My First Sour Diesel from Seed - Hydro Grow Experiment

definitely sub'd! definitely interested in a hydro setup myself...looking forward to learning along with you :thumb:

Hey there MT, welcome aboard! If you have any questions at all, please feel free to ask. This one is a DIY tiny hydro setup of bus tubs and a JumpStart light stand and a little 100CFM pond pump. The whole thing went together for under 100 bucks and as with all indoor grows, the light was the most expensive part. Watching these 4 grow and spread, I wouldnt recommend this size for any more that 2... I currently have 5 which is quite a tight fit for the space, but I'm keeping them trimmed back and letting them go-to-tree as it were, to make a small clone factory. With the 12-1 light schedule, it is giving about 12-14 clones every 2 weeks... whether I need them or not. I'm actually thinking about going BACK to 18-6 because this Gas Lantern Routine is growing them too amazingly well for my space.

To illustrate my point...


11.17.11
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11.30.11
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If I didn't know better, I'd NEVER have said that growth would happen in 13 days. but there's photo proof of the awesome GLR.
 
Sourpuss was moved in the bin to the place that the Indica of the twins "Thing 1" once was. As such, while my hands were in the bin, she got a haircut, and we moved her to phase 4 of LST. She now has a semi-circle of horizontal branches, and I took 4 clones for the flower test of the box in my signature. We'll see how it goes in the next weeks for how many of those survive.
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sweet glad its a girl!! :high-five: so are 9 blade fans rare? i have several plants full of em' im gonna have to learn more on this glr thing i keep hearing about, im off to go look at ur purples, im fixin on growing out and likely breeding 4 different purple strains! :peace::thumb::high-five:

Hey, hey B.I.D.! glad you stopped by! While 9 fingers aren't rare, they are an indication of optimal health. A friend on here, Twelve12, I think it was, had one that showed 11 fingers. That's rare, although not unheard-of. The reason I look for 9 is that when I see it, I know my girls are happy, and healthy. I get 9 fingers each time before moving on to the next step of LST for this lady, she drops back down to 7 for about a week, then I see 9 again. She's almost done now with LST, one or two more sessions, I think. Then I keep her low, and well groomed, until I'm ready for her to flower out. I'm keeping her low, because this strain tends to be a lanky/leggy breed, so the more compact I can make her hopefully, the less popcorn I'll get. It's just a theory, mind you, but I'm willing to try it. And, not that anything is wrong with popcorn nugs, it's just the bag appeal of the well-formed, dense, sparkly 1/8th oz nug-o-sour that I'm after.

I think everything in this bin will one day be mother plants, but LST isn't the best technique for that. Rather, more like what I'm doing with the purple. Clean, well groomed hardy stems that become branches like a tree that give long, healthy chutes for taking clones. From Sourpuss I will take a few clones, veg them out and choose the hardiest for that right before I put her in the flower box...
 
ladies with 9 - 11 blades are very healthy, i means your girls are getting perfect balance of nutrients and disired amount of calcium. Calcium is a primary constituent of all cell walls and membranes. Restrictions in the availability of calcium will adversely affect cell division impair the structural stability and the permeability of cell walls.

11 blades are very common iv had them many times and encountered them firsts on my second grow its amazing to see.
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ladies with 9 - 11 blades are very healthy, i means your girls are getting perfect balance of nutrients and disired amount of calcium. Calcium is a primary constituent of all cell walls and membranes. Restrictions in the availability of calcium will adversely affect cell division impair the structural stability and the permeability of cell walls.

11 blades are very common iv had them many times and encountered them firsts on my second grow its amazing to see.

+rep for that! Thank you!


Sidenote. Why Gorgonzola? Like it so much you made it your avatar?
 
Thanks bro :)

Haha oh yes i love the blue cheese, i resembles my favourite strain this year, uk has had some REALY nice blue cheese, just love the uk cut i dont know why buddah man didnt cross with this cut, made a big mistake in my opinion.

Lets see what 2012 brings.

:thumb:
 
Photo Update of a clone taken to flower, decided to move it into the Flowerbox instead of culling just for kicks.

REMINDER: She was a small clone and this growth was all flowering time. Day 50.

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Your eyes are not playing tricks... I had her set outside the bin she is on now, and she leaned to the better light. I have since turned the leaning away from the light and moved her directly under the lamps.
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:peace:
I love Sour Diesel too, good luck! Looking good so far! With hydro though you may want to keep your PH more stable and between 5.6 - 5.8 if you have a good meter. You can lock out nutes easily in hydro with PH swings. Are your cubes staying very wet? Just my opinion, but is 3x a day for 5minutes each watering a little much for this size seedling? Just wondering... Nice clean setup too!

