Bassman's Master Kush - Blue Planet Nutes - Grow Stealth LED Grow #3

[SpaceGhost]

Looking good Bass.
Wished you could have explained defoliation, with the photo's to this degree back 6 weeks ago.
Any ways I'm going the opposite direction this time just to see how bad I really messed my plants up. Its just something I gota do for myself to help my learning curve. I really didn't pluck much at day 21.

stop by new pics tonight. day 45, 28, 24, 17

 

[SurfBuddy]

Yeah Bassman! I fully agree with the waiting till the node has a stem before defol, and the pics help your description. Nice work fella. Crowded tents are a good crowd.

 

[Bassman59]

Go Master Kush! Looking really nice in there. Are they reaching the size you want?

Yes they are. The big one on the right is actually a bit bigger than goal. Hopefully on strip and bend day, Sun or Mon, I can get her into a more manageable state not overcrowding the two next to her and stunting their bud development.

Makes me wonder if 4 girls is too much for the tent and 3 more ideal.

Not exactly a bad problem.

 

[OG13]

Yes they are. The big one on the right is actually a bit bigger than goal. Hopefully on strip and bend day, Sun or Mon, I can get her into a more manageable state not overcrowding the two next to her and stunting their bud development.

Makes me wonder if 4 girls is too much for the tent and 3 more ideal.

Not exactly a bad problem.

Once you know what each strain does, it will be easy to dial in for next grow. Might be as simple as starting the big one a week later....

 

[Bassman59]

Once you know what each strain does, it will be easy to dial in for next grow. Might be as simple as starting the big one a week later....

These are all Master Kush from seed. I didn't take clones this time around. I'm not fond of popping multiple strains with only 1 light and space. Just because of growth issues and how much different the light penetration and coverage could end up.

Just got home from work, and took a peek. Tallest branches are at 30" now. That's 3-4" in 24hrs or so. And these are all side branches and off shoots. I'll get them lower when I strip in a few days and see better where I can bend.

I took about a dozen big ass fans out yesterday afternoon. Opened up the canopy substantially. We're at day 19 of 12/12. I seriously doubt stretch will be over in two days.

I had to actually pop a skosh of ph up into the res this morning. PH was 5.1. Been watching it go down, and my ro water that I've added recently was in the lowest range. Been adding 2+ gals per day, and yesterday was 3 gals.

I need to do a rez change, but I'm going to wait till I defoliate and do a good fresh nutrient mix.

 

[Dr.Blue]

I usually hold off till at least 21 days but a few fans won't be missed aand if your at the desired height maybe a bit of defol will slow stretch some.

 

[Bassman59]

yes, I agree. Taking a few off, selectively, like where there are nodes noted in the last series of pics, is fine. I have been thinking in the back of my mind, for a cpl days now, that I could strip them now and basically shut down the stretch.

For that matter, I could strip just the bigun. Make some bends, leave the others to stretch a few more days to catch up in height/width before defoliating them too. /shrug

 

[Alaskan1]

++++++ Reps to you Bass, thank you so much. I pretty much did the right thing but your pictures confirmed that and makes me feel better in what I did. INFACT, Since I just flipped the lights last night I may go back and take off some more that are well past that growth stage.

Again Bass.....thank you.

 

[Bassman59]

++++++ Reps to you Bass, thank you so much. I pretty much did the right thing but your pictures confirmed that and makes me feel better in what I did. INFACT, Since I just flipped the lights last night I may go back and take off some more that are well past that growth stage.

Again Bass.....thank you.

Just remember, that even though these nodes are developed, we still slow the growth a little as we pluck. There's that bit of a stall. The op of that long thread basically states not flipping right after a stripping. Give them that period to go go go in stretch. So, during stretch, whatever plucking we do should be somewhat minimal and selective.

 

[sqwheels]

Hi Bass,

Looking very nice in your garden

 

[Bassman59]

TY Sqwheels!

Been stripping the last 2 days, bend n strip. Going to res change then I'll do some pics.

 

[Bassman59]

TY Sqwheels!

Been stripping the last 2 days, bend n strip. Going to res change then I'll do some pics.

 

[Bassman59]

Update:

Day 16 in flower, day 24 in 12/12.

The pics I load today are from the last three days and today. End of stretch defoliation, bending, led hanging adjustment, a root ball, some flower shots from today, etc.

