My 2nd LED Indoor Grow - White Widow x Big Bud & Assorted Supporting Cast

I've just gone around and supercropped the auto-topped because she's going berserk. I've even re-supercropped the branches I'd already done. She showed no sign of trauma then and the cropped branch ends were all standing tall in the morning.
 
I have a couple of clones of her, but I may just take a couple more. But you are right, some seeds from her would be a very good idea. I'll think about that one.
 
Day 58 pictorial update.

Well, the auto has pistils and now the others have started to show their girlie bits as well, so I'll call this day 1 of flowering.

So here is the first view of the girls unleashed with their scrog corset removed. They are basically still in the same position except the auto-topped WWXBB has moved to the middle of the back reservoir and revegged clone #2 that was there has moved to the middle of the front reservoir. Clone #3 has gone mental with the number of branches it's sent out and it's going to get very crowded at the back.

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And here is the auto

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I think my little experiment with light reduction proved conclusively that it's the diminishing light that triggers flowering and not the magical 12/12 as some believe. These babies showed their first pistils the day after being dropped to 12/12.

As the tent is now on 12/12 it's a pain in the arse removing the clones every day as I don't want want them to go straight into flower this time, so I think it's high time I moved them out into the greenhouse. I believe the danger of frost has now passed, but the nights are still expected to be quite chilly this weeks with temps expected to drop to about 4 C (40 F). However, they will be in the greenhouse and I'll keep them in the humidor so they should be ok. Outside light hours are now at a little over 13 hours and increasing by 4 minutes a day so that will definitely keep them from flowering. I plan on up potting them with clay gravel and will feed drain to waste as they grow. They should definitely be ready to put straight into flower once these girls have done their thing and will mean I won't be able to scrog them even if I wanted to. I will, however, keep topping them and LSTing them.

The girls are starting to really fill the tent and the one 450w led light panel is definitely not enough for flowering and I have resorted to moving the light around on a daily basis to provide coverage. I think I'm going to have to bite the bullet and order myself a second panel this week.
 
Yeah, I'm gonna go with the same as you - the Viparspectra.

As it only draws about 200w from the wall, I can only assume it's using less capacity than mine, which draws 255W.

Together, I think they'll cover it, though I envisage still having to move them every day to get full coverage.
 
So, new light panel has been ordered and should be here Wednesday morning and not a day too soon, I say.

I've been running with a rh of 84% on average since I got the hygrometer, which is fine for veg, but way too high for flowering. There are a number of reasons behind this and I've now taken steps to combat it. The bubbling surface of the reservoir has been soaking the bottom of the plywood lids I just installed for the reservoirs and soaking through to the outer surface (I did say I wish I had applied waterproof varnish to them) and I had to change the basket on the top feed reservoir as the one I was using was slowly collapsing as the plant grew. The new basket, while being far more rigid and sturdy, allows a lot more light through to the reservoir and exposes a greater surface area to evaporation. I've now just sealed the lot with black plastic and that should drastically reduce the rh.

The addition of another light panel will lift the temp in the tent a little more and, as warmer air can hold more moisture, I'm curious to see the effect of that on the rh.

I have yet to experiment with two ice bottles to see how effective that is, but shall do so soon.

The rh is currently around 50% outside the tent, so, with transpiration from the girls, it will obviously still be higher inside the tent and I will definitely have to do something more to keep it down. That being said, the rh in the tent has dropped from 84% to 63%, so my intervention has had a drastic impact.
 
Cheers Sneaky. I will definitely look into a dehumidifier.

Pondering the humidity levels, I recall that somewhere in the WWXBB ancestry is a Brazilian landrace sativa, white widow, if I'm not mistaken. Perhaps originating in a humid semi tropical/tropical environment confers its resistance to mould.
 
I've just had a quick look at some dehumidifiers and the smaller, cheaper ones claim to extract up to 500 ml of water per day. That is about the same result I get using a single 5 litre bottle of ice and certainly doesn't sound like a viable option at all. After ordering the new lights, cash is a little tight at the moment and a more expensive unit is out of the question for now. Looks like I'm going to have to stick with my ice bottles for the moment.

Another option I am considering is to increase the size of my exhaust fan, which, to be honest, is too small and has been something I've been meaning to look at for a while.
 
New light arrived today and is now running. I must admit to being surprised by its size when I first opened the box. I guess I shouldn't have been as I was quite aware that the Viparspectra 450 uses nominal 5 watt diodes, whereas my existing panel uses 3 watts. I guess I hadn't considered the simple maths - my existing panel has 150 diodes and the Vipar only has 90.

I was further surprised when I switched it on as the visibile light was very different to that to which I had become accustomed. With the bloom switched on, my existing panel has a very red hue, whereas the Vipar looked to be very white in comparison. As neither of the panels can effectively cover the 4 foot width of the tent, I have them side by side but diametrically opposite and have resigned myself to sliding them from one side of the tent to the other on a daily basis. Kinda like a human light tracker :)

Along with the lights, I also received the user manual and specifications. At 18 inches, the Vipar delivers 690 micromoles, whereas my existing panel delivers 1380, exactly double that of the Vipar. That being said, my original panel cost almost four times as much as the Vipar and you really do get what you're paying for. Don't get me wrong, I'm not crying and wringing my hands and gnashing my teeth. No. Merely relating the situation. After all, I only bought the Vipar to give a boost to my existing panel.

Oh, while installing the new light, I managed to drop a pair of pliers right on top of WWXBB #1 and succeeded in snapping three branches right where they meet the main stem. Not to worry, they are now securely taped up and secured to other branches for support. That'll slow them down a touch. Oh well, c'est la vie.

In other news, the auto is shooting ahead of her tent mates in terms of maturity levels. The Quick One is known for maturing quickly and it is claimed will be ready in 6 weeks from the start of flowering. I take that with a pinch of salt as it is also claimed to go from seed to harvest in 59 days and today is day 62 from seed and day 6 or 7 of flower!

The tent is really filling up, partially due to me super cropping, and there is only a void of less than 1 square foot in each of the right hand corners and I know I would not have had as much canopy coverage had I left them in the scrog!

As per usual, I will update with pics on Saturday!
 
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