MFP's - Indoor - G8-LED - Master Kush - Hydro Grow - Fall 2014

[M F P]

I fibbed a little earlier (unintentionally) - the flower room is not ready to roll. Over the summer, the whole house AC held the temps in the flower room at levels I'd consider acceptable but not ideal (average daily range was 75F - 90F, with a peak at 96F over a couple days wherein I didn't realize the dehumidifier timer was on the fritz and allowing it to run during lighted periods).

Though outdoor temperatures here now are much, much cooler, it doesn't have much of an effect on the flower room when those lights are on. Compounding the problem - since it's cold outside now, my AC is never running; recent tests have led me to realize that when the lights are on, it's actually hotter in there right now than it was in August.

All good, however: I've got a portable AC and in theory a tech will be out tomorrow to help me run a vent up through the ceiling and out through an existing vent in the attic (or something, I'll leave it to him). Speaking of...any sympathetic electricians or HVAC specialists reading this and want to guarantee more work than you can handle for the rest of your natural lives? Leave a stack of your business cards in all the local hydroponic supply shops. I hate having to feel these people out for medical cannabis sympathy over the phone.

Anyhow. Here's my monsters (below). If all goes as planned and the tech shows, we'll be doing on major defoliation session tomorrow and then it's into the flower room. If all does not go as planned, I'll defoliate anyways just to keep it from crowding too badly in there. And then I'll have to make more dreaded GD phone calls to find a different AC tech.

HAPPY WEEKEND ALL!

 

[M F P]

Sunday morning striptease for you all! Thanks for stopping by.

 

[M F P]

Air conditioner successfully installed and vented. 98F temps reduced to 85F in less than 30 mins. Moving to flower room PRONTO.

AUDIBLE: replacing GH basic Flora series with GH Flora performance series immediately. Maximum strength feeding schedule, reduced by 30% per the G8LED recommendation.

Pics to come.

 

[M F P]

Here we go.

The trays are 2x4 w hydrocorn. Each has it's own reservoir w ebb/flow fill setup. Each rez is aerated and pH is continuously monitored.

CO2 is currently on a timer. If I feel like blowing any more of the money that should be going towards Xmas gifts for my loved ones on my outer space weed room, I'll upgrade that whole system to a monitored system in a week or so.

The lights, all G8LED products, are as follows: [L to R]

90W Flower Boost
G8900
G8240 (flower version)
G8900
90W Flower Boost

Plants have all been assigned an ID letter. Here are heights and widths and a little "overall health" score I jotted down for each as of today:

Plant ID


Plant ID A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R
Height 6.5 7 4.5 5 7.5 6.5 7 6 6 9.5 5 9.75 7.5 8.5 7 7.75 6.5 5
Width 9 9.5 8 5.5 7.5 12 9.5 7.5 6.5 10.5 8.5 8 6 6 10.5 10.5 8.5 8.5
Health B B A B B B B B C B A A B B A A A A

Finally...I'm going to attempt to diagram how they've been arranged. You've got the light layout above; this is how the plants are set up in the three trays below:

Q M C J B G
L D O A K R
N P H I F E

Hope that makes sense. Alright, y'all...update soon...have a great holiday.

M F P

 

[M F P]

Dang it. Sorry about the layout of the height/width and all that. Cut & copied from a spreadsheet. I'll try to fix later if I get a chance.

Thanksgiving is RUINED.

Just joking.

 

[M F P]

Plant L is really taking off, so...gonna swap her with plant Q while I can (refer to above position table).

 

[M F P]

Happy Thanksgiving, all.

Did a full defoliation yesterday...today I finally got around to building some angled floor panels. I wanted to use mylar/cardboard to reflect light upwards but didn't want to use a flat design as that might end up reflecting most of the light back up into the LEDs. Angled ended up being the way to go...just had to wait until I'd got the perfect sized boxes...and I had a bit of free time.

