Lighting Monsters in my closet, my ongoing grow thread

[Ozone69]

After checking the trichs through the 40x and looking back on the calendar a bit to get an approx age, I decided to start with flushing on the Auto Purple today. She should be about three weeks behind the Berry Bomb that I harvested just over a week ago, and starting to see enough clouding on the trichs that I think another week to two should about do it for her. Think she stunted a bit with some over watering still, so might not have made her full potential. Still looking like a nice plant to me, though. Digging the nice purple color, really nice to stare at and zone out on. :smoking:

I suppose it goes back to something I've mentioned once or twice before in that it's one of the challenges of enjoying growing different strains to check 'em out. While the variety is nice, there could also be benefits to having enough familiarity with this strain to know how off the mark from full potential for the plant I may or may not be. I still think that the lessons learned are equally applied across different strains, though. For example I'm taking a much more conservative approach to watering with the four Grass-O-Matic plants coming up now than I did with either of the last two.

Anyhow...enough rambling for now....back to reading/researching COB DIY LED info for the next lighting upgrade.

 

[Ozone69]

The four Grass-O-Matic assortment seed plants look to be taking off very nice. Getting into their first little growth spurt. I bumped them up to full strength nutes with the watering this evening. I also had my local hydro guys order me in a bottle of the Cal Mag supplement by Earth Juice called Oilycann that I've started them on to try it out. Supposed to have Hummic acid in it as well as the CalMag, which from what I've read can be a nice little booster. Plus I wanted to try matching up the supplement with the nute manufacturer. After seeing someone else around the forums using one and reading up on them a bit I also picked up an Exhale CO2 bag. Little bacteria bag that's supposed to hang out in the grow area and produce CO2, so hopefully the GOM plants will get a little more to breath in their air mix and do a little better than the might have without.



Meanwhile the Auto Purple is trying to finish strong. She's had her issues, but been a fighter through all of it and think she'll be some really nice smoke in the end. Still another week to a week and a half I'm thinking. Won't be able to go too long because at the rate the GOM plants are starting to grow I'm going to need to space to spread them out as they get harder to squeeze under the one light and still get good coverage.

 

[Ozone69]

Counted up the days after looking at the trichs on the Auto Purple last night, and figure she's at 70 days. Breeder lists her as around a 67 day bloom from germ, so pretty close. Anyhow...point of it all is that I decided to give her the chop today. She didn't have a super strong smell, but what she did have was interesting. Little bit of sweetness in there, but I was picking up a definite tinge of diesel while trimming as well. Didn't take any sample buds at this time, want to wait to dry and cure some before sampling on this one. Color doesn't come out in some of the pictures very well, but she did a great job of turning all the buds a nice purple color. Was fun to watch her grow, and think she'll be a decent smoke. I'd consider growing one again, especially if I got another as a freebie on an order like this one was.

 

[Ozone69]

While peeking in on the ladies this evening, I noticed the #4 has done a neat little split branching near the top that essentially has mutated it to have two main cola's starting. All four are starting to show their sex and all look to be ladies thus far. Getting some nice upward growth starting. Should be getting into about the fifth week, so seem like they are right on schedule for your average auto. Should start transitioning soonish.

My mutant:

 

[Ozone69]

Slaking on the updates a bit, so figured time to post one up. Mostly just cruising along. All four of the Grass-O-Matic mystery seeds are progressing nicely. I get the impression these are a lot more on the indica side of the scale than what I've grown before. Plants overall aren't as tall and the leaves seems shorter and broader. The smaller size could also be the 3 gallon pots versus my previous 5 gallon some, I suppose.

#1 started having some clawing on the upper leaves the last couple of days, with #4 showing the same to a lesser extent. I'd bumped up the watering amount some as they were in heavy growth recently. So there could have been a bit of over watering, though I was also waiting until things were much drier than I had on past grows as well. Could also be a bit too much nitrogen from what I read around the net/forums, which also would have increased with the more water. So I pulled back to the previous watering amount and also moved more toward flowering nute ratios, cutting back to half the grow nutes while bumping up the bloom. Other than that I'm not noticing any problems with any of them.



Double main on #4 transitioning into bloom:

 

[Ozone69]

Forgot to include a couple other updates in my update. See what happens when I let myself slack off on this journal thing....just start leaving out the big stuff. *grumble grumble*
Suppose it could just be forgetting to mention due to short term memory loss as well.
*shrugg*

Anyhow.....

Quick followup on the Auto Purple from Paradise Seeds. Weight after drying was 1.4 oz. Still love the purple color of the buds. Nice to look at while up close and personal doing the final trim. Tried a few sample popcorn buds while triming and jarring for the cure, and the taste and effect were both nice. Looking forward to how the cured product turns out.

