JohnGalt's 2nd Grow (1st Indoor) - Soil SCROG

12/06/2010 - Checked in on the plants, and took a few photos. Then noticed a gnat... then another... then another....

The bad news is there is at least one on almost every single bud. The good news is most buds I only spotted two or fewer gnats. The even better news is these buds are so sticky the gnats can't get unstuck (meaning hopefully they don't get to lay eggs). The downside is I'll be scraping bugs off my buds for a week...

So, my first plan of action is to crush some of my perlite down to a more sand-like size and layer it across the soil on all the plants. I'll probably also tape my drain holes down to barely let the water out (they are 1" square holes, which is plenty big for a gnat to find it and lay eggs - kudos for this idea to... can't remember who... someone on this forum that had gnats laying eggs in their drain holes).

Also in the news tonight: flushing! Blue Dream is supposed to take about 55 days of 12/12 to finish, and by my math it's been about 43 days since the switch to 12/12. So I figure since I can't tell by looking at the buds, I'll assume that 55 days is in the ball park. If it takes an extra week, that's fine by me.

The stuff I'm smoking now was harvested early due to some unknown plant death, and didn't get flushed. It is so terrible... a friend of mine who has his medical card was out sick from work for a week and as such was short on cash (which translates to short on medicine). I offered him a bag (I'm guessing it was about 1/2-ounce); at first he was so grateful... then we smoked a bowl. Later that evening imagine my surprise when he forgot his free 1/2-ounce of weed when he left!

I was so disappointed I couldn't move on to better things... This is the first of my outdoor grow, so it's the least potent and the least flushed, but I've vowed to smoke it in the order harvested. Never been so disappointed to see a half-ounce of weed. I'm thinking I might turn half of that crop into budder. Between that, the rest of the smoke, plus some recent "supplies" from the club, I should be good until this harvest is cured (figure roughly 2 months).

My goodness how I ramble... if you've just read this entire post you've just won a free 1/2-ounce of 2010 Outdoor Surprise! Unfortunately there's no way to claim your prize in real life, as any such real life interaction would compromise my grow security... but trust me, this is one prize you didn't want to claim anyhow!

OK, enough blabbering, time for some pics!

Another great pic of my favorite cola (the biggest, fattest one):
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Can you find the dead gnat in this picture? It's actually a tough one, so I'll give you a hint: you're looking down on it from over its head, and it's wings are folded up together...
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Random bud:
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Possibly the best macro pic I've got out of my cheepo camera to date! You can actually see some individual trichomes! Very excited about this one:
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12/7/2010 - a couple of the plants were droopy, so gave them a little pH'd water. Turned 10 gallons of coarse perlite into 2 gallons of fine perlite, and spread it over the top of the soil to keep the gnats from laying any more eggs. Decided not to mess with the drain holes for the moment. Had some house guests that stayed late so I didn't have near as much time to work on this as I planned.

A couple more of the plants are draining the nutrients from their fan leaves. I'm hoping this is just a thing they do as they ripen (as opposed to being the result of root damage from the gnats). Will be monitoring closely; hoping i don't have to harvest early.
 
If you can sit the pots in a couple inches of soapy water for a little while, you can drowned any that are about to come out from the bottom. I had little maggotty things actually crawl up the outside of the pot. And tons of mature gnats floating in the water. Was surprised at how many came out. Good Luck!
 
Hi JG, sorry to hear your first crop didn't meet your expectations but as you said, you can use it for budder.

Your update pics look good, loads of trichs on those leaves. Should be a big improvement on the first outdoor girls. Some nice looking tops.:welldone:

Powdered garlic(unsalted) works great to move the gnats out of your soil mix. I put a couple of sticky stiks in each pot then lay a teaspoon or so of garlic powder around the surface. Gnats vacated my pots in a hurry. After 3 days I didn't see any more little dead bodies and haven't seen any since. I don't think your roots are threatened unless you've got a lot of gnats.(how many is a lot?)
 
Tmac12 said:
If you can sit the pots in a couple inches of soapy water for a little while, you can drowned any that are about to come out from the bottom. I had little maggotty things actually crawl up the outside of the pot. And tons of mature gnats floating in the water. Was surprised at how many came out. Good Luck!
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Not sure I'd be able to get a tray under them to try this. My setup is the pots sit on a sheet of hardware cloth (metal mesh), and with the top of the plants in the screen there's no room to pick them up at all.

But, you give me a good idea... next best thing would be to mix some Safer's soap and thoroughly spray the openings. Can't hurt, and might get the job done. I'll spray them twice a day every day if I have to.
 
Mmmmick said:
Hi JG, sorry to hear your first crop didn't meet your expectations but as you said, you can use it for budder.

Your update pics look good, loads of trichs on those leaves. Should be a big improvement on the first outdoor girls. Some nice looking tops.:welldone:

Powdered garlic(unsalted) works great to move the gnats out of your soil mix. I put a couple of sticky stiks in each pot then lay a teaspoon or so of garlic powder around the surface. Gnats vacated my pots in a hurry. After 3 days I didn't see any more little dead bodies and haven't seen any since. I don't think your roots are threatened unless you've got a lot of gnats.(how many is a lot?)
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Yeah I'm not sure what "a lot" is either. I would have never thought to use garlic powder. I'm thinking I might sprinkle that over the top of my perlite, just in case the little buggers think they will just burrow out of that. Might even mix it into my safer soap for spraying the drain holes.

