First Grow: Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

[InTheShed]

Greetings! After all the research I've done (and a lot of it on this site), I thought I'd create a grow journal as I've gotten much info out of others' experiences.

I'm currently growing two autoflower strains from 420:
Blueberry (advertised specs: 15/85 indica dominant, ~14%THC, ~32" tall, 55 days)
AK-47 (advertised specs: 50/50 sativa/indica, ~20%THC, ~25" tall, 56 days)

I've got 2 blueberry on the go and one AK-47. One blueberry has a 10-day head start.

They were sprouted in water and placed in Jiffy Pots when the tap root was visible. After 4-6 days (the AK was slower) under a 60 watt incandescent at around 80º F, they sprouted and were planted outside.

Soil: 70% Dr Earth Pot of Gold, 30% Perlite
Pots: Two 7 Gal Smart Pots, one 7 Gal plastic pot
Nutrients:
Fox Farm Grow Big 6-4-4
Fox Farm Tiger Bloom 2-8-4

My tap water runs pretty alkaline (around 7.6 pH) and when left standing it rises to 8.4. So I've been using pH Down to get the water in the 6.4-6.6 pH range.

Here are some pics of the early days:
Blueberry #1 @ 18 days

AK-47 @ 14 days (with the "Finding Nemo" flipper leaf!)

Blueberry 2 @ 13 days

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

Since I'm in the Los Angeles area, we get what's called "June Gloom," which are overcast days that don't burn off until afternoon. It actually looks like it's going to rain now it's so gray! To try to counteract this lack of light, I set up a night-time makeshift grow room.

I got CFLs (4 @ 6500K 100W EQ, 4@ 2700K 75W EQ) and I'm moving the plants inside at night with about 10 hours/night of CFL light. The older plant gets 4 bulbs and the smaller ones get two a piece.

I have read that plants don't like to be moved or have their lighting schedules changed, but since autoflowers have such a short growing stage I thought I'd get as much light on them as possible.

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

I was originally going to do one of each, but I wasn't having much luck getting the AK seeds to split so I started a second Blueberry seed when poof, one of the AK's split. Since I have two Blueberry plants I've been trying LST on the second. Here's a pic of where it is now:

The rock is there to support the stem. It hasn't grown much lately so I'm not making much progress.

BTW, if anyone has any experience with moving autoflowers inside and out, please let me know!

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

Here's a photo of Blueberry 1 at 33 days (today)

I started with the FoxFarm Grow big at 1/2 tsp/gal at day 19, and upped it to 1 tsp/gal on the next watering (day 28). These plants don't seem to need much water so if I gave them nutrients every other water it might be two weeks between nutes, so since there's no sign of nute burn I'm going to stick with every watering for now.

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

It's amazing what a few days of sunny skies will do for these plants! They don't seem to be doing anything under the CFL's at night, but here's what they looked like this morning:

Blueberry 1 at 36 days

AK-47 at 27 days

Blueberry 2 at 26 days with LST continuing

Still wondering if it's worth the nightly move into the shed for CFL augmentation. Anyone have a thought?

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

Another thing, turns out that Blueberry 1 looked thirsty last night, so I watered it with plain pH 6.2 water. Funny thing is that even though I water these plants with 6.2-6.4 water and the runoff is the same (measured with a digital tester), the soil always reads 7.0 with the soil meter probes. I'm not going to worry too much about it as long as everything looks ok, but it still seems odd to me.

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

It's been getting hotter this past week so I watered everyone yesterday afternoon. The younger ones got 1 tsp FF Grow Big/gal, but since the older Blueberry looks like it's starting to get some flowers, I gave it 1 tsp Grow Big and ½ tsp Tiger Bloom/gal. That's day 39 for Blueberry 1, day 29 for the AK, and day 28 for the Blueberry 2. This morning's pics up in a bit.

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

Here's the Blueberry 2 @ 29 days with the LST continuing. I'm just using a big twist tie clipped to the side of the pot and a rock to hold it down.

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

Here's the cute little AK-47 on day 30. Can't see getting much off this plant compared to the Blueberry. FYI, this plant does not smell yet, whereas the Blueberry of the same age definitely smells like dope.

 

[InTheShed]

re: First Grow - Outdoor Autoflower Blueberry & AK-47 In Pots With Dr. Earth Soil

And here's the older Blueberry 1 at 40 days. I gave it the first dose of Tiger Bloom along with the Grow Big yesterday because it looks like flowers are a'coming. As I recall reading, you don't stop the veg nutes until all vertical growth has stopped.

