Battle Royal AK

I've seen pictures, videos and heard stories about it how amazing it is, people praise it like it's gift from heaven, so I decided to try it out for myself and see how amazing autoflower strain really is. I've actually never tried it or grow it before or any kind of cannabis plant for that matter. It's going to be an interesting ride. I used standard germination procedure, soaking the seed in water for 24h, and then straight into soil. After 2 days she broke the surface. She looks like a soldier with helmet in a bunker peeking out. To keep her warm for first few days i keep her inside overnight. In the first week temperatures went from 25°C at day to 3-4°C at night, extreme oscillations. I hope the plant will handle it. Something to mention is that I'm growing on balcony with only 7h of direct sunlight. From 13:00 till sunset. I hope that will be enough sunlight for the plant. I will be taking pictures every day with my mobile phone to record the progress. Soil mix I use: Coco coir Perlite Worm castings Mycorrhiza Very nice quality fluffy potting soil mix, really soft when handling.👌

Week 2 just got more horrid than I expected. OMG Two days were sunny then everything went downhill. Cloudy days, very cold nights, down to 4°C. Lots of rain and heavy winds at the end of week. It was comical non the less when you expected nice weather 😄 In all that bad weather she was holding strong and grew nicely up until last 2 days of the week. Wind was blowing strongly and later in the day I found that it preformed LST. She was just lying flat down 😱 like she needed CPR. The only thing I could do now is keep her in that position and see how it goes from there. One thing to add is that I started feeding her with nutrients that I use for my other plants. It has good NPK values for vegetative growth. N - 8.0 P - 3.0 K - 5.0 with chelated Cu,Fe, Mn, Zn the story continues next week....

She continued to grow nicely with some new fan leaves appearing, despite the weather that continued with some rain and wind. Cloud coverage was high, over 90%. There were some parts in days when sun was breaking through, so I was moving the pot around to catch some sun. After 3 days of driving miss pot around I felt a bit crazy for doing it. It was constant care and it took too much time, and I also had to move her inside overnight due to low temperatures of 7°C. Feeding and watering was increased this week by double amount from last week and she is taking it well. to be continued next week...

Extreme weather forced me to take her inside for the whole week. Gale winds over 100km/h with rain, temperatures below 10°C. It was a disaster. 😱 She lacked the sun but she was cosy inside the room. I need to tie her down a bit as she stretched a lot. Was also pulling the leaves to sides to open up for new growth. Too bad the weather wasn't good and from what I'm seeing, she could be much more developed. Feeding was changed this week. At first sing of pistils I started introducing nutrients high in Phosphorus. I'm slowly switching from one nutrient to the other. All in all sadness...😟 to be continued next week...

Finally weather stabilized somewhat so she can be outside. Temperature raised few °C, rain here and there throughout the week. Side branches started to grow. Nothing spectacular. I think all this unstable weather stunned her growth a bit. One more week of rainy weather is expected and after that temperatures above 20°C. I hope to see more progress when real summer arrives. This week I only fed her once with nutrients and water every few days. to be continued...

Days keep getting warmer. Next week summer starts, finally. I hope that will help with growth as she seems like growing slowly. One thing is weird. The first bottom branch is extremely larger than the one on the opposite side which is super small. Don't know what's that all about. Thing to notice is nice development of flowers. They are small but they make smile on your face. 😊 I feed her with nutes once a week and with 300ml of water every other day. to be continued...

Summer is here, finally. As much as I'm enjoying the sun, the plant is enjoying it even more. Buds are developing in fast pace as can be seen in pictures. Plant growth is halted somewhat as I'm not seeing any progress in height or width. Everything has moved towards bud development. I've tied down a bit the big leaves to open up the main stem so she can get more even lighting. Even thou she is very short, she just looks beautiful 😍 This week I've skipped with chem nutrients and gave her 1.25l of water with 5ml of organic molasses. Since this is my first auto strain I'm a bit cautious not to burn her with chem nutrients so I'm going super easy on her. If someone has any suggestions on feeding auto strains please drop a comment. to be continued...

So, we're in second week into flowering. Can't believe that 2 months have already passed since she was only a seed. Time flies indeed. She got a bit bushy and the buds are getting fatter. I spotted trichomes coming out of leaves, which is very exciting 😀 By the end of week they almost look like little mushrooms. Very cute. Don't know if that's normal or not for this strain, but plant isn't giving any kind of smell. Strange, as I though she'd give some kind scent by now. Feeding was the same as last week. I gave her some epsom salt and continued feeding her with molasses. There are no signs of any nutrient excess or deficiencies. She looks really healthy. I hope she gets fatter next week (this is a first time I said and wished that for someone 😋) cya all

At the end of this week something terrible happened so I don't have will or inspiration to write. I'm completely distressed. Last night my pet companion died. 😥 She's been with me for the last 13 years. Her name was Chi-Chi. She was my roomie, my buddy, my little love, keeping me company all the time. Very smart and gentle animal. Always curious, looking with interest what anyone was doing. She always understood what you were saying to her. The best pet I've ever had in my life. I miss her a lot... To all pet owners and animal lovers: "Treat your animals with care. They are special creatures. Give them unconditional love and give them attention they deserve, you never know when they will be gone."

