Northern Lights, Gorilla Glue #4, Amended Soil, Application Of Drought Stress Beginning Week 7 Of Flower Experimental Grow Journal

[Maritimer]

I will be examining the tolerance and results of applying drought stress to strains of Northern Lights and Gorilla Glue #4, beginning week 7 and lasting for up to 11 days, while monitoring leaf wilt angles (not to exceed 50 degrees of wilt) utilizing a simple angle measuring device and a soil moisture monitor. This is outlined by a gentleman (Caplan) who conducted experiments while writing his doctoral thesis. Not up to speed on rules for links so I wont provide one, but its on web in full. His results were astonishing in raising concentrations of both THC and CBD. He mentioned different strains may produce different results, hence this will be an attempt to try the stress with NL and GG4. Plan to post complete setup data as soon as possible.
Good Fortunes
Dave

 

[3fingerdSean]

Awesome will follow & read closely

 

[Curiousnoob]

Cool, I'm in.

 

[Maritimer]

About this grow.
The purpose of this grow is personal consumption and quality is paramount to all other goals. During this grow we will examine the drought stress induced at seven weeks as outlined in Dr. Caplans doctoral thesis. In his scientific example Caplan (available in PDF for free) achieves amazing results in concentrations of THC and CBD after subjecting cultivars to eleven days of drought compared to control plants. This is accomplished without negative impact to overall harvest yields. We are conducting and documenting our grow adhering to Dr. Caplans experiment utilizing seeds from Northern Lights and Gorilla Glue #4.
I am an experienced gardener and a field tester for a major LED manufacturer specializing in cannabis cultivation. Relax, I am not here to sell lights. As a matter of fact some of my lighting is in the developmental stage and I am prohibited from discussing the lights existence or risk the ire of my friends. The lights used in this grow involve a 300-watt (actual draw) full spectrum LED and one 600-watt HPS. The HPS system will be the source for the cultivars drought experiment.
Medium: 40 % Sphagnum Peat, 45% coco coir, 15% worm castings. This medium is amended to be identical to Dr. Caplan’s.
Nutrients: JR Peters 20-20-20 for veg stage and JR Peters 10-30-20 for flower at 2.0 grams per gal & 2.4 grams per gal. Wormstrap Tea ( 112 grams worm castings, 2 tablespoons organic blackstrap molasses, gallon RO water).
Water: RO filtration system & ph adj after nutrition is added.
Temps: 79 day 70 nights (basement location with no natural light) 14 X 14 room
Humidity: fluctuates but within tolerable ranges
Scrog height: 9.5 inches top of soil to net.
Containers: elevated 3 inches from cold basement floor we use Kitty Litter 4-gallon rectangular pots with drainage holes and handles.
Drought timing: The drought will begin March 12,2019 when the cultivars enter the seventh week of flower. Caplan went eleven days before ending the drought while monitoring leaf wilt angle not to exceed fifty degrees of wilt at the point the cultivar must be rescued. Different strains may react differently so we proceed with caution. At the end of the day this is my medicine and I am hesitant to engage this experiment but have enough full jars in the closet that we can give it a go.
If all goes well our harvest will be loaded with far heavier concentrations of THC and CBD.
Good Fortunes

 

[Aroxol]

Sounds cool I’m also in, and just to confirm you’re doing a side by side of control GG4 and NL vs 11 day drought GG4 and NL (all other variables the same)? Do you have criteria for success, what % increase in THC?

 

[Bonsai buds]

I’m in.. did you already flush?

 

[Aroxol]

Admittedly I’m mega skeptical of this dudes results, but excited to see your experiment and appreciate your efforts. If you’re in CA I’ll happily throw you meds if this goes sideways, but I suspect control vs test plants will be pretty much the exact same (no harm either way). My perspective is just I feel like if this was/is legit, every single commercial grower would do it, but they don’t.

 

[Maritimer]

The short answer TCH increased 50% higher and CBD 67%. The Docs findings follow cut and paste

