Dancing with Mephisto III

First Entry - 2019/11/11: All seeds were germinated on 2019/11/08; all had root tips visible and were placed into Rapid Rooters on 2019/11/10. 24 hours after being placed into the rooters they appeared as shown in the first three pictures. They were then placed into their final pots inside the 2x4 enclosure. Very pleased with the vigor these show so far. Second Entry - 2019/11/13: Watering with pH'd water as the pots dry out. Seedlings are currently under jars to keep humidity at favorable levels until I can outfit the tent with a humidifier. Ambient RH in the tent is currently between 20-30% which will obviously yield an unfavorable VPD for vegetative growth. Third Entry - 2019/11/14: Added a humidifier and was able to bring RH up from ~27% up to 60%. This has my leaf VPD hovering around .8-.9 kPa. This is perfect as the humidifier is on max; from here I can just dial it back at a target rate of approx. 5% per week. Fourth Entry - 2019/11/22 Was out of town on a business trip so this update comes a little late. VPD stayed exactly where I wanted it to be during week 1, ranging between 0.6-.08 kPa on average. Growth seems a little slow but nothing that has me alarmed. Temp fluctuations are probably somewhat to blame. Watering every third day with .25 gal of water pH'd to about 6.8. I've added a cam so I can keep any eye on things when I am away which has brought a nice peace of mind so far. I currently have the HLG board throttled back to about 65% total luminosity as it seemed to be causing some bleaching even at ~32" from the top.

I was out of town for the majority of the week so mostly things were on autopilot in the grow tent. I am happy with the progress they are making. They seem a little small for their age but looking at other FS soil grows here, they seem to be at about the right stage of development. I'm currently maintaining a VPD of about 1.0 kPa which they seem to enjoy. At this point, I'm still watering with plain tap water pH'd to about 6.8. I try to permit a good/wet dry cycle so I've been watering every third or fourth day so far or until the top inch or so is barely moist. All in all, I'm enjoy the more laid back workflow of this soil run as compared to the high maintenance and cost of growing with coco; especially without a more automated setup designed for multiple daily fertigations. I'll try to make another update before the week is out. Thanks for following along!

FIRST ENTRY: This week has seen excellent growth now that the root system has been established. I feel I could definitely benefit from starting in smaller containers even with autoflowers as I feel they lose a lot of growth initially when the root system is underdeveloped and they are in oversized containers. That said, I don't feel it will be detrimental to the grow overall. I am seeing a bit of yellowing on the first set of leaves on one pheno and some light chlorosis between veins on another. It has me wondering if I should hit with a light bit of veg nutes on the next watering. Currently I'm just using Real Grower's Recharge which always impresses. They are not showing sex yet on d17 but they are already starting to give off a distinctive skunky aroma. I'll probably start some LST regimen very soon as I'm about to lose my window to do so in any meaningful fashion. So far I'm loving these little ladies. I have very high hopes for the end result! SECOND ENTRY: It is now day 18 and I've begun to see female preflowers on one of the phenotypes. I also lightly fertilized for the first time this grow with Canna Coco A+B and the usual dose of Recharge; keeping inflow at ~ 550ppm. THIRD ENTRY: Day 19 and the fertigation seems to have had almost immediate results with the newest growth show a nice deep shade of forest green. FOURTH ENTRY: I've begun LST in earnest on 3 out of 4 of the girls. The last is still a little short for that so I'll probably start her later in week 4. My goal will be to spiral the shoot apical meristem around the edge of the fabric pot while allowing the secondary branches to level up to the top of the canopy. All other environmental conditions appear to be in good state wrapping up this week! Thanks for following along! Do me a favor and give the "Like" button a quick click if, indeed, you like what you see here. :)

