What’s up everybody, just gonna start my first post with this grow log. I’ve been growing on and off for a few years now. Started back in 2010 with no knowledge and failed multiple times. Never did any real research back then, never any real success but definitely gained experience. Fast forward to 2020, researched a ton during that time. Quit a job I was at for 10 years and maxed out in pay to start a job at a local medical cultivator and gained even more experience. It didn’t last long because of all the bullshit politics of how those small cultivators work. People basically backstabbing and shit talking to get ahead on the ladder, it’s all a game working in that industry especially when it’s new to the state/area.
Never destroyed the love I had for doing the work, just for most of the people that are involved in the business. Found a regular job to pay the bills and now here I am just growing myself for the love of doing it.
Alright story time is over. On to the good stuff 
Blueberry Cookies seeds from a dispensary bag(I know) really good cultivator here that grows in organic living soil one of the only cultivators here that uses living soil. One of the tastiest strains available here also. Managed to find 2 seeds in one bud, it’s a rare occurrence. So I am hoping these are self pollinated which I don’t know exactly how that will work out for me but here we go!
2.2Gal Air-Pots with Biobizz Light Mix
May 16th - “Day 1”
May 22nd - Day 7
May 27th - Day 12
June 5th - Day 20
They seem to be moving along nicely, one was obviously growing a big faster than the other but both basically identical which seems like a good sign. First time growing in soil as I am used to growing in coco. Have to get used to watering less but I’m figuring it out.
Any comments, tips, or anything you see that I may not is appreciated. Not a whole lot really going on yet but they are starting to take off. Both of these seeds germinated seemingly overnight so I’m hoping for the best, seem like good genetics so far. I’ll keep it updated as we move along. Thanks for reading and thanks in advance for any comments! Let’s go!
Day 30 update
#1
#2
#1 on right - #2 on left
17 Likes
Cool deal. Living soil for the win! Tag me if you get stuck. It’s quite different feeding the soil microbiota than feeding the plant readily usable nutrients in a coconut coir fertigation setup. Wishing all the best!
Thank you very much brotha, I’m sure I will need some help at some point. I’m honestly not sure how alive this Biobizz soil is lol, it’s been sitting up in my closet for awhile unopened but I need to use it. I have a big bag of Build-a-Soil Light that I will use once the rest of this Biobizz is gone.
I know these are probably good on nutrients for a little bit longer but I’m just not sure. I left room on top of the pots so I could throw a bit more and water it in so they can breeze into flower. I honestly might top them right now and let them go for another week or two before flipping to flower. I might as well get your opinion on that plan, whatchu think? 
Here they are right now with some growth
Day 21 - I reckon lol
#1 is going to be the taller one that is slightly ahead
#2
Probably should wait until another node pops before I top but it’s always good getting a second opinion on things. Thanks again!
3 Likes
They are looking mighty healthy. Beautiful leaves and plant structure so far.
If it were me, I’d hold off on topping a few more days to a week, if I was even going for that route.
I build my own soils from organic matter, mineral, and microbial additives, so I’m not sure about the inputs of your commercial soil. If in doubt, you can always top-dress, or water with a sprouted seed tea, compost tea, or other recipes to get the rhyzosphere flowing with bacteria and fungi, which is what does all of the work converting nutrients into a plant-usable form. The best thing about feeding the soil matrix rather than the plant, is the soil will be healthy for grows to come with little done on your part apart from a drench of one or more of the aforementioned things.
One other thing I would recommend, is a mulch, to keep the moisture in. Be it straw, wood chips, rice hulls, or whatever, besides helping the soil stay more consistent, and keeping heat in at night, and cooling it in the day, it can add organic matter that leaches into the soil, which is the backbone of a healthy soil down below.
Or, just ignore most of what I said, because really, they are looking great so far and you got this!
2 Likes
You are probably right on the topping, I may not even do that since I’ve never grown this strain before. I plan on adding trellis maybe a week or so into flower, until then I can probably just feel it out and tuck/remove leaves to get everything evened out before that.
You are definitely right on the top dressing and sprouted seed/compost tea. I will have to do a little more looking into that, I am trying to go the “cheap” route instead of buying anything premade. I know I’ve already gone that route with the soil but that’s about all I want to spend any kind of money on
I think I am going to get a new PH pen, my old Vivosun that I used to use crapped out. So far I haven’t even PH’d the water and probably don’t even have to. I would like to at least get an idea of what the base PH is of the water I’m using. Pretty sure it’s in a decent range but don’t want any surprises later on from not checking.
Growing in Coco with Bottled Nutrients and PHing throughout the grows for so long I’ve gotten used to it so it feels weird not having to worry about it.
Is there any resources or even just a list of some ingredients I could look into for making my own sprouted seed/compost teas? Or even a top dress recipe.
I was building a list a year or so ago but never finished and really don’t know which amendments/minerals are suited for veg and flower.
