First Grow w/ Bubba Kush

This is my second grow and my first in a tent. Using coco coir as my media and using free dry amendments I got called FlowerPower Bio Line. Used LST and topping. Bubba #3 when topped makes 3 tops. Did a defoliation a week before heading into flower. Update: Wanted to try out super cropping so I did a little test on my #2 pheno.

Week 1 Flower: Did a pretty heavy defoliation before switching to 12/12 light cycle to try and get those lower bud sites going a little more. Also did a little lollipop, re-trained some of the old branches and did some LST on the new ones Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Pro Cal (4.5mL/gal), Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal). Ended up watering each plant about 1.5gal of water. Raised the lights to their max height in the tent.

Week 2 Flower: Did a pretty heavy defoliation last week and it looks like it has recovered amazingly! Lowered lights to about 12-15 inches above the canopy. Pistils are starting to show! Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Pro Cal (4.5mL/gal), Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal). Ended up watering each plant about 1.5gal of water.

Question: How much defoliation is too much and how often is too often? I've done it twice in 2 weeks because the undersides of the plants where getting out of control and not getting any airflow. Week 3 Flower: Did a defoliation and lollipoping heading into week 3 of flower. Buds are starting to form on Bubba pheno #2 and #3, pheno #1 is starting to develop pistils...finally! Pheno #1 has been behind about a week for the entire grow unfortunately. For my next grow I'm going to buy more seeds and do more of a selective process in the seedling stage to try and achieve a more even canopy. I should have realised and noticed this sooner but... I just noticed after a few weeks after the super cropping that the branches that were below the super crop shot up like crazy almost to the top of the plant and the ones above did not. In learning from this I'm only going to be super cropping just above a node to encourage branching and achieve more tops on my next grows. I also changed around my lighting since the heat from the 400w HPS at 75% was pushing my temps over 90°F. I got rid of the 100w LED to make space for another 4inch inline fan to draw in cold air from the outside over top of the HPS light. My temps are now sitting around 70-76°F and the HPS is at 100% so I couldn't be happier with the outcome. The Dyson fan was also removed because it was causing some wind damage on some of the plants and was replaced with a 6inch WindDevil that is placed just above the top of the canopy. Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Pro Cal (4.5mL/gal), Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal). Ended up watering each plant about 1.5gal of water.

Week 4 Flower: Throughout the week I continued to do selective de-leafing to allow more light to lower and covered bud sites. The buds are starting to form beautifully across the canopy. I think I need to work on my training, in order to get a more even canopy, and might want to try out a trellis net in future grows. I think this will also help with my height issues in the tent since my plants are starting to get a little too close to the light, the top buds are around 10 inches away. All in all I'm still very happy with how things are shaping up. I also did a little more LST spreading out the canopy a few inches on each plant. Pheno #1 is super bushy and has been hard to manage and train, definitely been a challenge growing her. I noticed that I had gotten thrips on a few of my house plants and put some predatory mites around the house and in the tent, just incase they get in and cause damage. Things are pretty much on cruse control now as we head into week 5 of flower. Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Pro Cal (4.5mL/gal), Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal). Ended up watering each plant about 1.5gal of water.

Week 5 Flower: The buds are getting sticky and trichomes are frosting out all over! Thought the week I continued to do very selective de-leafing to allow for more light penetration into the lower canopy. I also removed all of the new/young/underdeveloped growth In the lower canopy to allow more resources to flow to the top of the plants. Heading into week 6 of flower looking good, although I am a little worried that the buds aren't forming as quickly as I would like compared to my last grow. I could be that the buds are growing denser instead of larger but we'll just have to wait to see. The spots from last week haven't been seen again since I removed the fan leaves. Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Pro Cal (4.5mL/gal), Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal). Ended up watering each plant about 1.5gal of water.

Week 6 Flower: Some serious frost is coming on! But still lacking the density that I would like. I've dropped the humidity to 45% to try and pack on some more density in the final weeks of flower. Still been doing selective defoliation to keep the tops nice and lit. I've been having problems dropping my temps and I believe its from my HPS light in such a small area. Since adding the ventilation for the light I no longer get up into the high 80's but would still like to see it get below the mid 70's. Might be adjusting my light schedule to a 10/14 and will be stopping the Pro Cal feed. I'm hoping that in these last couple of weeks the plants start to cannibalise and some nice fall/autumn colours start showing. Sorry for the lack of photos and info this week there isn't much to talk about. Everything is looking good heading into week 7 of flower. Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Pro Cal (4.5mL/gal), Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal). Ended up watering each plant about 1.5gal of water.

Week 7 Flower: Buds are starting to pack on some weight since getting the environment dialled in at a constant 75° and 45% humidity. Looks like they have about doubled in size over the week, very exciting! Did end up remanding for this coming week but cut the Pro Cal out. This will be its last feeding despite using organic dry amendments, trying to push for some nice fall colours. At the beginning of the week I had a pretty serious gnat issue and got some sticky traps, nematodes and bacteria that waters into the soil to help kill the eggs and larva. Hopefully this will solve the issue, the populations have already greatly decreased compared to the beginning of the week. Reamended the soil, 10g/plant of FlowerPower Bio-PK Booster. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal).

Week 8 Flower: Buds are showing some nice weight and have fattened up nicely. Trichomes are starting to go cloudy which means harvest time soon! Going to be checking in on the trichomes daily for the next week to make sure the plants get chopped down at the right time. Hoping this coming week is the last. My fungus gnat problem seems to have subsided quite a bit. Would definitely recommend using bacteria to kill the larva or even nematodes if gnat-nix isn't available to you, its not as quick of a solution but it seems to have worked flawlessly by the end of the week. I stopped all feeding despite being a "organic" grow expect for the Liquid Weight and Rezin since those additives are composed of sugars and microbes and nothing else just to help push for some last minute trichome and flavour development. Watered at a pH of 6.5 with the Liquid Weight (4mL/gal) and Rezin (8mL/gal).

Week 9 Flower: Hoping this is the last week! The trichomes showed that they weren't quite ripe enough to harvest so I'm pushing for another week hoping that does her. Fungus Gnat problem has slowed down a lot, still got sticky traps up because there is still quite a bit of larvae in the soil but hoping the bacteria and nematodes will sort them out. Not much to update other than that. Watered at a 6.5pH with no nutrients