ScienceGrow's Fast & Vast Autoflower In Soil Under LED

ScienceGrow

ScienceGrow

New Member
Started Germinating: 9-21
Germinated: 9-22
Bucket Size - 2.5 gallon
Medium - 75% FF Happy Frog, 25% Perlite
Lights - 700W Mars II LED
Nutrients - Fox Farm line, Cal/Mag Supplement
Strain(s) - Heavyweight Fast & Vast
# of Plants: 3

Opened the pack and pre-germinated in a cup of water until they sank, about 12 hours. Put them directly in ProMix for Seedlings, and put them in the cabinet with the lights off.
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This was yesterday, six days later.
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And this is today, transplanted to their final containers and watered with a little Cal/Mag. I went with a fertilized soil to make this Autoflower grow go more smoothly since I tend to underfeed plants and don't want to slow them down. I'll be training a little but no cutting, I'm mostly going to let them grow as they normally would.
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This is my co-second grow, my first Autoflower, and I'm excited to see how this does now that I've had a harvest and know a few more things not to do.

I mixed a little too much soil so I tossed that and about 10 bagseed in the bucket in the back and will let the top growers live, and separate them. I should have room for two more plants in this cabinet.
 
Pics tonight, but here's a quick update on the little girls.

We're just staring week 2 and growth looks good, nothing mind blowing. On the third set of true leaves for all three plants. I'm not full on fertilizing since I'm in the Happy Frog, but I am using Big Bloom at about 1/4 dose, and a half dose of Superthrive, with some cal/mag.

The LED is about 18" from the tops of the plants. I've had to water twice since the last update.

These guys have a new roommate, one of my Alpha clones, who will now be kept as a mother plant for as long as I can keep her. Ignore her.

I've moved the bagseed pot to my other cabinet. Funny story, after about a week I gave up on the bagseed and just put the pot in my potting room (laundry room haha) and two days later when I'm about to reclaim the soil, there's a two inch tall seedling, suffocating from a skinlike film left behind by the shell. It had basically taped the proto leaves together, preventing the first set of true leaves from emerging. Removed it early enough though, and it's doing fine.

Oh, question. To make watering a little easier and to prevent splashing, I've been prepping my water in a big bucket, and then dip my plants in the bucket. I actually just let them go, they float, and sink basically only to the soil line. This has been working for me, but not sure if there's any downsides. I can think of a few potential issues, just wondering if anyone has ever done this. Basically watering from the bottom, but submerging it all the way.

And that's it for now, pics tonight.
 
Not much to show here, but if you have any experience with autos, let me know how my growth looks. This is at 15 days since germination.
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Here's that one bagseed. I still can't believe it survived near suffocation and grew this fast in less than an ideal environment. Excited to see how this bagseed does, the last one didn't fail me in the least.
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So it's day 22 and I see stigmas on all three plants, so, looks like we're switching to flower. Or already switched I guess.

Last night I gave them a little flush since I've been feeding them a little. Actually, I've been feeding one a little, one a little more, and one a lot. 1/8, 1/4, and 1/2 doses of Big Bloom since the second feeding, with a single treatment so far of Grow Big at the same dosages.

1/2 dose (650ppm runoff) plant is the tallest with most distance between nodes, but it's got severely burned first set of leaves, and slightly burned next two sets. Kind of expected, autos in Happy Frog. One other difference of note on this one is it has had red stems since it germinated. The other two did too, but they went green after a few days. Not sure if that's a pheno thing or if it's related to nutes.

1/4 (525ppm runoff) dose plant showed signs of very minor burn, barely noticeable.

1/8 (420ppm (no joke) runoff) shows no burn at all.

1/4 dose and 1/8 dose plants are almost identical in size and appearance. So, it looks like 1/8 dose would be optimal in my setup, as the growth is similar but no burn.

I'll continue this experiment in flower as well. Pics tonight I think, as I expect her to shoot up in the next week and would be nice to see how it changes.
 
I took pics but never got back here. However, I'll make sure to post tonight. Lots of growth in the past few days.

Did some LST, have about 9 fully exposed flowers per plant with fan leaves tucked and branches bent down. About 12" tall each.

My nute burn issues are limited to only a few leaves, with lots of new undamaged growth. I think I'll be fine.

Pics. Tonight. Promise.
 
Hi rifleman and cogreen, thanks for stopping in.

Sorry I bailed on pics again. Kids man, they can really make your brain stop working sometimes. Anyway, on my honor, pics tonight.

These little Bastards are hungry for calcium and magnesium, let me tell you. Red stems returned, some spotting and light green foliage, and droop on my leaves for last few days.. Did foliar calmag last night, watering tomorrow. Droop went away this morning, so will likely foliar again tonight and then they'll get an increased dose of calmag tomorrow with just pH'd water.

