Tropicana Cookies Autoflower

February 23, 2024 Day 8 Both plants were watered today with 250 ml PHed to 5.8 around the whole surface. I plan to bump it up to 500 ml next watering possibly with recharge. I'd like to note that both plants look identical. Even both have the exact same yellow leaves. I think they are hungry. The recharge should bring the soil back to life. I probably should have started the recharge today, but I don't want to add anything that will cause any stress. It's strange. They are both growing perfectly. But the leaves are yellow. I may ask a question about this issue. First I'll try the recharge though. The lighting is perfect. I haven't had to change a thing yet. PPFD is the same, power is still at 30% and the distance is about a half inch shorter. I'll switch to DLI when they start getting nodes. I'll also switch to discuss individual plants at the same time. The environment is also near perfect. Temps are 77° during the day and around 68 at night. I think I'll increase the temp to 70° or 72° at night. That should improve the VPD as well. Currently it hovers around 0.77 kPa. I'd like it to be around 0.85 kPa. I'll also slowly drop the RH down through the course of this week. It's in the sweet spot range, but I want it around 60% by the end of the week. It should put the VPD to about 0.95 kPa. Perfect for Veg. Grow System Environment: Temp: 74.6° RH: 71.7% VPD: 0.82 kPa February 24, 2024 Today we start to focus on these yellow leaves. I've decided that it's definitely a deficiency and maybe the soil needs that slight boost. So to help things along a bit, I added 1/4 tsp of Recharge to the gallon today. I gave 250 ml to both ladies, but this time I covered them up with a Starbucks cup. It seemed to do what I wanted. The goal was to get more outside soil moisture to promote the roots to spread out. However, I don't necessarily want to soak the base with a new nutrient. Hopefully, the roots will grow into the nutrient rich soil outside of the cup. As for watering itself, I feel like I'm not watering enough to prepare the soil for late veg. I feel like 250 ml every other day was fine for the early seedling stage, but I need the soil to be moist throughout the container by the end of the week. I'd like to see a tiny bit or runoff. In theory, the roots should evenly spread throughout the container and take more time to grow down. It may increase the veg time however. I don't really want that, but I also don't want underwhelming plants. As for tackling the yellowing, hopefully it goes away in a day or 2. It should if a deficiency is the issue. I'd also like to mention the temp is a bit low today. 16° outside. That being said, the tent temp is currently at 70° but should be climbing throughout the rest of the day. Hopefully in the next couple of hours. Grow System Environment: Temp: 73.4° RH: 67.6% VPD: 0.90 kPa February 25, 2024 I have a feeling I was right about more water. The soil moisture level has dropped to 35% and I definitely need it to stay around 45% while I continue getting the entire container. That being said, I may do another 250 ml today. If not, I'll do 500 ml tomorrow. Half of the watering will be done with the domes off and the other half will have domes on like last time as to not over water the plants. Speaking of plants, these 2 looks great. Still yellowing leaves, but it seems to be going away. The leaves are nice and broad from what I can tell so far. But it's just the beginning. Also, the first set of true leaves is now on its own node and has started to stretch a bit. The Seedling stage is almost over. Welcome to the Veg stage. Starting next week, I'll be adding the Advanced Nutrients 3 part base along with Recharge. I do have Bud Candy, so I'll be adding that as well. Very small doses though. I want to see how they do without a massive regimen of nutrients, although I have a feeling I'll be needing them. At least I'm mostly set up for the Flowering stage. There's just a few things I need. Bud factor x, Big Bud, B-52, Rhino Skin and Bud Ignitor. Hopefully I'll be getting those in the next couple of weeks. Especially because of the super short veg time this strain is supposed to have. I'll need it all in like 2 to 3 weeks. Anyway, that should be all for the day. Lighting is fine. Temp is still a bit low this morning, but I'm certain it'll be perfect in a couple of hours. It's not freezing out today. Update: I decided to water in the 250 ml Recharge after all without the dome this time. Tomorrow I'll water another 250 ml with domes on and so forth until the container is properly watered. I'll stop using the domes when the plants get too big. Probably before the container is watered. But I'll still continue the outside watering until then. Grow System Environment: Temp: 73° currently RH: 63.5% estimated VPD: 0.94 kPa estimated (The estimations are based on the averages of 2 probes. One at soil level and one just above the seedlings. The RH is vastly different between the two. It's mostly due to the small humidifier in the center. It covers all of the plants, but doesn't lift up enough to get to the canopy probe. So the canopy probe is at 47.6% while the probe at soil level is 81.4%. Same thing for the VPD. Just used the average of the 2 probes.) February 26, 2024 As I said yesterday, I watered in 250 ml today with domes on. This will be the last dome on watering. They