Atomic 63W/100W Run 5

Athos This is the 4th strain I'm running, in this case BOMB SEEDS Atomic. This one is 4 days behind the other seedlings, since the original seed that I germinated was kind of weak and I wasn't sure it would make it. I still have not culled it. I'll probably will give it to a friend for a balcony grow. The SETUP ------------ Grow Space. 57 cm * 37 cm * 97 cm (1.87' * 1.21' * 3.18') = 0.2 m³ (7.22 cubic ft) 6 x 6500K 10.5 watts Philips LED Bulbs for veg (63 watts) 3 2700K Solstrips driven at 100 watts Exhaust: Noctua A8 FLX 1 gallon fabric pot

Athos The plant was transplanted on day 10 to a 1 gallon fabric pot and topped just above the 3d node. All side tops were removed at day 14, except for the 2 main ones.

Athos 3 weeks are gone. We have the 2 main tops we wanted, I'll let them grow a bit, probably a week and then it's time to flower. This last watering it was plan water, with no cal-max, since one of the strains showed signs of too much calcium and I prefer to be on the safe side. I have to say that keeping the lights further away has increased the node distance but the leaves are way bigger than previous grows; there's also much less purpling on the stems than usual

Athos Early update. Today the 4 strains have reached the 8 inches of height that I wanted, so at 25 days of veg (29 for the other 3 strains), the veg phase has come to an end; so tomorrow will be the 1st day of 12/12.

Athos I was away for a couple of days with my family and so I could not take the usual pictures that signal the end of the week. I changed the lights to the 100 watts strips and increased the light distance to 16 inches, with the increased light distance I have noticed a few thing: (i) the leaves are real big, (ii) There's no purpling of the stems. I also increased the EC to 0.4 (cal-max only); next feeding I will start some grow nutes to power the stretch and maybe some bloom nutes.

Athos I really like how the increased light distance has made the plant develop big fat leaves and the stems not to turn purple. The first official feeding went great and by the end of this week, there are signs of PK deficiency, probably due the plant starting to form buds. I still have some space for the plants to grow and if they grow too much I can always use some super cropping.

Athos Stretch is slowing down and flowers are starting to form. Even though I upped the feeding to 1.5 EC, there are signs of PK deficiency on the lower leaves, so just as the week ends, I'm upping the feeding to power the formation of the flowers. I plucked a couple of the lower leaves that dried up due nutrient deficiency..

Athos Stretch is done, now the flower are starting to take shape. This week sported a moderate magnesium deficiency and so as this week ends, I'm changing cal max for epsom salts and bio-bloom for Grotek Solotek Bloom. We will see how it goes. This is the first time I have a magnesium deficiency. I'm following a tip I read somewhere that at this stage I should change from cal mag to epsom salts due the increased need of magnesium to form buds and decreased need for calcium.

Athos This is the tallest of the 4 plants and I just love how the buds are looking at this point. With at least 4 weeks to go, I expect some serious bud developing. I just hope that the epsom salts and the bloom nute change will continue to keep the deficiency that I experienced last week in check

Athos Last week ended with a rather strong feeding of 2.26 EC and there were signs of over feeding; since I do not know this line, I need to dial my feedings, I believe I'm seeing potassium (K) excess, which in turn resulted in calcium / magnesium deficiency. At day 40 of flowering I gave the plant plain pH'ed water, since at this point I prefer to let the plant consume the excess nutrients in the last 3 weeks that I expect are left to go. I've plucked 1 or 2 leaves in order to open the path for the light to reach lower buds along with some more LST as needed.

Athos The plant has been receiving only water since day 40, much sooner than what I usually do, but then again, most of the times my harvest are much too green when the time to harvest comes, so this time I decided to start early. This is no flushing mind you, I just started giving the plant plain pH'ed water and letting the plant slowly consume every nutrient in the soil and stored in its foliage. The buds have fattened quite a lot this week. I expect to be done in 1 week, 2 at most. Having less tops per sq ft has allowed the plants to develop big fat colas, which is something I had not been able to accomplish before in my previous grows, currently I have 1 ft long (30 cm) colas which is something I'm really proud of. I don't know on which diary I saw this, but thanks to whoever mentioned using binder clips with fabric pots to do LST.

Athos Sorry for the lone picture, I was planning to harvest at the 56 flowering day mark, but at day 53, I spotted a tiny bit of bud rot and so I took everything down and is currently hanging to dry. I have a ceramic lamp heater (25 watts) to keep the temperatures warm and so prevent RH from rising. Fortunately the loss is minimal, although I'll have to look into a way to heat the grow box during lights out next time I grow regular strains. Once everything is dry, I'll post pictures of the whole buds.

Athos I would have got 1 gpw on this strain or close, but the bud rot made me loose part of the harvest. The buds were a thick and a ft long. I really liked the fabric pots; no root circling whatsoever, none at all. Downsizing from 3 gallons to 1 gallon pots, really helped to keep the plant size in check. Aiming for 4 tops per square feet, finally allowed me to get those big colas everyone else seems to get except me. The less dense canopy also helped keep the moisture in check (somewhat). I do not know if I mentioned this in the diary earlier or not, but binder clips are awesome to use with fabric pots to support twist ties. I got a 25-watt ceramic bulb, which emits pure heat in order to keep the grow box dark, but warm enough to safely dry the hanging buds, it worked like a charm.