First few weeks are the most crucial in cannabis plants lifecycle. Specially autoflowering strains. Light, heat, water and humidity are the ones that start the growing process, not the nutes nor the medium. The plant forgives you just so many mistakes and sometimes not even..
Unfortunately, this time I had to learn that by making a major mistake. I have been quite stressed about all the new things even before I started. There are so many different factors that could go wrong in a new environment and with an unfamiliar medium/setup. Controlling the temperature seems by far the most tricky one for me.
After one week I started to think about connecting the autopots with my brand new flexitank. To do that I separated Black Cream from Blue Dream. I had to split 12 trays under 2 400w HID lamps. That makes 6 trays under one light, which is perfect for connecting the pipes and placing them under the ”sun”. After placing the trays, installing the second light and switching it on, I begun to deal with the piping. The bad news here was that I did not get all the parts from the shop and I had to call it a night. Before I left I took my last glimpse inside the room and I noticed that the temperatures had allready been rising to over +27C. Curious that I am (as much as stupid sometimes), I CLOSED THE ROOM WITH BOTH LIGHTS ON! It was +33C inside the room when I got back and after a while the lights switched off. I was reading everything I found to be useful until I passed out.
MORNING IS WISER THAN EVENING
Next day I confessed myself I have made a mistake by choosing new lights without cooling. I counted on the fact, that it gets really cold outside and the room where my growing space is, gets really cold too. So I looked up my cooltube, cleaned it, assembled and installed it. It worked perfectly and I got the the temperature back to 28, which is still too hot for weak young plants. Resizing the old - and making a new, bigger intake-valve did not have any effect whatsoever. Time for second confession: my exhaust fan is not enough for my new growing space. In the matter of a few hours I had 2 things on my shopping list (cooltube + exhaust fan) and the shops were already closed. Now I could see that some of the plants take it more serious than the others. Black Cream seems to be less resistant than Blue Dream. They were getting droopy and then I relized that I have forgot to water them while I was busy with the heat and I quickly made a light solution. What a mess!
Finally, by the end of the next day I got everything under control. In 3 days I had to:
-get 1 new cooltube
-assamble 2 cooltubes and install them to a reflector that is not meant for cooltubes
-get new exhaust fan thats enough for 6 m3
-get an Y joint for connecting the tubes to exhaust fan
-get ventilation pipe
-install the new fan
-connect cooltubes to fan
-make new and resize old fresh air valves
-install and connect the autopot system
LESSON LEARNED WELL
Now for the last 3/4 days its always +25C again and most of the girls look lovely. Unfortunately
heat or cold stress in the beginning of an autoflowering strains life might stunt it for good. My Northern Lights auto got cold when I left it outside for a cold night after a hot spring day. It only grew 50 cm and gave 25 grams dried herb.
Today I see that some of my girls might have been effected badly by the heat and lack of watering...
Your Girls look great for their age, they will explode now in growth. the Heat did not harm them as it seems. Its great if PPl reflect themselves and change the actions. well done.. and sweet girls. iam sure they will bring you a lot of joy