Re: Project 23 - Hydroponic Homemade Hybrids - Amnesia Haze x Blue Dream Plus Widow x
CHAPTER 9
THE END IS NEAR
“I don’t like waiting, but if waiting means having you…I’ll wait until I have you.” -How I feel
Waiting sucks. This is the difficult time for me. I am waiting for these buds to turn so I can finally chop them. I am waiting for my next little girl-babies to strengthen and survive their first three weeks with vigor. I am waiting waiting fricking waiting arrrghhhhhhhh.
Just a minute if you please…
Okay, it’s ten minutes later and you know what I just did. Whew. So I may ramble but at least I’m calm again. Here’s what is going on in my secret little laboratory at the moment…
We are at 18 weeks.
Main Grow: Things are popping generally.
The final two weeks are hard to pin down precisely unless you have grown a strain multiple times. These are my own hybrids so who knows? I believe we are there but until trichomes start to cloud up noticeably we are still in full bloom mode. I see no evidence of cloudy trichomes on any of my three varieties.
Each has its particular characteristics. The Blue Dream x Blue Dream remains hardy and beautiful. Her buds are solid as rocks and her fragrance when a bud is pinched is still fruity but has evolved somewhat into more of a blend of berries with a hint of citrus. I will say these are the stickiest buds I ever remember, I can’t even touch one accidentally without having the offending area instantly rendered as tacky as if I spilled glue on myself and I have to use hand sanitizer to get it off. Trimming these buds will be a mess.
The Haze x BD is still a frosty hedge of stunning colas. Everything I can see looks luscious but it’s been many weeks since I could really see what is happening within the dense back half of this grow. I can’t get behind the grow physically because it’s attached to the side and rear walls. If I start leaning in there and parting plants to get a look I will be ridiculously sticky and risk hurting my buds. But I truly don’t know what all is in there, I only know it’s a lot. I can see some absolute monster buds back there and if they are as dense and solid as the front buds there will be a lot of weight.
As we begin to hit old age we are starting to show it…I mean my plants, of course. The first necrosis of the lower main fan leaves is appearing. I generally leave most fan leaves on the plant until harvest because to me they represent food producers for the buds and general botany theory holds more photosynthesis=more food. I do not know much about this. Just using my spider sense. I see other growers denuding their plants well before the chop and who knows if that helps or hurts bud mass/quality/plant health/anything? It isn’t like weed is corn or some other plant that we have been raising commercially for 10,000 years…we just don’t have enough organized clinical research on the subtleties of marijuana cultivation and development, and much of what we do know is gained from amateurs in tiny labs like mine, which is woefully unscientific I’m afraid. So everything about cannabis is somewhat of a guess, and I guess that’s the fun of it!
I am also not sold on the need to flush for weeks. My guess is if your marijuana has a chemical aftertaste you are using way too much, and/or too many, nutes. I never flushed in the early years and never noticed any complaints. Outdoor growers often fertilize but can’t really flush yet their buds are usually tasty. Plus, some of the dankest buds on Earth are outdoor grown and they use a lot of bat guano, worm castings, and fish emulsion…never tasted anything bad in the buds, even from that crap (literally). Not being deliberately naïve, I just really do believe
half the recommended nute dosage is usually more than enough and also that many growers feed their plants WAY too often, and usually way too much, so other grows might be more prone to chemical salt buildup than mine.
The main reason the recommended strength is twice what it probably needs to be is (think, people) these companies sell fertilizer. They are great folks I’m sure and they have something good to sell so they recommend you buy plenty. IMHO about twice as much as you need. As I have stated many times, just because your plant isn’t killed doesn’t mean everything you are doing is optimal.
I ‘sort of’ flush at this point, but prefer to see it as a three-week transition to plain water as opposed to a three-week pure water flush. For the past 10 days, as I refresh the nute reservoir every 3-4 days I top it off with plain water (only some cal/mag added and the PH adjusted). I can see the color of the solution gradually getting lighter and other than just a tiny shot of the bloom nutes (to keep the phosphorous level adequate to support continued flowering), I don’t add anything more. Notice I said “adequate” to support flowering not “blasted” or even “boosted”. How about a little science? Here goes…
Hypothesis: Bloom boosters will increase your yield.
