Return to Growing - IKEA Metod Cabinet

[cannabissequoia]

@Kraut420

As for the conditions / current issue of these fox tail buds - any thoughts? I’m just trying to figure out what in the environment is stopping them from staying short and stout.

It really is a fairly weird thing, imo; the nightime RH is too high but I have always associated the bud structure with genetics first, temps second…and I defer to the guys above, but I’d say it’s the genes unless you’ve seen the mother plant.

If you raise the lights-off temperature somehow that should help too.

I actually had a clone that was TOO dense(outdoor); the colas were so dense on ‘Blue Lemon Thai’ that light couldn’t penetrate…nor air. Had a nice smoke/effect but the plant basically sucked for me. Bugs & shit are harder to deal with on ‘rock like nuggets’.

[Mr.Sparkle]

First your at week 5 or so they will still fill out anyways but I’m gonna take a guess at your stretching buds or a potential reason why its the back corners. Now genetics come into play but let’s just ignore that and focus on environmental differences.

Do those buds in said back corner seem to be getting less light due to possibly your light position and size of your fixture vs the size of your space where your edges may be darker than say the center ? Also factor in your exhaust ports may be grabbing some extra stray light as well making those corners even darker than say the rest of the space or edges in comparison.

Looking at your photo from 10days ago it looks like that may be the case. Also being the back corner i bet it’s been the hardest to get to and tend as its been growing, so im guessing the growth back there is pretty dense in the sense that you have a lot of foliage and nodal budsites in a little area compared to say the side of the plant that are closest to you such as the door side or to the left now that the auto plants are gone ?

Something to think about is yes we want as many sites for potential bud grow as possible, but only so long as our space can support it and the plants can utilize it, if the “tops” end up having to fight each other they will stretch and claw and throw out wide to try and grab as much light as possible to grow as big and healthy as they can, but if the only option they are given is to grow up into a increasing dark area they will try and stretch out to grab as much light as possible in the only fashion they can.

So how to help with some possible quick changes just till you finish. I know you have your containers rigged with drain hoses so let’s work around that and try to reshuffle the plants to get them off the right wall for light and humidity reasons.
Consider taking one or your other lids from the containers on the left and covering all the center drain holes you made with tape for now but leaving some on the outside narrow edges open, you may have to drill a couple more or block off some more but spin the lid 90 degrees and have it supported in the center over the edges of either the two containers in the front or the two in the back so they are essentially in the center of both while having those open drain holes hangover and into the containers with the drain hoses, this will still allow you to use your system as is. You may have to put a some form of a support under the center of these lid to prevent those kuggis containers from flipping up, but that’s easy to do and can be anything that fits the bill.

Saying that obviously the scrog netting will need to come out to do this, which should be easy to do, reason scrogs can be a pain is just because you can’t shuffle things around if you need to, i expect little issue removing it now considering your main stretch is over.

Now i understand you put the netting in originally to try and keep things down and under control for a 10 day absence you had which again i understand a lot of times you do what you gotta do, but i’ll let this lead into some points for another post at a later time on the discussion about the starting size of a plant vs the size of the pot its in vs the the size of the grow space you have and when one should flip light schedules if running photoperiods. Now it’s in the past and we can only deal with now and moving forward but @ReikoX was pretty on point back on Mar 26th when you were wondering what to do with the autos and photos running at the same time, and him suggesting just flipping to 12/12 then, or trimming back harshly till you could flip them as big potted plants can grow really fast so long as they have the environment to do so.

Speaking of environment your cab is essentially not far off what one side in my current closet setup is, im technically running a tad smaller at 58x50x73cm tall internal dimensions and using bigger Kuggis boxes for reservoirs, and “currently” running 5 solstrips at 125w total wall draw per side, but also run a beefer fan and carbon filter setup with a few tweaks like top of cabinet air extraction which aids in heat removal vs side exits even if located at the top of ones cab.

Anyways lets start there and work our way forward.

[Kraut420]

My humble thanks for the in-depth reply and suggestions. Lots to think through here and digest before looking to adopt.

Will also look to sketch out internal layout better to discuss next grow adjustments. In short: I felt current design would yield even light spread but will review / confirm.

Density in the scrog is a concern but it’s at its worst in the area at the centre of each plants quadrant of the net and where they meet. Oddly the taller bud sights are in the less dense area vs. rest of the scrog. That far corner is not easy to get but doable.

I quite like the suggestion on repositioning. How about the below instead?
This doesn’t centre the plants but brings the plant in the far right quadrant to the front left. Then rotate both plants to have the longest woven sections pointing towards the back.

