"Yes, I really do need all these plants." 🤣 Autoflowers, photoperiods, bugs, breeding (journal)

[RainToday]

My new babies arrived!
Cuttings of Frankenstein and Blue Dream from @JohnnyPotseed

Awesome packing job, healthy and lovely in spite of the dang post office failing to deliver yesterday because they “couldn’t access” my location. Such BS. Anyway, they look good and I’m moving on.

I’ve got them unpacked and set up for rooting. Humidity up, lights on gentle, Costco cake lid in action😆, space heater on so it doesn’t dip below 70 at night, and fingers crossed.

Two of each are in plain vermiculite, since that’s what’s worked for me before, and one each are in a Rapid Rooter in the vermiculite.

I’m home to go in and peek at them and add water as needed.

[RainToday]

1 month old:

Miss Piggy and crosses - I’ve been raising the lights up and up and on 3 I’ve supercropped the tops to get a more even canopy.

Back right in the pic below:
Pineapple x Zamaldelica Express had a very defined few days of crazy stretch, and has settled down completely now. I successfully pollinated one small side branch only, with its sibling. Really love this plant, excited to explore the f2 generation it produces.

The male was spectacularly stinky already, and lush and a tough plant. RIP but I also used a tiny bit of his pollen to pollinate the pineapple at back left in the photo.

Side note - I do intend to use a second kind of pollen on some of these plants, but it won’t be for another 4-6 weeks. They’ve all had a good shower now to wash off any stray pollen, and by then any seeds from this round will be developed, and I will be harvesting most of the colas and then pollinating little popcorn buds so I can be sure I don’t mix the varieties together. I mist my greenhouse in general also to deactivate pollen and raise humidity.

Front left in the photo above is ‘shrimpy’ the BB#3 from Night Owl. Looking healthy, just very small.

Just planted:

Front right is the Ciskei x Lemon Pie X Zamaldelica Express seeds which I hope will sprout today, being one day behind these others:

…which have had a terrible germination rate so far. 13 plants from about 45 seeds. One happy note though is that the single seed I had from plant #2 did sprout. Glad I planted all of these, so at least the project has a chance of success still.

10 days old, and the Landrace Party is getting close to transplant. The pitiful one seems to be growing out of its sadness.

Cuttings look perfectly happy this morning, here’s a peek under the lid:

That’s it for me, hope you have a happy day!

[420noob]

Here’s some tips on keeping sativas small.

Keeping Sativas small with Upstate

I get questions all the time as to how I keep my Sativas small and manageable. I thought it might be easier for me to post a link to a thread that covers this topic. I’ve germinated some Oaxaca seeds from my favorite plant, Old Silversides. They are ready to plant today or tomorrow.

[RainToday]

Yes indeed! That’s a great thread, I read most of it and found it helpful even for my regular photoperiod plants.
Remains to be seen how well I do with actual sativas and my enjoyment of big plants always wars with my practicality

[percyryan66]

Just catching up on your thread…looking fantastic…keep it up and thanks for sharing your journey!

[RainToday]

Quick note - with today’s additions, the germination rate on the Ciskei x Lemon Pie X Zamaldelica Express seeds is up to almost 100%

Edit to add the mind-blowing thought I just had - maybe the first ones up were all the autoflowers? It’s about the right percentage.

Was just telling my mom how pleased I was the rest of the seedlings are coming up - she said " I hope they’re not slow plants" and I thought woah maybe they are the slow(er) / photoperiod plants?

Fortunately I took those photos of the first round so I can go back and mark which they were and eventually get an answer to this question. An utterly delightful investigation.

[RainToday]

Seedling in the center, weird leaves don’t look entirely healthy to me, live or die? I’ve got 5 others of that cross, they all look normal. I usually trash anything that doesn’t look healthy. Weird is fine. Not sure about this.

[luxton]

I can never say no to an oddity in a plant, lol

[RainToday]

I guess I’m keeping it for now at least

The new leaves that just unfolded look just the same and healthy. I think the light spots are thrips damage. I’ll spray the baby plants again, but the big ones are too far in flower so I finally ordered the encapsulated nematodes you suggested. They are also supposed to prey on fungus gnats, so they ought to have plenty to eat

Did a bunch of supercropping today. This is the pineapple x Zam. Express before, and I successfully got seeds forming on just one cola and a tiny bit on another.

[RainToday]

My poor cuttings look very sad, and the one I checked hasn’t made any roots. I have given them two doses of a light foliar feeding now, after reading a bit. I think the problem might be that my Vivosun heating pad keeps turning off, and it’s cold in there at night. I’m going to turn the heater back on, on low and 70f and hope it doesn’t trip the breaker again. My handy little Govee monitor app shows its been very cold in there. All the other plants seem perfectly happy.

