1st Grow FINISHED - Lemon Wonder Automatic

Elyxion Three days after germination, I watered for the first time. The top 2-3cm of soil was very dry, and the humidity had dropped significantly. However, since the soil deeper down still felt relatively moist, I only gave each of them 500 mL. At some point, I realized that I hadn't reduced the distance of the lights to the plants at all. So, I brought it down to 60 cm from the plants. By the end of the first week, the soil was very dry again, and the humidity had also decreased (obviously, evaporation had increased due to the shorter distance). This time, I was more generous and gave both pots a total of 1.75L each. By the end of the week, the growth really took off!

Elyxion At the beginning of week two, the plants seem to be growing more in width than in height. I think the leaves are hanging down a bit (under "daylight"), but I'm not worried about it for now. Humidity and temperature are constant, and the plants look overall lush green. As a precaution, sticky traps were installed. The rest of the week went smoothly. By the end of the week, you could definitely smell the plants when opening the grow tent.

Elyxion Start of week 3, I removed the excess from the fabric pot since the plants had no space. The internodal distances are very compact. I will probably cut the lower small leaves in the next few days. Aside from the fan (level 2), I will still avoid Low Stress at this point; the plants seem to be growing well in width on their own. On day 1 of week 3, I gave nutrients for the first time in the form of 1L of water with 0.5mg/L BioBizz Fish-Mix (I accidentally bought the outdoor test kit, which comes with Fish-Mix instead of Bio-Grow ¯_(ツ)_/¯). On day 2, I managed to top one of the two plants and will see it as a test subject for the different grow techniques. I’ll let plant 2 grow untouched as a reference. I also cut the lowest pairs of leaves from the plants since they weren’t getting much light anyway. Under the microscope, you can see the little bubbles; I think those are the trichomes. On day 3, I cut off the two lowest pairs of leaves from the topped plant because I imagined that the smaller leaves and leaf stems wouldn’t get enough light otherwise. In hindsight, I reacted unnecessarily panicked. If I had waited another week, I would have probably managed this with tying down. For the rest of the week, the topped plant looked very stressed and mushy, but I think it recovered well by the end of the week. On the last day, I gave each plant 1.5L of water with Fish-Mix (0.5ml/L) again.

Elyxion At the start of the fourth week of growth, I bonded the test subject. I was really surprised at how robust the little plants are at this stage. It took a while since I was very hesitant at first. Professional looks different. Let's hope I didn't overdo it :D. As expected, I overdid it and cracked one of the side shoots pretty good. I've been watching it for a few days now, and the shoot still seems to be growing. By the middle/end of the week, the LST made a noticeable difference. The test subject has recovered from it and is at least as lush from the canopy as the untouched reference plant. That one is also happily continuing to grow. By the end of the week, plant number 2 showed clear signs of heat stress (folded leaves + burn spots). This is probably because I've been letting the plant grow completely untouched, and its surface area is larger than that of the trimmed plant, which is why I illuminated the plants with 12/12 for the last two days of week 4 to give them a bit of recovery.

Elyxion Beginning of week 5 and the ladies are starting to bloom. I subtly defoliated my test subject and then provided both ladies with water (1L each) and nutrients so they can really get going now. I finally decided to defoliate the untreated plant as well since space was getting tighter and the large leaves were hardly letting any light through to the bottom. Midweek and both plants now need a good amount of water at least every three days! They are still stretching nicely. I have moved the reference plant to the front and the treated plant (Topping + LST) to the back.

Elyxion At the start of the second week of flowering, I did some light defoliation again to let the light penetrate through the flower canopy and reach the lower buds. Other than that, I'm just letting the ladies grow. Midweek, and the ladies are drinking like there's no tomorrow. Right now, I'm watering both every two days with 1.25 - 1.75 liters. On the days I watered, I also did a bit of defoliation to keep the leaf canopy clear. The plants have stretched nicely during these two weeks of flowering, but I feel like the shoots have gotten in the way a bit too much. Fortunately, they still looked healthy the next day. I guess that made me want to trim a bit here and there. Still, I feel like I panicked and unnecessarily removed a few leaves every 2-3 days, and I can imagine that might affect their growth. But for now, I'm satisfied with how they look.

