IslandGrower420 - Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

[IslandGrow420]

Hi All,

I've been growing for 20yrs, seriously for the last 5-6yrs. I've never posted on a site before, never mind a grow journal, so stay tuned and hopefully you will find it interesting and entertaining.

Details:
1) Seeds - Crop King Seeds; Cali OG Kush (OG Kush x Amnesia Haze) and Green Crack
2) Lights - California Lightworks SolarSystem 550 LED for Veg, Eye Hortilux 1000W HPS in a HydroFarm Daystar Reflector run off of a Phantom 2 ballast
3) Tent - 4x4 for veg, 5x5 for flower
4) Nutes - Veg: Fox Farm Grow Big, GH Diamond Nectar Humics, Botanicare Silica Blast, Botanicare CalMag, Botanicare Hydroguard, Hygrozyme enzymes, & Maxicrop Liquid Seaweed. Bloom: Fox Farm Tiger Bloom & bloom boosters, GH Diamond Nectar Humics, Botanicare Silica Blast, Botanicare CalMag, Botanicare Hydroguard, Hygrozyme enzymes, & Maxicrop Liquid Seaweed.
5) Method - Veg: DWC in 5 gallon buckets (3 gallon res); Bloom: DWC in 10 gallon trash cans (6.5 gallon res)

I've never grown these two strains before, nor have I used Crop King Seeds before. I'm currently at day 34 (since seeds sprouted) of veg - I will show all of the back dated pics! I'm not that far along as I should be as I had to stunt the plants for a few weeks while my second grow tent arrived, so you haven't missed much.

Week 1:
Popped 3 x Cali OG and 2 x Green Crack seeds using paper towel method, although I did use a heating mat as well. I used tap water which is filtered rain water where I live. Reads 0 ppm on my bluelab meter. It comes out around 8.0 ph so adjusted down to around 6.5ph. All 5 of the seeds sprouted in 36hrs. I then put them into rockwool cubes and put them into my aero cloner. I use a combination of GH Rapid Start and Dyna-Grow KLN. The Dyna-Grow KLN is THE BEST product I have used to root clones, or seedlings for that matter. It is basically a "liquid rooting gel", and you can apply it to your plants anytime you want to promote some serious root growth!

I don't have pics of the seedlings in my aero cloner, but I have pics of the clones that I have already cut from the Cali OG and Green Crack, in the aero cloner. I wasn't too impressed with the vigor of the seedlings. They didn't look as healthy or grow as well as most plants I've grown in the past, but after week two they all looked fine. I don't have close ups but I have a pic of the 5 seedlings in my flower tent with 3 Classic Skunk girls that I am getting ready to bud.

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 2:

The Cali OG Kush is growing like crazy, that is pheno #1 anyway. This strain is a cross between OG Kush x Amnesia Haze, and I am seeing the two distinct genetics in my 3 Cali OG seedlings. Pheno #1 is very sativa and is growing tall and stringy. She is growing like a beast, leaving the other 4 girls behind. I topped her and mainlined her. Pheno #2 is very indica and is short and bushy with fat round leaves. She is growing very lush but is not getting tall, just bushy as fuck! I topped her but can't mainline her as her branches are not growing that tall, just getting fatter! Pheno #3 looks to be a mix of the first two but leans more towards the sativa side. I topped her but she wasn't too healthy to start so I left her at that.

Green Crack #1 is growing like a beast, almost keeping up with Cali OG #1. I topped her in week 2 and mainlined her in week 4. GC #2 is a runt, looking healthy but not growing much at all. I topped her and left her at that.

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 3:

Not much to report. I've got all of the plants under a crappy 300w no name LED trying to stunt them a little bit, as I am waiting for my veg grow tent to arrive. I was using a makeshift grow tent I made out of cardboard which was small and pretty ghetto!

At this point I'm giving them a pretty weak Fox farm nute feed, everything else I am giving in normal doses. 2ml/gal humics, 3ml/gal silica etc etc

Apologies but I didn't take any of the green Crack

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 4:

I am still in the cardboard box grow tent under the crap 300w LED but arrival of the new tent is imminent! I forgot to mention in my first post that for the first few weeks I am using 3 gallon bucket with 1.5 gallon res in each. I do this as the plants are small and don't need a big res. I have upgraded the buckets to 5 gallon (3 gallon res) for OG #1, OG #2, and GC #1 as the roots were getting nice and big and I wanted them to keep expanding. The other two are still in the baby buckets. I also mainlined GC #1 as the branches were long enough now.

