I had poor success indoors until understanding this simple concept…
Heat stress is a myth!
Canoeing, light burns, bleaching… Fox tails… I never had those problems outdoors under the sun. I eventually figured out it was LIGHT sensitivity, not heat sensitivity, and this is why the sun did no harm:
Outdoors, the UV spectrum from the sun signals the plant to create hydroxycinnamatic acids that protect the plant from intense sunlight. In other words UV actually protects the plant from the sun. With greenhouse/indoor settings, UV is low, and cannot protect the plant from intense light.
The fix? Did we need to supplement the hydroxycinnamatic acids & add UV lighting?
Or…
Can nutrition fix everything?
It can.
It did.
It does.
I discovered the secret ingredient to dank in a 1994 Brazilian ag consultant handout:
I couldn’t tell a potassium deficiency from a bug infestation at the time. Jorge wasn’t helping. Neither was RC. I went out and bought a drum of potassium sulfate and haven’t been without since. I made sure to ignore the sponsored cannabis media guys after that. They probably sold potassium sulfate in High Times under a special Rasta influenced title at 100 times the price, I dunno. I never learnt a thing looking at brand names. Being sold fertilizer just made me dumber about fertilizer, not realizing how simple it all is. It’s chemicals. It’s plants. Don’t put a thought into it. The work has been done. And we have Google now. (it was Alta Vista and Dogpile back then)
Here’s the secret behind the secret…
You need to push micronutrients hard during mid flower. Hard enough to nearly antagonize sulfur. You want to do this before starting potassium sulfate, so you can then build the sulfur back up. Doesn’t matter if youre aeroponic or recycled vegan moon soil, it’s the same plant and the same fertilizer, the timing isn’t that different. The potassium sulfate readily dissolves, unlike sul-po-mag. This, people, is how to get them old school weed enzymes popping.
People often pat themselves on the back for high Brix ° leaves, but all it means to me is the sugars are not flowing to the sinks. You have to evaluate and take every part of the plant into consideration when attributing asset values.
Too long didn’t read: I’ve been growing plants for 30 years and have seen way too much Nitrogen. Way too much Phosphorus. Not enough potassium. And not enough micronutrients along the way. The trend hasn’t changed. The marketing has. Everyone stumbles until they separate P and K in practice and in the smokable end product. You cannot obtain primo quality by flushing all nutrients. Only nitrogen and phosphorus should be cut when silk hairs stop multiplying. Not potassium. Not micronutrients.
Harvest when pots are on the dry side. 80 degrees maximum, 40% rh minimum, 5 days hanging minimum. No special bags or freezers needed. No candy sweeteners. If your root bennies were in order and your cuts weren’t already ODed on Phosphorus at some point, you will have dank weed no doubt about it.
