2nd Grow - 3 Plants & Strains

Germination started on 9/15 and by 9/17 the Critical Kush and the Pineapple Chunk were planted. I waited until 9/19 before I gave up and started to germinate another Triple Cheese seed. On 9/22 Triple Cheese was planted. All the girls were nestled in 1 gal. fabric pots in a tray under a dome with a 1 ft florescent light. They stayed that way until I took them out of the dome on 10/6. Sun. 10/6 is what I am considering the beginning of Veg. Week 1. The girls had received their first nutrients on Mon. 9/29. Plain Distilled Water on Tues. 10/1 and nutes again on 10/2. Water again on 10/4. Nutes on 10/6, water 10/8, nutes 10/10. On 10/12 the ladies were transferred to their final homes of 5 gal. fabric pots and received 1 gal. of water each. (I think I might go Solo cup or 1 gal. plastic pots next time around. Transferring from the fabric pots was really messy...or maybe I should have watered in the 1 gal. pots before transferring to keep the coco together. Your thoughts and expertise on the matter are welcome if you care to share.) A couple of improvements I've made from my last grow. I was thinking that the bottom of the pot still sitting in a traditional tray wasn't taking full advantage of the fabric pots so the pots are now sitting on these little wheeled plant caddies that I bought...which are now sitting in a 2X4 hard spill tray lined with tin foil on the bottom of the tent. I initially put the tray in without the foil (it's this really ugly brown color) and it just darkened the whole lower part of the tent because it didn't reflect any of the light. I thought my wife did a really nice job covering that ugly thing up.

Even after a full gallon of water each the day before, on 10/13 they each took down another 1/3 gal...and an 10/14 they took another 1/3 gal. with nutes. Skip to 10/16 for some water, then all the way to 10/19 when I split 2 gallons of nutes between the 3 of these beautiful growing little ladies.

This week the girls graduated from "baby food" to full manufacturer's suggested nutrient doses. In case I didn't mention it before, I've bought in on the whole Cyco line of products and purchased the Cyco Platinum Series w/ Grow XL, and I bought Ryzo Fuel because it didn't come in the kit. The young ladies split 2 gal. of full strength nutrients between them this week. Once on 10/21, then they received nothing until 10/14 when they split 2 gal. between the three of them again. They were able to live on that nicely through the rest of the week. Unfortunately when I was using my shop-vac to clean up the run-off from feeding I the aluminum foil tore and I had to remove the tray I had added. I'm able to keep everything else the same but because the tent is in a carpeted closet the caddies are still rolling around on covered carpet which makes it a little difficult to roll the caddies when necessary. I saw rolls of reflective diamond foil on Amazon and am going to give that a go for covering the tray.

Sun. 10/27 the ladies drank 1 gal. each of nutrients. Tues. 10/28 I came home and FIMed all the ladies. I might have come a little too far on the Critical Kush and Topped her. I don't think so, but it's close. Wed. 10/29 the ladies split 2 gal. of nutrients. Thurs. 10/31 was back to 1 gal. each and I started a defoliation which I finished on Fri. 11/1. I missed taking height measurements but they are looking healthy and I've not noticed any of the issues I had during my first grow.

It was a 4 feeding week with the ladies splitting 2 gal of nutrients on Sun. 11/3, Tues. 11/5, & Thurs. 11/7. Because of the limited time in the evening during the week I was unable to do some much needed defoliation Sat. 11/9 (when the ladies graduated to a full gallon of nutrients each for good it seems). I cleaned up some lower limb growth that I figure isn't going to produce much later on and will just suck energy that can be best used in other areas and a lot of the larger fan leaves that were prohibiting light and air flow penetration. You can see in the after pictures of the Cheese & Pineapple where they were a little stunted I think. I said it last grow and I'll say it again. That Critical Kush is a beast of a plant. She just grows and grows and is just a beautiful plant all around. A real pleasure to grow. Not to take away from the other plants that I've grown at all. They've all been fun to grow (and smoke), but this Kush is just a really beautiful plant.

Overall a nice week. I think all the ladies benefited from the the big defoliation at the end of last week and which I continued on their next feeding on Mon. 11/11. (1 gal. of nutes ea.) I also FIMed them all again. With the training I think they're all filling out nicely. 1 gal. of nutes ea. again on Wed. 10/13. Fri. 11/15 I grabbed a few more fan leaves that had grown over the week and moved some stakes around. I decided to wait until Sat. 11/16 until their next feeding because as I was moving them around on Fri. they still felt a little heavy to me and I really wanted them to take as much as they could. I was finally able to line the garden tray with the diamond foil roll that I bought. It took a while and almost an entire roll of double-sided tape but I think it came out nice and it's now back in the bottom of the tent. When I put the ladies back in the tent after the tray I decided to rotate their order. The Critical Kush is now on the left. Triple Cheese moved from left to middle, and Pineapple Chunk moved from middle to right. 11/16 - Critical Kush 17.5" 11/16 - Triple Cheese 14.5" 11/16 - Pineapple Chunk 13.5"

