wtfn's 4000w legal medical soil food web organic grow show

[bobblehead]

You have soil mites, no big deal. Aphids are slow moving and hang around the roots. Soil mites can be seen on the top of the soil, especially after watering. They are fast moving and eat gnat larvae.

All of my plants look like shit right now b/c of vpd issues. Best thing you can do is get a pond fogger or 3 to increase the rh%.

 

[surfguitar]

Temps are 73-78. The only problem I had was this weird yellowing on the tops of my plants directly under the 1k bulb but that seems to be from trying to run that room without a circulating fan haha as adding one completely fixed the issue.

I'm setting up a grow of similar size to yours in a month or 2 and I plan to go fully vented at first so we'll see how that works out.

 

[whythefnot]

Temps are 73-78. The only problem I had was this weird yellowing on the tops of my plants directly under the 1k bulb but that seems to be from trying to run that room without a circulating fan haha as adding one completely fixed the issue.

I'm setting up a grow of similar size to yours in a month or 2 and I plan to go fully vented at first so we'll see how that works out.

That yellowing is the VPD we're talking about. At least from where I'm standing, you're lucky you didn't get it worse.

 

[whythefnot]

So the soil mites are no big deal, yeah...
But how about these?

I have to assume they are curl grubs.
I'm looking into how to eradicate them now, but I do have some questions on the topic already if anyone has dealt with them:

Should I be going nuclear on them, or is it feasible to control them through parasitic nematodes or the like? I read that they eat roots -- never a good thing. I'd hate to wipe out my thriving soil life to get rid of them when they seem like they might be fairly benign in the scheme of things.

 

[whythefnot]

http://www.dirtdoctor.com/Grubworms_vq723.htm

Should I believe the info here? It says that only 10% of soil grubs are root eaters, and the other 90% can be considered beneficial, due to their soil-moving abilities. I do need a better mix in there, I was really fucking sick on antibiotics when I mixed the soil so I only turned it about 4 or 5 times once I had it all mixed. I'm relying on my worm buddies to do the rest.

Hmm, as I read on, I find this:

Habitat: Adults fly around and land on door screens. Larvae (grubs) live in the soil. Pest grubs are found primarily in turf. Those found in planting beds are usually feeding only on decaying organic matter and are not troublesome. Beneficials and pest grubs are hard to tell apart when found in the soil, but if you lay the grubs on a smooth surface, the larva of the green June beetle will turn over on its back. With its feet in the air, it scoots away at a surprisingly fast pace.

It certainly did that ... right before I smashed the shit out of it. I couldn't get a picture of its back because every time I'd turn it over it would immediately turn on its back and scurry under the surface of the soil. I don't know if that's a sure fire sign of them being benign, but it's a start, anyway.

Here's another interesting quote from the article, which seems to be backed up by various other sources:

According to entomologists, only one in 100 grubs is destructive to plant roots.

And one more thing: I never mentioned it since it was so late in the game, but I found a few brown "caterpillars" around the base of my plants in the last couple weeks of the last grow. Since I'm in bug-tracking mode, I decided to look them up. Looks like maybe cutworms? I'm not sure at this point, but if there are nematodes that take care of caterpillars and cutworms I'll go ahead and get some. They should blow up pretty quick with all the action going on in here.

And another edit:

Heterorhabditis does that. I'm looking for some on the cheap, but I guess $30 - $45 isn't too bad for the peace of mind it should bring me, whether it's justified or not.

 

[whythefnot]

http://www.kalyx.com/shopexd.asp?id=1059100&gclid=CJi9vPzprLwCFUXZQgodsQgA3w

This doesn't look too bad. If I don't find anything better, I think this will meet my needs, artificially inflated or not.

Edit: $29 shipping. Ouch.

I don't think my clone guy is gonna come through with this wax rig so I'm gonna have to build my own right now. I'm down to chump change, but I think I have enough to scrounge a vacuum pump from craigslist and a hotplate from goodwill, or wherever I can find one. This is my last chance to make a great product out of the bulk of the sublime so I feel like I have to take it. I have about 300 bucks to my name right now, so that $29 means a lot to me. I may as well get quite a few million more critters from one of the free shipping sites. Hrmmmmmmm...

