BWC BayArea's Largest Solo Grow to Date

[PHATBLUNT420]

haha thats a wierd, but i guess correct analogy.. just hope you dont know beacuse of exp!lol

i was having a idea that if you had co2 when you get your tank filled you can ask them to inject sulfur like they do with nitrous (bastards ruined it )

have you taught of a sulfur burner? i was offered one for $50 but had no cash at the time

 

[BWC BayArea]

Day after spot spraying with Serenade for PM

LMAO!! Nah, fortunately I'm not speaking from experience. I thought about the sulfer burner but I'll be harvesting within the next 2 weeks at best and was advised against burning sulfur this far into flower.

As far as the plant's reaction to spraying, I've seen no adverse affects yet. No burns, no wilt, lookin pretty good. Although I can see where some PM spots are still. It looks like they faded some since yesterday. Hopefully this spraying will last me long enough til harvest. If not there's more as reluctant as I am to spray. I even got t few buds wet and I didn't notice much browning of pistils. I'ma smoke and feed a couple girl s and have a closer look tho.

 

[PHATBLUNT420]

cool that would suck,not being able to smoke blunts =/ lol well at least in a sesh

maybe next run on the burner..

yeah i dont think you'll run into any ill affects as long as you dont overdue it with your solution , i was spraying alcohol on mites and was going good till some1 mixed my damn bottle of water to a 50/50 alcohol/water ... ruined a crop

what time into your light schedule are you spraying your plants?

 

[BWC BayArea]

Flower Day 51

what time into your light schedule are you spraying your plants?

Sorry been lazy lately. Ready to harvest and get this over. I'll be damned if I flush em all in that bucket. They've been getting str8 water as they will from here on out. I spray when ever as long as I have at least 3-4 hours of light left (if I'm spot spraying). If I spray heavy I start as soon as the lights hit because the 1st time I sprayed every plant u see in there and then some and it took like 3 1/2 hours and over a gal of spray. I don't really care about the burn spots. Some have popped up days after spraying. Normally on smaller, weaker plants or thirsty plants. I don't move lights or any of that although it is recommended. Its too hard to manuver in my grow room and I don't wanna risk dropping anything on the girls. I already fell on a tray and dropped the glass out of a hood making an adjustment to the light and sheared off leaves and limbs. Sorry I took so long to answer ur question. I'll update in a day or 2. Maybe take some more pics. My LSTing is goin cool on a few clones. I still haven't moved them from the tight spot they were in, but they're managing just fine. I think they'll be cool til the others finish. As far as the spraying goes. I spot spray and pull infected leaves. They PM seems to dry of and leave a course dust on foliage. Dojn't know if these are active spores or what. Today I saw PM invading lower buds of a single cola plant so I sprayed them just to see what would happen to the buds. We'll see. Hope no real mold shows up, cus I'm cutting everything. I am happy to say that this grow has gone better than the plants that came out of the last 2. I'm getting decent resin production and the purple hues are really commn in. What's strange to me is that it looks better on the plants under the 400W. It is closer to the canopy than the 600W, but then again air circulation is better on the 400W side of the room. Update's commin on feeding details and pics tho. Thanks to all that hung in there this far with me. Thanks for putting up with me and for all of ur encouragement. U especially weedtastic (for inspiration) and sonzor (for constant and consistent encouragement). Don't mean to leave any1 out. U all have help in ur own way (well most of u). These 2 however stand out in my mind. Thanks again.

 

[Heavyherb]

Besides issues Looking super...hope you can stop PM good luck brother grower

what is PM please?

 

[BWC BayArea]

Acronym PM=

what is PM please?

Powdery mildew. Its a fungus all too common to cannabis, hell to most plants we can consume that grow above ground. Moisture must be in the equaiton for it to thrive, as well as a desirable temp range.

 

[Heavyherb]

thank you, ill look out for it, thanks

 

[HAPPY GRASS]

That PM must suck, I hope I don't get them issues here. Your grow still looks good though... good luck.

