A simple way to beat mold.

[Greenrocket]

Heres a idea that I found works and at this stage I cant see any negative effects from it.

On some strains when I get big buds I have pulled them early due to mold.

Anyway while looking for mold I got to thinking of why it occurs and thought if the buds werent so compressed together than air can pass through making it less likely for mold to occur.

So I grabbed a bud leaf from buds that were a part of them main cola and gently pulled the bud away from the main stem and other buds.

I havent had a problem with mold since and have been able to flower plants to full maturity.

If anyone can think of as reason why this may be detrimental to the plant let me know, if not it works great.

 

[sneakinman13]

i find that aslong as you have a sufficient enough air flow and humidity in the 40 percent range you should be good. i just grew some ak-47 with superrrrr fat tops. didnt get any mold and i had tons of plants touching each other... not saying you dont have good air flow just chiming in with my thoughts here.. take care

 

[Greenrocket]

My airflow could be better but its usually good enough.

I have come across a few strains that can mold not due to lack of air circulation but because the buds are that condensed that they cant breath at all.

Plants in flower and dried bud pictures.

 

[rocket high]

What about the top of the plants ?... one of my Big Devil plants had bud rot on the top of the cola and they had plenty of air movement but it was outdoors so i couldnt control the humitity

 

[Greenrocket]

Cant help you there rocket high, your really at the mercy of nature in your situation.

 

[Andyo]

good idea

good idea

Yes its a good idea not everybody can control humidity.
I moved to thailand and ive grown uk n spain never any mold but here even with air conditioners and tons of air flow big tight colas can get mold ive had 6 plants out of 40 get it .
Pulling the buds away from the stem would have prevented it .A

 

[Greenrocket]

I think the strain plays a big part as well.

1) Maybe the thickest collection of buds I have grown and no signs of mold.

2) Grown in the same area but infected with the plague.

 

[fabio1949]

G-rocket,
I just did the same to a blueberry strain with giant 3" thick colas.
Altho i had to throw away two main colas, the rest have been ok after spreading the buds out to allow air flow and running 40/50 % humidity

 

[buddin_904]

yea...strain dependent....get a new strain.......

 

[Greenrocket]

G-rocket,
I just did the same to a blueberry strain with giant 3" thick colas.
Altho i had to throw away two main colas, the rest have been ok after spreading the buds out to allow air flow and running 40/50 % humidity

Thats good to hear.

 

[Z10N]

yes that's the prefered method,
you can do it if you have a small grow,
but what about large grows? above 100 plants it gets a lil' tricky, not to talk about few thousand plants........ to control mold, lower the humidity in the grow area, increase ventilation and air flow, possibly start using a sulfur burner at the middle stages of flowering to avoid development of molds.

eliminate the cause from the core - and save time to deal with other growing duties.

possibly chose different strains that will fit your growing climate.
some strains are very resistant to molds,
arm-thick buds and 0% mold ChemD double sour diesel.....



it all works

peace

 

[GMT]

the easiest way is to top your plants a couple of times. You get extra yield and each cola is reduced in size which in turn reduces the odds of mold getting a hold.

 

[calstar]

Well...in my case topping and supercropping didn't really make the buds a lot smaller and I've lost a bit to botrytis(one strain I have is being affected, the ones with the thick, large flat leaves, supposedly sweet tooth but not 100% about that). These ladies are 3 months old(late start garden) and maxed at about 3.5' tall by 4' wide. They all have about 8 main colas and smaller ones under and in the canopy.

I'm very vigilant about inspecting them; if I see mold(or the sign of) I open the bud and cut it out with clean clippers, hit the cut stem with hydrogen peroxide, spray the area with potassium bicarb. and hope for the best. So far its been manageable(knock on wood a bunch of times). I also alternate foliar spray with potassium bicarb., 15% skim milk/85%water, and serenade. I started doing this for pm and will continue till harvest(which is probably a month away). Its a little counterintuitve spraying to stop mold and fungus growth, especially for botrytis which most often starts on the stem within the bud.

Here in so cal we just had three very foggy days, extremely humid and in the mid sixties, an excellent environment for mold(shit!).

Pictures show garden overview, bud size relative to a soda bottle, and a close up of whats going on in the bud interior.

 

[Greenrocket]

It was probably a poor choice of words in the thread title. It must of been a anti climax for growers who have larger crops.

