4th Grow... This Time Blueberry

[thunderpob]

Hey all.

So it time for my fourth Grow. Now i am small time, 5 plants only, so don't expect to see hundreds of plants and lots of light. I like to keep things simple, the simpler the better.

So to the technical stuff.

Seeds etc

I am growing from seed, Dutch Passion Blueberry (feminised)

Soil and Ferts
Grow medium is soil, Bio Bizz all mix (started in Light Mix)
During Veg they were getting feed with Bio Bizz Grow (5ml per litre)
During Flower they are getting Bio Bizz Bloom (6ml per litre) and Bio Bizz Topmax (5ml per litre)
Water source is rain water that is a constant 6.4ph

I think you get the picture that i am heavily into keeping this organic. To me Organic = Simple.

Environment

Temperatures range from a max of 92f lights on and 68f lights off. Humidity is around 45-65%

i have one input fan (4") and one output fan which is a 5" drawing through a carbon filter and venting to the outside world.

the grow "room" (or cabin as i like to call it) is 5 foot square with a height of about 6 foot, covered in mylar from top to bottom

Lights

1 x 400w
Veg was a Metal Halide (apparently they love the blue spectrum during Veg)
and in flower they are under a 400 Watt Osram Sodium Son-T-Plus Lamp (for the orange spectrum during Flower)

next chapter.. how it all started (with pictures)
oh and sorry in advance for the photos, my mac an my camera really don't get on.

 

[Prof Sublime]

Looks like I got the first seat.
You got my attention let the show begin.

 

[kro-magnon]

wow you're really heavy on the nutes. I don't know how your plants perform but i think they are overfed with this quantity per litre.

 

[thunderpob]

...The Next Chapter (now with pictures)

...The Next Chapter (now with pictures)

...So I got my seeds and germinated them straight away.

All 5 popped with ease, i used the Ziploc bag, wet paper towel on a window sill method. i have always used this method and it hasn't failed me yet.

On day 6, I transplanted them into peat cubes and then into small pots with the BB Light Mix

Around day 12 (to be honest i didn't write it on my calender so that is a bit of a guess) they looked like this.




They were kept on the window sill for about the first 15 days, it gets great morning sun.

They seemed to grow really tall really quickly so i had to use some wooden bbq skewers, lightly tied to the stalks for support. Now i really wouldn't advise this, as after two days and even though i was careful about watering the skewers promoted some fungal growth around the base of the seedling. Luckily, the plants were strong enough to stand on their own and showed no ill effects, after i removed them.

From there i put them into a the green house, mainly because it was getting way too obvious what i was growing and the inlaws were coming round....

 

[thunderpob]

Cheers Proff you have officially claimed "first"

kro-magnon - i actually had to up from 4ml per litre to 6 as they were hungry! i am trying to sort out the photos for my next entry

 

[Prof Sublime]

Aww look at the cute little babies.
Hahaha

 

[thunderpob]

indeed they are my babies

 

[thunderpob]

Chapter Three... the grow room

Chapter Three... the grow room

Being a bit handy with an electric screwdriver, i constructed what i consider to be the mother of all grow rooms so far. (others will disagree but i care not)

The cabin is half my shed and covered in mylar,


(if you want to look at it properly then turn your screen around 90 degrees clockwise - i hate my mac and it hates my camera)

i took all possible precautions with the heat signature from above (helicopters are are a wonder to behold but a pain when they are flying police colours) i take the opinion that camouflage is better than trying to hide things totally.

As it is "summer" as we laughable call it in this country, i went for lights on during the day and off at night to minimise the risk of detection the roof being black and all. i would say that this is a massive risk, growing outside in a shed and all but i have my reasons and after measuring the temperature on the roof (in excess of of 100f in sunlight) i thought bugger it.

I am running with a 4" inline fan inputing from the outside (which negates the need for an osculating fan in such a small space) with the ducting that i am drawing through capped off with a pair of tights to prevent bugs being sucked in ( i like the rest of us am paranoid about spider mite) and a 5" inline connected to a carbon filter for the output, temps stay at around 85-90f at during the day and 65-75f at night depending on the outside temps.

The light (400w mh during veg and 400w son-T-Plus for flower) started off on a on sliders, then when height became an issue (which it did) i had to attach it to directly to the roof.

i have just realised that this must be REALLY boring to read.... but i have written it now so sod it i will post it anyway.

 

[Prof Sublime]

Its not boring, just explaining your setup.


Cool setup, and stay safe.

 

[thunderpob]

Chapter Four... There May Be Trouble ahead....

Chapter Four... There May Be Trouble ahead....

