Grow #4.2: Autopot Run

FeebleSnane Well, this diary is going to be far less detailed than usual. I was busy and lazy after making this, so we're skipping 10 weeks of diary. This is day 78 since the plants sprouted, and day 22 of flower. (week 3 of flower) This is my first time growing with Autopots and coco coir, so I under watered both plants for the first couple weeks. I was manually watering them while they were seedlings, and the coco appeared to be wet, but I don't think there was as much water in there as I expected. After realizing this and watering more, the plants grew much better, and shortly after that I turned on the Autopot reservoir. I had an autoflower tent starting at the same time as this tent, so I kept these in veg until the autoflowers were well into their flower stage, which gave these plants about 8 weeks of veg. I'm using the General Hydroponics 3-part nutrient kit, and I followed the "light" feeding schedule on their website through the whole veg phase, and the plants seemed perfectly happy with that. I don't remember exactly when, but I topped both plants at the 5th node, and removed the lowest node, so each plant has 8 main branches going through the scrog net. The Papaya Sherbert looks like it wanted slightly more light than the Orange Sherbert because the node spacing is a little larger than I'd like it to be, but it's perfect on the Orange Sherbert. I hope that I some day build the courage to strip everything below my scrog net before switching to flower, but that didn't happen this grow. Hopefully my light is powerful enough to give the lower buds sufficient light. Both plants have loved the Autopot system since I figured out my coco situation, and I'm debating if I want to set up my other tent with it. The main stem/trunk on both plants are very strong since I've used silica in the reservoir this time around. I'm hoping it will make the branches strong enough to hold the buds when they start getting bigger. The node spacing on the Orange Sherbert looks like it will make very nice, long buds on the main branches. The tertiary(?) branches coming off the Papaya Sherbert are coming off the main branches and reaching perfectly straight up, which makes me happy. I've noticed the trichome development on the Papaya Sherbert seems far ahead of the Orange Sherbert, even having a nice covering on the fan leaves I'm trimming off. On the note of fan leaves, I've been assassinating those things all grow, and it never seems like enough. Both plants are producing a ton of leaves, and they get big very fast. Overall I'm super excited about this grow so far, but I'm withholding excitement. My grows have a history of pollinating in week 5 of flower, so I must remain vigilant.

FeebleSnane Today is day 88 since the plants sprouted, and day 32 (week 5) of flower. Everything has been going easy this past week. A lot of defoliation and trimming to get some airflow and light in the plants. The buds have made good progress since last week, with the buds getting bigger and trichomes developing all over. There's one bud on the Papaya Sherbert that has far more trichomes than any other bud in the tent. I've still been following the feeding chart on the General Hydroponics website, and it looks like there might be a little nutrient burn, maybe too much nitrogen, on the tips of the leaves. A couple dead tips on the Orange Sherbert.

FeebleSnane Today is day 96 since the plants sprouted, and day 40 of flower (week 6). I grew 4 of the Papaya Sherbert plants in my last grow, and had a bad experience with them wanting to herm on me. One was a straight up male, and another one grew pollen sacks. The Papaya Sherbert grew some pollen sacks/nanners again in week 5 of flower, which I'm going to blame on the strain at this point. The Orange Sherbert hasn't grown any that I've seen, but I've been keeping a sharp eye out. I went ahead and removed everything below the scrog net, and any small bud on the Papaya Sherbert because that's where the nanners like to grow the most. I'm sure that made an impact on my yield, but at least my yield won't have a ton of seeds. More purple colors are coming out on the buds and leaves, and I know from the last grow that the Papaya Sherbert likes to get very purple. The buds will stay about 30%-50% green, but the leaves had a lot of color last time. The nutrients were a little low on the plants last grow, so that may have contributed to the colors, so we'll see how purple we get.

FeebleSnane Today is day 105 since the plants sprouted, and day 49 of flower (week 7). The plants look like they'll be finishing up nicely. I haven't seen any more pollen sacks or nanners forming on the Papaya Sherbert, and the buds on that plant don't look like they've been affected by pollen. The buds on both plants are hard as rocks, and still getting a little bulkier. The buds on the Papaya Sherbert (left plant in the tent) are getting pretty big, and I really look forward to seeing them after getting trimmed. The buds on the Orange Sherbert have definitely been smaller than the buds on the Papaya, but the buds still look nice. I think the Orange Sherbert naturally has more buds sites, however. Trichomes are developing nicely. The flower time on Orange Sherbert is 7 weeks, and I think it still needs closer to 2 weeks to form more amber trichomes, but the milky trichomes are looking great. The Papaya Sherbert has a 9-10 week flower time, so hopefully it lines up with the Orange Sherbet. The trichomes on Papaya Sherbert are noticeably behind, but not too far.

FeebleSnane Today is day 111 since the plants sprouted, and day 55 of flower (week 8). This will probably be the last update before taking the plants down for trimming. The buds on the Papaya Sherbert are starting to get some fox tails, and I don't want those to get too long when I take them down for trimming. The trichomes on the buds are looking fine, even though I'd prefer to see more amber. The Orange Sherbert is looking very leafy, and I'm not looking forward to trimming it. Overall, I think I'm expecting 7-8 ounces in total, and most of that will come from the Orange Sherbert. I've stopped giving them nutrients, and they're getting FloraKleen to remove the salts from the nutrients I've been using. They'll probably get plain water for another few days before coming down.

FeebleSnane The plant came down after 115 days of life, and 59 days of flower. This is the 5th Papaya Sherbert I've grown, and the 3rd one to herm. I really tried everything possible to ensure the plant was stress-free the entire grow, but it still grew pollen sacks. Thankfully, I know to expect the pollen sacks to show up in week 5-6, so I was on top of it and removed all the problem areas early. The benefit of that is that it pushed me to lollipop harder than I usually do, and I really like how it made trimming easier, and the buds generally bigger. The overall bud structure on this plant was nice, but it did start to fox tail towards the end of its life.

FeebleSnane This plant came down after 115 days of life, and 59 days of flower. I enjoyed everything about this plant for the entire grow. It didn't give me any problems with nutrients that were hard to handle. It had minor burns at the tips, but that's usually what I'm looking for in my nutrient levels - right at the limit. The plant became super smelly towards the end. So much so that I got a letter about it 😶. It got even smellier when it was trimming. I'm really looking forward to seeing how these buds will look after drying up. I'm really hoping to see extra dense buds with some heft to them.