It's a boy!!!

[5th]

And that's a good thing...

I'm new to AF's and think they might be just what I need to get me through until the fall harvest. So I've done alot of reading here in the AF section and decided to giver' a go. I wanted to try something different and bought a 10 pack of mixed Mach 3. ( I found an unfinished grow here awhile ago but damned if I can find it again) The plan was to get a male, cull the females, and do a seed run.

I've been using a "Tick Style" grow box for the past few months for all my seedling/vegging/cloning needs and love the damn thing. 16x32w mixed spectrum floro's give me all the light I need in the 5ftx2ft interior.


Here we are at day 4, some are poking through the jiffy pucks...most are not. Two on the left are Fast Pine grown from seed de-fol'ed and topped. The Sativa is bag seed I affectionately refer to as "Plan B".

After a week in the jiffy pucks they were put into 4L bubble buckets and given 1/4 strength 10-52-10 plant starter fertilizer.

This is the 3rd week from germination, small as usual as I always have about a week of transplant shock. These pictures were taken the other day before they went into their own containers. The one on the left had the neoprene insert cut out and replaced with hydroton incase you notice something odd about future pictures.

This picture is a few days old and shows the two "spares" in the back incase the front two are female. The two in the front are bubbling away with 1/4 strength Flora Nova and loving it.

Oh yeah...all this damn rambling, three or four days later and I have a confirmed male. (one on the left)(I've never seen nuts on a plant that small, blows my mind)


This is just screwing around to help me visualize..but tomorrow I'll be spending the day making my baby boy his own condo.

I'll be posting a ton of noob questions tomorrow and hope the community will help enlighten me. Comments and critiques are always appreciated.

5th

 

[5th]

Did a nute change yesterday and found out one of the spares was a male. Swapped him out with the female. Both males are upfront on 1/4 strenght Flora Nova Grow, now waiting for the condo to finish being built. Female alone in the back, other spare/runt culled.


So being almost a month old now...and having shown sex, I'm going to guess the flowering part is in full effect. Should I be switching to bloom nutes now? I've never used 1 part nute solution before so mixing them just sounds like a bad idea...but I've been wrong before.

I was going to stick the female in with the males and give her a lil' pollen dusting when pollen becomes available. Any thoughts on that?

I'll get it finished tomorrow, (need another pc fan) but heres where we sit so far.

4" passive intake on the bottom, holes been drilled already through the floor of the electric compartment for my diy scrubber that will pull air through the flower chamber ceiling into the ballast/timer/pump area. Then another pc fan extracts that air through the back and out of the box.

Any suggestions of how to quiet my dual output air pump? It's wrapped in a towel at the moment and it helps...but theres gotta be a better way lol.

5th

 

[5th]

Day 31

Day 31

The larger male, (left hand side) grew at least three inches in the past 12 hours. Opened the cab an hour ago to find the top was now in between the bulbs and the tiny leaves crispy. Decided not to tone down the bloom nutes and gavem 2.5ml/L.

And the finished condo. Still a few light leaks to work on but nothing substantial.

So a month to go ... auto's are the perfect plant for impatient growers it seems .

5th

 

[Scrogerman]

Hey man,
I Like it, in answer to your pump question i thought id mention 'Bungie', hang it with rubber/cord etc. may help a little, if pumps touch the walls of your cab you get all sorts of resonant humming. they need to keep cool, wrapping in a towel might not help much, maybe sit it on foam(leave the intake free), that works some too, hangings better though.
Happy growing mate.

G'Luck man!

 

[Claude Hopper]

Looking good. I tried the autos for a quick crop, too. Now I'm a bit fascinated with them.

I'm sure they'll be the focus of my cool weather growing for a while.

In the summer months I'll try them outside with some of the new Nordic strains I snagged from Hybrids From Hell.

 

[5th]

Hell I've probably read that a thousand times and just plain forgot Scrogerman ,thanks I'll head out to the shed n' grab one now.

I'm with you Claude. Was initially just thinking a quick crop, now I'm going to splurge on some quality beans. My Fast Pine moms for example, been in veg for months. Pretty to look at don't get me wrong...but there just sitting there doing fuck all. With AF's we get all the fun of a normal grow condensed into 2 or so months. lol...awesome.


A buddy of mine has a powdery mildew problem. Bought and used a sulfur burner yesterday so I'm hoping his/our problem is solved. (its not really my problem, but I've a few plants that are flowering with his) So I opened up the cab this afternoon to find that shit on my plants and I lose it...I mean I fucking lost my mind. So about five minutes into my rant I grab the lil bastards by the stalk and I'm about to yank 'em. Pollen falls off the plant onto my hand. Fucking pollen. I still feel like an idiot.

 

[Claude Hopper]

Hell I've probably read that a thousand times and just plain forgot Scrogerman ,thanks I'll head out to the shed n' grab one now.

I'm with you Claude. Was initially just thinking a quick crop, now I'm going to splurge on some quality beans. My Fast Pine moms for example, been in veg for months. Pretty to look at don't get me wrong...but there just sitting there doing fuck all. With AF's we get all the fun of a normal grow condensed into 2 or so months. lol...awesome.


A buddy of mine has a powdery mildew problem. Bought and used a sulfur burner yesterday so I'm hoping his/our problem is solved. (its not really my problem, but I've a few plants that are flowering with his) So I opened up the cab this afternoon to find that shit on my plants and I lose it...I mean I fucking lost my mind. So about five minutes into my rant I grab the lil bastards by the stalk and I'm about to yank 'em. Pollen falls off the plant onto my hand. Fucking pollen. I still feel like an idiot.

