3x Gelato OG, 1500x800 Tent, 315W LEC/CMH In Veg, 630W In Flower

[d42zero]

06/09
Not really much to do today, just mixed up 40 litres of "Week 5 - early bloom" from the GH feed chart.

Micro: 42ml
Gro: 10ml
Bloom: 53ml
Calmag: 26ml
Dripclean: 2.5ml

Girls are just chillin' at the moment, I think most buds are in their final positions so I guess we just play the waiting game again!

Min-max @ canopy 16.0-31.3, 27-55% RH
Min-max @ pots 20.0-28.8, 37-57% RH

 

[d42zero]

09/09
Girls are cruising along nicely! Pistils are starting to go red, and things are getting a little frosty The tent stinks when I open it now, luckily I installed a new carbon filter this time around!

I feel like things are a little bit tight, there's three or four buds competing for each spot.. but it's a bit late to do anything so we'll just see what happens.

They sure ended up bushy!! I know I'm not supposed to get rid of leaves after about the third week of flower (it's now the fourth) but I feel like I should give them one more round this week and take the bigger fan leaves, as it looks very dark from the side. I removed all the bigger fan leaves but, in hindsight, maybe I should have taken all of the top stuff to let some light through and left the bigger leaves down below to soak up the scraps?

Min-max @ canopy 19.5-30.5, 31-72% RH
Min-max @ pots 20.6-28.4, 41-75% RH

 

[Stormblessed]

I think it’s ok to take fan leaves sparingly all the way through

 

[HunterHunt]

You are not using LED's why so much defoliation? You have good light pen with HID's. Defoliation only stunts growth and takes longer to recover. Have you done a grow with minimum/no defoliation? I see on your first grow someone suggested you taking all the fan leaves and you did. Most LED growers defoliate because the LED will not penetrate past the tops so they have to. With your lights its not really needed. Fan leaves store vital nutrients that the plant can uptake at any point. The lower fan leaves will fall off naturally. You will have stronger, bigger, and faster growth by not cutting up your plants. Just something to think about/try. The only thing I take off is the scraggly sub tops under that will not do anything. All leaves stay.

 

[d42zero]

You are not using LED's why so much defoliation?

No real reason other than in my first grow I had to decide either way on a bunch of things, i.e. whether to defoliate or not, without really knowing what I was doing and that's just how I decided to go. I'm methodical and I like to be able to compare notes, so I only change a couple of things per grow and I leave everything else the same.. in my second grow I tried auto watering and I nailed my room temp/humidity; this grow I'm trying the SCROG, the second light, and the smaller pots.

This grow has gone really well so far so I think I'll pretty much repeat it next time, except maybe run an extra week or so of veg so they fill the screen out a bit better. I might test defoliation in that grow too, if I'm keeping everything else the same I can defoliate one plant and it'll show what the end difference is

 

[HunterHunt]

Yea i know what you mean. You wont be able to do a side by side in the same room. The non defoliated plant will be ready to flower weeks before the defoliated one. Especially with hard core defoliation like you are doing. But who knows! It will be fun to see the comparison! Good luck.

 

[d42zero]

Correction
Last week's mix was "Week 7 - mid bloom" from the GH feed chart, not week 5.

Micro: 42ml
Gro: 10ml
Bloom: 63ml
Calmag: 26ml
Dripclean: 2.5ml

 

[d42zero]

Yea i know what you mean. You wont be able to do a side by side in the same room. The non defoliated plant will be ready to flower weeks before the defoliated one. Especially with hard core defoliation like you are doing. But who knows! It will be fun to see the comparison! Good luck.

Do you mean the defoliating, or the topping? The topping definitely adds a couple of weeks of veg, but gives me a nice neat plant which I like very much lol. When I said testing defoliation I meant I would top them the same as I did here, but only remove fan leaves at/after the flip on one plant. Or do you reckon removing the fan leaves at the flip also slows them down?

I could test topping vs no topping side by side... topping adds two weeks of veg, so I'd just germinate the topping seed two weeks before the no topping seed That would be a good test, probably not one I can do next grow but maybe the one after that....

 

[d42zero]

12/09
Just running on autopilot now...

This week's mix will be "Week 8 - mid bloom" from the GH feed chart, which is the same as week 7.

Micro: 42ml
Gro: 10ml
Bloom: 63ml
Calmag: 26ml
Dripclean: 2.5ml

Min-max @ canopy 18.2-29.1, 34-67% RH
Min-max @ pots 19.3-27.1, 46-69% RH

 

[d42zero]

13/09
Nutes mixed up and pH'd. I noticed today that the girls are using way less nutes than last grow... at this stage in the last grow they were using 50 litres per week with very little left at the end of the week to flush, this grow I'm mixing 40l per week and there's a good 10l left to flush through. Runoff is around 10l or 30%-ish so I think that's pretty on the money

 

[d42zero]

19/09
Girls are 100% on autopilot at the moment, haven't done a single thing since my last post.