Oh, and for my Celsius friends -

Everything else is doing well. Just up potted the landrace party and moved most to 12/12 in my mom’s bathroom. The others will go in there after they grow a bit more.

These seedlings are providing a nice illustration of how wide variation can be. I don’t know why some of them are so unhappy vs the others, but it’s pretty impressive since they are all nearly the same age and genetic heritage. I’m letting all of them grow for now, since these are just to identify and breed the autos, and sometimes they turn it around like the one I circled is doing. I have started foliar feeding the sad ones.

Speaking of turning it around, “Shrimpy” the Night Owl BB#3 has made a respectable plant. It’s about half the size of the others, but still quite a decent size and blooming at a good rate. That’s the center front plant here, and I’ve added a little extra light in the middle since the darned canopy is so uneven.

Those Miss Piggy on the left are 36" tall, and it would be a bit more but I supercropped all the taller tops to even out the canopy. They’ve been shooting up, so far I only lost two bud tips which bumped the light and fried before I noticed, so I trimmed them off. I’ve got a bit more space to raise the light

Here are the Gabagoo x Miss Piggy and the 2nd gen Miss Piggy - they are starting to run out of nutrients, which confirms to me that this less rich soil wasn’t enough for them and is probably why they aren’t as large as the first gen.

The Pineapple x Zamaldelica Express continues to combine the best of both by presenting a delicious sweet pineapple smell - I actually think its got more of an actual pineapple scent than the original pineapple, which I thought was mainly just fruity. It’s starting to get frosty, and the buds have a nice tight look. It’s the right front plant here

I’ve had a bit of overwhelm these last couple weeks, and haven’t been on top of things. At least the plants are at an age where they grow well without much attention.

[luxton]

Right on, your whole grow room is looking awesome!!

[RainToday]

Thanks! The fungus gnats are nearly gone too.
A few days ago I added the NemAttack beads you recommended from Arbico Organics, and they’ve decimated the fungus gnat population.

[luxton]

Right on!!! That’s wicked great to hear!

[RainToday]

Yes, I’m very happy, because the buds are just starting to get frosty. I’ll never forget all the delightful buds from a past run which weren’t smokable because it turns out that fungus gnats stick to sticky buds nearly as well as they do to those yellow sticky traps.

[420noob]

Do you wash your bud?

[Magu]

@RainToday

fungus gnats stick to sticky buds

I would have smoked them anyway .

[luxton]

Burn em, extra protein, hahaha

I really hope I haven’t smoked any thrips (GUARANTEED I have )

[RainToday]

I do, but they were stuck on and even down in the buds.
And I did try to pick them off but inevitably I’d have missed some, and mom says they are nasty to smoke. So since we had more bud than needed, I gave that all to a friend to cook with - a much better use of high protein bud, mom says

[RainToday]

Planted a new raft of seedlings today, I’ve kind of given up on soaking my seeds and planting little tailed babies. Direct seeding is more in line with my current attitude and available attention.

Thanks @Kidete for getting seeds for these two awesome sativa strains and @Upstate for organizing, and @sunra108 for going in with me.

Thanks @Hashpants , @LoveDaAutos , and @misterbee for the other seeds!

On to the Ciskei x Lemon Pie X Zamaldelixa Express auto project - gender is appearing in the autos. There were a couple of those happily vegging looking males which had hidden their male flowers and were within maybe 2 days of pollinating my grow room, but I’ve ripped those flowers off, chopped those plants way back, and stuffed them all in a pot together, with room for a few more. So far it’s mostly #4 males, and a really stellar looking one from #3.

Innocent veg impersonation of the #4s:

Post male removal:

All the boys:

Its super early, but mom has a chance to smoke for a couple weeks coming up in a few days, so I harvested a branch each from everything remotely ready. There’s actually some amber trichomes and fading pistils on the branches of the pineapple x Zamaldelica Express nearest the one(s) I pollinated. Also, my mother and brother confirmed the plant 100% smells like an actual fresh pineapple. None of the bud will be cured, but it should all be an interesting test smoke, giving me an idea what plants to breed.

Here’s some bud porn

[blowdout2269]

@RainToday

Direct seeding is more in line with my current attitude and available attention.

Omg, I so get this…
Me too, me too, lol.

@RainToday

mom has a chance to smoke for a couple weeks coming up in a few days

Ooo, how exciting!

Looking good in there. Im excited to watch you progress through the project.

I myself am about to start running through some of my Sour Scarlet Grapes creation. Gonna have a look through the F1’s on the side of everything else Igot goin on.
Just to get an idea.