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 5:

Veg grow tent is here! I moved all of the ladies into it under the SolarSystem 550 LED. Now all 3 OG's and GC #1 are in 5 gallon buckets. The GC #2 is still in a baby bucket. I've upped the Fox Farm nutes to 1/3 recommended strength. The girls are starting to take off now...looking perfect.

 

[Islandgrow]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Subbed can't wait to see what they do . Haha namesake . Sorta .

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Sweet bro, we must have the same father lol. welcome to the show, hopefully it's not a shit show!

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

ok, time for a long overdue update.....apologies but my laptop died.

Week 6:

The Cali OG #1 & #2, GC #1, and GC #2 are all ticking over nicely. The OG #1 and GC #1 are the biggest by far and getting very bushy. I mainlined them and gave them 8 tops but they are a ton of side branches shooting up into tops as well. The OG #2 (seriously Indica pheno) isn't getting very tall and is very compact and branchy. I mainlined this one too but in a slightly different way, but I gave it 8 tops too. The GC #2 is the runt but is finally starting to take off. They are all looking lush, no issues.

OG #1

OG #2
GC #1 side view

GC #1 top view

GC #2 the midgit

The problem child is the OG #3. This was a bit of a slow grower, and has always been well behind OG #1, even though it is the sativa dominant pheno like #1. Well, now it has a problem I've never seen before - and I never get issues in veg so I have no clue what is going on. The veins on all of the older leaves have gone really light green, with the rest of the leaf staying dark green. Once the leaf shows signs, over the week it gets worse until the leaf turns a reddy brown starting at the tip and eventually browning inwards. I though some cal-mag-iron would solve the issue but it didn't help. A res change helped bring it back a bit but it is still hurting. Is this a sulphur issue??

OG #3 with the issue.

The veins have gone light colour. The interveinal leaf stays dark green. Sorry I don't have very good pics of the issue. I have some better pics that I will post in week 7/8.

Just some info: I didn't change anything or do anything different with OG #3. PPM's are 600, PH is 5.3-6.0, water temp 65F at night and 69F/70F during day, room temp 68F at night and 70F/71F during day. Roots are fine. Using hydroguard and hygrozyme to keep them healthy.

Pic of the veg room....

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 7:

this week fell over the xmas period so I forgot to take pics. The OG #3 is coming back a bit. It has a lot of new growth and is moving forward again. The res change seemed to clear things up but the problem is still lingering a little bit, only the larger fan leaves show signs.

however, now GC #2 is showing the same issue...I don't get issues with my grow under usual conditions so this is crazy....

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 8:

OG #3 has doubled in size but is still showing signs on some of the leaves, although the leaves are not getting any worse than vein discolouration. They are not turning reddy brown and dying like GC #2. I'm going to hit her with another res change again and ride it out.

GC #2 pissed me off so much so I threw her out to make room for a clone from GC #1. It wasn't an easy decision, I haven't lost a plant in longer than I can recall. I might have revived her but I don't have time for sickly pheno's. GC #2 was always a runt, and I was never going to cut clones from her so fuckit.


OG #1 on the left, GC #1 on the right.

I harvested the Skunk Classic in my flower tent so I moved the ladies into their new home. I changed the OG #1 and GC #1 into 10gal Brute trash cans with 6.5 gal of res in each one. I'll change the OG #2 out in a few days before the scrog.

OG #1

GC#1


They all look a little ruffled up as I just gave them a minor defoliation.

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 8.5:

In the middle of week 8 I got the ladies scrogged out. I would have loved to let them grow taller for another 2 weeks but I'm on a schedule.


OG #1 side view

OG # 1 top view

GC #1

OG #1 & #2 and GC #1 supercropped and scrogged. The small plant in the bottom right of the tent is the clone I took from GC #1 a few weeks ago. She is now a lot bigger and healthier than GC #2 that I threw out so vindicate that, bitch!

