Super Skunk Auto & Auto Blueberry Grow 1.5 Behind The TV

[StoneOtter]

So, update time....yesterday was a hell of a day, glad it's over. Woke up to a sick dog, thought my pup was dying, after a stressful day we managed to get her into a vet and turned out she had a really bad ear infection that got into her ear bone(s). Shes on meds and is a bit better this morning.

So update on the grow from last night.
Did a reservoir change.
Nutes added (per gallon): 3ml cal mag, 3 micro and 6ml bloom
Supplemental nutes: Rhino Skin, H202, Diamond Nectar. All per manufacturer rec. Level

559 PPM with 22.7C reservoir temp.

Few minutes later when lying down I checked the cam, and they all looked wilted. What a beautiful day. Popped back in to the cabinet, PH was a bit off (5.4), I re-ph'd to 5.8 and noticed that I had forgotten to plug the humidity controller back in (used the plug for res change). Plugged it back in, reset watering schedule for a 1hr flood...and they perked back up.

Did some leaf tucking. This morning and topped back off the humidifier. I also reset the lighting schedule back to a 20/4 .

Average cab temp: 28C
Average root zone temp: 23.6C

Way to stay awake rexer! Nice save!

 

[Rexer]

So tomorrow will make week 4 from seed for the blueberries.
Did some ponytails last night for a bit on them (3hrs). I also gave them an additional shot of cal mag.
Checked PH and it had spiked to 6.8.
I added half a tea spoon of maxibloom to bring PPM up to 521 then PH'd to 5.7
Reservoir temp was 26.0C
Cabinet was running a bit hot today, temps got up to 34C, so this evening I setup the portable air conditioner in the cabinet's lung room, AC is set to 20C for now. Cabinet is now 29.9C and slowly continuing to drop, love it when a plan finally clicks in place.
I noticed a few leaves seemed to have crisped, I'm hoping that this will solve it, if I'm wrong please let me know!
I Went back in and did some more LST, more or less just reset where the ribbons are pulling them and opened up one super Skunk up some more.
Still no definitive signs of plant sex.
1st picture is last night's ponytail on one of them, rest are from tonight.

 

[StoneOtter]

Nice work Rexer. Hope pistols come soon for you.

 

[Rexer]

So I keep looking at those burn spots, trying to decide if things are on mend or if I need be worried. Did some fiddling around with the cabinet camera and made this photo, quality isn't best but I'd be interested in hearing opinions!

 

[Rexer]

So, when I went to check I noticed the ph was a bit high, 7.2 . When adjusting I accidentally put too much down in, and long story short I decided to do a res change.

Rather then continuing using the cal mag, micro and bloom I switched it up, fingers crossed.

Tonight's reservoir (52L/13g) has:
28ML of H2O2
25 ML rhino skin
24.6g of maxibloom
5 g of maxigro
25 ML of Diamond nectar
And 25 ML rapid Starter
PPM was 394 (was seeing what I think is nute burn, so this one is a bit lower)
PH was at 5.9
Now the long part of a late night res change....waiting for the temp to go up so as not to shock the roots....gotta love that ice cold tap water!
So a few closer ups as I was pistol hunting lol
And a quick root picture

 

[Rexer]

Day 29 for the blueberries
Day 49 for the Super Skunks

Checked the res, noticed PPM was up to 553, girls were thirsty but not too hungry I guess!

Was looking through and saw what I'm not sure was the start of a bit of WPM. That made me feel a bit plucky, so decided to take some foliage out to help with air flow in my little canopies. While I understand the debate of defoliation on autoflowers, I want the increased airflow, and from what little defoliation I've done on the one super Skunk I've seen nothing but improvements (in my newbie mind at least).
So a plucking I a went....

Stuck to removal of leaves on interior with attempting to remove no more then one leaf per site.

The leaf that started it all...


The aftermath:

 

[Rexer]

Did a maintenance flush this evening, the girls looked pretty grateful for it. Oh....and I do believe that I can say i have 4 females
I'll let you be the judge, hard to get the pics, not all for have shown pistols yet, but....maybe I'm jumpin the gun.

So, for the flush I filled up a spare reservoir and used it to help make it easier. The flush was done with around 55L that had a start ppm out of tap of 30ppm. I used a bit of maxibloom to help stabilize the ph. The maxibloom brought the ppm to 104. I then ph'd it to 5.8. After running the flush through the media and roots for 30min the ppm in the reservoir had jumped to 300ppm. That was then dumped and replaced with a fresh batch of 25g of maxibloom, 15ml of rhino skin, 30ml of diamond nectar and a few spoonfuls of Epsom salt. This brought the batch up to 548ppm (I made the batch in a spare reservoir and used pumps to transfer and leftovers goto the outdoor garden.

RH was at 37%
Avg cabinet temp at canopy level: 28.7C
Avg root zone temp: 22.3C
Reservoir temp: 23.2C

So...one last thing....the traps I laid out caught a few flies....I'll have to keep an eye for any signs of problems from them. In the meantime I'll look into a bottle of neem.

