Weasel Forges Ahead

So after sitting a night, the water in the container is turning into a blackish soup.

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The silver pieces will be covered in black gunk like the one on the right, but that will come off with a quick polish, like the one in the left, with no detectable harm done to the silver.


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I will strain this through a scrap of cloth to make it look prettier. It will work for the plants as is.
I might leave mine for another half a day. Or test the ppm today, leave it overnight, and test the ppm tomorrow to see how it progresses. Last time there wasn't a big jump in ppm by leaving it an extra day. And as I said - the 24 hour batch and the 48 hour batch both seemed to work equally well, in a very unscientific sense. I just sprayed the particular plant victim whenever I was in the area, until it started showing balls as shown in the one I showed yesterday :). I figure the plants got sprayed upwards of ten times within a 2- 3 week period, before showing the balls.
 
Thanks Twox. Yeah don't buy any. It's incredibly easy to make and you can produce endless amounts for free. My master plan is to make fem seed of all the best strains I have going right now. Just so I will have them. I have to do each strain one at a time because I don't even have one good place to isolate a hermied plant which is shooting pollen all over the place. And I definitely don't have enough good hiding places to isolate a bunch of them and keep everything controlled. It's why I'm keeping them so small- so I can hopefully tuck it in a closet under a cfl somewhere and it won't cause an overwhelming stink or need fancy things like ventilation.
The last one I did was Critical Cheese, and it was shocking how much stink a seven inch high plant can make.
 
Thanks Spitz. It hasn't been all that scientific an approach. I have to go plant some seeds in the veg room so I'll check the ppm now and report back.
I never diluted the stuff before.
The first time I made it and brewed for 24 hours- my ppm reading was only 40
The second batch, which I brewed for 48 hours, plus I used a big (25 ounce) silver bar for one of the electrodes and the stuff was a foamy mass of black goo, was only 60 ppm. It seems that, in spite of the appearance, all the foam and excitement going on in there, most of the silver doesn't end up in solution.
If I can trust my meter, which is a good one, so I always have before.
Anyway, at that point last time I said wtf let's just spray it.

When making the stuff I just add enough water to make the amount of CS I think will fit in my spray bottle.

I'll edit the ppm of it in here later.


EDIT - it is 40 ppm. Maybe almost 50 cause it flickered on 50 a little. Bluelab meter displays in tens, or whatever...you know what I mean.
I remember now why I didn't try to keep going after two days to attain a higher ppm. There is so much foam and crud being produced compared to the ppm of CS that I'm getting, that it seems innefficient.
More importantly, it works at 40 ppm so who cares what's going on with it.
Also- this second batch I've been using has been sitting on a warm bright shelf in the flowering room for many months and still worked fine.
One of the dire warnings when I first read how to make this, was to keep it out of the light as 'light destroys CS'. I haven't paid attention to that. My spray bottle is white and I can shine a light through it no problem.


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Straining



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~SPROUTING~

I got a seed order from Ace a couple days ago and put them in the sprouter. I'm going to post my sprouting method. It's not like it's an unusual method or anything. It's actually pretty much the way most people sprout, I think.
But it's a good method, and sometimes I see people struggling and stressing out over their sprouts (...'it's been ten days underground and I really hope it comes up soon...). I don't see any need to have sprouting seeds be a difficult thing. So maybe this will help a new grower who wanders through, or something.

I won't be constantly flooding this journal with educational tutorials. I won't have time to do that anyway. But I have time right now and if I'm going to document my setup it's best if that info is lumped closer to the beginning of the journal.

This is just the method I like, because I hate not knowing if a seed has sprouted before I plant it. I've personally had lower luck with seeds planted directly in the pot, and I didn't like the suspense.There is still suspense this way but at least you know whether the seed is viable before it goes underground. Also, germination rates are close to 100% and I figure if a seed doesn't sprout this way, it wasn't going to sprout anyway. At least not without special tactics.

- Tupperware type containers wth lid. Label it
- Paper towel layered in the bottom
- Sprinkle water on the towel till its lightly saturated. There should be no excess water running around in there. If there is -drain it all out.

