Jon's New Pared Down Setup Soil Grow: 3 Photo & 1 Auto With New Dedicated Auto Rig

Yep, if she is sucking down water that fast, she can use those extra nutes
It's crazy. I know it's going to slow down when she reaches a certain point in budding, but it sure is cool and fun to have to water her so often at the moment. (What's hilarious is that I don't know too many besides you and I who would think it's "fun" and "cool" to have to water a plant four times in a week, lmao) I figure she'll keep this rate of consumption up for another two weeks or so before she starts to slow down. And yeah, I sort of tend to say, if I don't see any signs of a problem, they likely are good on nutes. But, as your simple sentence just reminded me, there are times when it might be a good idea to give them more nutes despite showing no problems if the plant is proving it can use them as Chunky is. As I continue to realize, it's connected to the watering, as apparently everything is. I can see why you made watering one of your specialties and strived to understand it so deeply. Cuz basically it's everything. Yield, quality of the bud, growth rate...it all comes down to proper and effective watering if you want to max those factors out. Which we all do.
 
Yep, if she is sucking down water that fast, she can use those extra nutes
Hey got time for one more? So today I began my next grow. It's all outdoor, my first. The skinny on it is in the first (and only) page of the already started journal (you are tagged). Anyway here's the question: The plants are going to begin in the tent with the current grow until the flip of the current grow. By then they will all be up-potted the first time. 3 of these are autos, 1 is a photo. It is the photo I'm concerned with. The strain is Sugar Breath. If you might remember, when I put Sadie the Jelly Rancher outdoors to try and facilitate her recovery a grow ago (she was the sickly one removed from the scrog...), when she went from 18/6 to the hours of outdoor light, around 15/11, she started budding. That was why I cleared out the tent of autos and put her back in there to bud out. Well, I don't want this Sugar Breath to suffer the same fate in a three gallon pot on Day 30 (approx. when she'll go outside and what she'll be in by then) only to start budding on me before I can up pot her into the 10. So my proposed solution is, since my current 18 hour day goes 6 am to 12 am, why not just remove the Sugar Breath from the tent at 8 pm each night until she goes outside and put her in a dark closet indoors overnight with a fan? Then simply put her back in the tent at 6 am when the tent reawakens. That would start her vegging at 14/10. But 14/10 is going to be the light cycle outdoors for the duration of this grow. As it gets more fall/winter the days will get even shorter. So doesn't this make sense to start her on 14/10 so that when I put her outside she's on almost the same light cycle? Wouldn't that then allow her to pick her own time to start budding based on the season/weather like normal outdoor plants?
 
I don't think all the extra work is gonna be worth it. 10 hours of darkness is already at the border line too and there's a good chance that she may go into Bloom there... it could go either way. I would just deal with it when you get outside, and add a timed floodlight to extend the day out there if you have to.
 
I don't think all the extra work is gonna be worth it. 10 hours of darkness is already at the border line too and there's a good chance that she may go into Bloom there... it could go either way. I would just deal with it when you get outside, and add a timed floodlight to extend the day out there if you have to.
Ah, the idea of adding a floodlight did not occur to me. That's probably doable. So I know maybe light is not your specialty, but have you ever done this to extend the day hours? Obviously it won't be quality light or anything but if the only idea is to have it on from sundown til 18 hours have passed in total, that's easy. How big a floodlight do I need for that do you think? I don't really have any reference point of how much light is enough to keep it going as per day hours when it's dark outside. Obviously the answer is brighter than star and moonlight. But It would be better to be able to use as unobtrusive a light as possible. Oh, wait. Duh. What about taking one of the two blurples and just rigging something up on the lennai in the back? Then I can just wheel her onto the bricks at sundown and put her under the blurple for however many hours til she has a complete 18 hour day. When she's ready to flip, I just stop doing that and let her go outside. That would work perfectly wouldn't it? She'd get a full day of sunlight, great real light to extend the day to 18 hours and then bud fully in sunlight. Also at night she'd obviously still be outside so she'd continue to get the outside weather conditions all the time for consistency of environment. I bet she starts budding at 14/10 once she stops being under the blurple for 4 to 6 hours a day depending on sundown and clouds. Just as Sadie did.

Thanks! Appreciate the help!
 
