Sweet Crystal Candy Auto XL

👉Germination graduated to seedling and by mid week the seedling graduated to early growth. I was probably a little early switching to the week one "early growth" on the General Hydroponics Drain to Waist Feed chart. I gave to the center part of the plant at only 75% full strength. The tips showed a little stress. I reduced the fertigation fluid to much lower at the next event and have slowly increased it till I am now in the mid range of the target EC on the chart. I use the full line of GHE Flora series and mix with .003EC RO water made at a medical facility, transported home in two 6 gallon sterile water carriers. 👉The bigger the plants leaves are getting the faster its growing. When it first emerged it started to stretch upwards. Thankfully it stopped and has started expanding its leaves. As the leaves got bigger they started catching more of the breeze from the fan and so I added the wind diffusion screen to soften the breeze.I had originally intended to use the Mars Hydro ts1000 for this plant. Instead when I recieved a Phlyzon 150w led at the beginning of the week that I had intended to use on the plants tent-mate, Tangerine Dream. I liked the bigger foot print, so I decided to use it on the potentially bigger plant. I set it to 100W and at day 10 I increased it to 125w. The lamp is 24" away from the plant. As the plant gets bigger I will ad supplemental lighting from a MarsHydro TS1000.

👉Days 15 - 20. I love this stage! Ok...I love all the stages...but the vegetative stage is awesome in its own way...every time I check on the plant, noticeable growth has happened! The plant had more than doubled in just a few days and its just getting started! Its stayed short as a seedling, and now its main stalk is getting stout and it had formed a couple of branch nodes which should start reaching out towards the lights soon. 👉I started the light at 100w for the seedling stage. This week I increased the wattage of the lamp to 125w on day 16, then up to 140w on day 17. The light remains at 24" above. I will increase it to just under max wattage during the next week. Temperature in the tent remained at 73F most of the time, as long as the outdoor temps were colder than 50F. At 50 the HVAC stops running the heat and the tent reached a max of 77F on day when the temps outside reached 65. I was monitoring the tent via the Weird Jimmy Memorial Grow Cam on my cell phone while at work. I asked my wife, (who works from home) to switch on the a/c. Set to 68, the room returned to 73. At night the temps were in the mid to low 30s most of the time, and the overnight tent temperature is about 67. I have the exhaust on a timer and it shuts off during lights off to be more efficient. Once the plant starts giving off a strong enough aroma that my wife notices it in the mornings, I will leave the exhaust fan running 24/7. So for now the exhaust fan is just venting away heat and keeping the air fresh. I have the 12" oscillating fan and run it on low. It moves the air great around the tent. I placed a framed screen in front of the fan to lessen the wind stress. Ive been using the wind defusing screen since the last grow, and it definitely helps reduce the wind stress on the closest leaves, while allowing good circulation around the tent and the plant. 👉Using the "Early Growth" recipe for nutrient solution on the GHE drain to waste feed chart for the Flora Series of nutrients, I have been mixing about maximum recommended. When measuring my solution for each fertigation event, I lower the EC by adding low EC solution with just Cal mag, ArmorSi and Rapid Start. I have been gradually increasing it. I gave it a full low EC fertigation today (Day 21) followed by a low volume, full 1.32EC fertigation. This was to 'rinse' the media and keep the EC run off within +30EC of the max EC inflow. I will do this method of rinsing the media as needed, up to 3x a week if needed.

👉The plant has taken off and is looking good. Its not looking great however, some clawing and deepening of the leaf color with a bit of 'scrunchiness" to its texture. Should indicate Nitrogen excess. Can be exacerbated by other issues, but Im just going to try and keep the tent environment as good as I can, and try to address the N excess by lowering the EC target to the low end of the target range on week 3 of the GHE drain to waist feed chart. Humidity is low, temps are a tad on the cool side at mid to low 60s. I added a humidifier to the room. Its on the outside of the tent and there is a vent to a few inches above and it brings it in the tent. This only raised the humidity about 4-5% max (averaging 40%). Ive done a high volume/low EC irrigation, and extened the fertigation event intervals a couple of times. 👉Ive seen the roots start poking out of the cloth pot, and have seen the roots start going across the top of the media. The stems are sturdy and thick and the secondary branches are about to peek out for under the top fan leaves. When those 2ndary sites get close I will tuck to help them absorb some direct light.

