Dusted White Widow Hydroponic Grow

[Dusted]

Genetics: Crop King Seeds White Widow feminized
Grow room: 10 ft x 12 ft bedroom, well light sealed. Continuous use of fan for circulation plus furnace
Lighting: 600w metal halide. 10 day use of high pressure sodium bulb at end of stretch
Hydroponics: 3x15 L buckets with rock media. Continuous drip back to 40 litre reservoir, aerated
Containment: single water bed liner. Very important when you have 40 litres of water in a bedroom
Tap water: 180 mg/L hardness, pH 7.8, total dissolved solids (tds) 380 mg/L
Nutrients and pH: I make my own nitrogen solution (13.3% w/w calcium nitrate). The metals, K (potassium), and phosphorous I use whatever is cheapest since they are all virtually the same. My pH down is 25% w/w phosphoric acid. Target pH 5.1-5.5. There is a daily swing through this range as water is transpired and the tds goes up. When transpiring heavily the plants use 4 L of tap water a day and the nutrient solution must be switched out weekly or the tds gets too high causing nutrient lockout.

Hopefully I figured out the picture addition so you can see the basic setup. The reservoir is extremely turbid at the moment since I just pulled the roots from the previous grow. I added a bunch of enzyme and bacterial spores to speed up organic degradation.

Here is a taste of the last grow

 

[Blazinjones]

Genetics: Crop King Seeds White Widow feminized
Grow room: 10 ft x 12 ft bedroom, well light sealed. Continuous use of fan for circulation plus furnace
Lighting: 600w metal halide. 10 day use of high pressure sodium bulb at end of stretch
Hydroponics: 3x15 L buckets with rock media. Continuous drip back to 40 litre reservoir, aerated
Containment: single water bed liner. Very important when you have 40 litres of water in a bedroom
Tap water: 180 mg/L hardness, pH 7.8, total dissolved solids (tds) 380 mg/L
Nutrients and pH: I make my own nitrogen solution (13.3% w/w calcium nitrate). The metals, K (potassium), and phosphorous I use whatever is cheapest since they are all virtually the same. My pH down is 25% w/w phosphoric acid. Target pH 5.1-5.5. There is a daily swing through this range as water is transpired and the tds goes up. When transpiring heavily the plants use 4 L of tap water a day and the nutrient solution must be switched out weekly or the tds gets too high causing nutrient lockout.

Hopefully I figured out the picture addition so you can see the basic setup. The reservoir is extremely turbid at the moment since I just pulled the roots from the previous grow. I added a bunch of enzyme and bacterial spores to speed up organic degradation.

Here is a taste of the last grow

Subbed bro great job wat did u end up 4 a yield on that harvest?

 

[Dusted]

Welcome Blaze. Just jared the cola's today. Ended with about 7 oz (half from the 3 cola's, half from various side branches). Tried some of the 4 day cured side buds. Not that much taste (vape). Very buzzy high as advertised.

Reservoir cleared up so the bugs are just about dead from starvation. Gave the rocks a mild flush (2 L each) and emptied reservoir.

New Nutrient Solution to be used until the seedlings send out triple leaf
1 mL/L N
1 mL/L micronutrient with K
1.5 mL/L K silicate
1.5 mL/L enzyme
pH to 5.5 with phosphoric acid

I've worked with silicates for years in the chemical industry but never used it in my growing solution before half way through the last grow. Several of the side branches snapped under the bud weight last time so I'm going to try to get lots of silicate into this grow and see what happens. I hate working with silicates because they are so insoluble at pH 5.5. It take at least a day for the silicate to solubilize out of the colloidal suspension they make upon addition to the reservoir. The water becomes translucent until it goes into solution.

5 seeds starting hydration today. Let the grow begin!

 

[Dusted]

After 20 hrs submerged, the seeds were put under continuous drip on an inclined plate, sandwiched between paper towel. This allows air flow over the seeds and keeps the seeds wet, without getting up in the middle of the night to water your seeds. I generally don't even look at the seeds until the third day. Usually plantable at day 4.

