Indoor Heavy Metal Ice Cream

[Animatey]

Man that mold on the bottom of the stem can be a serious drag...

I've never had plants that were a foot tall straight up die before except to pretty much the same thing.

https://www.autoflower.org/threads/sweet-zkittlez-sog-in-rockwool-cubes.79079/post-2315271

In retrospect I probably should have done exactly what you did and just prop them up and let the top dry out.

Rockwool stays way wetter than coco though, so probably yours pull through just fine.

My problem was definitely keeping the cubes too wet.

 

[Animatey]

PS I dig the isolation bin... never seen anything like that before.

Will the males still grow OK without getting as much light?

Have you tried the bin before and it keeps pollen from the females?

Great setup overall man, I'll definitely keep a watch here.

 

[parsing_trees]

PS I dig the isolation bin... never seen anything like that before.

Will the males still grow OK without getting as much light?

Have you tried the bin before and it keeps pollen from the females?

Great setup overall man, I'll definitely keep a watch here.

Thanks. I have a separate post with more details. Used it a couple times now, works great.

 

[parsing_trees]

Man that mold on the bottom of the stem can be a serious drag...

I've never had plants that were a foot tall straight up die before except to pretty much the same thing.

https://www.autoflower.org/threads/sweet-zkittlez-sog-in-rockwool-cubes.79079/post-2315271

That looks like exactly the same issue. Really disappointing.

Five of my others seem to have recovered fully, but the A1 Anvil hasn't, and is still lagging behind enough that I'm going to cull it.

 

[Animatey]

That looks like exactly the same issue. Really disappointing.

Five of my others seem to have recovered fully, but the A1 Anvil hasn't, and is still lagging behind enough that I'm going to cull it.

Sorry dude, definitely a drag. Not much info on it out there either... I searched around for posts on "stem rot" and didn't find much. Posted about it on a couple forums and not many people have dealt with it. General consensus I got was to spray the base with h202 or some commercial products, but the plants declined very quickly.

Not sure if they were just on their way out anyways, or if the H202 sped them along, but they were not gonna make it.

I think someone mentioned it some kind of Pythium, but who knows.

Good luck with the rest of your run man!

 

[parsing_trees]

Day 43 from sprout.

I've finished with pollinating and pollen collection. The isolation bin is out and the males are composting. I also removed A1, because it had been struggling with the stem damage and fallen weeks behind the others.

There was a bunch of pollen in the isolation bin that didn't make it past the air filters. One male (A3) produced more pollen than the other (A2), but I saved several tubes of pollen from each (mixed ~10:1 with flour) to freeze and use in future grows.

With the isolation bin removed, everything has more room, and there shouldn't be any more problems with air circulation. The PN is roughly half as tall as the others, which is a awkward, but it's spread out broad leaves are probably still catching plenty of light. My autoCOB in front is lower than the one in back, but only as low as it can go without stressing out the SAD and WC in the middle.

A4 is about 23" / 59 cm tall. I've pollinated it with pollen from three different Anvil males now, and I also made seeds with two other female Anvils a year or two ago, so I'm not too worried about narrowing the gene pool by losing A1. I'd misted a pollinated branch just before taking this picture, which is why the middle branch on the left has water droplets.

A4 is turning purple, really visible at the top here. Also, when the leaf serrations are pointing up like that, I think it's a symptom of the plant maxing out the light it can handle -- not enough to stress it necessarily (and this one did get a little light stress before), but right on the line.

PN is also turning purple, and getting resinous. The center front and back branches there were pollinated (A3 and my older Anvil pollen); if you see something that looks like powdery mildew, it's actually flour from the flour/pollen mixture.

It's a squat little thing.

The Grape crinkle is a little behind the others, but catching up. It has lots of small branches I've pollinated with various things, most notably Zamaldelica Express, so there's some wheatpaste on fan leaves near/under heavily pollinated buds.

The SAD's clusters of stigmas are growing towards each other, and the older ones are starting to fill in. All the others should look like this soon too, but the SAD and A4 have the lead.

