Let's Find a Mother! Hiking Through a Field of Mary Jane

[BudTester420]

So when I use to work at Tarjay we tell people they could just take a lid from us when they came in looking for one cause their store didn't have them, I'm pretty sure you could say the same at wally world as well if you want to give it a try. Is it honest? No. But you heard it from the manufacture they can't help you, some times you have to help yourself.


Also Goodwill sells the whole bucket (large 20 gal sizes and up) for 3 bucks if you can find one in stock.

 

[Hiker]

Hey hiker do you use a filter on your water pump? How do you deal with the salt build up in all the res's or during main res change?

Hey Wiz

I have an RO system I installed in my basement. It uses a float valve to keep a 55g barrel full. FYI, don't buy a used barrel. There is a recycler down in the big city that sells used, food grade, barrels. They have a slight hint of some kind of odor. They said it had some sort of apple something (pie filling I think I recall) in it. I can't convince myself it's not affecting my water a little. My ppms are still 20, but it smells, and it seemed like I was having weird ph measurements. The weird ph thing only happened one time though, so it was probably residue from something on a measuring cup or something.

I use GH Flora nutes and I haven't had any problems with salt build up. I used the same line back in the 90s and never had a problem either. Sure, the rocks right above water line can get a little white, but it doesn't seem to hurt anything. My system feeds from the bottom, so that stuff just sits there. I washed all the rock in between (yes, it's a PITA, but it is what it is. I LOVE growing in rock enough to clean it), so I guess a few months isn't long enough for it to build up too much. I'm not perpetual. I do entire room harvests, so I can clean the entire room and system between crops. I'm certainly trying to avoid any issues, but this allows me to deal with any pests or disease more thoroughly and effectively.


lol I just reread your question. My recirculating pump is always pumping the soup from the bottom of the res to the top 24/7. That pump has a sponge type filter on it. It gets pretty gross, so it's catching a lot. I clean it out with every res change. I think that's what you meant, right?

 

[WizHigh]

Hey hiker can't wait to see this next grow and your complete set up.

 

[cannasensei]

 

[Dasher]

the search continues ! Welcome home Hiker.

 

[mcloadie]

Hey Wiz

I have an RO system I installed in my basement. It uses a float valve to keep a 55g barrel full. FYI, don't buy a used barrel. There is a recycler down in the big city that sells used, food grade, barrels. They have a slight hint of some kind of odor. They said it had some sort of apple something (pie filling I think I recall) in it. I can't convince myself it's not affecting my water a little. My ppms are still 20, but it smells, and it seemed like I was having weird ph measurements. The weird ph thing only happened one time though, so it was probably residue from something on a measuring cup or something.

I use GH Flora nutes and I haven't had any problems with salt build up. I used the same line back in the 90s and never had a problem either. Sure, the rocks right above water line can get a little white, but it doesn't seem to hurt anything. My system feeds from the bottom, so that stuff just sits there. I washed all the rock in between (yes, it's a PITA, but it is what it is. I LOVE growing in rock enough to clean it), so I guess a few months isn't long enough for it to build up too much. I'm not perpetual. I do entire room harvests, so I can clean the entire room and system between crops. I'm certainly trying to avoid any issues, but this allows me to deal with any pests or disease more thoroughly and effectively.


lol I just reread your question. My recirculating pump is always pumping the soup from the bottom of the res to the top 24/7. That pump has a sponge type filter on it. It gets pretty gross, so it's catching a lot. I clean it out with every res change. I think that's what you meant, right?

You know you guys can get big food grade drum liners...heavy duty and run em in 55 gal drums....when ya need a clean out you just drain the res and pop another liner in. They used em in cali for tomatoe products at the cannery.

 

[Xlr8]

Good to hear from you Hiker - can't wait to see what you've been up to brotha!

 

[Vick074]

surprise!!????

wiw!

 

[fish cake]

good weed to you Hiker!
hope you do find that mother! glad to see you back around too

 

[wildbill38]

Welcome back.

 

[nmherbman]

Hi

I've missed you!