 

[Dusted]

Day 4 of hydration 5/5 germinated and ready to plant. It is tricky getting the seedling into a rock crevice and not losing it too deeply. Once they are positioned correctly I spray the surrounding rocks and seedlings with hydrated bacterial spores hourly to ensure the root doesn't dry out and starts growing downward. Put the MH light at 2 ft and 75% output 18/6

I tried to get a shot of the seedlings in the rocks but they are the same colour as the rocks and tucked into cracks. Much easier to see when the seed casing comes off and a bit of green shows.
There is also a picture of a lab wash bottle which is very useful in a hydroponic setup.
And a bud

 

[Dusted]

The young ladies are all doing well. Tap roots all seem to have hit the water table and the stems are well hydrated. A couple have shed their seed casings. I no longer try helping the seedlings shed the casing unless they are obviously suffering, since all too often I end up pulling the entire root out of the rocks. Trying to get the root back in properly is like pushing on a string.

The previous grow is curing nicely. Initially there was very little taste to the buds when vaping it, but there is now a very earthy and piney taste with hints of pepper and solvent. Very happy with the high as well. More energetic and head rush than the Purple Kush from last winter.

I haven't owned a camera for 25 years so still getting used to the new technology. You just have to get out of the fully auto mode and play around with manual focus and aperture to get better shots I am finding. Unfortunately I can see photography could become a very expensive habit. I now want a nice macro lens with light ring to get the trichome shots.

Here are a few shots at day 2 after planting

 

[Dusted]

Day 5 after planting

I had to add Al foil to try and cover as much of the rock media as I could, since the reservoir temperature was getting too high (25 C). I have also been adding a frozen water bottle to the reservoir several times a day and the temperature is a much nicer 19 C.

The seedlings have stretched and flopped over. They will writhe around the rock surface for a few days and then straighten up again. Happens every time so I'm used to it by now. It must be the rocks don't support the stem as well as soil, until the roots develop.

 

[Dusted]

Day 7
Not much happening up top. They ones that haven't fallen over are propped up by rocks or foil at the moment. The others are crawling around the rocks. Internodes are starting to form. Most of the action will be taking place in the roots.

 

[Dusted]

Rats! I had to stop the cure on my cola's, since I found a couple of mold spots in one jar. I can never seem to get the buds to the correct water content before putting into jars. Too dry and no cure, too wet and bloody mold. I have been opening the jars daily to air but they were just too wet I guess. The buds went into the jars when the outside of the buds were crispy, but the large buds held lots of internal moisture which re-hydrated the outside of the buds. Oh well, at least the large jar with the side branch buds is the correct moisture content and is still curing nicely. I can also try the cola buds for the first time to see what they do.

 

[Dusted]

Day 13
One jar of cola's was destroyed by mold. One jar has some mold, and one has none thankfully. I should have enough to get me through until this crop is done.
Added new nutrients yesterday. This is the full vegetative mixture that I will use until flower development.
2 mL/L 9-0-0
2 mL/L metals 1-0-1
2mL/L 0-9-6
1 mL/L potassium silicate 0-0-4
1.5 mL/L liquid enzyme
Neutralized with citric acid this time instead of phosphoric to pH 5.5.
Unfortunately the resident bacteria in my system decided citric acid would be a wonderful food source. I woke up this morning to find a bacterial soup in my reservoir and of pH 7.5. I have now neutralized with phosphoric acid and will allow the bugs to eat up the remaining citrates in solution.

 

[Dusted]

Day 21
The reservoir cleared up after 3 days and has stabilized at pH 5.5

I have very seldom topped my plants because, back in the bad old days, I only had normal seeds. No use topping a bunch of males and then pulling them out of the grow system. I just grew everything till pre-flower, pulled the males, and snapped the females in half. I hear they call it super cropping these days.

I think I will top these ones soon, since I don't want clones off this batch. Not sure if I want all 5 plants yet either. There are 2 phenotypes in these seeds. One ends up with a much denser bud with larger calyx's than the other. You can see 2 of them in the following pictures. They have they very fat fan leafs. I guess we will see if they all continue to thrive.

 

[Dusted]

Day 23
Topped all the plants just above the second 5 leaf node.