Elyxion The ladies seem to be happy and are growing nicely. They are watered and fed with 1.5L every two to three days. The buds are getting denser and are slowly becoming sugary. My phone isn't good enough to take nice close-up shots, and the pocket microscope was a bad investment. Soon, I'll get myself a decent magnifying glass.

Elyxion There's not much to say. The buds are growing and getting denser. The ladies always seem happy. You can clearly see that the un-topped plant has a primary shoot, while the topped plant has developed a more even canopy. Next time, both will definitely be topped. Furthermore, I will most likely work with ScrOG in the next grow. Mid-week, I did some serious defoliation again. By the end of the week, brown discolorations are increasingly showing at the leaf tips. I can rule out water deficiency. The distance to the light is already conservatively high (35 cm). Since I expect to harvest at the end of the month, I'm not too worried, as the affected areas are only the leaf tips so far. The rest of the plant looks healthy. I'm going to hold off on further feeding for now.

Elyxion The stigmas of the ladies are turning increasingly brown, it's almost time. I won't be fertilizing anymore either, as the leaves are drying out/burning more and more at the tips. From today on, it's just water.

Elyxion This week, the buds have really packed on density and have become super resinous. I continued to water every two days. I actually wanted to measure the pH level from time to time because I think the burns on the leaf tips could be symptoms of a nutrient lockout. But I never did it out of laziness. Fertilizing was already stopped since last week anyway, and besides, the effects right before the harvest were negligible for me.

Elyxion After a very hot week, rain was forecasted for this week, so I wanted to take advantage of the upcoming temperature drop and harvested the plants. This brought me to an average of 21-23° C. For my circumstances, it's the best I could get out of it.

Elyxion I'm having trouble uploading my "Harvest Week" because I'm getting an error message, so I'm doing it this way now: Seeds ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Lemon Wonder Automatic (Zamnesia Seeds): - Stars: 10 - Grow Difficulty: Easy - Resistance: Felt strong The two seeds were the "Secret Extras" in my order. The short grow time and moderate THC level caught my attention, so I decided to do my first grow with them. Although the strain apparently causes issues for many because the genetics aren't that great, I had almost no problems from start to finish as a complete greenhorn in cannabis growing. I experimented with topping, LST, etc., and the ladies always bounced back quickly. The yield speaks for itself. Thanks, Zamnesia, for these great seeds. I can personally highly recommend the strain. Nutrients ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BioBizz (Fish-Mix, Top Max & Bio-Bloom) - Stars: 5, 5, Tried it for the first time and the results speak for themselves. I only used 1/4 of the recommended amounts, and the result was still great. Lighting ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mars Hydro TS600 (100 Watts) - Stars: 5 The Mars Hydro TS600 (100 Watts) seems optimal for a 60x60x160 tent. Thumbs up. Can recommend it. Conclusion ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The un-topped plant yielded about 35 grams, while the topped one yielded exactly 50 grams (I forgot to take a photo on the scale for the second one, but I was too lazy to pull everything out and weigh it since I had the buds nicely sorted in jars ^^). In total, I got 85 grams. That's 0.85 grams per watt. I’ll just hypothesize that I would have ended up with about 100 grams had I topped the second one as well. That would hypothetically be 1g per watt. I also left the stems on each of the buds a bit longer to grip them better, so my measurement can be considered "very generous" and may not meet the standards that other growers have. Nevertheless, the grow exceeded my expectations. I'm super happy! Now there's just the curing left, but I'm a novice and have already smoked a bud or two, and the effect is great, the smoke is already pleasantly mild, and the taste is good (this probably says a lot about the quality I've been used to over the past few years if it tastes good already).