Blue Dream 2.0

Baby Blue Part 2: This will be my second Nirvana Blue Dream single plant grow. I'll be using all General Hydroponics Flora Series nutrients and I'll be trying to keep everything consistent with my last BD grow with two exceptions. 1. I'll try not to snap a main branch of during the training process. 2. I'll be using a 315w CMH for all of the veg and for the first week of bloom. From the second week of bloom to harvest I'll be running a 1000w HPS. The goal is to assess the yield for a 1000w HPS vs my previous all 315w CMH grow. I'm more interested in retiring the 1000w HPS and switching solely to CMH but as any good ol' fashion skeptic I need see results for myself. I also have 2 bag seeds that have popped so we'll sex them when the time comes and hopefully have a pleasant added bonus to the pre-holliday yield.

Transplanted to a 1 gallon. Small boring little plant with big dreams.

Baby Blue 2 still little and boring but now she has 8 sibling Blue Dream clones to keep her company as well as 2 bag seeds from another baby daddy. So far so good, Hoping to top her in a week or so.

Blue Dream 2.0: Removed bottom nodes, began the LST. Had a 100% clone success rate on the other Blue Dream clones I made and they are all looking great. I'm going to go 1 more week of training and then a quick transplant to the final pots, one more week after that to let them settle into there larger accommodations then probably switch to 12/12. They're still a bit boring but things are shaping up nicely.

Week 5 in the bag. All the clones have really shot up and I've trimmed the lower third. Over the past week, they are all showing signs of what I think is a Cal-Mag deficiency. This is odd for 2 reasons. One, they get Cal-Mag with every feeding and two, the mother plant that these clones came from also showed the same leaf problems. The mother plants all strengthened up by the bloom phase but they looked bad for a week until the cal-mag was bumped up. The one plant that is a bag seed from a friend has been on the same feeding schedule and nute amounts and shows no signs of a deficiency. Could this be strain related? Is it not a Cal or Mag deficiency? I'm going to feed water only for the next 5-7 days and see what shakes loose. If anyone happens by and can better diagnose this problem evident on these lower leaves, please leave a comment.

Final week of veg. The next week will be 1 week of 12/12 under the 315W then they will finish out under a 1000w HPS. Gave them plenty of plain water this week and fixed the cal-mag nute lock out so all go for flowering.

First week of Flower in the books. Did a couple feeds with transition nutes and I'll be alternating plain water and feed for the rest of the grow. This week the light will switch to 1000w HPS and I'll monitor the stretching of the plants. It's an already crowded room so I might have to get creative with bending them to all fit nicely. More to come next week.

Late on the update, but all 10 still going strong. Been alternating plain H2O and nutes every feeding and its tamped down the cal-mag lock out. This week I've seen substantial stretching of several inches and all of them are starting to pop out pistils. I'm pleased to verify the one mystery bag seed that I germinated is also female. With the mystery female I've complete been hands off. No topping, trimming, or LST and its obvious to spot. Like a big green Waldo up front. Also, this week I will pull them out and give them a good lower third pruning and then it will be more or less hands off until the bud sites dictate if I need to move things around. I do have one plant with a crazy flat stalk, its like a flattened inner-tube. When I prune this week I'll get good pics. It's something I've never seen before. On a sadder note, the 1000w HPS experiment has gone to the way side, the guy that was going to lend me a ballast flaked out. Oh well.

Third week of bloom is over and I've got pistils over all bud sights. Thinned out the lower 20-30% of all the plants. I'll give them a few days of water to let them recover from the stress and soak up any locked out nutes. They seem to be holding water longer than I thought so I need to watch I don't burn them with stronger feedings. The one bag seed female has shot past her room mates, I can almost hear her grow. At this point not knowing anything about the plant or strain I'm just going to let it go until it either hits the light or I need to do something. I'm curious to see what kind of natural traits it has.

Missed posting week ten, catching back up.

This strain of Blue Dream is devouring Nitrogen. As soon as I dropped the FloraGro out of my feeding schedule the plants started to show signs of N deficiencies. Boosted N for week 11 and they've perked up. I'll keep the boost of nitrogen going until for at least another week.

After spending several weeks wrestling with nutrient lock out and noticing that this Blue Dream strain literally cant get enough nitrogen, I've decided to switch my 3 part nutrients from General Hydroponics Flora Series to Advanced Nutrients pH Perfect 3 part nutes. After 2 feedings, I've noticed the plants are starting to respond to the increased Nitrogen. I'll be finishing out this grow with Advanced Nutrients. I will say I was somewhat skeptical of the auto pH balancing, but it does work. My water is around 6.8 - 7.0 out of the tap and this dropped it right into the sweet spot. Kudos! Still have 2-3 weeks to go so I'll be monitoring the overall health of the plants based on the new nutrients. It's too early to say for sure, but I think I'll be dropping General Hydroponics and switching all of my nutrients over to Advanced Nutrients for future grows.

Added a 2nd, 315w CMH light to the mix. Wish I would have done this at the beginning of bloom. It's only been about 5 days of the 630w so I'm not expecting an aggresive amount of bulking for these last few weeks but one can only dream. From what I'm seeing too is this Blue Dream strain is not a weight packing strain. Should have got a whey protein weight bulker in the feeding schedule back in the 2nd week of bloom. These plants do seem to be reaching for the photons thought. Every time I come in here it looks like they're throwing their leafs in the air and yelling Heeeeeyyyyyyy! They're very excited to be here I guess.

8th week of flower in the books. Buds still a bit underwhelming as far as bulking but they are perfectly normal given 2 gallon pots, a single 315 for 90% of the grow, & no CO2 added. So, really, they're doing just fine. Not going to be a huge crop but it all looks like great smoke for a really easy grow. Starting to see some slight clouding on the trichs. I'll give them another week and see where the trichs are at and see if I'll need to flush soon.

After some 60X and 90X inspection, we've got cloudy trichs with roughly 20-30% deliciously amber trichromes. 2 days ago I pulled them all out gave em a good trimming and have flushed them twice so far. I'll flush every other day until my pph comes down to a satisfactory level, probably 2 more good flushes and then its harvest time. Really pleased with how easy of a grow this was. Had some slight nitrogen issues with the strain but once I recognized it and correct the feedings these plants have been fine since.

And that's a wrap! Overall, very simple grow. For those that might be interested in growing Blue Dream, watch your plants closely for Nitrogen deficiencies. I started this grow using the General Hydroponics Flora Series. If you're not familiar with the drain to waste feeding schedule you drop your middle, Grow, nute out during flower. This drop in nitrogen was enough to really put this strain in a bad spot. All the plants had yellowing and brown spots develop on the leaves. After switching, mid flower, to Advanced Nutrients the plants almost immediately responded to the nitrogen boost. Adv Nut 3-part feed is super simple too, all three parts are mixed equally per gallon of H2O throughout the entire grow. Can't be more dummy proof than that. The Perfect pH works as advertised as well, I'll admit I was a skeptical at first but it does work. As far as yield, I was my own worst enemy. I had too many clones for the room and I got greedy. Hard to kill a clone because you worry of overcrowding. And to make it worse I used 2 gallon pots under a single 315W CMH. Overall, 8 ounces dry, but I'm sure I could have boosted that figure easily 20-40% with 3 gallon pots and a second light. It will be a month or so until the next grow and by then I'll be using 2 - 315W and I think I'm going to keep all future grows at 4 plants, maybe 5 at max. Thanks for stopping by and happy growing!