MJ Crescendos 'Operation Snowflake' Journal

[MJ Crescendo]

Is it Indica, Sativa or Hybrid? What percentages? Mixed, primarily indica (fem snow white)
Is it in Veg or Flower stage? Seedling
If in Veg... For how long? 1.5 months
If in Flower stage... For how long?
Indoor or outdoor? Indoor dr80
Soil or Hydro? Fox farm ocean forest
If soil... what is in your mix? FFOF
If soil... What size pot? solo cups to air pots
Size of light? 180w GLH
Is it aircooled? Fans
Temp of Room/cab? Room temp 80 - Tent temp 90
RH of Room/cab?
PH of media or res? 6.5
Any Pests ? found thrips in ffof bag
How often are you watering? every 3 days
Type and strength of ferts used? filtered, pH'd, room temp water

I want to clarify that I hold a medical card holder, with a prescription from the doctor to grow cannabis for medical conditions. This is my second grow, but first grow with an LED. Usually I do not post, but I have noticed that many of you are very helpful. Learn from me and I can learn from you

I arrived on the idea of an LED because I was hoping to be able to produce a personal supply for myself, yet not have to worry about electricity and heating issues. I think I made the right decision and loving the ride thus far.

All seedlings emerged on 8/20. Lighting has been 20/4 since then. The light is approximately 13'' away from the tops of the girls. There are 4 fem. nirvana snow white's and 1 fem. nirvana hawaii maui waui and the other is medical bag seed from some white widow. Hoping for the best on the non-fem ww.

First problem was these little white mites (possibly thrips) that I found in the fox farm bag. Damn hydro shop must have gotten an infested batch, because I do not know where these little bugs came from. I've sprayed some fox farm 'dont bug me' and mixed it around and I think it's working. The solo cups that the seedlings are in are pest free already. Just worried about the transplanting. Exciting news for the transplant is that they are going into air pots

Next problem is that my thermometer consistently reads 88-90 degrees during the day. The intake air is around 78 degrees and the outake temp feels pretty cool as well. Either this GLH 180w raises temp tents by 10 degrees or my cheap thermometer is a liar. The seedlings seemed happy till today, I noticed a little drooping. I think they are reacting to the watering, not the temperature. I personally think that the temp feels around 85 in there and there is tons of air movement (2 fans) + vortex 4'' is pullin air out at a pretty good rate. Hoping to not see any heat stress, but only time will tell.

Also my camera sucks so bare with me on the quality of pics. I love growing plants in soil as I have always had my outdoor gardens grown the same way. It feels right to me and I am going to stick to it. To every man his own.

I have gone organic in the past, but will be using the fox farm line for this grow. I have ff grow big for veg, ff tiger bloom for first and second trimester of flowering. I will be supplementing w/ cal mag. During flowering I will be using bud candy throughout the cycle and end with advanced nutes overdrive.

This is just the beginning...

 

[MJ Crescendo]

I thought this was one of the most useful things I have found. I have ph up and down so I will try to adjust the pH 6.3-6.7 throughout the grow to allow for proper uptake of specific nutrients when needed.

 

[MJ Crescendo]

10 Days Veg

I have been watering every 3 days, which seems to be how long the soil takes to dry out in the cups. The pH of the waterings have all been 6.4-6.6 thus far. Most recent watering had 1mL of grow big + 1mL of cal/mag per gallon (1/5 strength). Day temps usually range from 84-89 degrees and night temps are usually 75-78 degrees. Humidity has been between 45%-55%. Not sure how I will be able to lower that for flowering, but seems alright for now. Next watering will be plain water to ensure that the low strength feeding did not overwhelm. They look alright since the feeding.

~Peace~

 

[scaredeecat]

good looking grow so far

 

[MJ Crescendo]

good looking grow so far

Thanks man. Good to see someone around the journal.

I transplanted them today and the roots looked very healthy (bright white) and I was gentle as possible to avoid stress. They all look happy thus far in the new pots, which are:

3 gal air pot: Fem. Hawaii Maui Waui and Fem. Snow white #1
2 gal air pot: Fem Snow white #2 and #3
Regular pot: Ice
Full solo cup (16 oz): Fem Snow white #4

This is a fun experiment to see the difference in growth rates in all the diff containers. All containers contain fox farm ocean forest soil. I watered them w/ plain 6.5 pH water. I do believe that future plans will be more simple (final home being all 2 gallon air pots) but for this grow let's see what happens!

