Starting a Malawi grow

[blondie]

The dead Malawi was actually in not bad shape, compared to the one that is alive. Dead one was much less affected than the live one by what I am calling the magnesium deficiency. I foliar both at the same time. The soil was mixed and sat in one of my red tub things for some months. Each fabric pot should have nearly identical soil mixes. I use a quart sized container and add various soil, then add nutes, then mix by hand. It turns out to be roughly a gallon of soil I am mixing at a time by hand. Then it sits... then I fill the fabric. It’s worked fairly well. I’m really at a loss here. The fox farms soil is happy frog. Not a hot soil I don’t think.

The live one is starting to grow once again.

There is is the smallest amount of green left on the dead plant that is not wilted. I’m hoping it somehow comes back but unless I fix whatever doesn’t seem likely.

 

[blondie]

Thing have been humming along in the grow tent. I posted in the sick plants section and picked up many good ideas. I think the baking soda mix I sprayed for whiteflies raised my ph and contributed to over watering. Also I did a rough ph of my water and if you trust the drops, my water was at least 8, likely higher. Combined with baking soda and drenching amounts of water.. I guess this did my one plant in. Not sure why only one plant died. I’ve popped two more Malawi’s that broke surface yesterday. I’ve got my greens going again also. I been hitting the one Malawi with a vinegar epsoms salt mixture and it seems to have stopped the issue. It’s growing well, though I am still seeing purple veins in new stems. I saw this on my outside grow last summer as well. Not sure why. Yes I need to cleanup and organize. A Few transplants left That are just coming up and once done, I can get better organized.

 

[goingrey]

Baking soda in the water will form an alkaline solution and raise the pH - yes.

Interesting indeed how differently the plants handled this - consider it stress testing.

Cool to see that the grow is still going on!

 

[blondie]

All is well in the grow tent lately. A new very very likely idea in what happened here is over abundance of potash. Maybe it was also the baking soda. And over watering. I repotted the one Malawi into a bag of Stonington platinum growers mix. Scored half price on an open bag that might have lost a quart, maybe. The branches perked up after a day or so and started growing toward the light. It’s doing well and hopefully signs of mag deficiency will diminish. Just put my two seedlings into new pots from peat pellets. I ran out of perlite so placed the one into a smallish container and the other right into the 5 gallon fabric. This is mostly the same mix I’ve been using with coast of Maine. I’m going to look into promix next grow I think.

My greens are are doing well. It’s going to be a while for harvest but things are coming. Next fall I have to get started earlier and not bring plants in from outside.

 

[aliceklar]

Looking much better!

 

[blondie]

Everything continues to grow fairly well. I’m going to get around to up potting that one young Malawi soon. Or maybe not soon. The magnesium deficiency is still showing. I did start the fan up today to get some air movement.

 

[aliceklar]

Using the fan is a good idea - you need air circulation to prevent mould.

The young Malawi doesnt look ready to transplant yet - good rule of thumb is to wait for the leaves to reach the edges of the pot, and roots just visible at the drain holes. It also looks a bit wet to me - if you are watering it daily, hold back - try to wait until it has dried a little between waterings. Will give you healthier root growth. If you can get a feel for how heavy the pot is just after watering, that will give a good guide. Wait until the pot feel lighter.

 

[dubi]

Hi blondie, looks like your plant is recovering well from previous too high ph.
It's very important to respect the dry soil cycles to embrace a better nutrient assimilation and a healthy root system. Good luck!

 

[blondie]

This grow is cursed! The friggin plant keeps showing more and more signs of mag deficiency. Even in the new soil. Even misting of neutral ph water with epsoms salt added. Leaves just keep slowly changing color and eventually are dying. I started thinking roots must be getting chowed by aphids so attempted to wash the roots and see if anything looked wrong. It looked fine to me but I’ve never really taken the time to look at roots before. The soil was not overly wet by any means. Maybe even a bit drier than it should be. I did stir up a couple of flying creatures. Not sure what they were. Maybe this is the issue. I looked under leaves, at roots, all over and saw no signs of insects other than the two flying bastards. Maybe someone with more experience can let me know how the roots look. My other plants are doing fine. Just gave them a first water with melted snow. My new ph meter would not calibrate. Hopefully soon I’ll get a working one.

