Just stumbled on your journal. Looking good. Loving the quadlined plants. Good luck with the seed production. I'm interested to hear how you go.
Thanks McRib, I'll keep you posted, but now I have spotted another issue, read on...
The plants look beautiful Stunger! How did the pollination work? Have the pistils turned brown and receded where you put the pollen?
Thanks Shed, there is a quick answer and a longer one. The quick answer, yep those 2 colas are showing browning pistils compared to the rest of the plant where they are still white, so I think that is looking positive that pollination has occurred and if so, the jar of 1 year old WW pollen that's been sitting on a shelf in the lounge amid some 30C days, it looks promising that the pollen is viable. Hopefully I will see confirmation of that at harvest!
The longer reply, on checking the Gorilla Glue's pistils and confirming that they were browning off, I noticed a few small caterpillars on the WW - a few choice swear words were uttered at that! I immediately filled the sprayer with caterpillar bacteria BT solution and sprayed all 3 plants.
Last year, the use of BT worked really well and seemed to knock out all caterpillars once it was applied, however visible damage was done by then from the late stage it was picked up. This year's incidence has been found earlier when the buds are not so developed and when the caterpillars are relatively still quite small, and so far I can't see any visible damage like last year, but obviously some will have occurred as these little feckers have nonetheless been chomping on the WW!
So I was understandably disturbed by this and then looked more closely at the WW/Gorgonzola cross which is the bigger of the 2 Quad girls but I couldn't see any sign of caterpillars on her, which of course doesn't mean that they are not there also. But I did find lots of tiny specks on it's leaves like dust but I think it is actually the specks were tiny leaf damage where insects have sucked some sap out because on the undersides there were very tiny little brown bugs that I assume are the culprits. Does anyone recognise this, just out of interest as I am going to spray them anyway, probably tomorrow, hopefully there is some good sunshine so they don't stay damp longer than necessary.
I need to go back and find the posts by
@Emeraldo and
@InTheShed regarding spraying for bugs and how late in the shooting match you can still successfully do it. I am passing by the organic produce shop tomorrow which has the Dr Bronner's range as Shed mentioned the Castille liquid soap, so it is probably good to at least have a bottle on hand should it ever be needed. Emeraldo reported good results from his combined Neem & Potassium soap. And full marks to Emeraldo who tried to warn me early on in this grow that preemptively spraying saved him any pest problems on his latest grow, anyway you live and learn, I will do that next year, since this has occurred now 2 years in a row, so I am buggered if I want to open the door to this again when I can pre-emptively prevent it. Hopefully by now Emeraldo has enjoyed some of his cured harvest and found it good. My 2 quadlined girls should still have at least 5 weeks to go, probably not much more, but that is probably still plenty for it to clear these bugs off and still allow the spray to dissipate and wash away with rain as harvest gets closer.
When I was moving about the branches while trying to comprehensively spray the BT on the plants, I couldn't help thinking that there are a lot of colas developing in the canopy which from previously 'looking but not touching' I didn't fully appreciate the hidden amount. Both Quad girls are looking really good in spite of this just realized infestation of bugs. This whole thing makes me realize how crap my eyesight is these days compared to a few years ago, aging does suck.