OK I believe this is a cottonwood tree. Is it the same thing?
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Looks like it though mine are a lot skinnier lol They grow really fast…
1st yr sapling
4th yr - this is my spring harvest “bush”
8th yr tree
Close up of the leaves
Every late spring/early summer the females form “cotton” fluff (seeds) that is carried away by the air…this year wasn’t so bad as I have been trying to keep only the males around mixed in the spruce and birch and pull up sapling runners after a good rain which also informs me of drainage problems on the property as the mature ones can drink 100+ gallons a day
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don’t be intimidated! I’m impressed by @MomOnTheRun’s mix too, this is like someone cooking “from scratch”. But you can take a short-cut and buy the most critical components from a professional composter like Coast of Maine - sort of like buying premade pie crusts or cookie dough. These people specialize in “living soil”
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reading this gave me a whole mishmash of emotions(is mishmash a village in AK? 
)… from the shame of my various soil mixes & their failures…to the consensus that most natural = most right… anxiety to do a better job at it while realizing that’s all for next year, money & all that…
sheesh. 
this is a great practical write-up & should be force fed on the new growers 
better than the ding-dongs 
selling the stuff!
edit: might wanna put the tree pics in the "what other plants do you have " thread 
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ROFL!! We have some strange names though thats not one of them lol I run all kinds of soil mixes just to try out as people rave about them and are proven so I see how they perform in my environment… some do well while most just suck and are all really expensive to put together then you have to learn how it functions and end up really over doing stuff giving an anaerobic soil after a while then have to either ditch the mix or remix…either way, its even more money spent - gardening shouldn’t be that hard nor expensive lol
The real ass kicker is even if someone were to emulate my mix to a “T” it will still be different and act different as the environments are 
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Now that our soil has rested for a couple days, lets see what texture we have to work with…
Sand is the 1st to settle as it has the largest particle size. Silt is the next to settle with a medium particle size and Clay is the last to settle with the smallest particle size… once the marks are made for each, the distance is then measured in mm:
Sand - aeration - 9mm
Silt - fertility - 13mm
Clay- absorb nutrients- 3.5mm
Now we have our distance, lets convert it to percentages…add up the total mm’s = 25.5mm. This is the number we divide each number by then multiply by 100:
Sand 9mm/25 x 100 = 36%
Silt 13mm/25 x 100 = 50%
Clay 3.5mm/25 x 100 = 15%
Now find those numbers on a soil texture diagram to find out the soil type
Damn near perfect soil! Do you know how we improve it? Mulch and cover crops 
Now for the clumping test: make a firm ball then poke a finger into the center one time…
Awesome!! 1gallon of water after 4 days and loosely covered with no plants tells me the soil is holding onto the water quite well…almost too well as I would expect more to evaporate in this much soil but I am happy with the water flow: 1/4c water into 1/2c soil drained in 1 minute 15 seconds
Microbial life and death is the major contributor to EC driving plant growth so when the bio-life is down, plant growth suffers and as energy gets used up Brix also drops as the plant becomes a target for disease and insects. In a bio-active, mineralized healthy soil the EC will stay consistent due to the interactions between microbes and minerals…this current drives plant growth.
Now in soil, these numbers show us:
Temp - affects speed of plant growth and soil processes
PPM - Not really used though backs up us/cm readings
US/CM (EC) - tells the soil energy making the amount of nutrients available…salinity level (salts)
Ph - tells how available nutrients are
Now the only thing I do not know and will not until the soil test is done, is which salts? This is important as carbon decreases, nitrogen and oxygen increases lowering the need of further inputs as fertilizer efficiency is increased. When the minerals are balanced, soil structure also improves.
I like to see a new soil EC around a 2.5 to give room for increases as the inputs are broken down by micro life though because the soil’s EC is almost a 4 without knowing what is available, a cereal/grain cover crop will be beneficial which will also add more tilth with nutrients returned as the cover crop decays above ground and the leaves below ground turns to loam essentially providing free humic and fulvic acids
Now looking at ph shows me that I have a decent balance of magnesium, potassium and phosphorus…excessive levels of magnesium and/or potassium increase ph which can cause mitrate nitrogen and EC to be low whereas, high phosphorus decreases ph. It also shows it is buffering quite well starting with well water at 7.3ph…dropped it almost a full point!
Off to a fantastic start!
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Now I’m getting excited! Glad to see the seedlings were viable. 
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Great! Looks like 2 more are working their way to breaking open the soil so 50% in 3 days isn’t too shabby
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please tell me this isn’t your first year gardening
you’ve just condensed quite a few books & many hours over a couple years spent on the subject…like Cliff’s Notes.
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rofl!! More like 22 yrs though only 9 yrs total with cannabis… 6 yrs in my teens/early 20’s and the last 3 yrs
Happy to break it down
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I had a similar vigour in my SSDD seeds so I’d guess they’ll have all popped within 5 days, or they’ll never pop. I only had one dud, but it was the smallest seed of the bunch and at planting I didn’t think it would take.
What’s been your experience with seed vigour? Can you think of other strains\breeders that have had similar seed vigour?
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I believe what your seeing is the true f1 vigor, I haven’t gone thru the genealogy of the strain, but it sure sounds like it to me (could also be why the seeds are so expensive lol)
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The way my skunk 91 seeds germed (11/12) and seeing when Capulator bought a pack and only 3 germed, im a firm believer that proper storage is #1 essential thing when keeing seeds viable.
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Idk, 2 strains do stand out that are hit/miss for me: Blue Dream and Snowshoe though most strains take ~3-4 days this time of year as my humidity is ~60-70%. In January/February, it takes ~5-7 days as my humidity is lower at ~20-30% unless I set them up in humidity domes (ziplock bag covering) and mist frequently though it only shaves a day off
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Absolutely love this! I bookmarked it. Thank you!
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I reckon @MomOnTheRun is an excellent choice for breeder/grower/chucker etc , she knows what she’s talking about and i think she’ll kick ass, also if a “bleeder” phen/geno can be found she’ll find it…
Good luck and well done for volunteering your grow room for the “team”.! (so to spk lol…)
I’ll be watching this one, also great 
prep and a great start on the germ front .!!
Happy growing/smoking ,
Gaz
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Glad ya’ll are enjoying the journal so far…I just spend the last 24 hrs fighting a flu little man brought home from school - wish he wouldn’t share so much lol Ah well, fevers broke so I feel somewhat human again. Anyhow, it doesn’t seem that there will be anymore seeds coming up so I will be doing a little excavating today to try and see what happened.
Numbers 1-6 at 2 days old
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It’s no secret that i am gonna wanna get some seeds off this run, like everyone else.
But i promise the captain, breeder and donor of this initiative a sewn patch of the logo for the project. My gift for your time and effort, will also make a giveaway or raffle to give out the rest to the overgrow community! Will make like ten or so.
I love overgrow, and thanks for this gang!
Sci 
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