Complete Phototown Update, Monday, September 6
Chunkadelic Significant Information and Change
Slurricane/Ghost Train Haze Further Training/Defol Session
Watering Day for all of Phototown
Grow/Veg Day 52

An important observation today about the Chunkadelic auto
and related action is the theme of the day. Today was watering day and it worked out just luckily that I got a rare day where every plant needed water on the same day. I pulled the Chunkadelic down to the floor to water her, check the buds, and do a little defoliation. When I took a picture of the upper most buds on the plant, I noticed that the very top buds are starting to brown up a little on the ends. You can see it very clearly in the picture, and you can then compare that to the other bud photo of a perfect bud with no browning. The perfect one was lower - further from the light. Once I saw this it was very easy to diagnose and correct. Also even though the lighting is different in each little bud picture, notice the leaves on each one. You can see how the leaves on the very upper bud have more pronounced veins, and appear slightly yellower than the ones on the lower bud. And if you really look closely you can also see the very most beginning of leaf curl on several spots of the top leaves. All of this says one thing and one thing only. The plant is getting too much light. She is not happy at around 1250 par. She wants to be more like 1000 or 1050, and that's where she is now that she's down on the floor. Gotta be careful with this light, it is not a toy to be trifled with. The upper most buds are getting a bit crisped. We obviously don't want any part of that, and thankfully this is a rare case when the solution couldn't be easier. Make the plant further away from the light however you get that done. Problem solved. And, best of all, we caught it way early, definitively fixing the problem before it could stunt the growth of the buds in the slightest. Nice catch if I do say so myself, LMAO. Sometimes the leaves up top will be praying up, the bud's emerging white hairs will be pointing and reaching straight up, and the plant appears perfectly humming along to just look at it with average eyes and focus, and it is - but if it weren't lowered away a little more from the light the growth of the upper buds especially will begin to be compromised. You gotta look CLOSELY at the plant. Or at least I do. Not only do the buds become lesser quality if they are allowed to stay at this too much light point, they become just....less. They also could begin to bleach or foxtail, although we are weeks from that potential yet. So I always inspect the buds, especially at the tops, at this point or even earlier. This browning is the easiest and clearest sign I can think of that the top of the canopy is too close to your light. And it's also a VERY good reason to NOT just rely on the dumb hand test or your unqualified eyes test or even the temperature at canopy level....you gotta look hard. This would be my unsolicited suggestion today, and especially if you are like me and someone who likes to push the light envelope.

But that also gave me the opportunity to clean the tent, which badly needed done, and rearrange some fans so that all four plants are getting sweet moving air, as well as moving Chunky to ground level on the wheel base where she now resides. The changes in the setup are also pictured, from the backside as that's where most of the changes were.

We also did yet another training and defol session on the Ghost Train Haze and the Slurricane. These girls are incredible and growing like mad dogs. I really can flip these plants anytime I want at this point. We have good canopies, we have a trillion legit bud sites, and we have a reasonably well distributed positioning for budding of the stems/tops. If I flipped them today the plants would end up 3 feet tall, and would still be amazing I'm sure. But I ain't growing autos here. This is big girl country where the real plants live. And they ain't near big enough yet for me to flip. Heh. I'll keep them in veg as long as necessary, I have patience and can outwait the plants any day. Heh.

Nutes-wise the GTH and Hulkster continue Week 4 Fox Farms feeding chart, the Slurricane gets nothing in her Sohum, and Chunky began week 7 today of the Canna feeding chart for Autos.

Environment remains unchanged and steady.

So the porn then....

First two pics are the bud comparison photos on the Chunkadelic so you can see why I had to lower the plant.
Next three pics are the Chunkadelic in her glory after a no-holds barred defoliation session and moving her down to floor level, including a full plant pic that shows the new changes on that side of the tent and a shot to show how sweetly opened up the inside of the plant post defol is. Btw, Chunky is now getting a gallon and a half each watering instead of a gallon each time. She still drains it in less than 48 hours. She is also a slower budder than the Sour Apple. This is part genetics but I suspect it's also partly cuz the plant only has X amount of energy and in the case of Chunky she has to distribute it to a jillion spots. Lol.
Then the Slurricane post today's training/defoliation
Then the Ghost Train Haze post today's training/defoliation
And lastly the gorgeous Hulkberry who don't look all that runtish anymore, lol, and is still awaiting her next training

Happy Labor Day Guys. I'm getting drunk with my puppy today. Something I very rarely do. Just feels right today now that the girls are squared away for the day and I have nothing further to do with the grow today. Heh.

:laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh:

Upper bud top Chunky.jpg


Lower bud top Chuky.jpg


Chunky whole plant post defoliation.jpg


Chunky middle post defoliation .jpg


New positions in the tent.jpg


Slurricane post defol and training september 6.jpg


Ghost Train post defol and training Sept 6.jpg


Hulkberry September 6.jpg
 
Hulkberry Training and Defol Session
Tuesday, September 7
Grow/Veg Day 53


We've covered this pretty extensively. Hulkberry's turn for training and defol today. Same process as on the other two photos. Check out the picture - it cracks me up that after a training session the girl looks like a MESS, and then within 24 hours she sorts herself out and looks amazing again. Anyway, that's it for today. Day after a watering is a good day to stay out of the grow room.

Here's a before and after picture to show the carnage. In the before picture you can see this is an absolutely beautiful plant. I think it is the prettiest structured and leaved plant I have ever grown. Just something about the way she looks, her color, and the incredible density and tightness of her nodes - I cannot WAIT to see the buds on this girl. Anyway, then there's the picture taken right after we got done defiling her and turning her into an absolute mess. Tomorrow morning I will addendum this post and show a before/after/24 hours later timeline photo thingie.:

Hulkberry September 6.jpg


Hulkberry post training and defol September 7.jpg
 
Sour Apple Autoflower Check In
Day 47


Thought we'd check in on the Sour Apple this morning and see how she's coming along in early budding. Her leaves, buds, and stems are all solid and show no signs of deficiency or anything else negative. No bugs. No blotches. No spots on any leaves. I sincerely hope she's as healthy in reality as she looks to my dumb eyes.

Included a couple bud shots to show that our girl is beginning to frost up. She's also beginning to stink up the grow room. Lol. I love the smell of this strain when it starts to give it up. Very dank smelling. I will be observing trichome development very carefully on this girl shortly, as I am very curious to see the effect the Sohum living soil has on the buds. See if she frosts more in Sohum or if she stinks more or if her trichomes are longer or whatever. Nice to have grown the strain under identical conditions once already in my Fox Farms soil and with FF nutes. Excellent comparison, half legit.

That's about it. The porn:

First two pictures are bud shots to show her beginning to frost up.
Next picture is the plant as a whole from overhead. It's difficult to get a better picture than this based on her current positioning and my height in the chair. Lol

Sour Apple bud September 8.jpg


Sour Apple bud 2 frosting up September 8.jpg


Sour Apple Auto September 8.jpg
 
Sour Apple Autoflower Check In
Day 47


Thought we'd check in on the Sour Apple this morning and see how she's coming along in early budding. Her leaves, buds, and stems are all solid and show no signs of deficiency or anything else negative. No bugs. No blotches. No spots on any leaves. I sincerely hope she's as healthy in reality as she looks to my dumb eyes.

Included a couple bud shots to show that our girl is beginning to frost up. She's also beginning to stink up the grow room. Lol. I love the smell of this strain when it starts to give it up. Very dank smelling. I will be observing trichome development very carefully on this girl shortly, as I am very curious to see the effect the Sohum living soil has on the buds. See if she frosts more in Sohum or if she stinks more or if her trichomes are longer or whatever. Nice to have grown the strain under identical conditions once already in my Fox Farms soil and with FF nutes. Excellent comparison, half legit.

That's about it. The porn:

First two pictures are bud shots to show her beginning to frost up.
Next picture is the plant as a whole from overhead. It's difficult to get a better picture than this based on her current positioning and my height in the chair. Lol

Sour Apple bud September 8.jpg


Sour Apple bud 2 frosting up September 8.jpg


Sour Apple Auto September 8.jpg
ADDENDUM PHOTOGRAPH

Sorry guys, I'm a doofus. I just found a real angle to capture the state of this plant much more effectively. This is a blurple picture that I tried to tint to a more palatable presentation. You can clearly see in this shot what she has going on. It's a lot more serious (lol) than it appears from the top shot, yes? Heh. I think so. Lol.

Sour Apple September 8 way better picture.jpg
 
my eyes! my eyes! They will never be the same! lol I do like the angle though.
Lmao. I know, I'm so sorry. It's a hilariously bad tint. It looked better on my computer before I actually put it in this post. Heh. But like you said, the angle is much better and that was the point. You deserved better than to have me give you a tint-harsh. I'll make it up to you with the next pictures! Hope all is going as well as can be expected for you and yours.
 
