Mephisto Chemdogging-Hubba / Biotabs

kohlrabi In my last, hasty update, I forgot the most important thing: the variety grown is a free goodie from Mephisto and a cross between Hubba Bubba Haze and Chemdogging. Since the title is limited and the variety is not available for selection, I have included one name in the title and the other in the seed description. Please forgive the confusing situation. The plant shot up quite a bit at the beginning, perhaps because I had the lamp set to the lowest setting. When I returned from my short trip, the thin stem had bent over, but otherwise the plant looked fine. I added some soil and increased the light intensity, and I hope it doesn't hold it against me.

kohlrabi My little latecomer is developing well. I was a little worried because of the damaged stem last week, but she recovered. I cut off the lowest branches, as in my experience they never really amount to anything. Otherwise, it only gets its daily sip of water until it too can be switched to watering from the reservoir below.

kohlrabi The plant is developing excellently. Regarding its size, it should be noted that in week two, I added about 5 cm of soil to prevent the previously thin stem from bending. Starting with watering from below now. I used large Airpots (20+ litres), but inserted the bases so that there was about 10 cm of empty space at the bottom. Then I threaded four irrigation wicks into each pot and secured them with wire so that they wouldn't slip when I filled the pots with soil. (See the pictures above.) Finally, I spread a small layer of pumice on the bottom of the Airpot and filled it with my soil-pumice mixture with all the Bio Tabs products you need for the ‘Just Add Water’ strategy. The pots are now standing in large plastic containers that serve as water reservoirs, which I can fill with 10 cm of water. For the first three weeks, I watered from above, but since then I have only been filling the reservoir. And what can I say? It looks fantastic so far. No problems with overwatering or underwatering; the plants are getting exactly what they need. I'm delighted.

kohlrabi This beauty shot up 22 cm last week. It looks magnificent and is now also being watered from below. This grow circle has been a lot of fun so far!

kohlrabi I'm incredibly late with the update; sorry about that. However, the pictures were taken right on time, one week after the last entry. Tomorrow's update will feature much thicker flowers to admire! :) The Mephisto plant is a whole two weeks younger than its neighbours and has already overtaken them in growth. It has grown a whole 40 cm in a week! Exciting and a little scary. The plants love the watering system and show me that I have been giving them far too little water during this phase of cultivation in the past. They drink about 2 litres per day. I have tied a few branches to the side and bent a few leaves so that the flowers get more light.

kohlrabi Okay what the HECK is going on here?! I bent the main branch away, but the next day it was still bigger than ever. I'm not complaining. I'm scared. (Keep in mind that this plant is 2 weeks younger than the other two.) And I'm wondering how I can provide enough light when this monster is overgrowing everything else in the tent. I hope my other two plants are ready for harvest soon, because if not, they'll soon be in the shadow of this giant Mephisto lady.

kohlrabi She's 1m tall now and growing daily. Not all of the many buds get enough light, so I hope to get the other plants out of the tent, soon.

kohlrabi On the one hand, this plant is fantastic, but on the other hand, it is not very supportive of its sisters. It has spread more and more, and now that one of the other plants has been harvested, it takes up two-thirds of the grow room – about 60 x 120 cm. And I strongly suspect that it will use the entire space as soon as the second plant is harvested. Impressive! The branches are long, full of flowers and holding up well so far. I expect I will have to support them soon. One day, there was not enough water in the reservoir, which it immediately resented and turned some leaves yellow. I removed those. Since there is now plenty of space, I will refrain from further defoliation if possible and instead bend the branches to the side to provide more light.

kohlrabi The reason my update is so late is because I'm slightly desperate about the condition of this plant. I don't know what's going wrong. At first, I thought it wasn't absorbing enough nutrients (because the leaves were yellow). Then I gave it CalMag, just in case it couldn't absorb the nutrients. Later, I tried giving it an extra dose of ‘Bio PK’. The leaves are still yellow and are starting to dry out. But it has enough water. I'll post a growing question here, but if any of you have any idea what's going on, please let me know. It will be even clearer in the pictures of next week, which I'm goint to post right now.

kohlrabi Help, help, help. I have no idea what's going wrong here. I've already tried Calmag, Bio-PK and plenty of water. But the leaves are still getting brown spots and drying out. I'd be grateful for any advice.