GSC Auto Fast Buds

There are two phenos of GSC on this run. This harvest review is mainly focussed on GSC1. The second pheno was simply turned into concentrates. GSC2 was trimmed and frozen whole bud.....then pressed into rosin. We began this run back on April 4th with germination. We finished with harvest on day 87, July 6/20 for GSC1 and 89 days for GSC2 on July 8/20. She was grown in a 3 gallon fabric pot (plastic as well😃) with coco coir and maybe 15% perlite. She was fed salt based nutrients……..so sorry but they are flushed out and that is what I am more comfortable with. Focus on the early growth with microbes, fungi and kelp!! She was fed the normal pattern with pH being held around the 5.4 to 5.8 range in feeding. Then as flower approached, I gave the pots a more consistent look at the runoff numbers and she was running 7.8pH coming out of her!!!!! WTF. She stayed in her pot that she was planted in and fought this issue all through the rest of her grow. The pH issues started surfacing around week 3….as we headed into flower of course. Scratching my head for weeks, I ultimately didn’t change anything other than really low pH feeding going in…….below 4 idea. For weeks she had 3.9 water going in and still getting 7.8 running off. I initially felt it was related to cheap fabric bags so I transplanted these girls into plastic pots. It could be a fabric pot issues but I am not as convinced anymore this run had that issue, also wasn’t sure about giving her Magnesium on top of Magnesium and therefore did I mess her up good on the inside early on in week 2 idea. So, out of options I changed back to RO water and that seems to have solved my issues……I was using tap water that was not filtered this run🤬 The pH was high so that was adjusted but with the ppm being at 185 to 200 range I chose not to buy a filter and just dechlorinated the water only. I was tired of lugging 5 gallon water bottles in and out of the basement😃 That is a difference from all other grows…..silly for not catching this by week 4! So…….back to lugging bottles in and out of the basement😂😂😂 The story of Mrs Frankestein……. GSC1 took the transplant on May 3, day 24 well. I set the fabric pot overtop of the plastic bucket and dropped her in a couple of inches…..I had cut a slit from side to side on the bottom of the fabric pot to let her fall out….kind of pulled and wiggled the fabric bag out and the girl fell down below into the new pot. Note……this is where things changed for GSC2, AKA Mrs Frankenstein😂😂 The nifty trick cutting a slit in the bottom of the bag didn’t work out as planned and one side of the bag didn’t “drop” the medium below but rather brought it up with the bag. Shit….suddenly the small root ball as it was, was suddenly on top of the pot….or half of it was🤬🤬🤬👌 I should have made a cut like a plus symbol so it wouldn fall out easier. Found an extra nice nug, loaded the bowl, found my happy place said F it!! We move on🤪🤪🤪 I am not going to spend a lot of effort discussing pheno 2, or GSC2 in the images and weekly notes, more in the diary besides here. GSC2 ran for two days longer than GSC1 at 89 days from germination. She fought all the same pH issues plus her twisted root mass. The mishap actually starts to look cool in the last couple of weeks……it looked like she was choking herself……the side branches look like some rib cage shape to me😎😎😎 Her frost levels were on par with the other girl so I decided a little later in the grow to just turn her into concentrate. Her buds never formed well and didn’t swell but she still had great frost levels. She went from two days of darkness into he dry box for a day and then into the freezer. She was then turned into dry ice hash rosin…..pretty close to live rosin. A comment on that……doing it again I will give them 5 days to “cure” before extracting, even if hanging the whole plant. There is something to the magic of the cure and you can’t skip it. The rosin was awesome and the taste was again……almost straight lemons!! So, thanks the memories GSC2……appreciate the smoke😃😃 Auto……Photo……Auto……Photo…….Auto…… GSC1 took the transplant in early week 3 well. She was very slow bringing on the flowers and her preflower lasted for a couple of weeks…….related to the transplant???? Focusing on root development and not bud development? Could be…..since she is already a long enough strain genetically, she almost had enough time to make up for it😃 I did a lot of scratching my head in weeks 5 and 6. By day 42 the girls still had not set large buds so to help this along I finally forced these two girls in to a 12/12 light cycle to bring on flower…….if they are not autos for some reason, they would flower for sure now! Day 43 was increased to 9 hours off for two days then back to the flower tent, more of a shock. Then by day 47 I moved them back to the veg tent and switched the light cycle to a full 12/12…..F it!