Vapoholic's 2nd Grow - Northern Lights - Soil

[vapoholic]

Alright, following the fail with hydro here Vapoholic's Skunk 2016 - First Grow I took a short break and decided to try soil.

I don't know if it was the water or something else contaminating the water, but I simply could not get a clean reservoir, even with R/O water. I ended up having to clean it completely every week and keeping that up for the whole period would have been impossible.
So, I cut my losses and regrouped.

Admittedly, this grow has been very relaxed and I've been very busy with other things as well, so this journal didn't really start off as I wanted. But hey, better late than never right?

This time I am using RootTrapper II pots, Kind Soil super soil and Canna Terra Professional Plus.
For watering, I just pass it through a sediment filter, a carbon filter and then add some Earth Juice natural down to get to around pH 6.5.

Starting with day 1, I opted to start in plastics mugs. Using one clear and another black one outside, so I could check on roots and if they needed water.
I put about 1/4 cup of the super soil at the bottom and filled the rest up with the Canna soil.
I then put it into a small propagator in my tent.

Some time then passed, we are about 3 weeks later here, I decided to plant them into the big pots.
The pots are 3 gallons, I put 3 lbs of super soil in each and then filled up with the Canna soil.

As with my first grow, I wanted to try main lining, so I needed something to keep branches separated. I used the padded garden steel wire and attached electronics alligator clips. It was then very easy to fasten them to the pots and hook the branches into them.

Now, today, we are 2 months ahead and I think I managed to get a somewhat even canopy
Three plants have been topped three times, for 8 main colas each, while two of them only 2 times, for 4 main colas each. Basically this was becuase two plants were for some reason growing much slower. I believe I will have enough for this grow anyway

I think I will begin the flowering within a week. The strain should be of average height, so I have to assume they can grow max the double and I am soon out of space considering that.

I will keep you posted

 

[vapoholic]

Day 65 (from seed in ground).

Time to flower, I'll change the lighting timer tonight and add the flowering ufo as well. The wide angle lens doesn't make it apparent, but they are quite tall. I barely have twice the grow height left, so I can't wait any longer

 

[vapoholic]

Let there be light

 

[vapoholic]

Day 75.

They have grown like mad. I noticed one issue already in the vegetation period and that's the fact that they have a seemingly very large node spacing and are very stretched.
I was very meticulous with the distance to my lighting, keeping it at a minimum safe distance at any given time basically, so I attributed this to the mainlining (topping, defoliation etc). Perhaps this strain or this particular batch didn't like my attempts.

I added a net to support the branches, in case some of them would be too long to support the weight.

In any case, the plants seem healthy. No identifiable issues on the leaves or stems and the flowering has started.
I just hope they won't grow much on the height now, besides the flowers. I have about only 20cm left I can raise my lighting and then I am screwed.
The plants probably wouldn't have become this tall normally, if the node spacing wouldn't had turned out so great.

 

[Stinky Snid]

He we grow again... Skip right to the exciting part. Signs me up vapO, I like a fireworks show.

KiG cheers

 

[infiniteJuan]

How ya goin, vapoholic?

 

[vapoholic]

Hi, well I am not entirely sure. There is something that browns the leaves, one plant even has more than the others.

I have gone through all the causes I can think of reading this forums and others and I've done what I can I believe. I even sprayed with BT yesterday in case there are gnats.

It does look like light burn, l but I see it even on lower level leaves. When it comes to nutrients I don't have much to change, since I am using super soil with simple filtered water.
Even if it was lightburn I can't do anything about it basically, since there is no more room to raise the lamps.

The flowers seem to be ok for now. I'll let it grow in any case and see how it goes. If all leaves turn brown it must be the soil in that case that didn't work. Although it's a known brand, so I would be surprised.
I've gone through the ph and over/under water check as well.

Anyhoo, I've learned a lot with this grow. I now know that I won't let them veg so high and that I next time will probably go full bio grow (Canna bio soil + bio nutes) to have more control over what the plants get.