Room temps, lights on: 78-81f
Humidity: 29-44% **want to see the low rise.
PPM: 1310 (2.6 e.c.) too high, but will go down with addition of r.o. water. Not worried.
PH: 5.4-5.8. Actually had to add a little ph up because I adjusted a little too low on the res change.

Spent parts of the last 3 days defoliating, bending, adjusting lights, and just plain staring. It's this very time now that I have the least confidence in which fans to pull, which to leave. I know later on it is easier, but right now there are all these smaller flowers forming with tiny leaves at the end of a fan leaf branch and I question myself.

Nonetheless, after coming back to it daily and plucking more and bending some, it's apparent we're achieving the goal of lots more light penetration throughout the grow and air circulation is much better.

Flowers are forming nicely top to bottom, but the lowest areas are of course tiny and need a little more light. But I still think it's better than last grow. I really need another 400w-600w of LED in here and it would be nutso good. I could set the light(s) at 14-15" and get the penetration throughout. As it is now, the far reaching areas in width don't get quite enough light. I have to raise the light to get more spread which hurts depth and the wide areas get less than optimal.

The tallest girl is 31" tall from bucket lids. Three inches too tall. I'll have to bend her more later.

The width is very nice on the big girl, but the others are a fair piece behind. Not sure if it's pheno or my not "getting it done", or because I just didnt have enough light on them and more was on the big girl. I tried to keep it centered well but all along, even in veg under HO-T5 this girl has led the way.

I've got a ton of pics here to load. I'll try to make comments accordingly.

Just before beginning of defoliation.

After first stripping and some bending:

Today, after 3 days of defoliation, bending, staring.

A couple flowers closer to the corners but still getting decent led light.

Upper mid canopy flowering.

About 1/3rd outer, top of canopy.

Root Ball:

Out of room, Light needs re-hanging to adjust higher.

Here you can clearly see the top of canopy at back wall gets little led penetration because light is too low.

After re-hanging.

 

[SurfBuddy]

Heh, Looks like you took it easy on them since the other defol I saw ;-)

That's a 600 and you only have it 16" from the tops? I thought I read for it to be further, for more even dist.. but maybe your LED's are different than others. I understand though that you want penetration too, and it's a balance or give/take between the two.

Otherwise buds look good and rootball is one of the healthiest I've seen.

 

[Alaskan1]

Bass, things are looking great!!!!!

What are those lights on the side? And do you use them all grow??

 

[OldMedMan]

A man after my own heart......nice defoliation job.

I see what you mean about light coverage.....soon time to start bending more.

 

[Tweaktion]

well shit, how longs this journal been hiding from me.
you have some really interesting stuff in here man, thanks for posting. :]

 

[OG13]

Hey Bass, any way to get the taller plants to the corners and the shorter ones directly under the LED? Looking good.

 

[Bassman59]

I'll try to respond to each:

@ SB, My last two grows I saw bleaching at about 14" I think it was. So I get as close as possible but back off at 1st sign of bleaching. As for the defoliation, I don't think we want to strip the hell out of them quite like you saw in veg. Right now, we have tiny flowers forming all over. The fans do feed these sites (I think I got this right) and help them develop not only the flower but the sugar leaf too. So we want to wait till the leafs are more formed before we trim off the fans. I hope I got this right.

@AK1, Those are CFL's supplementing the corners where I know the LED isnt reaching as well. In the front, each pair is a 150w equiv and a 200w equiv, 2700k cfl. In the back are dual 150w equiv 2700k. I need to get back to Home Despot or Wally World and pick up those 300w 2700k units I saw. Maybe today. And yes, I use them in the tent full time until such time as I get another light and don't need to supplement.

@Tweak, Welcome! Grab a chair and enjoy! Hopefully we're able to pass something along for you to use, or maybe something to prevent an issue in your own grow!

@OG13, It's only 4 plants OG13. They are all in the corners! I did rotate the two front ones about 90 degrees a couple days ago. I need to turn the back two also. For my next trick, er grow, I'm probably going back to setting up the buckets properly, in advance, with 2" pvc using Uniseals. Then I can go to the bigger pump too. I have to use the smallest pump I have to cycle the water now. Otherwise the larger pumps just pull more than the 3/4" line can gravity feed from the main res.

 

[Dr.Blue]

They look great! I like the way the Master Kush looks. Pretty plant.