If anyone has any advice or questions, feel free to chime in. So far I'm just talking to myself in here!

 

[iluvmysunny]

I new here, to growing as well. I'm also from California n know all about that June gloom lol. I'm interested to know when your plants started to flower?? I've got a couple ak47 and wild rose and sweet tooth auto goin on.

 

[InTheShed]

I new here, to growing as well. I'm also from California n know all about that June gloom lol. I'm interested to know when your plants started to flower?? I've got a couple ak47 and wild rose and sweet tooth auto goin on.

Well if those things on the top of Blueberry 1 are the start of flowers, then around 38 days. My AK-47 is 10 days behind that but seems pretty tiny by comparison. It was slow to do everything from crack to sprout, so it may just be a runt. I won't know until I grow the next one later this summer.

If you're having June Gloom issues as well I posted a question about it here if you want to check for answers:
Ok to keep moving outdoor autoflowers indoors for more light?

 

[InTheShed]

Today's update includes lots of pics and even some uninvited guests!

I took the advice of Scientific in this thread:
Ok to keep moving outdoor autoflowers indoors for more light?
and moved my little AK-47 inside last night under the CFLs and a tin foil hat:

 

[InTheShed]

So with the sun (gloom) rising on the first day of summer, I moved it outside to join its siblings. Here's the AK-47 outside on day 33:

Here's the Blueberry 1 on day 43 with a bit of leaf tucking I did to get the lower flowers in the sun (gloom):

and here's a shot of the top flower on Blueberry 1 which is about 18" tall:

 

[InTheShed]

And here's Blueberry 2 with more LST. I continue to bend the main stem counter clockwise around the pot, but I've also started to bend down a new branch that has begun reaching for the gloomy sky.

Blueberry 2 on day 32:

You can see the second round of LST happening with the rock and the long twist tie:

 

[InTheShed]

When I zoomed in on one of my pics I noticed a few uninvited guests. Looks like a pair of aphids to me!

I grabbed my bottle of Dr. Earth's Final Stop Vegetable Garden Insect Killer, which is an aromatic blend of
ACTIVE INGREDIENTS: A potent and superior blend of Rosemary Oil, Sesame Oil, Peppermint Oil, Thyme Oil, Cinnamon Oil, and Garlic Oil working in synergy with the following:
INERT INGREDIENTS: Beeswax, Carrageenan, Cellulose, Citric Acid, Glycerin, Lecithin, and Water.

I probably would have gone with Safer Insecticidal Soap if I had any left because now my dope smells like garlic. And also I have no idea if Dr. Earth's spray is safe for cannabis plants. It looks pretty harmless except for the inert list but I'll know more when I get home from work. To be on the safe side, I didn't spray the whole plant, just the leaves with the aphids, and I shook off the excess so it didn't leave oil spots.

 

[InTheShed]

Morning all! I made tin foil hats for all three plants and put them in the shed last night for 12 hours of CFL.

Everyone was thirsty this morning so I fed Blueberry 1 with GrowBig (1 tsp/gal) and TigerBloom (bumped up to 1/2 tsp/gal). It's grown an inch since yesterday and now stands 19" tall on day 44. It seems hard to believe that this is a 55-day grow as listed in the specs.

And since I haven't seen any signs of nute burn on anyone I upped the younger ones to 1.5 tsp/gal of GrowBig. I don't think this AK-47 is ever actually going to grow big, but I'll let it run its course. Hoping the next one I plant will look more like it's supposed to.

Today is a serious gloom day so I'm hoping that supplementing the sunlight with CFLs is helping.

 

[420dabbing]

Now youshould try to start a circle with the blueberry thats how i got the 7 tops on my critical

 

[InTheShed]

Now youshould try to start a circle with the blueberry thats how i got the 7 tops on my critical

That is where I'm headed but it's not growing all that quickly at the moment. New pics of that one when it starts to show off!

 

[InTheShed]

Today's update!

Flowers are coming along nicely on Blueberry 1, which stands at 20" on day 45:

Here are the flowers on the fourth level down from the top:

And here's the whole plant:

Leaf tucking is all I'm doing on this one. I'm not seeing any growth under the CFLs at night but no one is complaining either so they continue to get 12 hours/night under the foil hats.