8/4/17 Calling this Flower but still feeding late veg nutes until stretch is over. Feeding every other day is indeed a labor savor, just over 30 minutes to water and vacuum as long as everything is pre PHed and prepared. I bought a pressure sprayer to more evenly water, but it won't work as it took about 20 minutes to water 1 plant with 1.5 gallon.s Not efficient enough, sadly.
Lights are moving up once or twice a day. The time lapse camera will have to be adjusted as the tent is becoming overgrown. We have pre flowers everywhere, and Kush is 1st to flower. A couple other flowers forming, but oddly not any on the auto speed buds.
I bought a dehumidifier to deal with lights out and post watering humidity spikes, and it said it had a pump so I could pump the water into a bucket outside the tent, but it apparently is just gravity. Between all my gear and the newly expanding canopy, it is starting to get crowded in the tent. I may have to return it, but I really don't want to as the size has it fit right where I need it.
I think I found out what was eating my plant leaves. It was me. I accidently hit a leaf on Reek'N today with the shop vac while I was cleaning the runoff and it tore the end off a leaf and looked identical to the damage seen last week. On 1 hand, this is good news as we are still pest free (knock on wood), but on the other hand, I was careless with my girls. Shame on me. I will be much more careful in the future.
I( am noticing what might be nute burn on some leaf tips on a few plants. I have not increased the PPMs since going to an every other day feeding, and am getting consistently more runoff than I was getting, PPMs of runoff are mostly around under 200 more than I am putting in, so the frequency must be burning them. I may back off one day and see what that does and adjust the schedule as needed. I could use the break, too ;)
As long as they are stretching, they get Veg nutes, then a feeding or 2 of transition, then start flower nutes. Getting nute burn prior to changing PPMs was probably a good thing to alert me to back off the frequency of the feeding a bit, since they liked this PPM before with no complaints when feedings were spaced further apart.
8/5/17 They did not feed today as I am still monitoring the minor nute burn. I am starting to think, since I did not raise my nutes, that this nute burn is the result of me slowly lowering humidity to reach flowering VPD, in which case, the lower RH is causing the plants to transpire more and take up more nutes, hence the very minor nute burn I am seeing. I didn't consider the humidity to be a variable until a few minutes ago, but that would likely explain the issue. If so, I am pleased I got so close to optimal nutes that a variation of 5-10% less RH would cause this and concerned with recalibrating feed to this. It's a learning experience, tho, fo sho.
They are still happily growing tho, I have had to raise my lights twice in the last 24 hours and anticipate moving them up once more today, so I guess I am still mostly giving them what they want. The Kush is the tallest at just over 22 inches. The Mango Cream, the shortest at just over 14 inches. I may have to destroy time lapse continuity to better match heights with lights as in full flower, they move to around 12 inches (they have been at 18 inches through veg). I likely won't be too aggressive on light placement both for spread and to avoid light burn in flower. We shall see.
8/6/17 LMFAO I am starting to look for a home for 2 of the Auto Speed Buds. Nothing against them in particular, but I may need to make room and I have 3 of them and only 1 of every other strain. Things are going a bit bonkers in the tent and unless I want to see them fight to the death, I may have to make room. I will monitor things and decide.
What I thought was burn might actually be a def. I have consulted on a forum and have been persuaded to up my ppm at the same ratios. It makes more sense than burn, tbh, so I am going to go for it, new measurements to come, first feeding with new ppm tomorrow. Going to go 50% stronger in late stage veg and see how they respond, and perhaps will pick up the every other day feeding again.
8/7/17 New feeding based on slight def, full strength GH base nutes, EC 1.6, PH with white vinegar to 5.7
FloraMicro 5 ML gal
FloraGro 5 ML gal
FloraBloom 2.5 ML gal
CalMagic 2.5 ML Gal
Armor SI 1 ML gal
Roots Excelerator 0.5 ML Gal
Drip Clean .5 ML Gal
Photosynthesis Plus 3 ML gal
SM-90 2.5 ML gal
Ful-Potential 2.5 ML gal
FloraBlend 2.5 ML gal
Floralicious 1ML gal
1.79 EC after nutes and additives
cross your fingers that it is not too hot
Soon move to transition nutes, drop Roots Excelerator and add FloraNectar
So the plants were drier than I anticipated and the PPMs coming out were LESS than going in! I think the bump in nutrients was a good idea. We will see how these five handle it.
8/8/17 Just fed the other 5 full nutes, no trace of burn on yesterday's group. Light still going up twice a day. I am finding it very difficult to water and handle the Auto Speed Bud #1 in the center. The canopy is QUITE thick. The Kush is now over 10 cm taller than the breeder estimated for an indoor at over 70 cm. I am going to continue to feed every other day until they force me to feed every day. I am also going to continue with Veg nutes next feeding.
8/9/17 still growing, keeping the new full dose feeding. Will likely start upping the GH additives too. Kush is now over 80 cm.
8/10/17 As we wrap up week 6, Kush is getting close to 90cm, 50% taller than expected. 2 of the SPeed Buds are still in preflower, oddly. Everyone is healthy and getting huge. Having issues watering the plants in the middle because of the thickness of the canopy.
Last night my Raspberry Pi got into a boot loop. Since I run the time lapse with that, I have to do an emergency new setup to get the time lapse rolling again. I am putting together a tutorial to make one yourself and will have info when it is completed. There will be some disruption to the time lapse from thi missing time period, but honestly, I have been having to move the camera up so often because of the growth it will likely not matter much.
The plants are so big, I may push the next feeding past GH recommendations. Most people advise not to go anywhere near that, but the plants are so big and thriving so well and already got a bit of a def, I want to see if I can push them a little more by late flower. I have given full strength nutes and GH additives today to 5 of them, so will monitor and likely increase base trio ppms if all goes well.