👉More good growth and the early flowering stage has begun with an issue of nitrogen excess. I stayed with the "early growth" mix a little too long last week. I made one batch of late growth and the next was the transition. My next batch will be early flowering mix. With the excess N possible issues I cut the FloraMicro 20%. The trunk has gotten thick, the secondary branches are starting to extend and the leaf production is growing great. Did some minor tucking as the secondary branches start to peek out. The run-off pH has been stable and the EC run-off has started to consistently be lower than the inflow. This means that the plant is absorbing lots of nutrients. It also means the roots have filled the pot. I will continue to do intermittent low EC irrigations to rinse the media anyway.

👉The flowers are starting to bloom, and the aroma is beginning to be that happy, friendly aroma that contributes to the overall fun factor of growing this magical plant. The vegetation is dense and green. It had been showing signs of nitrogen excess in last week or so. This week I tried to address it by reducing the amount of Flora Micro by as much as 50% for much of the week. I also have made the target EC to be the low end of the recommended EC range on the GHE Flora Trio series Drain to Waste Feed chart. I also did a high volume H2Only irrigation at the beginning of the week to rinse the media. The plat seems to have responded somewhat. There are still some symptoms in the new growth, but overall its perked up. Could be a little perkier, but I would characterize it as just being mellow and not real enthusiastic. The coming week I hope to improve its overall 'perkiness', but being mellow isn't necessarily a bad thing, Ill just be trying to see if I can figure out exactly what it is needing. No burn tips or any other signs of nutrient issues. 👉Ive begun slight trimming and pruning of growth in the lowest parts and in the shadows. This has given some extra room at the base to make it easier to feed. I try to trim all the smaller interior secondary branches to reduce the amount of underdeveloped buds. I will leave the leafs on as much as I can unless the stop being a food factory or the plant is better off without it. 👉Added a new piece of equipment to the Weird Jimmy Memorial Grow Lab. A 6" inline fan with a controller that monitors the temperature in the tent and adjusts the speed of the fan based the temperature automatically. It also has a base speed that it maintains if the temperature drops below the base line temperature. So I set the base temperature at 70f and the base fan speed to 1, as the temperature increases in the tent the fan speed increases. This should save a few pennies a day on the cost of the fan and a reduction in a little of the HVAC cost because of reduced overall air being exhausted out of the house. Once the plant is in full bloom and my wife starts complaining about the stinky skunk, then I will probably have to just keep i full blast until its harvested and in jars. Just a new kewl toy for my fun hobby.

👉Ive been anticipating the plant to be in high gear in the flowering stretch. It has gained a couple of inches in height and a little around the middle, but significant stretch. That isn't necessarily a bad thing. Its tent mate is in a smaller pot and it has over taken the Crystal Candy by 4 inches. Several things may be part of this...it just hasn't happened yet, my intentional reduction of nutrient solution strength to address N excess, and my pruning of secondary branches and leaves inside the dome of green leaves. The N excess seems to have been abated and the plant is looking great overall. Lots of healthy leaves soaking up the food (light rays). The flowers are starting to form up nicely and look like they will me the typical pine cone associated with indica (in my mind). The aroma is also growing and is just the typical Irish Stink Weed aroma. The run-off has been consistently low as I continue to give more than enough volume of nutrient solution to get up to 50% run-off. The pH has also stayed in the 5.5-6.2 range and has actually settled in to about 5.9 average. I am hoping this will help mitigate some of the possible issues the undersized pot can cause or enhance. I have gone to week 7 "mid Bloom" on the mix chart, with no adjustments to the mix. I will do a full irrigation rinse in the next day or two as part of the routine to keep the media in balance.

