Calyx to leaf ratio.. I've grown 5 times now and still don't know what a bud is...

[OG Sinse]

So, I've got 5 successful grows under my belt and will admit I still don't understand what a bud is... Crazy huh that I'm so stupid?

Maybe it the strains Ive grown, (Nirvana Northern Lights and Durban Poison) but everything looks like leafs to me. When I trim, I'm really not sure what part of the plant is flower and what is leafs.... There are fan leafs (I understand this is not flower), pistols, sugar leafs and ? I'm having a hell of a time knowing the difference between sugar leafs and a calyx/flower...

My colas are fat and long, the very tops are obviously flower.. I can see the pistols early flower, and I understand that the buds form at the nodes, you can see them early flower... But later on the entire cola becomes so dense with sugar leaves that I'm still not sure what to trim..

So there you have it. I'm one of the silly people here, apparently not the sharpest tool in the shed. Can anyone help me out of my stupidity? Some of the grows below are when I was new, my growing has improved since then. But they are good examples.

Some pics of what I think is a bud? (grown by me) The picture with the blue lighter is a great example, after trimming, there was almost nothing left... Just a gangle of sugar leafs.

 

[013]

What’s up?

Fans are self explanatory, however just to clarify they can be 3 bladed, 5 bladed all the way up to 11 bladed or more.

Sugars are singled bladed leaves that comes right out the sides of your buds, so my friend you nailed it perfectly.

I grow photos but this might help your thinking… typically you have waves of pistils. So you trip the timer and get your first puff balls. Those puff balls are what becomes you bud or your colas. They will keep growing all way thru but as you enter late flower those original puffballs represent the first wave of pistils, but now they turn dark color and crinkle in. That’s good but it’s not done yet, for most strains a new wave of fresh light colored pistils will begin to appear around the calyxes. They will grow out so that’s 2nd wave and when they turn dark & crinkle in. Yep another wave can start… this can go on for a while, it’s a stall tactic she’s sitting with all her junk exposed just floating in the breeze waiting for pollen.

Typically you don’t harvest white pistils… but that’s where personal preference comes in too. Point is you want bulk of the pistils (stigmas aka hairs) anywho you want bulk of pistils to be dark and crinkled in.

Next we have a curve ball to keep it interesting. Foxtails are little appendages- extra growth that builds out on the calyx. Some strains will do it others not so much… anyways think you will recognize when you see it. Looks like your bud is growing arms

But wait there’s more, your buds don’t really begin to swell until most of the pistil action is done for. That’s right bud swell is what you are aiming for…

Trim job looks really nice. My preference is wet trim to hack the fans and anything crispy but sugar leaves are good for bud spacing soon enough they brake off and I find them in bottom of my jars

Maybe next time you are up for harvest drop a line right here and one of the crew can help guide you better. That’s the nature of growing, think Seinfeld talked about it shrinkage… seriously I kind of suspect you may be harvesting on the early side of things and having a pretty plant all green at harvest is not necessarily the goal. In real world sometimes the plant should look beat up and shit, faded out etc.. but back to the last point harvesting on early side means you might miss the budswell so yup there’s the shrinkage.

I’m still newbie but I’ve read a lot and tried to apply it so that’s my 2 cents. I’m not the best by any stretch but will say you need to push enviro stuff like temps and light spacing to get that dense nugget factor, temps 80 to 84 lights on / worked down to about 12 inches on light spacing


Love the colors on that bottom pic, but dang who spilled the sugar? She’s a frosty one nicely done OG…!!! And bull crap on the excuses that’s a mighty fine manifold you’ve built there.

 

[OG Sinse]

What’s up?

Fans are self explanatory, however just to clarify they can be 3 bladed, 5 bladed all the way up to 11 bladed or more.

Sugars are singled bladed leaves that comes right out the sides of your buds, so my friend you nailed it perfectly.

I grow photos but this might help your thinking… typically you have waves of pistils. So you trip the timer and get your first puff balls. Those puff balls are what becomes you bud or your colas. They will keep growing all way thru but as you enter late flower those original puffballs represent the first wave of pistils, but now they turn dark color and crinkle in. That’s good but it’s not done yet, for most strains a new wave of fresh light colored pistils will begin to appear around the calyxes. They will grow out so that’s 2nd wave and when they turn dark & crinkle in. Yep another wave can start… this can go on for a while, it’s a stall tactic she’s sitting with all her junk exposed just floating in the breeze waiting for pollen.

Typically you don’t harvest white pistils… but that’s where personal preference comes in too. Point is you want bulk of the pistils (stigmas aka hairs) anywho you want bulk of pistils to be dark and crinkled in.

