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I put my soil (mothers earth terracraft) into 2 5gal grow bags. It didn't fill it all the way to the top. I also heavily watered each pot, 1 gal each of spring water. They are going in my tent now to sit under the light and warm up. I watered them the same amount but one seems to be significantly more wet than the other. I watered and then turned all the dirt with my hands to make sure every inch was really wet. Going to let them dry out for a day or so and then plant my seeds directly into the pots. Any advice is welcome. This is my first ever time growing anything.
Today I went back and mixed up the soil again with some dry soil to lower the overall moisture level. I've got my tent temp at about 75-78. I'm putting my humidity up around 70% rh for the germination. When I get the right Temps and humidity, I will be putting my seeds in the soil. Update on that later.
just planted my seeds in the soil and covered them with saran wrap for RH. Trying to keep tent around 75 to 78 degrees and rh around 70 for germination.
Its only been roughly 24 hours nothing has sprouted yet. Keeping light on 24/7 to keep temp up around 75. Keeping RH around the same 70-75%. Will update later. I just misted the soil ever so lightly. I took the saran wrap off and put a couple plastic tubberwares over it. I feel like that works better with a fabric grow pot
48 hrs update: no sign of seedling popping through the soil. I'm hoping the see them tomorrow or the next day.
Day 1: woke up today and one seed had sprouted!!!!!! Not sure if I'm supposed to keep dome on or not, but I'm going to at least till I come home from work.
Got home from work and the other has sprouted also.
Day 2: just been misting the top of soil lightly. The bottom of my pot still feels pretty damp so I'm not thinking I'll have to water them till over the one week mark or more.
Day 3 10/30: Not a whole lot of progress. Plants are getting bigger just really slow.
Gave soil a light misting after work around 9pm. Pots are starting to feel lighter but I think I'm gonna hold off a couple days on water.
Day 4: used some soil to propped my larger seedling up slightly. It was semi leaning to one side.
What is the best way to water a pot of this size? It seemed like it nearly took the whole gallon before water started coming out the bottom. What amount of water will I be using in a week or two when I do my first initial watering?
You can use the finger test and actually pick the potter up to judge its weight. 1 gallon of water is 8 lbs. So you will notice a considerable difference between wet and dry substrate.
I dump 2 liters of water in a 3 gallon fabric pot and that seems to wet everything nicely. Plants are happy and in need of water every 3 days.
For 5 gallons, try 4 liters of water. If you want some runoff then maybe 5 or 6 liters. Depends on how you apply the water too. If you just douche it in fast you'll get some that leaks through the fabric and out the sides. Pour it in more slowly and it will penetrate the soil better and more evenly.
If you are growing Photo Periods i would not plant a germinated seed into a 5 gallon pot right off the bat. You'll likely over water it and kill it.
If it's auto's you intend on growing, you won't need a 5 gallon pot. 3 gallon is a much better size for auto's because they don't grow a huge root mass. Your roots will likely never touch the sides of your 5 gal pot or the bottom.
Day 1: woke up today and one seed had sprouted!!!!!! Not sure if I'm supposed to keep dome on or not, but I'm going to at least till I come home from work.
Got home from work and the other has sprouted also.
Day 2: just been misting the top of soil lightly. The bottom of my pot still feels pretty damp so I'm not thinking I'll have to water them till over the one week mark or more.
Day 3 10/30: Not a whole lot of progress. Plants are getting bigger just really slow.
Gave soil a light misting after work around 9pm. Pots are starting to feel lighter but I think I'm gonna hold off a couple days on water.
Day 4: used some soil to propped my larger seedling up slightly. It was semi leaning to one side.
Day 5: not much to report. The bottom of the fabric pot seems to be drying up. I think tomorrow is going to be their first watering. Maybe 2 days away. I will update. Keeping Temps and RH consistent. Around 75 each. I definitely see more leaves about to sprout out the top of seedling.
Day 6: seedlings are getting bigger. I'm still thinking about holding off water for another day but I'm not completely sure. Update: Definitely going to wait till tomorrow night to water, I'm still seeing decent growth so imma let it go till tomorrow night. Then I'll do the first water of this seedling.
Day 7: leaves on top are getting bigger. I will do my first water around 7pm tonight. Going to start with roughly a gallon and see if I get a little run off with that amount. After first water I won't water them again till the pot is completely dry.
FIRST WATERING: I watered both of my 5 gallon fabric pots with about 0.4 gallons of water each. I was able to obtain run off with this amount and the whole bottom of my fabric pot is wet. I will not water again till my pot is dry. My dry weight of my pot is 12 lbs. When I hit that mark I will think about water again.