ADDENDUM PHOTOGRAPH

Sorry guys, I'm a doofus. I just found a real angle to capture the state of this plant much more effectively. This is a blurple picture that I tried to tint to a more palatable presentation. You can clearly see in this shot what she has going on. It's a lot more serious (lol) than it appears from the top shot, yes? Heh. I think so. Lol.

Sour Apple September 8 way better picture.jpg
Submit that pic to a monthly contest
 
Morning Jon! Your girls are looking so good. Do you have more than one plant in the living soil? I thought it was the Slurricane but now I'm confused. I'm often confused lol.

I have good news and not so good news. The good news is that my last 2 autos, the 3rd Bruce Banner & 3rd Gorilla Glue, are well into flower with only minor issues. Slight rust on some of the fan leaves which I'm not happy about but all in all they are a huge improvement over the previous 4. The first 2 were on life support by now. They are both 63 days since sprouting and 40 days into flower.

The bad news is that the Gold Leaf photo, which looked perfect 10 days or so ago, is now looking quite stressed. I'm hoping that it was the previous lights which I replaced about a week ago were the cause. She's now in the first week of 12/12. The damage looks similar to what you showed in your post above, but much more pronounced. I'm holding my breath and hoping she comes back around. I gave all 3 of them a 10 gal flush yesterday.

I think I'm going to abandon the sunlight portion of this grow, at least with her. For one she's getting awful big to lug around. Plus I'm only able to give them 6 hrs max of good sunlight and that's with 2.5 hrs of shade in the middle of the day, so its maybe 2.5 hrs of morning sun, 2.5 hrs of shade, and then 3-3.5 hrs of afternoon sun - 6 hrs of sun in 8.5 hrs. I'm thinking 8.5 solid hrs under the lights may be as good or better? Your guess is as good or better than mine, Lastly I'm trying to eliminate as many variables as I can, not so much for this grow but going forward. It's almost impossible to get a feel for the lights when I'm moving them in and out every day.

I'm glad I've grown successfully in the past or I'd be close to wit's end by now. My next grow attempt will still be in soil but I'm mixing in organic nutes before I start. If that fails I'll go back to perlite. I really don't want to do that.

I'm compiling notes so I don't start off on the wrong foot next time. Item number one is to mix organic nutes into the soil. Item number two is to weigh each container before the first watering. I meant to do that this time but I forgot, and there's no going back after the first watering. Then I should be able to simply water with cal-mag & silica as needed, ph'd to 6.3.

Hope you're having a great week. Take care my friend.
 
Hey BK909 how are you? Hope all is well outside of the growing. Regarding some of the things you said, I may or may not be able to help, but I'll give it a shot. It would be a lot easier to help you for me and anyone else if you post a picture of the damage you are referring to, just fyi. So....

- Do you have more than one plant in the living soil? I thought it was the Slurricane but now I'm confused
Answer:
My Slurricane is the only photo in the Sohum living soil, but the Sour Apple auto in the Auto rig is also in Sohum. Both are doing amazingly well. I would argue that the Sour Apple, which I am quite familiar with by now, is frosting up at a significantly faster rate than in the past. The frost also appears to be a thicker coating than I have seen on this strain in the past. Keep in mind that I have grown this strain under the EXACT same conditions on every level, but in my Fox Farms soil mix with Fox Farms nutes. Definitely more frost in the Sohum. So I'm getting sold on the Sohum rather quickly and will be using 4 cubic feet of it in the outdoor grow.

- Slight rust on some of the fan leaves which I'm not happy about but all in all they are a huge improvement over the previous 4.
Answer:
It sounds from the sum of the post as if you are using Cal Mag, and maybe the plus Iron, regularly. Is this the case? If so, I would suggest discontinuing that practice. Try not using it for a week or a couple waterings. The rust you are referring to MAY, and let me stress MAY, be a result of an excess of Iron. And if you are experiencing a slowdown in growth, or stalling of growth altogether, that may be a sign of Calcium and Magnesium overload. Are your leaves especially dark green? That's almost a sure sign of too much Magnesium. If they are dark green ( I'm talking darker green than they should be ) AND they are wilting, it's a pretty fair indicator that there's too much Calcium too. I stopped using Cal Mag and particularly Cal Mag plus Iron that I use, as a preventative, for exactly this reason. Now I use it only when it seems the plants need it. For example, I had to water Chunky this morning. I looked at her closely. While the upper leaves are beginning to green back up properly a little since I moved her down from the light to the correct level, I felt that overall the entire plant could and likely should be just a little greener than she is. That says to me Magnesium deficiency just starting, so fix it. I did. I added a tsp. of the CalMag plus Iron to her gallon today. Now I will see what the difference, if any, there is in a couple days.

