The Lab: Perpetual Experimentation

[Weaselcracker]

I’ve done a little grafting now and then. Actually was doing it before Light Addict (pats self on back)- though when he got into it he really went for broke.

I have a four way graft going at the moment. Going to veg her/them another couple weeks at least.

Re bro-science. Around the time I joined the forum you couldn’t read advice on cloning without hearing people saying that you needed to get your cuttings into water immediately, or they would get an air bubble which would block the stem and kill them. I started a thread on it, ran a side by side test and found that cutings left laying around for an hour rooted just the same as the others. Anyway the ‘air bubble’ myth isn’t repeated much anymore, but you do hear it once in awhile.


When I’ve cut leaves of cuttings it’s just to get them down to the size I want. It’s common to take a cutting with a large leaf or two on it which takes up too much room next to the other cuttings. Also those large fans tend to wilt more easily as osmosis has its limits. I wasn’t aware of any other reasons to cut leaves.


I see the most room for myth busting in the area of late harvest. Flushing - vs winding down nutes - vs feeding full strength to the bitter end.
That is something I’ve been I’ve been testing quite a bit over the last year or more.

Also in the harvest and curing dept. There are quite a few ideas that don’t seem to have any science behind them. Such as ‘burping’. Not just ‘burping’ to dry the bud in the jar- but for the idea that some sort of ‘off-gassing’ is happening. I’ve never seen the tiniest hint of any such gas.

These questions bug me and once in a while I’ve thought about starting up a myth busting thread. But then I think about all the work involved and all the potential conflict with people and their cherished opinions ha ha.

Anyway good for you for doing some testing. It’s the best way to figure stuff out.

 

[The Physicist]

The flushing myth I’ve always wanted to test. My mother in law swears when she grew commercially it didnt matter and they fed through to the finish. Mostly because they felt that the plants are still bulking til you harvest so they are continuing to use nutes, watering just stunts the continued growth is what they felt.

I’ve looked into cutting the leaves a lot and I’ll post a cloning review tomorrow before experimentation friday covering the science behind the cutting of leaves. It actually does make sense and its a lot more deeper biology/thermodynamics than I had considered. Fascinating stuff.

I definitely want to get into grafting, I think this would be so cool to be flowering out multiple strains on one plant at a time rather than many plants.

The off-gasing does make some sense...there is a deeper chemistry than I think most people considerbut that is what this journal is for. Finding out why it works!

 

[Weaselcracker]

Skybound has done some interesting things cloning with triacontanol and getting roots in record time.
I know that stoneotter was doing some burping experiments but I haven’t had a chance to see if he’s followed up on it yet.

Off- gassing if any must be extremely minuscule, to the point of being nonexistent. I do a lot of fermentation including hundreds of gallons of wine per year, kimchi, yogurt etc. and I know what offgassing looks like. Whereas a gallon jar full of fresh harvested bud will not puff out the lid at all no matter how many months you leave it, or emit even the slightest sighing sound when opened. Oxygen requirements for burping might be another matter though.

......fed through to the finish. Mostly because they felt that the plants are still bulking til you harvest so they are continuing to use nutes,

The subject has been debated a bunch. It tends to attract the local trolls unfortunately- but if you have the stomach for it you can read hundreds of pages of opinions..

Flushing to improve the flavour- I doubt it. But whether or not they turn out better when feed max strength to the end- my impression is they turn out a bit worse. Tapering off to light or no feeding has generally brought my best results - but this is something I continue to experiment with and there are lots of variables.

One key point in that statement above is time of harvest. It depends when you harvest. If you’re doing an eight week flowering and chopping as soon as possible- yes it’s true- you’re chopping them when they’re still growing. Personally I flower my plants to a late stage of ripeness. At this point the plants are barely feeding and drinking, they are well past the bulking stage, leaves are yellowing, and they are shutting down, as annuals do at the end of their season.
There are a whole bunch of other variables that affect the question- hard to find a one size fits all answer.

I’m about to head out on a trip for a few weeks. Will catch up sometime in future. Good luck and happy growing!

 

[burdok420]

Will be keeping an eye on this one. Sadly I can't experiment but watching what people like yourself are doing is a very exciting thing for me. My experiments at the moment, I suppose, is keeping a plant short. If you have any tips on keeping a sativa dominant strain under 80cm then I'd love to hear it.
Best of luck, bud. But it seems you know too much already for luck to be a variable!

