RQS Skunk XL on Coco under LED

This diary could be a photo gallery, dedicated to droopy plants. Just as in week 2, they are drooping again. However, this time I’m not worried at all. I’ll get back on that, but first: topping the plants. TOPPING In the beginning of the week, the plants had grown 5 nodes and were working on the 6th. Time to top these babies. I topped them down to the 5th or 4th node, depending on the space between the nodes. The tiny shoots that were now the top of the plant took over immediately and developed nicely this week. The girls didn’t seem to be stunted due to the topping. TRAINING The plants are ultra bushy, internodal spacing is very short compared to my previous (and first) grow. The large fanleaves were obstructing lower side shoots to reach the light, so I helped them a bit by tucking the big leaves away. I have a few cola’s on every plant into the light and in the following week I will start LST and maybe defoliate a bit to open up the plant. However, I’m on a time schedule (because of a planned holiday, but I’m not sure it will be possible at that time to travel to another continent): I should flip to flower somewhere between April 20 and 25. Hopefully, they will at least double in size before the switch. This strain doesn’t stretch a lot during flower (according to the breeder), hence the canopy should already be quite big before flowering is induced. TRANSPLANT During the rest of the week, the plants grew nicely and it looked like they were growing out of their 4L pots. I had to start fertilize daily and I noticed a lot of roots poking through the bottom of the pots. That made me wonder: can you burry a fabric pot in a bigger fabric pot and will the roots just grow through the first pot? A lot of growers said it isn’t possible, one said it is possible but with risks. I agree. I think the roots can grow easily through fabric pots (if the plants are healthy), I saw a lot of them poking through the bottom of my fabric pots. However, it might not be optimal to transplant that way, so I opted to transplant the conventional way, by removing the old pot. I was traumatized by the first transplant. As I explain in week 2: it was pure horror. I seriously damaged the roots and my plants were stunted for a day or 5. This time, I came prepared. A few days in advance, I mixed my coco and perlite and started fertigating the empty pots to create a medium that was exactly the same as the pots they were transplanted from. Since I decided to toss ugly duckling Hannah, I started with her first. I loosened the pot from the root ball with a sharp knife and peeled the fabric pot down. Hannah had a great and strong root ball. The pot was fully colonized, I saw roots everywhere. And the root ball was easy to keep in one piece. I tossed here anyway. The other three girls were transplanted into 15L fabric pots and I was able to transplant them quite neatly. I damaged some small roots at the bottoms of the pots, but nothing serious. Most of the root ball was just one piece and slipped easily into the prepared holes in the new medium. Nevertheless, they are still a bit droopy from transplant. But, as said, I’m not worried this time, because I know everything is in check and they will probably pick up a fast grow rate within a day or 2. All in all, I don’t like my transplant strategy with the fabric pots. I will try a different strategy next grow and probably also skip one transplant (just do 2 instead of 3). I’m still a lazy stoner. Stay stafe!