CFL closet - first indoor grow - log / questions

Thanks man yeah- there are white hairs but you’re right which is why its throwing me a little bit. I’ll go take a look under a magnifying glass- would really like to soak her in light for another week

Oh damn they are still very sparkly … i’d say 75% cloudy 25% clear … nothing amber

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Patience is the mother to all virtue… Nice buds man!

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It suure is- i am in no way inpatient here… I have plenty of smoke :slight_smile: just had my friend drop off an ounce of GG4 homegrown… super sticky and amazing (Alaska where it’s legal). I will be drying and curting this out for at least 10 days before i even touch anything (more like a month but i’ll try a little after 10 days at least).

I still.have the bubblegum (day7) and cheese (day6) hanging… both are not quite at the point where the branch is snapping… still bending.

I’m still even nuting her and she’s fattened up quite a bit since that last picture… probably one more week of solid flower and a good 2 - 3 day flush and i’ll cut her (short flush i know but im still experimenting with things and wouldn’t mind seeing the difference between a 3-4 day flush and a 10 day flush … by flush i mean watering with pure tapwater).

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I would wait for a minimum of three months, then it will be ok

That seems a bit extreme man- you should be able to enjoy a nice smoke after a solid month after harvest… never heard of people curing for a 1/4-year before touching anything. Why would i want to cure it out that long? Not arguing, asking.

You can be proud to output that with a 50 buck setup, and for a first run.

imho the next steps to acquire in priority :

  • somes reads on the flushing process : how to prepare it with the planning of the space and how to drive it to the end.
  • light you hand on nutrients rate : the goal being to never get a plastic/shiny texture on leafs, specially around the buds. The difference in term of quality of smoke, flavors and potency with a “just enough feeded” plant is big. And i can’t invite you enough to at least grow a single clone this way, near yellow all his life. Just to experience the extreme in a cone.

big up !

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I strongly encourage you to test your 3-4 day (or better - none) against the 10 day flush.

Please do it :wink:

Btw I never ever no way starve them at harvest. Don´t overdo nutes and you will be good.

Proper and slow dry is key. Curing is also great.

Of course this is a discussion for another topic:

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The ideal curing time is about three months. In general, more sativa varieties need a longer period of time, the indica is shorter, but three months will not spoil anything.

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Thank you for the responses- @sk1 - I’ll keep it to 3-4 days because i dont want it to end up in the crockpot . The first two plants got 10 days of water but im sorta trying t push this last girl hard while shes in all the light to get a little more on the bud :slight_smile: and i do want to see the difference so i know in the future if i may have over-nuted something.

So far the bubblegum is on day 8 of hang drying with ambient moving air (not direct) and is still slightly bending as is the cheese (day 7 hanging).

They are getting close to snapping though and that at that point I will trim them and jar them and begin the curing process. I was thinking more of a month-long cure than 3 full months (never heard of that) but i will do some research before deciding.

I’ll probably do one more run with this CFL setup before i transofrom the closet into full-LED.

@Fuel Thank you. For a first grow i couldn’t be happier, trichomes are there and the yeild was higher than expected for CFL-flower. I’m guessing roughly 2 oz of dry per plant but i wont find out for a couple more weeks. Flushing seems to vary by grower. Some people literally flush the roots to the point of literally hosing down the whole pot , others water wit hpure water for X days (is what I’ve picked up so far).

Thank you all for the feedback… One of the funnest, most stressful things ive ever done (when i left the lights off for 15 extra minutes i almost had a panic attack… ordered a timer that day.

3 months? Really?

I’ve had a 2-year cured nug before and it wasn’t spoiled at all it was one of the smoothest bowls ive ever smoked (grew that one too, on a window sill).

I’ll have to research long-term curing… I mean the plants do continue to cure out as long as you leave them jarred… i dont smoke a TON of weed so i would think waiting a month or so and then starting in on it wouldn’t be bad… You really think a full 3 month cure before even tasting it?

After these three months, most varieties are at the top, both in terms of taste and efficiency.You can be sure to taste

Thanks - I’ve never actually read that before, good to know.

That is the mentality I took (advice from my cousin who’s been growing for 20+ years). Light on the nutrients… He told me one of the most common mistakes growers make is over-nute’ing their plants.

