Purple Lemonade Auto (Run #2)

First week down, all is well. I noticed #3 tilting it's leaves to throttle down photosynthesis to let it's roots catch up. Other than that, just cruising under 24 hour light at about 200 ppfd.

Not so smooth on this week. #2 is rocking it out, but #3 seems to be having some issues. I raised the lights a bit more to make sure that it wasn't light stress. May just be a dry pocket in the soil. I am growing in a ten gallon and I try not to saturate the entire pot every water, just enough for the plant.

A lot to report this week. Some good, mostly bad... Good news; Figured out what the issue was with #3... and it wasn't light stress. As you can see in the pictures, started getting yellow, then brown and dead leaves. Thought maybe I was having a soil pH issue like I did on my first run of this cultivar, but she hadn't gotten any nutes yet and I water with distilled water. That got me to thinking, I'm using recycled soil from my last grow that was Absolutely fine... except one MAJOR detail that I had completely forgotten. The last run was right before I moved. I had been so busy with the move that I missed the last two feedings (which lead to the premature termination of the Apple Candie and Nanaz). Now, I had "reamended" the soil with happy frog before planting these Purple Lemonade. Apparently I didnt mix the soil as well as I had thought, and #2 got the good reamended soil and #3 started it's life in spent soil. After realizing my mistake I took some the Roots Organic Terp Tea and made a tea for #3 as well as top dressed both #2 and #3 at 1 tsp per gallon as the bag recommends. I believe I have saved #3 from being a total loss, but I've definitely loss ground on what she COULD have been. With that being said, I have a policy in my garden. Once I fall out of ideal...it's time for FAFO. Fool Around and Find Out. In other words, once Ifall far enough out of the ideal range and can't make up ground, it's time to experiment and push the plants to see what happens. So... even though she's recovering from nute deficiencies... I topped her. It would have been time for training to start anyways, and I haven't topped an autoflower yet, so I wanted to see how it'd go and see just how resilient Purple Lemonade really is. And so far....not regretting my decision. You'll have to wait until next week to see just how it's going. ;) Now, as far as #2 goes. She's just chugging along being perfect...except I have noticed slightly slower growth than I expected. I assume that's from the soil being pretty scant on nutrients. There seems to be enough in there for her to be healthy and happy, but not enough to truly flourish. Also, as you can see in the pics...shes already started putting out preflowers and seems to be changing over to spiral patterned growth...aka she's started her flower cycle. She is WAY smaller than I had hoped she would be by the time she would start flower, but it happens. I don't think her flowering starting this early is anything I did or didn't do, think she might just be a genetic runt that got too much of the ruderalis in her genes and just did what her DNA told her to do. She's healthy and happy and she has the amendments now, so I'm hoping to still get at least an ounce or two off her, but we'll see. Not every grow will be perfect, and every mistake and moment of absent mindedness is an oppurtunity to learn and grow along with your plants!

Well, pheno #2 has definitely started flowering. She has started to build her colas and is stretching out to make room for buds. She's still on the petite side, but is gonna be a decent ounce or so at finish if I were to guess. Pheno #3 has started to recuperate from being topped. Her branches are looking skinny, but she's got growth on every node. They're both still struggling with nutrient deficiencies, and I don't have liquid nutes, so its Terp Tea at every watering. I feel like I'm behind the 8 ball on feeding them, and its getting frustrating... Next grow I'm going back to Gaia Green 444 and 284. I may still use Root's Terp Tea as a actual tea to boost growth, but I don't think I'll ever use it as a top dress again. To be fair to Roots, I should have reamended my soil before planting. Even still, I'm gave double the dosage on the last top dress and still struggling with deficiencies. Probably user error, but I'm still switching back.

Still fighting nutrient deficiencies, just can't seem to get ahead of their demands. So, with that in mind I nearly doubled the recommended amount on this last top dress and we'll see hot that goes. Might end up with a bit of nitrogen burn, but we'll see. And if that wasn't enough of a pain, as I was readjusting #2's branches for training I bumped one and broke her main cola. Ended up taping it back on with duct tape (I know that's not ideal and doesn't have enough "give"). It worked though. Top is green and happy again after a few days. I post these updates the following week and kinda recap the previous week. With that being said, I can't wait to show you what their looking like this week!

The girls are looking so much better this week. Also found out that with Root's Organic, you're supposed to be top dressing every week... maybe. Instructions were unclear. The bag gives one set of directions, but their website has a feeding schedule that is completely different than what the bag says. So yeah... last time I use it as a top dress. Gonna be sticking with the Gaia Green 4-4-4 and 2-8-4 that I did with the Big Bud I did a year or so ago. #3 has started flower and has nearly doubled in size. The size difference between the phenos is crazy. Did some digging on here and noticed that there seems to be quite a spectrum of variation on this cultivar. Its fun getting surprised and seeing all the way the genetics can express itself, but would be nice to be a little more predictable. Unfortunately, it seems like the nutrient issue is persisting, and will probably continue until the end of the grow. Last time I had this issue with the first pheno of Purple Lemonade and the Strawberry Gorilla, it was a pH issue and they just kept locking out. I don't THINK it's a soil pH issue this time, but I could be wrong. Soil was fine last grow, and I've only been watering with distilled water. I need to get good pH pens for the water and the soil, but money is tight right now. I know there's cheap pH testers on the market, but they all seem to be the same cheap pen from China that works the first 4 or 5 tests then craps out. Cheap, but expensive if you have to buy another one every 3-6 months. So I'm saving up my spare cash for a nice Blue Labs pen. In the meantime, just gonna have to keep top feeding every two weeks and giving them terp tea every week... Next grow will start with next soil and I WILL have the pH pens next time.

I'm... a fool sometimes. In previous posts, time after time, I kept saying that it couldn't be a pH issue. It just couldn't be. There was no way that it could be a pH issue.... It was a pH issue. I don't post these until the week after and I only just figured out today. Now, I thought that MAYBE it was alkaline....noooooooo 5.3 pH. WAY out of that nice 6.2-6.8 range. Today I watered with some baking soda (not ideal, I know). I had to do something to save what I could. Got a Blue Labs soil pH pen and will be trying to get it dialed in and hopefully not have to much of a hit on yield and quality. No more guess work and going on gut. Lesson learned. TEST EVERYTHING WITH THE RIGHT TOOLS!

Got fed up. Bought a BlueLabs Soil pH pen on my credit card. So, soil was sitting WAYYYY to acidic. Around a 5.3-5.8 range. No clue how it got so acidic. Nutrients maybe? I don't know. I'm wiping my hands of this grow, I'll just do better next time. Lesson's Learned: Use fresh soil everytime unless you test EC and pH and thoroughly reamend. Have all the tools for the job. Reliable, accurate, and professional tools do not make a professional, but they do make the job easier. Use smaller pots. It's way easier to maintain your soil and watering scedule with smaller pots.