Ya I realize (or hope) that they will likely grow out of it by week 2 of flower.
Should have taken a picture of the worse looking SSDDs so my comment would have made more sense. The nikon is making the male look better than it is also haha. Here’s attempt #2 of the male :
Roots from this plant are mostly white still but can see some browning going on at the tips. This plant dries out everyday so that part isn’t surprising.
Mostly older leaves that were affected and am fairly confident as a freshly transplanted cutting it will grow out of it. Still wanted to document the problem early on just in case I screwed something up with the amendments.
Hm. Yeah, okay, that plant doesn’t look too hot haha. Raise the light, maybe, and see if that helps. It kinda looks like plants I’ve seen on other grow reports where somebody has their 1000 watt HPS six inches from the tops, what with the way the tops are kinda “wilting away” from the light source and all.
I trust your judgment, but are you positive he’s drying out? Or are you just assuming that because of the tiny pot he’s in? Is it possible you may be overwatering?
Yeah, I dunno what to make of that haha. Like you said, she’ll probably grow out of it.
The plants aren’t perfect, but who cares? They look OK, and as long as it’s not a pest issue, I’m sure you’ll be fine.
Grow under very low light no more than 18/6, in warm temps, with a topdress. Don’t overwater, but adding a mulch or plastic cover will help. Adding LABS will help free up extra nutes from the soil. If you have space on top, add super high quality compost and/or EWC over your topdress. Repot when you’re ready to flower or veg out for clones.
I would guess that the intensity of the lights is driving them harder than they can take in the smaller pots. Even my old COBs seem plenty for veg, I have them dimmed lower than half way right now and my plants are kicking (they are in 7 GAL though).
I know you said your worm bin isn’t going right now (mine isn’t either, all my worms died for some reason), but, do you have access to top quality casting or compost?
Gonna be a challenge to keep them happy through flower in the smaller pots, but I’ve seen you flower them out pretty small before, so I know it’s possible. I’d try supplementing with Neptune’s Harvest or something similar, but not sure you want to get into all that.
You could also look into Gaia Green as a top dress, one of my gromies is using that, in addition to EWC/Compost in smaller pots, and it’s going well for him, but that may border on what you mean by “organic”.
Glad you found the thread! Was considering tagging you and others but decided to just post the link in my other thread.
I’ve noticed mothers seem pretty happy and for a longer period of time under cheap low wattage strip lights (25w?). Good tip thanks!
Gotta start doing more mulching. I’ve been slacking and even have shredded straw on hand to use haha. Thanks for reminding me.
Yeah I definitely need to address this for future cycles. It’s rare there are ever any issues using when using home-made vermicompost.
That’s my thought process on the light intensity / small pot relationship as well. Ordered a new potentiometer so I can dim the cobs. Hopefully it comes sometime next week.
No sadly, I’m using a lower quality mass produced “industrial” worm casting atm. I had some pretty good bedding options in the past that just aren’t there anymore either, but will still probably order some red wigglers in a month or so and just use a basic bedding source. Even in those circumstances the vermicompost will still be higher quality and more reliable than the store bought stuff which can’t be all that biologically active.
Yeah, I usually try to avoid flowering stuff out that is already showing signs that they need more root-space though. The SSDD male doesn’t concern me too much as the pollen source. I think the Triple Sunshine / Waking Dream may be slightly problematic.
I don’t think that there will be much issue in the way of root-space with the SSDD clones because they were timed fairly well. I’m not particularly worried at this point at least. Mostly annoyed that I made the soil up in the fall without paying attention to how much and what I was adding. Also the gamble on the low quality humus source reinforces my need to get back into vermicomposting. Quality compost sources take all the effort out of this stuff.
Gonna pull out the light meter later today and try to get a better idea of the DLI w/ the cobs on at full blast.
What were you using for bedding? When I first got my bin it came with a coco block. Ever since, I have been using a mix of peat, dead leaves, ROLS, shredded unbleached paper, rice hulls, and leaf mold.
We need to get an active worm / vermicomposting thread going on here.
I’ve had access to cheap rice hulls for at least 10-13 years now (2010) and when I tried using them in a thermophilic pile or worm bin I haven’t been thrilled. I liked the idea of DIY biochar using rice hulls but is way too much work and effort for me. Do rice hulls seem to help or break down in your worm bins?
Over the years I’ve used a lot of bedding sources but my 2 favorite that I no longer have access to consisted of :
Horse manure / straw mix hot composted with other green sources and then aged.
