ClosetCase420's - RDWC - 600W MH/HPS - AK47 - Grow Journal - 2016

[Papageno]

Yes but you already have 5 nodes and could top it now.

It is likely the first set will not really come in very fast and can be used to clone for the next grow.

 

[closetcase420]

Is my fourth arrow actually the 5th node? Should it be cut where the fourth arrow is?

 

[Papageno]

Above the forth arrow is another node. above that is a cluster. You could clip in the cluster and keep the node above the arrow at this point.

 

[closetcase420]

I went ahead and topped it before I left, I won't be able to check on them until next week.

Hope all is well

 

[closetcase420]

5/30 - 5.6 490

the plants look great after no attention for a week..

I did a water change (2 weeks on res)
10ml Sensi Grow A
10ml Sensi Grow B
a few drops of Orca through each net pot
a cap full of Silica Blast
a cap full of CalMag
a cap full of HydroGuard
current 7.1 530

The PH is a little high but I will measure again tomorrow and see if the PH perfect is working or not.

I have a question regarding topping. Before I left I topped the one plant and it looks to have split nicely.

I did cut off everything below the 5th node at that time yet I seem to have new growth below where I topped the plant. Should I cut it off? Also, do I have anything to be concerned with regarding how tall the plant is before it was topped?

 

[Papageno]

It is growing lanky due to the low intensity light. it is stretching for better light.

I don't know what you are asking about with the pruning. The plant is way to young to be taking anything off at all . You can top it but more then that will slow time to harvest at this stage.

 

[closetcase420]

My intention was 4 main nodes. Since I've topped it I've created 2 nodes which I want to turn into 4 nodes. That is why I was asking is this when I should go ahead and top and is that the correct location?

In regards to pruning. I read online that when topping you clean off all the vegetative growth below where you've topped so the plant can direct all of its energy to growing the new nodes. If this isn't true what are you suggesting? I'm hoping four a base that has 4 main stems that I can branch off as if they were there own plants.

 

[Papageno]

Removing Fan leaves especially lower ones does nothing to help and only slows growth. It is a huge mistake. fan leaves are reservoirs and generators. All the energy fro growth comes from them and all the nutes found by the roots gets stored up in them. Cutting them off is throwing away all that work the plant did.

Cutting branches is different and there are benefits when done correctly but that plant is not that big yet. Way too young for anything but topping.

Since I've topped it I've created 2 nodes which I want to turn into 4 nodes. That is why I was asking is this when I should go ahead and top and is that the correct location?

I have never heard of someone going about it this way. Cleaning off the ones below as you show in the pic would be the wrong way to go the whole point of topping previously was to get those lower branches to grow up to catch up.

You can grow these however you want. However you want it to fit the scrog...but what you are describing is not something I have heard of and not something I can recommend or comment on. I mean I know it will work fine. Just hard to imagine how that will fit in your scrog.

 

[Papageno]

I'm hoping four a base that has 4 main stems

Well you have 6... if you only want 4 you should cut the top 2 off. The stretch is not good right? You can fit more flowers in there if you use the lower 4 right?

 

[closetcase420]

So it's been about 2 weeks and a lot has changed..

I decided to try and make better use of the 600 watt by building a new grow room to allow more space for the plant to grow. It's been a lot of work but I'm finally happy with the new location. I only have to finish building the SCROG.. I built the stand on rollers and attached the SCROG base to the stand so I can roll it back and forth. This will allow me to get around the back side of the plant.

A few shots of the grow area but then onto the more pressing and serious issue.

So the bigger issue is the plants..

I have two of these girls at the moment. One is about a week older than the other. A couple weeks back I tried topping the older girl but it really was to high and I'm concerned about how it will grow out. After I finished building the new area I decided I was going to attempt a single plant with the younger girl and let the older girl get whatever light it can out of the way.

Yesterday I moved the younger girl into her new home and did the first feeding. At first the PPM was way to high 1200+ by using about 3/4 strength of the recommendations for my regiment. I dumped half the res and refilled with tap water bringing the PPM down to 820ish. PH was high at 6.7 but I'm using PH perfect so I assumed it would correct itself. Today I checked and she's reading 840ish PPM and PH 6.6. It appears the PH perfect in the AN is not doing what I expected it to do. I added a cap of PH- to bring the PH down to 6.3.

The plant is looking really sluggish, weeping is the best I can describe it. At the same time the leaf tips appear slightly burnt and the tips are curling. I took several pictures including the roots. Please help me identify and cure this issue.