 

[parsing_trees]

Day 53 from sprout.

Now that the pollination is done, things have settled down a bit. The buds are gaining mass, frost is spreading, and I see seeds forming, but without comparing pictures day by day the growth isn't as obvious. I'm planning on waiting another 3-4 weeks to harvest so the seeds have time to mature, even if they're ready a week before that otherwise.

Some nutrient deficiencies have been creeping in. There's major yellowing in the fan leaves, especially on the SAD -- I may have switched from veg to flowering nutrients a bit too early, and since they're making seeds on a couple branches, they may still have higher N requirements than normal. I had a hectic week and didn't get around to switching up the nutrients to provide more N until the weekend, so it may take a couple more days to show improvement. Some of the yellowing at the upper canopy is probably light stress damage from a couple weeks ago.

While Grape Crinkle was supposed to be one of the quicker strains in the tent, it's been a bit behind the others (possibly due to the stem damage before). It's filling in and getting frosty now, and doesn't seem to be impacted by the nutrient deficiencies.

The Purple Nuggets probably hadn't been getting enough light because it's half as tall as the others. I've drawn the front light in, but could only come so close without lateral spread stressing the taller WC and SAD next to it. About a week ago I realized that putting a reflector on my front autoCOB would channel more light downward. That brought the PN much closer to the light the others are receiving, and it's also bulking up, but it's probably going to stay pretty small. I bet a full tent of Purple Nuggets & Strawberry Nuggets would be really nice though.

Comparing the SAD tops against last time really shows how much the buds are filling in. Hopefully it will continue for a couple more weeks.

 

[parsing_trees]

Day 57.

Moving along, a few more weeks. Not much to do now but keep watering them.

I think next time I might switch up my nutrients a bit -- I've tended to use Dyna-Gro's Foliage-Pro (9-3-6) in veg and Bloom (3-12-6) in flower, but next time I'll try either Grow (7-9-5) or a mix of Grow and Bloom in flower, because the Bloom alone hasn't been providing enough nitrogen.

The GC is filling out now and getting frost everywhere. It's about 24" / 60 cm tall.

Just the tops.

The PN probably isn't going to stretch, but it's getting a bit of bulk. Some day I should do an all Purple Nuggets / Strawberry Nuggets grow, because I really like the flower, but mine have tended to end up surrounded by other taller strains and not had a chance to really thrive.

PN, from the side. (It's about 11" / 28 cm tall.)

The SAD is both the tallest (25" / 63 cm) and looks like it will probably be the first to finish -- a few of its stigmas on the upper colas are starting to darken and wither. I also see seeds forming on the lower branches (where I expect them), with a few still-green ones peeking through. By mid-June most of those should be mature.

The WC has some decent upper colas plus a bunch of little lower popcorn branches. I pollinated several of those, so not a big deal, but the WC in particular seems like it would have benefited from more room to spread out (without getting tangled up in the GC or SAD, or blocking light to the PN). The growth structure reminds me of a Grapey Walter I grew a couple years ago, that one was also branchy and wanted to spread out and soak up light, but branches found a lot of space between the others and it yielded quite nicely.

The Anvil is about the same size as the SAD, but infinitely more purple.

This one's upper stigmas are also starting to darken. Some of the upper fan leaves have damage from light stress, but the leaves below are doing better now.

 

[parsing_trees]

Day 63.

The GC buds are still visibly swelling in time-lapse, everything else seems done. There are a few amber trichomes on the PN, lots of cloudy trichomes twinkling on PN, WC, and SAD. I haven't checked A4's trichomes because it's in the back, and either way I'm waiting for the GC to finish and the seeds to mature, so it will probably be another week or so. If not for that, I'd be comfortable harvesting several of them today. My quickest grow so far. I don't usually wait for a particular percentage of amber, just mostly cloudy.

There will probably be another round of pre-harvest pictures, and some weights & seed counts a couple weeks after harvest.

 

[parsing_trees]

Day 64.

Here's a picture of the tent, taken during the dark period with flash.