Mephisto O’z³

ChillSpace Week 1 — MephistO’z³ is officially underway! Great first week for 5 O’Z 5, Do-Si-O’z, and TKO’Z. All three made it through germination and emergence successfully and are now established and starting to put on real growth. It’s crazy looking back at the first pictures from only a week ago—they went from tiny sprouts in huge pots to healthy little plants surprisingly fast. This week was also a big milestone for the entire grow. Everything lined up almost exactly how I had planned: the oldest three autos finished drying, I trimmed and jarred the entire harvest in one day, and that freed up the space I needed to rotate every generation forward into its next tent. The older autos are now in the finishing 2x4, the next group has moved forward into the main 2x4, and these three have finally moved into the 4x4. After spending a lot of time figuring out how I could maintain a breeding project while continuing to grow my autos, a perpetual three-plant rotation seemed like the simplest solution. It feels awesome seeing the whole system actually function the way I envisioned it. They’re currently under 18/6 lighting in 5-gallon soil pots, and for now the goal is simple: healthy roots, steady vegetative growth, and as little unnecessary stress as possible. I’m especially interested in seeing how these three newer Mephisto releases develop side-by-side under the same conditions. Week 1 complete. The conveyor belt is officially moving. 🌱

ChillSpace Week 2 and these three have honestly been about as easy as I could ask for. They’ve all been growing great and I really haven’t done much to them at all. A little watering, adjusted a few fans to get some more airflow across them, and otherwise I’ve mostly just left them alone. That’s actually becoming a bigger part of how I grow. I’ve changed and experimented with a lot over the last few years, but lately I’ve been getting better results by simplifying things and having enough self-control to just let the plants grow instead of constantly trying to “improve” them. That said I’ve been improving things around them 😂 They’re getting close to their first real LST session, but I don’t think they’re quite ready today. My normal approach with autos has become pretty simple: let them establish themselves, lean the main stem over once they’re ready, let all those lower branches turn upward and basically turn the Christmas tree into a bush. Then around weeks 3–4 I’ll spread everything out and usually do some lollipopping depending on how each plant develops. That last part may change a little this run because I’ve added some pretty serious under-canopy lighting to both of my 2×4 flowering tents. I’ll still clean up underneath because I want enough clearance for that light to actually penetrate through the lower canopy rather than blasting a bunch of tiny bottom buds from a few inches away, but I’m interested to see how much productive lower growth I can keep now. These three currently have basically unlimited room in the 4×4, so there’s absolutely no reason to rush them anywhere. The next 2×4 will open up soon after I harvest the trio currently finishing, but the next generation already in my production tent still needs a few more weeks before moving forward into the finishing tent. I’ll probably just let these O’z girls enjoy the 4×4 until around week 4 and keep the rotation moving from there. I also installed power-monitoring plugs on all of the tents this week and found out the entire operation is actually using less electricity—and costing me less—than I had estimated. That was a pretty nice surprise. I’m going to start treating the total electrical usage of the garden as overhead against production, including the separate photoperiod breeding project, so I can get a much better idea of what these harvests actually cost me. The long-term target is still the same: I want to consistently average around 200 g per plant. I’ve been getting closer, and I think the biggest improvement lately has been less about adding some magical new technique and more about refining what I already know works: better environmental control, better lighting coverage, healthier plants, less unnecessary training, and leaving the damn things alone when they’re happy. Lots going on elsewhere in the garden too. The finishing tent is only days away from harvest, the production tent is moving right along, the new under-canopy setup is installed, and I’m about 10 days into flipping clones from my photoperiod breeding project for sex testing. I’m starting to have some suspicions about males and females, but I’m not making any decisions until I’m 100% confident. For these three, though, Week 2 was basically: water them, give them some air, and get the hell out of their way