About to do my first water, 7 days in with seedlings. Using mother earth terracraft soil. 70% soil 30% perlite. How much should I water? Should I water till run off or much more lightly? Keeping temp and rh around 75. 5 gallon pots. Don't want to over do their first water.
I was recommended to use 500ml water in a ring around the plant, about the width of the leaves, until big enough to fully water the whole pot.. but I’m really just here to wish you good luck with your grow because I have overwatered and stunted every single plant ever started in a too big pot and I’m afraid of autos now
Hi bro, hope you enjoying your grow so far 😁1 week without water at all? I would recommend you to start with approx. 100-150ml around the seedlings and moist entire pot surface with bottle sprayer. Keep spraying the surface every couple of hours and keep watering every 2-3 days. Keep humidity above 70%. Hope this help.
Best of luck ✨🍀✨
Big pots for a small plant(I know....autos) will wick moisture away from your small root zone. Small frequent watering in a small ring around your plant is probably the best way to start. Increase as growth accelerates. Once your plant is big enough to truly be "feeding" is when you're gonna want to water until you get runoff.
Day 8 since sprout: last night was their first water. I planted them in wet soil to begin with so they wouldn't have to drink for a while. It took 0.5 gallons per plant yesterday to achieve run off, watering slowly.
Day 9 11-5-23: checked on them this morning 11am. I've noticed some slight curl upwards in a couple really small areas. Not sure of the cause. Will post pictures. I did raise my light a couple inches last night. It's now sitting around 24 inches. It was around 22inches. I've been running it 100% its a vs1000 100w grow light.
Update: I've now raised my lights to 29 inches. It's reading about 260 ppfd around the plants level. I think I was blasting them too hard. Also going to start giving them some darkness tomorrow morning. I'll set my lights to automatically cut off around 5am till 9am. I'll run 20 on 4 off.
Day 10 (11-6): nothing new to really report. Mostly slower growth that's been happening. I raised my lights up and started giving them rest in the early morning for 5 hours. I think they will get another watering tonight. I also ordered a moisture meter to help me double check that they need a drink. Don't want to over water them.
Just got my 4 in 1 soil tester in today. It is saying soil is wet-wet plus. So I think I'll hold off for now. Going to use the meter while also weighing the pot to know when to water.
Day 11 (11/7)
Just bought another moisture meter. Both are reading that soil is still moist, so I will not be watering again until those readings go down. I would rather be cautious and underwater than over water. My plants seem to he happy so I'm gonna keep it simple and let them do their thing. I'll post a pic of my meters. I have been lightly misting the soil, not the plants, everyday just to keep top layer semi damp.
Thinking about lowering my lights again A slight bit. Going to try to get around 450-475 ppfd at plant level.
Day 12 (11/8): not a whole lot to report. I did swap my plants around. The one on the right started getting bigger so I was wondering if it was a difference in lighting. Still haven't watered since day 7. Plants look happy, soil meter is still reading decent moisture levels, so I'm gonna let them keep rocking.
Update. Potentially one plant has some semi drooping leaves. I will wait till tomorrow and see how it appears then. This is the pot closest to my fan, so I think it gets dried out faster than the other pot. So I've swapped the pots around and will continue checking on them and waiting for them to tell me what they need.
Day 13 (11/9): raised my lights back up to 26 inches. I'm thinking 26 and up is the sweet spot for my light for seedling/veg stage. Noticed a little slight curl again so that's the reason for raising.
Day 14 (11/10): one of the plants is slightly droopy today so I'm going to water it when I get home. It was right in front of the fan so I think it dries out faster than the other one. Now I have a better idea of when they will need water, at least at this stage.
8pm 11/10: gave them about half a gallon each watering today. I slowly water the soil with half a gallon on both plants, then come back and do the same thing again after the soil is nice and moist. Only difference between last and this time, is I tried to water much more slowly. I'm thinking my next watering will include nutrients.
One plant is definitely much larger than the other at this point, but nothing I'm concerned with at the moment.
Day 15 (11/11): swapped to an 18/6 light schedule last night. One plant is still much smaller than the other but it seems to be developing fine, so I'm not too worried yet. The stem on the smaller one isn't quite as thick either. That's the only thing that worries me.
Day 16 (11/12): starting to get some yellow in the veins of the leafs. I definitely will need to feed them at their next watering. I assume the slight yellowing means they are getting low on something.
Day 17 (11/13): new growth happening all the time but my plants are still really short. I'm not sure If that's normal or not. Developing fine just not very tall.