A very uneventful last week before switching to 12/12 light cycle for flower. Full nutrients, 1 gallon for each lady on Mon., Nov. 18th & Wed., the 20th. I wanted to let the ladies drink up every last bit of veg nutes so they got skipped on Fri., Nov 22. Sat., the 23rd the ladies got 1 gallon of plain distilled water each for a flush before they lights went out for the last time for the dark period before flower. 11/23 - Critical Kush - 19.5" 11/23 - Triple Cheese - 16" 11/23 - Pineapple Chunk - 15"

So the ladies were in full dark for about 36hrs when the lights came back on Mon., Nov. 25th. and when I got home from work that evening they all got their first taste of the flower nutes. 1 gal. ea. More of the same on Wed., the 27th. Thurs., the 28th it was time for an overdue defoliation. Should have been done at the beginning of the week. I think the overgrowth was stunting the Pineapple and the Cheese. More teh Cheese than Pineapple. The uppermost branches of the Cheese look dwarfed. weird, not like the last grow. ...nothing stops the Critical. I've said it before, I'm sure I'll say it again for as long as I have seeds to grow of it; That Critical Kush is just a beautiful beast of a plant to grow. While I didn't take any pictures immediately before or after the defoliation, you can see the difference in the pics from the beginning of the week and the end of the week. Again, the ladies don't seem to drink down as much towards the end of the week. They were skipped 2 days again, and they were fed 1 gal. ea. of nutes on Sat., the 30th. Some how I managed to miss measuring the Pineapple at the end of the week. @#$%&! 11/30 - Critical Kush - 21" 11/30 - Triple Cheese - 17.25"

Pretty standard week. Each lady drank 1 gallon of nutrients 3 times this week; Monday 12/2, Wednesday 12/4, & Saturday 12/7. Friday 12/6 was a big defoliation/pruning to get some air flow and light to the inner part of the plants. I thought they felt a little full still which is why I waited until Sat. to feed them. 12/7 - Critical Kush - 26.5" 12/7 - Triple Cheese - 21" 12/7 - Pineapple Chunk - 17.5"

Another nice and easy week for me and the ladies. We've got our groove on and hopefully we'll ride it out nice till the end of this grow. Mon. 12/9, Wed. 12/11, & Thurs. 12/13 feeding schedule this week. 1 gal. each of nutrients for the ladies with another clearing of some fan leaves that got big during the week and a couple of new minor growth spots in the lower canopy that I don't think will have amounted to much. Better for the energy to go somewhere else. 12/14 - Critical Kush - 31" 12/14 - Triple Cheese - 25.5" 12/14 - Pineapple Chunk - 22"

Skipped nutrients on Sun., 12/15 because the girls were still heavy so they got 1 gal. of nutrients each on Mon., 12/16 and again on We., 12/18. On Fri., 12/20 the girls got a little flush out. 1 gal. of distilled water each because the nutrients are changing a little next week. Basic fan leaf maintenance throughout the week. 12/21 - Critical Kush - 32" 12/21 - Triple Cheese - 27.5" 12/21 - Pineapple Chunk - 24"

I definitely see some bud swelling starting to take place. I expect that this is the point in time where I will start to really see the fruits of my labors...and if buying into the entire line of Cyco nutrients was worth the investment. So far I can say I believe that I have heartier plants. I do think that temperature is going to play a part here as well. I had to start using a heater about 3 weeks ago. I've been able to keep the tent temps within reason but I just don't think its been sustained throughout the day as I would like because of the the way the heater works because of the safety features and temperature shutoff. Comparing Week 12 for the Critical Kush from last grow and this one. There's almost an 8 inch height difference and looking at the pictures, it's obvious that last grows buds at this Week 12 are much larger that Week 12 of this grow...but I suppose it's not Week 12 that counts is it? For all I know I may get a smaller harvest but the bud will be even better than last harvest. Who knows?...but I can't wait to find out! 😁 Again Critical Kush was first to the party with her first orange hairs. (Such a fucking beautiful plant to watch grow!) Added bamboo stakes into the Kush and the Pineapple in prep for branch support once those buds start to gain to weight. The Cheese's branches are really squat and strong and I don't expect to really need any support. Nutrients changed a little this week. Silica got an increase of 4ml/gal. No more Potash, but added Swell & Supa Sticky. Vertical growth seems to be done. The Kush didn't change and the Cheese & Pineapple looked like they just filled out gaining 1/2 inch and 1 inch respectively. 12/21 - Critical Kush - 32" 12/21 - Triple Cheese - 28" 12/21 - Pineapple Chunk - 25"

The ladies weren't very thirst this week. They got 1 gallon of nutrients each on Sun., 12/29, Wed., 1/1, and Sat., 1/4. Minimal fan leaf clearing throughout the week. Since the stretch is definitely over, on Wed., I lowered the light to 25 inches from the top of the Kush. It's coming down to the final 2-3 weeks. Time to start getting excited ...I'm also trying to decide if I am going to try and dry them in my basement so I can start on my next grow sooner. Decisions decisions. hahaha Enjoy the videos. The first one is of the walk-in closet that the grow tent is setup in and second is of what I have going on inside of the tent. I hope you like them and if you're a newb like me, hopefully you get something useful out of them. Thanks for following along. Happy smoking, and Happy New Year!

