Gelato Auto

dalemac Well... Happy Holidays Heather, and thanks for the seeds. Finally recovered from my post-retirement "vacation", which was actually like a 3 week road trip. Nice to see my dogs and crawl back into my own bed for a change. I see the 420 folks have been busy promoting contests while I've been out on the road (like you guys ever stop - hehe). You know I intended this current crop for some photo love, but I'm a little late to get in on the xmas decoration contest and these babies are just breaking ground anyway. Didn't have any mini decorations. Anywho... the Gelato Auto was the first to break outa her shell and scream PLANT ME. So I did. And away we go... December 20-22... transitioned seedlings from indoors to grow tent with LED lights (initially at 36"+ for acclimation). Lowered lights to 24" on 12/23.

dalemac The root ball, such as it was, almost collapsed on initial replant so that made me a little nervous... but all is well now. The new container is roughly one quart and she can develop some proper roots in this until final transplant into a 5 gallon container. Lowered LED lights to 24".

dalemac Things are starting to move along now that we have a more comfy sized container. Easier to keep a small pot hydrated while she develops a root system. January 6 > It seems like I'm missing a pair of leaves in here somewhere.

dalemac Seems like a set of leaves went missing somewhere and she seems like she's almost growing asymetrically. I'll get a closer look in a couple days when I will probably repot her into her final container. January 11 > Upgraded container to final 5 gallon fabric. Upgraded lighting in tent to add two vertical KIND bar lights running vertically. Bought these last year on sale and this is my first chance to deploy them (I loaned them to a friend for part of last year).

dalemac Things are starting to move along now that she's stable in her final container... and I've upgraded my lights. Doing a little manual low stress training just by bending things at the moment twice a day. Preflowers are showing up everywhere now.

dalemac She's really starting to take off now in her final container, almost doubling in size last wee to a tad over 11". She has managed to produce 4 top colas with hardly any help from me other than a little tugging and flattening things out. Still feeding veg nutrients for another week or so.

dalemac KInd of slow and steady amongst my 3 FastBuds. Mexican Air is growing vertically crazy, Blackberry has slowed down and gone into heavy flower... this baby is in between. She's the only one with an even crown of flowers at the top. Switching over to flowering nutes and running at full strength as opposed to my normal half strength. Also performed some minor undercarriage pruning this morning.

dalemac I think this girl has topped out vertically and she's starting to fatten up. Kind of amazing the amount of frosting showing up on the leaves around the buds.

dalemac This baby is starting to fatten up nicely. Will probably inspect trichomes tomorrow when I update my other diaries, but I suspect we're still a week or two away from harvest. Starting to smell nice. Probably a week away from flush depending on what the trichomes look like. We'll see. Feb. 17 > Still all clear in trichome land. Lots in the forest, but no clouds yet.

dalemac Trichomes are just starting to cloud over, so I will probably consider flushing this girl later in the week. Probably give her a couple more feedings to fatten her up a bit more, but she's taking on weight quickly. Thinned out a fair amount of fan leaves that were just cluttering up the interior at this point before taking pictures. February 24 > flushed this plant and the Blackberry

dalemac I flushed this girl on Monday so it's plain water from here on out. She's quite frosty looking but at last peek there wasn't anything going amber, but I wouldn't be surprised if we harvest her within the next week. Things change fast.

dalemac Normally I would be washing plants today but for plants grown entirely indoors there really isn't much need for washing as I do with my outdoor grows. You'd be amazed what falls outa the sky, but I really only have to worry about per hair because I only take my plants out of the tent for photos in sunlight, which is a relatively short period. Gave this girl an overnight dark cycle before harvest. She's not very large but she weighs about 300g vs the Blackberry which weighed about 200g at the start of the drying cycle. I see no need to use my TrimBag on these babies, they can be easily manicured by hand. I'll be back in a week or so to update things. March 11 > Trimming took only about an hour and I ended up with 31 grams of buds and 34 grams of trim/shake which had a lotta frosting on it. April 18 >>> This baby has had a month to cure and she's been smelling so nice I just can't help dipping in. Smell just bowls you over - very fragrant. Possibly more so than the Mexican Airlines but we'll give her another week or two. Definitely wanna grow another one of these outdoors for some larger quantity.