First Grow (RDWC)

ShiftyGaijin First week above ground, most of my difficulties have been in regulating temperature and humidity. With a humidifier running on high, 24/7, 50% is the highest I can get my room. Using the AC Infinity CLOUDLINE T6 has been good at keeping 3 LED lighting units at bay around 80*F (+- 2*F), but difficult to regulate at colder temperatures. To keep daytime temperatures lower, I have fitted an HVAC vent directly outside to pull colder air (outside temps in NE in Feb are 20-30*F on average, so shorter bursts of very cold air mix with the warm tent air to drop to desired temps with less vent time, allowing CO2 and humidity numbers to stay higher, longer, without adjustments). Super helpful to bring day time temps lower, but a struggle to keep night temps in a good range. Had to turn my Low temperature warning off because when it would dip below specified ranges, the vent would turn on, displacing warmer air with the cold air brought in from outside. As it got colder, the fan would turn onto an even higher speed, creating a vicious cycle of too much chill. A better understanding of the product would have saved me some of the worry, but all is well now. A space heater runs during the 6 hours of dark to keep temps in the low to mid 60's. Going to fit a flapper on the cold air intake to actuate under vacuum to close when system fan isn't venting. My water thermometer, TDS meter has proven to be unreliable. One of the Amazon purchases that should have been at a Hydro shop to eliminate poor quality products. Will be picking up a new one this weekend. Seedlings seem to be doing well despite not having perfect environmental factors. Roots pushed through the rockwool cubes after the first 3 or 4 days in a humidity dome Probably should have used slightly bigger cubes or just waited to transfer until a bigger root system starts, but we're testing things here.

ShiftyGaijin - Root has poked through the net pot a good 2-3 inches. - Temperature and humidity are much more dialed in than before. - Added 1/4 strength GH Flora series and Hydroguard.

ShiftyGaijin Day 15_______________________ - Noticing some yellowing on tips of leaves on P2 - Also P2 and P3 have some leaf tips turning up. Possible over lighting or too much heat. Moving LED’s 6” higher to see if it changes anything. P1 is thriving, so assuming it’s a difference in what P2/P3 strain likes for heat/light? Don’t really know yet. Still learning. Day 17_______________________ - P2 and P3 have continued yellowing Day 19______________________ - Discoloration has seemed to slow down after moving lights up. - Ran out of CO2 again today. One 20lb bottle has been lasting me 2 weeks I feel that is drastically off from what it should be. My fans kick on automatically when it gets to 78*F, so maybe since it gets to temp quickly, it sucks out the CO2 too frequently, so my CO2 valve keeps opening to replenish. $15 every 2 weeks is ok for now, when I’m learning, but I know that’s a big expense that I can cut done on by dialing in the tent better. - Going to be giving full strength Nutes this weekend. - I feel like my plants are all doing very well, but are quite compact and short. Might be from getting too MUCH light? Pondering with the idea of only using my HPS for a bit to help stretch them out.

ShiftyGaijin Day 20___________________ - Drained system and refilled with full strength nutes. Added CALiMAGic and Hydroguard as well. pH’ed out to 5.7 and after it circulated a bit, stabilized at 935 ppm. Installed full CO2 tank again and turned it up a hair so it reads between 1250-1500. - Did some math to figure out how much light I SHOULD be giving the plants. At ~50watts/ 1ft^2, and using half of my tent with a floor area of 8x4, or 16ft^2, I should be using 800watts for my lighting. (Technically using 3/4 of that 16ft^2, because I have 3 plants and one empty net pot, but for ease of understanding, I’m just using the 16ft^2 number) My HPS pulls 180w, and each LED is roughly 300w measured, so a grand total of 780 used watts, I’m not disappointed. Day 21___________________ - Measured pH, PPM, H2O temp, and size of plants. All adjusting very well to full strength nutes. - P2 still stained a discolored, yellow blotch and leaf tips slightly pointing up.

ShiftyGaijin Day 29_________________________________ - Drained and filled system. - Caramelino has started its upward grow, but both WW are still very short, with minimal distance between nodes. Their stunt has become drastically apparent when topping off the clay pebbles after noticing some holes in the net not blocking light. Going to trim some bottom leaves and branches. Day 31_________________________________ - Adjusted pH and pulled 2.5 gal from system and replaced with pH’ed water. PPM was stabilizing far higher than I wanted around 1500ppm. After partial flush, brought down to 1275ppm. - Topped P1 after healing well from lower leaf trimming. - Cleaned up tent and removed unused lights. - Raised carbon filter to raise lights 6 inches as an attempt to stretch node spacing out a bit. Day 35________________________________ - Started LST on P1 to guide in more light.

ShiftyGaijin Day 36__________________________ - Started LST on P2 and P3. P1 has taken very well to lots of pulling down. - Prior to water changing, noticed P2’s water level was much lower than all the others. Found screen to be clogged between P1 and P2 with some kind of algae or something. Removed screens and level returned to normal. Day 37__________________________ - Due to limited vertical space, attempting a ScrOG early on. - All plants doing very well with LST and new flush of nutes.

ShiftyGaijin Day 43_________________________ - Decided to make the 12/12 shift due to my Caramelino growing enough to risk light burn if it doubles in size during flower. I have the light as high as I can safely put it in my tent with fans constantly on above the lights, and still only have 33” of space from the top leaves. - That being said, lots of LST will be used to fan out instead of up. - Flushed out the system completely this time. Before I would drain enough for the water pump to suck in air, but this time I filled with 50 gal of pH’ed water. Then I measured PPM. I stopped when the remainder of the water was 250PPM. Just a little richer than my tap water. Should have been doing this the entire time. Probably wouldn’t have had the nute burn spots that I was getting when I was 1400-1500 after half a week of the plant eating and drinking. Now is sitting just above 1000. I feel the plants will appreciate the break from over-nuting. Day 48______________________________ - plants are all loving the lower PPM numbers and pushing through the trellis net. - Plants are all drinking about 5 gallons every 3 or 4 days. Replenishing with pH’ed water when I notice a significant drop. - Two main shoots are becoming a pain to try to keep at the same level of all the others. LOTS of LST.