Min-max @ canopy 18.0-32.2, 34-73% RH
Min-max @ pots 19.9-30.5, 42-84% RH

 

[d42zero]

20/09
The girls produced almost no runoff this week so it's time to increase feeding. I've increased all feedings by 5sec, and I'll mix 50l of nutes this week.

This week's mix is "Week 9 - mid bloom" from the GH feed chart, in 50 litres.

Micro: 52.5ml
Gro: 0ml
Bloom: 105ml
Calmag: 26ml
Dripclean: 3.5ml

 

[d42zero]

23/09
Nothing to report, just a couple of pics

And a side view of the canopy, I'll try for another on the weekend that's not focused on the closest leaf to the camera

Min-max @ canopy 21.3-32.5, 27-75% RH
Min-max @ pots 22.3-30.2, 36-79% RH

 

[d42zero]

27/09

 

[d42zero]

28/09
Little bit of an issue, I went to mix this week's nutes last night and there was about 10L more in the res than I expected; felt the coco and it was almost bone dry. Turns out the pump wasn't getting the water through, as if there was some sort of mystery blockage. Pulled the hose off the pump and water flowed all the way through, and water flowed from the outlet on the pump, but hook them together and it wouldn't work. Maybe an air lock?

Watered last night and this morning by hand, then sat down with the system tonight. Put a different pump on, didn't work; suggesting the problem is in the lines. Pulled it a tiny bit apart (like two hose joins), put it back together and it worked again.

It's possible the height of the pots is just what the system can handle.. I had a pressure reducer in the res so I removed that and it seems strong at the pots. I had to measure the output and re-set my timer, without the reducer it's watering 5% of the pot size in 10 seconds as opposed to the 30 before. I added up all the feeds at this rate though and it's way less than what I've been watering them, so I think I've made a mistake in my calcs somewhere..


Got on top of it this time, but I'll make it a habit to check how moist the coco is every night, a) just in case something fails again and b) to make sure my new watering schedule works. I've been leaving these plants without checking them for a full week at a time, I'm just lucky this must've happened either on or really close to mix day.

This week's mix is "Week 10 - late bloom" from the GH feed chart; same mix as week 9 but I've run out of Calmag, luckily this is the last week they're supposed to have it anyway so they should be fine.

Micro: 52.5ml
Gro: 0ml
Bloom: 105ml
Calmag: 0ml
Dripclean: 3.5ml

Min-max @ canopy 17.8-31.1, 20-52% RH
Min-max @ pots 18.7-28.9, 31-61% RH

 

[d42zero]

02/10
Seem to have sorted the watering issue out, things are nice and moist in there

Started trich photos today, still quite clear so I probably won't photograph them again for another week or so. Not too long to go now though!

 

[d42zero]

04/10
FROSTYYYYYYYY Even the fan leaves are getting a bit frosty near their stems, which I've never seen before!

Trichomes are still very clear, so I'm going to repeat last week's mix which is "Week 10 - late bloom" from the GH feed chart. I'm supposed to move to "Ripen" where the nutes taper off a bit, but I feel like they still have at least another week or two so I'll repeat this week and move to Ripen next week.

Micro: 52.5ml
Gro: 0ml
Bloom: 105ml
Calmag: 0ml
Dripclean: 3.5ml

Leaves are starting to get some crazy colours... this hasn't happened in my previous two grows, but I see it a lot on other people's grows and it seems to be a good sign they're finishing well, is that right?

Min-max @ canopy 15.8-32.8, 27-69% RH
Min-max @ pots 18.5-30.8, 39-74% RH

 

[d42zero]

08/10
Trichomes are changing FAST!

I think we're a week or less from harvest! I have a day off in four days, I think that could be the day. Next window would be the weekend, five days after that.

 

[d42zero]

09/10
The girls have busted out a fresh set of pistils:

Looking at previous photos I can see them, but only really noticed them today.

Might still be a little while from being truly ready for harvest.. I'm going to play it by ear for now.

Min-max @ canopy 21.8-33.3, 25-76% RH
Min-max @ pots 16.8-26.1% RH

 

[SoGnotSOG321]

That time it got dry stressed it and those new pistols were probably the reaction to that event. The extra trics on the leaves are an added bonus, can you stress it more? You say a week longer so what could it hurt that much? Nice going through an almost complete grow thread like this waiting for the end.
Edit, your scrog net, you can stiffen the pipes with all thread inside of it. All thread is just a length of metal rod that's been screw threaded the entire length. Find the inside diameter and get the closest size smaller and cut it to the same length as your pipes between the corner fittings. It will add some weight but not much a pound or half a kilo.