 

[BWC BayArea]

PM is like Steve Erkel. Once it shows up its hard as hell to get rid of. No matter what u do, it seems to keep popping up.

 

[BWC BayArea]

Flower Day 51

Ok here we go again, ready for a long post? So on the 8-10th I fed all pots Super bloom formula as follows (I'm bout to bit Abberation here)

9-8-09 5ml micro/15ml bloom/10ml Plant Amp/10ml Kool Bloom (liquid)/1 scoop (small side of scooper) Powder Kool bloom/1 cap full of silicone solution/ 1.5 gal H2O. PH 6.4, 930 PPM

They were all fed over 2 days according to pot weight and soil moisture (checked it w/finger 2" from surface).

9-10-09  Fed the same mix at 940 PPM

I have concluded by my plants reaction in to my feeding program that 950 PPMs is the threshold between health and stress from over fertilization for single potted plants in 1.5 gal pots or smaller. The girls are definitely thirsty. I'm watering everyday since the last feeding. I've managed to keep my humidity around or below 50% consistently be keepin my AC on dehumidify or dry mode. I's caused close to a $45 increase on my electrical bill, but that's nothin to be concerned with. That's the 1st part of overhead recouped. Any how. The PM is still present as I mentioned b4 I still spot spray and I anticipate that one or two may be overrun in a week or so. Getting too close to harvest to continue to spray buds. I know a few people advised against it but I'm hard headed, some shit I gotta see for myself. Y do u think I'm so confident in some of my info, 9 times out of 10 I tried it or watched some1 else that I worked for. The plan is to cook the PM infected med or make concentrates. The rest well u know what happens to the rest, lol. I got a few fun things goin hat I've been monitoring but haven't said much about. Kinda wanted to c who was paying attention to what. I'm surprised no1 questioned y or how I'm flowering a single plant in a party cup. Its gonna be a dwarf. Might get a gram or 2 tops. I still got the coco goin and they look like crap (2 me). My Mazar is beat back!!!! Look>

Small buds, browning pistils with no girth. It still has a fragrance and I can see many trichomes under microscope. This is the main reason she's still here. I'm still gonna finish it so I know what the result is of all its been thru. It really seems like indicas are more sensitive than sativa dominant hybrids (don't have the patience to mess with landrace sativas or haze strains). Here's a DCxSC top gaining it purple hues that I spoke on about the Triplets harvest. Kinda hard to c under HPS but if u look a the small leaves closest to the bud U can c it in this pic>

. I've telling people that I noticed that the supercroped plants appeared to be behind the unpruned plants. Tell me if u can see it in these shots, here are 3 girls in (1) 3 gal pot unpruned

If u look at the adjacent fan leaves, u will see around their edges that its so resinous that the leaves are curling up. This is a genetic trait of this strain. As the leaves are coated they "roll up". This 1 has been supercroped. Notice the the adjacent leaves look different and the buds are smaller. Good resin production, looks about a week behind the rest to me. Take a look >

. For me it way harder to notice in the pics. Here its plain as day.
I moved my clones from here>

to here>

. They went from CFLs to a regular dual lamp, 4' fluorescent lighting. The lamp is as low as the chains allow. There has been an ongoing debate in a couple threads about red/purple stems that I'd like to attempt to help clear up. Here's my take for future reference; Most strains are meant to be green plants, the stems, leaves, petioles, and buds. Unless Ur working with a blueberry strain or a Grandaddy Purple Pheno. I'm not aware of many more strains outside of these families that do this. I believe this is a trait retained from purple afghani parentage (not completely sure but confident I'm on the right track with this). So yes they will look like that. Most other strains will start off green and should stay green as an indication of good health. When the upper portion of a plant displays symptoms it can most often be attributed to nute lockout and/or PH problems. If u start having problems from the bottom up then U got some deficiencies goin on (Ms. Fox I think I finally remembered this right LOL). This is on of many with red petioles, but the focus on this 1 in particular is the upper red stem. This is ur plant sayin "hey, flush me and pump up the P, ur killin me here" (not literally killing). Take a look>

