Harvest help

[Geets McWagon]

Hi, I just joined a couple of weeks ago, and posted my intro yesterday. I am almost to harvest with my first grow, here is the info:

SOIL GROW

Strain - Pineapple Express, feminized
# of Plants - 3 (but I'm only inquiring about the oldest, because they were staggered)
Grow Type - Soil
Grow Stage - Flowering, near harvest
Bucket Size - 5 Gallon
Lights - 4 ft T5's (4 tubes - 2 full spectrum, 2 3000k spectrum)
Nutrients - Fox Farms Tiger Bloom and Big Bloom (less than recommended, but still some burning)
Medium - Miracle Gro
PPM - ?
PH - distilled water (now that I finally tested it, seems high, like >7.0, so I've been bringing it down to about 6.0 with vinegar)
RH - ?
Room Temperature - 70-78
Solution Temperature - ?
Room Square Footage - 2 plants in closet, see pics
Pests - very minimal; I see a gnat once in a while

Problem: I think I may have mis-read the start of flowering. I thought she was in week 4 right now, but I read somewhere that trichomes don't appear till week 4, and she has had trikes since 12/30/2018. She is starting to look pretty mature to me, so it makes sense that maybe she's already in week 7?! Trikes look mainly clear still (depending which bud I check), but I really need an uplifting/energetic high, so if anything, I'd rather be too early than too late.

Would really appreciate an expert looking at these pics and giving me an assessment. Hope I have provided enough info/visuals. Sorry the trichomes aren't magnified too well... seems like some buds have more cloudy/amber trikes...
TIA!! -Geets (or Gak, haha)
ps. I thought there would be more amber pistils to indicate maturity, but I'm realizing that they start to get amber fast -- a couple of days ago, there were far fewer amber pistils, but there still seem to be too many white ones for maturity? Maybe those are really nothing to pay attention to?

 

[fanleaf]

That plant is for sure ready to chop! Other thing though....Never pH distilled water! No need, it will take on whatever the pH of the soil is. I will reply again in just a second with a reply to another new grower on the same subject so you can understand what I mean.

 

[fanleaf]

Heres the question asked by the grower

With that said, I’m trying to find out why it takes so much more to lower PH of tap vs distilled?

So, I was running tap water through my plants..... (NEEEEVVVVVEEEERRRR AGAIN! Lesson learned!)
When I would lower the PH to 5.8-6.2, it would take 2 ML of PH down (for 2 gallons). I live in Anchorage Alaska, and we run hard water through our system and we obtain our water from Eklutna Lake.

"I am now running 100% distilled water. But, I put 1ML (for 3 gallons) PH down, and it drops to 3.3.

What a difference! Anyone know what’s up, or is my Ph meter anti distilled water? "

This was my answer...

It's because tap water has nutrients in it. Usually some amounts of calcium, magnesium and others. Tap water can actually be buffered at a certain pH and make it take more ph up or PH down to change it. Distilled water on the other hand actually doesn't have a pH believe it or not its pH neutral. Let me put it this way so it's easy to understand. Let's say your tap water tests with a PPM meter at 150 parts per million. That is going to give it a certain pH right? Depending on what those 150 parts are will be a determining factor in what the pH is. Distilled water has 0 PPM and is not buffered in any way. Now when you stick a pH meter in your distilled water yes, it will show you a pH however since there is 0 parts per million in the water the pH you are actually reading is really not even there. As soon as you pop the cap on a jug of distilled water just the air, CO2 actually,that touches the water will change the water and give it a pH because CO2 gas begins to dissolve in the water and form an acid. Distilled water is pH neutral and if you are feeding your plants distilled water you never want to pH plain distilled water because it is absolutely neutral besides the slight amount of acid that is formed from the CO2 in the air coming into contact with it. There are not enough ions in distilled water alone for a pH meter to function properly. Does that make sense? So the slightest drop of pH up or down you put in distilled water will swing it wildly because it is the only thing dictating the pH whereas your tap water has things in the water to interact with the ph up or pH Down liquid.

Hope that helps!

 

[Dwight Monk]

When did you switch lights to a Flower schedule? IMHO they have a ways to go still.

 

[fanleaf]

Could be, but I do see 10% amber in the 5th pic. For a more uplifting high it may be time. The plant will continue to ripen for several days after chop.

