Broke out the Nikon and took some shots tonight. I have to find something to do while waiting for them to finish up. The transformation these plants go through is really fascinating.

7 months ago

Starting to get some amber trichomes. I checked because two of the ladies didn’t drink like usual. They have been requiring a nightly water for the last three weeks. Tonight plant 5 is still at 40% only down a few points from last nights watering. Plant 4 is at 39% again only down about 4 points from last night. The other ladies were all at 22% from last night. So I’m going to leave them until Sunday unless I see a rapid shift to amber. Got the drying tents all ready and Mother Nature has provided the 60 deg air conditioning locally, so we’re good to go.

7 months ago

For my very first grow of cannabis ever, I’m really happy with how this is turning out. I was totally prepared to completely fail my first attempt, but so far, this is turning out well. They are producing amazing smells, the buds look like they are platinum in color, especially when they are under the lights. I never knew that buds could be greasy, but these things are which is blowing my mind. The calyx structure is starting to fill out so I know I’m at least doing something right. I can see how someone would think “just pick some now” and figure the added time wouldn’t matter but every day or two, the maturity of the bud structure, weight of the colas and aroma from the tent is increased. I’m not a heavy smoker and honestly, a lot of this will go to my x-mother-in-law to help with her MS so I’m not feeling the “need to wrap it up” which is nice. These plants have an advertised 75 day maturity from seed, but they will be done when they are done. Learning a ton from the process and have met some very cool people along the way. Its a shame that prohibition of this plant has and still does, hinder this community. One love everyone.

7 months ago

Moving along. I have been watering every night. Most nights I’m using the lotus nutrients I originally bought but I’m not happy with them. Their water solubility is not great and it takes forever to get the majority to dissolve. I know it’s close to the end but I did hit them with amino acids and some recharge. I also added some kelp to the mix because now that I’ve corrected my soil ph, these ladies have been thirsty and are showing yellowing on the lower leaves. I’m really starting to see how off they were for a few weeks. Now that things are good the amount they are drinking is much more. Instead of being close to needing water they are really needing water at the end of the day. Where they may have been at 29-32 % moisture, they are now getting to 19-22%.

7 months ago

This stuff it actually greasy. I bumped a bud tonight and it left a residue on my hand. I’m starting to smell blueberries with the skunk. I’ve never smelled anything like it. I did a half ass job growing this and it’s going to be the best cannabis I’ve ever smoked and I thought I had some fire stuff a few years ago. This growing your own shit is the way to go. 🤩

7 months ago

After taking the advice by LeChron and combatmedic my soil ph has gone from 4.3 to 5.9 in 3.5 days. Trichome development has increased, the leaf issues have gone away. Buds are putting on weight and getting nice and firm. Aroma is also getting really nice. I had to put the carbon filter on my exhaust because the outside of my house was smelling like a massive grow and I’ve got my daughter’s friends that come over to play in the yard and their parents swing by to chat from time to time and I just don’t want to alienate her friends because of my hobby.

7 months ago

Well these gals smell so freaking good. Taking advice from some of y’all I began feeding a watering ago and just worried about the input ph. They seem to be developing nicely and trichome production has improved over the last 2 days. Thanks combatmedic and LeChron.

7 months ago

Issues be dammed these things are fattening up really nicely. The trichomes are dense and the smells are getting potent. I’m really looking forward to seeing them in their final form. I had to water plant 1,3, & 4. Plant 2 was still at the 38% range according to the sensor and when doing the finger test and picking it up, it didn’t need water. It’s nice feeling what sort of wet is. Its so subjective and up to interpretation so using the sensors as a reference and learning tool helps a ton.

7 months ago

Watered again today. Only with wetting agent and root wise amino acids and a small amount of molasses mixed before adding to the brew. I’ve been aerating the water for 24 hours before using it. I’ve been using an aquarium bubbler as I read that the added oxygen in the water can be good for the roots and the microbiology.

7 months ago

I do have a question though. So I’m pretty sure that my diagnosis of the excess cal mag is what I’m seeing that caused a phosphorus deficiency however I haven’t used cal mag since September 18th. I also have cut out adding macronutrients and only things like wetting agent, amino acids, and mycorrhizae. I’m still seeing these copper dead spots showing up, starting mid leaf then spreading out. Any suggestions would be appreciated. I’ve got about 3 weeks to the scheduled finish of these plants. I know not to go on the schedule but I’m only posting that so y’all know how much time I’ve got left. I’m thinking of just riding it out but it would be par for the course if I lost these like 5 days from finish. I appreciate your help and input.