- The damage looks similar to what you showed in your post above, but much more pronounced.
Answer:
If you just switched out the light and you know you had the plants too close before the switch, it may, and again I say MAY, be a combination of light related issues. One, the too close to the light. It sounds like maybe you have corrected that. What, if anything, are you testing the par level at canopy level with? Did you download that Phototone app? Or are you using your eyes? DOWNLOAD A PAR METER is my strong suggestion if you haven't. Here's how I look at it: you wouldn't guess at when you reached 6.3 ph with Up and Down, would you? Of course not. That's why you have a PH test pen. Would you guess at when the pot is dry enough to water again? I wouldn't. That's why I have the same water gauge that almost everyone seems to use, with the long tongs and the green head that you stick in the soil as deep as you wish to test the moisture level. If you don't have one of these, get one. That is not a maybe, that's a do it today. They are ten bucks on Amazon. Don't guess about watering, test. As you seem to be. So all that said, why would anyone CHOOSE to guess on their lights? That's the single most important element of the entire grow!!!! So you are well served, trust me on this one, to use a par meter to dial in the lights. If you have the app or one like it that works, for your budding girls, you can't go wrong if you set the par level at 1000-1100. That will not be too much light for any plant in budding. It's safe and effective. The other light issue to be aware of is heat. You can't, and let me stress CAN'T, let the temperature of your leaves get higher than 85 degrees without Co2. If you do the plant will almost entirely cease to grow properly and you will start to see first the damage like what you are describing. So test the temperature at the upper most tip of the tallest bud. If it is higher than 85 degrees in an otherwise properly temped tent, you need to move the plants further away from the light. Again, trust me on this one. On this, I know what the hell I am talking about. If you attend to these two issues you MAY see an improvement. The bounceback to proper green on the upper leaves is dependent entirely on when you caught it and fixed it. In my case I caught it way early and the leaves are bouncing back to proper green. If yours is worse, it's possible they never get green and will die and crisp off over time. That's okay. If you fixed all the light issues you should see the new leaves to be popping out green and staying green.

- I think I'm going to abandon the sunlight portion of this grow
Answer:
I faced a similar decision last time. I chose to abandon the outdoor portion for exactly the reasons you describe. The plants need consistency. IF you have a good light and IF you can easily move the plant from sun to LED (I'll be showing this in the outdoor grow, wait til you see what I am working on now...), then yes, I would stay with the natural sun. But it sounds more like the outdoor isn't particularly effective at this point, and given the season it won't get better, only worse. So if I were you, I would go all LED as you suggest. Sounds to me like it'll both be way easier and more effective. And I suspect the plants will respond favorably to the consistency of the light.

I think that covers all the things I MAY be able to help with. I'm not an expert on anything, but you know that. That said, if you think I'm onto anything with any of this, my suggestion would be to bounce it off someone else who knows better than me, which is most people. Lol. If you get a few "yeah, that's probably rights" you'll feel more confident than just depending on one person's answer. If not, you'll know how little I actually know. :laughtwo::laughtwo::laughtwo:

Go for it man! Love the attention you're paying to the girls.
 
Admittedly Gratuitous Phototown Update :woohoo:
Photo Only
Grow/Veg Day 55
Bushes and a Gigantic Autoflower
Picture taken 15 minutes after watering the auto, forgive her droop


The Gang on Day 55 Thursday September 9.jpg
 
Plants are looking great! The only thing I'd do different is to get that extension cord off the floor! One miss with the water = problems ;)
Thank you sir! You are absolutely 100% correct and I was being a schwub for leaving it there this long. The excuse that I had to move fans around a lot is true, but you know what? I don't wanna hear my own fuc---g excuses. Get it done. And do it right. Muchas Gracias amigo! Good call.
 
Plants are looking great! The only thing I'd do different is to get that extension cord off the floor! One miss with the water = problems ;)
Not that I'd ever miss with the water.......
:laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo: :laughtwo:
 
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