A Grow to Pass the Time

[brandon.]

Well I placed a seed order recently after the two freebies I planted didn't make it past germination. In the meantime, I had some random bag seed that came from some good bud that I figure I'd experiment on.

My seed order for those that want to know:
10 Nirvana - Northern Lights
5 Kannabia - White Domina Auto

And now for the grow!

Current Setup
Stealth cabinet inside my desk (still unfinished)
Three 23w 2700k CFLs
Fox Farm Ocean Forest
Neptune's Harvest Fish and Seaweed Blend Fertilzer (2-3-1)
Grandma's Unsulfered Molasses (might use Organic Blue Agave Syrup)

adding soon

One 23w and Two 13w 2700k bulbs
4" inline fan
htgsupply carbon scrubber

For this grow I'm going to use 12/12 from seed just to see what I can do with it using my setup. I know my yields are going to be lower, but it's bagseed so I just want to play.

Now let's get caught up!

 

[brandon.]

Wednesday, November 17th
Placed 14 viable bagseeds into a glass of distilled water to germinate.

Thursday, November 18th
1 seed already successfully germinated. Taproot approximately 1/10 of an inch long. The seed was placed in a makeshift container, made from the bottom of a water bottle. It was planted into the soil slightly deeper than the height of the seed.

Friday, November 19th
2 more seeds successfully germinated. Placed into makeshift containers.

Sunday, November 21st
Only one of the seeds made it through planting so far. The cracked seed appeared peering out of the top of the soil. Success! It's growing a lot faster than I originally thought it would.

Tuesday, November 23rd
Seed shell fell of, and it's cotyledons are out!

Sunday, November 28th (Day 5)
The seedling is looking great. Second set of true leaves have appeared. It's a brilliant smooth green color, no signs of any issues so far. Cab temps are staying steady at 82-86 degrees. Although the stem appears to be strong, the seedling has been leaning quite a bit. I've had plenty of air moving on the stem the entire time the light is on (should I have the fan blowing during the dark period also?) but it is still falling over the side. After a few days of wrestling the stem to stand up using a pen laid across the top of the container, I decided to transplant it into a larger container. My hopes were that if the new soil were packed higher on the stem, it would be sturdier. After transplanting I watered with the neptunes harvest and put it back under the lights.

 

[brandon.]

Monday, November 29th (Day 6)

Monday, November 29th (Day 6)

I heard the faint click of my timer activating and turning on my setup. I anxiously peaked in on my baby and she is looking GREAT! I can already see the benefits of the nutes. As for the stem, it seems to be doing great. It feels very secure in the soil, even though it's not packed super tight. It's standing on it's own no problem.

 

[brandon.]

Wednesday, December 1st (Day 8)

Wednesday, December 1st (Day 8)

It's looking real good. Nice growth on it, doesn't seem to be stretching to my lights too much. I was thinking I may have to water today but I'm going to wait a day or two and then start introducing the molasses.

Do you guys think I should use the molasses or the organic agave syrup?

 

[brandon.]

Thursday, December 2nd (Day 9)

Thursday, December 2nd (Day 9)

I ended up watering my baby last night before I put it to bed. Smaller containers never hold their water as long as the big ones. I used a bit of the agave syrup, not much of it, probably 1/2 Tbsp.

I think it's looking awesome. How long do you think it will take to show sex doing 12/12 from seed?

 

[brandon.]

Friday, December 3rd (Day 10)

Friday, December 3rd (Day 10)

Welcome to Day 10. Nothing significant to report. It's coming along nicely.

It looks like my crappy camera is showing almost a yellowish tint on the leaves. I tried fixing the white-balance as much as I could but I can't get it to go away.

 

[brandon.]

Sunday, December 5th (Day 12)

Sunday, December 5th (Day 12)

Here's my girl (hopefully!)

 

[brandon.]

Here's my setup for anyone interested.

Here's my setup for anyone interested.

Heres the outside. I know, bit of a light leak. But this desk is also located in a closet that gets closed up when I put her to bed. I actually sat on top of the desk with the doors closed and the lights in the room off (she sleeps when I sleep) and let my eyes adjust to make sure I didn't have light leak from the TV.

This is the left chamber as it sits now. Once I get the 'Y' adapters, the power strip will be relocated to the ceiling of the chamber. I'll be using 3 adapters so I can add three bulbs. Two sets of 23w CFL's on the ends and a set of 13w in the middle socket. I think that puts me ~8000+ lumens which isn't to bad I guess. I also bought a piece of 1/8" MDF which is getting nailed to the back of the desk tomorrow. Right now it has that crap cardboard desk backing you get from walmart grade furniture. This side has the back out because this is where my computer tower used to sit.

This is the right chamber which is slightly wider. I took off the divider extension I made so I can get some light into this chamber for my cheap camera. The chambers aren't sealed from each other, so I made a cheap extension of the middle bracing board. It's not pretty but it works.

 

[brandon.]

My baby in trouble

My baby in trouble

Nitrogen deficiency strikes!

 

[brandon.]

Friday, December 10th (Day 17)

Friday, December 10th (Day 17)

Ok guys, finally got around to transplanting my baby. Not sure exactly how large the new container is because it's something I had laying around in the garage (took me long enough to find it haha).

I hope I didn't do any irreparable damage by waiting this long to transplant. I noticed today that there was actually some new growth in the past day or two, albeit not the healthiest.