Were nearing the end of her life cycle. The breeder said it's 5-7 weeks of flowering so I started giving her just water. The haircut I gave her last week it didn't affect the plant in any negative way. It seems to fatten the buds a bit or it's just how the plant grows. How ever you look at it, it's good. I'm happy. I took some close up pictures of buds and trichomes. They look really nice. Trichomes have grown and now it looks like some mushroom forest. I apologize for not having clearer and closer pictures as this is my phone's max zoom and I can't hold my hands very still. I know, I'd be a very bad surgeon. Way back I got one nutrient from GHE called Ripen and it seems that this is the right time to start using it. Some growing buddies here suggested that plant has 2-3 weeks left, so I'm going to give the plant few more days of pure water and then introduce Ripen. cya all next week when we'll start to witness what Ripen does. I'm actually more curious what it does than the plant it self.

The buds got fatter this week and they look compact. I'm resisting to touch them even thou the urge to squeeze them is irresistible. There is still some flower growth and some white pistils shooting out of them. I'm liking it very much. Trichomes are starting to get cloudy. There are still many of them translucent. I really don't know how long does it take for all trichomes to get cloudy. Taking pictures every day is the only way for me to track the ripening. This is going to be a nice learning process. This week feeding started with some molasses and since I only feed her once a week this is the last time I'll be giving her any nutrients. At the end of week I introduced Ripen. That's it for this week and I'll see you in the next one.

This week started with rain and ended with one. Temps dropped quite a bit. Don't know how this sudden changes in weather effects the plant but the plant looks normal and it even grew some more. There are new white pistils appearing on some parts of the plant. I guess that's normal. Trichomes are getting cloudy and there are still many translucent trichomes on leaves and on some buds. My estimate is somewhere 15-20 days, maybe less, till all the trichomes get cloudy. I'm really gonna have to eyeball it as I don't have any reference to compare it. Since last week I only gave her Ripen twice and the effect can be seen. It's interesting to see how Ripen is cutting out N intake causing deficiency. Nonetheless, it's a great experiment to be a part of. Looking forward to see how it will all turn out in the end. cya next week.

Hot days are back again and the plant is enjoying its last days on the sun. The odour is more tolerable when the air is dry and it's not raining. Last week it woke me up couple of nights how smell was strong. What's more funny is how small the plant is and it's a real stinker. One thing happened on the plant and good thing I noticed it very soon. There was a bud rot starting on one bud (pic Day 86_3). I surgically removed it so it doesn't contaminate the whole bud. It was a small flower, no huge loss and the plant didn't react in a bad way. Since last week buds got fatter and the whole plants looks and feels compact. Trichomes are ripening slowly. There are still a lot of trichomes that are clear. I'm looking when most of trichomes will turn cloudy. It's interesting to see all this process in person and document it. I'm enjoying it immensely. The harvest is nearing and the flush process began. I started giving her Flawless Finish with every watering. I'm guessing 10 more days till chop-chop. Maybe its too soon to tell. We'll see. cya next week

Another week passed and I'm getting anxious. 😁 Nothing really has changed since last week except the fan leaves are slowly turning yellow but not much. Trichomes are still not there yet. There are clear trichomes here and there but the amber ones haven't appeared. I'm gonna wait for a few more days for trichomes to get to desired ripeness. cya all next week. ...the last week i hope.

I left the plant for one more week to ripen a bit more and didn't water it. Soil was moist enough and this week was hit with rain and high humidity so there was no point in adding anything. Didn't want to risk getting mould or something similar. I guess this plant could go few more weeks like this as I've seen some new flowers popping up. I think 9 weeks of flowering is enough and actually I'm not looking for couch-lock effect so this will suffice. Last 2 days of the week I placed her in a dark place for 48h. What I saw today were some new flowers and some more trichomes. There were still no amber trichomes anywhere, just cloudy ones. Anyway, the plant went down. Peacefully. Didn't make a sound. Before I hung it in my drying room I removed large leaves that didn't have any trichomes on it. I also placed large fan in the room to circulate the air. I'll be back in a week to make a full report on this strain and the experience I got growing it.

Ah, Royal AK. My first autoflower grow and cannabis grow in general. GrowDiaries provided a nice platform to keep detailed track of this journey and Royal Queen Seeds supplied the seeds. When I was browsing the Royal Queen Seeds shop, autoflowering strains caught my eyes. I've seen videos online and read some articles on autoflowering strains and I just had to try it. It's been a long time since I was waiting in anticipation for something like I did for the seeds to arrive. When I got the seeds, in all excitement I popped one in a glass of water right away, like it would sprout the next day.😄 I was so excited. First few weeks was great for the plant. The weather was nice but then bad weather came that lasted more than a week. That situation couldn't got any worse as I transplanted the plant day before bad weather. The timing was impeccable. For that whole week, plant was most of the day inside behind the window. Lack of sunlight and transplant most probably stunt the plant. From what I've seen, there is not much time for the autoflower plant to recover after transplant. Lesson learned. Next time I'm planting it directly in the final pot. Plant grew just a few more cm and then went into bud production. With all the constant weather shifting and big temperature oscillations, in the end the plant was 35cm in length and 15cm in height. When I look at the pictures now, it really looks like a nice bonsai tree. The buds were big and dense, full of trichomes and sticky. Flowering took a bit longer than I expected but in the end since the plant got only 7h of direct sunlight I'm quite satisfied how it turned out. The whole plant yielded 12g. It's not much but the quality is great. It's been a hell of ride and a great experience. I've learned a lot on this journey. What to do and more of what not to do. I've also gained a new trait: Cannabis growing ( 1) In conclusion all I can say is that long time has passed since I tried something nice as this strain. Until next time 😎