1st Medical Grow, 3 Strains in 2x4 Hydrohut

thanks you made alot of good points will i will have some pictures up of my 3 ladies after the heavy defoliation i gave them today so im going to just keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best but im a first time grower and am just happy that i got 3 females.

So i guess we live and we learn.

Heres the Link to my grow so we might be able to learn something new together over then next 2 weeks
1st Grow Sour D/CFL

best of luck to you and yours.
:Namaste:
-KS
 
Today is June 1st, Day 8 of flowering.

I had been brewing my nutirent mix for 24 hours so I checked the ph and it was sitting at 5.2. and 950ppm. I originally mixed up 3 gallons but remembering from last time there was no run-off with this amount, I decided to give my ladies an extra gallon of distilled water to there nutrients. I wanted to bring it up slightly so I added a 1/4 spoonful of baking soda which raised the ph to a more comfortable 6.1ph and only raised the ppm to 1200ppm which is a little high but also acceptable for this time of flowering. I originally mixed up 3 gallons but remembering from last time there was no run-off with this amount, I decided to give my ladies an extra gallon of distilled water to there nutrients. I also gave a splash of coconut water to my nutrients before feeding, along with a tsp of myco powder and 1ml of Humboldt County's Snow Storm (which helps in tricome production as well as shortening the stretch portion of flower.) I watered all the ladies slowly making sure to cover the whole pot with water and checked the run-off which was now about 10% runoff...good!!

My blue dragons are really starting to show pre-flowers and many pistol developments...see photo below. My University Hill's OG's are still stretching and showing more pistol's but not really stacking the bud sites yet like the others...I was told that my blue dragons are about a 7 week finish, and the chemband and university hills og's were a 8-9 week finish...so as expected they are about a week behind the blue dragon. My chembands also are showing a lot of pistol development and stacking of the sites, but are continuing to stretch as well, but not as much as the university hill's og...

Every day the ladies are smelling more and more like the dankities I so enjoy!!! just a very light brushing of a stem on any of the plants will leave your fingers smelling like a heavy skunky smell!!! My soil upon watering also gave out a very rich sweet earthy aroma so I know the little micro herds are doing a great job down there.....

Other than the feeding there is not much else I can do at this point besides coax them on and watch... I imagine my next feeding at the rate these ladies are sucking up water will be in 4 days...

I have been keeping a close eye for any fungus gnats and I have seen just 1 or 2 flying around but have killed them on site.. other than that my yellow sticky cards seem to be working and though I have not seen any alive fungus gnats in my grow tent, I have found 2 or 3 dead ones on the yellow stickys...hopefully they got stuck before dumping off 300 eggs apiece...

I still am running my 400w MH and my 600w HPS (running at 400w). I will continue to run both spectrums of light for the next at least week or 2 until I see all of the ladies showing heavy signs of bud development, which at that point I will switch out the 400MH and throw in my Ushio Opti Red 400w HPS. This should give a huge boost to the red spectrum in my tent and add an addititional 15,000 lumens. At the time when I switch lights, I will be running my 600W HPS at full power giving an incredible 140,000 lumens in my 3x5 tent!!!! hoping for some dense, thick cola's!!! Upon the last 2-3 weeks before harvest, I will switch out my 400w HPS and put back in the 400w MH for added UV-B radiation in the final stages. I have read that this will help increase THC content and trichome production, as well as give the buds more color.

Since this is my first time flowering....I am very excited to hear your opinions, tips, techniques for a successful flowering. I would like to know what the best ways to ensure that buds are dense and hard, and not airy. I have read this is mostly dependent on the intensity and lighting the ladies recieve during flowering as well as strain genetics, but is there any other factors that will help harden my final product?? I have humbolt gravity, but won't be adding it until final weeks...anything else?

If anyone would like to suggest some great techniques for curing, I would love to start reading them and learning!! I know I still am at least a month and a half out before I have to worry about it, but I know that I will have to budget for some things like a few extra temp/humidity gauges, some canning/sealable glass jars, trimming scissors...and things like that, cause I want to be prepared!!

Grab your popcorn, seats, slippers, whatever you need and join me thru flowering.....!!!! your comments are always welcome!!
 
Here are today's photos, June 1st, Day 8 of flowering!!

Full tent view
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My stretching University Hill's OG's
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My very lovely blue dragon's, really starting to stack sites and show preflowers!!
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My Chemband's, showing a lot of stacking, stretching and some extra pistols!
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Close up of the Blue Dragon's preflower!!
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Thanks everyone for your kind comments and for tuning in...definitely helps me feel pretty confident with what I am doing...thanks for the luv!!