Thanks for dropping by and thanks for the advice.
 
Becareful, garlic might clog the spray bottle. If you have to drench can you tape the holes? If so you might want to spray into the holes and then tape them for an hour.
 
JohnGalt said:
Yeah I'm not sure what "a lot" is either. I would have never thought to use garlic powder. I'm thinking I might sprinkle that over the top of my perlite, just in case the little buggers think they will just burrow out of that. Might even mix it into my safer soap for spraying the drain holes.

Thanks for dropping by and thanks for the advice.
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The powder had them on the move for me. Doesn't kill them but if you have sticky stiks or something sticky sweet in a dish they'll not last long. Yellow attracts them.

I thought the perlite was supposed to keep them from laying in the top soil layer? Can't hurt to sprinkle some up top anyway. The garlic smell will persist for a couple days.

You could apply the garlic after spraying, it would stick to the wet soil mix in the pot openings.

You're welcome JG, good luck.
 
Tmac12 said:
Becareful, garlic might clog the spray bottle. If you have to drench can you tape the holes? If so you might want to spray into the holes and then tape them for an hour.
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Hadn't considered the clogging problem. I was assuming the garlic powder would dissolve in water, but I'm not sure it will. Guess I could just mix a small batch and see if it works.

Can't tape the holes. The drain holes are cut into the bottom corner/edge of the pot, meaning half the hole is on the side of the pot, and the other half is in the bottom of the pot. Since I can't lift the pots, I would only be able to tape half the opening. And as tightly packed in as the pots are, it would be a challenge to reach half of them at all.
 
Mmmmick said:
The powder had them on the move for me. Doesn't kill them but if you have sticky stiks or something sticky sweet in a dish they'll not last long. Yellow attracts them.

I thought the perlite was supposed to keep them from laying in the top soil layer? Can't hurt to sprinkle some up top anyway. The garlic smell will persist for a couple days.

You could apply the garlic after spraying, it would stick to the wet soil mix in the pot openings.

You're welcome JG, good luck.
Click to expand...

Yes, the perlite is to prevent further infestation. At this point I don't think I can get the larvae out of the soil. I just have to hope they eat the organic matter in the soil more than they eat the roots. Stopping egg-laying means the larvae population doesn't grow.

2 weeks. All I need is 2 weeks and they should be ready to harvest.
 
Almost forgot... put 1 tsp of garlic powder in each pot after watering. An hour later the little buggers were running away!

The down side is that this is driving the adults up (away from the soil), which means they're all up on the buds (dead, of course - go trichomes!), so it's gonna be a lot of work picking them off.

Also started seeing little black flecks near the dead gnats. Under the scope, even at 100x power, it was difficult to make out much of their shape/features. Only thing I could tell is they were very dark red/brown to black in color, have 3 sets of legs, and look kinda furry/hairy.

No idea what they are, but have yet to see one moving/alive, so not too worried.

The big bud (the one I'm always posting pics of) is showing some signs of yellowing on a couple of the bud leaves. Just a tiny bit, though. I'm slightly worried I might have to harvest that one sooner than I want to, but the rest of the bunch are looking fantastic. Mostly just the lower fan leaves turning a nice yellow as they have their nutrients sucked out of them.

In other news... the addition of garlic to my grow room mixing with the ambient odor has created a very strong odor. Who knew? Blue Dream + garlic = Slim Jims! (For the record I was completely sober for this odoriferous experience.)
 
The garlic powder gets them moving just fine. Too bad they like to land on your buds.
Mine smelled like italian sausage.lol

I'm not familiar with the smaller critters you're seeing. Probably some kind of soil mite, not necessarily harmful.(particularly not if they're dead):)
 
Mmmmick said:
The garlic powder gets them moving just fine. Too bad they like to land on your buds.
Mine smelled like italian sausage.lol

I'm not familiar with the smaller critters you're seeing. Probably some kind of soil mite, not necessarily harmful.(particularly not if they're dead):)
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Yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking. Thing is, they have no wings, so not sure how they got there... (just dawned on me...) maybe they hitched a ride on the gnat? Every single one I've seen was within 1-2 cm of a gnat... but I don't know if/how the gnat could fly with 8-10 of them riding along.

Either way, you're right. I'd rather see dead bugs than living.
 
Just checked in on the plants to take samples for the microscope. Thanks to the Plant Abuse Chart thread in 420mag's How To Grow section, I was quickly able to identify the issue as heat stress. This makes sense since this bud is the tallest and is directly under the light - it is in fact the closest to the heat source.

The good news is it is mild. The other good news is fixing it should be as simple as moving the light up an inch or two.

Also got a sample to check trichomes. Looking very good; wish i could take pics thru my scope. My estimates are 15% clear, 60% cloudy, & 25% amber for that sample. Keep in mind this is from the bud that looked the most "done" to me. Tomorrow I'll take samples from several buds around the screen to get an idea if where they are collectively.

If the schedule I read about this strain is right, they should be ready on Saturday. My plan is to water with RO water one last time before harvesting. (My water isn't particularly hard, but in researching water curing today I came to realize my water may affect the flavor.)

Will also get some more pics next time.
 
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