Just a quick update as I'm still super busy. Still have my buddy and step-son visiting, and I'm still finishing getting the next crop in.

All the parts I need to increase my bucket count didn't arrive before I left, so I didn't get everything set back up. I put a fairly mild veg nute recipe into my cloner, and they seemed to have liked it! Lot's of healthy white roots ready to go into the buckets. I topped almost all of them and threw away the few that never took root. I ended up with ~85% success. I'm OK with that since my cost to make clones is basically zero, and it takes MUCH less time. I love my aero cloner. I want to build at least one more and make some different lid configurations. I have too many sites to do any veg. The roots start to intertwine quickly, so I'd like to have 2 cloners with less in them. Does anyone know where/how to get just lids for Rubbermaid containers? Think I can get them online? hmmm... I'll have to go look.

edit:
Found the answer from Rubbermaid themselves...
Answer: Replacement lids are not available for direct order and are not offered by retail stores. We regret any inconvenience this may cause.

I have 35 buckets in the flowering room now (one leaks and I forgot to get it replaced and too late now) and about that many rooted clones. They will be in the buckets this weekend. I was hoping to have them transplanted already, but I am still exhausted from the trip, and now I'm slammed with work. The timing is bad because my counterpart, ie the only other IT staff in my tech company, started his vacation today. And on top of all that, my buddy who said "no problem" to acting as a broker, apparently was a little too confident in his "connections". I won't say much about that issue other than it's causing me a LOT of stress right now. The budget dept keeps asking AR wtf is going on?

In case anyone was wondering, I'm not going to close this journal. The search for mother continues. I have a feeling I will be starting another journal after this next crop is done, but we'll see.

I have some pictures of the harvest, and I still need to bring my written journal upstairs to the computer so I can share some #'s. And of course, see who won the contest!

I'm sorry if it disappoints, but I won't get any pictures up until after the next crop is in and running. There are not many pictures from the last harvest that I haven't already shared. The next picture update will be worth the wait though. I've made some cool improvements to the flowering room. I know this next crop is going to be even better, and this last one was awesome for the first at bat in 2 decades! The light mover is in and the lights cover the width of the room with only a few inches to spare, so coverage is going to be outstanding. The air hockey floor came together really nice too. I'm excited to get this new crop in. At the risk of making much ado about nothing... I have a surprise planned for the next update too.

I really appreciate everyone hanging in here until the end. I apologize for suddenly disappearing after promising the, still missing, update. I feel even worse that it happened right as I won motm. Hopefully when you all see what I've been busy working on you will forgive me

I know I'm stealing it from Mr Fishington, but I like the sentiment...

Good weed to all

hope things work out in your favor on work front bro. I am looking forward to seeing what your up to in the garden! congrats on motm

 

[NorCaliwood]

Drive bye,, Keepem Green

 

[fish cake]

good weed brother Hiker
gratz on the Nom for the MOtM

 

[Jimmycricket]

4.77 yield

did i win? am i like a month too late lol?

 

[fish cake]

wishing you a fine weedend Hiker

 

[Hiker]

4.77 yield

did i win? am i like a month too late lol?

You're not too late. I'm going to be publishing some #s later today.

wishing you a fine weedend Hiker

Thank you Mr Fishalopolous
May you have a fabulous weedend as well!

 

[fish cake]

You're not too late. I'm going to be publishing some #s later today.



Thank you Mr Fishalopolous
May you have a fabulous weedend as well!

 

[WizHigh]

Whats up hiker buddy. Dont forget to fix that leak in the buckets. Whens the next grow or journal going up? Like to see what your growing next.

 

[Hiker]

Dont forget to fix that leak in the buckets.

huh? What leak?

Whens the next grow or journal going up? Like to see what your growing next.

I decided to just continue this journal. I haven't settled on a mother, so the search continues...

--**********************************************************************************

OK guys, I'm sorry for the lack of updates. Things have been easing up a little on the homefront. I was able to catch up on journals a bit last week, but I haven't been able to work on the big update that is due. It will be another couple of days before I can get the promised update up. In the meantime, I did remember to bring my notebook into the office, so here are some final weight #'s, AND... the long anticipated announcement of the winners of my little contest!