Well today, things were looking good, watered the plants this morning, things seemed all good until I went to check the soil of my Chemband plant that was infested with fungus gnat larvae. Upon using a spoon to turn the top 1" of soil, I noticed.....(with a super bummed facial expression) a lot more live fungus gnat larvae.... Not this was definitely not as many as before and they seemed to be in smaller patches in the soil, instead of throughout the medium so I am thinking that my preventive and proactive measures have been helping. But still more fungus gnat larvae..!!!! ARRRGGGG!!

So again, I pulled out my clothes steamer since I know now it causes instant death to these buggers and went to work...I loosened the soil all the way down to the rootball, being careful to not tear away or expose any roots. I would hit this area for a good 5-10 seconds with steam, making sure to cover the entire exposed area, and also would steam the uncovered pile of dirt from this area. After steaming it, I would then shuffled the treated dirt back and move to the next quarter of the pot...slowly working my way around until all of the soil, down to the rootball was steamed....Instant death again for these buggers...After loosening the top 1-2" of soil, steaming it, and replacing it, I again steamed the entire layer of 1-2" of soil just to make sure I hit any existing eggs and living larvae so they didn't hatch.

I figured I might as well check my other pots and sure enough, my front Blue dragon had very few in the soil...but they were there. Both of my University Hill's OG's as well were effected, not heavily, but not just a few either....What a bummer.... I can't believe after religiously using mosquito dunks with every watering since purchase, soil drenches with Azamax, Azatrol and Neem mixture, and still having this issue....

Well, spent quite a few hours now on the ladies...its worth it to me to fix the problem before it gets worse...I cultivated the top 1-2" of each of the pots, working my way slowly around with the steamer. I made sure to hit the entire top layer of soil at least 3 times to make sure that anything living in there was now dead....This probably included my micro herds as well, not too sure, but since I am only steaming the top few inches, away from the main root structure, I hopefully am not damaging more than 20% of them if that..

The one thing that was a plus out of this whole treatment/steaming was that it really gave my soil a great smell...the kind you smile about when you open a good batch of organic soil....sweet, earthy and smelled alive!!! I also noticed that it helped keep my soil from being to compacted upon drying out and it was more airy. It seemed to absorb water more efficiently on the steamed plant (the chemband from before) on future watering's than the untreated plants so this was a good perk!!

Today I busted out the rest of my Yellow sticky cards I bought and placed one open across each row of pots, now it will take Indi-gnata Jones to get into these pots....lol.... I don't want to put a per-lite layer down yet since I still have a larvae issue in the soil, however, DE or Diatomacious Earth may be my next route. DE is supposed to have microscopic razor sharp edges that cuts up the larvae when they crawl around in the soil...I have read there are a few kinds, some more hazardous to humans that others so I will have to read more before I go out and purchase some DE.

I have also read that taking a few cigarettes and soaking them for a few days in your feedings also can work against these...I don't know if I want to try this though, with fear of introducing all kinds of Unknowns to my soil. I also have heard somewhere that tobacco can be bad for plants, so I don't know if I will try this method...If I do, I most likely would go with a all natural brand like American Spirt, but this method needs more research before I try it....anyone every used tobacco juice sucessfully?

I am now wondering if my weird leaf curling on my University Hill's Og's was because of these fungus gnat larvae's??? When my one Chemband plant was severely attacked, all of the new growths took on a warped, distorted look. Now since addressing the problem proactively, the new growths are normal. My university Hill's OG's along with the others, did receive the soil dunks with the azamax, azatrol, neem and mosquito dunks and the infestations were no where near as bad as the front chemband was originally. I never steamed the 5 other ladies because upon previous checks, I never noticed an abundance of larvae, so if there was a few, I must not have noticed, or they hatched since my last inspection... Either way I will stay at these guys and see what happens!!!
 
Steamed Potato's anyone!!!! lol. Tonight I stuck some potato slices on top of my soil about 3 half potato's per pot, in addition to the yellow sticky cards...My plan to draw those little "pain in the grass's" out of the soil to the potatos and cook em tomorrow with the steamer. I am going to also re-steam the soils if necessary and start looking into using DE....I want these gnats gone for good!!! I also am going to look into another recommended product called Gnatol and see if any local hydro shops carry it.
 
Great first grow journal packed with good info and good ideas. Whilst reading it I was constantly breaking off to do some quick research. Your plants aint so bad either :)

I especially liked your lateral idea of steam cleaning the soil to kill larvae, I still have a grin on my face as I write this. I went off soil as I bought some compost with black gnat larvae which came as a freebie. I do not like paying good money only to find it is an inferior product with known and fixable problems, some commercial gardening suppliers are getting away with simple theft.

