BigBearNTX Perpetual Auto Grow

[BigBearNTexas]

I know I just updated yesterday, but I couldn’t help taking some pics this morning because who doesn’t love a baby pic!

CKS Northern Lights Auto dropped to soak on 3-1-18 poked her head up above the perlite yesterday.

CKS Northern Lights 3-6-18.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 6, 2018

Crop King Seeds Northern Lights Auto dropped to soak 3-1-18, put into hempy on 3-3-18, popped up...

Update on the LST of the Canuk Amnesia Auto. Taking the abuse like a champ. No need to adjust pegs this morning.

Canuk Seeds Amnesia Auto LST.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 6, 2018

Canuk Seeds Amnesia Auto LST progress

The CKS Northern Lights Auto reflower seems to get starting to amber up by my eye, but can’t tell with the pic I took. I’ll pull her out into sunlight this weekend to double check progress. Still a scragglytoothed mess. Lol

CKS Northern Lights Auto feflower.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 6, 2018

Reflower if Crop King Seeds Northern Lights Auto harvested late December.

CKS Northern Lights Auto rebloom trichs 3-6-18.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 6, 2018

Starting to get amber to the eye under the scope, not so much in the pic.

And last, the Fast Buds Pineapple Express Auto. Her leaves look old and she’s getting some rust spots. I flushed on Saturday and gave some light nutes on Sunday. I held off on some cal/mag, but I’m thinking that she’s going to get some home made calcium supplement and some Epsom salts with her watering tomorrow. Buds look good, but fan leaves are not where I want them to be. She still has some maturing to do and so I want her to be able to collect all the light she needs with those fans.

FB Pineapple Express Auto 3-6-18.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 6, 2018

Leaves starting to look old. And getting some rust spots.

 

[Bonsaiweed]

Ok, what is the perlite on the top of the soil for?? (make me smart..... ok, make me smarter. Not sure I'll ever be "smart")

 

[BigBearNTexas]

Ok, what is the perlite on the top of the soil for??

It’s not soil, it’s a mix of perlite and coco, which is why there is brown color showing in some pots. Perlite on the bottom to the drain hole, then the coco/perlite mix, topped off with perlite on the top. I was afraid of attracting gnats if I filled all the way with coco.

 

[Bonsaiweed]

It’s not soil, it’s a mix of perlite and coco, which is why there is brown color showing in some pots. Perlite on the bottom to the drain hole, then the coco/perlite mix, topped off with perlite on the top. I was afraid of attracting gnats if I filled all the way with coco.

Ah....I see. I lose track of the growing media between the journals I follow...... I need a cheat sheet on my desk..

Would this be a good idea for soil too? I definitely want to avoid pests as much as possible.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

I’ve heard of filling the top of soil with perlite to help control gnats. I don’t know if it works, but it was one of the remedies that I found when I was having an infestation.

 

[Bonsaiweed]

I don't think it would hurt. I may do that too...... perlite is cheap. Thanks for the info.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

Soil settles, adding some perlite will keep those upper roots covered as well.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

Updates:

Lighting:
I pulled the trigger on a new light. I’ve been obsessing over Lights for a while and decided to make the upgrade to a Chinese 300w full spectrum LED white light. I was thinking of doing a cheap Chinese COB, but decided that I can always upgrade later. The lighting rigged up right now is just a mix of stuff. This new light should be fine for my 2’x2’ tent, and I can always supplement with my existing lights if needed.

Pineapple Express Auto: 9 weeks. Not much to report, except the issue with the leaves seems to have stabilized. May do a bit of defoliation tomorrow, she has a lot of bud growing in her middle that I want to give more light.

Scraggly ass NL Auto in reflower:
I’ll pull her out of the tent tomorrow to get a good look at her trichs. I see some amber, but it still may need another week to get where I want it to be. I want couch-lock sleepy-time meds from the trichs.

Amnesia Auto:
Week 5. LST is progressing. I need to get some nice rocks to use for my initial pinning. I don’t like how close this ones stem is to the perlite, I’d rather have it above the medium rather than touching it. Also, my veg period seems to be coming to a close, I saw preflowers this morning. It needs to start growing upwards soon.

Northern Lights Auto seedling - day 5. All quiet, but looks good, she should be building roots.

Pics coming tomorrow.

 

[Troy01]

Your plants will love the new lights. Looking forward to seeing your pictures tomorrow.

 

[Ripe1]

Ya know BigBear, I was warned about putting perlite on top of the soil, but nobody ever said what would go wrong. There were 2 people who seemed wary enough about the risks to not do it. I was steered toward DE as a soil topper. Do that if it is only gnats are you concern. Nice work fixing the leaves! I can't wait for pics either.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

The pics of the Pineapple Express will look exactly like the one from Monday. She’s a little stalled, just working on the Buds, which is why I decided to go ahead and pull the trigger on the new light. I think it will help develop those Buds.

DE on top of soil works, but it compacts easily. If I were to use it again with soil, I would probably take it up now and again with a fork. The fluffier it is, the easier it can cut into those bugs and kill them. Lol

 

[Ripe1]

Good call. I till with a fork about every 9 days anyways. I just saw a couple gnats a couple days ago so I think DE is the way I'm going to go. Did you have any bad result aside from the DE compacting? If there is more to the story I'd like to know before I do it...and I'm going to search the negative effects of perlite and DE right now.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

No bad result from using DE, except that my infestation was massive and the DE didn’t do much at that point. Using it from the first sign may help out much better.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

The light I ordered arrived last night thanks to free same day delivery from Amazon. It works. It’s bright. It’s white.

