Been really busy so not a lot of time for a full grow journal this round. Trying out some autos for the first time and making some auto seeds.
Started with 1 fem CBD Black Mamba from Blim Burn, 1 fem Tangerine Dream from Barney’s, one fem Cheese from Canuk, and 4 reg LRxUV#2 from @ReikoX.
The 4 LRxUV#2 turned out to be males. I selected the best one and segregated him under his own array of CFLs. Just collected some pollen and selectively pollinated the 3 girls.
As you can see, the girls are small and not particularly happy/healthy. I was out of town for a week (unexpectedly) so I just watered the heck out of them before I left and hoped for the best. It didn’t go well for them but they are recovering.
Even at nearly 50 years old, I somehow forget these all important lessons passed down from wiser people.
I took a shortcut with my grow this time around. Usually I mix my own amended soil (peat moss, perlite, dolomite lime and EWC) and use GO nutes. Has worked perfectly and problem free.
This time I let laziness and haste get in the way - I bought a bag of “super soil” (Blue Mountain Organics). It hasn’t played out too well. Little did I know that autos, in general, don’t like hot soil. Also, since the soil is heavily amended I was cautious about the GO nutes and was only adding some CaMg and some epsom salts (because the plants had sure signs of Mg deficiency early on).
1 week of neglect didn’t help the situation, of course. Now that they are flowering I have started adding some GO BioThrive Bloom and Bio Bud along with the CaMg and epsom. The plants are alive and growing, but I can just tell they aren’t super healthy and happy like my previous grows.
So I took a shortcut and “fixed” something that wasn’t “broke”, and I have learned my lesson. Next time I am sticking with my original soil recipe and feeding schedule. Actually, next grow will be my first outdoor grow so it’ll be completely different, but that’s another story…
Well, no matter what I do, these plants aren’t very happy. They are flowering like crazy but there are obvious signs of nutrient issues. No big panic, though.
I’m not desperate for a huge crop of “fire”, so I have decided to just give them water till they are done (some time in mid March). Not going to waste time or money dicking around with them. I’ll get an ounce or 2 of smoke and some interesting seeds out of the deal. Fine by me. Need to focus on getting ready for my first outdoor grow…
The Black Mamba CBD auto has crazy trichome production already, with 3 weeks to go…sorry about the orangey white balance on the first shot. You can see the sugar on the tops of the buds in the second shot.
They look fine to me mate. Auto flowers late into flower seem to fade a lot quicker than photos do. It looks like it’s all old leafs and not newer growth. I’d not stress about it personally
No stress here! I just know I can do a way better job with these next time if I go back to my old soil recipe and nutrient schedule - and not leave them alone to dry out for a week as they go from veg to flower.
Or maybe not. I guess there is only one way to find out.
Very interesting to me how different these three plants are growing under identical conditions. I have never had this much of a difference in my tent, despite growing some very different strains.
The white balance is off. They are all a bit greener than they look. The Cheese (left) is actually quite healthy looking. Basically just a medium green colour all over. It is budding and maturing the slowest though.
The Black Mamba CBD (middle) is “healthy” but quite yellow, but with ridiculous green/grey/pink frost-covered buds. It is budding and maturing the fastest by FAR.
The Tangerine Dream is pathetic. Not only is it yellowing, it has gross brown spots all over it. Not a happy plant at all, but I’m not going to pamper it. Zoom in on the photo and take a look at the ugly phucker.
Yeah I’ve found growing different strains mean mixing different solutions for each plant. I used to push each one to the limit but grew tired of it. I now give no more than 800 ppm of megacrop, some calmag/Epsom and a little P.K. Just enough to keep them all happy and green. Quality over quantity
As discussed, I made the mistake of using “hot” (“super”) soil this go round. Seems only the Cheese can tolerate it, although I think that Black Mamba is going to be pretty damned good either way.
I look forward to trying all three strains again with my tried and true soil mix and GO nutes.
Harvested the top cola of the Black Mamba CBD Auto. I have read the CBD content is typically at a peak earlier than THC content and the trichomes are basically all milky at this point so off it came. The rest will come off over the next few days. Basically 65-ish days from seed…
I just know I can do a way better job with these next time if I go back to my old soil recipe and nutrient schedule - and not leave them alone to dry out for a week as they go from veg to flower.
