600 Vert: Ak-47 in coco coir

Welcome vertical growers!

I've wanted to give bare bulb vertical growing a shot for quite some time now, so thought I'd buckle down and create a space for the spare 600 watt HPS I had sitting around.


This is what we're trying to grow! This nug is actually from a different AK mom I used to have, but she was from the same Serious Seeds pack and look very similar structurally. Hopefully we see quite a bit of this in the next few weeks.


Here are my (4) AK-47 gals on June 29. This is only a few hours after being transplanted into 3 gallon containers and set around the 600 HPS for the first time. Before being moved to their final spots they rooted within 10 days, spent 20 days vegging under LED lights in keg cups, then spent another 2 weeks under the same 126 watt LED in 1 gallon containers. I'm guessing they're about 2 months old at his point.


The 3 gallon pots they're in are night & day from the containers that I used to use to use. The old containers were stamped as 3 gallons pots but they were only 2.25 gallons when I measured them. The new ones are actually 3 gallons.


When the plants were this size is was hard to tell how big & bushy they were going to get. I was thinking it was going to be a disaster, but 23 days later they're doing great and there hasn't been a single burnt leaf yet.

Images from today to follow. . .

Day 13 of Flowering

Day 13 of Flowering

After 10 days of vegging in the 3 gallon containers around the 600 watt HPS, the plants were between 26"-29" so I flipped them to 12/12.


The plants are about 36" tall above the top of the medium as of today.


The canopy isn't as full as Aero's doughnut but it's about as good as I imagined considering that my space is only 46" wide x 35" deep! The center of the shorter walls are solid canopy, but the center of the longer back wall & the door are both a little thin. If I do this again, I'll take a second batch of cuts a couple weeks after the main plants so I can flower the second batch in 2 gallon pots to fill in any gaps in the canopy.


This is in a basement, but the heat wave we've been getting for the last few weeks is killing me! A small percentage of the larger fan leaves are showing signs of heat stress, but everything else looks fine. I think the worst of it is over now that it's cooled off a bit & the lamp is only on from 8 PM to 8 AM.

I'd love some input from the vertical grow regulars. . .

I'm thinking that drill is not going to grow with out more coco coir.

nice.sup wit d black n white???u on dat artty high!lol peace

Are you growing these plants in a timewarp from 1950?

I grow serious AK47 as well... I always have to watch the AK grows when I see them.

Dude all your leaves are grey?!?!? DEFICIONCYS!!!


lul

all the leaves are grey... and the sky is brown....

I went for a walk.... downtown....

Anti said:

Are you growing these plants in a timewarp from 1950?

I grow serious AK47 as well... I always have to watch the AK grows when I see them.

Click to expand...

Well any info you have on the strain would be much appreciated. I don't have much experience with it and I've never grown out larger plants like this before. Info on stretch would be especially appreciated.

As far as the time warp, I decided against plasticing up the room for a variety of reasons. As an unintended result, the exposed wood-colored paneling gives flash an odd color cast and we all know this site doesn't need anymore bud shots with a sickly colored hue to them.

But, to satisfy the curiosity. . .

very simple setup! Absolutely excelent!! I am hooked for this one. Let's hope you can manage 500g atleast! What are you feeding them, man?

Nice vert man, how often are you feeding?

It's been very hot here, more than +20 degrees F above the usual temps, so they're going through the water in their 3 gallon containers much faster than usual.

I use this line of nutrients in the yellow bottles because I haven't ever seen a difference between any two given 2 part nutrient lines & the local hydro store carries it:
http://yellowbottles.gostorego.com/


My feeding routine is generally based off of Crazy Composer's routine. Very simple, easy & effective. Check it out here:
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=209274

I only have two feeding recipes, one for a 1100 PPM veg mix, & one for a 1100 PPM flowering mix. They'll be switching to flowering nutrients on Day 14 of flowering. No water or nutrient solution is ever flushed out the bottom. I control the concentration of the nutrients in the containers by controlling how often/when they get the plain water. I don't really have a schedule for when they get fed and when they get plain 0 PPM PH-balanced RO water. I'd say on average there's usually about 2 feedings before there's a plain watering, but it depends on a lot of things, mostly grow-space temps & strain.

My Ingredients
• 0 PPM RO water
• add CalMag until the PPM's are around 150 PPM
• add a small dose of GH's Floaralicous Plus (just enough to color the water like iced tea otherwise things get gummed up)
• add my A+B nutrients in equal parts until the desired PPM's are reached
• a dose of Drip Clean if the solution is to used in one of my dripper systems
• Ph balance the resulting mix (never feed anything to the plants that isn't Ph balanced!)

For example, right now it's been hot, so when I saturate the containers, then come back and feel they're close to empty only about 24 hours later, I know that most of that water evaporated. There's just no way that a plant used that much water that quickly, especially when the plants are smaller for the pots size because they're still stretching. As a result, I give them plain Ph-balanced water more often, say every other watering/feeding because I know that the water was used faster than the nutrients, so when I re-water the pot I use plain water so the nutes don't build up in the medium. On the other hand, some of my outdoor starts (Sensi Seed's Early Girl in keg cups & coco coir) needed more nutes than the 1100 PPM veg mix was delivering. They were yellowing with a full strength feeding, so I knew I had to let the nutrients build up in the medium for a few days. . . as I kept feeding with the veg mix, the concentration of the leftover salts in the medium started to rise higher & higher. Sure enough, after a few feeding in a row, the PPM's in the keg cups must have raised to an acceptable level because they plants stopped yellowing and recovered. More time between plain waterings = higher PPM's, less time between plain waterings = less PPM's. No run-of & no measuring run-off, just simplicity. Just like Crazy Composer, I like to always keep my plants on the edge of yellowing. If I give them plain Ph-balanced RO water twice in a row without nutrients in between, they'll start to yellow. I like that because I know I can start the flush anytime and it lets me know where my plants are at.

