Emmie's Vegan Fertilizer, Pineapple Chunk 2020 Celebration: Experimental Soil Grow

[Emilya Green]

The last crop was so good that I have been able to resist until now... but today, we take our first test buds to quick process and evaluate. I will let you know.

 

[Emilya Green]

Pro-level tent, that is. You could probably hit the fabled 3lbs/light mark by the look of those buds.

Not sure I have heard that fable, but let me guess that I am going to get around 4oz dry from each plant, so that is a total of 12oz dry, which will have to be about 3.3 lbs harvest weight. Not bad at all from 3 plants, but lets wait and see how heavy these buds really are; my numbers may be way off.

 

[HutchBenedict]

This has been such a great ride Emilya! Can't wait to see what happens in the next few days. You are going to have a fantastic harvest!

 

[Rad Man]

Here she is, our indicator leaf, right where she should be. She is the lowest and biggest fan leaf on the plant, just up from the bottom on node #2. Textbook mobile deficiency and that means macronutrient. K is the suspect as always with MC.

To my eyes, this appears to be a slight K excess, via the interveinal chlorosis. Am I reading that correctly?
You are stating that your intention is to feed until you see a small sign of excess, to ensure the buds are not deprived of any micro nute.

I like the idea that you have your foot on the gas as things finish up.

This makes me wonder, if we want to speed across the finish line, should we "hit the gas/overfeed" earlier in the flowering phase, or just ride the MC green until harvest? I know you were experimenting, so for your next grow, how many weeks prior to scheduled harvest are you suggesting we strive for small signs of excess? Or should we always fault to slightly overfeeding?

 

[Emilya Green]

To my eyes, this appears to be a slight K excess, via the interveinal chlorosis. Am I reading that correctly?
You are stating that your intention is to feed until you see a small sign of excess, to ensure the buds are not deprived of any micro nute.

I like the idea that you have your foot on the gas as things finish up.

This makes me wonder, if we want to speed across the finish line, should we "hit the gas/overfeed" earlier in the flowering phase, or just ride the MC green until harvest? I know you were experimenting, so for your next grow, how many weeks prior to scheduled harvest are you suggesting we strive for small signs of excess? Or should we always fault to slightly overfeeding?

Hi Rad... no, an excess of K is an ugly thing and will often cause lockouts of one or more of iron, magnesium, zinc or calcium and the symptoms tend to mimic either or all of these deficits at the same time. Also, interveinal chlorosis is the opposite of what is happening here... check out this leaf:

Compare that to my leaf having Veinal chlorosis... the result of a deficiency.

This is clearly a mobile K deficiency, starting at the bottom, but also taking out some of the leaf edges and tips above. Also logically, where would the plant be getting an excess from at 4.5g of MC, when the most likely cause of this reduced dosage would be a deficiency of some kind. Here at the end when the needs of P & K have gone up, it makes sense that one of these macro-nutrients would be the cause.
But yes indeed, it is my belief to keep going full speed till the very end. Organically grown plants are not told to slow down at the end and neither will my MC plants. Everyone has a growing style when it comes to these plants, and my style is to go full out with these plants from their very beginning. I believe that everything we do is cumulative, so I err on the excess side as much as I can, always striving to get the buds you see here today. I try not to overfeed, but I do try to get right up to that line.

A word about calmag supplements and MC. In my situation here, using unfiltered tap water all along, I have not had any calcium or magnesium deficiencies that were needed to be handled with a supplement. Any time I have had what looks like either a calcium or magnesium deficiency, I have solved it by adding more MC and I have trusted GLN to have provided the correct amount of Ca and Mg into the mix. As long as I am giving the correct level of MC, all should be where it needs to be.
I believe that a lot of people are so used to using their calmag products that they mistakenly identify indicators that the MC product gives us, into a need for additional supplements. Once you have given additional, you have messed up the balance provided in the MC product and it is my belief that you lose a good bit of control over the MC system at that point and you are well on your way to locking out some of the benefits provided in the complete MC package.
This may or may not be true in hydro systems and until I experiment with a coco or hempy grow, I am going to stay out of that side of the debate by stating that what I now know to be true of the GLN products only pertains to soil. Hydro is different in many ways, but it is my belief that it is not that much different in how it should be used, and that there are a lot of folks out there, especially on the wet side, still misreading the indicators given with this product. Time will tell, but for now, these are my beliefs. Your experience may differ.

 

[Emilya Green]

Day 54 of 55
There are just a few white pistils sticking up in the tent this morning and I spotted one lone amber trichome up top. Harvest will most likely happen tomorrow evening after I get home from work.

6am tomorrow morning will also be watering day, and I am going to continue with the current experiment, right up to the end. This morning I see clear evidence that the added gram of BE was not enough to catch up with the deficit in the last 24 hours and I am very curious how things will look after 48.

If we are still not getting ahead of the deficiency by then I will be convinced that I should have also given the SC last time for even more P&K, and I will this next watering just to sweeten the ending.

It appears that we have indeed learned that the plants are calling for more P&K at the end and stopping the supplements at the end is not the correct course. On the next run I will resist the urge to go wild with the SC and BE during weeks 4-6 and will give only the 1g dosage, and I bet we can maintain this all the way to the end without seeing damage and can even safely increase the BE right at the end, as the supplement calculator seems to call for.

The experiment goes on...

 

[Rad Man]

Em, thanks for straightening me out on the K excess/def. You are right, the K excess looks horribly worse.
So with your prior experience, did you usually witness yellowing of the fan leaves this late in flower in your LOS grows? Others have made statements as if it is almost an expectation.