Every thing proceed as normal, the girls were transplanted from their smaller pots straight to (i think) 15 litre pots. at this point i moved them into the cabin under the 400w MH lamp. As an experiment i moved one of the five to a 5 litre pot (then after 2 weeks onto the 15 litre pots)

they grew well, a little too well....

now, as i have the space and i am not too worried about time, i vegged them for around 4 weeks under the classic 18/6 cycle of light/dark, i have experimented with 24 hours of light during veg but i am yet to see a difference and always felt it to be unnatural so as we now live in an age of energy efficiency i have reverted to the 18/6 cycle.

so after around 50 days (well from the last pictures i posted) and 2 weeks into flower, they looked like this.









you may notice that in the first image there is a "snapped" branch. i did this on the advice of a friendly local head shop proprietor and i admit to being skeptical at first but it really did help with my height issues and had no ill effects (quite the reverse in fact) apart from an unsightly blug that formed at he pinch point.

when i moved them back into the grow room (these images are taken out side) i noticed something i have never seen before and being the inquisitive chap that i am i decided to leave it and see what happened.

this was a BAD IDEA.

what i noticed was some odd growths directly on the main stems of one of the plants. i decided to let nature take it's course. (i really wish i had photos of these growths but sadly i don't)

what i didn't realise is that one of my "female" plants was not stable and produced about 8 full on male flowers. i don't know why, as i had checked for light leaks in the grow room and passed it as dark so i can only assume that this was an abboration of a particularly head strong plant intent on naughtiness. ( that or i failed to remember that feminised seeds are never 100% female)

about 4 days after i had returned the plants to the grow room i had one of those "oh no second" moments. i opened the room and noticed some "dust" on the lower leaves of one of the plants it was at that point that many a minutes of swearing took place. i had finally realised what those strange growths were and they had released pollen.......

 

[thunderpob]

Chapter Five.... the horror

Chapter Five.... the horror

After about three days of panic i calmed down a bit and decided that the worst that could happen is that i would have a load iof seeds for my next run and would just have to deal with picking out the seed when i skinned up.

now i am sure you have all worked out that i don't profess to be at all an expert but It does however look like i got lucky. Only one of my plants (the same one with that showed the male flowers) looked like it got pollinated. and now it looks like i have some seeds maturing in some of the buds








and for that i am thankful, indeed the god of grow is smiling on me so far.

The only problem is that because i panicked, i riped out anything that looked odd just in case it was another set of male flowers (this is the first time this has happened so i didn't know what i was looking at, still you live and learn.

 

[Prof Sublime]

Hey those girls sure do look pretty. I think my outdoor grow got pollinated too. So dont feel bad. Next time as soon as you see the male flowers remove them or the plant or something. Dont worry about the seeds theres nothing wrong with seeds. Heres some pictures of males as I think you said you dont now what males look like really.

 

[thunderpob]

At least now i know what the warning signs are.

One day i would actually like to purposefully grow a male plant just for the hell of it.

MMmmmm outside grow... one day i am going to live somewhere that i can plant some outside and watch them grow

 

[Prof Sublime]

The plant in the right picture is an outdoor male that my friend left outside for some reason. Its about 6 feet tall.

 

[thunderpob]

kudos on the photos, i was looking around for some pictures when i was trying to work out what was going on with the plants, couldn't find any that i would say looked the anything like what was going on.

i didn't twig what the could be initially as they grew and released within 3 weeks of flipping them to 12/12.

still i am looking forward to seeing if i can grow out any of the seeds i collect, if i have understood what i have read about genetics they should be feminised as well..... i think.

 

[thunderpob]

Chapter Six... On The Road Again

Chapter Six... On The Road Again

After my panic and subsequent large amount of hacking about of the plants to remove some offending buds (i have since come to regret this) things settled down to a nice routine, each plant got around 1 to 1.5 litres a day o Bio Bizz Bloom along with the top max supplement. i initially stared with 4 ml per litre of both Bloom and top max but the girls were looking a bit weedy so i gradually upped it to 6ml per litre of Bloom. As a few people have said to me, this is a tad high, but the girls loved it and shot up.

In order to reduce the risk of "locking" the nutrients out (something i have read about and only understood a little) i feed with straight water every ten days. i intend to feed with bloom up until the last week before harvest, some say to flush with straight water from two weeks before harvest, some say it's ok to feed under and an organic regime right up until harvest so i err on the side of caution and am going to split the difference and flush from 1 week before harvest.

So, i am now at about day 35/38 of flower (sorry to be a bit vague but hell i am a stoner and i sometimes forget to record things properly)... as previously mentioned one of the plants got a bit fertilised and is busy producing some seeds but the other four plants are continuing their majestic progress and damn if they don't look like the best things this side of a smoked bacon sandwich first thing in the morning after a heavy night.

here are the latest pictures

 

[thunderpob]

oh and one of my fav's

 

[Prof Sublime]

Yeah as far as I know a female gone hermie produces fem seeds. Alot of people will bitch n moan that you shouldnt grow seeds from a plant that went hermie cause noone wants hermie plants. I say give it a try who cares. Im glad the pictures helped, I just wanted to show you the early signs of a male(left) and a mature male that popped already(right).
Take it easy brotha

Btw, are the seeds going to be BB x BB.???

Edit:
Opps didnt see chapter 6, all I can say is those buds look great!!!
Keep em coming.

 

[thunderpob]

yeah, i expect the seeds to be BB x BB as they are the only seeds i planted out... that of course depends on whether thge seeds i bought were all BB...

in my book, it all good if they are free

 

[Prof Sublime]

I am sure they are all BB, I dbout DP is going to rip you off.
As you said free is good.