Hi everyone, long time lurker first time poster. Hope you're all having a noice holiday season!
I started growing about a year ago and I have been improving with every cycle but my autos are always short little ladies. The first plants I grew were from WhiteWidow Seed Bank from Canada. They turned out, but they were really short and didn't yield much. I grew 3 runs with slightly improved but similar results.
I grew them in soil with added perlite in 5g pots with a SF1000, I used Gaia Green dry amendments and I PHed my water. My Tent is in my basement but i regulate RH with a sensor and a humidifier and I have an exhaust fan with a filter to maintain good temperatures. I didn't notice any deficiencies, they looked like fairly healthy plants from sprout to harvest, but they were just really small. After harvest I dug up my root balls to see what I could see. The tap roots were only like 3" long so I thought the soil was too compact for autos and I have since added more perlite to my current grow.
This round I bought my magic beans from MSNL and I upgraded my light but I'm still having the similar issues. I am growing 5 different strains this time, so I'm not really looking for strain specific advice, but there must be some root cause (see what i did there) as to why none of my plants ever grow to more than 30cm
Problem: short plants and low yield
Medium/grow method: amended garden soil with perlite. The soil is just cheap garden soil from a hardware store. I added Gaia Green all purpose 4-4-4 (the tub says to use 3 tbsp/gallon of medium, I used about half that much) and also added 25% perlite. I have been germinating in my final container, no paper towel, no transplanting. I've been careful not to over water seedlings because I know that can be an issue in a large pot
Feed: Gaia Green organic dry amendments and worm Castings. trying to keep it somewhat Organic
water source: municipal tap water @ 6.3-6.5, i don't have any other meters
Strain/age: MSNL various strains (northern storm auto, lemon og auto, GDP auto, silver haze auto & auto OG) all planted on Oct 24 so that's day 66 today
light used: spider farmer sf1000 along side a Phlizon 1500W Dimmagle LED. I don't know the real Wattage. Both lights are 20" away and I only plugged in the SF1000 for flower
Climate: 22-25 deg day, 17-20 night. humidity between 45%and 55% (was around 60 during Veg)
Additional info: I have included Photos of my plants.
I'm pretty sure the Silver Haze Auto is too close to the light but the other's aren't showing any signs of that.
The Auto OG has some burnt leaf tips and some yellowing, but she seems the closest to harvest. I don't know if that's nute burn or just fall colours?
I never tried topping before and I know that's the opposite of what you want for taller plants, but I thought it could help overall yield. I topped the GDP auto and the Lemon Og and it did work because they are larger plants and have more bud sites, but they seem to be considerably less developed than the 3 strains that I did not top. Is it typical that topping will delay harvest? or is that purely strain dependent?
To fit 5 plants in my tent I needed smaller pots, so this time I have 4 plants in 3g fabric pots and the Auto GDP is the only one to get a 5g fabric pot. If you look at all of the plants it is evident that one is in a larger container, but the plant is still fairly small.
Here are the other plants:
Here's my low tech security setup:
Thank you all for reading my ramblings, and all help is much appreciated.
I started growing about a year ago and I have been improving with every cycle but my autos are always short little ladies. The first plants I grew were from WhiteWidow Seed Bank from Canada. They turned out, but they were really short and didn't yield much. I grew 3 runs with slightly improved but similar results.
I grew them in soil with added perlite in 5g pots with a SF1000, I used Gaia Green dry amendments and I PHed my water. My Tent is in my basement but i regulate RH with a sensor and a humidifier and I have an exhaust fan with a filter to maintain good temperatures. I didn't notice any deficiencies, they looked like fairly healthy plants from sprout to harvest, but they were just really small. After harvest I dug up my root balls to see what I could see. The tap roots were only like 3" long so I thought the soil was too compact for autos and I have since added more perlite to my current grow.
This round I bought my magic beans from MSNL and I upgraded my light but I'm still having the similar issues. I am growing 5 different strains this time, so I'm not really looking for strain specific advice, but there must be some root cause (see what i did there) as to why none of my plants ever grow to more than 30cm
Problem: short plants and low yield
Medium/grow method: amended garden soil with perlite. The soil is just cheap garden soil from a hardware store. I added Gaia Green all purpose 4-4-4 (the tub says to use 3 tbsp/gallon of medium, I used about half that much) and also added 25% perlite. I have been germinating in my final container, no paper towel, no transplanting. I've been careful not to over water seedlings because I know that can be an issue in a large pot
Feed: Gaia Green organic dry amendments and worm Castings. trying to keep it somewhat Organic
water source: municipal tap water @ 6.3-6.5, i don't have any other meters
Strain/age: MSNL various strains (northern storm auto, lemon og auto, GDP auto, silver haze auto & auto OG) all planted on Oct 24 so that's day 66 today
light used: spider farmer sf1000 along side a Phlizon 1500W Dimmagle LED. I don't know the real Wattage. Both lights are 20" away and I only plugged in the SF1000 for flower
Climate: 22-25 deg day, 17-20 night. humidity between 45%and 55% (was around 60 during Veg)
Additional info: I have included Photos of my plants.
I'm pretty sure the Silver Haze Auto is too close to the light but the other's aren't showing any signs of that.
The Auto OG has some burnt leaf tips and some yellowing, but she seems the closest to harvest. I don't know if that's nute burn or just fall colours?
I never tried topping before and I know that's the opposite of what you want for taller plants, but I thought it could help overall yield. I topped the GDP auto and the Lemon Og and it did work because they are larger plants and have more bud sites, but they seem to be considerably less developed than the 3 strains that I did not top. Is it typical that topping will delay harvest? or is that purely strain dependent?
To fit 5 plants in my tent I needed smaller pots, so this time I have 4 plants in 3g fabric pots and the Auto GDP is the only one to get a 5g fabric pot. If you look at all of the plants it is evident that one is in a larger container, but the plant is still fairly small.
Here are the other plants:
Here's my low tech security setup:
Thank you all for reading my ramblings, and all help is much appreciated.
