Girl Scout Cookies - Organic Outdoor

Very excited to be growing these seeds outdoors this Spring! Noob here - these are my first bought genetics! I learned some lessons germinating these seeds. Previously with some bag seed I messed around with, I had success with a 24 hour soak, then transferred to the paper towel method - and it worked out fine. Using bought genetics for the first time, I was a bit more cautious. I found the guide at https://2fast4buds.com/news/germinationguide and decided to follow that. I was a bit concerned at the suggested soak times of 2-3 days (or more if no action yet) but went ahead and after 24 hours there was a crack in 2/3 seeds. In 48 hours 2/3 had a tiny tap root showing, and in 72 hours, one had a good looking, ready tap root, one had a stunted tap root and 1 was still yet to crack, I wasn't prepared to let them soak for longer than that, so I moved them to paper towel and by the next day one was where I expected, with a nice tap root. The other seed still had a stunted tap root and the smallest seed still had yet to crack, which made me nervous. I transferred all 3 to jiffy pellets and by the next day, there was life shooting out one of them. Still nothing from the others. The healthy plant was doing well and was moved to the final 30L pot. I mixed 5ml mycorrhizal fungi (which came with my soil) in the area surrounding the jiffy pellet. The other 2 seeds never showed signs of life. The one with the stunted tap root remained as it was the day I took it out of the water and the small seed never cracked open. I'm guessing they drowned in the first step, by leaving them soaking for too long :( Noob lesson learned - sometimes you need to trust your gut, and don't soak your seeds for longer than 24 hours. It might work for some folks, but it's risky. Moving on, I germinated the last 2 seeds successfully using my tried and trusted method (24 hour soak, then paper towel). They'll be a little bit behind the big sister, but let's see if they catch up! I'm covering the seedlings with 2L cold drink bottle tops to help protect against insects and unpredictable Spring weather. There are some strange white spots on the cotyledons of the 2 new seedlings. They almost look like the size of water droplets, so perhaps it has something to do with the moisture inside the bottle tops. The emerging true leaves look okay so far, so I'm not going to stress about it. See you next week!

There's been some cold snaps towards the end of September, with some very hot days in-between. The girls look happier, but hoping they aren't too far behind where they should be in terms of veg. I'm a bit concerned that the cold days may have slowed growth a bit. Being autos with limited veg time, I'm hoping they'll explode soon! Started a very mild nutrient solution of probiotics, fish hydrolysate and kelp. I'll step this up a bit on the next feed. Next grow, I might try make some room inside and veg under some CFL's before taking them outside, but that's going to take some planning and research. #3 (the one that had the most white spots on the cotyledons last week) is a bit behind, but looks like she's recovering from whatever happened last week. I'm considering a mulch layer of hay to keep the surface of the soil from drying out as the days get hotter, and to provide my soil with some organic matter over time. I got hold of some marigolds to surround my plants, anything to keep the grasshoppers off (they hate the smell of these) 💪 Peace!

I was headed out of town this week for 7 days of holiday, so I decided to build a mini hoop house to protect my plants while away. Too much rain, insects etc were all concerns. I could write a whole story on making that thing! Let's just say I finished up at 3:30am. A good friend took care of my feeds this week, all these pics were taken before I left, so see week 4 for more updates. The bird - it just appeared on my patio while I was building the hoop house. Must have flown into the glass doors and knocked itself out earlier. It was very friendly, I gave it a drink of water, held it a while and it flew away when it was ready. After returning - #1 has been overtaken in height and volume by #2 - started 5 days after her! Unfortunately #3 is really battling and looking stunted. Whatever caused the yellowing in the center, the white spots on the cotyledons etc has held her back and she's trying hard to recover from that. I'm thinking it has to do with too much moisture in the jiffy pellet in the early stages, and too much humidity in the cold drink bottle domes I had on in the start, topped with erratic weather. Let's keep the faith though, right? :)

#1 and #2 are coming along nicely. #3 is trying hard to push on. It's going to be interesting what happens with her. Go girl! Since I now have a protective area where the monkeys can't get in (I hope)- I'm using the hoop house to start some basil and a Carolina Reaper. I'm using an organic garlic based pesticide and the marigolds to keep insects out. I've stopped using reverse osmosis water and just using tap water that has settled for a few days. Watering 2L per plant on nutrient days (once per week) and on plain watering days which is also once to twice week, with additional top ups if the medium is getting dry. I also use probiotics on the plain watering days Cheers for now :)

