New Grower intro

[ShaggyGrower]

Hi All,

Firstly, my condolences to the family and friends of Franco Loja.  I've only recently found the Strain Hunter series on YouTube, and after enjoying a few epesodes, found out about Franco's passing.  Very sad

OK.  I'm a new serendipitous grower having found some seeds on some bought bag-weed.  I planted them in Miracle-Gro to see what would happen and the three seeds sprouted.  after getting to 30cm I re-potted in Miracle-Gro & soil outside for the summer.  Four weeks ago, my guerrilla-grow was about to be strimmed by the council, so I bought I 1.2mx1.2mx2.0m tent (extractor fan & carbon filter & 250w/400w/600w/660w HPS light) and brought the plants inside and topped up more Miracle-Gro.  Two plants are full sized and one is a single stemmed quarter sized dwarf.

Having leant that Miracle-Gro was not good for flowering, I bottom-watered Run-Off (RO) water and Shogun HydroBloom A&B.  My tap water is ph 7.25 and EC 0.8 (360ppm) while RO is ph 7.12 and EC 0.12 (59ppm).  More learning and added TNC CalMag to the nutrient feed.

After a couple of weeks I decided to flush with just RO via top-watering to flush out the Miracle-Gro.  EC was 3.5+ and ph was ~7.5!

So, after about 4 weeks of alternating between nutrient enriched RO (ph'd to  5.5 with 1.3EC) on a Thursday and pure RO on a Sunday  I've got 30% run off from 12 litres in at ph 7.0 and EC 1.8.

I've got some Shogun PK Warrior 9/18; Shogun Sumo Boost; and Shogun Dragon Force arriving today ready for the last few weeks of flowering.

I've no idea of strain.  I'm thinking a Sativa of some kind or a heavy-on-the-Sative hybrid.  I've attached some pics.

I've had to do some LSTing to keep the plants fitting the plants in my tent.  They're min 30cm from the 600w light and can't get them any further away.  Temps are 82°F-76°F with lights on and 76°F-68°F lights off.  I guess if they need to be further away (?) I'd have to lower lights to 400w?  Humidity is 37%-50% lights on and 45%-55% lights off.

They're on a 07.15am-18.15pm lights on (11 hours) with 13 hours of darkness.

Any thoughts/tips please?

Regs, ShaggyGrower

[LedCherryBerry]

Goddamn she's gorgeous!

I'm thinking she's a Hybrid. Long leaves, yes, but fat and not skinny. Also the colour, but it might be from the photo itself..

I know it is a bad idea, but maybe try tilting your pot to avoid burn? You'll have to re-tilt it for each watering, but you'd gain some cm since your plant is leaning on a side.
Beautiful job so far, though! 

Anyway, welcome to the forum. 
I'm new myself, joined a couple weeks ago. 
I also grow mainly bag-seeds. I love the fact that you totally don't know the strain, because it's the perfect opportunity to learn about that particular one.
Downsides are you could get very weak genetics, or runts, or whatever else nobody that does it for a job wants, but since it's not my job.. 

Anyway, you may already know these things. 
See you around!

[ShaggyGrower]

Cheers LedCherryBerry!

Yup, they're looking good. More by luck than judgement I have to say.

 

There are two plants (well, three, but one is a single stemmed dwarf) that are lst'd over.  Their top colas are tipped over 45 degrees (!) and have since trained themselves upwards and have now stopped growing (phew!).  There's not much more tilting/moving I can do, so hopefully they'll be ok.  I'm a fiddler so check on them quite a lot when at home making sure they don't get too high a leaf temperature on top (using infrared thermometer).  Infrared thermometer usually reads about 5°F more than the white plastic thermometer/humidity detector, so max ~ 83°F with infrared.

I think there are two different strains as well as Plant1 has darker and slightly thicker leaves than Plant2.

I'll add more regarding these plants on this thread.  I've started a proper grow thread in the correct place for the four plants I've just recently stated and which I'll be trying to grow by-the-book.

Kind regards, ShaggyGrower

[Jose.gh]

Welcome to the forum  

 

I agree, they seem hybrids because of the size and morphology of the leaves. However, Sativa trend.

Very good for the dark schedule (13 hours) is ideal for sativas varieties (better than 12/12).

 

The plants appear to look good, healthy, healthy. Sure everything ends well and you can enjoy good smoke  

[g22]

Hi

maybe give her more fresh air whit the intake for lower the heat en when light of change the air to for humidity 

[ShaggyGrower]

Thanks for the comments Jose.gh and g22.

I think they're getting there (see photo's), although not sure how many weeks to go and I'm wondering when to start the two-weeks-prior-to-harvest flushing/nutrient change.

