1st Try At DWC/Soil Grow - Huckleberry - Cherry Pie - Dogwalker OG - Malawi Gold

[OlderGrower]

OG just put twist valves on the bucket lines. You have to put a grommet anyway. Might as well use one that has an on off valve.
These are 7 bucks on the web. Search for hydro flow shut off valve.

excellent, that is exactly what I need...

Hi olderGrower,how is your girls today?

good morning Sara, the ladies just flipped to flower on Mothers day, the Huckleberry is going to be a beast, but the Malawi Gold is going to be a chore, it is growing like a fat kid in a candy store. May be time to break to the SCROG for her. The LEDs are doing a bang up job especially since I was able to borrow 2 from brother for this grow, hopefully if I can work some more overtime this summer I can buy a few more for myself before my next grow

 

[OlderGrower]

I have to say I am very impressed with many of the growers here at 420. They are able to keep multi-strain grows happy and healthy while many different strains require different needs for their grow to be successful. I find it quiet confusing at times keeping track of which strain requires more or less of one thing, for example I have discover, (the hard way) that Malawi Gold requires more Cal/Mag then both Huckleberry and Dogwalker OG when grown under LEDs. In fact it requires almost 2 times as much to get the same results.

A big shout out to Major Pita this morning, thanks for the heads up on the stretch I should expect from my MG once I switch to flower. I am thinking I should have flipped them a few weeks earlier then I did but a least I was prepared (Somewhat) for what I was getting into. I would love to have her under a SCROG but until I figure out a good way to do that in a DWC bucket that will work for me, I am going with plan "C" or is it plan "D". Hard to keep on top of which plan I am on when it constantly is changing.

I was hoping to take a week or two off this summer and take a road trip back to Montana to visit family but looks like I will have to wait until after this grow is harvested. Lesson learned, while the smaller plants in the buckets drink between a quart to two quarts per day, the big Huckleberry drinks like an Alcoholic locked inside a liquor store. The last 5 days she has been drinking 3 gallons per day, and since she has been drinking so much, I have been adding nutrients to her water every time I water. I started her out this week at 1540 PPM and have been using roughly 300 to 600 PPM with every watering. I water her 1st thing in the morning about 1 gallon then around 6 in the afternoon she gets 2 more gallons. I was originally pushing the branches down every day kind of forming them to stay down but now I only do that one to two times a week. I have been cutting fan leaves off her like crazy every time I do this and by the next day it appears as if I did nothing to her. Actually quiet a remarkable plant. I will most likely defoliate her some today since I have some time, I am not sure just how to go about Lolli-popping her since she is so freaking short. I will try and get some pictures and measurements today once they wake up.
Today I am hoping to get the scrog set up on my outdoor grow on one of the MG and perhaps get the wires strung up for my other MG so I can get started training them. The wife flipped me a bunch of grief about the lights I put on the girls out back since it keeps the automatic chicken door from closing and we have been visited a few times this week from the neighborhood possums but other then that excitement all is going as planned, kinda sorta
The MG I have out at my brothers place is not planted in the ground yet and I am thinking I may not plant her in the ground, I may just make a DIY fabric pot using weed barrier cloth and building a wood frame to support it. I am thinking a 4 foot by 4 foot frame around 3 foot high should give her plenty of root space to grow.

I am also thinking of a way a person could do a DWC grow outside, this is going to be more of a can it be done project, not sure if I have time to do it this summer but perhaps next, though I can start acquiring matts now so I can have it set up for next year. I am thinking really off the wall on this, perhaps a 50 gallon plastic drum or a 30 not really sure just yet. It would require pumps and a dual barrel set up along with a huge ass storage barrel. Maybe grow them in 30s with a 50 for a storage tanks, still lots to work out on this crazy idea. My thoughts were grow a plant in 5 gallon buckets in veg till summer, get it about the size that my Huckleberry is now, then transplant the bucket from a 5 gallon to a 30 gallon bucket and move it outdoors. You could set the barrel 1/2 way down into the earth so that the barrel is insulated, which should solve the problem of keeping the water temp cool enough to prevent root rot.
So many strains so many plants yet so little time

 

[OlderGrower]

The girls are awake and ready for another day so I grabbed the camera and the watering can and got started with my normal routine.
This bucket was filled last night at about 30 minutes before lights out and this is what it looks like on a typical day.

