Just caught up with the journal and I have to say you've overcome a few difficult situations and your grow looks great. I'll be reading!
Pre Flower Day 4 TheFxckingHero - You're right I got ahead of myself and started counting early. ^ ^ ^ ^ Im lazy today and didn't feel like taking pictures but I will for sure tomorrow. Growth is amazing and when I adjusted them today I had to add almost ten more strings.
I bet you've got some preflowers on your plant right now if you look closely, as one of mine is already showing them and yours are a bit ahead of mine. do you know what to look for? if not, check out right next to where a branch connects to the main stem... inbetween that and the stipules ( the little pointy claw-like things you see at every node, these are on both males and females) if they have started showing, you should see just a tiny little green point sticking out there inbetween. you need some kind of magnifying glass to get a better look. male preflower will look like a ball on a stick, and female will be a little nub with one or a pair of tiny hairs coming out of it. without zooming in, they look pretty much the same. I haven't been able to tell the sex of my plant that is showing preflowers yet, because the only thing I've got around for magnifying is this illuminated microscope i got from radioshack, but the lowest amount of magnification it goes is 60x, which is a bit too close when trying to find a specific spot on the plant... hard to find the preflower... like looking for a needle in a haystack lol. something like 10x-25x would be a lot easier to use for that... maybe even a 5x magnifying glass.. not sure. I don't have anything like that laying around to use right now though. but if you see preflowers and have something around to take a closer look at them, go for it. not really necessary for you as you've only got two in there and you're not very limited with space like I am, but you might be able to find out a little quicker just for the fun of it/experience for later here's a good link with pictures http://68.103.98.234:6667/ogi/modules/growfaq/1037.htm
I think what Ill do is get a few really good macro shots of them tomorrow and zoom in, in photoshop and post them here. You'd be surprised how close I can get with my camera. Till tomorrow...
Pre Flower Day 6 So I tried to take some macro shots today and most turned out like shit but one is ok. And from looking closely at them I think I have two Widow females. I could be wrong because its still early and I usually don't really know for sure until day 11 or so. I retied them today and watered them with 2tbsp/gal of Foxfarm BigBloom for their first dose of flower nutes. The two Papayas were also watered today and got 1tsp/gal of Foxfarm Growbig. Everything seems to be going smoothly right now and lets hope it stays that way.
whichever plant that macro shot is from looks to definitely be female... can see the pistils there easily... congratulations. :] do you have a clear shot of the other one? I think you should try to take some clones if there any branches buried under the leaf canopy there... because that's some pretty thick vegetation and any branches stuck below won't get much light anyways... so see if you can get some clones rooted :]
Day 1 Flower Sorry for the lag in updates. Its been a busy week. Both White Widows are 100% female. One Papaya was a male and went down the garbage disposal tonight. The other one Im not sure of yet. The remaining three I watered today. The Widows with just plain water and the Papaya got a dose of Growbig. Everyone looks good and healthy and growing steadily. I only snapped off one shot of the male before it was pureed. More photos for sure tomorrow.
Day 2 Growth has been amazing. I really need to hurry and transplant before they get any further into flowering. Tomorrow won't be good but Ill probably run to the garden store on day 4 or 5 and transplant then. Still no apparent sign of sex on the Papaya but it is growing and should show sign in the next few days. I retied the girls and adjusted their positions once the lights went on. Its not shown in the photos but all three of them are raised on individual pots to bring the Widows about 6 inches off of the ground and about a foot for the Papaya. Heres the photos like I promised.
They are looking great, such vibrant colors! Got my fingers crossed the Papaya is a female! Not sure if I mentioned this but I love your setup and if possible think you could inform me on exactly what went into creating this grow space?
hello Cronoholic. very nice looking plants there my freind. looks like im joining at a great time, pre flowering . hopefully they will all be ladies eh! will be watching. oh what PPM's PH's are you running??? stay safe
^Yeah, for real...I'm starting to feel insecure about my CFL grow. My plants don't even begin to compare in terms of quality. +rep because you deserve it
Day 4 Alright I lagged on pictures today because my lights go on at 7pm and I only have an hour after that before the sun goes down and it gets dark. So between 7 and 8 I transplanted all three of them into their final containers. Oh yah...the Payaya is female which gives me 3 out of 4 females. Not too bad. So the Widows are in 5 gallon pots and the Papaya went into one of the Widows old 2 gallon pots. I watered all of them with 2tbsp/gal of Bigbloom and threw them back into the cabinet. Tomorrow Im going to the Angels game so I won't be able to take photos but I should on Saturday (Day 6) Later...