 

[blondie]

Lots been happening. Things are moving along and I’m gettIng itchy for flip. Meanwhile I’ve gottten some new toys to play with. Ph and tds meters. The ph meter doesn’t read neutral correctly. Here are my numbers. I need to read up on what these mean now. Obviously if the ph is to be believed it’s not great. I also found some fungus gnats walking around the top of the soil. Nothing flying and my yellow stickies don’t show anything new. But they are here. Does not seem like a huge infestation yet I see weird symptoms. Maybe the PH. Plants are growing ok. The original kind of half recovered. The other two are pretty good, though they have whatever the other has.

Rain/snow - PH roughly 6.7 tds 49.

Runoff - plant 1 ph roughly 5.8 tds 776

Plant 2 ph roughly 5.95 tds 712

 

[blondie]

Things are finally looking dialed in and growing well. Flip is coming in a few days.

 

[lemonade]

Looking much better! Nice job mang!

I've got some Malawi goin' as well. Some crosses too; bunch of ace beans. Day 3 bloom for me.

Keep us updated!

 

[blondie]

Thanks... yes finally got my shit together. Still a bit off but I should get a good crop. Now I’m curious what I have here. This is my cross between some standards . Two of three plants have a wider leaf, the third has smaller thinner leaves. This is old Malawi and new killer Malawi strains? Also, some of the leaves are really shiny and almost a silver sheen? Not sure on this.

 

[blondie]

These fine ( hopefully) ladies have hit their stride. Growth has been what one would expect from a strong sativa, especially this last week. I just Set my timer to 12/12 before starting this post. I know many people gave excellent advice to me on this. Very appreciative to everyone. I must have made mistake with nutes. Any rate, flipped now and let the fun begin.

Three seeds from the same mother and father, started different times and each plant had varying degrees of issues. It’s interesting to think how the issues affected growth patterns or this is just differences from the seed, or a combo. The original plant is compact, many branches and looking good. Two later ones... one is stretched with fewer branches and very healthy. This one had fewer issues and is the clearly best growing plant. The other is more compact, more branches, lessstretch and not in great shape. It’s ok but the leaves show a troubled history. It has put on good growth though recently. Check it out...

Edit: forgot I measured height. Stretchy one and original are about 21in. Other one is close about 20. I have a feeling the one is going to stretch like crazy, maybe a male..

 

[blondie]

Sex is showing and I have two males and a female. Unfortunately the runt plant is the female. The leaves are a bit different in this female than the two males. Wider fatter leaves. It’s short and squatty but could be due to the issues I had. Don’t think I’ll get seeds from it, though maybe one lower bud Ill try and get a few. The one plant I thought was a male is. Great plant once I got my soil right, the thing took off and is going gangbusters. The other male is the original. It’s not bad either but it’s less vigorous. Leaves are pretty thin and it looks strong sativa to me. Keep in mind these are all from standard Malawi’s. I’m going to save some pollen for future seeding. Not liking the males here and looking forward to feminized outdoor summer grow.

 

[blondie]

Slow and steady... she’s coming along nicely. Starting to fill in some. Looking like this one is going to flower for a long time.

 

[blondie]

Still chugging along. Filling in nicely. Not much else to say.

 

[Podenco]

I bet you will have a smoke. Thanks for the detailed update Blondie. Very educational for everybody. Making a log is a good thing, I still go back to old logs to check what I did (wrong) years ago.

P

 

[dubi]

Well done blondie glad you managed to correct the nutrient-ph imbalance, growth since March looks indeed healthier. It's very important that you did correct the problem before flowering to ensure later as much as possible a good flower development.

Malawi can be a bit slow in the first month flowering, to later explode ater the 5th week.

 

[blondie]

The good news is my buds are getting fat and crystals are easily visible. The bad news is my plant is over nuted and the leaves are showing it. Seems to not affect bud production. I didn’t chop the fan leaves or trim much except some lower larf. It seemed good I didn’t as the plant is pushing nutes out the fans.

The other thing is this plant is on day 47 of flower below image. Pistols are starting to turn brown already. For a 14 week flower it seems awful early for this. I haven’t grown this strain indoors for three seasons and I really don’t recall what it looked like at this stage.