This should clear up all of my problems. After talking to local hydro shop guy, it seems the plant kicks up its needs a great deal. Keeping my cal/mag additive low due to these being autos, I just wasn't ready for that jump. Noted for the future. Lots o calmag.

Otherwise, she's doing great. Growing nice and tall, flowering great on many sites. Interestingly, while I burned that one plant really bad, it's actually got the most developed flowers right now.

So, may have stunted these a little bit, but if anything, I've stunted vertical growth, which doesn't bother me. I should have the issue controlled before she really kicks up bud production in a week or so, and I have hope the yields will be smile inducing.

So, pics tonight. Seriously.

Oh yeah, rifleman, I'll probably never do soil indoors again. Outside, in the ground, yes. But indoors, I just want that control soil doesn't offer. Especially with these autos. Thanks for stopping in.
 
Alright, finally, pictures. Will cover all the pictures I've taken but failed to post, in order. I've hopefully solved all of my problems but if you see anything familiar let me know.

I could see obvious Mg problems and looked like Calcium too. My pH in is usually around 6.3, and my pH at runoff was around 6.5 tonight. I had been going light on the CalMag, but considering it really kicked in right when flowering started, and I've seen this before, I'm pretty sure those are my problems. Fed a healthy dose tonight with a 1/8 dose of Big Bloom and Tiger Bloom. Pots were pretty dry, and these pics are right after being fed.

This was on 10/15, day 24:


These are from 10/20, day 29:



And these are from 30 minutes ago, day 31:





Hadn't planned to originally but once these streched a bit I decided to train them out.


And this is my mother plant from my first grow. I'm flowering out her clones now and will be applying colloidal silver to some of their buds to try to get some feminized pollen. For now, she'll carry on the genetics.
 
Question guys.

In the pictures above, I had just finished watering. I 2as hoping all that droop you see would go away, but I've still got a lot of droop, mostly on the bottom bud leaves.

The top leaves have perked up a bit, not completely, but definitely better than before watering.

I'm pretty sure it's not overwatered, pots were light and mix was starting to pull away from the pot.

It may have been slightly underwatered prior to watering.

They do sit in a steel cabinet, and while the lights on temps are 75F, the floor they sit on is likely closer to 68. Not sure if that can be a problem or not.

The lower new leaves are droopy, not clawing or anything. Very nice color, no damage, but the leaflets coming out of this flowers are slightly twisted, but I believe the calmag feeding will likely fix that.

Anyway, can anyone think of what would cause droop on new, lower growth? Or do I need to just wait a little longer for them to perk up?

Plus side, I'm not seeing new damage.
 
Nevermind, it just needed some time. Flowers continue to build so I seem to be in the clear, just have purple plants with a few ugly leaves.

The droop disappeared completely, and the leaves up top are exactly as they should be. The ones down below are still down a little, but not drooping, just sagging a bit. I think they'll be back to normal by tomorrow night.
 
Watered two of the Fast & Vast, pH'd water only. Third one, smallest of the three, didn't need it.

Little bit of droop still. I raised the light a bit, since everything else seems fine. They really got some vertical growth in the last week or so.

No new damage to leaves, the calmag solved that issue. Red petioles and purple stem have subsided on new growth.

Flowers continue to build. The LST was a good way to go, these have a ton of nice lower bud sites that are getting a lot of direct light.

I accidentally trained a half dead leaf off its stem. Not sure what's worse, keeping or removing the dead leaves. Anyone know this for autos?
 
Cool! Any limit on how many to remove per day? Don't want to stunt.

Also, do you have any advice on flowering autos? Do you kick nutrients up, or drop them back, or add anything, raise or drop lights? My lights are currently on a 22/2 light schedule. Should I lengthen nights?
 
ScienceGrow said:
Cool! Any limit on how many to remove per day? Don't want to stunt.

Also, do you have any advice on flowering autos? Do you kick nutrients up, or drop them back, or add anything, raise or drop lights? My lights are currently on a 22/2 light schedule. Should I lengthen nights?
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Hopefully you don't have a lot of dead leaves. If they are damaged like my Lemon Amnesia were I'd just cut them off, otherwise just be moderate at trimming. I use a 16/8 light schedule. We need down time to rest, repair and grow, I think they do too. I'm a hydro grower so I read nutrient levels different than a soil grower. Watch your plants they will tell you how well they are and what they need.
 
Only a few per plant, older leaves. I'll snip them over a couple days to be sure.

Droop returned. I think I may try swapping lights between cabinets now, to see if that's my droop problem. This is a pretty powerful light for the small space I'm in, and everything else seems fine. I can't get much higher in this cabinet, so I think I may need to. Will toss a few CFLs in too to keep temps up and add some extra light to the buds. If that doesn't fix it I may swap them back again.

My clones flowering in the other cabinet should be quite happy with this arrangement.
 
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