Edited October 20, 2017 by ShaggyGrower
added photo's one by one - multiple uploads cause error

[Jose.gh]

Hello!

 

If you have already observed the fattening of the buds, and the pistils begin to oxidize, it is a good time to do a root wash

If you have a macro camera or a miscroscope, you can look at the trichomes and verify maturity.

Regards!

[ShaggyGrower]

Trichomes don't look there yet (still clear), so as they looked dry (soil coming away from side of pot and quite a light pot). I've given them perhaps they're last major feed:

Run-Off Water in: ph 7.88; EC 0.126; ppm 63
1ml x 10 Shogun HydroBlook: after ph 6.95; EC 0.652; ppm 326

2ml x 10 Shogun Sumo Boost:  after ph 6.94; EC 0.694; ppm 347

1ml x 10 Shogun PK Warrior: after ph 7.06; EC 1.088;ppm 544

0.25ml x 10 CalMag: after ph 7.03; EC 1.202; ppm 601

 

Ph down added to get: ph 5.76; EC 1.13; ppm 565

700ml of Run-Off from the 10l put in: ph 7.11; EC 1.782; ppm 854

Growing medium (composting soil and Miracle Gro - yeah, I knew no better back then) must still be alkaline to get 7.11 out for a 5.76 in.

 

Next watering I'll just give 2ml x 10 Shogun Sumo Boost and 4ml x 10 Shogun Dragon Force in RunOff water.

Edited October 21, 2017 by ShaggyGrower
added photos

[ShaggyGrower]

Frostiness. Photo taken shining a diving torch at it  as well as the HPS lights on.  Makes photo's look more blue and sparkling 

[Jose.gh]

You really have lots of resin, good buds

 

Do you make hash with resin from the leaves? It must be delicious!

 

[ShaggyGrower]

Hi Jose.gh,

Thanks. These will be the first plants I've ever grown, never mind made hash out of.  I've been a-Googling how to make hash, and watching the Strain Hunter videos.  What method would you suggest I use to make hash out of the leaves.  I've seen several, and one putting the leaves through various bag filters (with ice and water) looks the easiest (Filtration Bags: purple 25 micron , white 45 micron, yellow 73 micron, black 90 micron, orange 120 micron, red 160 micron, green 190 micron, blue 220micron).

[Jose.gh]

Hello ShaggyGrower, 

 

 

There are many ways to make hash, extracting trichomes from dry leaves.

 

You can even make a homemade drum, with a tube of cardboard (pringles) and an average woman, it is rustic but effective hehe

 

On a personal level I use a bag of 90 microns, making a dry stretch. However, you can get more using water and smell beforehand. But the quality of the dry extraction is second to none

 

Cheers! 

[ShaggyGrower]

Hi Jose.gh,

Thanks.  I'll look into more ways (such as dry) ways of making hash to see which one I fancy.

An update on these plants.  Trichrome are still clear, so 2/3-4 weeks to go I think/hope.  Today was watering day.  Unfortunately a neighbour left the tap open on my Run-Off collection barrel and there was none left, so I had to use tap water  Pot was quite light so they defo needed some liquid.  I decided to give a little feed first (a quarter feed of ) Shogun Sumo Boost and Shogun Dragon Force, and then flush thoroughly. 

The pot holds ~9 litres of water before Run-Off occurs. I put ~ 60 litres of ph'd down (from initial 7.60) tap water through (10 litres of ph ~5.55; EC 0.702/351 ppm first with small feed, 5 x 10 litres for subsequent flushing's ph ~ 5.4 EC 0.370/181 ppm).

Out values were:

ph in 5.56 - ph out 6.60; EC in 0.702 - EC out 1.440; ppm in 351 - ppm out 722

ph in 5.56 - ph out 6.95; EC in 0.370 - EC out 1.554; ppm in 181 - ppm out 773

ph in 5.45 - ph out 7.05; EC in 0.370 - EC out 1.260; ppm in 188 - ppm out 627

ph in 5.57 - ph out 6.98; EC in 0.374 - EC out 0.862; ppm in 183 - ppm out 432

ph in 5.44 - ph out 7.22; EC in 0.352 - EC out 0.750; ppm in 178 - ppm out 376

ph in 5.37 - ph out 7.06; EC in 0.362 - EC out 0.660; ppm in 181 - ppm out 330

As you can see, no matter what I do with ph going in, it comes out around neutral (~7.0).  Looks like I managed to flush out a lot of hanging-on nutrients though.  I'd rather have used my Run Off water as that has a ppm of ~60, so compared to my tap water of ~ 180, there is 120 more ppm for my nutrients rather than water suppliers nutrients.

 

Anyone any ideas why ph in the run-off remains stubbornly high?