7 months ago

I feed them today for the first time since my cal mag issue and phosphorus lock out. I used a bloom and boost feed from lotus at 1/2 strength and still have not added cal mag. These are both higher p and k. I also added an amino acid blend from root wise to help transport the nutes. I have been phing my soil and it is finally getting above 5 again. The bud sites are really coming together it seems and they are really getting trichomes. I accidentally bumped plant 4 and it smells so good. They are also drinking so much. I’m glad I went with earth boxes for my next grow. These 3gal pots are just not enough. They are hard to water because the plant is so much bigger than the pot and they are getting to 22% moisture according to the ecowitt sensors in 24 hours so it’s been daily watering. I did let them dry out an extra day just to see the pot weight difference in dry weight now that they are this big. Can’t rely on tech all the time and I do want to learn. I don’t want to depend on sensors, I’m using them as a learning tool. I’m thinking this was my last feed because they should be done around day 75 and that’s about 2 - 3 weeks from now. I might hit them again in 5 days depending how they look. I know there’s been a few studies showing that feeding to the end vs flushing doesn’t really make a difference in most areas but both studies did show a decrease in chlorophyll which will increase taste or lessen harshness. I think I’ll feed 2 to the end and flush 2 to see what I like. In all reality, wherever I get from this is going to be better than anything I’ve ever had in my past so yeah.

7 months ago

Ohhhh weeee gettin frooostyyyy 🥶

7 months ago

Oh man life happened the last 2 weeks so I haven’t had time to post. I also had an issue about 10 days ago where my plants started showing a drastic copper color on the leaves and yellowing/drying out. I first thought I was missing nutrients but I slowed down and researched and concluded that it was a reaction to too much cal mag. I’ve been adding 1/4 dose to my water because I’m using reverse osmosis water so I figured to replace the minerals I’d do this. The copper color was due to a lock out of phosphorus but it happened so fast. I wound up just staying calm and I watered when needed with just ro water and cut off the torched leaves. Now 10 days and 4 watering sessions later they have fully bounced back. Some of the leaves still show nutrient burn but new leaves look good. I thought I blew it but these gals want to live. These ecowitt water moisture sensors are really nice which really helped me gauge the health of the plants by seeing them uptake more water as the soil returned to good levels. I’ll make another post to show what they looked like at the height of the issue but these pictures are the most recent. I should be back to more regular posts now that work has gone back to normal. Working in IT and being the owner of the company that also still is in the field can take me away for a while. These pics are from today.

7 months ago

These are the pictures from September 23rd. I thought I took more of them on the 20th before I defoliated the really bad leaves but there’s a few in these pictures where you can see the copper color and drying out. The very first picture of the single leaf is what they looked like on the 19th. By the next day, probably 36 hours after those spots showed up they went down hill fast. Now they have completely recovered and I’ve had to defoliate several times just to thin them out from all the growth. I also had one die but that’s because I put it in a different tent because it was being crowded out and one of the days I was super busy the small tent lost power and wasn’t on my battery system, we have had a very hot, cold cycle here in Minnesota the last few weeks and it was on a day that got into the mid 80s, I had it in a room that got to 97 and the ventilation went down but the lights stayed on. According to the controller it got to 112 deg and 42rh. Cooked her. Tried to revive her but just didn’t get to it in time. Probably for the best because those other gals are raging so hard they are over growing the foot print I had them in.

7 months ago

Had to water in 4 gal across all plants again. The bigger ones are really putting down the water. I did a pretty heavy defoliation on bottom leafs, light blocking fan leaves on the main stem, tucking others and tying down the outside branches to get more light. These things are really growing fast. My 2nd tent is pretty much setup and I’m thinking of pulling some of these to the other tent because they are so big.

8 months ago

Holy crap every time I’m thinking these things are growing fast the next few days after that they are even faster. This is nuts. I’m having to water every 24-36 hours now. I’ve been letting the ecowitt meters get to the high 20s and if they are 32 or lower at night I’ll water just so they don’t slip lower than 25%. I’m going to apply my last round of IPM tomorrow as the bud sites are actually forming and I don’t want neem in my buds.

