Fast Buds Tester FF 9 - Mostly Indica

Seeds were germinated with the paper towel method on 12/12/19. Less than 24 hours later, the seeds had popped and the taproot was ready to be planted. Seed was placed in an aerated solo cup with Fox Farms Happy Frog potting soil. Light mist of water on top after placing the seed. Depending on how quickly the cups dry out, I may end up putting the humidity dome over it. This will be an 18/6 veg and the goal is about a 3-4 week veg time and will include topping and LST. Update: Plant broke surface on 12/15/19. Watered with about 1 tbsp on 12/18 19. Plant has been misted daily.

Watered with about 1 tbsp of water on 12/18/19 & 12/21/19 and around 2 tbsp on 12/24/19. Plant will be ready to be transplanted within the next week.

Watered with a few tbsp on 12/27/19. Transplanted on 12/27/19 from solo cups to 3 gallon cloth bags. Plant was fed on 12/31/19 .5 tsp of Fox Farms Grow Big, 1.5 tsp Fox Farm Big Bloom per 1 gallon of water and .25 cups of lime raked in via top feed. Plant was given about 1/5 gallon of water.

Plant was watered on 1/3/20 as well as fed with 3 tsp Big Bloom and 1 tsp Grow Big per gallon. Runoff is quite high, sitting around 8 however plant is showing no signs of lockout. Plant was watered again with water pH'd to 6.1 on 1/7/20 in an attempt to lower the runoff however, the runoff was still at 8. I am unsure if this is because the lime was added as an afterthought and it takes time to seep in and take effectiveness. Plant was topped on the 5th node on 1/4/20 and an LST ring was placed on 1/5/20. LST began on 1/5/20 with the plant staples being added on 1/7/20. I will continue to water with pH 6.0 and will possibly flush depending on if I see any runoff improvement. The plan for the upcoming week is to defoliate in preparation for the flip to flower at the end of week 5. Veg has gone on a bit longer than I expected but for no reason other than I have not yet hung the HPS.

Plant was lollipopped on 1/12/20 and followed by a flush of 1 gallon of water ph'd tp 6.2. Runoff still maintains at 8.0 and I believe it is heavily influenced and thrown off by the lime top feed. , She recovered from topping and LST well. Additional LST was performed on 1/12 - 1/15. Good growth spurt post manipulation. I have decided to set back switching to flower until next week at the soonest. I'd like to wait 7 days post lollipopping. I may just swap the bulbs in the T5 and switch to 12/12 until the new light is installed. I am planning a final veg feed to be included either the tail ed of this week or early next week. She will receive the recommended dosing at 3/4 strength. Exhaust fan has been ordered and I anticipate installation next week. My biggest concern is half of the plants are nearly double the height as the other two and my T5 setup allows for me to accommodate that. I do not know how the transition from that to HPS would be so I guess the decision will rely on the install of the HPS.

Plant was watered with 2.5 tsp Grow Big and 4.5 tsp per gallon (3/4 dilution) Big Bloom with a pH of 6.2 on 1/17/20. Runoff still reading at 8 however there have been no signs of lockout. Additional LST was performed from the 17th to the 20th. One of the large fan leaves got nutrients on it during the watering and it was not rinsed off as it should have been thus getting some burn on the inner portion of the leaf (shown in last image). Plant received about .4 gallons of plain watered pH'd to 6.2 with runoff finally dropping below 8 but still around 7.8. HPS was finally installed and plant was flipped to 12/12 and placed under the HPS on 1/20/20 (Week 6 day 3). Color may be slightly off in the day 3 pics due to the HPS still being on.

Plant was flipped to HPS and a 12/12 schedule on 1/20/20. Plant was watered on 1/23/20 with 2.25 tsp Big Bloom and 1.5 tsp Tiger Bloom, followed by 1 gallon plain water feed on 1/26/20 which actually turned out more like a mini flush accidentally as I would have preferred not to have as much runoff as I did (around 50%).Continued with LST where possible but this is the point where I am going to let her begin to stretch as opposed to spreading it out and keeping it wider. Plants appear to need more water than previously as I think they would have been better off two days apart as opposed to 3. I notice that the substrate is not holding water very well and I think between the increase temps in the room and the stronger light, they are drying out much quicker than I anticipated. Next feed will be a full strength flower feed and I am anticipating a 2nd defoliation at the end of week 2. In terms of the runoff previously reading so high, turns out the pH pen has been having issues jumping between reading in the 6 and reading in the 8 range. For example, I had to calibrate it twice in one watering session alone. This is concerning in terms of knowing what the actual pH going in was however, I have seen no signs of issues of lockout and so I believe the pH out was the only thing reading off. The runoff from the 1/26/20 watering was around 6.7.

