Grimbol's Auto Berry by MSNL

*If anyone read through my GDP diary, this is going to be mostly the same stuff. So, sad day friends. I got spider mites and had to throw all my plants out. This is what I think happened: About 2-3 weeks ago I noticed some freckling on the lower leaves. I looked at it and thought it might be a cal/mag issue so I added cal/mag that week and went about my business. I saw it about a week later and it wasn't getting any better so I added more cal/mag. This continued for about 2-3 weeks until I finally took off a leaf and examined it under my microscope. I saw little bugs crawling everywhere and my stomach just dropped. My fiance did some quick research while I was panic ripping leaves off (see pictures) and she correctly diagnosed it as spider mites. I debated with myself and my close friend and ultimately I decided to throw all the plants in my tent away. I know that there are a lot of people who will say that there are things I could have done to make it to harvest but what it came down to is the people I take care of and personal pride. I consider myself a caregiver and I give away product for free that I am not going to use to my family and close friends. I thought to myself "Would you smoke this?" and when my answer was "ehhh, I don't know", I thought about how it would feel giving it away and immediately made the decision to destroy them. I take an immense amount of pride in my product and this hobby and if I am not going to stand behind it I would rather just start over. I grow from my heart (shout out to the Grow From Your Heart Podcast!) to help people and make sure my family is not getting unsafe product from sketchy people. To spray pesticides in flower that may hurt people and have little bug carcasses in there just goes against that in every way and is just wrong in my opinion if you are giving it away to others. If you are the only one smoking it then it is one thing to take that risk but not with your patients. I want my medicine to help people, not create or exacerbate health issues. It is also important to note that the mites had moved from my flower tent into my veg space and took over my auto berry as well. Damn things are crafty and fast. So that is why I made the decision to destroy them all after 3+ months of res changes, pruning, and manifolding on a slow vegging strain. Feel free to chime in with your opinion but I do not regret my decision. I threw out my new clones, mother plant, and auto berry I had on my veg side as well. Shout out to all the other growers out there that do the right thing by their patients. Caregivers > Cash croppers. For anyone curious, I removed everything from my tent and scrubbed it all with a 20% bleach/water solution. All equipment has been wiped down and stored in the garage away from any organic materials. I will give them until tomorrow (2 days) to air out and dry and then I will wipe it down again with bleach and wait another 2 days. Hopefully that will make sure everything is dead and will not come back next grow. That next grow should start in about a week. It sucks but sometimes it happens and you gotta be ready for it. Lesson learned. Never bring outdoor plants into your indoor garden even if it is after just a day or two. A bunch of people on here and Reddit warned me and I did not listen. Now I have learned the hard way and it feels like when your parents "told you so" haha. Thanks to everyone who stopped by along the way. Stay tuned for a new grow coming soon. It is going to be some cool new limited edition Mephisto Illuminautos. I am pretty excited. Good luck out there and always grow from your heart folks. -Grim