👉The plant didn't stretch much and it only grew one inch over the week. But the buds have started to bud up. The buds are looking like they will be nice fat dense pine cones. The main trunk is thick and the branches are all very stout, I have the metal rods in place on the pot so I can attach bamboo support rods if needed, but since going to this style of light (non-blurple) my plants have been super sturdy and haven't needed support for the good big buds Ive been blessed with. I expect this one will be no different. The leaves are dense and no nutrition issues are showing. I wont be removing any leaves until the plant tells me it doesn't want them any more. I fertigated at the mid range of the feed chart recommended range. Towards the end of the week I have eased off just little. The aroma in the tent is the typical cannabis fun smell. It makes me smile every time the aroma hits my nostrils when I open the tent. The buds have a sort of sickly sweet putrid aroma when sniffed up close. After touching a bud and then smelling my fingers the aroma is sweet pinesol-esq with none of the putrid smell. That up close bud sniff aroma seldom remains in the final bud so Im not worried that my weed will smell that way in the end. Its just very weird...which is part of the fun of growing this magical plant.

👉The plant is a solid dense bush. I've increased the fan speed to help circulation. The leaves will remain long as the plant is using them. I've removed some lower leaves at the lower area that were starting to look haggard. The buds are getting fat. Nice plump pine cones. The frost is spreading like crazy. The tent aroma is an oddly sweet dank smell. An up close whiff of a bud, gives a light, almost putrid, sweet aroma. The unpleasant putrid-ness of the aroma has started to fade towards the end of the week as the overall aroma of the plant has gotten stronger. 👉Ive given a consistent volume of solution which is enough to have as much as 50% run-off volume. The run-off EC hasn't increased and is consistently lower than the inflow. The pH also is staying in range and stable in the run-off. I didn't give it an H20 only low Ec irrigation till today. I should probably do it a little more frequently but the time available to perform a high volume rinse isn't that easy to come by. Since the run-off stats are good and the plant shows no issues, I should be good.

👉The plant is looking good and the flowers are getting plumper everyday. Its super frosty and the aroma is getting strong. The odd almost putrid aroma is gone, just a hint of sickly sweet now. The touch of a flower leaves sticky stanky perfume that is wonderful, but just your basic, almost generic aroma. Only a couple of pistols have turned orange. The buds, especially the queen, are getting very plump, nice pine cones. The Queen cola is not very long, but it is getting very fat! There is some upward curling on the top layer of leaves with some folding. I had added an oscillating fan, turned on low speed, that was directed at the upper areas of the plants. When the buds get this fat I always worry about that nasty surprise of botrytis. I think the fan, combined with lower humidity, has caused the leaf curl and folding. I moved the fan a little further away from the plant and turned on the humidifier. The humidifier sits in the room outside the tent. It raised the humidity about 3% (its set to low). I have checked on the plants after lights out a couple of times and the humidity inside the tent skyrockets to 65%. Im not sure if it stays that high all night, but the fans and exhaust are running, so Im pretty sure its not an issue. The winter temps outdoors keep the house HVAC running more frequently, so during the day its set to 65F. The daytime temps in the tent have stayed at or below 75F. At night I turn up the Heat to 68F. 👉I have not performed an H2Only irrigation (due to procrastination and time available). The volume of solution I ad each event seems to be sufficient because the run-off EC is consistently in the range between .95 and 1EC. The pH of the run-off is also consistently around 6.0. This tells me the media is almost perfectly balanced. There is no accumulation of nutrients and that the plant is absorbing all the nutrients in need. Ive been diluting the solution between 1.1 - 1.2EC. I am at the 9th week mixing recipe on the General Hydroponics Drain to waste feed chart for the Flora Series of nutrients.