Hey folks! I stepped up the fish hydrolysate by 1ml/L, since they're entering a growth spurt - but I slightly burned them (see the leaf tips) 🙀. It's an organic product from Freedom Farms, so I wasn't expecting that, but I guess I didn't fully take into account that I'm using a super soil (Organics Matter) and that it will also have loads of stuff in it already to see the plant through the grow. I'm going to go back down to 2ml/L for the next feed. I started low stress training them and they seem to be responding well. Sewing a wire ring on the inside of these fabric pots is an easy way to be able to do that without making big holes in these lovely bags. #3 is starting to make a comeback but it's on the clock. Makes me wonder if autos like her are triggered into flower by time from seed or by maturity. Any thoughts? Guess we'll find out one way or another... Expanded the grow area with 2x 70L fabric pots from freedom farms, each with 60L of Freedom Farms Organic Classic living soil. I'm going to start some Dutch Passion Glueberry OG photoperiods in them soon! 🙌 Have a great week, friends! 🤜🤛

This week saw a major growth spurt and first signs of pre-flowering on all 3. Training seems to be going well (I think). #1 pulled out the training wire without me noticing and has straightened on the major bend and stiffened up a bit in that location, so I'm just going to leave her main stem as it is, rather than try bend it back to how it was. I'll pull back some of the potential new colas as they get taller. She's much smaller than #2 and 5 days older. Very odd. I hope I'm doing this LST thing right and that it might actually increase yield. Any thoughts? I'm trying to make the canopy as even as I can. Did a slight bit of defoliation to clear open some bud sites. I'll back off the training when flowering gets more serious. I was tempted to leave them to just grow straight up with no training, but #2 is doing well and I'm a bit sad about the size of #3 and #1 so wanting to maximize yield here to make up for it as much as possible. Nevermind the 2 dead seeds right back at the start😭 #3 is wasting an entire bag, I'm thinking of moving her into the same pot as #1 in the opposite corner and replacing with one of the Dutch Passion Auto's I'll be receiving soon. That's it for now, cheers 😉

Flowering is kicking in and they are stretching a lot, which is great because I'm trying to expose as many bud sites as I can before the branches stiffen up. I did a bit of defoliation (not much), just to uncover some shaded new growth. I have no idea what to expect, like how much they'll still grow etc. Keeping the canopy at an even level is tough, because there are some stretchers in there! I guess as long as I'm opening up the branches and exposing the bud sites, I should be good. Next week I will start on some mild flowering nutes. #3 is getting stronger! Stunted as she is, I'm still going to get some bud from her. Still wasting a whole 30L pot though! So I decided to transplant to the same pot as #1 - there is space. Started an Auto Daiquiri Lime to take that slot 🍋🍸 I'm hoping that my LST efforts (mostly talking about #2) are going to benefit yield 🙏, because if I can do autos low and flat like this, I can see them all the way to harvest in a protected hoop house. Although I am kinda keen to build a bigger one :) Cheers for now ✌️

This was an interesting week! We have had some crazy storms suddenly and non-stop rain. Flood conditions in some areas. I'm grateful that I have these under a cover! ⚡💧 I've been getting whatever pics I can in between the showers. I started with some flowering nutrients, carrying on a little bit into flower with the fish hydrolysate, which I'll start pulling back - and began with the fire juice from Freedom Farms. #2 is really starting to bush out, but I think the lack of sun is causing them to stretch a bit extra. I'm still able to keep the LST going and they bounce back within the same day. Maintaining an even canopy is still proving difficult but just trying to let as much light in as I can. My plants had a visitor this week, a spotted bush snake. They are quite harmless and keep the population of geckos in check! 🐍