Day 18 (11/14): maybe thinking it might be time for a watering tonight or tomorrow. Had 7 days between my first feeding and 7 days between my second feeding. Probably only going to go 4 or 5 days this time. I will be adding a very light dose of nutrients. More on that later.
(11/14) 10:51pm. Just watered roughly half a gallon per 5 gallon pot. I also added in 1ml of calmag, 1 ml of gh micro flora series, 1ml of gh bloom flora series. This is less than 1/4 of a dose per nutrient, I started really light just to see how they react. More to come in the morning.
The past two times I've watered, it was about 7 days between each watering. This time I only waited 4 days. The pots were right around my 12lb mark that I decided was close to the dry weight of my soil in the pot. So I went for it. Let's see what they look like tomorrow. The bigger plant has some light areas so we will see if that corrects itself with the nutrients. The other one really looked fine its just small compared to the other one.
Day 19 (11/15) today the plants were sitting very nicely after their first feeding. Last night when I fed them, both plants started to droop pretty heavily, but that has subsided as of this morning. I'm not going to touch them with any more water or anything for a few days at least. If they seem to handle the nutrients well, I will slightly increase the dose next time. My plants are still only 3-4 inches tall. When are they gonna get taller?
6:15 pm. Just did some leaf tucking to get some light to the new growth. I haven't done any tie down lst. I think I'll wait till I'm in day 20 something for that. For now I'll just keep tucking leaves.
Day 20 (11/16): woke up today and everything looked good. Did some extra leaf tucking and rotated my plants 180°
Just lowered my lights to 20 inches from the top of the plant. Just lowered it down an inch to raise my ppfd a little.
Day 21 (11/17): just watching the plants and taking occasional moisture readings of the soil. Probably a few more days before their next watering. Haven't decided if I'm going to feed them nutes two waterings in a row or not. They seemed to react okay to it. Been doing some more leaf tucking.
Day 23 (11/19): plants are definitely still growing. I gave a very diluted feed last time and I'm still seeing some light spots on the leaves. Wondering if I should do plain water with calmag or do the whole feeding again. Not sure. They will be ready for water soon.
Day 24 (11/20): plants keep getting bigger everyday. Vertical growth is slow. Plants appear to be healthy. Thinking bigger plant will be ready for water today, smaller plant maybe tomorrow. I would like to keep them on the same feeding schedule but I don't see that being possible through the whole grow.
(11/20) 7pm: just watered my plants roughly 0.5 gallons each. Noticed them perk right up. I'm still having some light spotting in some of my leaves but I'll be feeding again soon and we will see if that takes care of it. Overall I think they look really great.
Day 25 (11/21): starting to get some decent white hairs around the bud sites. So I assume I am in pre flower but im not sure yet. Will post some pics.
Day 28 (11/24): just fed my plants nutes again. I did 2.5 mL of calmag, micro and bloom this time. Last time I only did 1mL of each. Plants responded fine so I decided to up it a little bit. About half a gallon each plant.
Day 29 (11/25): lots of new growth. I lowered my RH to around 55-60%. Still running an 18/6 schedule. Not sure if I'm 100% in the flowering stage but I think I'm pretty close if not. Lots of white hairs. The plants seemed to do really well with the nute feeding last night. I upped it from 1mL per gallon to 2.5mL per gallon. Also my lights are sitting around 18 inches away.
Day 30 (11/26): I just bent over my main stalk to give some light to the lower bud sites. I just did some Defoliation to give some better airflow and light to the bottom bud sites. You see people who do defoliating and those who don't. We will see if it helps or hurts the plant in the following days.
Also noticed my pots are getting dry. I will check them again tomorrow night and possibly do a plain watering. The pots are getting dry much faster now.
Day 31 (11/27): I've already noticed new growth after doing the Defoliation. It didn't slow them down a bit.
(11/27) 4:30pm. Just watered plants again. 0.5 gallons per plant usually gives me 10 percent run off. I might start watering more on my plain water feedings to help flush out some of the nutes from the previous feeding. Don't want them to build up in the soil.
(11/27): just did more LST. Tied down every branch I could. I can definitely tell how there is much more light getting to all areas of the plant. However, the outside bud sites are getting a lot less ppfd. So I might eventually adjust the light again lower to give better light to all areas. Right now I'm going to wait a couple days and see how they grow.
Day 32 (11/28): Definitely seeing a lot of the empty space growing in after doing lst. Everything looks to be going great.
Day 33 (11/29): just fed nutes to the plants again. This time I used 5mL of the micro and 10 mL of the bloom. I left out the calmag this time. Total water used for both plants combined was 1.125 gallons. Or 1 gal plus 2 cups of water. I used the extra 2 cups of water to bring my ph up. We will see how they react to the much larger dose this time. Basically following the lucas method to an extent. 1 part micro 2 parts bloom.
