9/28 Day 24. Raised air pumps above the water line using two 5 gal buckets. Removed the inline air backflow valve and this increased aeration greatly!
- Feeding day. Red TDS 850. EC 1.8 / Blue TDS 800. EC 1.7 / Yellow TDS 785. EC 1.6 / 10ml CalMag, 10ml Micro, 5ml Grow, 5ml Bloom, 2ml UC Roots. Will check TDS & EC through the week as they are starting to drink up the water.
- LST started today. I will be adjusting them daily to pull off shoot branches in different directions.
9/30 Day 26. Added water for the first time. Used purified drinking water from the grocery store (Ph 7.45 TDS 95 EC .2) and PH'd it down to 5.9
10/1 Day 27. Readjusted the LST wires and added some new ones on the stems that can now be pulled in different directions. Red suffered a break on the main stem that went 1/2 through the stalk. I decided to use the LST wire to push it back together so that it can heal. I will still train the other shoots in different directions and let the main stem just do it's thing. Blue and Yellow pulled in new directions to open up the middle and spread out the stems.
- I defoliated (light amount) some of the 3 leaf blades that were touching the container lids, and any larger 5 leaf blades that were blocking light to any new shoots with new stem growth and potential bud sites. I wanted to allow the air flow at the lower section of the plant.
10/2 Day 28. Everyone is bouncing back from the LST. Keeping a close eye on Red and the injury healing. I've decided to do a 1/2 of a weekly feed every 4 days instead of a mass feeding once a week. I will test the TDS and EC, see what the plants are telling me before I feed of course.
(All values before feeding)
- Red PH 5.98 TDS 720 EC 1.512
- Blue PH 6.17 TDS 728 EC 1.544 / Will add .25 PH down and re-test all in an hour after the feed to check PH values.
- Yellow PH 5.93 TDS 708 EC 1.497
Feeding: 5ml CalMag, 5ml Micro, 4 ml Gro, 2ml Bloom, 2ml UC Root Guard.
Post Feed values:
- Red PH 5.78 TDS 808 EC 1.695
- Blue PH 5.90 TDS 846 EC 1.796
- Yellow PH 5.73 TDS 803 EC 1.700
Lessons learned week 4.
1. Be a little more gentle on LST.
2. Mark the water sight gauge at each 1 gallon increment so that I can track water replenishment levels.
3. Started a spreadsheet to monitor feeding value changes.