Rain, rain and more rain. The rest of my garden is loving it, so I won't complain, but these girls could really do with some sun! With all this humidity, and with me trying to protect them from too much downpour by putting them underneath the little hoop house - they got powdery mildew :( Since they're flowering it's a little more difficult to treat PM without damaging their pistils, which are already browning at this tips - not sure if that's normal this early. I sprayed them with a solution of h202 (20ml of 12% h202 per litre) and reverse osmosis water and it seemed to work but the next day it was the same or possibly worse. I then tried a diluted milk solution. I know late in flower this could encourage botrytis, but it's still quite early so I decided to give it a try. I used 1 part milk to 3 parts reverse osmosis water. I sprayed, and also sponged down the leaves. Between the h202 and the milk, they mold seemed to stop, but there was a white residue left, but the new growth seemed okay. A day or 2 later and I thought I'd try one last remedy, an organic fungicide based on ascorbic acid. I tried to not get it onto the budsites and gently sprayed it on the affected leaves. To me, that might have been the most effective. The next day I sponged off any residue with h202 and all seems to be under contol. I did some defoliation during all this as well, and I no longer keep these plants undercover - it's just too humid for bigger plants, it's fine for seedlings. I will respray using a combination of these methods and keep a watchful eye out for any mold. I've heard that trichoderma can be introduced to seedlings to help innoculate them against diseases like PM. I will look more into that, but wondering if it will interfere with the mycorrhizal fungi already being established in the root zones. Peace, fellows 🌱✌️

The powdery mildew seems to be at bay - thank goodness! I think the organic fungicide has really helped and I'm spraying it in 5 day or so intervals until I'm sure it's gone. I tested the spray out at 2ml/L on some popcorn buds to see if it dried out the pistils and it seemed to have no effect, which is great news and makes this solution viable should this happen again. I'd prefer to stop spraying now that it's so far into flower, but for now I'm more concerned about keeping the mold away. The smell of these plants is starting to come out nicely. The biscuity and earthy notes that the final product has, are already starting to come from the garden 🍪🍪🍪 I encountered 2 visitors this week, a blue headed lizard and a night adder. It's reptile season here! 🐍

Just when I think these buds are slowing down, they seem to just keep packing on weight! 😲 Smell is getting more intense, very excited to harvest these. Trying out some pond water from a friend just to change things up a bit and introduce some diversity in the soil. They seem to like it 💪 Not too much longer to go, I wonder if I'll be harvesting these this year or early next year.

We've had more rain again and it doesn't seem to be stopping. Keeping the girls under cover to try prevent mold. The buds are smelling great and filling out but there don't appear to many pistils, which is odd. Maybe some more will shoot out before the end?

💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧 This is a lot of rain for summer! It has been a long, wet stretch and with that come some growing challenges. Even though I've brought these in under cover most of the time it rains, these buds seem sensitive to bud rot and I've found 2 small sections of bud that were starting to rot. Luckily I caught it quickly, snipped off a bit of bud and keeping an eye on them. 🌞 Finally getting some sun! Just in time as well. Still no signs of new pistil growth on my upper buds, but interestingly, the lower/late to the party buds seem to be getting their classic orange pistils. I would love to know why this is - any ideas? Cheers for now 💤

Gave the girls their last feed. They could probably go another week, but It looks like these won't quite be ready before I need to go away for Christmas, so I will have to harvest them a bit early. Plus, I've been battling bud rot so I'd rather not leave them any longer. Still no crazy pistil development happening, but I guess that time passed and the plants were shocked by something during that stage. Bud development seems to have maxed out and the trichomes are mostly white with a few amber, so I'm generally happy with chopping them down at this point. See you at harvest time!

This strain is probably better suited for indoors with controlled conditions, but it was fun to grow other than the powdery mildew and bud rot that I battled, living in a humid climate. That's definitely something to consider if you are wanting to grow this outdoors. Out of 5 seeds, 2 drowned (do not soak these for more than 24 hours), 1 was stunted, 1 was small, and 1 was a decent size. I didn't get the classic pistils in late flower that you see in the pics from the indoor guys and girls, but it could have been stress during flowering because of the mildew and rot, as well as extreme heat days and also very rainy conditions. It's a great smoke, with a quality high and amazing flavour profile. Will grow this again! Some numbers: Dry weight (total): 48.8g Decent bud: 34.82g Second grade smaller bud: 9.4g Larf: 4.6g