 

[Geets McWagon]

Thanks very much fanleaf (this is a symbolically good name for you, heheh). There is SO much to learn. This being my first grow, I kind of neglected understanding about water and pH. I was told distilled water is perfect, but I didn't understand pH, so when my plants started to show problems, many of the answers had to do with pH. I finally got some test sticks, but still didn't understand how pH works. Same with looking at trichomes. I was thinking, "aaah, I don't have a loupe, so I'll just watch the pistils..." When I finally decided to spring for a loupe, it took so long to get to me, that I think I'm almost too late! I looked through the more powerful lens of the loupe this morning, and to me it looked like most of the trikes were milky or amber! I think I'm going to have to chop it asap (and I had wanted to flush better first :-(

So, thanks much! Two more questions: is it normal for pistils to still be mostly white, or at least 1/2 still white when you harvest a sativa-dominant hybrid like Pineapple Express? Also, what do you recommend for a "quick" flush? I have Advanced Nutrients "Flawless Finish" waiting to be used, but I almost feel like I don't even want to risk letting her mature for even a day longer... your thoughts appreciated...

Aloha, Geets

 

[Geets McWagon]

When did you switch lights to a Flower schedule? IMHO they have a ways to go still.

The lights went to 12/12 around 12/12/2018 (haha, cool numeric anchor, I just noticed), but if I recall, I was already starting to see whispy pistils before that. So I probably got the flowering start date wrong. That said, the buds themselves (with the naked eye) do not appear to be that ripe to me -- they only started turning amber about 7 days ago (but maybe white pistils are fine, and that really doesn't play into it with this strain?) But when I looked at the trikes closely (since I FINALLY received delivery of my loupe), I was like, WHOA!

I really need these buds to be energetic, because they are meds for me.
Thank you for your input, and I'm weighing it with fanleaf's reply to you... I might try a partial harvest, just to see how they would have turned out if I waited longer... Thank you though! -Geets

 

[Dwight Monk]

Well unless they are Auto's you count from when you switch or when they start flowering 7-10 days after the switch (folks do it both ways but it just a rough time frame and they are done when they are done), what you see before that are just pre-flowers and don't count into your Flowering time. So if they regular seeds they have been in Flower less than 6 weeks, what I see online for that strain says around 7-8 weeks. Can harvest them whenever you feel like it, you just lose weight (as they plump up a lot towards the end) and lose potency if you harvest them early. And when I said IMHO too early there is too many straight white pistils yet, not as accurate as the trichs but majority of the strains a large percentage of them will change color once they ready.

 

[Chris Scorpio]

Ya I'd say they have a week or two more , lots of hairs busting out still

The trick pics look like end of leaves with the Amber, leaves degrade much faster than interior buds

Edit
Last pic has lots of clear trics still, more realistic pic of the plant in my opinion

 

[Geets McWagon]

Ya I'd say they have a week or two more , lots of hairs busting out still

The trick pics look like end of leaves with the Amber, leaves degrade much faster than interior buds

Edit
Last pic has lots of clear trics still, more realistic pic of the plant in my opinion

aloha Chris, thank you for your reply, I wondered about that. Where is the best place on a plants to check the trichomes?

 

[Geets McWagon]

Well unless they are Auto's you count from when you switch or when they start flowering 7-10 days after the switch (folks do it both ways but it just a rough time frame and they are done when they are done), what you see before that are just pre-flowers and don't count into your Flowering time. So if they regular seeds they have been in Flower less than 6 weeks, what I see online for that strain says around 7-8 weeks. Can harvest them whenever you feel like it, you just lose weight (as they plump up a lot towards the end) and lose potency if you harvest them early. And when I said IMHO too early there is too many straight white pistils yet, not as accurate as the trichs but majority of the strains a large percentage of them will change color once they ready.

thank you Dwight! These are all trains of thought that have been passing through my head; thank you for clarifying, and maybe if I took pictures of the trikes from a better spot on the bud, they would be more clear, because the seeds are feminized but not auto flowering, and I made a note that I started changing from 18 to 12 hours on about 9 December so yeah if pineapple express is 7 to 8 weeks then it does seem like it’s too early but then I was thinking maybe because I am a novice and I had some water problems maybe the plan is just stunted and it’s actually done already? thanks again!

 

[Geets McWagon]

Well unless they are Auto's you count from when you switch or when they start flowering 7-10 days after the switch (folks do it both ways but it just a rough time frame and they are done when they are done), what you see before that are just pre-flowers and don't count into your Flowering time. So if they regular seeds they have been in Flower less than 6 weeks, what I see online for that strain says around 7-8 weeks. Can harvest them whenever you feel like it, you just lose weight (as they plump up a lot towards the end) and lose potency if you harvest them early. And when I said IMHO too early there is too many straight white pistils yet, not as accurate as the trichs but majority of the strains a large percentage of them will change color once they ready.

thank you Dwight! These are all trains of thought that have been passing through my head; thank you for clarifying, and maybe if I took pictures of the trikes from a better spot on the bud, they would be more clear, because the seeds are feminized but not auto flowering, and I made a note that I started changing from 18 to 12 hours on about 9 December so yeah if pineapple express is 7 to 8 weeks then it does seem like it’s too early but then I was thinking maybe because I am a novice and I had some water problems maybe the plan is just stunted and it’s actually done already? thanks again!