Truth: Not really. I like to step away briefly from cannabis-centric information sources and look to data gleaned from industrial production of flowering plants for more reliable big-picture data. Most knowledge acquired by this industry is applicable to our work. The evidence is clear that these blooming supplements are overrated at best, and at worst can hurt your plants and even render the grow medium toxic.
Looking into it, I found information from several sources. These include:
References:
1) The American Rose Society – Phosphorus Fallacies – Too Much of A Good Thing:
American Rose Society
2) The Story of Flowers – The Potassium Myth:
Potassium and Flowering | The Story of Flowers | Adam Dimech
3) “The Truth About Garden Remedies”, book by Jeff Gillman
And here’s what I found:
Flowering is caused by hormones, not nutrients. A plant only needs a certain amount of both Potassium and Phosphorous to properly grow to its potential, and the RATIOS of the nutrients N,P & K will ideally change somewhat during different stages. However, past a certain point MORE does NOT produce more flowers. Supplementation of these two nutrients is only helpful if a deficiency exists.
The real possibility exists that adding too much of either P or K can even poison your soil and hurt your babies. Many people create issues in their plants by adding boutique bloom-boosters and such while believing the problems couldn’t be caused by them so they chase rabbits and all the while they are doing it to themselves. The ads for many of these supplements make you think you could never grow a single frosty bud without them. It’s the advertising age, people. Think.
ANY fertilizer with a high level of phosphorus can be considered to be a bloom booster fertilizer, even if the label just calls it fertilizer.
If you look at the fertilizer numbers in bloom booster products you quickly realize that every manufacturer’s formulation is different. Does that make sense to you? If there was a special formulation that boosts flowers wouldn’t you think all manufacturers would use the same formula? They don’t, because there is no such thing. These are just packages of fertilizer with the words ‘bloom booster’ slapped on the label.
Bloom booster fertilizer is largely a marketing gimmick to get you to buy more fertilizer. Many people grow plants for the flowers, and so manufacturers are using your desire for more flowers to sell more products.
Well, that’s what I found.
“Judge my conclusions by my buds.” -H. Merica
Back to the grow, my Widow Mix x BD is a strange plant indeed. The buds are smaller, and slower to develop. I am now convinced the plant is just different, it’s not anything I’m doing or not doing. To further intrigue, I examined it closely and found several of the lowest branches are totally popping with seeds! This isn’t bad news, I chopped them and after a few days of drying I can see I will get over a hundred fresh seeds of a new unknown hybrid. Who knows? Most likely it is residual pollen from the Blue Dream parent during the previous grow. This would result in a backcross with the original parent and we might get a really nice bump in vigor. It could be the next mega strain… I will take what I get from her and chalk it up to an experiment. Can’t wait to grow out some of these seeds and see what we get. Sometime next year.
Now for the new kids. They are coming along as I would expect, looking a little scruffy but growing steadily. They all have a little tap root reaching into the nutes now so they will be all right. With that first critical connection made they can begin to grow at will.
A few months ago I surprised my wife and booked us a Las Vegas trip. We leave in two days. It’s nice to give someone a present, especially a trip since a trip just keeps on giving for months as it gets closer and closer. Since we leave in two days I have to get everything even a little tighter so I can be out of the picture for 5 days and no worry. It’s great to have a system that will allow me to do so with confidence…hydro has many advantages and that’s a biggie.
I will over-fill the two hydro bubblers and the main nute reservoir. They will be fine for five days. The babies grow so fast at this stage I can’t wait to see them when I get back. My guess is they will about double.
To Vegas we go!
