First Time Grower, 20 Plants!

[RandyL]

Most of the pots are 1 gallon size, the 2 big ones are 2-1/2 gallon. K wants to use the 2-1/2 gallon size for all the plants when they get transplanted, I'm not sure 2-1/2 gallons will let them achieve their potential for maximum bud quantity.

I'm hoping to keep the plants as short as possible without doing any LST to them. Everything I read says the plants grow tall when they don't have enough light, so I'm blasting them with 800 watts of light (2 400 watt MH lights), to both help them grow as much as they can, and to keep them from having to grow tall to get more light.

One of the plants had its dirt settled down about 2 inches from the top of the pot, so last night I turned the pot over and took the plant out while K dumped in 3 more handfuls of dirt. I saw roots reaching to the edge of the pot, and tried not to disturb them any more than needed.

I've been giving the plants 16 ounces of plain RO water PH'd between 6.3-6.8 every 4 days, and yesterday they got their first 25% doses of Big Bloom and Grow Big in their water. I'd like to take photos once a week to monitor the progress here. They'll get plain RO water in a few days, then maybe 50% doses of BB and GB next monday.

 

[RandyL]

K wanted me to mention this - we are in California and have the medical paperwork to legally grow as many as 31 plants (6 for me, 25 for K), so we are ok with 22 going right now. Legal notification if needed, I guess.

 

[RandyL]

Day 21 update!

Everything seems to be doing well. Most of the plants are between 6 and 8-1/2 inches tall, 2 are in the 10-11 inch range. Even little Nurblur has DOUBLED in height! Nurblur grew a couple new sets of leaves since last week, and is up to 3-1/2 inches in height now.

Lots of leaves are spreading out wide, lots of stems have 5 leaves on them and 2 little ones. K says that means they are maturing more now. I don't know about that, but they are looking good to me!

Tomorrow they will get more water. I decided to increase their individual doses of water from 16 to 24 ounces, I think now that they are getting bigger and are getting their nutes they probably need more water. When I put 16 ounces in, there's rarely any runoff from the bottom of the pots.

And since they got 25% nute doses last week, I'll try 50% doses this week and see how that goes.

I had been watering every 4th day, now I'm doing it 2 times a week. Nutes on monday, plain PH'd RO water on thursday evening.

And finally, here's Nurblur on Day 21.

 

[Waikinbaik]

looks very nice. are the tall plants your Granddaddy?. im growing 20 GDP my self and mine always stetch no mater how much light is there. im running 2 1000w lights and they still get over 3 feet tall from the top of the buckets. i had 8 last run get to about 4' and im asuming the shorts are your kush plant. keep up the good work.

 

[RandyL]

The plants don't seem to follow any strain-related pattern for size. Both of the tallest plants are Bubba Kushes, but then Nurblur, the shortest plant, is also a Bubba Kush. Some are bushier than others, some are a few inches taller or shorter than others, but so far I haven't seen anything specific to any certain size that one kind has that another does not have.

 

[RandyL]

Day 30 update!

Somehow, the Day 21 photos aren't working, but they are all in my Gallery. I hit the Process button today for the first time ever when uploading the Day 30 photos.

Lots of growing in the past week! I gave the plants their 50% charge of Fox Farms nutes last week, and it really gave them a good kick in the ass! Nurblur has doubled in size, now at 8 inches tall! Starting to look like an actual plant! The tallest plant, a Bubba Kush, is now 18 inches tall. Most plants are between 10 and 14 inches tall. Some a little more, some a little less.

Yesterday they all got their first 100% nute dose, and are looking good so far. We'll see how much they grow in the next week.

The plants were growing outwards a lot and getting bushier, so I had to spread the pots out somewhat. I put about 3-4 inches between the metal pans the pots are sitting in. And they look like they will need to be spread out some more sometime soon.

The room is on its way to getting filled up!

Nurblur at Day 30! Finally starting to look like a normal plant!

Nurblur really taught me something about how marijuana plants grow. The original big leaf with the hole in it is still at the bottom of the plant, near the dirt. Marijuana doesn't get taller all over, like a tree, it keeps adding new growth to the top only, like a tall building being built.

 

[Screwnuts33]

They are looking great. I see a transplant in your very near future. May want to get that done before going 12/12. Give them a chance to stabilize in their new home before flipping the switch.

 

[The Butcher]

great grow!! some of the picts arent coming up. aNyhow nice set up and I'm posted up. Lovin the names, reminds me of getsmart..

 

[RandyL]

I don't know why some of the photos aren't working, they did work before. They are all in my gallery here though, and are labeled by what day they were taken. It won't let me go into the older posts to re-edit the photo links.

We may be doing the transplant tomorrow, we have to mix up the dirt and wet it all down. So we'll see how that goes!

 

[The Butcher]

either way I'm posted and watching. And nice gallery!!

 

[RandyL]

Day 36, the growth continues! The plants are getting wider more than they are getting taller, although there is still some vertical growth. I think that is good, hopefully more bigger branches will make more bigger buds.

Had a near-meltdown on the watering issue sunday night / monday morning. As usual, I was planning to water and fertilize on monday. Sunday night, the pots were feeling light and a couple plants were looking a little dry. Ok, no big deal, I've been reading how the plants like a little dry time between waterings.