👉The plant overall looks fairly healthy. The buds are dense plump pine cones. The aroma is very strong and has become very perfume-ly sweet. The leaves are the more fragrant of any leaves Ive grown next to basil. The leaf curl up and the folding continues. I addressed it so far by raising the light and slightly diminishing the air blowing on the top by moving the fan further away. This didnt seem to counteract it at all. Friday I began reducing the inflow and skipped a fertigation. I then followed up the next day by doing an H2Only irrigation. I will be reducing the inflow of solution to reduce the run-off to 20-30%. I assuming it may actually over watering and maybe a magnesium deficiency (Im guessing at both). While its very difficult to over water in coco, and the solution travels thru the media fairly smoothly and quickly (unlike the tent mate in a 1 gallon pot which takes 10 minutes to give 1.5L). The roots are densely packed in the pot. this may result in the roots holding solution longer and less oxygen in the media as well. To address this I will be giving lower strength solution as well as less total volume to reduce the run-off to the normal 20-30%. I will also need to give more frequent H2Only irrigations to keep the media balanced. I may also skip one or two evening fertigations to help draw out the overall moisture in the densely packed center root zone.

👉Trichome hunting season is here! Ive began scouting the plant with the USB micro scope and the DLSR camera with macro rings added to the 50mm lens. Surprisingly lots more cloudy heads than I expected, and a few ambers showing up on the sugar leaves. The aroma is super strong, dank and sweet. The plant is shorter than I expected a XL to be, but the buds are definitely XL! Fat dense pine cones. Ive been watching the tent temperatures and maintaining good circulation. Ive been removing lots of leaves this week and have thinned it out quit a bit. Amazing at how many leaves Ive removed and its still a dense bush of green. Not going to be much larf on this plant, well not larf in the the traditional sense. There will still be some under developed sites on the lower and inner areas. 👉I had intended to do an H20nly irrigation followed by regular strength solution more frequently, however I only did it once. I have slightly reduced the overall inflow and thus outflow, yet the outflow EC remains within the +30% limit. I have also increased the EC of the inflow the last couple of fertigation events. The pH of the run-off has remained at approximately 6.0pH, so Im satisfied the media is balanced. I dont think the plant is using as much water as before, partly due to the large volume of leaves I removed. I switched to the late bloom Mixture on the General Hydroponics mix chart for Drain to waste using the full line of Flora-series nutrients. I may switch to the ripen mix soon.

👉Its a solid dome of pine cones. I stress a little that the grey nastiness will pay a visit. I try to be vigilent, the room is clean and steril as I can make it. Leonardo Da Vinci is the official overseer of the Weird Jimmy Memorial Grow Lab, yet he isnt allowed inside the tent. However I know, its a risk you face when the buds become freek-show fat and dense. I have great ventilation and the air is never still in the tent. The aroma of the magical plump cones is sweet and piney. The finger smell after touching a bud is a very arousing, tangy sweet pine-sol. The pistols on the buds are almost completely brown for the upper level buds. The lower outside buds have a bit more white pistols. The plant looks as if the amber trichomes would be numerous. The trichomes are mostly cloudy on the calix's and almost no ambers. Amber trichomes can be seen everywhere on the sugar leaves. 👉I changed to the ripen mix on the GHE flora series early in the week. The pH ha remained steady, but the EC has climbed. By the end of the week I have increased the frequency of the low EC irrigations. Its just a watch a wait game now. Ill be observing the trichomes almost daily with a 10x magnifying glass, a 40x eye loop, a DSLR, and a USB microscope.