 

[whythefnot]

I left the runt clone in the 5gal smart pot because it wasn't worth taking up that much space in the beds to transplant it. I thought maybe I'd keep it for a mom but I decided to flower it with the rest. You can see it in that last room photo, right in front, sitting on top of the soil in the bed. I picked it up to see what was underneath. Lo and behold:

2 earthworms, a roly poly and a butt load of roots poking out. Great

 

[silver hawaiian]

Holy f*ck dude, you've got a lotta biodiversity in there eh? WTF did that grub come from? I'm presuming it came in one of your bags that went into the mix, but yikes. That's a large-sized stowaway.

Best of luck with the predatory nematodes - I let a sponge's worth into my containers last year to get these other little nematode fucks that were eating roots. They worked well! (The good guys, that is)

wtfn, if you're into sharing, we'd love to hear about your wax/concentrate-making process.

 

[whythefnot]

Holy f*ck dude, you've got a lotta biodiversity in there eh? WTF did that grub come from? I'm presuming it came in one of your bags that went into the mix, but yikes. That's a large-sized stowaway.

Best of luck with the predatory nematodes - I let a sponge's worth into my containers last year to get these other little nematode fucks that were eating roots. They worked well! (The good guys, that is)

wtfn, if you're into sharing, we'd love to hear about your wax/concentrate-making process.

I'm seriously considering just letting things ride if I don't start seeing damage to the plants, and I don't see any more cutworms. All that crazy crap going on in the soil will probably create enough competition that any problems I have may be mitigated.

Also, I found another little black soil insect, just a little bigger than springtails, with an upward curved and pointed abdomen. I think I saw one of them jump or fly away too. I'm googling right now, probably nothing serious.

And yeah, I'll be sure to post a little bit about the BHO. It'll be a little more ghetto-rigged than I'd like this time, but I'll still be following good practices. I'll be running about 2 lbs of flower and all of my trim, which is by far my largest batch ever, so things should get interesting to say the least.

 

[whythefnot]

There needs to be a site, something like pest registy dot com (typed out so those opportunists crawling the web don't pick that up and buy the site before I get to it) where we can crowdsource common garden pests and categorize them. There could be an associated app too, to make it easier to upload photos. Maybe I'll get started on that this year.

 

[bobblehead]

That grub is a beast!

 

[whythefnot]

That grub is a beast!

Hehehe, yeah. I dug down about 2 inches near one of the corners of a bed, mostly to see how moisture was distributed, but also to inspect soil life. I reeled a little when I first saw him, but immediately threw him over into the one fabric pot full of soil I forgot about when I made these beds, which is where he was in the photo. By the time I ran downstairs to get my camera and made it back he was totally buried in the soil, and the only reason I got him back is because I saw the surface churning. Big ol' grub, that thing was.

I finally identified that other black insect:

Atheta coriaria, HUGELY beneficial predator. Apparently they eat Shore Flies, Fungus Gnats and some types of Thrips. I guess I can let my guard down a hair for now.

 

[surfguitar]

That yellowing is the VPD we're talking about. At least from where I'm standing, you're lucky you didn't get it worse.

That's what I initially thought which is why I wanted to get a humidifier but I wonder why adding more ventilation(circulating fan) decreases the yellowing? I still think I might get a humidifier to play around with.

 

[whythefnot]

That's what I initially thought which is why I wanted to get a humidifier but I wonder why adding more ventilation(circulating fan) decreases the yellowing? I still think I might get a humidifier to play around with.

Sounds like you just evened things out a good bit in there by circulating. You were probably creating a localized warm spot directly under the light from the radiant energy, raising the temps and in turn lowering the humidity. When you added the fan it replaced that localized heat with fresh air from elsewhere in the room.

I'm starting to think that I actually do need a little more airflow happening in here. Some of these fans are quite a few years old at this point, and noticably weaker than others.

