Lebrons Second Grow

lebrongrows 1:28 : A week after they sprouted and they're looking fairly healthy. A bit leggy again but I turned up the lights since. Looking good for now. Temp hi 70's in the day and low 70's at night. Humidty in the 65-75 range. Looking good for now

lebrongrows 1/31: Transplanted the plants. Could have waited a bit longer imo but my roommates were worried we were taking too long. Overall fairly successful operation I would say. The first few plants were a a tiny bit messy and we accidentally cut or ripped off a few roots, but I quickly found an easy way to cut off the bottom of the solo cups, and then a vertical slit, letting us kinda of slide out the soil into our bigger 7 gal pots without harming or touching the roots much. About the medium, we went with an around equal parts of happy frog with our old soil, which was Near Source organic potting mix we had found at home depot. Our old soil had pretty much zero perlite and was extremely barky, which we realized was a big culprit of our last grows' failure (bad drainage and aeration). Combined with the happy frog, the plants seem to be doing fine, at least much better than last time, but I'm sure there are still better medium options out there. Oh we also mixed in around 15-20% perlite to help with drainage/aeration this time. 2/2: Plants have all seemed to settle in and actually continue growing quite steadily which is appeasing. Was worried some of them would have some stunted growth due to our rudimentary transplants at first. We also have dropped the temp and humidity a tad as they're a bit more than just seedlings now, and fastbuds' website doesn't recommend that tropical of a climate. Leaves are now about 4-5 in wide. Stems are thickening, more and more new emerging leaves. 2/3: Walked in the tent this morning to refill the humidifier and its starting to smell a tiny bit. Its getting exciting, fingers crossed we don't mess anything up 2/6: Now officially two weeks since the girls sprouted. Updated with some more recent pictures. The bigger plants are around 9 in wide now. As for the smell, its definitely gotten stronger. Def noticeable when you open the tent up, and then it kind of fades away as you acclimate. But yea I really wasn't expecting it to smell at all till a while from now, but no complaints fs. Some of the plants have been slightly droopy, while still looking healthy otherwise, so I'm gonna wait a bit before watering them again. Still no nutrients also. Lights are about 65% strong now, before they were 60% for a bit less than a week, and 50% before that. I also numbered the plants, so we can keep track of individual growth all while moving the plants around every weekish (i'm not sure how my different lights compare exactly, and humidity and heat and airflow may not be completely the same throughout the tent).

lebrongrows 2/11: Now officially been 3 weeks since plant. Overall pretty happy with how things are going. I realized I had been slightly overwatering the plants a week ago, so I left them to dry a bit for 5 or so days, and watered them lightly yesterday morning. Will probably water them tomorrow, and this time I'm thinking of adding in a very light dose of nutrients for the first time. Overall, plants look fairly healthy. We have 2, maybe 3 phenotypes, one being super bushy and dense, the other less so but still fairly compact. The plants had been a bit droopy the last week, which is why I waited to water for a bit, but it seems they are perking back up slowly. The bushier phenotype also seems to droop a bit more. One of the plants is significantly smaller than the others, while still looking fairly healthy. Its somewhat on track in terms of number of fan leaves, it just doesn't have the vertical and horizontal growth of the others. My roommates said they kinda fucked up the roots when transplanting, so i'm hoping its just a bit stunted and will reel the others back in soon. Oh, and when I walked in the tent a few days ago in the morning, the temp was at 102f. I have no idea how it got to that, but it musn't have been for long because the plants seem fine other than maybe 4 tiny bleached spots on 2 of the plants. I'm hoping the plants get a bit leggier, as the new nodes under the bigger fan leaves are really struggling to get any light. I don't think I will do anything for now besides a very light dose of nutrients next feed, but might get into some lst, topping, and defoliage in the next week. Need to do some research to decide if we try mainlining, scrog, or other techniques. Light settings still the same also, might raise them a few inches in the next week. 2/15: Topped all the plants. Didn't have time to get lst material but will start that hopefully tomorrow or day after. Not sure if we should defoliate some of the upper fan leaves that are fully covering the new nodes coming in from under. Plants looked fairly droopy all day, I'm hoping its from underwatering, and i'm fairly confident it is. Watered them tonight, this time 0.75 gallons each, so almost double the amount of last time. Will probably stick to this amount for the next week or two. Still stuck to the same nutrient ratio: 5 tsp big bloom and 2.5 tsp grow big per 2 gallons (our watering bucket is 2 gallon). I think next feed will probably be straight water to flush the soil a bit, but not completely sure yet. Was also pretty confused as to why some of the pots had significantly more runoff than others. Hoping to continue to see growth, and less droop. The straggler is also finally starting to speed up a bit. Most plants are around 8-9 in tall besides the straggler, about half as tall. 2/17: Plants look very healthy overall. A lot less droopy, and definitely got some decent size now. Noticed one plant has some sort of bleaching that I'm fairly certain is cal mag deficiency. Makes sense since we haven't introduced any cal mag at all, so I will go buy some today. Gonna water tomorrow as the pots are already pretty much dry. Trying to add a video with detailed view of all the plants from different angles but doesn't seem like uploading is working