8 months ago

Well shit these things are cruising. I rotated the pots tonight just because I want to get all sides flowing. Other than that I swear the bigger ones grew a half inch or more today. I don’t know what to think about the front left one, it’s definitely behind on growth and it’s super bushy with little spacing between nodes. I’m probably going to watch it for a week and then decide what to chop off.

8 months ago

I had to water again last night. Didn’t get the chance to post because I’m setting up my second tent and cleaning my lung room, cat hair, me hair and it’s all hard floors so dust and stuff shows up quickly. Outside temps have fallen. In Minnesota we get cool quick so I’ve got a ton of work to do this weekend between getting my tropical bonsai trees inside, cleaning up my back yard in prep for fall and I’ve got to finish this tent so I can get my house back. I did feed again with the watering because all the plants are showing pistils and the tops are growing quick. The 3 gal pots just have me on my toes with water and feed. I’ve stuck with low EC and low PPM and just feeding more frequently. I’ve been doing 1/4 to 1/2 doses of my amendments. Defoliated a few older large main stem fan leaves, been doing them as they overwhelm a node that obviously has pistils. I did a lot of tucking in the beginning so going back and opening up the canopy seems right to do. I also did some stem tying and I used some bonsai wire and shaped some stems like I do with my trees.

8 months ago

Are these pistils I’m seeing? This plant has increased the node size and it looks like white hairs at the bases by the node. These are auto flowers which is why I’m asking. And it’s my first grow.

8 months ago

I’m doing much better. Been watering these like they are my Japanese maple bonsai that are prone to root rot. I’ve been under watering since the beginning, I’ve been looking for the leaf praying that many have and I never did until I upped the water. I bought those ecowitt sensors and they are amazing. Ecowitt sensors reported 35-28% across all plants. Watered 2.5 gal according to sensors. Plants 1-5 are reporting 41-48% after watering. Plants 6&7 are reporting 57% & 54% (too much) respectively 20 minutes after watering. Mixed 3.5 gal ro water with 100ml microbe life vitamins and amino acids, 6oz kelp, 15ml yucca, 5ml rhizotonic, molasses, 1tsp cal mag lotus. Wiped to froth as usual, let sit and wiped again. All amendments are at half strength or less. Cal mag is always in my water because I use ro water so I use at 1/4 strength every watering to replace minerals. I also trimmed the bottom fan leaves off plants 2, 4 & 5, they were not getting any light. Leafs looked healthy and no sign of pests both on the fly paper and under microscope.

8 months ago

So I fucked up. I lost track of my watering schedule and we had some really weird weather this past week with temps running in the 95 deg to the 65 deg and back again, my ac unit failed to start when I was on a call for work and when I checked my temps they hit 88 deg and 40% rh. I was planning on watering the night before but I was on site ( I’m a contract it admin running my own business doing emergency work for hospitals) so i was way dry during this ac failure. My biggest plant basically fried 1/4 on the light facing side. I’ll show pics so you’ll see when I came home the leaves were tacoing on the one side. I checked the pot weight and it was like when I first put the soil in the pot dry. 😰 I watered to runoff slowly and bottom watered about 1/8” in the trays. They bounced back nicely and I trimmed off any leaves that were too far gone. Pics show the most effected plant over the few days this went on. I’ll post again what they all look like as of today in another post.

8 months ago

See other post from today. Pic 1 is of the most effected plant that I cut leaves off of. This is what they all look like after recovering. The drought happened Wednesday. These pics are from today, Saturday. I’m happy to see only the one plant got really damaged and it’s actually bouncing back nicely. It’s funny, of the three northern lights, one didn’t germinate, one I messed up and accidentally mixed my living soil through the whole pot instead of the bottom third so it got nute burned and the third was my biggest plant but it now got whacked by my failure with water. It’s like my brain doesn’t want that strain even though it’s been my favorite in the past when buying. These pics are all the most recent from today.

