Banana Purple Punch Autoflower

February 15, 2024 Welcome to the next installment of my grow world. This run will be a pair of Banana Purple Punch by FastBuds. Happily, I won these in a contest and will take great pleasure in growing them. So let's get into it. I'm running a 3x3 AC Infinity Grow System. It has a 4" exhaust fan and carbon filter. 2 circular fans with one oscillating. I may end up with a second oscillating fan in a couple weeks. We shall see about that. The Germination Center is also AC Infinity with the 12" supplemental lighting for the seedlings and a heat mat. I also have a small 4" computer fan, also from AC Infinity, to help regulate the air exchange in the Center. For the grow itself, I'll be using 3 gallon fabric pots and the AC Infinity bottom feed watering basins. I have used these for a few runs with these and I love them. Technically it's a hydroponics setup, but with soil for a medium. Speaking of soil, I'll be reusing my Sohum Living Soil. The last run had used soil and I ended up with 21.25 oz from a single plant. A few more things to mention about the expectations of this grow. I'll be implementing LST and SCroG if needed. I don't want to top them as I feel it slows down the grow and extends the time it takes to grow. As it stands, I have about 10 weeks until a contest I'm running in and this is an 8 week strain. Hopefully it doesn't take any longer that 9 weeks. If not, I'm kind of in trouble. Anyway, along with training, I'll be running a weekly dose of recharge and advanced nutrients 3 part base. This is living soil so it shouldn't need much for nutrients. However, 8 do have a regimen that I have ready to go if I need it. I'll also be using root riot plugs for the seedling stage. With the light at around 250 PPFD, I'll run the light at 18/6 from the start. That's all for now. See you tomorrow. February 16, 2024 Day 1: Both ladies popped last night and had little tap roots ready to go this morning. So they were planted in the root riot plugs. I don't expect them to be in the Germination Center for more than a few days. I prefer to plant in the final pot before the roots start to show through the plug. So like 2 days. Currently I'm warming up my soil from being out in the cold garage. I'll be filling up the pots probably tomorrow and have them in the tent for a day to acclimate and get some water before planting the plugs. Germination Center Environment: Temp: 77.6° RH: 82.9% VPD: 0.55 kPa February 17, 2024 Both ladies are showing some green coming out of the plugs. I feel like they will pop the surface later today. I'm having a bit of an issue keeping the temp above 75°. I'm sure it will adjust once the lights go on, but for now it's just below 75°. The humidity is a bit bouncy as I can't find the correct spot for the "exhaust fan" yet. It won't really matter until the lights go on and both ladies have popped. I didn't end up filling the pots up yet. I have to wash the basins out first. I'll do that today and prep the pots tomorrow. Quick Update: I turned the light on now that I'm seeing green but not quite popped yet. It should help with keeping the heat up. Germination Center Environment: Temp: 76.5° RH: 82.1% VPD: 0.56 kPa February 18, 2024 Both ladies popped their plugs last night. Perfectly green and healthy little stalks. Honestly, it's only been a total of 2 days and they have already popped surface? I don't think they will be in the Germination Center for too long. At this rate, they'll be in their final pots by tomorrow. I'll try to not let the roots grow out too much. Speaking of final pots, I have filled my 3 gallon AC Infinity fabric containers with reused Sohum Living Soil. So they are all ready to go. It's nice and clean and still perfectly moistened and fee of roots. I've also decided not to use humidity domes when I plant them. I will be using a humidifier and the light lower and dimmer to keep the RH in place. At least for a couple of days. I do plan on raising the light significantly and increasing the power. I genuinely feel that the perfect foot print for this setup is about 24" at 90% power. Any higher and light may be lost even at 100%. This is just my experience so far. But I wouldn't pay too much heed to it. I haven't been able to really test my theory out yet. My last couple grows had plants that were much too tall. Hopefully I can keep them short and wide this time around. Anyway, the supplemental light is currently at 60% power. The intensity is around 250 PPFD. I'll be running the light at 18/6 for the entire grow starting last night. I normally run seedlings at 24/0 and switch to 18/6 when the dome comes off. But this time I feel like trying a full 18/6 from day 1. It'll be interesting even if nothing happens. At least something to note. Quick Update: I decided to drop the light power down to 30%. I'll