 

[The Physicist]

Will be keeping an eye on this one. Sadly I can't experiment but watching what people like yourself are doing is a very exciting thing for me. My experiments at the moment, I suppose, is keeping a plant short. If you have any tips on keeping a sativa dominant strain under 80cm then I'd love to hear it.
Best of luck, bud. But it seems you know too much already for luck to be a variable!

Funny you should mention that! I am going for the 8” mother plants myself, specifically I am doing Blue dream first which is heavy sativa dominant. I’ll keep you updated for sure!

 

[The Physicist]

Skybound has done some interesting things cloning with triacontanol and getting roots in record time.
I know that stoneotter was doing some burping experiments but I haven’t had a chance to see if he’s followed up on it yet.

Off- gassing if any must be extremely minuscule, to the point of being nonexistent. I do a lot of fermentation including hundreds of gallons of wine per year, kimchi, yogurt etc. and I know what offgassing looks like. Whereas a gallon jar full of fresh harvested bud will not puff out the lid at all no matter how many months you leave it, or emit even the slightest sighing sound when opened. Oxygen requirements for burping might be another matter though.





The subject has been debated a bunch. It tends to attract the local trolls unfortunately- but if you have the stomach for it you can read hundreds of pages of opinions..

Flushing to improve the flavour- I doubt it. But whether or not they turn out better when feed max strength to the end- my impression is they turn out a bit worse. Tapering off to light or no feeding has generally brought my best results - but this is something I continue to experiment with and there are lots of variables.

One key point in that statement above is time of harvest. It depends when you harvest. If you’re doing an eight week flowering and chopping as soon as possible- yes it’s true- you’re chopping them when they’re still growing. Personally I flower my plants to a late stage of ripeness. At this point the plants are barely feeding and drinking, they are well past the bulking stage, leaves are yellowing, and they are shutting down, as annuals do at the end of their season.
There are a whole bunch of other variables that affect the question- hard to find a one size fits all answer.

I’m about to head out on a trip for a few weeks. Will catch up sometime in future. Good luck and happy growing!

I’ll have to check out why skybound tried then in addition to the other methods. Would be very interesting to find something not many people know about that boosts growth/rooting significantly.

I would think the oxygen and also nitrogen in the air both play a role in freshness of the buds in the jars. Undoubtedly there could be some ion exchange happening with stagnant air that happens over time and the replenishment of oxygen and nitrogen help to maintain some reactions. A lot of digging is needed on the chemistry side of this.

I see your point about the harvesting time certainly. Weening the nutrients off makes definitely the most sense to follow the natural progression of the plant. Certainly needs thorough testing!

 

[The Physicist]

The cloning chambers are ready. Two with heat mats, one without also as a test for propagation. We learned that too much light forces vegetation rather than root development so we have added some paper towels as diffusers to reduce the intensity. The intensity being too high causes the leaves to yellow as the cutting tries to grow and steal nutrients from fan leaves Going to run blue vs full spectrum soon too.

 

[The Physicist]

Also got new Light Warrior from Fox Farm to test as it is their germination propagator for seedlings and cuttings to run against Ocean Forrest

 

[Pennywise]

Does it have hormones in it?

 

[The Physicist]

Not necessarily hormones but it has bacteria and humic acid as pH stabilizer to help propagate roots. Here is the packaging:

 

[The Physicist]

I actually might start mixing this in when I transplant clones from now on. Im liking what i see. It has fast drainage though so watering more often than ocean forrest

 

[The Physicist]

This will be interesting to run against coco coir more than ocean forrest. Ocean forrest has nutes and comes a bit hot, where as the Light Warrior grow medium isnt soil, and more similar to coco coor but with goodies

 

[Pennywise]

If I leave coco it’ll be for LOS I think.

 

[The Physicist]

What is LOS?

 

[Pennywise]

Living Organic Soil- water only

 

[The Physicist]

Oh! Yeah that is something I really want to do also, but takes a long time to get a good compost pile started and everything for a few months???

 

[Pennywise]

Kind of expensive to start but pays for itself over time.

 

[The Physicist]

Is there a recipe you recommend over all others?

 

[Pennywise]

I’ll probably run the Coots Recipe.

 

[burdok420]

The living soil option was one that I thought about before deciding to go to coco and megacrop to keep my expenses low. However in the next couple of months I will be starting to cook my own soil to use in grows down the line. There is just something appealing about how natural it all seems.