Also going to look into mounting some small 12V fans internally to lift airflow / circulation and if I reposition the plants potentially rotting the solstrips 90*.

Respect and thanks bruv.

[Mr.Sparkle]

Yes your light setup does provide an even light spread for your space, but that doesn’t mean that your corners are gonna be the same as your center, they will be darker regardless you just gotta work with it, as technically the best you can do is have light directly over or in the edge to counter that but still one side of your plant is still against a wall that’s providing no light or ability to pass light. The back why they are stretching is probably again because they are by that exhaust vent that may be grabbing light and also jammed against an edge which does not have light directly overhead, they are fighting themselves and it’s probably darker to them back there than elsewhere thus they stretch for more light… Sure some air issues could be present but that’s just an add not a main cause.

But yes your destiny will be the most dense where the plants are smashing against and fighting against each other, as they are just trying to spread out and got crammed into a smaller space for their foliage than what their roots can support and to add to that they were given a sibling to fight that same space for.

Straight to the point your pot volume is too big for your space with how your watering and your choice of media, your plants wanted to be bigger than what you could provide space… better to be on this end of the spectrum than the other as its easy to tune it back on subsequent grows. Consider this, some of my plants that utilize 400ml of canna coco are the same size as your current plants with fill levels 16-19 times the volume of them. Thats a shit ton of root space capability, again with very similar light setups, grow space size, watering styles, grow medias, and nutrient bases and not to mention you gave them a 4 week or so veg time too.

Your plants were just trying to outgrow the space, as you gave them the root capabilities to do so…

On to moving them, sure doing that is actually better but it’s just a rotation from our perspective, but how its better is it will allow you to move the plants back and not have to have some hokey ass lid support like i was initially thinking, but instead they will partially bridge the two containers on either side which leaves them in place with their lids and the only thing you’ll probably have to do is throw some tape over the edge where the two container meet that way any run off from your fabric pots will preferably run onto your tray lids and down your drain holes, instead of down the crack between the containers, just overlap some tape over the lid lips.

Reason i want you to get that one side of the plants off the wall, or door if you rotate them is you have a bunch of space going to waste on the opposite side, its empty space filled with light so you might as well use it and make best of it, no sense trying to get the plant to stretch over even further when your at 5 weeks in, they are just concerned with bud building by the looks of it.

If you shift them so they are more in the center it allows two sides to grow vs one as the one side thats against the wall/door will get more light and that will help build those buds while providing some space for that side of the plant to grow, the opposite longer woven side isn’t really losing anything in the process doing this it’s just getting the space that It can “potentially” grow into reduced, but that doesnt mean its gonna fill it though. Consider it’s easier to have a plant just grow out naturally in as many directions as possible than it is to force it to grow in only two directions such as left and up toward the light.

Let the plants do the work for you, as really your just there to provide guidance, not tie them into submission even if needed at times.

[Kraut420]

So an update. Was away for a long weekend and only now been able to “have a go”.
Not sure what this will yield and I hope I have mashed too much resin off the buds. Hopefully they just think I’m some pesky herbivore and they start producing even more resin to protect themselves. More worrying was my overly aggressive repositioning of branches that caused a split down at the very bottom of my branches. Being unsure what to do about it i covered it in rooting gel and bound it back together best I could. Let’s see if it survives.
I’m away for 3 days from tomorrow so I’ll see what the changes have yielded.
Hard to see from pics but have basically:

1. repositioned pots best I can away from walls and as central as possible - one complication is that one plant has grown a bad ass massive root network into the catchment reservoir and down into the drainage tube; the plant with the stretchy / fox tailed buds hasn’t done this… more intrigue.
2. Rearranges branching and tied down the stretchiest colas and branching
3. Moved the lights up to the maximum height

Once these puppies come out I’m going for a full redesign and rebuild.

I’m also going to have to look into some temp/humidity control that doesn’t utilise the sonoff TH.

Yet another one has failed on me so I’m now also flying blind on temps/humidity and have to go with some crude timings for lights off fan control. Worries me as overnight I noticed that with fans running to keep humidity down I end up with only 11-12C inside the box yielding a 13-14C temp differential lights on/off not a good thing from all I’ve read.

Maybe it’s the TH16 only and I should try the TH10. Very frustrating on the TH16 is that plugging in an extension cable (4pole) trips the circuitry. Leaves you with some useless ass 30cm long cable on the sensor.

Anyway. Something smokeabme will hopefully come of it all.

