The old Lady and the beginner.

Hi everyone👋, this is my very first diary and I decided to start with something really bizarre 😎: 😲👉 Is it possible to grow an autoflowering with a 50 watt LED, to a decent harvest? 👈😲 I know so many young potential growers that give up on growing cannabis, frightened by the high costs of lamps and electric bills.😱 So I decided to dedicate a grow tent to this experiment hoping that it will prove to be successful and give an idea of ​​what is really possible with very low light power. To add difficulty to the experiment there is also the cold season that I face😨, because the tent is placed in a covered but not regularly heated place. If everything goes well I presumably will harvest for Christmas.😍 For this experiment I chose a White Widow Automatic from Royal Queen Seeds, a seed company that has already surprised me with its Northern Light Auto and Quick One. I have always been a fan of the old white lady but I never grown an auto of this strain and I really hope to honor her...🙏 Let's start!💪💪 I germinated a couple of seeds using the RQS Easy start that includes an activator and in 3 days the seeds sprouted on 11th of October. After a couple of days I chose the best one and moved to the final pot. I used Canna professional soil mixed with RQS Easy boost organic pellets that should be more than enough to feed the plant until harvest. I will only add sometimes RQS Easy Grow and Easy Bloom Booster Tablets as supplements when watering. The ship has finally sailed, I hope not to be wrecked 😅 p.s. I'd appreciate very much your considerations, comments and suggestions

19th October 2020 Day 8: The second week begins without variations, the plant seems healthy and obviously it doesn't require frequent watering. 22th October 2020 Day 11: Today the main news is that temperature is lowering faster than I imagined, reaching 13°C in the night. I guess I will have soon to find any heating solution.

27th October 2020 Day 16: 5 days after my last report the situation is stable, the plant is not growing fast. Today I placed a 5 watt heating pad under the pot, it should raise the temperature of the roots a few degrees. 30th October 2020 Day 19: The pad is working well for my purpose. It helped to raise the temperature 3-4 degrees 1st November 2020 Day 21: The plant seems to respond well to the change and I hope it will boost in the next weeks!

3rd November 2020 Day 23: The plant seems reached the 4th internode so I decided to apply FIMing to her. Let's see what happens! 6th November 2020 Day 26: The lady appear as totally recovered from the fiming, maybe even too fast to have good result on secondary branches, anyway it could mean that the plant now has a lot of energy for growth. Fingers crossed! 7th November 2020 Day 27: The temperature in the pot reached 24.4°C, so I lowered it a bit.

10th November 2020 Day 30: Air temperature is going on lowering but with the pad I can have the right temperature on the root that now is around 20°c. The plant is growing and the stem of the plant is becoming much stronger. 13th November 2020 Day 33: The plant is looking really healthy and lateral branches are stretching. She is not tall as I hoped and I love her!

17th November 2020 Day 37: the cold is coming, external temperature is lowering fast, even if in the room and in the tent it is changing more gradually. Probably next week I will have to check more often the roots temperature. Anyway the plant is continuing its growth in a wonderful way. 20th November 2020 Day 40: Flowering will begin soon and like everytime I'm excited like a child! I watered adding a quarter of tablet of RQS Easy Bloom Booster. 22th November 2020 Day 42: Air temperature in the night reached 12°C but the plant doesn't seems to be affected by this for the moment.

24th November 2020 Day 44: The air temperature is slightly lowering everyday despite the substrate temperature is stable at about 20°C. 27th November 2020 Day 47: I applied some gentle LST to spread the main stems. The plant is asking for some more water even if the cold doesn't allow the substrate to dry fast. Anyway I'm giving some RQS Bloom booster every 2 waterings.

30th November 2020 Day 50: I removed 2 or 3 big fan leaves that were covering from light and a pair of smaller stems that would probably steal energy to main colas in the future. I decided to have 8 or 9 main colas cause I think they could be more than enough for this experiment. 3rd Dicember 2020 Day 53: The plant seems to respond very well to defoliage. The impression is that this improved production of new leaves. Temperature is stable this week.

9th Dicember 2020 Day 59: The plant is growing in these days even if not stretching. I love her because compact and with powerful stem and branches. The plant is not so quick to be an auto, but I suppose the low temperature are influencing stage times.