Amendments:
Barley
Fish meal
Camelina meal
Mild mustard seed
Fish meal
Fish bone meal
Oyster shell
Gypsum
Calcium sulfur
Crustacean meal
Minerals: ? 
I hate to ask about too much that I could probably just Google, but man I love hearing and learning from people that have been doing it for awhile.
So far it’s been water only so I’m assuming this Biobizz soil is decent. It did smell like mushroom mycelium when I opened the bag, I know that smell all too well and I’m assumed that’s a good thing.
1 Like
Also research KNF (Korean Natural Farming), if you want to go super cheap. It’s a great set of techniques.
By top-dress, you can just add what is needed to the top of your soil bed, and water it in. I like kelp meal, alfalfa meal, and EWC (earthworm castings) for most purposes. I try to stay away from animal products, not because I’m vegan or anything, but…plants have all of the nutrients from insects and worms in the soil already. Going back to KNF, there is FPJ (fermented plant juice) and FFJ (fermented fruit juice). For example, if you need a bloom ammendment, you can pick some young buds off of trees or plants in your area, ferment them in some sugar for a week, and dillute the liquid that results in your water. For veg, obviously, use fresh new vegetative growth. It’s amazing the results you can get without buying much of anything and using your own local ecology to do the heavy lifting.
For minerals, I prefer basalt rock dust, epsom salt, and some others.
1 Like
I will read up and try to take as much of that in as possible and see if I can start implementing it. I never thought of taking flowering buds/vegetative growth from other plants and fermenting to use. I found that part really interesting and I’ll definitely be looking more into that. Thank you again for all of that info it’s very much appreciated!
1 Like
Yeah it blew my mind too when I started doing it. Chop up some banana and add some brown sugar, and you got yourself some nice bloom juice. Very potent so look into dillution ratios…FPJ/FFJ goes a long way.
1 Like
Welcome @slonethedrone
I’ve always enjoyed the surprise of a good bag seed. Maybe a little nostalgic for me.
2 Likes
Exactly I have a small selection of seeds I wanted to go with but after remembering I had these I said why not!? Especially since I’m doing my first soil run, figured if I mess something up along the way it isn’t really much of a loss other than some time.
Was thinking about adding an auto flower to the mix but honestly not sure at this point, will likely just try to get these two to fill out the 2x4. I think I might have been over watering a tiny bit at first but I’ve been letting them dry back for about 3 days now, I’ve noticed a big difference in growth. The pots today are starting to feel a little light but I might hold off on watering until lights on in the morning.
1 Like
Updated with day 30 pictures. Any suggestions on topping/defol/flipping?
I used portrait mode on my phone so it has weird areas where it tried to blur out the background and didn’t blur some of the tent where it’s closer to the leaves. It makes it looks weird, I might have to take different pictures and upload them.
Also #2 on the left has a weird lean to it I haven’t done anything to them training wise I am wondering why it is curving like that but the stems have definitely gotten thicker!
Have drooping about 1-2 hours before lights out, I know I haven’t been over watering so I decreased the lights from 40% to 30% hanging about 16" from canopy. Usually they are perked back up in the morning but I forgot to refill the humidifier over night and woke up to 45% humidity so they were still drooping, got the humidity back up to 65% and hoping to see a difference here shortly.
By the weight of the pots I feel like I could probably go another day without watering but the side branches are starting to stretch out from under the main fan leaves. Will probably start requiring a little more frequent watering soon enough. These plants do seem a bit dramatic when it comes to the droop hopefully that’s all it is.
Alright so I went about my way and did some readjusting to the light, brought it down and got it into a more acceptable PPFD/DLI. I have the Photone app and didn’t realize I never calibrated it to my specific light. Definitely had it a little too intense for the plants at this stage, did some light defoliation and a watering. Today they seem much happier, a lot of side branching coming through. Looks like I’ll probably veg for another ~10 days depending, another light defoliation right before flip and will probably take a few clones from the bottom.
Day 33
Thanks for looking everybody, Have a good day!
2 Likes
Topped them yesterday, probably shouldn’t have honestly with the way the structure is. I may do a tiny bit of lst on the lowers to expose them to more light and get them spread out a bit more. Otherwise seem to be doing well!
Thanks for looking! Any suggestions/comments are more than welcome.
2 Likes
Day 8 Flower
Busy with work, needing to do some clean up in the tent. Kind of embarrassing posting any pictures of things with the runoff and debris 🫣 but oh well. Here is a few, the next updates will hopefully be less embarrassing.
1 Like
Flower Day 50
A little disappointed in how these are turning out, could just be being hard on myself. Used to Coco and feeding every watering with ppm/ph. First time using soil and dry amendments, probably need bigger 5 gallon pots for all that. I will probably keep going with it next run, have a big bag of soil so gonna try again. After that I may go back to my roots(coco) lol
Thanks for the love from everybody. Still got a week or so I believe hopefully they fatten up a bit.
1 Like