The LED is approx 16'' from the top of the little ones and I'll gauge how much stretching occurs because of it. The footprint seems to include all of them at that height.

~Peace~

 

[Bandit420]

Nice job so far MJ C and to 420!
I'll be curious to see how you like the Air Pots and what kind of differences you see between the different containers

btw, if you want to post your opinions, thoughts, pics, or whatever AirPot related please feel free to post on the Air Pot review thread!
Superoots Air Pots -An Evolution in Containers

 

[basementdwell]

with the ph set to the lowest level (i say 6.4)and then the nutes and roots using nutes will drive it up max it at 6.7-6.8 then lower it to 6.4 again and so on through out. I set mine to 5.5 the lowest for hydro and let it ride up to 6.2 and lower it back down. just my opinion =)

ON another note they look great for what ur doing and i think led u may be able to bring it closer to the canopy of ur plant for best effect.

 

[MJ Crescendo]

Nice job so far MJ C and to 420!
I'll be curious to see how you like the Air Pots and what kind of differences you see between the different containers

btw, if you want to post your opinions, thoughts, pics, or whatever AirPot related please feel free to post on the Air Pot review thread!
Superoots Air Pots -An Evolution in Containers

Hey bandit. Glad to be w/ the 420 crowd I am also very interested to see the differences in a side by side grow. I love experimenting w/ these factors to see the true differences. Thanks for the link.

with the ph set to the lowest level (i say 6.4)and then the nutes and roots using nutes will drive it up max it at 6.7-6.8 then lower it to 6.4 again and so on through out. I set mine to 5.5 the lowest for hydro and let it ride up to 6.2 and lower it back down. just my opinion =)

ON another note they look great for what ur doing and i think led u may be able to bring it closer to the canopy of ur plant for best effect.

Hi dwell. I will keep in mind that when the nutes get used that it may head back up to the 6.7 area. I will make sure that I only lower it back to 6.4's when necessary. Hopefully I can keep my pH levels very smooth throughout the grow.

I took your advice and lowered it to 14'' from the top of the canopy. All the girls are at the same canopy level as well now. That should help!

 

[MJ Crescendo]

Needed somewhere to post this great information. Straight from DocBud and will be considered every watering

"I'm learning a ton of stuff about pH and soil culture, etc. The most interesting thing I've learned is that pH isn't really that important....but total Alkalinity is. In other words, the pH of the water can be adjusted.....but the overall acid buffering capacity of the water----total alkalinity----does it's own thing once in the medium. In other words, if the total alkalinity of your tap water is high....pHing it down to optimal levels will still result in raising the pH of the medium.

Use of high alkalinity waters in container-grown crops result in significant increases in soil pH. These increases result not from water pH as is commonly thought, but from the accumulation of bicarbonates deposited from repeated applications of irrigation water. Deficiencies of iron, manganese, copper and zinc are common where high alkalinity waters are being used. Alkalinity, not water pH, causes soil pH increases. Low alkalinity, high pH waters in most cases will not be a problem.

So, a fast, easy way to reduce total alkalinity is the mix tap water with RO, and pH that mix. Using straight RO will often lead to deficiencies. The minerals in tap water are important for plants!"

"Low alkalinity, high pH waters in most cases will not be a problem" which is good for my 7.6 pH tap water!

 

[Setting Sun]

I imposed a moratorium on myself as far as subscribing to new threads, but I have to follow this.

you like to experiment, we've got the same tent(s), and you're using a GLH LED light, which naturally I'm interested in because I'm using the 300w model.

Let me ask you something about experimenting. What's your reason for doing so?

Do you do it mainly for fun and curiosity, or are you working towards a goal like refining your grow method until you get to a certain place where you will stop or decrease your experimenting and stick with a certain basic method?

 

[MJ Crescendo]

I imposed a moratorium on myself as far as subscribing to new threads, but I have to follow this.

you like to experiment, we've got the same tent(s), and you're using a GLH LED light, which naturally I'm interested in because I'm using the 300w model.