Now we are back from a truly wonderful trip. I was a winner in Sin City but the real jackpot has my focus now…a harvest of giant, meaty buds! I certainly had a touch of anticipation, not really worry but no matter how good your setup is you never know what can happen on total autopilot for a six-day period. I open the secret door after six days.
To my relief, the forest of buds is bursting! Frost monsters are everywhere, huge swollen chunkers bending their branches over like they might snap. After almost a week the further development of the buds is noticeable. I have to touch a couple of them to gauge density and it’s an instant super glue on my hand. I have had some sticky buds before but never this sticky. I literally have to use hand sanitizer immediately to un-guck my fingers.
The buds are really, really solid. There are some huge ones in the back. The yield is going to be very good and worth the wait.
These hybrids have not been overly smelly for most of the way which I like, but right now it’s getting ridiculous in here. I’m almost choking on the deep, rich fragrance. Yeah, I’m getting things ready for the chop because I think it’s about time.
After wiping my drool I popped the door on the nursery. Everybody looks pretty good. Whew. Another relief. The new girls have all developed foot long root bundles and are getting plenty of water. Some of them look a little scruffy on a couple edges but they really haven’t had any nutes yet and probably a little too-high a PH so I lowered that and fed some GH Grow for the first time. We should see green perfection in a few days but even now it’s obvious we will have a nice bunch for the next generation.
Now the next day. The 19-week mark.
Exactly microscope time.
The trichomes are quite different this time around…lots of cloudy ones and the ambers just beginning to appear. Five days or less! I dilute the reservoir with the remaining fresh water so there’s only a small amount of nutes left in the water, I can tell by the color which is very light. I would probably go to 100 fresh water at this point just for the last few days but it’s 8 degrees F outside today and the drain line from my grow lab is frozen somewhere so we will just go with what we have. Again, the diluted solution that remains will still somewhat flush the plant and it won’t affect the taste. I know this because I chopped a nice bud from each of the three varieties last week and sampled them yesterday and today. Amazing sweetness and flavor, and a bang bang buzz. The buds will be fine.
I think the Haze x Blue Dream is ready. Don’t you?
Blue Dream x Blue Dream x Yummy!
This Widow Mix x Blue Dream plant still looks like a weirdo but it’s tasty. Already got over 100 beautiful, viable seeds harvested from her last week in my seed vault (I put one in water and it popped a tail immediately so they’re good). Might be the unlikely mother of a super strain!!
So, here are a few final hardcore bud porn shots. Do you think they are ready?
I agree with you. IT IS TIME!
Now to get ready for the chop! I got two new pairs of professional-grade pruning snips, and several pairs of latex gloves. I have an idea I want to try this time around. Every harvest, I trim reasonably well as I harvest before hanging the branch segments. I don’t like automated trimming devices, IMHO they separate a LOT of the trichomes from the buds and even though much of that material is retained in the trim bin, it reduces the amount on the buds considerably. On the other hand, manual trimming is sticky business and I always wonder if there isn’t a better way that might allow for hand-manicuring but avoid transferring so much resin to my hands and trimming device. My idea is, wear latex gloves and keep them wet. Since the buds are fresh and we’re about to hang them up a little water won’t hurt them, and it seems to me since trichomes don’t seem to come off with just water maybe this will enable me to handle the colas (by the stems mostly but you know) but not remove nearly as much of that sticky resin. We shall see.
“Victory belongs to the most persevering.” -Napoleon Bonaparte
My victory is now at hand. I sit down, light up a fatty, and take a massive hit. Pulling on the smooth latex gloves and after getting them a little wet, I heave a semi-sad sigh, look my last on my beautiful garden, and my pruning snips approach the first heavy branch...
Until next time,
Peace, Hyena
I know you have a great deal of knowledge about growing, but these honeys look like a rival for brix growers. I'm envious because I'm only on my second grow, drooling over your girls!! Do so enjoy your grows!!
My hands have been known to shake at that moment of recognition. Lol! How I love the creative process, and I adore the way you share the inside of your brilliant mind with us. 
