First time growing autos

[Bill.de.Cat]

I'm in Northern Michigan surrounded by the Great Lakes. 33 degrees Fahrenheit right now and snow covered the ground today. Forecast is for rain and ice storm this evening and then temperatures near 60 degrees Fahrenheit by tomorrow. I'm curious whether those seeds that sprouted outside will survive this weather I've got right now. I expect that if they survive this they will be pretty much stunted.

The White Widow hybrid autos I started in a tent in my basement a couple weeks ago in some 2 gallon plastic pots are filling in and yesterday I decided to top them. Looked at them this morning and the topping seems to have accelerated other leaves to grow.

I noticed on some autos I grew outside last year that when you top them the growth can be really vigorous afterwards on some strains and a day or two later you can get rapid recovery and vegetative growth once you top them. Four inches overnight sometimes under long Summer days in the Northern latitudes. Not like photo plants though, the few photo plants I've grown outside grew so fast and large planted directly in the ground grew out of control and filled my outside grow area to the point I had to cut four down and just leave one that I cut back extensively. The grow area was only about 12 feet by 12 feet surrounded by a six foot high board fence.

I have had good luck with Fastbuds autos when growing outside. Mexican Airlines and Pineapple Express did well in the hot humid temperatures I experienced with 80-90 degrees Fahrenheit and very high humidity outdoors living on a smaller island. I believe they are pretty much sativa auto strains but I have also had the Pineapple Express give a pheno that looked more like an indica strain once with a single huge central cola that was prone to budrot when grown indoors in a tent. I think it grew better outside. Fastbuds was running a buy a pack get one pack free when I checked yesterday if you are somewhere they ship directly to.

I'd put Tupperware bowls and some insulting on the outside ones. Give em a fighting chance.

 

[Doug58]

I'd put Tupperware bowls and some insulting on the outside ones. Give em a fighting chance.

They were just seeds that fell to the ground last year when I was harvesting autos I had from making a seed run. I have four small Mason type jars of seeds stored in my house. It just amazes me how hardy those seeds seem to be compared to seeds I have purchased at what I consider expensive prices that sometimes I can't even get to germinate. In my location you can't even really transplant seedlings outside until the first day of Summer, June 20th. I just think regular seeds are much more vigorous than feminized seeds from breeders that seedbanks may have had for long periods of time and improperly stored before they get shipped to the US. I have some Colloidal Silver solution and I also ordered some STS(?) to try to do a feminized seed run from the plants in my tent and will be better able to judge if I manage to make some feminized auto seeds from the plants I crossed.

Snow on my deck right now from last night. I don't even know if covering them would help much with nighttime temperatures getting down to 22 degrees Fahrenheit and it is no great loss since the seeds were not intentionally planted.

In the 80's, I lived in an area where feral commercial hemp was rampant from fields where it was grown during WWII. The climate in that location was even more severe than where I am now and it was impossible to eradicate the feral hemp. Plants would be over 12 feet tall and with zero measurable thc just growing wild in every vacant field. That same state has now made recreational marijuana legal but I bet it would be hard to grow quality weed outdoors there with fields of feral hemp growing everywhere.

 

[Humanrob]

I look forward to following this one. Like others have mentioned, I too switched from photos to autos outdoors to better match the short length of my optimal grow months. I plant in the ground, but only get about 6-7 hours of peak direct sunlight per day, so I'm always interested to see how plants do with more/better sunlight. I've mostly grown Mephistos, this year I'm mixing it up with some Dutch Passion and Fast Buds, so much hype and talk, time I find out for myself what works best in my set up.

Along for the ride