Let me ask you something about experimenting. What's your reason for doing so?

Do you do it mainly for fun and curiosity, or are you working towards a goal like refining your grow method until you get to a certain place where you will stop or decrease your experimenting and stick with a certain basic method?

How's it going SS? I have thoroughly enjoyed all of your grows as I have been browsing through them since I joined the 420 crowd.

This experimentation plan kind of unfolded in my lap. One day I saw these air pots and I found a place selling them for CHEAP. I was unsure of them a year ago, but now I know they are right for me. Off the top of my head I figured the 2 gallons and 3 gallons were the way to go, so I purchased only those. Now when I started this grow I knew I would want to transplant into these air pots, but having these different sizes, it turned into an experiment. I also had these fem snow whites, fem maui waui, and ice seeds laying around so instead of going the cloning route (mother in a 3 gallon air pot would be fantastic) I used seedlings. I decided on which got larger pots, on how healthy they were. Snow white #1 and hawaii maui waui were a step ahead of the rest of the bunch so they took the 3 gallon air pots. The next 2 that were on track (snow white #2 and #3) got the 2 gallon air pots. The ice which is not a fem seed (risky) got a regular walmart pot that I found laying around. The solo cup was inspired by Sicc over at RIU.

I am trying to do something similar to this

I guess you could say I am taking advantage of the materials at hand. After I took a look at everything I decided that I have an experiment on my hands. Hopefully I will be able to gauge differences between regular pots and air pots and even the differences between size of air pots. I am thoroughly intrigued by how the root mass will differ in air pots. Here are some pics of a past grow where I used some of these walmart pots (I think you are doing the same thing with some bubbles )

My root mass spiraled around those little holes on the bottom as well and I felt like it kept my plants healthy. So enjoy those pots!

I will continue this grow as is and look at the results to determine how to approach my future grows (goal orientated you could say). Far as speculative future goes, I am leaning towards adding another GLH 180w to the DR80 and do a SOG style grow with 6 girls, all in 2 gallon air pots (they fit really well into the tent). With 3 lined up under each 180w and a SOG setup I see myself getting incredible yields that can keep me medicated for a while

For now I just hope that my setup will take me in the right direction and still end up with a good yield. Here is a pic of them at 13 days of veg. Still in a little shock from the transplant, but oddly enough they are stinkin the tent up in a good way haha Got the ona gel out for a little. They are getting tight internode spacings and the stem is getting STRONG. I love these GLH lights so far because my MH/HPS days always had weak stems and a lot of stretching. Hopefully they will be out of shock soon and I can begin some LST I also will be grabbing some hydroton to add to the top layer of all the pots. I am glad I found that tip on 420 and think it will help a lot w/ waterings and allowing the root mass to use the upper portion of soil.

~Peace~

 

[Setting Sun]

Thanks for detailing your thoughts, setup and goals.

That solo cup plant is something else!

and thanks for sharing your experience with the WalMart pots. I tried using them with perlite, but they really need soil or coco to work well.

Hope the airpots work well for you. They're a fairly new product, so I'm waiting on more grows with them to see what the consensus is, but the concept seems very sound.

I've thought of taking a drill to a regular pot and drilling holes all over it, and may still do it, but that's a little different than the design of the holes in the airpots.

Wish you the best on this grow!

 

[MJ Crescendo]

I begun some LST on HMW and SW #1 yesterday by taking some rope around the top 1/3 of the plant and leaning her over. Every couple of hours I pulled a few more cm's until I felt that they were both sufficiently pulled over. This morning I noticed that the upper leaves already responded to the light and straightened back up. I took another rope to the lower stem and gave it a pull till the bottom of the plant straightened up.

I read somewhere that the girls getting the highest intensity of light will show signs of stress first. Well I found this to be true. My solo cup SW has given me some symptoms on her lowest set of fan leaves. The LST girls w/ purple on the bottom is just light from the led, if anyone was wondering.