 

[surfguitar]

Interesting, that makes sense. thanks for your input wtfn!

That's pretty awesome you got such a crazy amount of diversity. I spent a bunch to load my beds up with bugs haha, I suppose if I would have waited they would have just found there way there tho. Unfortunately I was trying to deal with fungus gnats which are harmless in my garden but so damn annoying haha

 

[whythefnot]

Haha, I wouldn't exactly call fungus gnats "harmless" -- their larvae do eat roots. It may not wreck your harvest, but it will definitely put a dent in your crop.

I actually just found another small predatory beetle -- I'm pretty sure, anyway. I lost track of it trying to get it to my computer, but as far I can tell it was a Delphastus pusillus, or Whitefly Destroyer. My limited research shows that they mainly eat whiteflies, but will munch on spider mites if no whiteflies are around. Now if only I could confirm the prescence of predatory nematodes I'd be locked down and bulletproof.

This much biodiversity didn't just find its way here, either. I'm pretty sure it all came from the castings I bought. They were manure-based, so I was a little skeptical at first, but the guy I got them from seemed like a real pro. He was very proud of his product and was eager to tell me all about it, and show me around his community farm. They came unscreened and teeming with all sorts of life. If anybody in SoCal wants to know where I got them, just PM me. You can also find them on craigslist here -- there are only 2 ads for castings that I know of in the area.

At this point barring a real RA infestation, I'm going to do whatever I can to avoid putting any type of pesticide on the soil or plants. These critters have gotten to be too valuable.

 

[surfguitar]

These are by far the healthiest plants I've grown despite the small FG population haha I don't think the larvae will seek out the roots necessarily, just eat them if they happen to be in the vicinity or they don't have other food sources(which my beds have plenty of). The main issue I see with them is they can get all over the buds and what not.

I'm gonna pm you about those castings, I got a bunch of worms and some castings off a guy and it was pretty high quality. Interested if it's the same guy or different as I'm about to get a bunch of compost

 

[whythefnot]

My IR thermometer came in yesterday, a day earlier than the earliest estimated day. I'd highly recommend getting the one etekcity has. For $15 it feels like a very solid tool. It reads C/F, has an optionally backlit screen, and has an optional laser pointer. Runs on 9v too, so the battery is easily replaceable, and my cats love it, but not nearly as much as my mutt does. She figured out that we control it years ago so she begs us to shine it so she can chase it. Crazy dog.

Anyway, nothing surprising as far as leaf temps go. 77 - 82* depending on a/c cycle, same as the rest of the canopy, and about the same as the ambient temps. I'm scared to take it any higher than that. I still have a few plants that are sort of quick to wilt ever since the high VPD incident, don't want to stress things any more than I have to.

Edit: I should mention that those temps are with air-cooled lights only. Once the ventilation fan kicked on the a/c barely ran. It cycled once early in the night and I'm don't think that it cycled again until I heard it kick on from downstairs just now. I have the ventilation fan set to kick on at 82 or so, and kick off about 77, but the a/c is set to kick on at about 85 and kick off at about 79. This is a new system that I just got rigged up a few days ago and I think it's gonna save me a bunch in electricity while it's still cool out.

 

[whythefnot]

Ok, I've made up my purchase list for a new bho extraction and purging rig. I'm getting the pump from craigslist, so I won't post the link here. But it'll run me about 80 bucks or so, if all goes well.

~300g Extraction tube $50

50 micron mesh screens $15

3 Gallon vacuum chamber $132 shipped

Electric Range $16

Vector Butane or comparable brand, will purchase locally ~$50 for a 12 pack

I sort of phoned in the range. 16 bucks, I'm tired of shopping. I'll be using some round pyrex storage bowls from Target to blast in. This is gonna be fun, and a lot of work.

Everything comes out to about $340


High quality BHO on a budget

 

[silver hawaiian]

Excellent work wtfn! I'm interested to see how it works out for you. I used to make my own until I got a hold of some hot-damn shatter. Made me realize the upside of having the whole dang rig..