14th December 2020 Day 64: the flowers are finally forming and the plant seems to need more water. I started watering every 2 days. The temperature is going better this week and stopped lowering: minimum is about 10°C. Substrate temperature is stable at about 20°C. 16th December 2020 Day 66: the tips of the leaves are taking on nice purple hues. I'm very satisfied: there appear to be no signs of nutrient deficiencies or excesses. I'm really impressed for the moment by nutrients RQS provided me: they are very simple to use and dose. 19th December 2020 Day 69: The purple hues are expanding, roots temperature is stable. We are going to enter in 11th week.

22nd December 2020 Day 72: a crucial period is beginning, which can give me clues to predict what kind of harvest I will have. 24th December 2020 Day 74: Colas are slowly forming and I'm so eager to see how big they'll can be 25th December 2020 Day 75: There's no Christmas without a Christmas tree! So... Merry Christmas folks!

28th December 2020 Day 78: This week start with good vibes. Plant is going well, flowers are forming and temperature is stable. We have a minimum of 10°C and a maximum of 16,5°C for air temperature. 30th December 2020 Day 80: Last visit in 2020 to my plant. All seems good, some watering and... see you in 2021! 3rd January 2021 Day 84: New year has come and all that I can say is: YOU ARE SO BEAUTIFUL! 😍

6th January 2021 Day 87: 😱NOOOOOOOooooooOOOOOooo!!!!!!!!!!😖 I can't understand how this could have happened, but the plug of the heating mat slipped out of the socket and lost contact! 💩💩 Root temperature plummeted to 10 and I fear it may have consequences!!!! The plant seems to be good for the moment anyway. 🙌 9th January 2021 Day 90: Unfortunately the plant is suffering, probably as consequence of low temperature. The accident with heating mat and a sudden drop in temperatures due to the season seems to have eventually caused damage. The stem is purple striped more than ever so I fear a phosphorus deficiency caused by low temperature....

11th January 2021 Day 92: Bad news folks. Many more leaves are becoming brown, I am not sure about what to do, I never experienced a similar situation. Let's see what happen, but temperature is not expected to rise and I am assuming to use a heating source. Any suggestions are welcome! 13th January 2021 Day 94: I raised the soil temperature yesterday to 23°C. I decided not to add an air heating source as I want to avoid sudden changes in temperature. 14th January 2021 Day 95: The plant is definitively stabilized. Leaves are turning yellow fast. The plant is running out of its life cycle 16th January 2021 Day 97: The ripening has almost come to an end, thricomes are all milky white. A few more days and I will proceed with the harvest!😁

19th January 2021 Day 100: Last watering yesterday with only water. It is the last 3 days of this lady's life and like every time I have mixed feelings. The excitement of the harvest mixed with a little melancholy due to the end of this cultivation experience. 21th January 2021 Day 102: Last day of care for my old lady. She is so beautiful! The trichomes are perfectly ripe as I like them. Tomorrow I will harvest. 👋

We have come to the end of this journey. It was a really challenging growing experience and not so much for the experiment with only 50 watts per single plant. What I had only partially predicted, regarding the low seasonal temperature 😨, turned out to be the most risky factor for the correct growth of the plant. However, this proved to be an opportunity when, perhaps a little late, I decided to use a terrarium heating mat to raise the soil temperature and stabilize it around 20 degrees. Low temperatures affect the availability of nutrients and luckily I did not fall into the temptation to increase or supplement the doses of fertilizer, which would certainly have had negative effects. Despite all these difficulties, I was really amazed at the robustness of the plant's stem and its prosperity. Flowering was very satisfying. Can't wait to try the final product!😚 It is time to take stock of my experiment. It is therefore time to take stock of my experiment. Is it possible to grow weed without a powerful lighting system? Absolutely yes! Is the final yield proportionally lower, equal or higher? Considering the 55 watts (including the 5w of the heating mat) air temperatures that reached below 7 ° C, with 70 grams of wet product already trimmed, well I can only consider this a huge success! So friends, if for some reason you don't have the possibility to use a lot of electricity, know that cannabis cultivation is still possible with more than satisfactory results!