2+ year old “leaf mold” / rotting leafpiles
I really don’t mind shredded news paper or cardboard but it’s a lot of effort to cut up the thin strips manually. Really not a fan of the coco coir blocks and haven’t had good luck with those personally, but would still prefer compost made in that style over the store bought stuff.
If you build it they will come? I’d follow that thread for sure. Would love to up my skills in that area.
I got tired of cutting up cardboard too and have lazily just been using fresh compost as bedding and it seems to work fine. Not sure if it’s ideal, but it has been easy. Lots of perlite in my compost so it doesn’t get too muddy either until it’s all been converted to castings.
Yeah, don’t want to invest in a high quality / industrial shredder either just to make bedding. And the time and effort to manually do it is ridiculous haha. Quality compost has worked great for me as well in the past, after all they are manure/composting worms. Always see an abundance of them in compost piles once they cool down. This time of year I don’t have access to “quality” compost that I trust (don’t have a hot pile going). What are you guys using for bins? Rubbermaids, smart pots, dedicated “worm bins”, something else ?
I found a worm bin on Craigslist, can o worms, it works well, but feel like a Rubbermaid would work just as well. It is nice having different levels so I can stop feeding one level and the worms will migrate out of the finished product though.
Ya that sounds nice for harvesting for sure. I just put a container with some fresh compost / food in my bin and most seem to migrate to it usually.
Also over the years I’ve noticed old bales of rice hulls on the ground that broke down from UV exposure and got wet never really seem to have an abundance of worms. Mold yes, worms no. Bales of straw, wood shavings, bark mulch, and all other sorts of materials seem to have much higher worm populations if left out. No idea why though (PH or silica content maybe?) and just an unscientific anecdote. In worm bins I’ve also never had them fully break down by the time the bedding needs to be replaced. We’re all getting rice hulls from the same company I assume.
I remember using rice hulls as a mulch off and on over the years and have never been too impressed in that area either. The first widespread usage of rice hulls as mulch that I was exposed to was a trial back around 2015 or 2016 by Willoway as a strategy for weed suppression. They are still using rice hulls to this day as a mulch for what it’s worth
In 1 GAL pots it probably doesn’t matter anyways when compared to a more appropriate volume of “living soil” where there’s more visible soil life. May try a few rice hull mulched pots and a few straw just for fun.
So currently with the cobs at 100% hung at the top of the tent the canopy reads from 400-500 depending on location (reflectivity) @ about 36 inches away from the light.
I bought a galvanized stock tank from Tractor Supply, not sure if they are nationwide. Its a 300 gallon tank and I fill it about two thirds to three quarters full with aged horse manure from two different sources, one source is just alfalfa bedding and the other uses pine shavings for bedding. Both are already devoid of heat and well broken down before it goes in the bin.
I feed it malted barley and vegetables/greens from my vegetable garden that have bad spots, rot or whatever.
I elevated it so I can put 5 gallon pails under the drains under both ends to capture the leechate, the leechate gets cut 4/1 with water and goes into garden beds about twice a month.
Was just in there the other day and was looking at both those and all the plastic ones for the dogs in the summer. Last I checked my tractor supply was also selling 50# bags of organic alfalfa meal for less than the cost of a 4LB box of Down To Earth Alfalfa meal on Amazon. They seem to be one of the less depressing big chain/retail stores, definitely prefer them over Home Depot & Lowes.
For a while I was letting my plants get regularly rootbound in late veg in their 1g hard pots, and I found the best combo for healthy white roots was pretty hard dry down cycles combined with Recharge and LABS watering. I use fabric pots now for everything but if I had it to do again I’d probably go Hygrozyme and LABS and maybe aerated water, just everything to get oxygen to those roots and clean up the sludge. One I haven’t tried yet that’s organic is just a 2:1 H20:H202 flush, which makes perfect sense but would also wreak havoc on everything. Still, that for sanitizing and oxygenation followed by a compost tea or microbe pack watering might be a protocol that would work nicely for mother plants.
The other option would be to just take them out and do some root pruning with a sharp knife, shave off an inch from every face and repot in fresh soil in the same container. That’s only for vegging plants, obviously.
Thanks for the suggestions! I tried making LAB a few times when JayKush posted some Rodale / Gil Carandang “How-To” guides on ICmag back in like 2008 or something like that. Was using much larger pots back then though, so it wouldn’t hurt to try again. Assume that is the better route rather than buying EM-1 or something like that… Will have to search through @BeagleZ thread a bit more.
Yeah, that’s my usual approach with mothers once they start getting unhealthy and ultra root-bound. I am envious of the coco / hydro guys who can pull off healthy large flowering plants in tiny containers haha.
