GrEeNdAyZ - DIY CFL - White Widow - Indoor Soil - No Tent - Winter '17

Oct. 1st. 16 days above soil.

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Oct. 4th. Day 19 above soil.

It appears that I have some nutrient burn happening, most probably a nitrogen abundance. As I had posted in the beginning of this thread, the soil the seedling is in was recycled from another garden project. Thinking back to the spring, I did amend this soil with both blood and bone meal. I'm now guessing that I was a little heavy handed.

I'm not overly concerned at this point. I plan to repot this afternoon using fresh soil, it will again be ProMix Veg and Herb mix as before. If your familiar with mainlining or have looked at the article I have linked in this journal, I plan to top the plant back to the 3rd node once it has produced its 6th node. The first and second node growth with also be removed at the same time training to form the base manifold begins.

Here is today's picture update.

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Repotting day! As stated in the beginning of this journal, I have selected a #2 nursery pot(2 gallon) that I have had kicking around the garden. This one in particular originally held a Kiwi. It's also been used to transport a number of different perennials from garden to garden. With that said, the first order of business was to give it a good wash in hot soapy water. It's good practice to keep your gardening tools, equipment and grow space as clean as possible.

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Tips from a Newbie :high-five:

I've already ranted about repotting but this is where I am in this grow. The roots of your little seedling are fragile, and they really don't like light so pulling a seedling out of its pot, exposing its roots and leaving it in the sun or under your grow lights is probably going to piss the little plant off. Planing and preparation will make this really easy. I'll share what I did this time around. If your all hung up and nervous about the transplant, this process will hopefully remove some fears.

Preparation, simple, get a pot and some dirt. Note the seedling pot there...that's the same as the one the seedling is in.

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Put some soil in the bottom of your pot, shake it, smack it or tap it on the ground. Just settle the soil in the base of your pot until you can place an empty seedling pot in the centre and have it even with the top of your larger pot.

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Fill the pot around the spare seedling container...your simply making a void in the centre the same size as your seedling.

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As I did when I prepared my seedling container, I run a bunch of water through it in order to get a nice even soil compaction throughout the container.

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Here you can see the little pot in the centre filling up...it has its own drainage holes so it will flow through. If your using something like a red solo cup you can add drainage holes but if you didn't, no big deal.

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I let the pot sit and drain for a few hours at this point. Your goal is to have the soil damp not wet. Next step is to pull out the little pot, just before doing so I give each side and the bottom a little push in an effort to open the void slightly making it easier to drop the seedling in.

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Grab your seedling, give its pot a squeeze to free the soil from the container, gently tip it over and remove the seedling, its dirt and roots from the pot and drop it in to the void of the new container.

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A little push and it should slide right in...here you can see the nice tight fit.

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I did add a little water, 2 or 3 tablespoons, around the seedling to balance out the moisture content of the soil but that will eventually happen on its own.
 
After repotting, I had to make some adjustments. Simply dropped the shelf and drip tray down a level and lowered the lights...at the moment I'm just using rubber coated garden wire to suspend the lights. Here's what it looks like now.

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Since I ran a bunch of water through the pot prior to adding the seedling I shouldn't need to water for maybe a week, maybe more...I'll just need to keep an eye on the height of the lights.
 
Oct. 8th. 23 days above soil.

I've been doing some reading and research trying to understand where the transition from seedling to the vegetative state occurs. The best description I can find states when vigorous leaf growth begins. Still pretty ambiguous and suggestive to me but as I look back through my journal and photos, it appears to me that on or about day 10 the plant is producing multi bladed leaves with stems. So for my purposes of documenting days in veg and days in flower, I'll use day 10 as the start of the vegetative state thereby making today day 13 of veg. If you have a clearer understanding of this transition, please let me know.

Today's photos, clearly continuing to show my screw up and the ongoing nitrogen toxicity on older growth. New growth looks bright and healthy, however there is some twisting of new leaves.

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That's Awsome! And thank you! I was beginning to believe that my attempt at humours ranting in the beginning had turned the entire 420 community off in a big way...truth be told, my indoor setup is almost identical to yours except the local hydro guys convinced me into a DE 1000w fixture instead of the pair of 600w fixtures I had my mind set on...Had to put things on hold while my daughter and son-in-law occupy my basement transitioning from collage to university. I don't really want them to go but with two till I get my space back it's taking them forever!

Thanks again!
 
Oct. 10th. Day 25 above soil. 15 days of veg.

Plant now stands 3-3/4" above the soil and is 6-1/2" wide.

Temp below the light is 75* and the RH is 79%...keep in mind that with the exception of the wall behind this is growing in an open spare bedroom, the window is wide open. At the time I took readings the Weather Channel shows temperature at 61* and RH at 88% in my area.

I still have not watered since repotting. The soil is starting to separate from the pot and it is certainly lighter but I'm still going to hold off hoping the roots will stretch out away from the excess of bone and blood meal that was in my seedling pot.

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This photo is the 3rd and 4th node, the 3rd being where I will top back to and begin the base of the hub/manifold. Still unnerving to think that almost all this growth will be coming off.

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Oct. 12th. Day 27 above soil. 17th day of veg.

Today was top and clean day so I did add about 600ml of water to the pot...I typically shoot for a PH of 6.3.

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This is after the first cut...I ended up topping at the 4th node...you can see that clearly in another photo below.

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Unfortunately, after removing all the growth below my top, I was left with two of the fan leaves most effected by my earlier error with to much bone and blood meal...the two growth tips I want look good though.

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I'll remove them once the two growth tips grow a bit and I start training then in to position.

This photo shows the first 3 nodes I removed and the stub left from the topping. My understanding is leaving the nub should help prevent splitting later in the training process.

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Here is the 17 days of growth I removed.

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Fingers crossed I'm moving in the direction I intended.
 
Side project!!!

I have nothing else to do today...who am I kidding!...I'm retired and have nothing to do anyday!

I have zero experience in cloning and really haven't put in much research at all on the subject but I do like to preserve and over winter cuttings from my garden to give me something to do over the winter. I have had good success using Gator Aid bottles to root different plants in the past so I figured it couldn't hurt to try and save the top of this plant.

I simply cut the top of the bottle and invert it into the bottom...a Rapid Rooter plug fits perfect in the spout.

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The bottom of the plug ends up just barely submerged once the bottom is filled with water. I don't have rooting hormone or anything but sometime ago on a gardening forum I read that cinnamon can be used as an antiseptic and root hormone so you may see that. I roll the stem in the cinnamon and added some to the plug. After clearing some growth from the cutting I also split the stem about an inch before it went in the plug.

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Here they both are back in place under the lights.

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