Day 34 (11/30): plants are looking good so far after their nute feeding last night.
Day 35 (12/1): growth is slower right now. I'm sure I could have stressed them out when I did the lst and defoliating. I'm hoping to see them stretch pretty good in the next couple weeks but we will see. They still appear to be really healthy and I can tell things are progressing, just kinda slowly.
Day 36 (12/2): 12:12 am. Just did a plain water on the plants. One of them looks really great and the other doesn't look so great. Nothing wrong as far as deficiency goes, but the structure just isn't as good. I'm basically going to use it as a test as this point. Most of my defoliating will happen on that plant. I want to see if it really stresses it out or not compared to the plant I'm leaving mostly alone.This is my first grow so I'm experimenting to see what's best for next time. I think they are still both developing fine, just one looks much better.
Day 37 (12/3): just did a super light Defoliation on the better looking plant to expose some lower bud sites. Both plants look good and are growing every day.
Day 38 (12/4): fed the plants nutes again last night. 5mL of micro and 10mL of bloom. This is the same amount I used last time and it seemed to work, so I'm sticking with it for now.
Day 39 (12/5): plants are growing nicely. Starting to notice some crystals forming on the leafs and buds. Done a little bit more lst to the plant on the left to keep it at the same height as the other plant.
Day 40 (12/6): everything looks to be going well. I did notice a slight nute burn on my plants. At first I thought it could be light burn, but it appears on growth that is far away from the light. So I think it's from nutes and not lights. I will be doing a plain watering next anyways, I might do it twice in a row just to wash out any build up.
Day 41 (12/7): hoping to see these buds fatten up soon. Looking pretty skimpy at the moment but I've got a good ways left to go.
Watered them today around 11am. Plain water, around 12 cups of water each. I did this just to get a little more run off. Roughly 4 cups of run off each plant.
Plant on the left seems to keep stretching, not so much on the other plant. Interested to see which one performs better.
Day 42 (12/8): plants are looking good. Interested to see when the buds will really thicken up and resemble the finished thing. I assume I'm about half way through the grow. Probably will go light on the next feeding for my plant on the left. It seems to be more prone to nute burn than the plant on the right.
Day 43 (12/9): selectively removing leaves that cover bud sites. Nothing really new to report. Buds are getting bigger and sticky. Waiting for them to really swell up and see how they turn out
Day 44 (12/10): just fed the plants some nutes. I only did 5mL of micro and 8mL of bloom. I cut back every so slightly because I think last time They got some nute burn. Still trying to get a couple cups of run off for each plant during my watering/feedings.
Left plant: I'm still doing heavy defoliation to this plant. If I see a leaf I don't like, I take it off. Obviously, I'm mainly going for ones that are covering bud sites.
Right plant: I've pretty much left this plant alone. I've taken a couple leaves but only if I think the plant will benefit from it being gone.
Day 45 (12/11): they seem to be doing fine from the feeding last night. Going to keep alternating water and nutes like I have been doing this whole time.
Day 47 (12/13): nute burn seems to be spreading a little. So I will do two plain water feedings in a row this time, then cut back on my feeding when I feed next.
Day 48 (12/14): 4pm just gave my plants some plain water to try and stop the slight nute burn I'm seeing. I will probably end up doing one more plain water next time also. Everything else looks to be going well.
Day 51 (12/17): starting to spot some deficiencies, so I fed plants again last night. 5mL of micro 10mL of bloom. I might end up adding some extra calmag next time. I will probably increase my doses to 8mL and 16 mL.
Day 52 (12/18): plants mostly look good. Some curling on a few upper leaves. Might be from the light or might be from a deficiency, not sure at the moment.
Day 53 (12/19): plants are looking good. Buds are definitely getting bigger on both plants. The left plant is starting to fill out nicely. The right plant has already been pretty filled out. Plant on the left is definitely having a good bit of yellowing. Will probably add some calmag to my next plain water feeding. Next time I feed nutes I'll keep it the same for this plant and raise the dose on the right plant.
Day 54 (12/20): 11:30pm. Just did my 2nd straight nute feeding. I've been alternating this whole time but I think I may have caused a deficiency in one of my plants so I decided to do 2 in a row this time. Plant 1 (left) 5mL of calmag, 5mL of micro, 10 mL of bloom. Plant 2 (right) 5mL of calmag, 5 mL of micro, 12 mL of bloom. This plant seems super resilient, so I decided to up the bloom a little. Eventually I plan to be giving it 8mL of micro and 16mL of bloom. Fingers crossed and let's see how they react in the next few days.