 

Temperature stayed ~ 75°F in canopy and 71°F in middle of plant throughout (usually ~75°F-82°F lights on; 68°F-72°F lights off)  , Humidity rose to ~60% (lots of air movement though) - it's ~36%-50% lights on.  HPS set on 600w (could go to 660w, 400w or 250w) giving about 200k lumens. Which is the best for late flowering wattage wise and canopy temperature wise?

[ShaggyGrower]

btw, here are two photo's I found when they started flowering. The very green one was taken outside on September 8th, the darker one was taken just after they had been moved indoors, on 15th September.  So perhaps flowering period started 1st September.

[ShaggyGrower]

A trichome shot from today of one of the outer (node 5 from the bottom) colas.

[ShaggyGrower]

Some leaves now starting to turn yellow on one plant, most of them yellowing on one side first.  Nitrogen deficiency perhaps.  I think it's a good sign at this during-flushing stage and means plant is cannibalising it's own nutrients. Buds growing in thickness and length and new white pistels appearing.  Seems there are multiple flushes of pistels.

They were very dry and a wilting last night, so gave them a feed of 4ml Shogun Dragon Force + 1ml Sh' Sumo Boost x 11l.  ph'd in at 5.6 (out was 6.8) tap water (, still not rained to collect RO water) has 320ppm (ec 0.640) and with those nutrients added ec in was 1.80 - high I think.  1l run off. Light is now 10.5/13.5.

[ShaggyGrower]

Day 61 of flowering. 
 
More leaves are turning yellow.  White pistels still appearing.  No amber trichomes. Buds getting thicker. Smell getting a little stronger.  

Canopy temp between 74-85 lights on and 66-78 lights off.  Humidity between 24% and 37%

Still not rained much here so I've been collecting the humidifier-out water (EC 0.015;  30 ppm) and mixed with the rain water available giving 11l of EC 0.126;  63 ppm 0.070.  ph starting was 7.14.

Added 11 x 1ml Sumo Boost: ph went to 7.0; EC 0.144; 72 ppm (pyi, says elements: Phosphorous 9; Potassium 18)
Added 11 x 4ml Dragon Force: ph went to 5.91; EC 1.530; ppm 765 (fyi, says elements: Phosphorous 9.5; Potassium 6.9; Magnesium 2.6; Sulphur 2.5)
Added 1 x heaped teaspoon of molasses: ph went to 5.89; EC 1.60; ppm 800.

Added liquid in stages: 4l slowly then left for an hour so plants could suck it up. Another 3 litres slowly. Plant/soil still soaking it up (no run-off). Waited another hour then added the final 4l.

Only got 250ml of run off from the total 11l.  ph out was 7.29 (stubbornly high); ec 2.618 (very concentrated although expected for such a small runoff) with 1309ppm.  Seems a build-up in the soil (probably still a hangover from using Miracle Gro) so I waited 3 hours for the plants to take their fill of watery nutrients, then flushed with 2 x 11l tap water (best I had available) with ph in of 6.0 and EC 0.307 and 614ppm. Ph out is unknown as I dropped my ph pen in water and might have broken it (it's drying out) and ec 0.472 -  944ppm.

Hopefully in the photo you can see their pot on stilts in the saucer - aids run-off and makes sure lower roots do not soak in water - also aids oxygen intake.

Edited October 31, 2017 by ShaggyGrower
added photos

[ShaggyGrower]

Trichrome still clear or cloudy, can't see any amber ones atm.

Can any of you see any amber ones in the photos?

 

Additionally, how far from harvest do you think these two plants are?

 

Regs, Shaggy

[Jose.gh]

Wow mate, 

 

 

They look amazing, great job!! 

[Cannabissapean]

They look very pretty, man.  But I definitely would not chop them at this time.  You just fed them again last Tuesday with full strength nutes, and since then, you haven't flushed.  If you chop them now, they will be harsh to smoke.

 

If it were me, I would flush them with cool tap water (3-times the pots volume), then continue 2 more weeks feeding only pH'd water until the chop.  Doing that, they should swell a bit more, but most importantly, the plant will rid its tissues of excessive salts and minerals, making the final product sweeter to smoke.

 

You could let them go a little longer if it seems they are still swelling and you still have no amber trichomes, but I would guess definitely not longer than 2 more weeks.

[ShaggyGrower]

Thanks for the advice Cannabissapean.

I'm a little confused regarding my nute regime atm.  Here it is: http://shogunfertilisers.com/feedcharts/

Last Saturday and then last Tuesday, I followed the "Week 8" schedule. Their blurb says "Providing a final and decisive boost to your plants before harvest, SHOGUN Dragon Force is an expertly formulated final flowering feed designed to be used in the final two weeks before harvest."