Loved your end angled SCROG screen.

It will be interesting to see how the fan leaf clones go. Most cloners say cut 3 nodes or so down from the fan leaf. Hygiene is also supposed to be important for cloning so I have bought a scalpel and iso-propyl alcohol.

One problem you highlighted was access to your rear plants for watering. My thought is a gravity feed reservoir with indidual pipes to each pot. Each pipe would have an inline tap so you can switch individual feeds off when the pot is adequately watered.

Since only the Chemband has fungus larvae there has to be something different about it from all your other plants. If it is not something you have done different soil etc then the problem must have come with the clone plant.

Keep up the good work now you are flowering :bravo:
 
Thanks Munchbaccy for your suggestions and taking the time to read my journal. I tried to be very detailed so if everything grows as planned, I have a good base to go off of. The other reason is because I learned from this site and others how to grow, so I figure, why not recycle the information back to others to learn.....

Yeah the fungus gnats have been my nemisis for the past month. After the steaming of the soil....every day I have checked and no fungus gnat larvae!!!! So it kills everything for at least a week period!!!! Next time I water, when the moisture drives these little bastards to the top of the soil, I'll hit em with steam again!!! I also have noticed my yellow sticky cards have a few victom's!! They work well to catch the adults!!

I also had the same idea about watering the back plants!!! great minds think alike!!! lol For my next grow I definitely will be fashioning up a watering system with tubes, watering rings/diffusers, which should make my life just even that much easier!!!

Sorry to hear you had a gnat issue as well...I know mine stared by me leaving my front door of my apartment open for a bbq...they got into my sink and my dishes that I didn't take care of right away and began to breed in my garbage disposal. A few days later there were dozens of these things all around my apartment. I thought I had killed most, but somehow a few must have gotten into my grow tent and layed eggs... since then I have not seen more than an occasional one cruise around my apartment, and ususally if i can catch them, they die instantly...so hopefully with repeat treatments of the soil to kill the larvae and eggs, they should die off!!!

I think they chose my chemband plant because it was the runt of the group at the time and was struggling more that the rest of the plants to survive. just my assumption but generally the weakest in nature gets the brunt of it. Upon my last steam cleaning, I did find the larvae in 4 of my 6 plants...however they were in very small amounts compared to the chemband...
 
June 3rd...DAy 10 of flowering!!!!

Well my ladies continue to explode every night and seem to be at least 1-3 inches taller every day. My blue dragon hasn't really streched a whole lot, and has really began with good bud development and stacking. My chemband plants have continued to stretch, however, now have full buds on the tops and have slowed the stretching. My university Og's are still streching like crazy, I hope they stop soon because I only have another 12" they can grow without being too close to my lights....A lot of white pistol formation on the university hill's og's but no full buds yet...I imagine within the next few days I should see a change...

I checked all of the soils with a spoon today, gentilelly sifting the top soil looking for fungus gnat larvae, and I saw none!!! So far so good and my steaming from the other day seemed to have worked. The soil is still pretty moist so I don't plan on watering for at least another 2-3 days. I probably will start bubbling a feeding tomorrow for a sunday or monday soaking, but they still have quite a bit of moisture. I also checked the potato slices and didn't see any fungus gnat larvae on the potatos. Either they don't like potatos and didn't go to them, or I killed all the larvae within range and they didn't pick up the scent...so either way....good I saw none....Also a note!!! Do not leave your potato slices on the soil for more than a day, they start to develop mold, which is none of our friends!!!

Things continue to look good, the ladies are thriving and as long as I keep the gnats at bay, I should have much success with this grow!!!

Follow along, leave your comments and rate my thread!!! lol thanks!
 
Screen is looking very nice and congrats on getting those little buggers under control. I know how hard it is once they get to breading but sounds like you are winning the battle. Great job...Bless.....
 
Here are the photo's for yesterday, June 2nd, Day 9 of flowering...

Sorry for the delay!!

Tent overview on June 2nd
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My Chembands
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My Blue Dragon's
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My University Hill's OG's
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Close up of my Blue Dragon
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My 2 large and thick Blue Dragon tops, look at how there stackin!!
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Close up of my University Hill's OG
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Close up of my Chemband
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Here are the photo's for today! June 3rd, Day 10 of flowering...
Tent overview
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My Chemband's
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My Blue Dragon's
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My University Hill's Og's
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Close up of my University Hill's OG
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Close up of my Blue Dragon
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Close up of my Chemband
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In all of you growers experience....can you give me your advice....