So… I’ve been doing literally a few drops of flower solution per gallon of water - I think I found a decent rate but i wont know until i have more time to experiment and cross-compare (and actually smoke the stuff).

Used a standard soil mix (Sunshine #4) … Right away the plants started yellowing leaves (from sprout) so I researched and ended up making my own cal-mag using epsom salt and activated calcium (food processed eggshells + vinegar)… leaves turned deep green within a week. Was awesome to watch

I pulled a couple of clones off the bottom and sent one straight into flower (which is budding out now) and the other is in full-veg mode. That third “clone” was already flowering so i just potted it and left it in the flower room (in a pic a few posts up) … The two buds are getting frostier by the day.

Good times. Can’t wait for round 2.

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And here’s the end result :slight_smile:

Roughly 5 ounces dry … .VERY good stuff on all 3 plants.

there’s some “cheese” budshot… everything turned out better than expected… Yield, potency, and the power i got from the butter i made out of the trim… very potent butter didn’t use anything quality. This stuff is straight top shelf…Bubblegum grew in straight purple a little purple in the cheese buds as you can see (researching now what actually causes that). Awesome experience… now im flowering out the three clones i ended up with via experimentation … Then I’ll start round-2.

Thanks again for all the help everyone. Total success…$50 setup.

Random question (dont want ot start a thread) Does “autoflower” mean growing from seed right into a 12/12 cycle?

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congrats again! beautiful nuggage, especially for a first harvest, and with fluoros.

What did you use for the soil mix? Seems to work well.

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Thanks man- yeah im super stoked on how potent it turned out. Sunshine #4 soil mix with some “around-the-house” cal-mag solutions and a VERY light amount of miracle grow liquid.feed… general plant food type during veg and general flower type during flower. .i would have gone with some kelp-based stuff since i live in Alaska and it’s everywhere but i literally had this stuff laying around the house and just did some research and gave it a go trying to minimize cost at every corner (since i assumed i’d be making mistakes on my first grow anyway).

Turns out i have a bit of a knack for this and just went off pure interest, soaking in as much info as i could regarding super-crop technique, when to flower, ideal temps/humidity… all that stuff.

Basically bare bones basic gardening soil (with perlite and other additives… but im pretty sure nute free…sunshine #4 is the brand/type) with liquid nutes almost daily. I messed around with watering schedules and landed on basically daily , rotating between a light water and a heavier water day after day. always with a light amount of nutrient.

Had some gnats starting to show so i backed off the water a little bit and took care of them pretty fast (next time I will be treating all my soil first so any eggs in the soil will be either dried out or dead before i use it).

But yeah nothing special really… just a lot of bulb adjustment, leaf tucking, and general TLC.

Update:
I found there was a fine line in balancing how close to get the CFL bulbs (because of course you want them as close as possible without causing heat stress/damage) and got the bulbs a little bit close one day on the cheese … ended up scorching a few good sugar tips but didn’t damage the buds … and really focused a lot on keeping bulbs at different heights (using a hanging technique with bulb adapters from Home Depot) so they were always in optimal position/proximity for maximum efficiency… i will probably alwways use CFL bulbs at least a couple to supplement a future LED setup because I like the way you can tuck them into fairly tight spots to get light where you otherwise could not (or I’ll get my supercrop techniques up to snuff so i have a flat canvas and dont even have to worry about that).

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I guess I’ll chalk it up to (luckily) having a lot of time on my hands away from work to make daily adjustments- bulbs… a branch holding a branch holding a leaf bent 90 degrees toward the light with a whole other stock balancing off the counterweight of that to open up direct light on a lower node that was otherwise in pure shade… crazy branch gymnastics :slight_smile:

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In case you didn’t find the answer yet…
Nope, “autoflower” is a genetic trait wherein a plant starts flowering once it reaches maturity – it doesn’t start flowering based on a light cycle. There’s a debate thread about the pros and cons over here, and I think we have a few grows tagged with #autoflowering where you can see how they grow.

When I found out you can’t clone them, I immediately hated them :grin: Nothing worse than not being able to grow an amazing plant again.

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Thank you! I have a lot to learn, wow (sorry was trying to figure out how to reply without bumping and double posted)

Except for the amazing plant that didn’t get grown because you’re growing the same thing again.

Just playing devils advocate… sorry about the thread jack.

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