Then I put the seeds inside a smaller flap of paper towel, and put that on top. Sprinkle a little water on there too so everything is moist and when the lid is on the RH will be around 100%. Put the lid on.

I often put several flaps of seeds in one container, after labelling the flaps. Do this at your own risk because seeds sometimes roll around...


Put it somewhere warm. I like it between 80 and 85° F. On the warm side of room temp. People find all sorts of sweet spots on top of computers, hot water tanks, whatever. I have mine up on a ledge above the wood stove.

Seeds usually all sprout in 24- 48 hours. Once I left one in there that didn't sprout, and it opened up almost 6 days later. But normally I would have thrown that one out long before, because after 3 days I figure they've all done what they're going to do.

I put these ones in there 36 hours ago and this is standard growth for that time. I'm going to go plant these now.


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Note the humidity.


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Well, since you asked,, you did ask did you not???:thanks:

I just dont see what all the fuss is about,, i used to use paper towel back when I was a kid,, for other things too

It just seems so complicated, all that towels and water and checking and tender rooties et all, oh, and containers and pencils, oh my, I am tired now

All good fun friend, just offering alternatives is all

Me method, how simple is this

A seed, a small cup with an inch of wawa, ( water, fer you growed ups) drop the seed in the water, after twelve hours tap the seed down into the water, it will sink, after 24 to 48 hrs the seed will crack open, and when it cracks open enough one will see the tiny white taproot commin out. The seed is a keeper and ready to plant,, into premoistened soil, moistened, not soaked, three quarters to an inch deep, keep top moist and in four to six days the beast will emerge,

I know paper toweling is done by all, but, why????

This method has never failed me, but i have broken off quarter inch tap roots before, when I was a kid, of course

:volcano-smiley:
 
Dear Nivek:
Substitute paper towel for your glass of water, and we have the same system. Except my sprouts never sink to the bottom, but stay safely nestled in a comfy home, and need no checking whatsoever. I just take them out in a couple days to plant them. Paper towel is then left somewhere to dry so I can reuse it to wipe the perspiration off my forehead from the effort it takes me to write this post to you, who are clearly completely deluded about seeds, and furthermore are wasting valuable water resources.
 
Oops double post.
To fill this space I'm going to hop in my time machine here and go looking around through the glorious future to find a post to respond to.
Oh look there's a Chimp.
Chimp, the GT is my current favourite smoke from that one I grew last time. I'm almost run out of it now. The Honduras sounded more worrisome- just going by the fact that Ace suggested 2 weeks veg time
I've gotten too greedy and started way too much stuff. I'll probably end up starting new clones of the biggest vegging plants, then axing them.
 
Thanks Blaze.
And thanks everyone who has come along to sub to this journal. Please don't feel under appreciated if I don't write back to each and every post. I know I didn't greet each subscriber personally. I know you're there, and I definitely appreciate it. I'll always try and respond to questions, but I always sucked at the small talk.
So it probably just won't be that kind of place because I lack the time and social skills to make a super chatty journal hang together properly, and I want to still have time left over for other stuff. Ok? Guilt free journal for everyone. Come and go as you like. :thumb:

I got some more info about the Ace Honduran strain which sounds very stretchy. Ace suggests vegging it for two weeks. That statement sends a little tingle of danger down my spine. 18 strains now. Most of them still in the very early stages, and a full flowering room and overcrowded veg room. Not sure what I'm going to do. I've even toyed with the idea of putting another light in the flowering room. But where?
The two GT and two Honduras seeds I planted are both regulars so some may turn out male. This hardly helps me though. In fact it really doesn't help me at all, at least if I want to save pollen, or do anything with them other than destroy them. Which was the point of getting regular seeds.
I'll sort it out. I've been here before, many times. This is the constant cycle of feast and famine that my grow goes through. I don't think there's any way of managing a perpetual grow with as many kinks as I have in it right now, and making it all balance perfectly.
 
so clearly i still don't know what i'm doing bc ^ was written in reply to a pic. but it shows up at the end of the thread. same with the previous. i wrote it under the "box" where it appeared originally yet it shows up at the end. i'll get the hang of it...sorry. sigh.
 
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