Aspen's Alaskan Purple In Soil - 2022

AspenCultivator

AspenCultivator

Well-Known Member
Hello everyone! Last week I posted a new journal starting some White Widow seeds, which unfortunately were too old to pop. I made a seed order in 2020 and never used them, so I'm dealing with what I have. This time I waited to start the journal until I actually had something above the ground. I'm going to copy/paste all the specifics from that last failed journal, because the setup is the exact same.

Light: HLG100V2 3000k
Tent: Vivosun 36" x 36" x 72" (Usable grow area about 20" x 30" x 72" due to shelf inside the tent)
Exhaust Fan: Vivosun 4" fan with carbon filter
Lasko tower fan with 5 speeds
Generic humidifier with 1 gallon tank (I think anyway?)
3 gallon AC Infinity fabric pots
Nutes: Fox Farms Dirty Dozen
Soil:
Fox Farms Happy Frog (plus 20% perlite) in nursery cup for seedling
Fox Farms Ocean Forest (+20% perlite) in bottom 2/3 of 3 gallon fabric pot, Happy Frog (+20% perlite) in top 1/3.

Seedsman Alaskan Purple feminized photoperiod seeds.

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Alaskan Purple Tap Root

Alaskan Purple Tap Root


Alaskan Purple Seeds Cracked

Alaskan Purple Seeds Cracked


Alaskan Purple #1 Day 2

Alaskan Purple #1 Day 2


Alaskan Purple #2 Day 2

Alaskan Purple #2 Day 2


Alaskan Purple #1 Day 2

Alaskan Purple #1 Day 2


Alaskan Purple #2 Day 2

Alaskan Purple #2 Day 2


Alaskan Purple #1 Day 3

Alaskan Purple #1 Day 3


Alaskan Purple #2 Day 3

Alaskan Purple #2 Day 3


Today is the first day emerged from the soil for two of the seeds, so we'll call this day 1. I germinated 3 total but that third one didn't have much of a tap root before it went into the cup, so we'll see. I'll only be growing one of these all the way, so in a few weeks I'll select the best one and up-pot it into the 3 gallon fabric pot.

The training plan I'm going for is quadlining. I had a ton of fun doing a mainline for my first grow many years ago, so quad is right up my alley. I'm shooting for a 4-6 week veg time, but since this is my first soil grow I'm expecting to encounter watering and possibly nute issues. I've read up on Emilya's technique and I'll be following that to a T.

I'll be doing updates at least once a week, probably on weekends, unless something comes up. Thanks for reading along, and I'm excited to be passed the germination stage with this old seed! Let's see where she goes!
 
Welcome in sjb, thanks for stopping by. This will be my first soil grow so I'm definitely learning a lot still from the great journals (like yours) people have going. It's all about sharing knowledge to grow this plant!

Welcome Mel, glad to have your expertise along the way!

Oh and I didn't mention it in the first post, but anyone is free to post pictures in this journal and ask questions. It always drives good dialog and I think anyone reading after the fact can benefit from the discussion, even if it gets off track for a bit.

Additionally I forgot to mention I added mycorrhizae before I added each seed, and when I up pot I'll have some in the hole and also spread it all over the root ball.

So now that I'm above ground, finally, how do soil growers handle watering at this stage? I have been using a small spray bottle with 6.0 PH water and keeping the top moist several times a day. Now that the roots are a bit longer should I be watering from the bottom? Do I add water to the tray, then remove the water after a period of time? I'll be researching this in the meantime.
 
Watering this small seedling is going to depend in how you want to grow. If you're going to do the wet/dry thing you are going to try to develop the roots. You'll want to give it enough water to keep it going but fairly soon will be watering out to the edges to get the roots looking for water out there. Emilya has a good thread detailing how to do it Here

I grow in a SIP pot and for those I would water once down the stem to show the roots to follow the water and from then on mostly water from the reservoir by pouring water down a tube.
 
Melville Hobbes said:
I use a syringe and dribble a bit around the stem whenever I think they need it. @Bill284 uses a larger one down the side of the cup as well.
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That's a really great idea actually, and coincidentally just saw a youtube video of someone doing it that way. I have syringes for measuring nutes so I'll just water that way for now and not worry about bottom watering. Do you water to runoff, even a tiny bit? I have a nursery cup of the same soil mix in the tent dry, so I can compare the two if I need to get the feel of the weight.

Azimuth said:
Watering this small seedling is going to depend in how you want to grow. If you're going to do the wet/dry thing you are going to try to develop the roots. You'll want to give it enough water to keep it going but fairly soon will be watering out to the edges to get the roots looking for water out there. Emilya has a good thread detailing how to do it Here

I grow in a SIP pot and for those I would water once down the stem to show the roots to follow the water and from then on mostly water from the reservoir by pouring water down a tube.
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Thanks for coming in Azimuth! I've read Emilya's post probably 10 times, and will probably read it 10 more as well. It just doesn't deal with seedlings in a solo cup, but I haven't read the replies either so maybe I should start there. I understand the idea of watering down the stem vs. outside of the cup/pot. The video I saw used a syringe to water down the middle for the first week or so, then slowly start circling towards the outside of the cup.

I love the idea of SIP, especially coming from hydro. I'll for sure be lurking your thread and once I have more room (I have several tents planned in the coming months/year) I'm definitely going to give them a try. I'm seeing a lot of members are having huge success with them.
 
lootznbootz said:
I’m in! I’ll catch up when I get home and start my diy sip bucket @Azimuth 😉
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Sounds like a plan. Keep us posted on your progress. And, lots of help available over in #SIP Club thread.
 
