have a cheap Milwaukee pH600 and after 3 months of use it had drifted enough to cause real damage (was reading 5.8 when chemical drops read ~4.0). Alternatively, is there a reasonably priced option that would avoid this?
Calibrate your meters monthly is whats generally recommended. I don't personally do that because i am lazy. I usually calibrate before the start of a new grow and then just ride that through. After awhile you will get to know where your water sits and what you need to add to get the pH in range. You'll get familiar with the routine and will spot something out of wack if it's severe. Slight changes like 0.2 are hard if not impossible to detect. That may not seem like much, but with a pH of 5.8 when it's actually 5.6 because your pen didn't read accurate can cause an issue in nutrient availability.
Rinse off your pH meter after use with tap water. Don't touch the glass bulb, ever. Shake the tap water off or wipe the plastic exterior, then place the cap back on the meter. The glass bulb can not dry out so get yourself some storage solution to pour into the cap. Some people use tap water which i don't recommend. Probe storage solution is reasonably cheap, and is designed specifically for 1 purpose and will last you years.
Lots of pH correction this week - last batch of nutes continued to drop the pH dangerously low every day. I think the Mega Crop may not have dissolved all the way at first and did kind of a slow-release. New batch of nutes seems to be doing the same, but to a lesser degree. Installed a prototype of a custom measurement system so now getting notified if pH drops/rises dramatically.
Buds have fattened up some, and leaves have filled out. Leaves are all green, but have curled tips still, not sure how to fix that. Turned fan down and moved light a little further away, but no luck yet. Upper fan leaves have pink stems. Removed some of the bottom leaves that hadn't been doing great because of lack of light.
Smell is starting to get nice, but still faint. Trichomes are starting to show.
Slow growth this week, and claw leaves and pink stems stayed the same despite a fresh batch of nutrients. Flushed pot with lots of pH corrected water and reduced PPM after in hopes of resolving this.
pH has been much more stable this week hanging out somewhere between 5.8 and 6.2 at all times. There seems to be some swing between night and day which I think might be temp correction of the probe.
Solid week, working on dialing in automation system. I was out of town for the weekend and it was really cool to be able to check on pH/EC while I was away. New batch of nutrients with less mega crop and a little more Liquid Cool Bloom for PK.
Fall weather means the humidity has dropped. I was seeing temps of 75 in the tent with humidity as low as 25%. After doing some digging, this is definitely not ideal in terms of VPD. In the short term I've been spritzing the leaves with some water once or twice a day to keep humidity around 40%. Seeing some brown tips from what looks like light burn. Sounds like this is expected if VPD goes too high, so hoping it will go away with higher humidity and/or lower temps.
Not sure if I'm going to have to harvest part of the plant first - some stems have 5 petal leaves and almost no pistils left. No amber trichomes, but otherwise look almost ready. Two new branches have been growing quickly. These have 3 pointed leaves, lots of pistils, and the flowers are much less mature. Is it possible for a plant to have a genetic mutation only in some parts?
Finally got a humidifier and it seems to be making a difference. Able to keep the VPD around 1.3 during the day instead of 2.0 now.
Plants are drinking more water, I think that's a good thing, probably means transpiration was blocked because of VPD too high?
Not much else to report. Not seeing amber trichomes yet, so got another week or two at least even on the older buds. That makes sense to me as this plant was so stunted during early flower.
Edges of leaves on some branches are turning yellow at week 9 of flower - does this look like nutrient burn? light burn? heat stress?
Lower leaves seem to be effected too, so I'm thinking not light burn?
Super high N locking out K. possibly high N and low K.
Glossy is the N - the leaves are very shiny it seems. The burns around tips is the K deficiency (one way or another).
Good week of growth, new buds are filling out and old buds continue to mature. Humidifier seems to be a game changer for growth. I've been able to keep VPD below 1.5 during the days now and the plants just seem a lot happier that way. I'm a little worried about how high the humidity is to sustain this though, it regularly crests 60% which feels too high for this stage of flower. Vent fan is on full though, so don't really have a way to lower temps to hit the target VPD with less humidity.
Not 100% sure on harvest time, but I'm thinking something like another 2 weeks. Just planted next batch of seeds (Blackberry Moonrocks Auto) so will need to harvest before the seedlings outgrow the veg shelf.
Buds continue to bulk up and ripen. Added a second set of side lights this week to try to ripen up larpy lower buds. Removed some lower leaves that weren't getting light as well as some that were blocking lower buds.
Mostly clear trichomes still, but some milky ones on riper buds. I'm thinking two more weeks, but going to check the trichomes every couple of days from here to harvest.
Deficiency/toxicity doesn't seem to getting better. At this point I'm going to just ride it out and harvest.
Harvested a test cola this week since I started to see some amber! Without the scrog, the colas are HEAVY and I almost snapped the stem the carrying it out of the tent. Loose trimmed for hash and fresh froze.
3-pointed leaf branches have lots of clear trichs now and some milky, but I haven't spotted any amber. Probably going to harvest those branches next weekend.
Nutrient toxicity/deficiency hasn't improved visibly, but this plant is close enough I'm not terribly worried. Might impact yield somewhat, but at this point it is what it is. I'm formulating nutrients for the new plants on the veg shelf now.
Harvested branches as they ripened since some had very different readiness.
Overall measured 500g of buds loose trimmed which I froze for bubble hash and eventually rosin. Had another 3 good sized branches which I have hung to dry. Conservatively estimating this at another 150g. Good yield for a small, stunted plant IMO.
Unfortunately I found a ton of immature seeds in the wash after making bubble - looks like this hermed along the way and I just didn't notice until washing? Good news is the hash has a nice light color and doesn't seem to be effected. Yield was ~4% from loose trimmed fresh frozen. Have to decide what to do with the curing branches, might try a test smoke and if I get fireworks I'll make flower rosin or edibles or something.
@Lemonhazelover, my gardeners hand isn't so good that's why I have to automate most stuff lol. Appreciate it though, I'm excited to see how this one turns out!
Wow buddy!! super nice buds
What an amazing grow so far - good job and well done 🤝
Happy Growing & cant wait for your upcoming weeks 🌱
Cheers, Bud Boutique 👩🌾💚
Lala_grows