Next we have a curve ball to keep it interesting. Foxtails are little appendages- extra growth that builds out on the calyx. Some strains will do it others not so much… anyways think you will recognize when you see it. Looks like your bud is growing arms

But wait there’s more, your buds don’t really begin to swell until most of the pistil action is done for. That’s right bud swell is what you are aiming for…

Trim job looks really nice. My preference is wet trim to hack the fans and anything crispy but sugar leaves are good for bud spacing soon enough they brake off and I find them in bottom of my jars

Maybe next time you are up for harvest drop a line right here and one of the crew can help guide you better. That’s the nature of growing, think Seinfeld talked about it shrinkage… seriously I kind of suspect you may be harvesting on the early side of things and having a pretty plant all green at harvest is not necessarily the goal. In real world sometimes the plant should look beat up and shit, faded out etc.. but back to the last point harvesting on early side means you might miss the budswell so yup there’s the shrinkage.

I’m still newbie but I’ve read a lot and tried to apply it so that’s my 2 cents. I’m not the best by any stretch but will say you need to push enviro stuff like temps and light spacing to get that dense nugget factor, temps 80 to 84 lights on / worked down to about 12 inches on light spacing


Love the colors on that bottom pic, but dang who spilled the sugar? She’s a frosty one nicely done OG…!!! And bull crap on the excuses that’s a mighty fine manifold you’ve built there.

Thanks for the compliment man, growing colas hasn't been a problem. Its knowing what the F to trim ! The very tops of the tops are a no brainer, but everything else down the cola is questionable.

Nirvana Northern lights: I go around 9.5 weeks in flower, its a fast flowering strain and all the seed banks say 7-9 weeks. I've gone as long as 10.5 weeks just as an experiment and the plant was done. It stopped drinking water and started to look rough...A few of the pics above are from this harvest. I wait until all the pistols turn brown (almost all) shrink in and the trichomes show amber. Around 10-20 percent. The plants start to look a little rough at the end just as you say..

My problem is that its all sugar leaves ! As for as calyxs go, I guess they look like swollen sugar leaves?

Here is the fun part: When I reach for a bud from my jar, I either get knocked on my ass (way too high) or not high at all. There must be some bud in there somewhere, but its not easy to tell sugar leafs all bunched up from flower, if that makes any sense. Sometimes I'm smoking pure leaf no flower at all...

Meanwhile, my dispensery buds are like rocks, I dont see the sugar leaves everywhere like my own bud.

Thanks for taking the time to write back, I'm listening ! I'll try another strain maybe something less leafy and I'll wait for the swell as you mention.

I say this proudly. I still don't really know what a bud is. I'm growing master kush now, I'll post pics next time at harvest and trim time. I really need help with my trimming !

 

[OG Sinse]

Here is a better pic, seems like all sugar leafs to me. where is the flower? Week 9, maybe I could have gone another week for the swell, but the odor got a little out of hand... (a hidden grow in a 1.5 x 1.5 x 3 ft space)

Pic two, you can see swelling at the tops, I'm pretty sure that's a bud. But as you can see, there is a lot more happening below.

On the positive side, its smells amazing, grinds better than rock hard dispensary bud and tastes like lemon, pine and earth. I just never know if I'm reaching for a flower or gangle of leafs.

I think you might be giving me good information, its the swell that I might be missing on the lower buds...Hell, maybe I'll start lollipopping all the lower crap and grow tops only... Been thinking of trying a quadline with nothing but tops as a test. (16 colas instead of eight, get rid of the bottom half of the bud. Maybe the lower part of the cola isnt swelling up which explains my leafy-ness.

Yes, I can tell this is a bud. You can see the pistols, calyx's etc... But this is the very top of the top...Everything except the very tops confuses the hell out of me.

 

[013]

I see what you mean, there are many things that gets chalked up to phenotypes and that puppy has unique structure… exactly what you said… bud to leaf ratio..

Stick a pin in this one too… backbuilding. Do a search here and it will take you to over to LightAddict’s journal where it’s explained in detail. But snipping the tops of each cola taking a few hairs & some leaf or calyx triggers the plant. It’s ran out of room vertically so it will grow the buds fatter… more dense.

Do you do supercrop or ever tried monster cropping? Some swear by defol others swear at defol… there’s other stuff like lollipopping yup removing all lower calyxes.

It’s a trade off, sometimes less is more… figure it evens out time wise 8 donkey dicks versus 16 nice colas versus 32 fat assed golf balls…

I will add cloning helps you learn cuz you can run same pheno over & over. take the first sister at 8 weeks, next one at 10 weeks and so on down the line

Anxious to see what else comes in for you here

 

[OG Sinse]

I see what you mean, there are many things that gets chalked up to phenotypes and that puppy has unique structure… exactly what you said… bud to leaf ratio..