After adding a gallon of straight PH'd H2O. There was plenty of color in the site glass this morning so I did not add more nutrients like I normally do. Typically the water in the site glass is clear, that is why I normally add more nutrients. Right now I am only giving them Nitrogen, silica and cal/mag but only silica and cal/mag on the bucket change outs, the rest of the week I have been adding just Nitrogen.

It is not really shocking to see the size of the plumbing that lets her drink this much but compared to my other plants I was a bit impressed with her stalk

She is one week into flower, so I will continue to keep the Nitrogen levels high for one more week then I will switch to Potassium and Phosphorus as their primary feed. This week I will cut back on the Nitrogen a little so I can give her a taste of whats to come, but with as much stretching as they are doing right now I want to keep the Nitrogen up to give them the food they need to grow bigger. I will be bumping the other plants up to around 1100 PPM this week and will keep the big Huckleberry at around 1500 PPM. I know that is a bit high but she seems to be doing fine so far so until she starts showing signs that she can not handle it, I plan to keep the numbers high.
Here are a few pictures of the big Huckleberry this morning from a few different angles, plus under LED and under white light.

She is a little taller then last week, hard to tell by looking but I did notice that the sensor for my temp/RH gauge use to be right above canopy level now it is below the canopy.
Till now I have grown a few respectable plants but nothing I felt compelled to enter into the PoTM contest but I do believe that this grow may produce 2 that are worthy in my eyes to enter, the Huckleberry being one of them.

to Major Pita for the heads up since the growth spurt my MG has done over the last week would have spelled disaster for me had I not started plans "A" "B" and "C" before actually coming up with plan "D" for her. While this is not the best, it has allowed me to keep her slightly under control for the time being.

It is a pain in the butt to change out the buckets but if I remove the light from above her it is very doable to pull her out of the bucket and switch her to a clean fresh bucket without to much hassle. Had I not figured a way to tie her down I am afraid to imagine how tall she would be right now, thank you again Major Pita, I can not say that enough.

The ladies out back are getting settled in though you can see that they did not enjoy the transplant as well as I was hoping for, hence the reason I am contemplating an above ground grow out at my brothers for the MG I will be growing out there.
This Huckleberry is no comparison to the indoor one but like her sister inside, she is a real trooper and took right to her new home.

These two did not take well to coming out of the pots and into the ground but I have high hopes for these two and feel once they get settled into their new digs they will do just fine.

The Cherry Pie is still causing me to pull out my hair (what little I still have) but all in all I was honestly expecting her to look a lot worse after being moved outside considering how much trouble she was inside.

Sinead is settling in quiet nicely considering her early start in life.

Later today I am thinking it is time to set up the SCROG on one of the MG's outside and start stringing wires for the rest (Have to keep them fairly short if possible) The wife reminded me that we will be having roofers in the yard this summer and they will be able to see the plants which I reminded her, I am completely within the law and if they really wanted some weed they could easily and legally grow their own.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend and your gardens are green and pest free. Looks like my job which was suppose to end in June is now pushed through July so I can continue to medicate for a bit longer before I have to get back on the wagon

 

[ShiggityFlip]

Awesome update OG, I will be eyes glued on that huckleberry!

 

[Major PITA]

Looking good my friend! Here comes the rain.

 

[Frenchy672]

Jesus she's a big bush!

 

[OlderGrower]

Awesome update OG, I will be eyes glued on that huckleberry!

Yeah me too, I am debating on getting another LED to toss above her.

Looking good my friend! Here comes the rain.

Thank you sir, I got out just in time this morning to move my lights in before it started here, I will have to come up with plan "G" by this evening to get them back out there and lighting up the girls.

Jesus she's a big bush!

Thanks, she has been a delight to grow

 

[Amadeus Forzin]

Jesus she's a big bush!

