Autopots, beanstalk crf, and water

RyanGrows Transplanted into flower pots this week. I added beanstalk crf to each pot at the suggested rates. The beanstalk crf will provide enough nutrients for the entire grow.

RyanGrows I defoliated to start week 5. Defoliation helps the plant to focus its energy towards the tops of the plant, resulting in a bigger yield. I was unhappy with my scrog net and so I made the time to improve it by drilling more holes and adding more screws to the PVC and now the net is has 3"x3" squares instead of 6"x6" squares. This should help create a more even canopy in flower. The lights have been lowered to a foot above the canopy and are now set up on a timer for 18 hours a day. I spent more time this morning defoliating my plants and tucking branches under the scrog. I turned the autopots on this week. They are mowing drinking a few liters of water each, each day. Now adding Regenaroot to the reservior at a rate of 1 ml/l. Besides pH down, that is all I am adding to the reservior.

RyanGrows I am continuing to tuck the plants underneath the scrog net. The plants are growing on autopilot and I have been only checking them once a day to add water to the reservoir and empty the dehumidifier bucket as needed. I am switching to flowering on Wednesday, 8/19. I raised the temperature in the grow. I was sitting around 70F and now I am closer to 77F. I also raised the humidity to the 60% range. I lowered the lights another few inches. They are now about 12 to 14 inches above the canopy on 70% strength. When I switch to veg on Wednesday, I plan to turn up the lights to 90%. I installed the UV light bars and am turning them on today at low strength for two hours a day in the middle of what will be the 12/12 cycle. The lights have been scheduled for 12/12. The lights will turn off early tonight at 8pm and will turn back on tomorrow at 8am making tonight the first night of 12 hours of darkness. I turned the lights back to 80% to better follow a DLI chart. I'm going to start recording the amount of water I am adding to the reservoir. Added 25L today, 8/21.

RyanGrows Im starting to add Head Masta to my reservoir at 1 ml/L. These plants are growing so darn fast! I added 25L of water to the reservoir 8/23, 8/25, 8/26, and 8/28. The plants are now drinking about 3L of water per plant per day. I have forgotten to turn the reservoir back on after refilling a couple of times this week. This has resulted in drybacks lasting up to 12 hours. There have been no visible signs of underwatering from forgetting to turn the reservoir back on. I had a small flood on 8/28. One of my aquavalves did not work as it was supposed to. I took the valve out and cleaned and reinstalled it. Do not want to be having these problems in the future.

RyanGrows I added 25L of water everyday so far this week. I added a layer of trellis above the scrog on 8/30. This layer is meant to support to tops of the plants as they stretch and put on weight. The lights were raised again on 8/31. They will be raised to 90% on Wednesday, 9/2. On 9/1, I noticed that the Black Maple 22 is experiencing eaely signs of light stress on the top leaves. I dint want to raise the light up until 9/2 when I will also be turning up the intensity. To help the situation, I turned the CO2 up to 1400 ppm. The lights were turned up to 90% on 9/2. I raised the lights up again as well. The plants seem to have responded well to the raising of the CO2 levels. I accidentally left the valve to my reservoir closed overnight from 9/4 to 9/5. The plants havent seemed to mind the minor dryback. There are no signs of underwatering from leaving the reservior off. I raised the lights again on 9/5.

RyanGrows I noticed trichomes on 9/7. I defoliated and loplipopped below the first scrog before lights out on 9/8. Continued defoliating and lollipopping in the morning on 9/9. The garden really started to smell of weed plants after the defoliation at the beginning of week 4 flower. On 9/9, I changed the UV schedule to be one on the middle 6 hours of light on. I also turned the strength of the UV to level 4. I will turn them up again later this week if the plants acclimate well.

RyanGrows On to another week. The plants are looking and growing great. I am still adding roughly 26L of water to the reservior each day. On the evening of 9/15, I turned the lights up to full blast. I also turned the UV light bars up to 10. The lights will remain at these levels for the next two weeks of flower. The Black Maple 22 has been and is continuing to show signs of light stress. These signs have not gotten any better or worse since I turned up the CO2. The Black Cherry Guava and Mousse X do not show any signs of light stress. I turned the dehumidifier down to the 40% setting (the lowest setting on the unit) on 9/18. This should help the leaf surface be at a more ideal VPD for late flower. The humidity was around 50% and I'd like it closer to 40% for late flower. On 9/18, I realized the water level had not dropped in my reservior although the valve was open. I ended up cleaning the filter and emptying the reservior for a thorough rinse and quick scrub. I also cleaned the valve. Once I was finished, I added roughly 52L of water to the reservior along with Regenaroot and Headmasta. Cleaning the reservior solved my issue, but the plants did go through another dryback which probably lasted about 24 hours. The plants don't seem to have minded. This was the third or fourth accidental dryback this grow. I replaced the CO2 on 9/19. The plants were without CO2 for a total of less than 6 hours of lights on after the previous tank had run out.

RyanGrows I am adding water to the reservior everyday. The grow is pretty much on autopilot at this point in flower. I forgot to turn the reservior back on on 9/21 and didnt realize it until 9/22. The plants arent showing any signs of stress from the dryback.

RyanGrows There are bugs eating the leaves of my plants. The damage is pretty limited to the leaves on the Black Maple 22 that sit in front of the fan. There are only 16 days left before harvest so I plan to let it ride. I believe I am dealing with thrips. As it is late flower then only option I would really have is buying beneficial predatory mites. I decided to not let the plants ride and I bought beneficial bugs for the grow room. The bugs arrived 9/29 and were immediately deployed against the thrips. The bugs are Orius, Cucumeris, and nemotodes. I turned the lights down to level 9 on 9/30. I plan to lower them again to level 8 on 10/6.

RyanGrows I turned the light down to level 8 on 10/7. After checking the trichomes under a jewelers loupe, it doesn't appear that the thrips did any damage to the trichome heads. I don't see any thrips remaining on the leaves either.