Thanks man, I feel a lot better maybe I'm not crazy after all. See what I mean? I trim and trim and trim until there is nothing left but stem. Where is the flower ! The tops are incredible, but everything below is just leafy. Where are the nugs?

Stick a pin in this one too… backbuilding. Do a search here and it will take you to over to LightAddict’s journal where it’s explained in detail. But snipping the tops of each cola taking a few hairs & some leaf or calyx triggers the plant. It’s ran out of room vertically so it will grow the buds fatter… more dense.

Nice ! Yes, I am very aware of backbuilding but have been nervous to try it. Great tip, I may try it next grow. I read a lot about growing and this technique gets mixed reviews, but hey I'll give it a shot.

Do you do supercrop or ever tried monster cropping? Some swear by defol others swear at defol… there’s other stuff like lollipopping yup removing all lower calyxes.

Great tip ! No I haven't tried super cropping, but I've considered it. I use a metal rod to tie down my manifold low, I could easily supercrop and support the branches while they heal up.. Pic below of my technique.

It’s a trade off, sometimes less is more… figure it evens out time wise 8 donkey dicks versus 16 nice colas versus 32 fat assed golf balls…

Man, you get it ! I'm torn between donkey dicks vs a lot of tops.(not sure if that sounds quite right) In this case though the lower buds on the colas aren't worth a dam so I'm leaning towards 16 colas next go. Maybe a quadline.

I will add cloning helps you learn cuz you can run same pheno over & over. take the first sister at 8 weeks, next one at 10 weeks and so on down the line

I grow one plant at a time in a very small space. As much as I'd like to clone, I dont have the space to keep a mother plant alive for now.

Anxious to see what else comes in for you here

Incredible advice thanks ! Super cropping and backbuilding to be seen in my next grow. I am also growing a different strain this go around, maybe the flower to leaf ratio will be better and the buds will be more obvious.(Master Kush Reg seed from a dispensary bud) Thanks again !

I think I'll also try heavy defoliation so that only the tops take up plant resources.... Now if I can figure out how to get 16 tops in a circle, I should be golden. No donkey dicks this time it seems.

 

[Sueet]

My gosh what do you do to make that stem so thicc? Lovely!

 

[013]

I’ll wrap with this to let the others off up their thoughts but you don’t have to keep clone moms, just clone generation after generation and for a while clones are kinda dormant in that they can thrive with low light not a lot of nutes. I have multiple grow spaces but still prefer to flower only 1or 2 at a time to keep odor down… but I’ve always got a plant or three on the back burner so to speak. I use what I call a high shelf like top of fridge for keeping clones, it’s warmer up there so that’s half the battle just use a lower light setup maybe compact florescent bulbs and the goal is to keep them alive not pushing them for rapid growth but you can turn up the volume anytime on clones as the main plant nears harvest… its perpetual grow without much coin for new beans every round

You’ve got the skills no doubt!!

 

[OG Sinse]

My gosh what do you do to make that stem so thicc? Lovely!

Lol, mistakes, way too many mistake. I lost three branches training too aggressively but didn't give up. Each mistake cost me a week to catch up (3 times---3 weeks) so, this was in veg a very long time. I think the pic above was taken week 9 veg. Pic below is week five mangling.

Lessons learned, be very careful training young plants ! I also learned that a long veg is a good thing. You can build a very thick frame to flower from. Works very well considering my 3 foot height limitation.

poor plant had a rough day here (week 5 veg)

 

[OG Sinse]

I’ll wrap with this to let the others off up their thoughts but you don’t have to keep clone moms, just clone generation after generation and for a while clones are kinda dormant in that they can thrive with low light not a lot of nutes. I have multiple grow spaces but still prefer to flower only 1or 2 at a time to keep odor down… but I’ve always got a plant or three on the back burner so to speak. I use what I call a high shelf like top of fridge for keeping clones, it’s warmer up there so that’s half the battle just use a lower light setup maybe compact florescent bulbs and the goal is to keep them alive not pushing them for rapid growth but you can turn up the volume anytime on clones as the main plant nears harvest… its perpetual grow without much coin for new beans every round

You’ve got the skills no doubt!!

Thanks again, good stuff man.

I have a secret grow cabinet, nobody knows. I might be able to build a box or cabinet for clones, not a bad idea at all.Seeds are silly expensive, this idea would save some money too. I use my grow cabinet to hang and dry buds as well...

 

[013]

that’s a nice rig…!!!

 

[OG Sinse]

that’s a nice rig…!!!

Sorry man, took the pic down. It wont stay a secret if I post pics

I have teenagers, this is why I keep it secret---keep it safe.. (as Gandalf said)

 

[Sueet]

Darn I missed it >.> lol