 

So this has got me in a dilemma of either using no nutes the final two weeks as I've often read should occur or using as described above.

 

Actually, I've just read the Dragon Force Page: http://shogunfertilisers.com/products/dragon-force/

There it says "Plain Water" in "Final Week" whereas the Feedchart page says "Add Water" in "Last Week" which had me confused.

 

Phew - we're all on the same page (pun intended) then - plain water from now on only for up to two weeks. Thanks!

 

On the water front, it's still not rained here.  We're famous for our rain and it's not rained for ages. Typical! It's due to lash down tonight though, so hopefully I'll have a water-butt full of run-off water (EC ~ 0.030, ppm ~ 70).  I even located the nearest stream the other day and went there with buckets at 7am.  Alas, EC was 0.320, very similar to my rather hard tap water.  I've 2 x 12l of tap water dechlorinating atm just in case the rain holds off.

 

 

[Cannabissapean]

Reviewing that site, it appears that they do not sell online?  Is that right?

 

It further appears that these products are available for purchase only through Stockists inside the UK alone. 

Good luck to them.  Maybe they will expand in the future.

 

 

 

Shaggy, I did not intend to confuse you.  But as you see in their chart, "Add Water", Shogun does in a way indicate a reduction in nutrient feeding.  I could be wrong, but I do not remember seeing anything like that in most any other chart by other nutrient manufacturers.  So, kudos to Shogun.  Hopefully, ALL nutrient manufacturers will begin to follow suit and start to acknowledge fully in their charts the need for flushing and the need for allowing the plant to continue for a COUPLE WEEKS AFTER THE FLUSH in order to optimize the final product.  Time will tell.

 

Nutrient manufacturers would love for everyone to think that there is nothing wrong at all with their products and that their products can be used from start to chop without any worries.  And for the most part, you can use the nutrients all the way to the end if you want to.  Just be aware that not flushing and not allowing the plant to cleanse itself will result in higher amounts of salts and metals in the plant.

 

Remember also that in nature, the plant must struggle and send roots farther and deeper to find its nutrients.  Whereas in our grows, whether indoor or outdoors, when we feed with nutrients, we are basically saturating the plant with nutes.

 

I remember the explanation from @NVmedclosetgrower where he described that all these metals with which we are saturating our plants are the same metals found in the head of matches.  They are the same metals found in various explosives.  If these metals are allowed to remain in the plants in sufficiently high concentrations, when the dried product is later burned, the result is sparking and popping. 

(In the old days, that was always explained away as "Oh, a seed exploded".  Maybe so, but today, we try to grow sensimilla, so if sparking and popping continues when no seeds are present, that can only mean excessive metals.)

 

Experienced growers have learned to tell the difference.  When I open-up an older jar of cannabis where I had not yet learned to flush thoroughly, I can smell that chemical smell... like walking into a chemical factory.  When I open a jar of a product that was properly flushed, I smell the invitation, "Smoke me!   Vape me!".  The non-flushed products just don't have that same inviting smell.

 

Another indication of properly flushed product is, when it is smoked, it burns well and the ash is white or lighter-colored.  A product that is not properly flushed is difficult to burn or difficult to keep burning while smoking, and the ash is dark to black in color.

 

Shaggy, thanks for posting the Shogun information.

 

And good luck with the upcoming harvest.  The plants look great.

 

 

[ShaggyGrower]

Hi Cannabissapean,

I think Shogun Fertilizers are part of the a company called GroWell.  GroWell sell Shogun fertilizers and equipement (I've got most of my equipment from them), online and in their shops.  I read somewhere on the internet that GroWell own Shogun. If so, they could make this link more transparent imv.

Don't worry, it was not you that was confusing me, it was the Shogun feed charts.  I think they could be written more clearly (ie, week 9 Plain ph'd Water, Week 10 plain ph'd Water).

I shall flush and flush (with a touch of molasses only) from now on, hoping to get rid of the explosive nutes and not end up with suicide-spliffs 

 

[Cannabissapean]

Ahh, thanks for that tip on GroWell. 

 

https://www.growell.co.uk/

[ShaggyGrower]

Hear's another tip.  If you're in the UK and your tap water is ec ~0.66 (330 ppm) and are thinking of using bottled water, not all bottled waters are the same.

This mornings findings:

Morrisons Saver still water: ph ~7.9; ec 333; ppm 666 (similar to my tap water)

Evian: ph ~7.4; ec 320; ppm 640 (similar to my tap water)

Morrisons Yorkshire Vale water: ph ~ 7.4; ec 200; 400ppm (> 50% lower ec/ppm than my tap water/above waters)

Morrisons Yorkshire Vale water as backup to rain run-off (ec 0.03; 60 ppm) for flushing it is then!