lebrongrows 2/18: 4 weeks since we planted them. Some of the new nodes since topping are starting to come in. Also finally got to doing some lst. First time, so I didn't rlly know what I was doing all that much, but my main goal was to pull branches outward and have more light reaching all the nodes. I should definitely have topped and done LST earlier, but oh well, now I know for next time. I also removed some of the new fan leaves that were covering the new nodes. My roommate wanted to experiment with the smallest one so removed some of its big fan leaves. I don't really think that was the right call, but whatever we'll see what happens. Would also have loved to try mainlining but its also pretty late for that. It would have slowed down veg quite a bit too, and since we have to go home from college in early may, they have to be harvested by then. Gonna water later this afternoon as well. 2/19: Watered them last night. 0.75 gallons each. 4 tsp grow big, 6 tsp big bloom, 1.5 tsp calimagic per 2 gallons. I'm not sure why I didn't realize earlier I can just partially tuck the higher fan leaves under the lower nodes coming in. It makes the plant look droopy since big leaves are tucked, but I feel like it helps the lower nodes receive light and catch up, while being able to keep the fan leaves without cutting them. The small plant has 10 main nodes, and the rest have between 12-14, with many smaller additional nodes coming in under. I'm not sure how much I should try to grow these smaller nodes on the lower branches, or if I should just snip them off. Main focus right now is to get the nodes at similar hight and horizontal grow. 2/23: Watered this morning. Should have watered last night but my roommates were asleep and I was a bit too lazy to do it myself (took me an hour last time to do it all myself). I think I'm gonna start filling up a 5 gallon bucket instead of the 2 gallon one I was using, since I won't have to spend as much time refilling the water, nutrients, and get correct ph. Nutes doseage was 3 tsp grow big, 6 tsp big bloom, 2 tsp calimagic per 2 gallons. Roughly 0.8 gallons each plant. Ran out of big bloom for a few of the plants, but I don't think that should cause any big issues. Me and my roommate were debating if we should feed them nutes this water, or do straight water and calmag. Ended up feeding them since I didn't think we already have much salt buildup, but I think we will do a straight water and calmag flush next time. I also remembered we have a TDS meter, so I used it for the first time. Water in was about 750 or so ppm, and runoff was about 1350. I think thats kinda high for runoff, but like I said we will flush next time, and plants look healthy for the most part. Will definitely look more into that starting now. Also, the ph meter I had previously bought is complete garbage, so I had only been setting ph to around 6.2-6.5 with one of those visual mixing solution kit. I'd been doing this before mixing nutrients, and hoping that they don't throw the ph values off too much. I know this is pretty reckless and stupid, but it seems to somehow be working for now. I think it's probably a better idea we get a working ph meter so we can make sure levels are good after mixing in nutrients, but I'm feeling a bit lazy and frugal to buy a meter, so we'll see. Overall, plants look fairly healthy. They were a bit droopy today because I think I waited a bit too long before watering them, but oh well. One of the two plants that is a leggier and less bushy phenotype is turning pretty yellow however. I'm assuming it's a nitrogen deficiency but I'm not certain. Seems to have gotten a bit worse the last few days, but I'm hoping things will sort themselves out. Might also just up the doseage for grow big, which contains more nitrogen than big bloom. On a few of the other plants, the older and lower fan leaves also seemed to have some spotting resulting from calcium deficiency. Newer leaves all seem fine, and with the recentish addition of calmagic, I'm hoping this won't be an issue going forward. Have also been snipping very small nodes that are coming in on the lower branches. Not snipping them all, just trying to predict which ones have a chance at reaching quality light and developing into good colas. Anything I think will turn into larf im just snipping. Looking back on the last few weeks, there are a lot of things I have learned that I hope to carry over to our next grow next year. I should have started lst and topping sooner, I understand how much and often to water them much better now, and there are a plethora of other small things that I have learned. I wish I didn't cut corners on some small things and overall was a bit more attentive to details, but for how well it seems to be going, I really can't complain. I'm incredibly stoked about how this is going, and I still can't believe I'm growing these plants with my roommates in our garage as a college student.