Doctor Caplan
Cannabinoid concentration and yield in the dry floral material of cannabis exposed to drought stress at week seven in the flowering stage. T
Conclusions
This study suggested that controlled drought stress can increase the concentration of major cannabinoids THCA, CBDA and the yield of THCA, CBDA, THC, and CBD in chemovar II cannabis without reducing dry floral weight (yield) and irrespective of decreased Pn. These results were achieved by gradually drying the substrate over eleven days until plant WP reached around -1.5 MPa during week seven in the flowering stage. Comparable results can be expected using leaf wilting as a drought stress indicator with fertigation triggered at a leaf angle 50% higher than in its turgid state. This method for administering drought-stress and the results of this study should be applicable for similar varieties of chemovar II cannabis; however, other chemovars or varieties may respond differently.
Yield in the control was 178 ± 9.4 g·m-2 and was 232 ± 18.5 g·m-2 in the drought treatment but yield did not differ statistically between the two treatments (P = 0.06; n = 3). The moisture content of the dried and cured floral material was 8 ± 0.1 % in the control, 11% lower than that in the drought treatment, at 9 ± 0.1 % (P = 0.01; n = 3). Henceforward, the floral dry weight and cannabinoid contents are corrected to zero percent moisture.
Of the analyzed cannabinoids, all were detected in at least one sample, these included: THC, THCA, CBD, CBDA, CBG, CBGA, and CBN. In the drought treatment, only one sample had a detectable concentration of CBG and CBN, and in the control there were no samples with detectable CBN; therefore, comparisons could not be made for these cannabinoids, and the means for CBN were not presented.
The drought treatment elicited a 12% increase in THCA concentration and a 13% increase in CBDA concentration but had no effect on the concentrations of the other detected cannabinoids Drought had substantial effects on cannabinoid yield, expressed as grams of cannabinoid from floral material per unit growing area (g·m-2). In the drought treatment, THC yield was 50% higher, THCA yield was 43% higher, CBD yield was 67% higher, and CBDA yield was 47% higher than in the control (Table 5.3, bottom).

 

[Aroxol]

I’m in man, very curious to see what results you get. I’ve seen a lot of stuff about people dehydrating plants before flush to promote THC, but the flip side is you can actually make the dry time longer by doing this (not shorter despite what some articles say). This site has turned my mindset to that of Houdini trying to call bullshit on Mediums because I’ve just read so much nonsensical stuff and I don’t want ppl to waste their time (at the risk of coming off like an a-hole). I think this experiment has merit and am interested, I just always use the commercial growers with a thousand lights backed by tens of millions - sometimes more money - as my guiding compass. If they don’t do, there’s a reason, it doesn’t work. If this actually works however, I’ll be doing it for sure, as will everyone else on this site!

 

[Maritimer]

Not sure why commercial ops not involved, and like you I am skeptical why this is not standard grow procedure if it kicks so much rear. But then again I am in a position to conduct the experiment welcoming the injection fun it brings to the equation.

 

[Aroxol]

TBH could genuinely work but be related to dry/ cure time. Maybe juice isn’t worth the squeeze money wise e.g. more financially advantageous to move 20-30% product 10x per year than 30-40% 6x per year. Either way I dig the experiment and will be watching. And also want to know more about the lights that don’t exist offline

GL man, will be fun to watch

 

[Maritimer]

I’m in.. did you already flush?

Tuesday will be last fertigation. Do not plan flush until harvest time (9 weeks flower). Plants will be fully recovered from the drought prior to harvest flush.

 

[Maritimer]

Going to try my hand at putting up some pics. Not most tech savvy old hippie you will meet.

 

[Maritimer]

This is Gorilla Glue #4 at Flower Day #40 under HPS 600. This cultivar is scheduled to be stressed. This is a painful task for a gardener who names each plant and plays piano music 24/7 to keep their moods happy. Her name is Ninja Lady.

 

[Maritimer]

The garden is a bit sloppy due to my out of town travels and not pruning and training like I call normal. The wild girls I call them. Anyhow the plants dont fit well in one pic but these might help visualize.

 

[Maritimer]

Top pic top two plants GG#4, second row two left plants NL. Dwarf on right is NL and is being grown for the fun of it.
Bottom pic, bottom plant is Gorilla Glue #4 under LED300. Her name is Frutilla. She/s a peach trying to get her nutes up to speed with her growth.

 

[Captain Cannabis]

I'm on board! They certainly look great Dave. Best of luck with the trials.

 

[Maritimer]

 

[Curiousnoob]

I cannot open those files? Not sure if anyone else can, just to let you know.

 

[Maritimer]

Hello my friend, I see what you mean. I can see them but they wont click to get bigger. Maybe I should go over those upload instructions I passed over. I see you are from down under. Fond memories of sunsets at Kings Park above the Swan river near Perth. I was a young Marine (1981) and we were visiting the RAF for a 30 day exercise playing with airplanes. Very nice and hospitable folks as we Marines were continually being invited to home cooked meals and meeting families of the RAF mates.

20190309_154712.jpg

• Maritimer
• Mar 10, 2019

Tools of the Garden