 

[closetcase420]

6/17 - 6.3 850
plant is looking worse and worse
I'm not sure was the deficiency is, calcium, magnesium or nitrogen. Maybe a little of all?
I dumped the res, only 3 days old
I refilled the res with tap water and used 3/4 strength Sensi Grow A and B plus Silica Blast and CalMag.
I'm concerned that PPM is way to high.
My base is under 100.
With 4ml/L (16ml/Gal) in my 15 gal res would be 250ml
I put in 175ml of A and B and PPM was already over 800.
After 75ml of CalMag (5ml/Gal) I'm reading PH 6.3 PPM 1100
Seems quite high for base nutrients and CalMag

 

[Papageno]

Sorry I have not been able to be on. I will check back later today if you have an update. Have you put in voodoo juice or some bacteria?

 

[closetcase420]

6/19 - 6.5 1140
I cannot decide if I think the plant is turning around or if it is getting worse.
The leaves that were bad are really really bad now.
There are parts of the plant though that look healthy though she still isn't reaching for the light.

To answer your question about bacteria..
In the res I dumped I had included Hydro Guard, Liquid Kool Bloom, and Orca.
In the res now, there is only the Sensi Grow A and B along with CalMag.

What do you think the problem is? Do you think the plant is swinging back or still failing?

 

[Papageno]

You really can only tell by looking at the new growth. I think the PPM is too high for that stage and size. You had a problem. I think you have added too much to compensate. you can't compensate. The plant grows in time and when that time is gone the plant grew there. Some things are repairable but most things about fan leaves are one and done. Fan leaves full fill multiple purposes. What a lot don't know is as they grow they are generating excess sugars. So having fan leaves grow is a good thing. When they stop growing they are doing great but not making a ton of excess. The plant itself grows on the excess. So as fan leaves grow the plant grows. This is why taking fan leaves slows it down. Stalks don't grow on their own. And fully mature fan leaves that are not growing anymore wont help. If you take too many small ones an leave only mature leaves the plant slows down dramatically.

Anyway

I think you will be fine if you slowly dilute that back down and keep it happy.

 

[closetcase420]

I've been sitting at the same concentration now for a few days and noticing no real uptake so I'm definitely going to try and bring PPM down into the 800-900 range.

I'm not sure though that I've solved the issue. The really really bad leaves all fell off, I'm concerned with the remaining fan leaves. I'm not sure if I'm looking at new growth or if these were just hidden better before the really bad fan leaves fell off.

It is really hard to show under the lighting since the bulb makes the entire room look yellow

 

[Papageno]

Yeah 800-900 is max at peak growth. 1100 that is for experts doing a lot of things extra correct. That plant is closer to the 600 range. 900 is bud stacking, you are still in veg.

 

[blulezard]

hey Man!
Im just passing by. Hope your pant recover soon!
Good luck with the issues!
Cheers!

 

[closetcase420]

I believe I figured out what the issue with plant number one was.. when I moved from the starter 5 gallon reservoir to the 10 gallon reservoir I also moved the plant from a 3 1/2 in net pot to a 5 in net pot. There was a large amount of root growth already through the net pot and I tried to be delicate and surgical in getting the plant out of the pot but I was probably too high and did a lot more damage than I thought. About a week ago I was adding back water to the reservoir and I had the plant sitting on top of the scrog suspended. It got knocked over and fell about a foot to the top of the reservoir.. Plant looked fine but I noticed the big slop of roots had fallen off.

So where am I going with this... I realized that most of the existing growth on that plant is no good yet there was new growth and some nice white roots coming out of the new net pot. The other plant, we'll call her number two had been sitting this last few weeks in a very low nutrient solution and a single air stone. I checked the roots and WOW they are tremendous. I made an executive decision to swap primary plants. I moved number two under the main HPS light and number one off to the side to recover and grow some new roots..

Number two has been in the new reservoir under the HPS for about a week now. I just did a reservoir change and we're sitting at 6.2 PH / 890 PPM

 

[closetcase420]

Today I went back to check my notes and saw that I dropped these seeds back on April 12th, that is 83 (19 under 600 watt) days ago. That's just shy of 12 weeks.. I feel like this plant should be soo much further along to be 12 weeks old. Oh well, can't change it so just go with it

Plant A is starting to fill in the scrog a bit nicer; I've been tucking her back under each day.

I'm really starting to second guess this PH Perfect from AN, PH always seems to be high to me..

Current 6.6 PH / 880 PPM

 

[closetcase420]

Current 6.3 PH / 850 PPM

PPMs dropping over the last 3 days, this is a good sign. I may have found my magic number