What/how many times should be feeding im on week 5 and half and at the moment i recenly changed it 3days from 4feeds in dalights on12/12 from 3 times in the day and 1 in the night as i was recently told that i was feeding to much also i mentioned that when i lifted pots the one day a load of nutrients ran out (way to much). would appreaciate any comments/advice
 
:peace:

What/how many times should be feeding im on week 5 and half and at the moment i recenly changed it 3days from 4feeds in dalights on12/12 from 3 times in the day and 1 in the night as i was recently told that i was feeding to much also i mentioned that when i lifted pots the one day a load of nutrients ran out (way to much). would appreaciate any comments/advice

Mark. I personally feel through watching how my plants react, that feeding at night when the plants are resting is sort of a no-no. The plants are resting, getting up the much needed energy for the next day's growth. The photoperiod is for growing and uptake of neturients, and after that, when the lights are off, as with all living things, it is time for rest. To feed them during this time is to invite a myriad of bad things into your grow. There, as far as I have seen, is little actual uptake of nutrients, if any at all. I prefer to feed once right as lights go on, once halfway through the day, and again, within one hour before lights go off. This helps let the roots dry out a tiny bit at night to help to prevent over watering, and still provides nutrients when plants are using them the most, during photosynthesis which only happens when light hits the leaves.

While it is true that plants really never stop growing, I have observed that while lights are off, there is a definite shift to a rest period, and even a slight wilting has been observed in some plants whether water/nutrients were supplied or not. Heh, it really looked as if those plants were, "asleep."

To wrap up, I would suggest a feeding schedule that is something like this:

If lights on is at 6am, and light off is at 6pm:
Lights on - 6:00am
Feed 1 at 6:15am
Feed 2 at 12:00pm
Feed 3 at 5:30 pm
Lights off - 6:00pm

Of course you could adjust times for your particular photoperiod, but I seem to have the best results with this interval. Also, with using the GLR, I have exactly the same lights on and lights off that I have for flowering, the only difference for flower is that the lights do not come on for the hour at night to break the flower hormone. Otherwise, the lighting schedule is exactly the same for the first 2-3 weeks. after that I will be reducing the photoperiod by 0.5 to 1 hour per week until they are receiving only 8 hours of light per day, which leads to a massive build-up of the flower hormone at night and that causes huge flower growth during the day. During the last half, I go down to feeding twice a day, once at lights-on, and once an hour before lights-off.

I dearly hope this helps get your watering schedule under control to help fix your over watering! Good luck, and Keep it GREEN!

Edit: I just had a look at your journal. Feeding that much in soil is WAY TOO MUCH, the little clones, looked they were in Hydrotone? for Hydro feeding that often is best, but for the ones in soil, you want them to almost dry out before your water/feed again. NEVER-EVER 3xday in soil, you'll rot the roots, bring fungus, and a whole bunch of other very bad things will happen, that are too horrible to even think about, including. . . . . . .death.
 
Aww nice 1 dude very informative and I'm sorry but I should ov explained more my set up in question is hydro I'm usin hydroton clay and 1cm rockwool and also can you give me a break down ov what week and flower time one should be on @5 half weeks as that would be great. The more one thinks about it do make sense as nights get longer also what about flowering I mean like how one would tell when to harvest as all I understand is once hairs are 75% redish and not to sure on the cloudy bit and what are the different effects on harvesting at different times as id preferably to get the most yield and stronger high. Once again sorry4 the miss understanding and thanks for the advice :thanks: :peace:
 
Aww nice 1 dude very informative and I'm sorry but I should ov explained more my set up in question is hydro I'm usin hydroton clay and 1cm rockwool and also can you give me a break down ov what week and flower time one should be on @5 half weeks as that would be great. The more one thinks about it do make sense as nights get longer also what about flowering I mean like how one would tell when to harvest as all I understand is once hairs are 75% redish and not to sure on the cloudy bit and what are the different effects on harvesting at different times as id preferably to get the most yield and stronger high. Once again sorry4 the miss understanding and thanks for the advice :thanks: :peace:

Thanks for the rep!

Wow.. all good questions...

At 5.5 wk, I'd go down by 15min a day till you reach 9.5-10 hours then wait till the end of the week and start going down by .5 hour a week till you get to 8.

