Welcome to my first grow journal! I want to start off by saying Thank You Very Much to Grasscity for giving me this opportunity. It should be a great learning experience for me and hopefully others can benefit from it too. The Grow Room Shower stall. I used emergency blankets instead of mylar cause it's much cheaper. 400 watt HPS with 6" cooling hose. The hose starts a few inches above the floor and runs up through the fixture and has a inline fan to blow it the rest of the way out the roof vent for the bathroom. With this setup the room stays at a steady 78 degrees and 40 on the humidity. The Seeds 2 Autoberry Feminized Auto Berry Feminized Marijuana Seeds 2 Autowidow Feminized Auto Widow Feminized Marijuana Seeds 3 White Widow Skunk Feminized White Widow Skunk Feminized Marijuana Seeds 3 Easy Rider (Freebies) Free marijuana (cannabis) seeds with every order Germination After some research I have changed the way I germinate. I was always a big fan of the wet paper towel method, however last time I tried this I had 2 out of 5 sprout. This is why I did some research. I found out that some people prefer to soak the seeds for 24 hours before you put them in the wet paper towel. The ones that sink should sprout. All of mine were floating when I first put them in the water. I used distilled (steamed) water and had to slightly adjust the ph to reach 7.0. After about 12 hours 9 out of 10 were sunk. I tried to sink the one that was floating and it did not want to sink. After 24 hours I checked them and all 10 were sunk. I was excited. I made 4 seperate pieces of paper towel so I could keep track of who's who. I added the seeds to the paper towel and dumped the water on them that they soaked in. They are in a sandwich sized tupperware container and then added to a cardboard box to keep the light out. I put them next to the heat vent for warm germination. To my suprise all of the seeds sprouted this way. I had 10 little sprouts and the tap root was just starting to poke out. I added them to a special seedling soil I bought. The very next day I have little seedlings popping out of the soil. I wait another day and the others were starting to pop now too. It's now day 3 and the last little girl that I didn't think was gonna make it decided it wanted to live. I should know by tomorrow whether or not that one is gonna rise up above the soil. I am super excited! I got 8 that are showing their first set of leaves, 1 that is rising up but still wearing it's shell, and 1 that hopefully is going to grow. I went in there tonight to give them all a little pep talk and snapped some pictures for you guys. I didn't want to shut my light down so I appologize for the yellow pics. 420Madman
Ok so now that I got the journal posted I wanted to throw out a few questions. I am a fan of the Foxfarms nutes. I have the bigbloom and the tigerbloom and I am going to buy the growbig because I am going to need it for the white widow skunks because they are not short season like the auto's are. FoxFarm Soil & Fertilizer Company Should I start right out giving the Auto Flowering plants blooming nutes or should I try to give them some growbig for a couple weeks? The last auto's I grew didn't show hairs for the first 2 weeks. I am thinking maybe they should get a decent dose of the higher nitrogen fert for a couple weeks before I start giving them the bigbloom. I welcome any and all input. 420Madman
hey bro thanks for the heads upp on the journal. just finished 3 autoberries, got another goin, and just ordered some white skunk. not sure if its same genetics but its also white widow skunk cross. where did you order from? i made some qwiso of the the trim from the autoberry tonight! its dryin now. as for your nute question, go real light on the nutes with the autos. what soil are you using? fox farms ocean forrest has enough nutes for about 3 weeks so you dont really need anything untill at least then. i gave mine a very light veg feeding after a few weeks, even though pistils were showing, and then went on to bloom nutes. and try to do everything possible not to stunt the autos in any way, i.e. heat/sold stress, lighting, over/under nuting/watering, ph. it really hurts yield. this is shit you probably already know, just throwing it out there. anywho, kinda blazed, sorry to ramble. good luck and good vibes. im pulling up a chair bro.
Thanks for the reply! I have ordered my seeds twice from Marijuana Seeds.nl and both times my order came in pretty quick and sealed into a cd case. Marijuana Seeds.nl sitemap The guy at my local grow store said he just got this stuff in and it's a new product from Dr. Earth. He has had some feedback from a few growers that are using it and they are saying it's better than Fox Farms Ocean Forest. I figured I would give it a shot. I tried to look it up on their website but they don't have that exact blend listed. They do have others that are very very close. Looks like that may have taken one of their blends and added a few things to make it great for marijuana cultivation. Dr. Earth Homegrown Premium Soil. Organic & 100% natural hand crafted blend enriched with Bat Guano, Worm Castings, Kelpmeal, Microactive Concentrated Seaweed Extract, Aloe Vera, & Yucca Extract blended with 100% pure love. Natural and Organic POTing Soil. (notice the POT is in captial letters as if it was blended just for Pot Heads) Probiotic Inside Beneficial Soil Microbes Plus Mycorrhizae The first-of-its-kind, ultra-premium, PRO-BIOTIC™ Planting Mix! This Planting Mix contains the same combination of selected strains of beneficial microbes with endo and ecto micorrhizae proven so effective in Dr. Earth Organic Fertilizers. Contains the finest blend of all natural/organic ingredients to adjust the soil to 6.5pH, the ideal level for most garden soils. Seven champion strains of beneficial microbes insure quick greening and long term planting success. Eight select strains of endo and ecto mycorrhizae contribute to drought tolerance, increased nutrient availability, and soil-aggregation. 100% natural/organic formula provides optimum levels of essential plant nutrients, including important micronutrients and minerals. Eliminates the need for chemical fertilizers when used as directed. Long-lasting organic ingredients increases moisture retention in loose or sandy soils while improving soil drainage in hard compacted or clay soils. Hope this helps. 420Madman
thats where i ordered from last time. the only place i have found the autoberry. i didnt see perlite or anything like that listed in the ingrediants in the soil you got. is there any in it? i would say your good on nutes for the first few weeks with that stuff to bro, but im no soil expert or anything.
ya, it never is. as long as its there. how much was that soil? i should be needing some soon, and im always lookin for better stuff.
