Real Gorill4 5th Node Topping

Seed was germinated with the paper towel method on 12/14/19 as an after thought. 24 hours later, the seed 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. This will be an 18/6 veg and the goal is about a 3-4 week veg time and will include topping and LST. I have learned that this strain does not talke to LST and topping very well. It has always stressed the plant and cause a significant slow down of growth. In ,my research, it has been suggested that topping on the 5th node causes less stress and stunting. Plant broke surface on 12/16/19 and was watered with about 1 tbsp of water on 12/18/19. Plant has also been misted daily with a water bottle

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 1/5/20 and an LST ring was placed on 1/7/20. LST began on 1/8/20 with the plant staples. Signs of pH fluctuations from the lower leaves, perhaps from trying to correct the runoff. Slight red showing on stems but to be expected considering this strain seems to become stressed easily. Ever time I insert a ring, it ends up hitting some roots on its way down. Same with the staples. 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 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 indeed does recover better from topping after the 5th node. I have not noticed any slow in growth but rather a good step forward and explosion of growth. Due to lollipopping and last week defoliation, Additional LST was performed on 1/12 - 1/15. 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. The color on her has lightened up a lot and it appeared to me that she was looking for some more nutes. So she was fed two waters in a row with the second being on 1/26/20 with 3 tsp Big Bloom 2 tsp Tiger Bloom. 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. Depending on the status of the color on the next watering, I may or may not feed for a 3rd watering in a row. Expecting to do the 2nd defoliation at the end of week 2 in flower. 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. 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. You can see the significant color difference after the feed. She is clearly just more hungry than the other girls. She is stretching like crazy and gained 2.5 inches over the last week. However, she is becoming a little bit leggy which I fear will effect her bud structure. Previous experience was either very small buds with some compression or very airy non compressed buds. I am finding it hard to find a sweet spot with this or discover what her bud composition should be looking like. Very light LST done but in retrospect, I wish I had been a bit more aggressive with her LST to avoid the legginess. Her stalk structure looks as though it could have been manipulated even more horizontally but I was intentionally light handed due to her sensitivity. Her buds are just as significant as her FastBuds garden mates and she is coming along nicely. I saw no stress from defoliation which is great because she has been the most finicky and picky in past grows. The only sign that she ever showed as stress is some slight red in her stalk. Other than that, she has not had any obvious recovery time from any of the topping, LST and defoliation so I may have found a sweet spot for her. 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 flush of the plant on 2/12/20 with 3 gallons pH'd to 6.4 with runoff around 6.3. The reason for the flush is because of the signs of deficiency and it was not clear if it was a nute lockout or a cal/mag deficiency. Deficiency started to show on bottom outside leaves and behaved like a mag deficiency. Regardless, I chose to first flush her in the event it was a lockout. 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 also included 3/4 tsp of Cal/Mag. The feed 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. The reason for this is I started to think there had been too much of the Grow Big based on the large number of smaller leaves she was producing towards the bottom. Runoff was again around 6.3 pH. Did some lollipopping of the lower 1/4 of the plant as it had almost appeared as if I had never lollipopped in the first place. Also some light defoliation of sick leaves as well is anything blocking on the top of the canopy. She is showing a little better bud structure than her last 2 grows. One thing I notice through out all grows of this strain is that she very consistently shows a phosphorus deficiency (sometimes worse than others lol) and I need to accommodate for that going forward. https://growdiaries.com/diaries/33628-rescued-seeds-grow/week/213290 https://growdiaries.com/diaries/22668-real-gorill4-dosido-039-s-purkle-1/week/141908

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 3 tsp Big Bloom, 2 tsp Tiger Bloom, 2 tsp Grow Big and .8 tsp of Cal-Mag with water 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 as well as removing any sick leaves from continued signs of deficiency. The plant has not shown any improvement since first Cal Mag feed and so I included another. 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 with runoff of 6.4. Watered again on 2/27/20 with 3 tsp Big Bloom and 2 tsp Tiger Bloom pH'd to 6.4 with about 10% runoff. Plants were rotated under the footprint. The addition of Cal-Mag has not seemed to stop or slow down the deficiency signs. It appears as if it is a mobile deficiency and I am leaning towards wondering if the lack of phosphorus signs with the red veins actually was the underlying cause. Week 14 will show the heavy progression of the deficiency. 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. This girls neglect is really showing. Seems as though the mag deficiency that I suspected was a wrong diagnosis. Plant has continued to show heavy signs of deficiency and I am starting to think that it is phosphorus. Each grow, this genetic has continued to show signs of phosphorus deficiency with some red stems. I have never seen this deficiency in a late stage but my research shows that it is the closest thing to what I am seeing. I guess the correction would have been a heavier bloom feed or an organic supplemental top feed. This is something I will consider for the next grow. Images of the progressed deficiency will be view-able in week 14 as my fiance did not take additional images in my absence. She may need to be harvested early due to the state of the deficiency.

This is just a really weird one for me. I finally returned home long enough to give about a week of care before having to leave town once again. She is showing good fade but that fade is also showing VERY prominent signs of deficiency which I now believe to be phosphorus. As I have mentioned earlier in the grow when she first showed signs of red on her stems, her genetic has always shown that on the stems however it has never progressed. I think the fact that I misdiagnosed the early signs as a mag deficiency caused it to just continue heavily until it became very prominent. I do not even now if I am on target with the phosphorus because I have never had a plant progress this heavily in deficiency. I believe this greatly affected her bud structure as they almost appear stunted when compared to the garden mates (I understand there is no real comparison there genetic wise). She has never been a very bulky bud genetic to begin with but she certainly did not fill out as nicely as the last attempt. Any feedback or insight is greatly appreciated! 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. I let her go into week 9 last harvest seeking amber trichs however, her garden mates will be ready much soon and I utilize the room I grow in as my drying room as well so she will likely be chopped MUCH sooner this grow. The previous grow she went to week 10 with good results. Trichs are all milky. I generally like to aim for about 20% amber but 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 including trichs but it will not be completed until after the drying and curing process is finished so that I have a chance to sample.

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 right on point. 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 what these genetics are capable of and I do not believe it was the fault of the genetics at all. Every single plant was a disappointment weight wise. I think my unexpected absence affected the overall performance. The quality of the smoke was mediocre. The smell did not retain well at all. This taste of the smoke was mediocre as well based on what she has previously put out. Taste was smooth but lacking any real taste at all. She did not receive any minor seeds from the self pollinating FF3 in the garden.