Dudesome said:

very simple setup! Absolutely excelent!! I am hooked for this one. Let's hope you can manage 500g atleast! What are you feeding them, man?

Click to expand...

Three zips/plant would come out to 336 grams. 5 zips/plant would be 560 grams. If I can cut the difference and harvest an average of 4 zips/plant I'd be stoked. That'd be 448 grams. Mostly I want to have a positive experience with growing larger plants. Obviously I can't stick with this larger plant routine unless it pays off. After taking care of only 4 plants in veg, it would be hard to go back to caring for like 20 of them.

Nice. Now one more tip... And I'm not sure I will ever say this in public again, so pay attention... Use silica in your feeding regimen. Silica is the secret to super killer pot. It makes your pot burn 3 times better, and the high is three times higher. Shhhhhhhh!!! Don't tell everyone. But remember, I was the first to say it, and right here in your thread. Silica is the missing key from most indoor gardens... and most people who use it don't have a clue that it is helping their herb burn better and get them higher... they just think it's for plant strength and disease resistance! The advice to use silica is the best advice I can give for the grower who wants to achieve pot that burns even better than a cigarette. Tobacco is grown in sandy soil, and has access to lots of silica.

Crazy Composer said:

Nice. Now one more tip... And I'm not sure I will ever say this in public again, so pay attention... Use silica in your feeding regimen. Silica is the secret to super killer pot. It makes your pot burn 3 times better, and the high is three times higher. Shhhhhhhh!!! Don't tell everyone. But remember, I was the first to say it, and right here in your thread. Silica is the missing key from most indoor gardens... and most people who use it don't have a clue that it is helping their herb burn better and get them higher... they just think it's for plant strength and disease resistance! The advice to use silica is the best advice I can give for the grower who wants to achieve pot that burns even better than a cigarette. Tobacco is grown in sandy soil, and has access to lots of silica.

Click to expand...

brother, composer, is Liquid Silicon organic? is Silica organic? thanks!

most of what plants use for food is inorganic, though it may be found in organic substances.

Crazy Composer said:

Nice. Now one more tip... And I'm not sure I will ever say this in public again, so pay attention... Use silica in your feeding regimen. Silica is the secret to super killer pot. It makes your pot burn 3 times better, and the high is three times higher. Shhhhhhhh!!! Don't tell everyone. But remember, I was the first to say it, and right here in your thread. Silica is the missing key from most indoor gardens... and most people who use it don't have a clue that it is helping their herb burn better and get them higher... they just think it's for plant strength and disease resistance! The advice to use silica is the best advice I can give for the grower who wants to achieve pot that burns even better than a cigarette. Tobacco is grown in sandy soil, and has access to lots of silica.

Click to expand...

I figured you'd have some tips for me if you made it over this way! Thanks. I just have to google the word "silica" to see WTF it is now! Assuming it's locally available I'm going to implement it into my feeding recipe this round. Can't wait to see how it goes.

Now in Technicolor - Flowering Day 22

Now in Technicolor - Flowering Day 22


Some of the leaves are curled, especially near the bulb. The temps rise to about 87 degrees when the lights are on. That's a little hot, but I think it's mostly because the plants are so close to the bare bulb. The space is only 35" deep by 48" wide & the plants are big, so that doesn't leave much dead space around that bulb. I'd guess it to be 5-6" on the narrow side. The leaves on the inside of my ring look like they need nitrogen, but it's just from the bulb beating down on them all day.



All in all the plants look pretty good. They're tall! They've been stretching for 3 weeks now & I have to say they've filled up the space very well.


These pics suck, but the plants are tough to move at this point and quite honestly I've included them more for informational reasons than anything else. I've never grown plants this large before, but this is scary! I don't understand how the buds can already be running together at day 22. . . it's crazy! Even if they end up being a little fluffy from the heat I think this is going to be a fun grow to watch over the course of the next few weeks.

Looking real good man even with the heat; always wanted to try out the AK. I used to grow the doughnuts too in my old room and can't wait to flip my bulbs back the right way .


Don't be afraid to tug those buds down at the bottom back a bit with ties and such. Also a little fan leaf trim job to expose more buds goes a long way. Keep that lovely green canopy, but a few leaves here and there will definitely help to decrease fluff come harvest time.


Tagged up now, let's crank that 70's funk and bring on the buds....

I really like the green colour on your pics.

Day 32 of Flowering


They're killin' it!


Some leaf curl due to the heat, but given that the dimensions of the room can't be increased, that's just the way it's gonna be this run.


The buds are stacked so tightly that they're running together. I've never grown a strain like this!


I took an AK out of the donut for this pic so you could see the Casey's Dream I snuck in the back. She's my first test mom for House of Love Seeds and she's a very hardy plant so far! I just took 4 clones off her last week and now she's getting flowered. She'll be 4 weeks behind the AK's, but I'm in no rush to clear the room out, so we'll see what she does. Much thanks & respect to Festivus & redspaghetti for the tester beans!