 

[Dusted]

Day 28
I neglected them for a few days and the stem rot went wild. A couple fell over and I'm afraid of straightening them up since the stems may have started healing in the new position. All the plants have the rot in varying degrees but the middle one is the least affected. I think I will top it again in the next few days. Hopefully the others don't get too stunted. Oh well, they really do want to survive, so we will see what happens.

 

[Dusted]

Day 34
Lost 3 plants because I let the stem rot progress too far. I was hoping to get one plant per bucket, but will have to make due with two plants.
The two remaining plants have been topped several times. They both have stem rot as well, but it is under control.
Turned the MH light up to 600 W. It is about 18 inches above the plants.

 

[Blazinjones]

Day 5 after planting

I had to add Al foil to try and cover as much of the rock media as I could, since the reservoir temperature was getting too high (25 C). I have also been adding a frozen water bottle to the reservoir several times a day and the temperature is a much nicer 19 C.

The seedlings have stretched and flopped over. They will writhe around the rock surface for a few days and then straighten up again. Happens every time so I'm used to it by now. It must be the rocks don't support the stem as well as soil, until the roots develop.

I always just used a tooth pick and a twisty tie. Put the tooth pick in the rocks and lightly wrap the twisty around the tooth pick and the stem and Bing bang boom bobs ur uncle lol.

 

[Blazinjones]

Day 34
Lost 3 plants because I let the stem rot progress too far. I was hoping to get one plant per bucket, but will have to make due with two plants.
The two remaining plants have been topped several times. They both have stem rot as well, but it is under control.
Turned the MH light up to 600 W. It is about 18 inches above the plants.

Hey bro hope ur having a great start to the new year. I am sry to hear u lost one of ur girls tho. I am wondering how does topping the plants help with the root rot? And even with the rot the 2 girls that are left are lookn good still great job bro. Im guna be getting a dwc bucket in the mail some time this coming week and I'll be entering the world of hydroponic harvests. Because by then my hempy girls should be done and ready for the chop or atleast 2 of the four will lol. But yea man i love hydro ive never had buds with so much frost as these lol. How long u been growing bro? It seems like u have some massive gardening skillz since ur making ur own nutes and everything i didnt understand lol but u made it seem pretty scientific when u worded everything and so far ur harvest seemd pretty solid except for the mold but shit man happens to the best of us sometimes. Idk if u have them or not but get some cheap hygrometers from amazon. The ones that can fit in the jars u use to cure the buds. Then u will know exactly the %humidity in ur buds. Ever since I started using them when I go to cure i haven't had any jars mold on me any more. Idk jus my input hope i was of sum help.

 

[Dusted]

Blaze
Thanks for the kind words.
Topping the plants has no effect on the stem rot. I'm topping to increase yield. This grow will take longer than the previous one (100 days) since I won't have single cola's per plant and haven't flipped yet. They are starting show pre-flowers but I want them a bit fuller before flipping this time.
The hygrometers are a great idea. I will have to look into that. Thanks.

 

[Purkle]

Subbing in .

Hoping the root rot issue works out soon buddy!

Never seen a grow using rock medium. Definitely going to be popping in often

 

[Dusted]

Welcome Purkle.
The weird thing is that the roots of the affected plants are perfectly normal. The constant issue is the young stems turning to mush about 1 cm above the rock surface at about day 21. The trouble is that I have used the same rocks for 30+ years and they are heavily contaminated with organic material and the fungal pathogen contaminating my plants. Once the seedlings survive the initial onslot they are usually ok, but always have active fungus encapusulated in a cancor on the stem. It occasionally erupts with mycelium which I spray down with a peroxide solution.

 

[Purkle]

Welcome Purkle.
The weird thing is that the roots of the affected plants are perfectly normal. The constant issue is the young stems turning to mush about 1 cm above the rock surface at about day 21. The trouble is that I have used the same rocks for 30+ years and they are heavily contaminated with organic material and the fungal pathogen contaminating my plants. Once the seedlings survive the initial onslot they are usually ok, but always have active fungus encapusulated in a cancor on the stem. It occasionally erupts with mycelium which I spray down with a peroxide solution.

I think I'd end up anxious if I had to attempt the same style.

Sounds like you know your stuff though!