FIRST ENTRY: As you can see from the photos, LST is underway on all four plants with leaf tucking to allow light to bathe the lower branches and hopefully break apical dominance. They don't seem to be at all stunted or bothered by the training even though I'm being more aggressive with these than I have other plants in the past. Mephisto delivers some excellent genetics as usual. VPD is currently dialed in beautifully at 1.0 kPa (RH=~60%, Ambient Temp=75F, Leaf Temp=73F). SECOND ENTRY: Continue lateral training. Light watering of .25gal with Real Grower's Recharge as I didnt have time to do a full watering tonight. THIRD ENTRY: Really happy with the way the LST is paying off. They bounce back without issue each time I adjust and tie down. Very healthy genetic. I'm also very impressed with the uniformity of the phenotypes. Increased light intensity slightly. I need to put a meter on it this weekend when I have some time and see what the current draw is. FOURTH ENTRY: Flat canopy has pretty much been established at this point. All side branches are equally vying for their chance at some time in the sun and I'm continuing to tie down and leaf tuck where needed to keep this paradigm going. It's been a great week for growth so far. Thanks for following along! Do me a favor and click "Like" if, indeed, you like what you see here. Cheers! 🌱

I was very happy with progress this week as a three definitely hit the stretch. Luckily, the training has paid off and achieved a nice flat canopy on each plant that will fill out nicely into multiple productive bud sites. As usual, I am impressed by the overall versatility of cannabis and the hardiness of this particular cultivar by Mephisto. Earlier in the week I hit her with a mild dose of PK 13/14 and began adding 5ml/Gallon of Canna Boost which has always given me excellent results. Plain water irrigation will always include Boost and Real's Growers Recharge as neither is enough to push TDS into undesirable areas on their own. On average my inflow TDS is around 550ppm when giving full dose fertigations. I started to notice some chlorosis between veins and a few other signs of light stress before realizing I had allowed the light to get around 28" from the tops. I backed it off to ~ 34" and it seems to have helped. Worst case, I will dial back the I/O POT on the HLG light to ease up on the luminosity. Current VPD is calibrated for flowering ranging between 1.2-1.4 kPa (RH = 50%, AT= 73, LT=70); quite happy with where this is dialed in at the moment. My next move will likely be some light defoliation to let some of those tops get out of the shade. More on that in the next update. Thanks for following along! Do me a favor and click "Like" if, indeed, you like what you see here. Cheers! 🌱

Apologies for the late updates. The last few weeks didnt leave much time for me to sit down and give this diary the proper attention. Unfortunately this grow has gone a little bit off the rails as you will see in the next few updates. Things really started to become evident in this week though as week 5 saw everything lush and healthy. However, you can begin to see the start of some cholorosis between veins and yellowing of older leaves indicating a problem with some mobile nutrient. Unfortunately, I misdidentified the issue as a Mg deficiency and began treating with epsom salts when in reality I had a K problem either brought on by ph lockout or my going to light on the bloom ferts. Either way, week 6 was the last time they looked predominately healthy. 😕

Apologies for the late updates. The last few weeks didn't leave much time for me to sit down and give this diary the proper attention. Unfortunately week 7 did not see an improvement as I continued to misdiagnose the nutrient problem my plants were experiencing. Flowering all but slowed to a halt and the deficiency continued to burn up older leaves. Quite a few lessons learned this time. Several times by this point had I considered chopping these and starting fresh. I'm only posting updates because I feel I need to finish what I started with regard to this diary.

Apologies for the late updates. The last few weeks didnt leave much time for me to sit down and give this diary the proper attention. Week 8 saw the nutrient issue turn critical as the majority of older leaves burned up due to the K deficiency. By this point, I think, I had realized my error and flushed with two gallons of water with florakleen followed by 4 gallons of ph'd tap water for each plant. I then followed up with a does of PK13/14 which seemed to improve things by the end of the week but still not enough to recover this grow from the ditch.

Apologies for the late updates. The last few weeks didn't leave much time for me to sit down and give this diary the proper attention. Despite a minor correction with my flushing and late stage application of K, I fear it may be too little too late. The buds are thin and airy and not filling out between nodes. I don't expect much in yield or potency as the terp production was hit hard by the lack of potassium for so much of the critical flowering period. Only a week or so until I can chop and reset, thankfully.

Nearing the end of this run and the plants look about as I expect them too given the issues I've had. They smell very nice and the buds are starting to get a little bit fatter on one or two phenos. Definitely not what I was aiming for but I'll take it and learn some lessons I suppose. Thanks for following along, even if they arent much to look at.

They were a breeze to grow in veg and were all prolific with their branching. Easy to train and level the canopy in a matter of days. Definitely sensitive to pH fluctuations ans has a very specific hunger for flowering nutes that you will need to dial in accordingly. Beautiful plant that presses into the loveliest light golden rosin. Great work by Mephisto!