8 months ago

They are drinking more for sure. I bought two earth boxes for my next grow, 3 gal pots just need more attention I think. At least I’m going to give it a try. 1 gal with a half dose of kelp, quarter dose of cal mag, quarter dose of SI, phed to 6.7, PPM was 73, ec was .3. I didn’t water to runoff today as I did it two days ago and all was fine and I’m using organic with home filtered ro water that naturally is 6.8-7.3. No gnats on the new traps even after watering to runoff the other day so I feel my program of neem oil/silica alternating days with a 4 day break in the middle is working. I also did a dusting of nature’s living soil autoflower as a top dress, which is what I used to make the super soil mix in the beginning. I’m very confident in my tech, I’ve been able to keep the room between 76-79 deg and 59-62 rh averaging a VPD of 1.3 air, 1.1 leaf. Leaf temps are -2 to -4 deg F from tent temp, lung room is 73 deg and 51 rh. I added battery backups that I normally put on servers and it will give me a 4 hour run time. Tested the system with my backup internet 5g and the backup power and all is well. I blacked out the room tonight and checked for light leaks and I didn’t see any more since the first time I checked and taped up when first setting up so I’m feeling that photos are able to be done and my gear and controls are tuned in. I’m having way too much fun with this.

8 months ago

I watered 2 gallons across all plants which averages to the 10% of pot soil volume and put kelp, super thrive, rhizotonic and PHed the water to 6.3. Watered to small amount of runoff, the runoff tested at 6.8ph and 1480ppm on the 500ppm scale. That was yesterday. Today (when the pictures were taken) I topped plant 4 and I tucked the bigger one (plant 1) as I didn’t want to top just because it’s my first grow and I want to see what they do with little to no training. Also being in 3 gallon pots I think they are going to be smaller. Next grow I’m going to use earth boxes for the larger soil buffer. I trimmed the first leaves off plus any that were touching soil. Only a few leaves were taken off plants 1-5. Plant 6 I left alone as its more spread out and light is penetrating the canopy nicely. I had to raise the lights to adjust for the canopy growth and put the lights at 50%. They are 200 watt lights each and the DLI is averaging 45 with the highest being 53 and the lowest being 38. PPFD is 625-790 with a 19/5 schedule. They are about 14” from the highest part of the canopy. I felt I was running the temp a little low so I adjusted my day high temps to be 78 degrees F and my humidity is set to 60. Night temps are 72 degrees and 56 rh. New fly sticky traps were installed in each pot to watch for pests.

8 months ago

No new gnats on the traps today. I took everyone’s advice (much appreciated y’all) and let the soil dry out a touch more, the neem oil and silica spray alternating days, and the vinegar with soap in a cup was started. I think I caught it super early. Plus with new equipment everything was clean and I’ve been keeping up on any spills and soil that gets out of the pots, so I hope that’s that. I am going to use the silica and neem again this weekend and probably do a weekly application until flower then cut it out so I don’t mess with the buds. I guess neem is a no go on buds. Anyway, I’m really happy with progress so far. Feels good to have identified, albeit a minor issue, early and took care of it and successfully managed it. Small wins. I do appreciate this community both posting on my stuff and being able to read your posts to learn from. Happy Labor Day weekend to my US growmies.

8 months ago

I’m really happy with the overall growth of the ladies. I noticed 2 gnats on one of the fly papers yesterday. I sprayed with a silica foliar spray yesterday and neem oil tonight. Tonight I noticed 1-2 gnats on 4/6 fly papers so I made sure to spray the under sides and tops of the leaves and hit the top of the soil. I’m thinking this happened because of the heavy watering 2 days ago. I’m thinking of a sand or other cover like DE. Being my first grow I want to see the effects of the treatments I’m employing before the top cover gets deployed just for educational reasons. If they increase over the next few days I’ll go more nuclear with my responses. I’ll re-apply the treatments in 2 days for the next few weeks. I’m thinking of adopting a few full time as a preventative measure. Again, if anyone has any suggestions or thoughts I’d love your input. I’m by no means above constructive and good meaning opinions. Happy weekend everyone, God bless.

8 months ago

I had to water again today, the pots were really light and the last time I watered I didn’t get any runoff. This time I watered all until runoff and did the whole pot. Tested runoff and it came in between 6.2 and 6.8 ph depending on the plant. I used kelp, cal mag and added dynomyco to the top before watering as I didn’t have it when I planted so we’ll see if I get inoculated when I chop at the end by doing the granules so late in the process.