 

[Emilya Green]

Em, thanks for straightening me out on the K excess/def. You are right, the K excess looks horribly worse.
So with your prior experience, did you usually witness yellowing of the fan leaves this late in flower in your LOS grows? Others have made statements as if it is almost an expectation.

Over the years these problems have come and gone for me but lately in my organic soils I had been plagued by a strange late season yellowing that I couldn't explain and I was really questioning myself and my organic soils for a time because of it. Then I hit on the potassium needs at the end being the cause, and then completely solving the deficiency by adding Terpinator at the end of a couple of grows, I knew I was on to the solution. This made me also realize that my Subcool soil recipe needed potash added to it in order to be complete for future organic grows. Once I figured out what this very common deficiency was, and how to be careful not to over apply its solution, I have never again had that problem of die off down below or the crisping out of the sun leaves late in flower.
So no, I don't agree with the popular crowd that console their followers that this "fade" as they call it, is natural and to be expected. It is not. Systemic die off denotes a deficiency that can and should be avoided for the full expression of the buds.

 

[Deketx]

I just watered tonight at the same 4.5 grams MC. The last couple days I've started to see Amber on sugar leaves on all but two plants, they're sativas so they still have a few weeks. I'm not seeing any amber on the tops of the buds or on calyxes. But I'm seeing foxtailing and pistol shrinkage on them. So harvest time is soon upon me. Again @Emilya helped me greatly through this first MC grow. I post on her thread so she can use my f up's and issues to add to her info to ultimately help all of us that want a fairly simple grow method. She is the Cannabis Sherpa.

 

[ChefDGreen]

Day 55! Day 55! Bring on the harvest!



Your ladies look fantastic @Deketx . I love the dark purple girl... even though her bud to leaf ratio looks like she’s gonna be a bitch to trim.

 

[Emilya Green]

Day 55, The Predicted End Of Bloom
Indeed, today I saw my first significant amber in one bud, while the one next to it did not have it. Their daytime ends at 11:40 this morning. I will take a look when I get home, but yes, harvest will begin tonight or tomorrow... I leave that decision until later today.

The girls know it is time. Suddenly, my every other day watering schedule is not working. The girls were still wet this morning so I did not attempt a watering. The girls are choosing to die... making that decision themselves. The buds have been developed. Their job is done.

So I was not able to continue this last experiment, but after 48 hours we do have clear proof of our hypothesis because green has started to come back to our indicator leaf, and everything up top looks vigorous again. BE right to the end is clearly indicated to be very helpful with our weed.

I wish I had pictures to show you with this, and later today I will get those to you, but for some odd reason the pictures that I took before heading off to work are not on my memory stick. For now, we are going to have to settle for the garden camera shot but later today and definitely before harvest, I will get those pictures on here, especially the one showing the improvement in our indicator leaf.

 

[Emilya Green]

It has been a weird day. First, my girls stopped drinking. Then my 6 am pictures didn't transfer somehow to the flash drive. Now, the freaking flash drive is gone. I don't have a clue where the dang thing went and I have looked everywhere and then some extra places after that. It must be sitting here, right in front of me... on top of something and in plain sight.
Good thing for spares...
I just took some more pictures, this time successfully AND with proper white balance, and I have gotten another look at the trichomes now several hours into their night. Everything seems to accelerate here at the end and not surprisingly there are now quite a few amber trichomes able to be seen up top.
This evening, we harvest. First we eat dinner and bulk up, being sure to drink lots of fluids while we prepare ourselves mentally for the task that we must do. 5-Hour Energy shots are at the ready, pruning scissors are clean and sharp.

Here are the pictures...
First, our important indicator leaf, a little bit greener than it was, even as everything is shutting down.

And then the buds, and the closeups...

I will be back later with more pictures and some numbers. Do I hear any guesses?

 

[THC Onlyfans]

Oh dem colas be so fat....4.5oz my guess...

 

[AdaminCO]

I thought you were a “wait for no new white pistils” before harvest.
Man those are monsters!

 

[Budstachio]

Absolutely stunning , this journal has switched me to megacrop.

Fantastic work em, seriously

Imma guess 4.75oz from those Beautiful ladies you got there!

 

[Emilya Green]

Anyone want to up your estimates a little? We just got done with Marci and these are definitely some very heavy and sticky buds. She weighed in with 36.8g of LARF, and 633g of bud, for a total of 669.1g of harvest weight. A quick run through my dry weight calculator shows that we have just harvested 5.31oz dry from this first plant... 2 more to go.

 

[SlyTown420]

Wow. I mean Dayum!!! Those are fat flowers there.

 

[Emilya Green]

I thought you were a “wait for no new white pistils” before harvest.
Man those are monsters!

Usually I am more patient than the pistils... but not on this strain! This is a very good example of every rule having an exception, and also that one should always go by the trichomes, not the pistils.

 

[AdaminCO]

Usually I am more patient than the pistils... but not on this strain! This is a very good example of every rule having an exception, and also that one should always go by the trichomes, not the pistils.

I finally have a good lupe, so we’ll see how these go. I’m pretty sure this is the last time I grow 6 different strains at the same time. So much easier to plan.
I should have learned my lesson with the one before last, but it is nice not harvesting 6 at the same time.

 

[Rad Man]

Fantastic work Em! Congratulations on a bountiful harvest.

Just more proof that what you get out equals what you put in.

You mentioned a dry weight calculator. Do you have a link for that?

Also, I can't remember, what size pots did you finally end up in for bloom? 5 gal?

I'm looking forward to the "smoke report".