Previous lighting was a 75w blurple UFO, four 40w blurple grow bulbs, and four 100w household 5000k led bulbs. Actual wattage was 122w. Which was just at the recommended 30w per square foot.

New light is 300w full spectrum white 3000k with 124 actual watts.

If I leave the supplemental bulbs in the tent that will take me to 196w from the wall. This will take me to 49w per square foot.

Picture update!

Here is the Fast Buds Pineapple Express Auto at 9 weeks. Not much change from previous pics. I’m still going to pull her out and do a bit of defoliation.

FB Pineapple Express Auto .jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 10, 2018

Fast Buds Pineapple Express Auto week 9

Canuk Amnesia Auto at week 5. Filling in nicely. I think this is probably as much lateral growth as I will get out of her. Time to grow upwards.

Canuk Amnesia Auto week 5.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 10, 2018

Canuck Amnesia Auto undergoing LST at week 5

Scraggly ass Northern Lights Auto reflower. I’ve already pulled, harvested, and washed. She’s going to be harvested for tincture, so not going to do much of a cure on her.

CKS Northern Lights reflower week 11.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 10, 2018

Reflower after harvest of a Crop King Seeds Northern Lights Auto week 11 before cut

Trichs on CKS NL reflower week 11.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 10, 2018

The baby, CKS Northern Lights Auto at day six above ground.

CKS NL Auto 6 days.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 10, 2018

CKS Northern Lights Auto six days from popping up

 

[Bonsaiweed]

The light I ordered arrived last night thanks to free same day delivery from Amazon. It works. It’s bright. It’s white.

Previous lighting was a 75w blurple UFO, four 40w blurple grow bulbs, and four 100w household 5000k led bulbs. Actual wattage was 122w. Which was just at the recommended 30w per square foot.

Wow, I didn't realize you were in such a small tent. I thought mine was small....... holy moley. More for height than footprint

You're doing great in that space. I know there are smaller spaces, but those people are just hyper-motivated and I have great respect for them.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

I’m literally doing a closet grow, so don’t have much space to work with. Had I known then what I know now, I would have found a 3’x2’x5’ tent. There are a couple on Amazon, maybe I’ll upgrade next year.

This is also why I do autos and LST. I only have 4 feet in height. When I bought it I wasn’t thinking about losing height at the top for hanging the lights. If I ever grow something tall, I may cut the roof open and place the light on top to get some more room.

 

[Bonsaiweed]

I’m literally doing a closet grow, so don’t have much space to work with. Had I known then what I know now, I would have found a 3’x2’x5’ tent. There are a couple on Amazon, maybe I’ll upgrade next year.

This is also why I do autos and LST. I only have 4 feet in height. When I bought it I wasn’t thinking about losing height at the top for hanging the lights. If I ever grow something tall, I may cut the roof open and place the light on top to get some more room.

Yeah, I'm at 27 x 27 x 63, and even then I must keep my pot height down, due to the light hangar. I need to measure the exact height my plant and pot can be with the light at the very top.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

Harvested the scraggly Northern Lights reflower yesterday. Into the dehydrator, into the oven for decarb, ground and into the freezer. Harvested 20g of material, but that included stems.

I didn’t do quick washes, just two soaks in the freezer, so this batch of tincture is very green.

Uploaded sideways, damnit!

5268D37E-D035-4A6F-B1DD-D7C129FBE729.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 11, 2018

Nothing really new to report, but thought I would do little collages of the current grow. It’s hard to see changes sometimes, so it’s good to see these pics side by side.

Pineapple Express

Fast Buds Pineapple Express Auto collage.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 11, 2018

Amnesia

Canuk Amnesia Auto collage.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 11, 2018

Northern Lights

CKS Northern Lights Auto collage.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 11, 2018

Northern Lights reflower

CKS NL reflower collage.jpeg

• BigBearNTexas
• Mar 11, 2018

 

[Bonsaiweed]

I'm sad for the little ugly NL girl.....but I'm happy for you!!!

We need to have a conversation about your process. There are so many ways to process, I can't imagine knowing them all.

Nice collages, that puts things in perspective.

 

[BigBearNTexas]

Processing was pretty simple and quick. Because I’m not going to smoke the plant, I don’t really care too much about curing. Down the line, using cured bud will be an option, because time helps break down the THCA and other cannabinoids into what we are looking for.

For tincture, I’m basically processing like for a solvent resin, except I don’t evaporate all the solvent. I use 190 proof ethenol from the liquor store, so it’s food grade.

I dry the bud in the food dehydrator, to minimize cells bursting open when freezing.

Decarb to convert the THCA to THC. Pretty standard 240F for 45 min.

Grind with my regular weed grinder, not a coffee grinder.

Freeze. Was frozen for about five hours.

I normally would have done a quick wash with the alcohol, but decided to just let the plant material soakin the freezer overnight. I knew it would draw out more chlorophyll, but wasn’t concerned.

Strained. Did another quick alcohol wash or two, then put it into this water bath set for 200F to evaporate off the alcohol. I’ll evaporate down to about 50ml, started with 400ml.

Simple stuff really. I use the electric griddle, btw, so there isn’t an open flame around the alcohol fumes.