Day 55 (12/21): plants look fine today. Not noticing any negative effects from doing 2 feedings in a row yet. I plan to do plain water next time with maybe some calmag or molasses added so they are still getting something.
Day 56 (12/22) plants look good this morning. Leaving town for a couple days. They'll need water when I get back.
Day 57 (12/23): plants looks great when I got home today. They will need a watering tonight.
8pm: water the plants with 5mL of calmag.
Day 58 (12/24):
Day 59 (12/25): plants are looking great. Keeping RH around 50. Can't wait to see how these fill out over the next few weeks. Planning to do a few more feeds before flushing them out the last week or so.
Day 60 (12/26): will check the plants tonight and see if they need another feeding.
Feeding 8:42 pm. Plant 1 (left) 6mL micro, 12 mL bloom
Plant 2 (right) 8mL micro and 16 mL bloom. Also 3.5 ml of ph up seemed to put me in the right area.
Day 61 (12/27): plants seem to have taken well to the feeding from last night.
Day 62 (12/28): no change really. Probably will water in the next day or so.
Day 63 (12/29): just watered the plants plain water around 10pm.
Day 64 (12/30): no real change. I have been checking trichomes. Plant on the left appears to be getting cloudy. Plant on the right still appears to be mostly clear. I'm assuming I still have another 20 days or so but I'm not really sure.
Day 65 (12/31): no change.
Day 66 (1/1): I'm thinking the plant on the left will be finished before the plant on the right. The leaves seem to be fading and the trichomes seem to be more mature on that plant also.
11pm: just watered the plants nutes. Same as last time. Left plant 6mL micro 12 mL bloom. Right plant 8mL micro 16 mL bloom
Day 67 (1/2)
Day 68 (1/3)
Day 69 (1/4): just got home from a trip. Plants seem to be doing fine. Nearing the end I assume. Plants will probably need water tonight
10pm: just fed my plants nutes again. Both plants received 8mL of micro and 16 mL of bloom.
Day 70: (1/5)
Day 71 (1/6): plants look good this morning. The left plant is definitely nearing the end of its life. The plant on the right still could have another week or more.
Just posted a video: plant on the left definitely doesn't have very large or dense nugs but it has a lot of them. The plant on the right has some super dense nugs. I'm excited to see what they both yield.
Day 72 (1/7): plants will be getting a plain watering tonight. Nearing the end. Still seeing a good mix of milky and clear trichomes. Waiting to see more of that amber pop up before chopping. Realistically I'm thinking in the next 7 days.
Watered plants 11pm. Plain water.
Day 73 (1/8): I noticed today that the plant on the right is starting to fade a decent bit.
I will have a separate drying area since one of them will probably finish before the other.
Day 74 (1/9):
Day 75 (1/10): still checking trichs, not much change. Mostly clear or cloudy except on the sugar leaves but we aren't using those as a guide.
11pm: fed the plants nutes again. Plant 1 (left) got 5mL micro and 10mL of bloom. I lowered the dose since I think this plant is really close to harvest. I'm not doing a prolonged flush because I don't want to starve the plants in the last couple weeks. I'll flush the last day or 2 before Chop. Plant 2 (right) got 8mL of micro and 16mL of bloom. It appears to still have another week or two. Still a decent bit of white hairs and the trichs are not turning amber yet.
Day 76 (1/11): plant on the right seems to still be fattening up. Not much change with the plant on the left. They will both be coming down by day 84 or sooner.
Day 77 (1/12)
Day 78 (1/13)
Day 79 (1/14)
Day 80 (1/15): while I probably could cut these down now, I'm still not seeing a good enough mix of amber yet. Really none other than on the sugar leaves. Left plant is more mature than the plant on the right. I'm going to harvest both at the same time as of now. I want the left plant to be more sleepy time and the right plant to be more daytime smoke. So once the plant on the left is ready, they will both come down.
Wonderful plant to grow. Super pumped about my first harvest. Patience is definitely a virtue. Thanks for the love, will update with dry weights soon!
Started my dry at 9pm on (1/16)
4 days in and they seem to be drying fine.
Keeping my dry room around 60 temp 60 rh.
(1/22) 8pm. Buds are still drying nicely. Still haven't got any stems to snap yet, so I think I've got a couple more days. I'm taking them down on Wednesday regardless and starting the curing process.
Weigh in: I got 57 grams from plant 1 (left) and 59 grams from plant 2 (right.) For a grand total of 116 grams= 4.14 Oz. I'm super happy with the results I got.
Bigdaddyblue