All waterings have been given at least 4 days between (seems to be when soil is dry) I foilar spray every 2 days w/ plain water. All waterings have been pH'd at 6.5 and I actually checked the solo cup runoff and it was 6.6. The last watering was the first nutrient solution w/ 2.5mL of grow big (approx. 1/4 strength). The soil has been drying since and it took 2 days for this to appear. I believe it's lack of nitrogen, but I was unsure since she is the smallest of all the girls and maybe her feeding was not needed yet. The rest of girls look lush and green

 

[MJ Crescendo]

I just watered the girls and decided that the ice was getting out of control, so let the LST begin! Thought this was a good photo of my initial tie downs. Hopefully ice responds w/n a few hours to the light (should since they love the led)

Thus far the air pots have been taking 3-4 days to dry out. Not bad considering this is straight ffof. For me this is perfect because I can do nute water to plain water in the same week. I think it will make it easier to keep track of things. Todays watering was plain and in 4 days hopefully they will hungry for some grow big.

~Peace~

 

[Setting Sun]

nice job on the LST.

sounds like things are on-track .

 

[MJ Crescendo]

20 Days Veg:
Ok today I mixed up their next watering. I added 5mL of grow big and 5mL of ca/mg to 1 gallon of water (1/2 strength). I pH'd it too 6.6. According to my soil pH chart for the plants to uptake the ca/mg it needs to be between 6.5-6.7 so they should enjoy the next feeding.

My other gallon jug has water pH'd at 6.3. The pH chart says for micronutes the pH should lie around 6.2-6.5 Hopefully having alternating pH waterings should really allow the specific nutrients to be uptaken with ease.

Thus far HMW, SW#1, #2, and Ice have begun LST. They all are enjoying being manipulated closer to the core saturation of the light.

My only other considerations would to be topping SW #3 and #4. I am considering using Uncle Ben's topping method for 4 tops. It looks something like this.

What worries me is that the internodal branches are already growing out quickly and they are just so healthy thus far that I don't know if it's worth my time to do topping. It may be even cooler for me to focus on a central cola on these two girls. Anybody consider this method of topping to be fool proof and should I give it a try? So far I'm going to let them be.

~Peace~

 

[MJ Crescendo]

23 Days Veg

They weren't tended too for a couple of days, but they love their environment so they thrived while I was gone. HMW is REALLY showing that sativa side, with an extremely thick stem and lower branching competing with the main stalk, but LST to the rescue! SW#1 is showing vigorous growth, but definitely just a hybrid strain. The heavy indica in the ice has kept her incredibly short even after some tie downs.

I am thinking that 2 more weeks of LST (approx Sept. 26th) and it is time to test the flowering potential of the GLH 180. Maybe even sooner

Keep it Real
~Peace~

 

[Setting Sun]

You're going to have a very full tent .

Plants are looking great!

I prefer LST to topping. Topping shocks and stresses the plants, and you lose time while they recover. When you LST, they just start branching out the same day. Both techniques work very well, but one is more efficient, IMO.

Besides, every plant I've topped has needed LST anyway down the line, so topping doesn't work well for me.

You can top, but the plant's still in control, unless you want to keep snipping away, but I don't play that game.

When you LST, *you're* in control.

 

[MJ Crescendo]

The possibilities to these air pots are limitless! I read that with air pruning, the total root mass is smaller (we want larger root systems for bigger buds, right). With the double pot technique the root mass can extend even farther down. Apparently it's best to start w/ seedlings or clones in these 2 (gallon or liter idk) air pots so the taproot can extend to the bottom. Once some air pruning has taken place in these pots, the bottom cover can be removed and the air pot placed into a larger pot. This prevents stress from transplanting and will keep the upper root mass air pruned and allow the lower root mass to go wild. Even watering can be done differently, with bottom feeding in the bottom pot and regular feeding through the air pot.

and some other pics...

Snow White#1 initial LST. Top of plant has begun it's 360 degree adventure around the top of the pot.

Hawaii Maui Waui. Responds super fast to any LST thus far

Ice. The indica traits have kept her bushy.

cont.

 

[MJ Crescendo]

SW#3 w/ no LST, but not getting as much lighting so maintaining a short height.

Left front: SW#1 Right front: HMW Center back: SW#2 workin her way straight up still.

Trying to keep it all green. Oddly enough air pots have been taking 4 days to dry out. The regular pot takes 3 days to dry out and the solo cup drys out in 2 days. I always heard that air pots dry out faster, but I guess that is not true for me yet.

~Peace~