Hunting in the mandarine field (+reveg)

So here is my first adventure of growing. The attemps before were unsuccesfull, so I had a lil upgrade with the lamps and the air extractor and now it's time for some serious stuff! I choose the Red Mandarine for my first attempt because the growbox is kept outside in a sort of wintergarten - but during the night the temperature fall a bit and I'm wondering if a fast version can beat the record and make me harvest between final week of november and the first of december. The choose of the supplements are made because i don't have the time during these month to keep progression of every nutrients and so on, that's why I chosed a pre-fertilized soil like the All mix and the BioTabs, which will help me by only worring about watering with a lil of Orgatrex and Bactrex in the future. Every suggestion for helping me achieve some nice orange buds are very welcome, a rookie like me need some community support! Update will made every sunday, so keep an eye on this diary!

During this week I regularly water the plants with 0.5L each pot. Due to this the soil compressed a bit and the roots found the edge really fast. Only one lamp run during the week. Sunday was a busy day, I TRANSPLANTED all of them just 14 days after the birthday! So I prepared the 20L pots with a mixture of Startrex (42.5g) and Micotrex (3g), then I prepared the hole and added 2 spoons of Micotrex, to help the roots find fast nutrients for their expansion. Then I add 2.5 Biotabs, half tab each hole, five hole in total. After covering with a few cm of fresh soil, it’s time to water the plants. With a mixture of Bactrex (1g) and Orgatrex (5mL) for each Liter, I repeat the process for 6L in total, avoiding a heavy compression of the soil itself: it was necessary a gentle touch for our princess 👑 After this week it will begin a 4-week-water-only period, during which It will be made the FIMming and the switch to the flowering period 💪💥

During the third week the plants start building structure and increase size - but not in high! The last week I transfer them into 20L pots so I suppose they are now growing roots and try expand them into the soil. The week was simple: 16 hours of lights and water when needed (0.75 L maximum each watering). The 21st day they were ready for the cut. I proceed by cleaning the first to internodes for every plant and by Topping 2, FIMming 1 and leaving untouched the smallest one. During the cut I noticed some strange yellow stripe on the big leaf of the NANA, but it can be some nutrient I missed, I really don't know. In general they look very healthy. My goal is to keeping them short and working more on the cure of the leaf. Maybe if the cutted plants are fast to heal I can switch to flower the first week of October, let we see how things will change. I will keep you all update with some nice pic!

This week can be called the "recovery week". Almost all the plants have been cutted last sunday and it took a bit to answer to this stress. The two plants that I Topped (Geom.Teacher and Manda Rossa) grow in height more than their sisters; one plant have been FIMmed and took almost 5 to 6 days to recover from the cut, keeping a low height but increasing leaf's surface; the Nana was the only one which wasn't cutted (except the first 2 braches, removed from the bottom) and didn't had any great respond.. After a week of observation and light watering, it's time for me to add the red light and make them stretch a bit!

During the week I switchd the photoperiod from 18 to 14 hrs the first 2 days and then switchd to a 12/12 period on wednesday, the same day I gave them some nice tea to drink: 1.5L water with 60mL Orgatrex and 3gs Bactrex. This organic drink was repeated on sunday, after then I will only water them. The plants looks good, I moved them around the box to use every inch avaiable. Some toppes girls show some orange trail on the leaf, hopefully it’s and indicator for a strong fenotype, we will keep an eye on it. I would try to perform some LTS technique but because of some fear to break the branches I just put some light circle which organize the leafs and orientate the branches.

6th week proceeded good. I got no problem at all, just a little drop of the temperature (-2° ) but everything seems fine. I'm worried if the temperature reaches 17-15° during the last phase, hope to not ruin everything. No bends were given to the stems, just a gentle push from the pressure of this light, green circle, which reveals really helpful! I gave them almost no water until sunday, when I overwater them a little bit. The early first sign of flowers revealed during friday-saturday, and now the box smell a little different :) By ending this week I just thought that I'm finding myself almost at half of my journey: only 6 weeks more divide me from harvesting those succulents fruits, yum yum!

Around the 40th day, almost like the other diary here on GD, my plants shows some nice sign of flowers! Smells weakly but good, on 4 plants just one is purple, but 25% is ok I guess, is better than nothing :D Let’s see how it develop.. Day 44 - I water them with 1.5L water, next week I would add a bit of Orgatrex and maaaybe some top max from BioBizz. Day 48 - Soil is dry, leafs are sad, maybe they need some water to take all the nutrients from the bioTabs! I just add a lil bit of Orgatrex -35mL ca. and a good splash of Top Max by BioBizz - around 2 splashes in 1.5L. From now until the crop only good old water!

Tuesday, day 50. Half journey is gone and now is just patience and care.. only the right amount of water, not too much and not many times per week - maybe tomorrow, friday and sunday. The Nana is the tallest now, since it wasnt stressed by any kind of activity, she’s presenting a beautiful purple tone on her leafs and flowers begin to grow very well. The other topped girls looks pretty same, 55cm in height, a lot of dense buds cover my stems, yeah! The fimmed girl is the shortest but the biggest in terms of yeld! I wanna see the difference between the three metods and see which one works better with the genetic! Sunday - day 55 - cold is dropping hard during these days, temperature start colling down of 1-2°C and I’m worried about the plants.. how can I avoid to kill them with the cold? What’s the minimum temperature for this genetic? Now I’m hitting 15 during the night phase and 17.5-18 during the daily phase (between 6pm and 6am).