 

[vapoholic]

I do have a bloom ufo, I am considering turning that off, it's quite strong. It might be too much for the short distance to the plants.

 

[Stinky Snid]

Wish I could help out VapO, to me it looks like Ph fluctuations causing different signs of deficiency. But I could be totally wrong. Are there any tears in leafs, light burn usually will cause more evident signs before getting to the current stage of observable leaf behaviour. Keep your eyes in the threads looking for answers. Sorry I couldn't pin point your issue.

KiG cheers

 

[David Bowman]

Hope all is well in your world.

Is this grow still alive?

We would love to be updated with some pictures and info.

How about posting a 420 Strain Review?

If you need any help with posting photos, please read our Photo Gallery Tutorial.

I am moving this to Abandoned Journals until we get updates.

Sending you lots of love and positive energy.

 

[vapoholic]

Hi all, sorry for the absence. Has been rather crazy lately.

I had one specific issue while flowering, which I identified. Basically, my flowering went like this:

On the 5th of July I switched to bloom.
After a little while I noticed yellowing on tips, but it was very little so I didn't bother.
The yellowing continued however, so I did the following:

1. Tried drying the soil out properly before watering again. I knew I had over watered so I though it might be stress. Didn't help.
2. I shut off my bloom ufo, since they were basically too close for comfort (they were growing too much height wise). Didn't help.
3. As a last resort I checked some runoff water. Normally I did not do any runoff, since I had super soil at the bottom and there were no chemicals involved. I just pH:ed down with earth crystals natural down. To my dismay, I found a pH under 5 (close to 4.5).

After finding out the horror pH I flushed the plants a bit with regular filtered water, which is around 7.5-8.0 at my house after which I watered exclusively with this water directly without using any pH down.
The browning stopped, but when it did stop basically 50% of all leaves were brown already.

I noticed however that the plants themselves didn't seem to give up, they kept upright and continued flowering, so I supported them as best I could.

Yesterday was week 10 and I harvested. The buds are obviously small, but the smell and stickiness is there. I also checked with a handheld mini microscope and it looks ok.
I forgot to take pictures of the trimmed buds, I'll do that when they have dried.

To sum up, I had two major problems with this grow:

1. For some reason the plats shot off like mad height wise when turning on bloom. I know they should, but this was abnormal. The stems were very thin and some could basically not support themselves (so I put in a net). I am not sure why this happened, the light was at the closest I could keep it, so I think it has to do with the trimming and mainlining I did. Next grow I won't do anything to the plants basically, I'll try a "au natural" grow.

2. pH issue. Now, I used a known super soil brand, so I don't think it was that. My suspicion however is turned to the natural down crystals I used. It's possible that they weren't dissolved entirely and accumulated in the soil. Which would also be supported by the fact that they seemed ok for the first month.

In any case, I now feel very confident for my next grow

I'll update with pictures with the dried buds in jars

I would like to end with the fact that these seeds were remarkable. Any other plant, cannabis or not, would probably have given up with that horror pH I had (for quite some time even since I didn't check it first thing).
I don't know if we are allowed to promote seeds in the threads, but I'll give a review of them for sure.

 

[Stinky Snid]

Congrats on the harvest, can't wait to see the final product. Working out the kinks is what we do around here. Keep it up and...

KiG cheers

 

[vapoholic]

Alright, coming up on the end of 4th week of curing

As you can see it's not much, but it does work. I tried vaping at 338F and then at 389F to include all the other goodies. Both temps seemingly gave me the proper effects

I think my next grow will start in a few weeks, no cutting or pruning this time, just a pure unmodified grow. I'll use same Northern Lights again, seeing how it actually managed to produce something useful, even given the pH disaster and low yield.

 

[David Bowman]

Hope all is well in your world.

Thanks for sharing this grow with us.

Please head over to the 420 Strain Reviews forum and post your smoke report there too.

I’m moving this to Completed Journals now.

Have you started a new grow you would like to share with us?

If so, please feel free to start a new journal here: Journals in Progress

Sending you lots of love and positive energy.