I had initially wanted to defoliate around week 3 but as I was watching the buds develop and I evaluated the bushiness and leaf coverage of a lot of buds, I decided to go ahead and do the final defoliation at the beginning of week 2. I have read that it is better to wait so that it does not take away from that early bud growth due to the stress. But my thought was, how will many of the buds get growth anyway without getting proper light. So I went ahead with the defoliation. Only way for me to know is to diary this experience and try a week 3 defoliation next grow for compare. A few grows ago I had an issue due to over defoliation so this is something I am still honing in on with my craft. I saw no stress from defoliation. Instead, I feel like she had a great growth spurt after. Watered with Tiger Bloom (2 tsp/gal), Big Bloom (3 tsp/gal) and Grow Big (2 tsp/gal) on 1/29/20 and again on 2/1/20 with plain water both times pH'd to 6.4. She shows a little color change after the feeding. She is stretching in a nice reasonable manner. Some LST done. All of the FastBuds plants have a significant flower size compared to garden mates. She has not had any obvious recovery time from any of the topping, LST and defoliation. Speaking of pH, I had to go invest in a $40 pen from a grow store (probably half that on Amazon) because I was having to re-calibrate the old one around every 20 min and I could not take it anymore. The new one seems to stabilize on the numbers better so I am hoping I am now getting true readings.

Watered and fed with 3 tsp Big Bloom and 2 tsp Tiger Bloom on 2/5/20 pH'd to 6.4. Plants clearly do not like to wait 4 days to be watered. All plants were droopy. Stretch continues gaining over 3 inches during the week. It was difficult to keep the light at 15 inches. Plants were rotated and swapped to different areas of the footprint throughout the week. Watered and decided to feed again on 2/8/20 with 3 tsp Big Bloom, 2 tsp Grow Big and 2 tsp Tiger Bloom pH's to 6.5. I was unsure if I wanted to do a 2nd feed in a row but decided to try it and see what happens. I may need to do some very light defoliation as buds continue to develop. I should have waited for week 3 defoliation because it is as if I never even defoliated. Now lets talk about my discovery of the unsuccessful topping. I actually realized this last week when I was looking at the stem structure but forgot to mention it. I will need to go back ind indicate that this was actually a FIM. Very light LST done as the structure is pretty set and all the growth is now vertical.

Started the week off with a watering of the plant on 2/12/20 with 1 gallon pH'd to 6.4 with runoff around 6.3 and up to approx. 30% runoff. Followed up with a feeding on 2/16/20 with 3 tsp Big Bloom, 2 tsp Tiger Bloom and I decided to vary from the recommended Grow Big feeding and only did 1 tsp rather than 2. I am starting to wonder if I should have gone with the extra tsp of grow big because the is a very slight early yellowing and it seems a bit early for it to be flowering stage fade. The final feed for the week happened after a 4 days with no water which I estimate she needs every 3 days so she may look a bit droopy on the 2/16/20 pics. Runoff was again around 6.3 pH. Her counterparts in the garden have similar showings of fade but I have to remember these are a fast flowering genetic and should be finished 10-15 days earlier than the rest. This is very clear in her bud production as she is stacking and gaining some bulk and continues to stretch. With that said, the fade could be very on par with typical late stage flowering fade as that would technically put her 2 weeks ahead. Alternatively, the yellowing started on the bottom middle and this could just be a calcium deficiency. I do not believe I will give her any cal/mag in the next week as I think I will instead adjust the next grow to do a supplemental feeding of it sooner. Also some light defoliation of yellowed leaves as well is anything blocking on the top of the canopy.

This week began the beginning of a family emergency that caused some spotty care during week 5. Plants were watered on 2/21/20 with 1 gallon water & 3 tsp Big Bloom, 2 tsp Tiger Bloom, 2 tsp Grow Big & .8 tsp Cal-Mag pH'd to 6.6 Runoff was low around 6.1. There must have been a watering somewhere between the 2/16 and 2/21 however it is not noted. Light defoliation of a few fan leaves that were blocking light. Plants were rotated under the light footprint. Nothing else of note due to my absence from the plants.