This week I rearranged the space between plants, I pushed lightly the green circle to obtain more space inside the circle to let the main colas grow strong and I cut some leafs out, to obtain some light even on the under flowers.. Thursday - day 59 - HALLOWEED HAPPY HALLOWEED TO EVERYBODY! Today the check was easy, soil is still wet and temperature support the 18º level. That’s a good thing, because now November is coming and temperature start decreasing slowly.. hope the lights can warm enough! Friday - day 60 - Inspection day So today I took my plants outside the box the do a quick inspection, cut some extra-leaf and removing one of the green circle from the MandaRossa. While looking at the girls I noticed the DecaBull grown a fifth stem right where I FIMmed and that's amazed me! I had to cut the two flowers away because they required too much energy to grow less than nothing.. Also, I discovered the Nana isn't the only purple! Even the DecaBull has some purple trails on! What a beautiful day to start November!

This week snow came to the mountain surrounding me and temperature drop very bad. I got a 12.3°C during night phase, that’s not good for the whole ecosystem, I got to solve someway.. Some leafs are turning yellowish now due to the autumn, and the low temperature increase resin production. Look at the first pic and try imagine how big it can be in 3 weeks! Also, I got a small problem with humidity: I cannot control it anymore, the vent isnt working properly and it's all a mess, everytime I check it's around 71-72°... How can I solve it? Hope to receive some Feedback from the community, I need support during the last phase!

This weekend was very busy and I forget to check the girls. A lil bit of negligency and some unlucky events (it’s raining a lot here and I can’t control more the humidity- very low temperature) and this is the result. A lot of yellowish-proxim to death leafs appear on bottom of all the plants. The soil was very very cold and dry, I had to water them with a hot solution. But I’m very happy about terpens and resin, the smell is amazing (soft but very citrus) and the buds start growing density! Finally :) Day 74 - this is strange. I got VERY LOW temperature (like 9-10°C) and HIGH humidity (Almost hit 85%) and some new flowers appeared. I’m thinking about trying to reveg the Manda Rossa and the Nana (for her beautiful colour!) Day 76 - I bought a heater, 1000W. I know, it’s very dispendious, but it goes alternately without Specific order (it switchs on each 1-2 hrs, randomly) And it raise the temperature to 18 again. It helps and it will last only 1 week, just for the last period of flowering. I’m hoping to harvest 60gs at least!

On Monday I water them with the last 1.5L of water: from now I will not give more water. I managed to raise the temperature a bit but not too much (enough to avoid congelation). I’m running against time - in one week I will receive a nice gift from RQS (the Organic Nutrient Pack + some ICE and Wedding Gelato’s seeds) so I have to wait a bit before plant the new girls! Also, I’m dreaming about revegging the Nana for clones (some buddys really liked the phenotype and asked so much for a copy!).. let’s see! Wednesday was defoliation day! I cut most of the yellowish leafs, leaving only the greenest attached. Tomorrow I’ll turn off the red light to increase resin production :) Friday - it’s cold now, I raised the temperature to 18° so everything can proceed until the end! I cutted the most of the leaf from the Geom.Teacher - to compare with the MandaRossa if it’s better to leave them or not. The Nana is splendid, looks and smell greatly! Their buds Are dense and covered in resin!

After some different approach I can definitely say that if you don’t mess with the hormones - meaning to not cut any part of the plants- it preserves and shows his genetic phenotype. During the last two weeks every plants developed some dark purple colour on the lower part. Defoliation should be made at least 3-4 days before harvest and - if possible - use low temperature and 1-2 days of full darkness to increase resin production. Low temperature slows growth but helps to obtaine stickness on the buds. The BioTabs should be used in his wholness! Don’t buy only the starter pack, use all the products they offer, it helps during the last phase! I hoped for a good crop but in the end I harvest only some juicy buds..

So I just harvested my beauties and I decided to keep two exemplare to experiment with the revegetation process. The plan is to develope from 5 to 10 clones at least, so I can share this genetic with my grower friends and preserve the pheno hunted during this last three months! Day 0 - sunday 24 november 2019 Harvest day. From tonight the girls start living under 18 hrs of light. Humidity is around 65% and the temperature is LOW, at least 15-16° during the night phase and a few degrees more during the day. When (and if) I will understeand how the thermostate works maybe I will solve this problem.. Day 2 - tuesday - the nutrient day I went to my local grow shop to buy some Bio Grow and Boom Boom Spray, to help the little plants recover a bit from the trauma and the stress of the harvest. After 2 days of flowering light 18/6 it’s time to turn the red light off and leave only the vegetation one on, always 18/6 hrs. I don’t have any problem anymore with the clima! Now always is under control! Day 7 - the perfect clima exist. 20º and 66% humidity is what helps these beauties to grow again! The Nana struggles to reveg but the other one has no problem at all! It developed three nice point of start, but I can’t decide if keeping them on the plants or try some cloning method...

I adjust all the parameters in the box and I left the two girls to stabilize.. the purple one didn’t show any grow sign but the other one survived and increased in height. Thursday I cut the purple one to death and left the other grow for a couple of days, before hiding it in the basement for a couple of days (thanks to a unexpected visit from the parents).

So after 3 days of total darkness and temperature below 10°C, I took the girl inside the house, where’s warm and the humidity is okey. She’s not more in the box because it’s too cold outside. I tryed clean a bit the mess I made during this stressing period: cutted some leaf, tied for some LST, sprayed with BoomBoom and watered with some Biogrow. Now I’m not expecting a good reveg, I’m here only to analyze how it works ;)