Flower Week 7 is in the books. The girls weren't very thirsty again. Their last feeding last week was on Sat., and they didn't need to be fed again until Tues., Jan. 7th. On Thurs., Jan. 9th I checked on them and I decided they didn't feel light enough for a full feeding, but I didn't think they should go as long as it would have been until I could feed them again. So, I split 1 gallon of distilled water between the 3 of them, and on Fri., Jan. 10th they all got 1 gallon of full nutrients each. Just before I took the pictures for this week I did a big fan leaf cleanup. There weren't a lot of big ones but instead it was a lot of little small ones that were blocking bud sites directly underneath them. Hopefully next week is the last week. I haven't starting checking tricones with my jeweler's loop yet so we'll see how they look next week but if everything works out right I could be harvesting over MLK Weekend. Thanks for checkin' in. Until next week, Happy Smoking.

Flower Week 8 - What I thought was going to be a harvest holiday weekend turned into a disappointment but I'm sure it'll be worth it. After checking the tricomes at the beginning of the week I resigned myself to the fact that the ladies weren't going to be ready for harvest at weeks end, so...1 gallon of nutrients for each lady in Mon., 1/13 instead of starting final flush week. Checking tricomes again Tues., & Wed...Thurs., 1/16 warranted another gallon each of nutrients...although I did finally start to see clouding in the tricome heads. Sat., 1/18 I decided that I was going to start flush week so the ladies got plain 'ol distilled water, 1 gallon each. Hopefully the next entry is harvest! See you then. Thanks for checkin' out my diary.

Another week in the books and still no amber trichomes 😔...but the buds on the Critical Kush and the Pineapple Chunk got bigger 😁. The Triple Cheese seems to have finished growing completely. I didn't notice any further bud swelling on her. I'm done with the nutrients now since I've been expecting to harvest so it was flush week. 1 gallon of distilled water for each lady on Tues., 1/21 and again on Thurs., 1/23. I decided today (1/25) that they would be fine again until tomorrow. This will be Flower week 10 starting. Hopefully those trichomes start to change color and I'm harvesting next weekend. Enjoy the pics. Thanks for stopping in. Happy smoking.

While this is the harvest entry, it took the full week, adding 2 more weeks to the estimated grow time for this strain. This was my choosing and by no means reflects anything wrong with the strain or seeds. I was having terrible trouble controlling my temps and humidity towards the end of the grow. I waited to harvest because I didn't see the number of amber trichomes that I wanted, but at the same times I didn't want to wait to harvest anymore I took 'em down on the last day of what was Flower Week 10, Sat., February 1, 2020. Their last watering was the previous Sun., Jan 26th. I wish I knew what I did, or didn't do, that stunted the growth on this plant. Other than the size she was healthy as a horse, and now that I've sampled the bud 1 month after harvest, it's just as good if not better than the first grow.

While this is the harvest entry, it took the full week, adding 2 more weeks to the estimated grow time for this strain. This was my choosing and by no means reflects anything wrong with the strain or seeds. I was having terrible trouble controlling my temps and humidity towards the end of the grow. I waited to harvest because I didn't see the number of amber trichomes that I wanted, but at the same times I didn't want to wait to harvest anymore I took 'em down on the last day of what was Flower Week 10, Sat., February 1, 2020. Their last watering was the previous Sun., Jan 26th. For the second time Critical Kush was just such a joy to grow. It basically grew itself and still yielded the same amount as my first grow even with the issues I had towards the end. To be perfectly honest I was disappointed the overall yield. I thought the grow until the end went really well and was disappointed that the buds didn't put on more weight. I blame myself again. I'm a noob and still getting my sh!t together. The weed itself was again excellent to smoke.

While this is the harvest entry, it took the full week, adding 2 more weeks to the estimated grow time for this strain. This was my choosing and by no means reflects anything wrong with the strain or seeds. I was having terrible trouble controlling my temps and humidity towards the end of the grow. I waited to harvest because I didn't see the number of amber trichomes that I wanted, but at the same times I didn't want to wait to harvest anymore I took 'em down on the last day of what was Flower Week 10, Sat., February 1, 2020. Their last watering was the previous Sun., Jan 26th. Like the Critical Kush, this was a great plant to grow. I got the overall size and structure that I wanted but just didn't get the bud size that I was expecting. I will figure out what I'm doing wrong! I would definitely grow this strain again.