ShiftyGaijin Day 52____________________________ - Not much has changed from last week. Just fighting with the trellis net keeping everyone held down. - pH has been strange recently. I’ve been used to the pH raising as the week goes by, but in the past week or so, pH has dropped. Used to try to keep it at 5.6 and it would slowly turn to 6.0, but a few mornings I’ve checked it, it’s been at 5.4 or 5.3, so I’ve adjusted pH to 5.8, and am just monitoring it closely. - Checking root health has been a struggle as the trellis net kinda keeps everything held down. Removed the net to make sure nothing was getting caught in the drain tubes and make sure no root rot is happening and re-installed. - Starting to get super stinky when the stems are touched Day 55____________________________ - Plants were in desperate need of some under canopy clean up. Removed lots of fans shadowing and lower, weaker branches. Noticed a few leaves not looking so hot that we’re laying on top of net pot. Assuming it’s just from being neglected. Keeping an eye on nute levels and pH just in case. Day 56____________________________ - Removed a few other fan leaves once plant repositioned itself after messing with ScrOG. - Installed small fan blowing through newly opened up under canopy to help plant breath. - Will need a bigger Dehumidifier if opening up the under canopy doesn’t help bring down moisture. Set to 45%, expecting to get closer to 55%, but still seeing times with 75% or higher. It’s averaging out to 63%, which isn’t terrible, but I know I’ll need more juice soon anyway Day 56____________________________ - First pistils are showing!!! Day 57____________________________ - Decided to throw my Amazon.com dehumidifier in the dumpster. It would run all day and only pull a few teaspoons of water from the air. Got a hold of a nice GE unit that can handle 70 pints per day of dehumidification. I have literally zero clue if that’s a lot or not, but it’s 6 times the size of my old one, so I’m sure it’ll do fine.

ShiftyGaijin Day 58____________________________ - Trimmed lots under the canopy and opened up some light by taking a few fans up top. - Found a few leaves with spots on them.

ShiftyGaijin Day 64____________________________ - Plants all look super healthy. - Cleaned tent floor and sterilized to try to combat yellow spots on lower branches. Day 67_____________________________ - Noticing some of the pistils on a few of the bud tops have browned. Wondering if it was from me moving the fans and blowing constantly on a few tops. Moved back the fans and reoriented them for a nice, but light, cyclone effect. - Some nute burn on leaf tips became apparent. - Also noticed some leaf tips start curling down. Checked TDS and it was a bit high, due to the water being lower. All 3 plants used to drink 5 gal twice a week, and now it’s closer to 3 times a week. Just something to pay attention to again.

ShiftyGaijin Day 71_____________________________ - During my weekly flush, super scrubbed the inside of my reservoir to break up some water lines and possible algae. Had a pH issue a few days ago where my vivosun pH test pen broke the bulb underneath, and lead me to think I had dipped down to 4.5. I added enough to bring pH up and noticed it went down. After a few times of adding pH up, I realized my mistake, and tested pH with the color dropper. Luckily, it had only gone up to 7. I drained half the system and refilled to bring everything back to where it should be. - Colas all blowing up with long white pistils and leaves getting quite sugary.

ShiftyGaijin They’re all doing amazing. Caramelino smells like a super sweet, floral fruit. The White Widow in the corner is stacking up with white flowers all the way up the main stems.

ShiftyGaijin Seeing as this is my first grow, I’m still learning to read the plant and know what’s going on. Think I’ve developed some fairly advanced leaf septoria. Might not be bad enough to affect the end result, but I’m pretty clueless, so I put up a question about it. Hoping to hear back from more experienced growers about what I’m looking at. Going on week 7 of flower, week 6 if we’re going off of the first pistils, when the breeder recommends 8-9. So I know I’m coming up to the end of things. Cutting back on nutes due to some burnt tips. Not any substantial amount, but put EC on the lower side of the range that GH recommends for its stage in life. Buds smell amazing and seem to be developing great IMO. Had to tie a few down to bring the canopy all to one level again. Didn’t think that sticking my arm down the leaves for 2 seconds worth of tie wrapping would make my arm hair all super sticky for hours. Lol. Every experience is a good learning experience for my first grow.

ShiftyGaijin Cutting back for a 2 or 3 day flush to reset. Started experiencing possible nute lockout so giving it a few days to heal. Probably going to cause yield problems. First grow. Still learning new things every day. Yield isn’t the final goal. I am however excited about my new macro lens for my phone.

ShiftyGaijin Running a partial flush this week to see if anything helps with the Caramelino leaf discoloration that continues to advance. I know I’m close, but being my first grow, getting jumpy to pull the trigger. Haven’t seen any amber trichomes yet. But getting a decent amount of opaque. The smells are absolutely out of this world. 😌✌️🏻

ShiftyGaijin In the final stretch to harvest. Most of my trichomes are cloudy and seeing an Amber from time to time. Going to try to use the long weekend next week to get through harvest, tent cleaning and switch the tent to a dry room. Starting to run into heat problems due to it getting warmer, so I set an AC unit outside the tent to keep the room the tent is in cool enough to cool the tent as well.