Week 12 was also a week of spotty care due to family emergency. Plants were watered on 2/24/20 with 3/4 gallon of water with pH'd to 6.5. Runoff was 6.4. Watered again on 2/27/20 with a full gallon. I have halted all nutrients as it the plant should be harvest ready by week 8. Plants were rotated under the footprint. Nothing else of note.

My family emergency pulled me out of state and completely prevented me from even being able to do spotty care. Luckily my fiance was able to water for me on 3/4/20 and 3/7/20. I had to walk him through how to pH the water. He was aiming for 6.5 pH both times and used 3/4 a gallon on 3/4/20 and a full gallon on 3/7/20. Light fading noted by him which I told him was likely late flower fade. Continuing with flush as the plant should be ready next week.

I finally returned home long enough to give about a week of care before having to leave town once again. I likely would have harvested at this point if not for having to leave town again. I wanted to make sure I was supervising the entire dry as to not miss any cure windows. My RH tends to be low around here (30's) and so things often dry a lot faster than I would like. She is definitely showing signs of fade but the red coloring that she is showing is a bit concerning. Only because she has a garden mate that was really hindered by a deficiency this go around. Other than that she has a really nice purpling color that is looking beautiful and is not shared by the other FF genetics currently in the garden. Flushed with 2 gallons pH'd to 6.5. I would have liked to do a much larger flush however, the current pandemic has really limited my access to distilled water so I used what I could get. She had another water during my absence on 3/14/20 of 1 gallon pH'd to 6.5. For the first time ever she had to have spring water as there was no other bottled water available to get her by until my return. Continued to remove any dead foliage. Trichs are all milky and ready to be chopped upon my return. I generally like to aim for about 20% amber especially in an indica heavy plant however, others prefer a much more heady high and so I said I would give a full milky little to no amber harvest a try! The following week from this will include harvest but it will not be completed until after the drying and curing process is finished so that I have a chance to sample. Edit: After reviewing my trich pics from this and the following week, she actually could have used a little more time. I am still seeing a little bit of clear.

Plants were harvested on 3/18/20. She was hung completely intact, no leaves removed. In retrospect, I am going to start removing all fan leaves before hanging. They can still get a slow dry from all the other plant content but A) they are so much easier to remove wet and B) I think they actually hindered the dry too much. They had last been watered on 3/14/20 so I expected them to be prime in terms of water content. Drying conditions were near perfect RH wise. I remained between 45-50 which is a huge improvement from my last dry. Normally my RH is on the very low end (30s) so I used a humidifier to keep the room even. The temp in the room however was dropping down to 60. I did not want to run the heater because my goal was to achieve the slowest dry possible. I thought things were going great. I had made it to day 7, the longest I had ever gone when I started to get some concern regarding how slow it was actually going with those temps. It was day 7 and it still felt like it could be 4-5 days. I had not encouraged the best airflow and so I decided to open the room up to allow the temps to equalize and to encourage the airflow. I placed my fan in the next room and aimed it at the wall before the actual room to keep it from aiming directly on the plants. This helped bring the plants to a point where they were ready for cure within the next day, day 9 (which I did not love because I then began worrying about missing my cure window). Flower went into the jars on 3/29/20 fully trimmed. RH was pretty high so the buds were left on the rack several times to lower RH. RH stabilized to 65 and a Boveda pack was added to help keep them in the zone. Now lets talk about the weight. As I mentioned in the review of the HPS used, I was a bit disappointed with the performance on this first grow with HPS. I would have expected to double my weight in harvest going from T5's to HPS. The return was about equivalent if not less than my last T5 grow. I know Fastbuds is quality genetics and so I do not believe it is the fault of the plant. Every single plant was a disappointment weight wise. I think my unexpected absence affected the overall performance. The quality of the smoke was the best out of the grow. The smell did not really retain nor did the purple coloring in the plant. Instead it lead to what looked like darker colored buds. This was a nice uplifting and relaxing smoke with a great quality high. At this point we are past week 4 of cure and she is just about gone lol. She was certainly the most potent. She is easily my favorite strain i grew of five (FF3 & FF6 also in the garden). She did receive a few minor seeds from the self pollinating FF3 in the garden but it was nothing of concern.