As for the question of hair color... you're more looking for the trichomes, rather than at the hairs. KISS says when hairs are 75% turned... but it can be more complicated than that. I will elaborate so as to better understand.

The hairs that are commonly referred to are actually part of the female flower and are called pistils. If you have a photographer's loupe or strong magnifying glass, look at the tiny little hairs with little crystals on the tips, commonly called frost, ice, crystals, dust, what have you. Those are are found in, on, and around the bud sites and are called the trichomes. They mature and show definite milestone is aging. When they're clear, there is not much THC in them at all. When they go "cloudy" they are starting to produce THC and not much degradation will have occurred at this point. The third and final stage of the triches, is what we call "amber". This has the strongest amount of THC in them and are what we commonly refer to when looking for harvest time. What you're looking for is an amber color in the shiny crystal part of them. The more amber, the more couch lock, to put it simply. Most harvest when around 50% to 65% of all the thrichomes are amber so as to avoid any unwanted degradation of the THC within the "Trichs". Still others harvest at around 40% to 50% to avoid the heavy stoned effect that makes you become one with the upholstery. It's all a matter of personal preference at this point, but the general consensus says, "Triches at 50%, chop it." As experience with the strain increases you can start to tailor your harvest time to increase the effect that you're looking for.

For a good view of the Hairs vs. Trichomes...
The greenish looking long hairs are the pistils. The little drops of dew or crystal things on the leaves and around the buds are the trichomes.

I did have 1 question though..... 1cm Rockwool? That's fairly small; |___| about that big... Are you talking about the 1.5" or 4cm Rockwool Starter Cubes?
 
So adjusting light cycle to 8hrs as I dropped half hour(I Panicked PMSFL) I should wait till 2moro nite or continue to drop 15mins until 10hr daily?, So fascinating the pistol hairs, triches and crystals ov when to harvest and do they appear underneath and inside the bud as it's beginning to appear so all good. And when one feeds Nuts by sticking to there EC.21or 2.1. continue to feed at this level or to raise it slowly and also some ppl say at the last week ov flower to stop feeding Nuts and to give PG'd adjusted water 5.6 5.8 both soil and hydro. Also about your question the size you mentioned is what I was describing lol. Also love the sour diesel my second fav smoke as I just can't get Enuff ov the cheese bro Haha that's on my shopping list for my next grow lol. Dude thanx once again my appreciation.:thanks: :peace:
 
So adjusting light cycle to 8hrs as I dropped half hour(I Panicked PMSFL) I should wait till 2moro nite or continue to drop 15mins until 10hr daily?, So fascinating the pistol hairs, triches and crystals ov when to harvest and do they appear underneath and inside the bud as it's beginning to appear so all good. And when one feeds Nuts by sticking to there EC.21or 2.1. continue to feed at this level or to raise it slowly and also some ppl say at the last week ov flower to stop feeding Nuts and to give PG'd adjusted water 5.6 5.8 both soil and hydro. Also about your question the size you mentioned is what I was describing lol. Also love the sour diesel my second fav smoke as I just can't get Enuff ov the cheese bro Haha that's on my shopping list for my next grow lol. Dude thanx once again my appreciation.:thanks: :peace:

Well, at this point, 2/12/12, you should be going down to 10.5 hours tonight, to be at 9.5 by this saturday night. Then wait 1 week and go to 9.

Your nutrients should already be on the flower schedule for whatever nutes you use.

ALWAYS-ALWAYS-ALWAYS pure water, or a finisher from your nutrient line should be used in the last 1 to 2 weeks of flower to remove the heavy nutrient taste from your bud. Your plants will pull nutrients from the leaves and non-essential parts of the plant to finish up. Yes they'll look ragged as hell by chop, but you do NOT want to taste how your nutrients mess up your bud if you don't. We lovingly call this final growth phase "The Flush". (i.e. "...I started the flush last night, as it's getting close to harvest time...") The pH of the water, if it is pure water, is of little concern at this point. But if you are using a finishing solution, follow the label directions for pH. Personally, I go down to half strength nutes at the first week of flush, then simply plain tap water for the last week. Not everyone can do that, but I have 40ppm tap. If you're over, say, 110ppm from the tap, I would buy bottled, or filtered water; never spring, or mineral water as heavy minerals will salt up your grow and fook up the taste, and create the need to try to get minerals off your hydrotone. Yes, you'll be washing your hydrotone for the next round, but mineral deposits are much harder to get rid of.
 
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