👉All the older leaves and leaves tangled together inside the dome have been removed. The buds are slowly ripening and the vigorous growth has subsided. Mostly red pistols and lots of cloudy trichomes. Still a lot of clears and other than at the tips of the colas, there are very few amber. I have been using a DSLR with a 55mm lens and macro rings added fro the macro shots. I also inspect the plant with the USB micro scope. Its a very low resolution camera, but its easier to do quick surveys of different areas. To get good pictures of the trichomes takes a lot of patience so I only take a few withe the usb. The DSLR is hard to move around so I just choose one cola and photograph different spots on the bud. I take a bunch of pictures at different settings. After lots of trial and error I figured out some of the settings that can give me nice pix with a wide view. I can then open them on my computer and zoom in closer to get clear details with richer colors than the USB camera. I crops some of the pictures and due slight lighting adjustments. 👉 I am trying to choose when to harvest based on the the state of the trichomes. Its very close and I just waiting for more ambers in the mid and lower areas of the colas. Just looking at the tops of the colas there are plenty of amber. But there are still a few too many clears everywhere else on the cola, so I will try to be patient and am just going to continue to fertigate and irrigate to keep the media balanced.

👉The plant looks ready when looking at it from normal distance. The leaves and the pistols all say time to harvest. However when looking up close, there were still too many clear trichomes. I harvested its tent-mate, Tangerine Dream, on the 105th total day (both plants same germination date). This seemed to trigger something in the Crystal Candy. The next day, day 106, sprouts of white calixes popped up on lots of the colas. I dont think the two are related, thats why I stated "seemed to trigger". One the main cola tips that this occurred on, there were also some male flower pods developing inside that calix. I pinched off all the new calixs with these new hermied bits. Oddly enough, none of the secondary branches, that also had freshly sprouted calixs, had any male pods. I'm sure the appearance of the hermied bits are a result of the plant being ready even if the trichomes were not quite ripe enough. Fortunately, there are far fewer clears evident in the plant as of yesterday (day 110). I will hopefully be harvesting this plant tonight.

👉This plant probably wasnt the typical plant that this strain can produce. The plant is supposed to be an XL and it stopped stretching at 19". It was a solid dome of leaves and flowers. Solid trunk and sturdy branches that didnt need any help supporting solid, plump, pine cone shaped buds. It was very leafy. While the plants over-all size wasnt XL, the buds definitely are. I hate trimming green leaves, but this plant had so many leaves I took handfuls of them from the plant weekly towards the end. Even though I took more than normal as far as total number of leaves there was still plenty of leaves left at the end. There was also minimal 'larf' on the plant due to selective pruning during first weeks of flower. 👉To harvest I started at the bottom and snipped the lowest branch first and worked my way up the plant with the Queen cola last. I kept the main cola of each branch in-tact, trimmed and weighed each one. Then hung each cola on a numbered clothes pin that corresponded to the colas weight on the weight log. I have a tall oscillating floor fan and ran it at its lowest speed. I would rotate the colas so it would get even drying on each side. The few buds on the dry rack got turned as well. After a day and a half I placed the colas in paper bags with the tops open. then after a day of that I began taking test weights of different colas to determine how much has dried out. I was trying to make the dry take a long as I dared. I put the first colas in jars after 5 days when they were at least down to 25% of the wet weight. All colas were in jar b y day 6. I placed a hygrometer in each jar to monitor the humidity levels and would open the jars for various lengths of time to allow the humidity to escape. The final humidity target was a stable 62% . Again the large buds were the last to meet that mark. The humidity stabilized in the Queen bud jar after about 10 days. I believe this slow dry helped the plant miss the 6 week cure mark. Tasted pretty bland at 6 weeks. But but 8 weeks the flavors started showing improvement. I think it may not be at the equivalent of typical plants 6 week cure till as long as 12 weeks. 👉When I did the close wet trim I did it over a "Trim-Tray". I had to scrape my scissors multiple times and got a nice little ball of scissor hash. The plant was sooo frosty I got a nice ball of pure resin, no green matter. I collected this and formed a small disk with my fingers. I let the trim get bone dry, then ground it with my hands and sifted it over the screen. This produced the most trim kief Ive collected from a plant! 9g of kief pucks! This kief didn't have any of the bland taste the buds did. It was sweet candy from day one. By 6 weeks it was getting sweeter and is superb tasty candy hash! The pure kief and the scissor hash is incredible!