OG #1 on the left, GC #1 on the right

OG #2

 

[IslandGrow420]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Week 9....now known as Flower Week 1!:

I scrogged the ladies mid week 8, and then gave the girls 4 days to recover, and then flipped them. I did some defoliating and took off growth below the scrog. Any branches I bent upwards through the scrog. I took off about half of the big fan leave below the scrog. They weren't getting any light and it will improve air flow.


They have recovered already after 4 days. I had to cut the nutes back a bit as they aren't the same plants they were 4 days ago...

Upskirt shot xxx! The only thing hanging down are fan leaves. All branches have been removed or preferably turned upwards through the scrog.

 

[Scientific]

re: IslandGrower420 - Crop King's Cali Og Kush & Green Crack In DWC

Upskirt shot xxx!

 

[IslandGrow420]

Hey Scientific and (my brotha from another motha) Islandgrower, do you have any suggestions about what is causing the issue I posted in the pics under Week 7? Or anyone else please chime in....

Just a recap: The leaves were a nice dark green but then the veins turn a very light colour, but the interveinal leaf stayed dark green. The tip of the leaf then starts to turn a dark reddy brown colour and this slowly spreads inwards, and after long enough the leaf dies.

 

[Scientific]

Hey IG -- As soon as you get to 50 posts you can send and receive private messages, so commence to posting.

I'll guess magnesium deficiency based on the funny color changes, but diagnosing deficiencies is really hard--much harder than those leaf charts would make it seem. (I saw someone here the other day posting about their boron deficiency.... not likely.)

What always comes to mind in cases like this is when I started keeping fish. You could buy all kinds of fish antibiotics and other treatments for all manner of fishy problems, but the experienced fish keepers always said the same thing: "Keep your water right and your fish won't get sick." Prevention beats treatment. I think it's the same thing with cannabis: you feed a mild solution of balanced nutrients on a consistent basis using good water (not too hard) and don't overcomplicate things by adding a whole bunch of extra boosters and sooper joose etc--just NPK+micros in good water--and chances are you won't have many problems. That's my grow philosophy anyway.

I have super soft water so mine seems to need lots of calmag, but other than that, just plain old half-strength FloraSeries works for me.

Of course, that's a "good enough" solution, and experienced growers who are pushing everything to the limit work out their own specialized growing regimens, but I think for most four bottles at half strength works great.

<edit> I just looked at your fertilizer list. Yowza, that's a lot of stuff! Based on that list, I would expect that excess was more likely than deficit. And I see you're adding calmag. So for the problem that leaves (no pun intended) something more exotic like pH being wildly off (unlikely, right?) or an overconcentration of one nutrient blocking another (like too many positively charged potassium ions making it hard for the plant to process the similarly positively charged magnesium ions).

Now I'm thinking of Thoreau's dictum: "Simplify, simplify, simplify!" Maybe reduce to base nutrients and then slowly start adding back the supplements? Just a thought (and just my .02 of course...)

Nutes - Veg: Fox Farm Grow Big, GH Diamond Nectar Humics, Botanicare Silica Blast, Botanicare CalMag, Botanicare Hydroguard, Hygrozyme enzymes, & Maxicrop Liquid Seaweed. Bloom: Fox Farm Tiger Bloom & bloom boosters, GH Diamond Nectar Humics, Botanicare Silica Blast, Botanicare CalMag, Botanicare Hydroguard, Hygrozyme enzymes, & Maxicrop Liquid Seaweed.​

</edit>

 

[IslandGrow420]

hey thanks Scientific! yeah, i know what you are saying about the nutrients. I use the essential additives (humics, cal/mag, epsom salt, and silica) in small amounts (usually 2ml per gallon, epsom I put 1/8-1/4 tps in 6.5 gal res) and make sure i keep the ppm's down. i don't use the maxicrop liquid seaweed anymore either....i was trying that out for this grow but dropped it after week 3. I use the Hygrozyme at half strength too and only when I do a res change. I've got a bluelab combo meter which i test once a week, and i check the ppm and ph once every day and adjust to desired levels. i've been using this nutrient mix for a year now and with great results, as you can see with the rest of the plants on this grow. I am a big believer in proactive, not reactive....i don't get deficiencies ever. the biggest issue i have to deal with is fungus knats, but that's not a prob.