Thanks for coming in and hanging out Lootz, good to have you.

I'm starting to think a few steps ahead and wondering about mycorrhizae in the soil. A lot of videos I'm seeing seem to be split 50/50 on whether they mix the myco into the soil on up pot, or if they just put myco in the hole and on the root ball. I've seen @OGpapa 's harvest and he mixed the myco directly into the soil and it's glorious, so I may be doing the same instead of just spreading it on the root ball and calling it done.
 
@AspenCultivator I'm a believer. I thought it was a bunch of Bs. Everyone has an opinion. I've always had pretty good roots, er what I thought. Then I would see pictures, leaving me speechless. If I can starve my plants, and water board them with 8.5ph water. While still producing a moderate to high yield for autos. Psht. Imagine what it could do with love, food, and strict regimen.


Before
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After
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100% all @DYNOMYCO

I wanted it to prove itself, it did just that. More roots, more nutrients, more productivity, and I believe they finished nearly 20days earlier than last run
 
Now that is some incredible evidence that's for sure! It only makes sense, look at the before root mass and notice the amount of main roots compared to feeders. Wow, the difference is incredible. I wish I would have mixed myco in my cup instead of just dropping some in the hole! All well, I'm sold, when she goes into her final 3 gallon I'll mix myco into both layers of media. Thanks for posting those OG!
 
No problem. There is lots of evidence.

Now I'm trying to decide between @GeoFlora Nutrients or @Prescription Blend for my new run that just popped. Yes I'm actually going to feed this time. Psht wtf. I know I know.

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Day 3 from Germination

Hi everyone, small update this morning. Everything is moving right along as far as I can tell. I gave both plants 3ml each of water yesterday evening PHed to 6.4 and directly at the stem. The mix inside the cups is still holding its shape so there's still moisture towards the outside. In a couple days if it's dry around the edges I'll wet more towards the edges.

Was in a bit of a hurry to get these pics so they're slightly out of focus (oops) but shows the little bit of growth over the last 2 days anyway.

Alaskan Purple #2 Day 3.jpg

Alaskan Purple #2 Day 3.jpg


Alaskan Purple #1 Day 3.jpg

Alaskan Purple #1 Day 3.jpg


The light is currently 36" above the seedlings, with around 100 PAR at canopy. Over the next week or 10 days I'll slowly start lowering the light, couple inches at a time, until the light is around 18" away.

The third cup still has no sign of growth, so it'll probably be pulled by this weekend if nothing pops up.
 
Day 4 from Germination

Hi everyone! Another small update today. Growth has been steady, and the cups have been getting lighter as the young seedlings are starting to drink. The cups were light, but slightly moist at the very bottom, so they both got a full watering today. I read through probably 20 pages of Emilya's watering guide and learned when it comes to seedlings in solo cups, once they're established enough to handle a full watering (meaning they don't float away when water is applied) that's when the official wet/dry cycle can begin.

How did I do it? 10ml syringe. I PHed a mason jar of water to 6.4, making sure the water was luke-warm (about 70*). I applied 10ml of water to the stem of each plant and waited around 5-10 minutes. I loaded 10ml more and started saturating the pot, starting in tight circles around the stem and circling out towards the outside of the pot. Only 10ml at a time.

Runoff started at 60ml of water to each cup, and it was barely a dribble out of the bottom. Again, after each 10ml was applied, I waited 5-10 minutes before applying more. It took around 45 mins or so to get them watered. Now I'm going to wait 5-7 days (estimated from Emilya's thread) until she's completely dried out before watering again.

Alaskan Purple #1 and #2

Alaskan Purple #1 and #2


Alaskan Purple #1

Alaskan Purple #1


Alaskan Purple #2

Alaskan Purple #2


The pics were taken after the first 20ml of water, so the soil still looks dry on top. They took a lot more water after these were taken.

So on to the questions. My TDS meter is reading 125ppm in my tap water. I'm on a community well in the country, so ppm is high and so is my PH, 7.8. I use PH down (a drop or two in a mason jar is enough) which brings ppm up to 133. Is this going to be a good enough base to use the FF dirty dozen synthetic nutes? I've read that RO water is best for organic grows where you don't have to PH or even feed a LOS, so I don't believe I need an RO setup. With synth nutes, the minerals in the water are going to be good for the plant. Is that correct?

Thanks for coming by!
 
Melville Hobbes said:
125 ppm sounds pretty good. You shouldn't have any problems with that.
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Dang it, I forgot to mention that's at the 0.5 scale. My pen can test different things (I really need to read up on the differences) but it was set to 0.5 when taking the reading. If I set it to 0.7 it changes the reading, I don't know if that's useful or not.

But, if 0.5 is where I'm supposed to be testing at and 125ppm is good, then hey, something's going right so far! Thanks Mel.
 
AspenCultivator said:
Dang it, I forgot to mention that's at the 0.5 scale. My pen can test different things (I really need to read up on the differences) but it was set to 0.5 when taking the reading. If I set it to 0.7 it changes the reading, I don't know if that's useful or not.

But, if 0.5 is where I'm supposed to be testing at and 125ppm is good, then hey, something's going right so far! Thanks Mel.
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I've never used a ppm meter or TDS pen, so I can't help you there. I did check the water quality report for where I live and we have 120 ppm of calcium carbonate in our tap water.
 
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