 

[StoneOtter]

I'll let you be the judge, hard to get the pics, not all for have shown pistols yet, but....maybe I'm jumpin the gun.

Close but I can't see any hairs.

So...one last thing....the traps I laid out caught a few flies....I'll have to keep an eye for any signs of problems from them. In the meantime I'll look into a bottle of neem.

Keep on top of those rascals. In soil I keep a fan at soil level. Gnats are poor fliers and have a hard time in the wind. Yellow sticky sheets collect lots of them as well. Looking good!

 

[Rexer]

Close but I can't see any hairs.

Keep on top of those rascals. In soil I keep a fan at soil level. Gnats are poor fliers and have a hard time in the wind. Yellow sticky sheets collect lots of them as well. Looking good!

So far theres only been the two, fingers crossed no more show up. I took your suggestion and moved my fans, hopefully that'll do the trick.

Lol well I jumped it a day early...2 showed pistols today .

Least I'm sure that's what I'm seeing here...

 

[StoneOtter]

Congratulations Rexer! Nice baby girl!

 

[Rexer]

Great news!! 4/4 are females....though I cheated, the two super skunks were feminized seeds, I've just been worrying over hermies since they went through hell at the beginning.

They're finally starting to show some nice growth!! The excitment that I felt when i first popped those beans is back!

Checked the res, added 4L of premixed nutes from res change (i had some extra so I kept an airstone in it in a bucket) to top off reservoir and PH'd to 5.6 (was at 6.2)
PPM : 696
EC: 1.4
Reservoir temp: 23.2C

Average cabinet temperature: 28-29C

Average root zone temperature: 23.12 C



RH 38%

I know these are small compared to other grows on here, but I'll just be happy if I can make it to the end, preferably finishing with enough medication to last till next harvest.

 

[StoneOtter]

Looking fine Rexer

 

[DonkeyDick]

Your dog makes me laugh.
I hope her ear is ok.
(Nice plants).

 

[Rexer]

Your dog makes me laugh.
I hope her ear is ok.
(Nice plants).

She seems to be slowly getting better, she still walks sometimes like shes drunk and cant hold her balance but even then shes starting to adapt. The vet gave/prescribed 6 weeks of antibiotics for her so theres hope shell get back to her old nutty self....that dog means the world to me, and my family. Really appreciate you dropping by my journal, here's one of my favorite nutty pics of her...

 

[DarrenAdam420]

Nice setup, i'm sure you wil get a great yield. I love DWC. Will keep an eye on the progress

Hope your pup gets better soon!

 

[Rexer]

Thanks budPacient!
Its actually a kind of ebb and flow/ rdwc, right now I'm doing 1hr flooding (with airstone in flood table) and 3hrs with pumps off.
I love talking about my setup, quite proud of it so if you ever have any questions ask away!

 

[DarrenAdam420]

I would have to have this kind of setup but it might be too advanced for me at the moment. I hate dealing with soil, in the next grow i'm going with coco and perlite which is half way to DWC. How expensive is a setup like yours? How many watts a day is it consuming?

 

[Rexer]

My DIY setup flood trays are pretty cheap and could be used in any tent no problem. I got the idea from some YouTube video, the controllers and automation make it easier but wasn't too hard for setup, longest part was figuring which ones to go with and how to hook everything up, most of which I figured out via this site and YouTube.
The only part that was my idea for the flood trays was to make wooden lids for them, makes it nice to easily screw a hook into the lid for LST.

As for daily costs, I'm not sure to be honest, probably best for me not to think on that part lol. It's a 400W MH/HPS with digital ballast (V*****N).

I'd love to grow with coco, but the lifting would be too hard, I need the automation and pumps to do the work.

 

[DarrenAdam420]

Where i am i dont have a lot of access to stores so i need to have anything shipped to my house and having soil shipped is expensive, that is why coco is such a nice alternative, i had it shipped in the dried form (very light and compact), i will mix it with some perlite that is also light and easy to have shipped and then i can reuse them for years. That plus an automated watering system and i will be good to go. How much maintenance / daily input does that setup require? Also i dont see a carbon filter, are you using any?

 

[Rexer]

Hey bud,
Yeah I hear you on the need to have everything shipped, everything came from Amazon, home hardware and Canadian tire.my nearest hydroponic store is sn hours drive away.
I did two online orders from hydroponic stores, one big order of nutes, and a 50L bag of hydroton. I also have two kratky gardens in the go which is why I needed so much.
If you need a buy list kind if thing I can PM, I just don't want to advertise for our sponsor's competition.

Daily maintenance, so far yes it's been more maintenance then I originally thought it would be, but it's pretty easy now that I've got it dialed in. Right now, I just drop 0.7ML of ph down twice a day into reservoir and do a top up every couple days (nutes and water), I also check PPM daily, but that's for my own tracking.

Gotta keep the mini humidifier topped as well (thats the biggest PITA), I need two add a bigger one or a 2nd lol, needs refilling right now 2-3 times daily. Easy fix, just need the money.

Maybe this fall I might modify my system to make it a coco one, it would be easy enough to refit into a top feed/drip system.