Any plant not wanting to cough up mass amounts of bud has come to the wrong house.

PS eventually you'll get a pic of these under normal lighting.

 

[M F P]

AUDIBLE: replacing timer setup on CO2 system with Autopilot analog CO2 sensor system. Setting will be at roughly 1200ppm.

Sorry, youngest brother...that Wii U you were going to get for Christmas? Well, now you're getting a Starbucks gift card. If memory serves it's the exact one your wife gave me for Christmas last year. God bless us, every one.

 

[M F P]

Just playing catch-up...got a better pic of the angled floor panels (as promised above) and the CO2 unit I mentioned earlier today.

 

[J189RFC]

Looks like these are going to be monsters soon enough. Great looking set up!

 

[M F P]

^^ thanks compadre! Thanks for checking the grow out.

 

[M F P]

Had to pick up a second CO2 tank yesterday as the new system is blowing gas like it just ate Del Taco. Additionally...I tried to devise some sort of containment system such that my fans weren't immediately blowing the CO2 off the plants.

PVC, white fabric from Joann's ("it's for the head table at a WEDDING!") and velcro. My CO2 unit is finally backing off with the gas a bit.

Also - huge error on my part: I put the new CO2 system online on Friday. Went out of town. Came back Sunday. Sunday night I waited for my lights to shut off for the day and I went in the room immediately to check for lights (I do that periodically as a failsafe against idiocy like I'm about to describe).

That damn CO2 system was blinking like an NES on meth. Pretty frustrated with myself, honestly, as the whole room was lit up & blinking like Xmas thanks to all the mylar. I know I'm very early into flowering, and it was still very dark in there, and it was only two nights - but man. Still a terrible mistake and symptomatic of a larger problem which I don't know how to fix: I'm not on my A game 100% of the time, and with a project like this, you really, really need to be.

Anyways. Here's the pic. Hope y'all cleaned up on those Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals.

M F P

 

[M F P]

Had a pretty good week all in all. Slow, steady growth with what seems to be minimal stretch as we head into the third week of flower. Those floor panels I built coupled with regular defoliation sessions and a once-a-day practice of running my fingertips over the top of each plant seem to be doing the trick...oh, and I should mention I've got the lights lower than manufacturer recommendations (20") to help out as well. We're seeing heavy branching, the beginnings of flowers, and everything's good.

The CO2 containment rack I built is really doing the trick as well. Seemed kinda hillbilly at first but it was so cheap I figured I had to try...lucked out. The gas is hardly running at all now.

Here's today's pic...freshly defoliated. Happy Saturday, all.

M F P

 

[M F P]

Another round of defoliation today. This one just a mid-week, "lite" version where I focus on leaves that are a) large, and b) blocking light from either another portion of plant or one of the reflective floor panels. On weekends when I have time and inclination I'll do more complete defoliations.

Here's a mid-week shot of one of my girls. P, from the seating chart on page 2. Happy kid.

 

[M F P]

Happy Sunday folks - these shots were actually taken yesterday as I ran through my weekly chore list. Another round of some pretty hardcore defoliation (2 hours for 18 plants), took a before shot & an after shot. Also turned the LEDs off so the photo looks more like a grow room and less like a NASA bunker.

Things are going well. The upgraded CO2 system appears to be steadying to where I'm thinking I'll be swapping canisters out once every two weeks. Not bad at all. My TDS meter began acting up but I borrowed one Friday and my PPM is exactly where it needs to be (GH recommends 1100-1300ppm, so I compared my reading with the average of those figures adjusted down by 30% for LED and I'm spot on: I'm at 850ppm, and 1200ppm x 0.7 is 840ppm).

Hope you all have a great week & thanks for checking out my kids.

 

[M F P]

One final thought for the day. Recall the following post:

"Those floor panels I built coupled with regular defoliation sessions and a once-a-day practice of running my fingertips over the top of each plant seem to be doing the trick...oh, and I should mention I've got the lights lower than manufacturer recommendations (20") to help out as well. We're seeing heavy branching, the beginnings of flowers, and everything's good."