The other big(ish) news, is that since I didn't have anything going on in my little tent, and have a number of photo period seeds I decided to try something different from the auto rotation. I had thought about doing a seed or two to try and cultivate a mother plant, but since I don't know if I want to rotate clones into the closet with the autos on a regular basis I decided to take a different route. So far I've just let plants grow au naturel, taking whatever shape they chose. Since I'd seen different things like LST and the like around, I started reading on them a little. Stumbled on a technique called "mainlining" and decided for no better reason than it sounds like fun to give it a whirl. Since I had twice as many of one strain as the other I started two "Ghost of LeeRoy" from Rare Dankness (breeder that I believe is out of Colorado somewhere..but not sure) seeds and one "Grilled Cheese" from the Bud Depot recreational store in Lyons, CO. One of the Ghost of LeeRoy seeds failed to break ground, and after looking at the light some more I decided two 5 gallon pots may be enough anyway, so rolling with one of each. The plan is to take a nice loooooong time vegging them out and setting them up for a mainline grow. Hopefully, if fate is fortunate, I'll have an auto run in the closet finishing up around the time these will be ready to flower so I can move them into there to finish off. I think mainlining is a good fit for that scenario because most of the work is front loaded in the veg growth stage, and once you get the plant to flowering it's on autopilot and just however long it takes to bloom, then back to 20/4 light cycle for more autos. May try to sneak in a clone of one of the early trimmings at least long enough to determine sex along the way as well since the seeds are not feminized, but will have to see how the timing plays out. I don't want to switch to 12/12 lighting with autos in the closet if I can avoid it so as not to diminish their best chances for producing.

 

[Ozone69]

Not much of an update this week. Everything just growing along and doing it's thing right now. The four Grass-O-Matic plants had a last little growth spurt and look to be settling into blooming now. May have adjusted the nutes too soon, but they don't seem to mind too much. Much smaller than the previous two plants. Not sure if it's genetics or the three gallon versus the previously used five gallon. Guessing probably just a little of both.



The split, double main on #4:

 

[Ozone69]

Starting to get some yellowing mostly on the lower leaves but starting to spread. #1 and #4 have been in the lead all along so they have it the worst. Starting to think I'm probably over watering them again. Keep thinking "deficiency" so wanting to water more frequently when I should be fighting that urge and watering less I'm starting to suspect. Did the same thing last plant, but let myself get sucked in again. Looking forward to trying out the Blumats after these to (hopefully) help with my likely watering issues. *grumble grumble*

 

[Ozone69]

Well, the yellowing kept going and most of the large fans on the bigger plants have all yellowed, faded, and come off at this point. Still keeping them going, but think they're limping compared to what their potential was. I thought I wasn't giving them enough of something based off last grow, but that didn't fix things so now I'm thinking that it's that I'm giving too much of something. Lot's of red on the stems, and I was reading somewhere that could be a sign of too much Nitrogen. So maybe too much grow nutes early on and into bloom.

Anyhow...because of that and because they will be a much longer veg and I don't want 'em getting too big too fast, I'm watering the small photoperiod plants in the tent on just water mostly with mixing in some nutes every third or forth watering. So far they seem to be doing well on it. The third nodes showed up a day or two ago and are just starting to grow out. They'll be my first cut point to start the process of mainlining these. The plan is to take the cuttings and try and root them in some of the rockwool cubes I've still got lying around. The current autos in the closet should be finishing up in around 3 weeks, so I'm hoping to be able to get the clones in the closet shortly thereafter and put them on a 12/12 light schedule just long enough to determine the sex. Not sure if it's all going to time out just right. Have a feeling that I'm going to need at least a couple weeks more veg time on the clones before I can flower them, but since it's only to determine sex and then I may toss them and start the next batch of autos I don't know yet. Keep going back and forth on it, so will just have to wait and see once things start happening.



The surprise of the week on the Autos is that I was taking a look at 'em and noticed that my "runt of the litter" (smallest plant of the bunch), #3, is actually doing the best bud wise. She's holding on to her fans longer than the rest and not yellowing as hard. Plus the main cola bud on her is getting nice and thick, especially compared to her taller, lankier sisters. Of course, the double main cola on plant #4 is also fun to watch develop. Decent looking bud's on her, though not as thick looking as #3.

#1 & #2

#3 & #4

Thickest bud so far, #3..

 

[trailanimal]

Counted up the days after looking at the trichs on the Auto Purple last night, and figure she's at 70 days. Breeder lists her as around a 67 day bloom from germ, so pretty close. Anyhow...point of it all is that I decided to give her the chop today. She didn't have a super strong smell, but what she did have was interesting. Little bit of sweetness in there, but I was picking up a definite tinge of diesel while trimming as well. Didn't take any sample buds at this time, want to wait to dry and cure some before sampling on this one. Color doesn't come out in some of the pictures very well, but she did a great job of turning all the buds a nice purple color. Was fun to watch her grow, and think she'll be a decent smoke. I'd consider growing one again, especially if I got another as a freebie on an order like this one was.

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