I just realized I never took final weights for the White Widow or the Blueberry. Those will have to be posted on another post. Here are the final weights for each plant (grams ounces):
1A, TGA's Apollo 13 x Vortex: 61 2.2
1B, TGA's Apollo 13 x Vortex: 111 4
1C, TGA's Apollo 13 x Vortex: 130 4.6
3A, AK-48: 88 3.1
3B, AK-48: 108 3.9
3C, AK-48: 131 4.6
9A, Bubba Kush: 66 2.4
9A, Bubba Kush: 128 4.6

And last, but not least, is plant 8A, Royal Queen's Critical femmed. This is the plant I pictured and asked for estimates of the weight.
8a, Royal Queen's Critical: 123 4.4

If we just look at the closest guess, it would be Fish Cake, with the very specific guess of 4.5379. If I look at the closest, without going over, it's Sl1ngblade, with 4.25.
Since I never specified either way, you're both Grand Prize Winners!

I promised some really nice Nothings as prizes. I checked my supply and I have enough for everyone who played along. Congrats to everyone. You're all winners for participating!

You do have an option for a real prize however. As part of the prize for winning motm last month (thank you all again I'm still a little in awe), I received a case of rolling papers. While I have been smoking more joints lately, this is several years worth of papers for me, so if you would like to trade in your nothing for some rolling papers, let me know. Actually, you can have some papers AND a the Limited Edition Hiker Nothings 2013 if you prefer.

For our grand prize winners, Fish Cake and Sl1ngblade, I'll figure out something special for them since I think they both may have the same case of papers.

I'll have to measure the White Widow and Blueberry later to get a final total, but the above plants total to 946g or 33.8oz. My goal was 2 pounds, so I made it!

While this statistic is pretty worthless without a final weight, it did calculate to an interesting value. My grams per watt calculation is 0.4204444444444 I know I have 6 oz from the 2 missing plants, so my gram/watt should end up ~0.5 Not very good, but about where I thought I would be for a first run. I'm pretty confident I can beat this number on the next run.


Lessons learned:

• Double check the drain pump for air lock after every flush/res change.
• Use DM Zone.
• Popcorn sucks. While very smokeable, and what I will happily be smoking for some time, it makes harvesting much more time consuming. The lesson is to clean off the lower parts of the branches when defoling. I used to do this when I scrogged, but it's a lesson I had to relearn this round.
• I avoided topping last round. This time I am topping a lot in addition to bending/training.

This round I am running the following (Strain - Qty):

• Blueberry - 7
• AK-48 - 6 (3 phenos)
• Apollo 13 x Vortex - 11 (3 phenos)
• White Widow - 3
• Critical - 4
• Bubba Kush - 4 (2 phenos)

There are a lot of Blueberry just because she provided the most clones. I'm not sure how happy I am with this pheno of Blueberry. It's not much like I what I remember from the last time I grew her in the 90's, but perhaps I need to just let go of my expectations and try to just appreciate her on her own merits. She just doesn't have the blueberry smell/taste that I recall. I'm giving her another chance. If I don't like this one, I will pop a couple more seeds. I still have 7 of the 10 I ordered. I also kept one of the males for future breeding ambitions.

I'm not quite ready to provide any smoke reports yet. I'm mostly smoking the shake and popcorn. I have kept the strains separate, but the shake and popcorn from the TGA and AK plants are all mixed together, so I need to do a more scientific comparison of the individual plants.

It's taken all morning to get this written.

I think that's about all I have to say today. There will be a picture update coming soon, and as I mentioned, there is a surprise in the works for this update. That surprise is taking longer than anticipated, hence the delay.

 

[Jimmycricket]

OMFG!!!! I won.

I won I won I really really won. OMG I'm gonna call my mom and tell her the awesome news. Quick someone call NBC, CNN, and Howard Stern, I got some interviews to do!