Right now I am running 2 HID lights...on 400wMH and one 600w HPS (dimmed to 400 for first 3 hours and last 3 hours of the day). I am still using the MH bulb because of the extended UV-B output of this lamp which essentially creates higher THC levels and more resin and trichome production....I am contemplating switching out the MH for a Ushio Opti_red which will give me more red spectrum for flowering, and about 18,000 additional lumen's over my MH......Now the question....Should I wait another 2 or 3 weeks to switch out the MH, or should I switch it out now????

I have read that using both MH and HPS together thru flowering will give you better results than just using one type or the other and that people with both in there grow rooms say the plants that do the best are where the light spectrum's cross...Should I even switch it out at all??? Should I wait? Should I switch it now?

My plan was to leave it in for another 2-3 weeks until the ladies have had a month of flowering, then switch it to dual HPS, then last 2-3 weeks before harvest, back to the MH....does that sound like a good plan?

I still have the light running in correlation with the sun's spectrum, The MH fires 1/2 hour early to represent the blue morning sun, both are on for 11 hours together, and then the MH turns off 1/2 hour before the 12....
 
Hello Ice,

This is just one opinion so take it with a grain of salt and there is growers that I am sure will chime in that have much more indoor experience then I but I think you are making this way more complicated than it needs to be. I would think that having both MH and HPS bulbs going at the same time will work fine. There is a general consensus that the MH work best for Veg and HPS for flower. So I am pretty sure you can not go wrong with this. I am also pretty sure that if you do what you are planning, it will also work, It just seems to be a waste of energy when the MH and HPS is an already a proven method that works. My philosophy is keep it as simple as possible and much less can go wrong. Although it would be nice to see a comparison of your method vs. the tried and true one.
 
Here are a few evening photos of the ladies.... I am so excited to already be seeing buds develop!!! There scent is really getting much stronger as well!!

Here are there evening photos..
Full Tent View
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Full Tent View
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A close up of the Blue Dragon bud..
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A close up of the Chemband Bud
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A close up of the University Hill's OG bud
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staffy said:
looks good ice :cheertwo:
Click to expand...

Thanks Staffy...So far I am happy that I have made it this far!! Hope everything goes just as good through flowering!!! Thanks for stopping by!!
 
Sonzor said:
Hello Ice,

This is just one opinion so take it with a grain of salt and there is growers that I am sure will chime in that have much more indoor experience then I but I think you are making this way more complicated than it needs to be. I would think that having both MH and HPS bulbs going at the same time will work fine. There is a general consensus that the MH work best for Veg and HPS for flower. So I am pretty sure you can not go wrong with this. I am also pretty sure that if you do what you are planning, it will also work, It just seems to be a waste of energy when the MH and HPS is an already a proven method that works. My philosophy is keep it as simple as possible and much less can go wrong. Although it would be nice to see a comparison of your method vs. the tried and true one.
Click to expand...

Hey Sonzor!! I really appreciate you taking the time to comment about the lighting, appreciate the good advice. You are absolutely right, I also have read that running a combination seems to produce the best results so unless I see my University Hill's OG's getting too airy(There the ones under the greatest intensity from the MH), I will leave them be as is.....

thanks for lookin out Sonzor!
 
Day 11 of Flower, June 4th

Today I checked out the ladies and they seem to have slowed there stretch including the University Hill's OG's and now all are showing good signs of budding. My blue dragons now all have nice white tops, same with my chembands, and the University Hill's Og's are just starting to show there first full bud developments.

The ladies will need some watering most likely by tomorrow, so I mixed up 2 1/2 gallons of distilled water with my bloom nutrient mix. (Earthjuice recirculation cycle of grow, bloom, catalyst, micro, metak), with 20ml of bio root, 10ml of Bio-Weed, 20ml of Cal/Mag, 15ml of Hygrowzyme, 30ml of humic acid, 6ml of Advanced nutrients carbo load, 1 ml of snowstorm, and 30 ml of naked brand green machine, and 30 ml of naked brand blue machine smoothy.

This mix will be bubbled at least for 24 hours and may need another day depending on the dryness of the pots.

As for my fungus gnat infestation, the yellow sticky cards that I topped the pots with really seem to be working good. I have noticed only about 5 adult fungus gnats that It has caught, and hopefully it caught them before they could lay eggs. I will be steaming my soil again, before my next feeding to make sure that I kill any exixting larvae/eggs in the top 2" of soil..otherwise all of my plants seem to be showing very healthy growth!!!

Here are todays photos!!
Tent overview
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My Chembands
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My blue dragon's
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My University Hill's OG.
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close up of my blue dragon bud
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close up of my Chemband's bud
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Close up of my University Hill's OG.
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Side view of tent
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Side View of Blue Dragons
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Side view of University Hill's OG's
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