increase it to 40% tomorrow and so on until I hit 350 PPFD. Because this strain is super fast, I'm going to need to get up to 350 in a matter of days. Then the big light goes on. Germination Center Environment: Temp: 76.5° RH: 76.5% VPD: 0.74 kPa February 19, 2024 Today is a new day and a new stage. Both ladies were planted in their final containers. I watered them in with 250 ml of plain water PHed to 6.2. I didn't concentrate all of the water at the base. I made sure to start with 100 ml around the base and the rest covering the whole top soil. Their tap roots were poking out from the plugs already. I was kind of hoping for one more day in the Germination Center, but then I would have had to set up the nursery bags and that wasn't the plan for this run. Hopefully my calculations are correct with the 250 ml. I'm using the 3.4 gallon fabric pots from AC Infinity I already mentioned. They are also used from 2 runs ago and washed thoroughly. Domes were added and the main grow light is now on at 20% power. The light height is around 30" and the intensity is at 290 PPFD. It's a bit high, but the domes block out a bit of the light, dropping the intensity down to 200 PPFD. The tent isn't all that warm currently due to cold weather, but I'm hoping the heat of the main grow light will increase the temp in the domes. Currently the tent temp is 72° and the temp under the domes is around 68°. I'm hoping over the next few hours, the temp will raise up and the environment will stabilize. I can't keep the domes off either as the RH is hovering at 43% in the tent itself. I have a humidifier, but that dropped the temp down even more, hence the domes. Kind of a pickle I'm in. I'll keep trying different things until I get it right. I hope it won't take me more than a day or 2. If not the next few hours. Grow System Environment: Temp: 68° RH: 80% VPD: 0.49 kPa February 20, 2024 It's day 4 since seeds and these ladies are doing perfectly fine. Right on cue as well. I expect them both to hit the Veg stage in just a few days. Should be by the end of this first week. Maybe a day or 2 after. The domes are doing their job perfectly. Just a little bit of dew and the temps are finally leveling out at a reasonable number. 75° by the end of the morning, the environment should be spot on. That's all for the day. No watering. I'll water tomorrow another 250 ml for each baby. Grow System Environment: Temp: 75° RH: 75% VPD: ? (I'm taking readings from 2 different hydrometers. One of the main tent for temp and the one for the Germination Center for RH) February 21, 2024 Both ladies got another 250 ml of filtered water PHed to 5.8, spread around the entire pot surface. I was thinking about doing another 250 ml around the outside of the pot. It may be a good idea to start moistening the rest of the soil. So when they start the veg stage, they can take off immediately. I'll probably wait until this afternoon and then decide. I did notice that A had drier soil than B. B is in the front and A is in the rear. I wonder why that is. They look absolutely wonderful. Slightly praying and they both have really nice steady growth. The leaves are a beautiful dark green. So healthy and ready to go. The baby fan leaves have some really pronounced, serrated edges. As for lighting, I've been paying attention over the past day and I think the domes will come off tomorrow or the next day. The light may also need to be lowered when the domes come off. Currently the intensity is 200 PPFD. I think 300 PPFD should be a good starting point starting week 2. I've also been researching and I think I have a good light schedule for the whole grow. At 18/6 Week 1: 200 PPFD DLI: 13 Week 2: 250 PPFD DLI: 16.2 Week 3: 350 PPFD DLI: 22.7 Week 4: 500 PPFD DLI: 32.4 Week 5: 700 PPFD DLI: 45.4 Week 6: 700 PPFD DLI: 45.4 Week 7: 700 PPFD DLI: 45.4 Week 8: 550 PPFD DLI: 35.6 Week 9: 500 PPFD DLI: 32.4 This is based on a 3 week veg time and 5 week flower time. Update: Domes Removed. I was researching as to when to remove a humidity dome from a seedling and everything I've read is to remove them a day or 2 after sprouting. So I removed them. The tent has been sitting nicely around 68% and 77°. So everything should be fine. I'll have to keep an eye on the light. Without the domes, they are getting the full intensity. However, I'm not all that worried. They are both praying, so a bit more light won't hurt. Grow System Environment: Temp: 73.6° too low RH: 77.5% spot on VPD: 0.95 kPa estimate February 22, 2024 Not much to do today. I filled the humidifier, cranked the heat and spritzed the babies with a mist of PHed water. Took some photos and that's all. No adjustments needed. Both plants look absolutely perfect. Their leaves are flat, so I know the light is right where it needs to be. Grow System Environment: Temp: 75.9° RH: 80.9% VPD: 0.93 kPa