10 hours later, about 8 plants were wilted BIG TIME! I'm glad K didn't see it cause he woulda freaked out on me. I immediately got to work mixing up the new 100% Fox Farms charge of nutes + water, and gave all the plants 28 ounces, about 50% more in the 2 big 2-1/2 gallon pots.

By the time I was done watering, the first plants that received water were looking better, and about 6 hours later the plants were pretty much back to normal. But I don't want to go through that again, so I might do 2 smaller waterings throughout the week in addition to the water / nute day, instead of only 1 watering.

This time, I uploaded the photos, hit the "Process" button, and then got the html links from full size photos straight out of my photo gallery, so hopefully the photos don't get lost again. It sucks that there is a time limit for editing posts.

Day 36 photos:

And here's Nurblur, now at 36 days.

We are transplanting to the 2-1/2 gallon pots tonight, it's time.

Also, I tested the runoff PH from the plants when they got water and nutes yesterday. The water / nutes were at 6.57 going in, and the runoff water was 6.10 .

 

[Stakkur]

Very beautiful plants you have there, grow size i could only dream off here, anything above 10 plants tends to get busted by the cops.

Definetly want to see how this turns out for you.

 

[RandyL]

A couple days ago we transplanted all the plants into 2-1/2 gallon buckets. Except for 2 because we ran out of buckets. So K went and got 2 dorky looking orange containers which I don't think are big enough but it's done now. They are too tall and narrow. We put a full quart of water in each pot the first day and again yesterday, and I saw no runoff at the bottom, so maybe a quart per watering isn't enough? The plants are definitely drinking more water now! I had to increase the watering schedule from water + nutes on monday and water on thursday night, to water + nutes on monday, water on wednesday, and water on friday.

We also raised the lights, as the top leaves were turning yellow inside. Once the lights went up, the yellow mostly disappeared. But they have gone yellow-green-yellow-green a couple times now.

Y decided to break the top stems of a few plants and lay them over 90 degrees, to make 2 new "tops" in effect. Supposedly we will get more buds. We'll see how that works out.

Even our extra clones (Master P and Purple Sour Diesel sativas) on the floor, WAY away from the lights were showing the yellow in their leaves, so I'm not sure what that is about. I'll have to get a photo of it. K was supposed to sell the clones, they were given to him by someone who was moving away. But they had roots coming out of the rockwool all over, so I put them in straight Fox Farms dirt with just some PH'd RO water. The rockwool cubes were still all attached, so we had a big block of rockwool, plants, and roots. I had to operate with a pair of scissors to seperate them all, and it didn't seem to hurt anything. They've been in dirt 10 days already and are getting tall fast. I don't know if K plans to keep them or not.

Humidity in the room is also higher in general. The first 3 weeks, the humidity was never over 30% except in the dark time. Now it's never UNDER 30% even with the lights and fans on! It bounces around in the 30% to 60% range mostly.


More news soon.......

 

[The Butcher]

nicve update R.L.. that Neblar lookin nice and healthy. Great work my friend.

 

[fastfor20]

Randy this photo is for ref this is 29 plants in 3 gal buckets on 2 4x8 grow trays at 17 days flower they were vegged about 35 days

next time I will do way more LST and cleaning out the low stuff

I hated cutting em up but it is needed. Good luck with your grow your off to a great start

 

[RandyL]

Day 43. Gave the plants their water + nutes today. They were starting to look a bit dry already, after I gave them each a quart of water on friday. So I'm thinking they will each need 1-1/2 to 2 quarts of water per watering now. I gave one plant 2 quarts because I had some water+nute mix left over, and even then there was only a little bit of runoff from the 2-1/2 gallon bucket.

New photos soon.

 

[newsisnoise]

nice plants man. you guys are doing great, any idea on the yellowing? you figure it's heat?

 

[RandyL]

Day 44 photos.

I'm not sure what the yellowing is, I don't think it is heat, as the 2 400 watt MH bulbs aren't closer than 18 inches to any plant, and most leaves are 2 feet or more away. We had some clones here for a few days and I saw the yellow on them too.

The yellow seems to come and go every few days. Sometimes the top leaves are nice and green all the way to the center, sometimes they are yellow in the middle. Here's some photos from my gallery:

I thought maybe the 100% charges of Fox Farms nutes on water+nute days might be doing it, but the little clones had yellow leaf centers too, and they only got PH'd RO water.

Could it be humidity? Room humidity is usually in the 30% to 60% range. Or maybe it's just something with the new growth leaves.

Or perhaps temperature? Temps are usually in the 70-85 range, although spikes to 89 or 90 do happen sometimes.

ALSO - we got REAL CO2 now! We have a 20 pound tank in the room with an electronic switch. You can see it in the bottom photo in this post. I have the regulator set to 10 psi and the flow meter at 2 CFH when it is on. We have a timer set to turn the CO2 on for 30 minutes throughout the day, right after the exhaust fan shuts off. According to some online calculators, at 2 CFH flow rate the room should be at 1500 ppm in 21 minutes.

 

[The Butcher]

is it only when the leafs first come out? if so then its just new growth. And just as a precaution watch the nitrogen. But honestly from my Point of view they look nice and healthy bro.

 

[HealingKronic]

nice grow! im also using ocean forest and the full FF nute chart for soil, they love it! i think the butcher is correct, i dont see anything wrong from your photos. new growth is always much much lighter and darkens as it grows out. i was reading about your watering method and there is no need to measure. i just fill my bins to about the top of the pots they are in. keep the trunks clear of branches that may get into the water by lollipopping.