LOL!

With AF's we get all the fun of a normal grow condensed into 2 or so months. lol...awesome.

Me and Mrs Hopper joke about what we'll face each time we open the cab! There's a dramatic difference everyday.

I'm with you on good beans. I tried the LR2's because I knew they were pretty stable and had a decent track record. I've got too many beans now but I'd still like to pick up either/all of the Onyx, Sour 60, Pink Bud and Fruit Salad. Mitch's current grow is yielding some phenomenally beautiful flowers of both the latter varieties. I'm eagerly awaiting his smoke tests.

 

[5th]

The Onyx grows/results on this site have me pretty stoked to give it a shot. Got a 10 pack of LR2...it came with 5. None cracked...so it's left a bad taste in my mouth.

I'm undecided on exactly what I plan to do after this seed run. I mean provided the smoke is good I'd like to keep running it. Since plant numbers aren't a care or concern I could fit 120 into my little area...or I could run a perpetual harvest and trim weekly. lol...been wanting to try a 400w vert system for awhile...so many options...

 

[5th]

I've never grown a male before.....ever....or an AF for that matter. Check out the pic from three days ago. So much for internodal stretching.

 

[mitch_connor]

a little hard to tell from the photo but it looks like they might be starting to drop some pollen soon, are they somewhere safe away from your ladies?

is it a select pollination or a seedrun for outdoor later in the year?

 

[5th]

It's a shitty camera, sorry about that. Pollens already dropped and collected from the tall one on the left. Female in the back dusted with said pollen, Yep, seed run for the soon coming spring, summer, fall.

 

[mitch_connor]

sweet, good work

 

[5th]

Day 35

Day 35

Yeah I know. Its alot of pictures of the same lil plants.
I'm hoping the stretch is almost over.

I gave my moms the maximum recommended dosage of Flora Nova Grow before the weekend and they loved it. Then forgot they existed and forgot to feed 'em. Watered last night and they sprang back to life. The point is I'm so impressed with this brand of nutes I decided to give a full dose of the Bloom to the AF's. So lets see how they like that.

Anyone care to comment on if I should continue to feed nutes right up until chop? 0% of these plants will be consumed so its not an issue of smoking harsh seeds lol.

5th

 

[5th]

Day 39

Day 39



...ok...now I think the stretching has stopped.
The female in the back is packing on the buds...lol...well ok no its not. But the flower sites are looking good, nugs about the size of dimes at the moment.

Both of these males have grown to roughly 24". They showed their sex at about 4". This is exactly the trait I was looking for in an AF plant. The female is leaning towards the White Widow part of her lineage. Actually if it was 6ft taller it would have been identical to a WW plant I grew a few years ago. So thats also a good thing.

Everytime I open the damn door on this thing (which is quite often lol) I get a blast of pollen shot into the room. I'm only visiting my moms in the Tick box in the morning before I open the AF cab to try to give myself piece of mind. The two are at opposite ends of the house but I still worry...and I miss my moms.

 

[habeeb]

^ for future, you can just top the males to keep them shorter.. so you don't have to bend them and raise the light..

have fun


also like your thinking, on the short ( 4 inch ) plants.. who wants a tall ass autoflower ???

 

[5th]

You know the thought never crossed my mind habeeb. Hell I top everything else...why not a male. Thanks for the tip.

The lights in a fixed position however, I just use empty boxes of beer to adjust my plant height. This way I always have a few shelves around.

 

[5th]

Day 44

Day 44

Was time to come out of the box for a lil' while n' get some sun.

Shes only 6"...and both males grew to just shy of 24" so I'm not quite sure what to expect out of this. As you can see the males have been culled...and more for the fact of trying it, I collected pollen aswell. Placed an order last night for Russian Rocket Fuel so I'm eagerly awaiting their arrival. lol, hoping for the bush pheno like everyone else who buys them.

EH!!!! This is your reminder you cut clones on the 20th

 

[5th]

Day 52

Day 52



Surprisingly (for me anyways) the lil' seed/bud stick has grown another half inch in the past week. Going to keep running flowering nutes for another few days then begin the flush. Took a sample bud, and other then being harsh as hell...it did the job nicely. Almost a lemon skunk type of smoke.

Out of my 10 Russian Rocket Fuel seeds 9 have cracked and have been put into peat pucks. Also cut another 10 Fast Pine clones today.

 

[Greenheart]

Hey man,
I Like it, in answer to your pump question i thought id mention 'Bungie', hang it with rubber/cord etc. may help a little, if pumps touch the walls of your cab you get all sorts of resonant humming. they need to keep cool, wrapping in a towel might not help much, maybe sit it on foam(leave the intake free), that works some too, hangings better though.
Happy growing mate.

G'Luck man!

What he said.

I placed a hook in the cieling and formed a small loop in the cord to hang the pump from. Things were much quieter without walls and countertops for it to vibrate against. I use a dual 50 gallon myself during flush.

 

[CannabisPatient]

You could top the boy or maybe even better would be to super crop him.

I am doing my first auto flower grow currently with some auto Ak x Diesel Ryders. I am doing a seed run to get beans for the summer too. lol

Good luck with your project. Looking very good. The size makes me want to do bubbles next round.

Maybe take some of that pollen and hit the preflowers on your mother plants. You could get a few extra beans that might be very interesting to throw around outside.

Happy Growing,
CP