Russian Automatic X Sonnenerde

Aircoholic She germinated after 5 days, which I consider a perfectly normal germination time. She lost one leaf in the process, but is compensating with some nice growth on the pair of first real leafs.

Aircoholic So far, this is a very calm grow, feels more mindful and relaxed than previous grows - but I'm sure that has to do with the plant and nothing with myself 😌

Aircoholic She's growing slow and steady, taking her time, not letting anything or anyone stress her out. As with White Banana Auto growing in parallel, I'm debating topping her - just not sure how she'll respond, since she's not the fastest grower. Well, there's still time, it's not a decision that needs to be made today or tomorrow.

Aircoholic It wasn't an easy decision, but I did end up topping her. YOLO! 😂 It's never an easy decision with genetics and breeders you have no experience with, but I've made topping my plants a bit of a habit and didn't want to leave her out. By the looks of it, the topping didn't affect her negatively - she didn't stop growth, she just keeps going.

Aircoholic Some early flowering signs are visible, but not quite there yet. After she reacted so well to topping and showed some vigor in her growth, I decided to apply some LST clips, to open up the canopy. The lowest node branches have used the opportunity to shoot up to the level of the others. Absolutely beautiful. Just as with White Banana Auto, this is a very calm and relaxed plant, making this grow rather hands-off, which feels unusual, but quite enjoyable.

Aircoholic Flowering stage has officially begun - not exactly a surprise after last week's pre flowering signs. So far this is still one of the most hands-off grows I ever had, and I love it. But this also means, I don't really have much to report - she's looking great, doing most of the work, the soil is also wonderful, I just feed RO water and there are no nutrient issues in sight whatsoever. Fingers crossed!

Aircoholic She did a massive jump and stretched out to almost double the height over the last week - very impressive! She's not showing any signs of deficiencies or toxicities, which really speaks to the soil. Not much to report, really - she's just doing her thing, while looking beautiful!

Aircoholic That's what I call a stretch! She went up high, and I'm not sure if she's done yet. My feeling is though, that she's pretty much reached max height - maybe she's got a few cm more in her, but not much. Her Buds are forming beautifully with the pistils, creating this pompom look, that I really enjoy. First tiny trichomes are visible, and it looks like there are loads of them. Also, there's a shy mild smell forming in the grow room already at this early flowering stage - definitely need to check my air filter situation.

Aircoholic Everything about this plant signals "I feel happy!", from her height, her fan leafs all praying to the light, the beautiful shade of green, no reddening of the leaf stems, to the sheer amount of flowers, the sugar leafs and buds covered in trichomes, the smell getting stronger. I fed her some PK Booster ACT - my idea is to try 2 feedings, the first at the beginning of flower, right after the stretch - basically a few days ago. And I'll try to get another one in maybe in 2 weeks, towards the end of flower, to give the plants a nice little boost.

Aircoholic There's not much to report here - she's the happiest plant I've grown so far. Her many many buds keep bulking up, trichomes show up everywhere, her fan leafs keep prying to the light gods, she smells delicious and looks overall happy. No signs of stress whatsoever. I don't have to do much of anything - she got this! For this update, I changed the white balance setting on my camera as an experiment - I will change it back for next week, I don't like the overly warm temp, even less than the overly cold temp I usually use.

Aircoholic This plant is incredible! Her buds are getting ridiculously big now - her strength is a blessing, the buds are a lot of weight to be carried. She's starting to show some signs on the leaf tips and along the edges of some leafs. What exactly these brown/yellow-ish areas mean or what they are, I'm not sure. If it's a nutrient issue, I can't identify which one. It could also be senescence, part of her natural aging process in the final weeks of her lifecycle. Her pistils are starting to oxidize as well, which indicates a level of maturity. She does look absolutely stunning otherwise, so I'm not too worried about this. She'll receive another ACT feeding in a few days, in the hope that she still has 2-3 weeks left before harvest, so the microbes from the ACT can boost the microbiome in the soil, which then can give the plant another nutrient boost, helping with even more trichome production and all the good stuff.

Aircoholic No idea what those brownish dried up looking areas on some of the leafs are - they started at the top and slowly spread down, which would be the other way around if it were senescence. Light/heat burn doesn't really travel down the plant, or does it? Anyway, whatever it is, it's spreading slower than the plant matures. Looking at the trichome macros, it still looks mostly clear and milky, barely any amber - my guess is 2-3 weeks until harvest. She reached a phase, where I'm getting impatient - I know she needs time to mature and for the trichomes to ripen, but she's looking so gorgeous with these thick fat buds, all those trichomes and just the sheer amount of bud sites, which makes waiting for her to ripen very challenging. I fed her 2 Liters PK Booster ACT 5 days ago and in reaction to that, her aroma starts to intensify noticably.

Aircoholic Her reaction to the PK Booster ACT is astonishing! Her buds have not only bulked up beautifully, but the trichome production went on overdrive and resulted in this gorgeous frost layer all over the buds. Her buds also get pretty heavy, one of the side branches now leans against the wall full-time. Many signs point to her end being near, but as much as I'm looking forward to harvesting her, I don't think she's quite there yet - still a few days, maybe a week left, I'd say.

Aircoholic When I got into the room one day before I scheduled the harvest, her branch collapsed under the weight of the buds. Not surprising, the buds were massive and dense! This is one of the best problems to appear during a grow, could never be mad at a plant for lack of strength to support the massive buds. I decided to view it as a sign from the plant, that it's done, it had enough, so the harvest happened a day early. Her buds were too tall for my DIY Cooler and since the buds were so dense, it wasn't easy to get to the stem to cut it and since the buds were covered in trichomes, the gloves were super sticky. The genetics were pretty amazing to grow, super happy plant with amazing growth - thank you, @Exotic_Seed for the seeds! 🙏