Good vibes everyone.

 

[brandon.]

Saturday, December 11 (Day 18)

Saturday, December 11 (Day 18)

No real progress as of today but it's still early. It'll pick up in a day or two. I have faith! I've been sending good vibes to my plant all night haha.

Here's a quick look at the beginning of my LST system with this bigger pot. I have a bunch of these tiny hooks from a picture frame hanging kit I purchased years ago. They stay surprisingly tight into this cheap plastic. I'm going to screw the all around the side so that I have enough spots to tie down my baby.

Here you can see my anchor spot. This will help keep the plant from coming unrooted as I start to tie it down. This is the only hook that will be on the inside of the plant. It's also about an inch or so lower than the rest of the hooks. The string isn't very tight because I haven't started the LST in this container yet.

 

[brandon.]

A little bondage never hurt!

A little bondage never hurt!

I was bored and wanted to spend some time with my plant so I went ahead and bent her (finger crossed it's a female anyway) over.

Is it possible she's showing preflowers already?

 

[brandon.]

Sunday, December 12th (Day 19)

Sunday, December 12th (Day 19)

Well I can't really tell if the nitrogen deficiency is going away. It definitely seems like it went through a growth spurt. Good new growth on top, even though it's a yellowish-green. I can tell you that the yellowing hasn't spread any further. It's already turned completely up towards the light after the LST last night. I might even have to tie her down further before lights out tonight.

Whatd'ya think.

I really have to buy another dSLR at some point. I can't stand the color this shitty camera captures.

 

[brandon.]

Monday, December 13th (Day 20)

Monday, December 13th (Day 20)

Well the plant is looking great. The new growth is nice and green. It's coming in quick actually! A little too quick... I didn't notice it touching my lights today so the tips got a little burnt. Poor girl.

Anyway let me know what you think!

 

[brandon.]

Tuesday, December 14th (Day 21)

Tuesday, December 14th (Day 21)

My baby is recovering awesomely. Nice new growth. I'm considering topping it before I do any more LST work. I'm thinking if I can snip it low to get 2 main colas I can LST them around the rim of the container.

Do you think it would be smart to top since I'm flowering? Or should I just leave it as is.

 

[brandon.]

Wednesday, December 15th (Day 22)

Wednesday, December 15th (Day 22)

Any yellow on the new growth is due to my shitty camera.

 

[brandon.]

OK! We're all caught up. That took forever copying posts from another forum. Please feel free to comment on my grow. I encourage you to speak your mind about my setup. I know it's not the best but I have something better in the works

 

[touringfunkband]

hey brandon-

From the pic in your first post it looks like you got some of the same FFOF that I'm seeing around here in the midwest. This is a much different mixture then what I had been use to seeing in past years in that its much less rich, much more brown colored, and definitely has more peat, sticks and bark in it then i have ever seen in OF. It also runs extra hot which has caused crazy deficiencies with a current bogglegum grow i have finishing up. I'm just curious if you have amended your soil with any dolomite lime and/or are doing any ph testing of your run-off or nutrient mixes.

 

[brandon.]

hey brandon-

From the pic in your first post it looks like you got some of the same FFOF that I'm seeing around here in the midwest. This is a much different mixture then what I had been use to seeing in past years in that its much less rich, much more brown colored, and definitely has more peat, sticks and bark in it then i have ever seen in OF. It also runs extra hot which has caused crazy deficiencies with a current bogglegum grow i have finishing up. I'm just curious if you have amended your soil with any dolomite lime and/or are doing any ph testing of your run-off or nutrient mixes.

Hey touring! Thanks for checking out my grow. This is my first time using FFOF. Why do you think it's different from the other OF you've seen? New blend, or did we just get some shit bags?

I haven't amended my soil with anything, but next grow I'm going to do a 50/50 mix of FFOF and Light Warrior. I didn't have an issue with my FFOF being too hot, but I'd really like the mycorrhizae fungi that's in FFLW (I'm pretty sure there isn't any in FFOF, but then again I'm a noob)

Unfortunately I only have a crappy pH drip tester. I'm pretty sure my nitrogen deficiency was caused by my nutrients. I couldn't find any info on the companies website so I eventually emailed them and asked for a lab analysis. When the sent it back the pH was 3.6! I'm pretty sure this locked out my nitrogen (as well as a lot of other nutes, I'm sure...)

I tested my run off before and after transplant. It came in at 5.0-5.5... I asked on my other forum about it and they said it was normal...?

Btw I'm watering with pH 7 right now (haven't added more nutes yet). I'm new to growing the right way so I'm not really sure about pH

 

[touringfunkband]

The FFOF I had been use to seeing in the past was much richer with much less filler junk in it IMO. It was black with richness and you could easily clump it together like a snow ball. It didn't have an excess of peat and it definitely didn't have all this bark and sticks I'm seeing in it now. It is also much lighter in weight and looks much more brown, very similar to what LW looks like. I don't mean to cause you panic, but you might consider amending with some lime on your next transplanting so the mix isn't so hot. You might save yourself from some obvious pH caused deficiencies down the road. It couldn't hurt to also invest in a good pH pen if your financially able to. I picked up a nice Oakton Ecotestr for 65$ or so which is pointing out a lot of pH variances in my current Bogglegum grow.