. Am I gonna get good bud off of a plant that looks like this? Most def. Could its yield be greatly improved, U damn right and this is my point. Commercial growers may not care. This is kind of an art form for me and my intent is to master this strain. So yea I wanna get to the bottom of it, correct it, and if possible prevent it from happening in the future. I've dealt with this problem on this strain fo so long I thought it was normal. Until I noticed in my SOG short crop, hardly any plants did this.They were green stemmed top to bottom and some almost finished with green petioles (leaf stems). Here's a healthy up stem, same strain >

. The red one is in coco coir and I've been having problems with every last one in coco. I have to mess with soiless another time when I have more time to dedicate to just that. Almost 4got good ol faithful PK (purple kush). I tell u if she was a woman we'd be a match made in imagination. Here's the midget >

and a bud shot

. I wanna give em at least 8-9 weeks. OK so I think I got that covered. Again these are my views from my experiences with a strain I've been working with non stop for a bout a year. I think I'll cut it off here till the next post. I actually want some of u to read all of this so I don't wanna post too much. I took a lot of time and effort and put into this journal for a grow that I'm not taking too seriously. If u ask a question that was answer in previous posts I will either ask u to read back or ignore U. No disrespect to any 1, its just that if I take the time to create a journal for the benefit of us all I refuse to do all of the work. My job is to do what I've been doin and post. To me if ur here, urs is to read. Thanks guys, especially those that have been attentively following the grow and helping out along the way. We're almost done (when I say we I mean as a community, this is a 1 man show). Its been good.

 

[HAPPY GRASS]

Re: Flower Day 51

Clones are looking good, keep up the good work.

 

[GimmieGreenie]

Some of the water (2 gal) was distilled. The rest was tap water thru a Small Boy filter, the water bottles get re-used.

Hi BWC Big fan
You may have answered this question before but What is a Small Boy filler? is it somekindof portable filter? It clearly works well for you. how much was it?

 

[BWC BayArea]

Small Boy Filter

Hi BWC Big fan
You may have answered this question before but What is a Small Boy filler? is it somekindof portable filter? It clearly works well for you. how much was it?

This is the small boy HYDRO-LOGIC SMALL BOY FILTER UNIT SYSTEM - eBay (item 200359222529 end time Oct-01-09 0527 PDT)

It is a chlorine/sediment filter made for municipal water. Nute lock out and PH problems have reduced since I started using. Dunno if it impacts PH any.
Paid like $99.99 USD plus tax out of the store.
Wow, I didn't realize I had a fan. Its flattering, yet encouraging.Thanks for the support.

 

[BWC BayArea]

Flower day 53, possibly the last day

Ok this is the middle of week 8 and I am at a fork in the road. PM has gotten to some tops. Yesterday I cut down 3 DCxSC, My mazar (her pistils were browning and buds growth seemed like it halted, PM was concentrated in small amounts ove the whole plant around buds' smaller leaves). I also cut the majority of one of the tri-potted plants. Reason being, if its sisters can make another week I don't have to worry about decaying roots adversely affecting my living plants so I left enough stem and foliage to keep it alive. Kinda how a flowering girl looks when set to reveg. So now here's where I'm at. I haven't done a real flush since the last documented flush. I haven't even been watering to run off typical in order to try to keep up better with what the leaves tell me rather than the #s. worked ok. The buds are just staring to put her weight on. This is said to be a 7-8 week finishing strain. I have finished well in that time frame in the past but this summers weather and the volume of this grow kinda feels overwhelming at times. This is pretty much what I do. With that said I'm seriously considering cutting my losses NOW. I just wen in there and can c PM cling to the top of a nice looking supercroped plant? NE 1 with some kinda past success in this department please speak up. No response before the end of the photo period, I may shut this thing down today. Now I see how much real work a large solo grow is. Much respect to all that had success this summer. Mine wasn't all that bad. Learned a lot, made a decent amount of mistakes but I'm proud to say that I made close to the complete prescribe cycle time. Although I feel that success in these journals is often measured by the weight and monetary value of the finished product, I feel I have acheived a moderate amout of success all things considered. I think I'll take weedtastic's approach to outline or go over some of the finer points after a complete review of raw data. Thanks to all for ur support. What ever I decide I'll place a couple final photos. I need a break anyway, been over a year with the exception of a week here day or to there for emergencies. I'm goin on vacation after this. Thanks for all ur support,I am truly grateful.

