First Grow: Barney's Purple Punch Auto

Day 22 Update: I spent a while reading and looking at other GrowDiaries specifically for LST. I decided I should try some, but not much, to get a feel for it. Well, I used soft ties folded into a long U or V shape and poked the ends into the soil. None of them are that deep so it might not hold too well. I also pulled the top stalk towards one of the rope handles to hopefully give the lower branches room to stretch. Most of the main stalk is still pliable, but the top part very much so. Earlier in my GrowDiary, I mentioned how similar sunflowers and cannabis are and each day confirms the similarities (obviously one gets much bigger and the other has much more foliage, but yeah), so I felt comfortable manipulating the plants. I also read about topping and FIMing, but I think I'm definitely too late for that, so maybe on my next kiddos. Fresh water today. A little more aggressive with my 5-1-1. 3 Tsp into about .5 gal of room temp water. About 2/3rds of that mix went into this plant. A little got poured around the edges of my humidity domes so I didn't oversaturate. Time to keep an eye on it and keep the lower limbs growing straight from the stalk. More 5-1-1 Tuesday or Wednesday night. My second light was making things way too warm since my exhaust system is yet to be installed (ordering today). So just the one main Galaxy Hydro (Roleadro) 1000W about 20 inches above the main plant for the foreseeable future. Midnight update: I adjusted the LST to pull the main stem further one way as I move the other limbs in the other direction as best I can. I ordered some gardening staples so those may help. Even with my limited experience, it feels like things are going well. Hope the other seeds come up soon. Day 23 Update: Still seems like all is well. Foliage looks healthy. LST seems to be working. Water tomorrow night probably. One of the other three seeds has sprouted, still hopeful the other two will as well. Day 24 Update: Big day! Garden staples, a trio of Fox Farm nutrients, carbon filter, and exhaust fan all arrived today; all got installed tonight! So, the pics from today will show the LST touchups with the garden staples as well as the base of the stalk being stabilized to the other handle. I get the sense that the main stem is still going to be much taller, but the side branches seem like they are in good shape to start growing vertical. I doubt I'll mess with the LST too much from this point. Furthermore, since I think there's still at least another week of veg, I gave her 2 tsp (10 ml) of Fox Farm Grow Big (6-4-4) in a half gallon. About 2/3rds of that went in again, but a decent amount ran out, so hopefully not too strong still. The growth feels good so as long as that takes ok, water next, then another feed before I go out of town. My vacation watering stuff should be here tomorrow so I think I'm going to be 100% ready to go out of town and not worry too much. I'm testing the temps in the tent now with both lights on at their highest point. I'll move the LED over this plant back down to 24 inches tomorrow. Seedling update: 2 of 3 are looking good and healthy. The third hasn't popped up, so I'm thinking, maybe no go. I realized that pot was next to the vent where I have an exhaust booster blowing fresh air in and maybe that caused the pot not to be warm enough? I moved that one to a different spot in the tent so maybe it'll get some warmth and still grow. One can hope. I'm worried that low humidity might be an issue, so that will need to get sorted before I leave obviously, but otherwise, I'm really happy with the install of the exhaust and getting the tent reloaded and getting both of my lights in use! Also gave me a chance to clean out the tent pretty well. So everything's clean and installed and running smooth! This is a lot of fun...also, if anyone reads this, I'm keeping this diary for me, and I like to write! Day 27 Update: It looked like a very light bit of yellowing at a handful of leaf tips yesterday, but they're turning back green today, so probably just water next. I have to pickup my vacation watering stuff and see how that all works. Otherwise, everything looks pretty good still. The 2 seedlings are doing well, keeping them spritzed a couple times a day for light watering. The third never popped so I planted a new seed 12.18 because I have several more seeds. We'll see how it goes. The humidity has been kind of difficult to control, but a couple things I've read are working okay. The air is just dry these days I think so my plan is to leave several bowls of water under a ceiling fan to keep the overall humidity in the apt up while I'm gone. After a 24 hours of full exhaust, both lights running, and a wet towel hung in the tent, the humidity was in the high 30's and everything except the soil was bone dry. I think it'll be alright while I'm gone. Not much else to say that the pictures won't. Several new shots from the past three days up now. Day 28 Update: I moved one of the seedlings to where I've had this plant, on top of a cinder block. This let me lower both lights to about 22 inches for the seedlings and 18" for main plant. I feel like the ambient humidity has way more impact on tent humidity than what I've been doing to keep in tent humidity up, so I still like my plan when I leave. Everything looks pretty good still. Maybe starting to flower, I'll throw a pic of that up later tonight. Water and testing out the vacation watering devices later tonight as well.