Excellent choice! Good drainage. Built-in soap dish. Hosing down the light is the mishap to be wary of. Meh. I'm not a big fan of mylar. Flat white paint is better, I think, but I do not recommend painting the interior of your shower stall. I tried that, and I don't want to talk about it. That sounds like a sweet setup. The thing about germination is this: when viable seeds get wet, they germinate. So every method has a high degree of success. 2 out of 5 is not so good, but that could have been the seeds. They may have been dehydrated, which is not the same as dead. Soaking does help, I think, but you can drown a seed if you soak it too long. I soak my seeds for 8 to 10 hours. Seeds sink when they are full of water rather than air. Sometimes, after a few hours, if you give them a nudge, the floaters will sink. But many (probably most) floaters do germinate. After I soak my seed, I skip past the paper towel stage and just plant it in the medium, trusting nature to do its thing. Like all the other ways people germinate cannabis seeds, this method almost always works. The paper towel method has the advantage of affording you the visual certainty that the seed cracked and the tap root emerged. But now you have to place the opened seed in the medium without damaging the tap root. My method affords me no visual confirmation of the seed opening, but it also removes the possibility of the tap root getting damaged or dried out. As Jbudz pointed out, good soil will start out rich with nutes. Seedlings don't need to be fed at all. Once the third leaf set is in and the vegetative growth phase has begun, the plant will start to feed on the nutes in the soil. After that, it's OK but perhaps unnecessary to add nutes. The soil should be sufficient for three weeks or so. If flowering has not yet started when you start to feed then I would stick to veg nutes. Grow Big and Big Bloom. Go light on the Grow Big and heavy on the Big Bloom. The Grow Big can burn your plants if the dosage is too rich, but the Big Bloom is organic, liquid essence of bat guano and worm castings. Mmm, tasty! Except autos skip right over the veg stage and go into flower instead, so you probably will not have much use for Grow Big with these particular plants. I do feed veg nutes during flower, though, every once in a while, every 4th or 5th feeding perhaps.
Thanks for stoppin by Alatar. Glad to have you on board. Ok so no nutes for 3 weeks. I will eventually need the grow big for the white widow skunk as they are not auto-flowering. I figured 7 autos that way I get to harvest them after 2 months and then the 3 white widow skunks can take over the rest of the room for a couple more months. Hopefully there is enough room.
He sells ocean forest for $18.00 and the Dr. Earth was $20.00 for 1.5cu ft. I think he is pricing it up a bit because he claims it's new. He has the only Hydro store in the area so his prices are a bit higher than normal. The bag I bought looks different than what they show on the Dr. Earth website http://www.drearth.comso maybe they changed the way the bag looks now and are trying to market marijuana growers to compete with fox farms. When you look at their website they offer a planting mix and a potting soil. The planting mix looks to have the same stuff in it as what my bag says. I will post a picture of my bag. I used their dealer locator feature and found 2 places in my area that carries their products. Hopefully I can get it thru them for much cheaper. http://www.drearth.com/locator1.php
You can see at the bottom of the bag they adverise for "organic medicine gardens" and look at how they spelled POTtng soil with the little look alike pot leaves. They are definitely trying to market marijuana growers.
hey bro, thanks for the info. those prices are kinda steep. i get a 1.5 bag of ocean forrest for $10 at my hydro store. im gonna check that out the next time i get some soil. ive been kickin around the idea of goin coco, but still have a bunch of soil nutes i wanna use up first. and as for your post earlier about choopin the autos after two months, your gonna want to let them go a full 10 weeks bro, it really makes a difference. just a thought.
Day 6 Well I lost 2 1 of them barely made it to the soil surface and just never rose up. The other one grew real tall. nearly 3 inches but it just wouldn't sprout open and push away the outter seed shell. Today I noticed that it must have just grown too tall too fast because it fell right over. I think the top with the shell still attached was too heavy for it. Kinda strange that I lost 1 from each of the strains that I had 3 of. Now I have 2 of each strain. For the record we have: 2 AutoBerry Fem 2 AutoWidow Fem 2 EasyRider Fem 2 WhiteWidowSkunk Fem Here's a couple pics. I just harvested my 2 autoberries that I had goin.
hey bro, congrats on the harvest!!!! the autoberries taste soooo good. and i couldnt even let it cure more than a week and a half cuz everyone wanted it now! sorry to hear about the platns that died, that sucks. as for the getting to tall, how far away is your light? i have a chart in my journal (given to me by brotha alatar!) that i cannot copy paste at the moment (using my phone to check updates), but it tells the distance you can keep different wattage hps bulbs to get best light. but those babies are lookin real good. so what you doin with the trim from the autos?
I am going to go with BHO. I have done it several times now so I am confident that I won't screw it up. I figured I had better let the trim dry before I run it. Never tried it with wet leaves and I just don't think it's a good time to try it now. I would like to get some bubble bags sometime and give that a try.
im not sure about bho, but i know for qwiso and bubble bags, wet, frozen trim is best. i threw mine in the freezer right after trimming. if you do go with bubble bags, go on amazon.com, they have a decent set for like $70. screw the $400 from humboldt.
Day 9 They seem to be doing well. I took the pics just after watering them. I am giving them tap water that has sat for a few days. I PH it to 7.0. Tonight when I checked the PH of the runoff I was suprised to see it was 7.6. I was hoping to see 6.5. I have been very careful making double sure that what I give them is 7.0. The rise in PH in the runoff kinda scares me. From left to right they go: AutoBerry-AutoWidow-EasyRider-White Widow Skunk