8 months ago

The feeding of cal mag and kelp yesterday really seems to have helped. The larger of the plants took off and even the smaller ones has increased quite dramatically. I bumped the lights to 45% tonight bringing the PPFD at canopy level to 620/700 from 570/620. I’m going to be at week 3 on Thursday of this week so I am going to gradually raise the PPFD to the 800/900 level over the next 2 days.

8 months ago

Watered and added a small amount of cal mag to my water because I’ve been watering with reverse osmosis water. Also added some kelp juice. Both at half recommended doses. Added to one gallon of water, mixed well and slowly added across all plants to ensure it soaked in. I’m happy with the looks of the plants but if y’all see anything please let me know. 👍

8 months ago

Basic check in. The differences in the phenoms  is really cool. The thunderfuck is for sure more compact in its growth and a darker color green. The lights are taking off like crazy. My plants that was deformed has for sure grown the next set of leafs and they are normal so I think she’ll be ok now. The ones I transplanted from starting in rockwool are showing a bit of transplant shock but I expected that. I think I should have opted for a smaller tent and just done two 3x3s or something like that. But maybe when I go to photos I’ll be happier with the larger tent. It’s just a PITA keeping it dialed in with zero experience.

8 months ago

Starting to really speed up. The one that I dropped a fly paper on when it was a seedling is still alive so that’s cool. I really borked up that leaf when it was the only two on the seedling. I’m definitely seeing the difference between the strains in growth pattern and speed. But we’ll see if it lasts or if it’s just different in the stage it’s in now.

8 months ago

Update: So I was trying to drop my lights in my tent and my cables weren’t long enough so I thought I could just turn up the light and it would be the same, guess I was wrong. One of my plants got really long and the others are odd but not as bad. SaviiBuds actually told me about this too and I’m glad that I was able to re-work my tent. All my lights are now 14” away from the top of the fabric pots. I also got a camera in there now to I can check when I’m at work. I’m going to pot up the rock wool cube grown plants today and sink them a bit more into the earth as I read in a few places to combat the legginess of the mistake I did. Again, pictures 10 and 11 are of the deformed plant that I’m trying to figure out what is going on with it.

8 months ago

Anyone able to tell me what’s going on with this plant? It’s grown like this since day one. Deformed, much slower than the rest and seems to have ridges / holes in the leafs. I’d really love to know if this is something I’m doing or if it’s just poor genetics and not to obsess about it. If it’s bad, should I keep it? I have 3 more plants than I can have in flower, because this was my first grow, I wanted to make sure I was as successful as I could be so I planted 8 total knowing that I’d lose some. One didn’t germinate, so now 7 and want to hear what you think about this odd plant.

8 months ago

Basic check in. Gave them 1/3 gal water across all plants in pots. Splashed the Rockwool cubes as they were showing signs of getting low. Installed sports bars in the 5x5 tent and had to run the room AC unit because it’s hot as Hades today and seems like it’s going to be hot all week. Lights still at 50%. Starting to see second real leafs starting to form on all but the two that seem stunted. It’s not because of strain because one of the stunted are the Northern Lights and one is the Northern Thunderfuck. I have done the exact same thing with each plant so either they are just slow growers or they’re not up to par genetically. Going to leave them until decision time before flowering when I can legally only have 4 in flower. Then I’ll offer up 3 to my buddy or if they are really bad they will meet their maker.

9 months ago

Gave 8oz of water total across all 7 plants. I increased the lights to 50% (was 45%) and now the PPFD is 200 vs 175. I’m going for small increases from seedling to veg versus just blasting them with more power. We’ll see. The Rockwool cubes are getting bigger faster which is interesting. Temps are 65f night 78 f day. RH is 72-75%. Running 18/6 as I read for autoflower. I’ve removed all humidity domes today at the half watt point of todays light cycle.

9 months ago

Seedlings are getting 180 ppfd of light. Lights are 33” from seedlings. Rockwool seedlings are 2” +.

9 months ago

Seedlings transplanted into fabric pots on Sunday the 13th. Monday the 14 seedlings broke soil.

9 months ago

Seeds started on first ever grow. 8/10/23

8 months ago