I ended up chopping one main bud on accident, I have some pictures somewhere, and tried to dry it long enough but it was dry in like 2-3 days, so I put it in a jar.
Then life got really hectic and I started smoking all my medicine, picking off buds here and there leaving others to develop. But it was strong as all get out when at least properly dried. I don't have enough stash to cure now, but net time for sure I want to enter the mystical world of curing.
I think I've only had cured bud once from one of my most pro-level buddies. He only smokes the best. All I remember was that it was smooth, and the rest is a blur, so I guess it was nice!
I am going to go with a 250W CFL all-in-one with reflector hood. I'll get a blue bulb and switch to warm white for flowering. I can add supplemental skinny tubes on the side if necessary. I think it'll be perfect for my closet, which is only about 24"x18"x60"+, so tight on floorspace but plenty of height.
I will post some final pics this weekend. I'm going to start a closet grow thread because I am anxious to get started!
But here's my review of Fast Bud:
A little slow to start, then grows faster and faster. Mine flowered later than three weeks, but I am convinced they were stunted from heat and humidity, not enough water, probably not enough nutrients. Pots size as well, although I'm sure they are at least 1 gallon. The plants were dwarved and did not develop a lot of vegetative structure for the buds to develop from. That's all on me and possibly harsh conditions. But the sun was strong when it did shine, and I think that plus organic nutrients during flowering gave me high quality.
There is a lot of variety in the plants, from almost pure indica dominant to wispy sativa, but the best pheno is a cross between the two, showing more height and vigor towards the second half of growth. They just shot up during pre-flowering and then exploded into buds.
The buds were just covered in resin, as you can see in previous pictures. That's good genetics. I just let this one go to nature, which is something you can do with autoflowres, and I'm delighted at the result. Now I want to see what I can do in a closet with ample light and a good breeze going.
The plants tolerated everything I threw at them, finally settling on a 3 times daily feeding with the drip tubes, with various organic goodies tossed in the bucket/reservoir.
That's why I think I should have started light nutes in week two, tapering up to high N levels, then maintaining those while introducing flowering nutrients and other bloom boosters.
Right now I basically have stumps, but I left a couple nodes intact and have been blasting them with N. I kind of wanted to see if they'd regenerate, fully knowing that that's very unlikely with autos.
But they continue to put out white pistils and the little popcorn buds are nasty, sticky, and potent.
The plants smell of sweet lemon candy and hash. The flavor was not so great because I basically smoked 'em dry but green. Rich hashy taste, overall, though I suspect the aroma would've developed more in a more robust plant. Mine were just little bonsai, but I did get buds with minimal effort and expense.
All in all an easy to grow strain, and one that will probably respond to whatever you can do to create optimal conditions. Ample trichomes everywhere, good hybrid structure and bud formation, and relatively pest and problem free.
I did have mites, but I applied an organic compound via misting and it did clear them up. It took a week or so, but it did work like the guy said.