Anyway, Calstar that is a nice looking set up.

 

[infinitylimit]

Not speaking from experience but I understand if you burn sulfur the last two weeks you will prevent mold from forming.

 

[BigBudBill]

Heres a idea that I found works and at this stage I cant see any negative effects from it.

On some strains when I get big buds I have pulled them early due to mold.

Anyway while looking for mold I got to thinking of why it occurs and thought if the buds werent so compressed together than air can pass through making it less likely for mold to occur.

So I grabbed a bud leaf from buds that were a part of them main cola and gently pulled the bud away from the main stem and other buds.

I havent had a problem with mold since and have been able to flower plants to full maturity.

If anyone can think of as reason why this may be detrimental to the plant let me know, if not it works great.

I was concerned about the potential for mold so I tried this as well. I am only under a 400 and have topped my plants for more,smaller colas to fill up my canopy.

One thing I noticed when pulling the buds away from the stem is that,flowers that had limited light and airflow respond very nicely to this. They started darkening(they previously had that lighter green color than the flowers exposed to more air/light). The leaves new orientation kept them buds from returning to the original position.

This, with my rotation of the plants, seems(maybe I am biased) to have an effect of advancing the ripening of underexposed flowers.

 

[calstar]

Couldn't agree with you more bigBudBill. When you say you rotate them do you mean you change their orientation to the light source? I turn mine 180 degrees every 10 days to even out the plants growth.

 

[BigBudBill]

Couldn't agree with you more bigBudBill. When you say you rotate them do you mean you change their orientation to the light source? I turn mine 180 degrees every 10 days to even out the plants growth.

I rotate and they revolve around the light, as best as I can, while trying to maintain a "bowl" shaped canopy. This means it's not exact and more of a feel for me, with those guiding principles, as my canopy is never perfect.

Not a single spec of PM this time around, even with ~70% RH in the room feeding fresh air into my grow area(Grow area was ~50% day, ~60% night). I did not use any products, just concentrated on giving them them best environment possible. Rather than try to address possible low yields by foliar feeding, I realized that this was just another source of moisture on the leaves and breeding ground for PM. I decided I would sacrifice any potential gain in yield to determine if this was a source of my PM.

I dont think I lost any yield(drying the crop right now), if not gained some by concentrating on dialing in the environment, rather than looking for some product(s) or method to give me help.
I am very happy with the result.

Also when I was trimming I also used my scissors to pry the bud away gently from the stalk, allowing more airflow through, similar to what the OP mentioned(and I used as well) to pull the buds away.

 

[Greenrocket]

Some good info, I have never really tried rotating plants as it probably should be done. My grow set up is fairly basic when it comes to ventilation. I mainly leave the room door half open with 3 normal fans going 24 hours a day. Every few days ill face a fan directly into the doorway to try and flush out stale air. I think if there was a way of seeing air movement there would be pockets of poorer quality airflow. So if I do rotate, it is to give the fatter buds or the more susceptable strains priority. I also noticed that the buds from a big cola on certain strains dont all seem to mature well when they are very compressed and some of the really nice buds surfaces that get very limited light or air can look a bit like broccoli when broken up. I found seperating the buds even a small ammount helps the buds in the cola's to mature a bit more overall making hopefully making the main cola more productive. This is only my opinion and Its really only practical on a smaller scale.

 

[Ratzilla]

Being I grow a strain that I made myself.
It is a cross of Red Hair Skunk X Cinderella 99
I call it Skunk A Rella
So far its downfall is that the tops of these plants get BIG and DENSE and as I grow along and these colas are getting bigger and fatter they are attracting Botrytis.
I do plan to include more topping in the future in trying to keep the top colas size smaller.
I mean I am in a closet 50 inches X 24 inches.
I pack 10 females in there under a 1000W HPS
I rotate the plants when I water
I also have 3 fans going now.
I might want to increase the air flow some.
But mostly I have been looking at SERENADE its OMRI certified and they say its safe to spray on harvest day.
So do any of you growers use Serenade for protection from bud rot.
If so how often are you using it
How you mixing it.
I suppose all that information is with the product.
I mean my plants are healthy and happy at harvest and with big donkey dick size colas Botrytis has started to show itself.
A little more air and kicking in the plants SAR with Serenade is my thought!
Any other idea's?
Please don't say change the strain for this is my strain.