She is a very big bush. I hope she doesn't outgrow your space OG, she's huge already.

 

[OlderGrower]

She is a very big bush. I hope she doesn't outgrow your space OG, she's huge already.

She will have to double in size before that happens, if push comes to shove I will cull the other plants to make room for her. I do have options at least, my tent is 5x10 and has all kinds of extra crap inside that I could move out if needed. Very worst case I make the wife park her car outside I move her into the garage and convert my garage into a flowering room till the grow is finished. Ideally I would prefer to convert my garage into my grow area but until the wife decides to sell her Mustang Roush I do not see much chance of that happening

 

[Amadeus Forzin]

I can understand that, she's a stunner.

 

[OlderGrower]

I would have loved to see this gal FLUX'd like the one you are working on, now that would be a stunner

 

[OlderGrower]

If I had taken the time to FLUX her like you are doing with yours then she would truly be a stunner, right now she is just a nice plant

 

[spyro]

Wow OG, nice plants! Reminds me of all the outdoor grows I've had. I'm eager to see your results

 

[Conradino23]

Hey man, it was to be expected that they wouldn't take it easy. It's hard for an indoor plant to switch to outdoor conditions when grown in soil, and jumping off from DWC to outdoor soil cannot be even compared. You can spray or feed them with compost tea, that should boost their systems.

 

[OlderGrower]

Wow OG, nice plants! Reminds me of all the outdoor grows I've had. I'm eager to see your results

Hey man, it was to be expected that they wouldn't take it easy. It's hard for an indoor plant to switch to outdoor conditions when grown in soil, and jumping off from DWC to outdoor soil cannot be even compared. You can spray or feed them with compost tea, that should boost their systems.

I had planned on growing the MG out at my brothers place in the ground like I am here at my place but have since changed my mind, a friend who is doing an outdoor grow has offered me some of the soil that they have left over from transplanting their plants for their grow so I will be moving her into a 150 gallon container this coming weekend. They do all of their plants in either 100 or 200 gallon containers depending upon the strain. The price difference between a 100 gallon pot and a 150 gallon pot is very minor but apparently once they hit 200 gallons they must be sewn together with gold thread and lined with diamonds for drainage.

I am hoping to get a descent grow here at my place but the plant I am counting on to be the feather in my cap will be the MG I am growing out at my brothers, we have already picked out the location for her, gets sun all day no shade spots at all, and we are putting her on a large pallet so if push comes to shove and things get ugly weather wise we can move it into the barn with his tractor till the weather passes.
Thanks for the heads up on the tea, I have some in the works right now,will most likely be able to get some on the ladies come this weekend if everything works out for me the way I am hoping.

Wish my job was closer, makes for a long day and getting older does not make this any easier.
Hope everyone is having a great week and your garden is green and pest free

 

[ShiggityFlip]

Much love OG, can't wait to see what the MG does out at your brother's place!

 

[OlderGrower]

So I broke down and got the 200 gallon pot apparently you have to special order the gold thread and diamond drainage and I did not have the time nor the money so had to settle for just the plain old 200 gallon cloth pot. I will be transplanting her in this weekend, I still have a few items to pick up but I will grab the on the way home from work during the week so I can get this all done on Saturday.
I see Major Pita has his already in the ground so I feel a bit like a slacker for not having all of mine done. Time to catch up, his plants look simply beautiful.
It has been busy at work, panels to set and terminate. I got a nice compliment today from the head gentleman from PGE when they came to pull the primary power into our switch gear today, he said the pipe work in the electrical room looked great. I did not tell him that I did all of it, but it did put a big ole smile on my face.

Hope everyone is having a great week and has plans for a fun weekend ahead, I know mine will be.

 

[ShiggityFlip]

Wow 200 gallons! Someday I will do something like that.

 

[OlderGrower]

Wow 200 gallons! Someday I will do something like that.

Hopefully it will not be that far down the road if the government ever wakes up and smells the coffee.

 

[ShiggityFlip]

Maybe I will just have to live down the road from you someday haha.