 

[PHATBLUNT420]

Honestly I would have chopped em a week ago,
cut your losses NOW , im sure youll have some nice smoke!
and bleach the shit outta your room

 

[BWC BayArea]

IMO it is sometimes better to make mistakes and learn from them then to just trust others words or experiences because no 2 are alike.I;m about as hardheaded and stubborn as they come. With that said, I've cut plants down at first start of visible PM in the past. I know what that gets u......a lot of non potent plant material and wasted time (other than the actual experience). Don't know if any of u were aware, but all of my DCxSC cuts (this grow) came from a PM infected mom that I cut down in june or july I believe. Her foliage was so dense on her interior I didn't have adequate air flow constantly going thru her canopy unknowingly providing a suitable environment for PM. Lots of overlapping leaves. One of my professors told me that we will all deal with mites and powdery mildew at one point and time or another. I have battles I've won and lost to both under my belt and stripes to boot. This is my 1st war with PM. Had I given up I feel like I'd have felt at a loss. Kinda like in a real fight where U may have been physically dominated but mentally u never broke and can still walk tall. I feel as a grower I can still walk tall. The PM didn't beat me. I've come extremely close to the end of the prescribed flowering time. Some will make thru the whole time I'm hoping. If that's the case I will salvage what I can for smoke of the visibly affect ones and contniue the rest unless I can think of a reason not to. They show any digression they get the ax. Only 3 days supposedly left, but then again I did supercrop and those buds are smaller still. All have ok resin production. I may have to give hydro/DWC a go cus I've seen some nice looking specimens and I need to step my game up. Next grow will be more professional from jump and I'm gonna try to apply some things I learned from weedtastic and Abberation. If I go ScrOG then I'll borrow from 420fied and munki's journals and if I fluke up on a greenhouse opportunity then I'll consult with maslowjj. Next year's outdoors and I hope Dirtfarmer's still around, shit I hope I'm still around. Ahhhh, decisions, decisions.

 

[brider]

good vibes going your way on your grow brother...peace

 

[KatoRica]

PM is like Steve Erkel. Once it shows up its hard as hell to get rid of. No matter what u do, it seems to keep popping up.

Have you tried any of the "Safer" products. They carry them at our local Hydro shop and claim you can use them up to just before you flush. They have solutions for PM. I used the white fly and mite solution. They told me to gently mist my plants with water a few days before I pull them and the Safer wouldnt affect the taste or smoke. I use the aerosol and it creates a nice gental fog mist.

 

[BWC BayArea]

Flower Day 54

Kato, no I haven;t tried any Safer products. This is the first time I've used anything other than neem oil or a neem based product for a fungal problem.

Ok after brooding over my options through out the night. I decided to harvest the plants that appear to be most affected. So I harvested 3/5 of crop. The light throws u off because in the natural light u can really see the difference between PM and resin and some weren't as bad as I thought. Any how I loaded up my drying box. I think I'll pull some limbs out and set them on trays to dry. I left my little Pk in there. she took a small hit but those are the meds I need most right now and I ain't sharing. I'm hurtin right now and these meds don't have much of a narcotic effect, so I need her to be as potent as possible. I had a week tri-potted group that I cut completely. Got some pics to upload later. Got things to do.

 

[Munki]

Fight hard for every gram my brother. Get it all harvested as late as you can go then get wicked with the cleaning. If you have ever grown mushrooms, you will know the level of cleaning I'm talking about.

you planning on staying in your current location or are you moving to "greener pastures" where you don't have to be so convert?