Below is pre change around. I meant I map out the position of the Solstrips to the overhead shot of the scrog net. What can be seen though is that a number of the fox tailed buds are in the inner quandrant.

This is the situation post the carnage.

[Mr.Sparkle]

Yeah the further into flower you get the less time obviously things can change, but your centering i still think will help, not long now anyways

and broken branches if its with the stem they wont care if its across it then they will.

Looking great though.

[Kraut420]

Another update of winter wonderland frosty snow coverage.
Most of the buds have started filling out a bit. The stretching and fox railing hasn’t gotten worse and the indica (60%) genetics are a little more telling here with slightly denser buds on the foxtailed flowers.
I have had a mishap in that my pump seems to have underperformed while I was away on work. I’ve now got one plant with very crispy slightly clawlike leaves.
As a result I think I’ll be worse than even my modest hopes in terms of yield (expectation would have been 130-150g range or just about 1g/W).
Anyhoooo… nothing to doo

[cannabissequoia]

…not sure whether this time or the drying time is my most anxious.

[Explorer]

They’re looking really nice now mate ya did well with the DIY SCROG

[Kraut420]

yup. Hard to sit on ones hands… trying to be patient though.
Planning to harvest some a little late to see what the difference in body high is. As an indica I am tempted though to take the majority early. Again, just not a fan of the heavy stultifying body stone.

[Kraut420]

Thank you sir. Very kind. It’s a long list of improvements to think through from everyone’s input and Mr. Sparkles comments. Back to the drawing board.

[Kraut420]

Latest close ups.
Moving to straight water and slightly longer night time cycle.
Probably cutting down in a week max.
This is mid week 10 since flower and 17 from seed popping.

[cannabissequoia]

sooooo close!

makes me want to go chop some plants early

[Kraut420]

Back with a final update on the grow.
Everything got cut down wet trimmed and hung to dry.
Tonight, after 10 days drying, I stripped the dried bud and had a pure flower weigh in.
All packed into mason jars with 65% Boveda packs and stuck in a dark place for another month.
Not earth shattering but pretty satisfying.
Two plants: Barneys Farm Gelato 41.
Under Solstrips drawing 145W peak during flower (41W/sqf).
152gramms nearly shaved dried flower stalk free.
I didn’t manage a wet post trim weigh as it was just too damn sticky and too damn late after a nights trimming. A lot of thr top ends of the buds look grey/white - that ain’t bleaching. That’s pure sticky madness.

What is earth shattering is this bud. Had a tiny trial spliff before bed. First it gave me a big lift, strong mental buzz with some visual entertainment and hen knocked me down like a bag of flour after about 1-2 hrs. This ain’t a morning pick me up for pre work creativity. This is colours and mind wandering happy armchair.
Had harvested earlier than planned to retain as much of a head high as possible. Seems despite clear / slightly foggy trichomes with minimal amber I’ve got more couch lock than head high.
Aroma on handling is an intense cesty and fresh flavour with a slight spicy note.

Have another two plants outdoors from clones enjoying the summer. Excited to see what they produce.

[Mr.Sparkle]

nice good job im sure you will enjoy the rest of it

[cannabissequoia]

@Kraut420

hen knocked me down like a bag of flour

Glad you’re smokin’ your weed…

[Kraut420]

Worst thing is I can’t swear not having seen a hen at some point.

[Kraut420]

The Gelato 41 clone loving the outdoors

And two more clones in my veg box. Need to figure out what to do with these. It’s hand watering and they’re stretching hard.
Don’t wanna replant the flower box until I can work through a proper redesign.
Still chewing through feedback from @Mr.Sparkle

[Mr.Sparkle]

well you can hack back those clones, just need to keep a few lower nodes to keep them going and i mean the little ones, just if you do it make sure they haven’t been heavily watered as the removal of leaf mater will slow water usage.

[Kraut420]

Four and a bit months of radio silence. That’s what having a first child does to once agricultural ambitions

Anyway. Here an update to the Barney’s Farm Gelato 41 left to the outdoors over the summer. She loved the sun and a larger pot and gained some serious height over the pre flower stretch.

However, the summer turned nasty and as the keener eyed will notice she got hit mid flower.
I’m starting to think the Gelato41 is way too rot prone. It may be bad luck in terms of both higher than desired humidity on the indoor grow plus overly dense scrog canopy and just bad luck on the weather for the outdoor grow (literally 2 weeks of no sunshine and virtually persistent rain) but I’d still flag it as a risk.

Had to cut her down and turn her to mulch sadly.

Although can say I was very happy with the site of the root ball.