We took measurements on or around 11/24 (the day we moved to flowering). We're now 21 days from that date, so we just took measurements again. The below section is going to be boring and technical but very telling. I'll list the plant ID followed by height on 11/24, then today's height.

A: 6.5" - 8.0"
B: 7.0" - 10.5"
C: 4.5" - 5.0"
D: 5.0" - 7.0"
E: 7.5" - 9.5"
F: 6.5" - 10.5"
G: 7.0" - 8.5"
H: 6.0" - 7.5"
I: 6.0" - 7.5"
J: 9.5" - 11"
K: 5.0" - 9.0"
L: 9.75" - 12"
M: 7.5" - 9.0"
N: 8.5" - 12"
O: 7.0" - 8.5"
P: 7.75" - 10"
Q: 6.5" - 11"
R: 5.0" - 7.0"

A few things to note: several plants have only grown an inch vertically. Not a single plant has even doubled in height yet. Average increase across the board: 2.25".

I'm actually having a hard enough time getting into the body of each plant when defoliating that I am going to consider allowing them to actually stretch more next time. This was unexpected and, truthfully, kinda severe.

Anyways. Miller time. Happy weekend.

M F P

 

[M F P]

The weekend is off & running. Massive defoliation session this morning, cleaning four reservoirs and re-stacking nutrients = FUN.

Not much to report. Everything looks good. Here's some shots of some kids on the other side of the table...B & K.

 

[Xbones]

Looking great! Hope xmas went good! Happy Holidays!

 

[M F P]

You too Xbones! You just reminded me...I keep forgetting to read up on juicing (didn't even know that was a thing until I checked out your grow).

M F P

 

[M F P]

So at four weeks into flower I'm prepared to point out that I may have an issue. Magnitude TBD. In a nutshell...the buds - which have popped up all over the place, no issue there - have not increased in size as they have during past grows.

This goes against my expectations. My last grow, for example, used the GH flora series for nutes and had extremely limited CO2 supplementation as it turned out (it was on a timer rather than measured, but now that we're measured and dialed at the appropriate PPM I'm going thru four times as many tanks as I did last time). Now I'm using 1000PPM CO2 and the GH performance series nutes.

I've been mentally hammering away at the problem for about a week now. The only potential correlation I've been able to dig up: defoliation. Or, specifically, overly-aggressive defoliation too early into flowering.

I incorporated defoliation roughly three weeks into flowering during my last grow and liked the results enough to want to continue to read up on the technique. Unfortunately, "official" sources (my books, etc) simply don't endorse the technique and the argument ends there. My unofficial sources - the Internet - continue to state differently. However, these unofficial sources (blog posts and message board discussions) don't always have that crystal clarity you get from, say, a nice book written on a nice laptop with spell check and then sent to an editor.

It does appear, however, from researching my symptoms (small, slow bud growth), that the unifying threads I can find between myself and maybe a half dozen others researching the same problem are as follows:

- we're all growing cannabis.
- we're all experiencing the same problem: tiny ass buds that aren't growing.
- other than this single problem, the rest of the grow has been a breeze with no reported issues.
- we all defoliated extremely aggressively during the first three weeks of flower.

I'm going to continue to research and monitor and will update as necessary. At the moment I'm going to take a week or so off from ripping fan leaves off my girls and just let them chill. I may eliminate the practice from the remainder of the grow, depending on what I turn up.

I believe defoliation, as a technique, has great value: dramatic increase in air flow, less places for mildew and pests to pop up, dramatically lowers your relative humidity, and improves your yields dramatically due to increased light on your buds. I will continue to use the technique on future grows, with one primary caveat: I'll probably chill the F out during the first three weeks of flower.

Below is a photo taken about an hour ago. Hope you all had an AMAZING Christmas.

Much love,

M F P