are already just barely touching the sides. Anyway, 250 ml of Recharge today. Nothing else to do today. The yellowing seems to have stopped, but it's still yellow and not turning green yet. Regardless, they are in great shape. Nice growth. Lighting is at 280 ppfd. DLI: 18.1 mol/m²/d The plants are also about 2 3/4" tall or 6 cm. Honestly, every time I hit this part of the seedling stage, I freak out because the plants don't grow. It's just the roots that are spreading right now, hence the extra watering. I have to keep up with the spread. So far I'm hoping that's working. I'll keep up with the 250 ml per day for the rest of this week. Then I'll move to 500 ml every other day for week 3. Then I should be good to go after that. Hopefully I won't have to water much after that until flowering starts. We shall see if my technique is correct. I still have to install the basins and fill them up. Maybe I'll do that after week 3 or until the plants need to be spaced out for size. Which ever comes first. I think it will be based on the water and not size. Grow System Environment: Temp: 73.5° RH: 51.6 kPa (currently 70%) VPD: 1.34 kPa (false) (currently 0.83 kPa) February 27, 2024 Today, both ladies got a nice misting and will be getting 250 ml without dome PHed to 6.0 when the water reaches room temp. Either I'm getting used to the yellowing or it's getting better. I can't tell. Hahahaha. Anyway, they are very healthy from what I can tell. The leaves are nice and broad with upward growth is super smoothe. Outward growth is also quite steady. Nothing else for the day so far. I'll update as needed. Grow System Environment: Temp: 74.7° RH: 60.6% VPD: 1.16 kPa February 28, 2024 Both ladies got their daily dose of 250 ml water PHed at 5.95 with the moisture level hovering around 50%. I'm not sure if the 250 ml at a time is enough to start penetrating deeper into the soil. However, when I start the 500 ml per watering next week, it should start penetrating deeper. That way the fast growing roots have perfectly moist soil to travel down to. I believe it's time to allow the tap root to dig deep. Lighting is looking really good. Next week, I'll increase the intensity to 350 ppfd or a DLI of 22.7 mol/m²/d. The ideal DLI is 20 mol/m²/d, but I feel like these ladies like the slightly extra light. They may even like even more. They are praying almost perfectly. So I'll leave it alone for now. I think instead of dropping the light distance, I'll increase the power and adjust accordingly. Both of the plants are still fairly light. Not exactly yellow anymore, but still light. I think the boost of base nutrients will help with the possible nitrogen deficiency. I'll also add Cal/Mag. Covering all the primary basics. Plus I don't really have any other nutrients for the veg stage. I'll also start the regular regimen during week 3 of veg. Big Bud, Bud Candy, Tasty Terpenes so far. I'll try to get a few other nutrients that are supposed to be in my regimen as well. I may not be able to get them in time, but if I can, I will. Grow System Environment: Temp: 75.4° RH: 62.9% VPD: 1.09 kPa February 29, 2024 It's the last day of this week. As we move into week 2, things will be changing quite a bit. Watering will change and the nutrient regimen will be started. Lighting will also be changing. Everything increased. These two are still a bit light green. Not quite as yellow as before, but I expect that will change in the next day or two, when they start getting the nutrients they clearly need. Lighting will be increased as well. DLI: 22.7 mol/m²/d PAR: 350 ppfd. I may increase the power and leave the light, but I think it will be a mix of both. I'd like to keep the light at 30% for the next few days before the growth really starts. Then I can increase the power. I'd like to keep the light a bit higher than 24" as I believe I have enough power to keep the distance for a good footprint. I'll be changing the watering schedule from 250 ml daily to 500 ml every other day. I also plan to install the bottom feed system as soon as the plants hit the edges of their containers. Given the fact that I'm going to start the Advanced Nutrients 3 part base solution tomorrow, I should see some immediate growth from these two. I'd like to note that both plants are very healthy and look great! One thing I did notice is their height. The rear plant (Tropicana Cookies) is about a half inch taller than the front plant (Tropicana C). However, from the light, the distance is the exact same. That being said, I found that the rear containers soil level is about a half inch lower than that of the front. Interesting indeed. I will keep note of the height as well. If I'm right, the height should remain roughly a half inch difference until I start training. Either way, it's an interesting observation, but won't matter soon enough. The whole canopy will be level anyway. Update: I realized my plants were reaching a bit too much and leaning in toward the light. That being said, they definitely need more light, so I lowered it until I hit a DLI of 19.8 mol/m²/d. That way when I bring it up to 22.7 mol/m²/d it won't be hit so hard immediately. I should have dropped the light down a day or two ago, but oh well. It will be on point for the rest of the grow. Also, the temp is back to normal. Just waiting for the RH to catch up. Grow System Environment: Temp: 72.9° RH: 62.1% VPD: 1.04 kPa