……she will flower now🤪🤪🤪🤪 By day 51 starting to see more prominent signs of bud sites setting in. On day 52 I started working the light cycle back and went 15/9 again and then back to 18/6 finally on day 54. Well that was interesting!!!! At any rate we are there now and lets get to swelling finally😃 GSC1 Getting Big…..Son of a B………. In week 5 they were given a 42L flush to try and control the pH. The upside is that it helped to keep the ppm low in the soil😃 The downside was it didn’t do crap to help the pH a few days later……I was still using tap water here and not RO, which I feel was the issue. The pot she was transplanted into was a good size and there was room for further root development and she took advantage of this! See pictures of roots. As a result she kept on growing and growing and by day 56 I knew she was not going back into the flower tent with others😃 They would have just choked each other out and not done well in the end. Problem is that the second tent was just set up for veg cycles.........Amazon to the rescue…..had no time and we are now in the start of week 9. I need more light and a humidity controller today! I went with a Mars Hydro SP-150 as it came 48 hours later…….a big deal right now because it was the first week of June and COVID. Shipping was messed up and anything growing related was sold out…..case in point HLG had NO kits in stock.….damn!!!!! The Mars light took the wattage up to 370 watts of full spectrum lighting in the tent so she should be okay…..yes she was: 1:: 1:: 1: The little Mars works well physically in the space I have in the tent actually and I quite like it!!! Will be an easy resell in the near future if need be.......or add two more for this size tent 😃😃😃👍 The tent now more affectionately named “Fast Buds Auto Tent”👍 (couple of back to back runs planned with their newer genetics 😍💪🤩) So, problem solved with a little time and some money, both in short supply😃, they are now in their own tent and have the room to finish properly. By day 60 GSC1 pushed GSC2 out of the tent…..she wanted it all for herself😂 Finally on Day 61 we are starting to see the leaf tips pointing up……almost straight up as this Fast Buds strain does often! She was 36” tall week 10 and settled in there finally. The problem was she also got to 32” wide, so that fills a 3’ x 3’ tent......Son of a B!!!!! Finally finishing the journey…….. Now we finally find ourselves into weeks 10 through 13 and she just simply took her sweet ass time finishing😂😂 Was quite worried about the buds as she started to show obvious signs of deficiencies and lock outs in the last days. The frost really came out in the last weeks……she was frosty early on and certainly by week 9 you were smiling💪 Bud swelling happened quite a bit a the end of week 11 as well…..day 70’s idea…..through these days they firmed up quite a bit🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏 She finally started to show her beautiful colours at the end and some of the buds were starting to get a little darker as well. Between all fo the brown spots and yellow fading….she was looking like a rainbow by day 79😃 Leaving her to just grow as high as she wanted was fine, but I do prefer to bend them over and have 6 or 8 colas Idea. Her top cola swelled up a fair bit but certainly didn’t set any records with having so many other bud sites to fatten up on her as well. Not a complaint but rather happy she swelled and firmed up as much as she did. A lot of leaf stripping in week 12 to get the last light energy down as low as possible. Finally on July 4th, day 85 she went into darkness and on July 6th, Day 87 she was cut down for harvest. She was too awkward for my situation to dry whole so I decided to stick with my normal and used the homemade dry box with strings to hang the branches. I have a room that holds a perfect 64 degrees all the time 👍👍 She was dried for 10 days and put into jars on July 16th to cure. Yield was decent and I am certainly not going to complain……genetics played a big part here👊......I must admit, that I can’t help think if only I had done this or done that……she would have been more, she was so big😂😂😂 Same old thoughts for all of us growers!!! In summary….she was great. I had a Jekyll & Hyde scenario for sure this run😂 She was a ray of sunshine in a run that was filled with frustration and few answers, so I am grateful. She has so many positives with her vigor, her appearance with the leaves pointing up, her frost…..hell with it I am going to run her again right away!! I was waiting for something in the mail but its delayed until????????? GSC again!!!! She certainly smells and tastes of lemons and the woods. The effects have been strong but I must admit it is still early in the smoke department and she has been changing already over the last couple of days…….she needs a few more weeks. It has come across as a nice balanced smoke and can be a day time smoke for myself. The bud won’t last long because she is so pungent you wont leave the bud jar alone😂😂😂 Terpinator came through!!!! Going to wrap up at that Growmies🙏 It is a lot of work to keep on top of several diaries, your own notes, problem solving, personal life, and working for a living, so much respect for the Growmies able to keep on top of it all each week and have their diaries dial in…….RESPECT!!!......I usually find myself running behind☹️☹️ More hours in the day please....haha.....but seriously thanks Growmies for sharing your time and efforts through your diaries. I scroll through others all the time when selecting new strains🙏🙏🙏 Since all of GSC2 was just pressed into rosin I didn’t add her into the yield numbers. I only recorded the weight for GSC!!! Happy growing Peeps and thanks for the read……looking forward to the next one😎