Starting a new thread for my tent & closet works winter season. The next crop has been sexed and topped with one more week of veg before 12/12. Started a breeder pack of TGA Pennywise and added 5 freebies from Dynasty - Miss. Universe X Harlequin.
Pennywise is TGA’s Jack the Ripper by Harlequin, and the seeds looked identical, maybe coming off the same Harlequin mother clone? 10 plants made the final cut, got 5 female/5 male. Interesting, the Dynasty cross is clearly more vigorous than the Pennywise. Will have 1 Dynasty female and 4 Pennywise in flower. Got really nice males of each as well.
2 more transplants to go, first into 2 gallon pots to start flower and then into 5 gallons at two weeks into 12/12.
I have to restrain them, otherwise they seem to grow very quickly and become rootbound. I get best results doing final transplant when the pistils start showing about 2 weeks into 12/12. If I move them into the 5 gallon pot any earlier they seem to put too much energy into vegging instead of flowering. They would need an 7 or 10 gallon container if I moved them earlier.
day 2 of flowering, just red light pics. All the females have been pruned to 6 main branches. And some Huckleberry Cookies kief at the bottom of my bud-sorting bowl. really nice lemon/mint/grape flavor to that herb.
couple pics in better light, I like this Pennywise female, the most sativa looking, hopefully it takes after the Jack the Ripper father. I think the extra blue in the Hortiled lights is having effect, plants are very compact this time.
vigorous Pennywise male, a few days later going into flower. I’m happy the way the males are working in the 3 liter containers, makes them a lot easier to handle
experimenting with using the flash - helps a little but still looks too red. 2 days growth over the last pics, I love the rapid growth of the first 3 weeks of flower
Two of the Pennywise at Day 13 of flower. The big move from 2 gallon pots to 5 gallon is going down tomorrow. They’re starting to get stressed from being stuck in the small pot but hopefully growth explodes with the transplant, just as flowers begin to form. Finally I have figured out the correct height for the LED and there are no burnt tips.
Earlier this week I harvested pollen from my favorite males and sent the boys to the compost pile.
Awesome garden. My buddy is running my pack of pennywise too, but they look nothing like these beauties. A couple questions on how you tend to males. How long do you normally let the males go to gather pollen from? How do you normally collect and store it.
that male is looking good! Miss. Universe must be a good plant.
When the plant shows enough preflowers to be confirmed male I move it to 12/12 and it starts dropping pollen about 2 weeks later. I hold a little metal tablespoon under the male flower and jostle it around with a knife to shake pollen into the tablespoon. Then I dump the tablespoon into a small glass jar, with a dessicant pack taped to the side. I’ll do this once a day for 2-3 days and usually that’s enough. I mist the plant down with water before moving it out of the house to avoid stray pollen getting loose.
I keep the jar in the fridge and it lasts 6-12 months. The more you warm up the pollen and expose it to air, the faster it degrades.
Awesome. I’m always intrigued how other people gather and store pollen. Mainly cause it’s an area I still have issues with lol. Can’t ever get pollen to last more than 6 month’s. I’m thinking I don’t keep it cool enough.
alpin stash has some good videos on harvesting pollen and selective pollination. this is the technique i plan to try. they also mentioned storing in freezer for long periods of time but its practically single use once it thaws out (no refreezing) so store/freeze in single use portions