I use cal/mag and I epsom salt. i don't think this is a mag issue. its not the interveinal leaf getting lighter (like you see with most mag problems), it is the veins getting lighter....i've never seen this before and can't find anything through my research. this one has me stumped. it's clearing up on OG #3 but I still would like to know what caused it.

 

[Scientific]

hey thanks Scientific! yeah, i know what you are saying about the nutrients. I use the essential additives (humics, cal/mag, epsom salt, and silica) in small amounts (usually 2ml per gallon, epsom I put 1/8-1/4 tps in 6.5 gal res) and make sure i keep the ppm's down. i don't use the maxicrop liquid seaweed anymore either....i was trying that out for this grow but dropped it after week 3. I use the Hygrozyme at half strength too and only when I do a res change. I've got a bluelab combo meter which i test once a week, and i check the ppm and ph once every day and adjust to desired levels. i've been using this nutrient mix for a year now and with great results, as you can see with the rest of the plants on this grow. I am a big believer in proactive, not reactive....i don't get deficiencies ever. the biggest issue i have to deal with is fungus knats, but that's not a prob.

I use cal/mag and I epsom salt. i don't think this is a mag issue. its not the interveinal leaf getting lighter (like you see with most mag problems), it is the veins getting lighter....i've never seen this before and can't find anything through my research. this one has me stumped. it's clearing up on OG #3 but I still would like to know what caused it.

> I am a big believer in proactive, not reactive....
Unless you're adding (and paying for) stuff you really don't need, or even adding too much of something...

So cal/mag AND epsom salt both? So magnesium nitrate AND magnesium sulfate. Sounds like a lot of Mg. Like I said, more isn't always better, and too much of one anion can cause and imbalance with another anion (or anions), which could give interesting/unusual symptoms like you're seeing.

I question the notion of "essential" additives, except in the case of calmag with soft water. "Humics" sounds like marketing talk to me.

Anyway, I'm not trying to criticize or talk you out of anything, just ruminating on possible reasons why things went wrong. Like I said, my approach would be to go back of to a known-good minimum configuration and only then start adding stuff one by one and see what happens.

Good luck!

 

[IslandGrow420]

It has taken me 3 yrs to get this mix right. I started with a base nute (I have to use fox farm as it is the only hydroponic product available where I live, and shipping isn't a viable option), then I tested various additives like hydroguard, cal/mag, silica, humics, recharge, epsom, liquid seaweed, hygrozyme, sweeteners, mycorrhizae, additional beneficial bacteria, etc, over a 3 year period on multiple grows using the same strain. I found what works for me and what doesn't. I'm using the same nute mix on the rest of my plants and they look awesome.

I use epsom in flowering and cut back the cal/mag as the cal/mag I use has higher levels of nitrogen in it. I've never had to add much epsom in the past, but the green crack I've got going now is a mag whore.

I have observed humics/fulvics to be beneficial for my plants...i won't stop using them now. I did a lot of research on it, some conclusive and some not. The website you use has some interesting reading on humics. Humic acids in hydroponics: What is their effect? | Science in Hydroponics
Still not conclusive but I've done my own comparison testing and I'm happy with the benefits for $50/yr.

The problem on my OG #3 has almost cleared up so I'm all good. I just wanted to know if anyone recognised the symptoms I described from past experience in their grows.

Thanks for your opinions Sci!

 

[Islandgrow]

Hey Scientific and (my brotha from another motha) Islandgrower, do you have any suggestions about what is causing the issue I posted in the pics under Week 7? Or anyone else please chime in....

Just a recap: The leaves were a nice dark green but then the veins turn a very light colour, but the interveinal leaf stayed dark green. The tip of the leaf then starts to turn a dark reddy brown colour and this slowly spreads inwards, and after long enough the leaf dies.

Maybe an iron deficiency? Not sure about that either.

 

[IslandGrow420]

I've got iron in the Cal/Mag (botanicare Cal/Mag+) and there are small amounts in the base nutes as well...unless I had some sort of lockout...which I'll never know now as I've changed the bucket res once already. The leaf pattern is so distinctive - I figure someone must have seen this before.

That's a healthy leaf on top of a leaf showing the issue, both leaves from the OG #3.


feckin baffled...