Hello everyone. This is my first time growing. I acquired some knowledge prior to germination but as time went on, I quickly found out how much more there is to know. I’ve learned a lot that I will take into action when I start my next grow but my questions here today are about my steps going forward. I am 5 days in from switching to a 12/12 schedule. *As you will see one plant is much smaller. I starter her later and ran into storage issues with the bigger girl starting to outgrow the tent*. My first question to everyone is how much of my plant should I have trimmed off before making the 12/12 switch? I feel like she has WAYYYYY too many leaves from what I’ve seen but i don’t know which leaves are safe to trim at this point. I did trim a lot of panel leaves off earlier in her growing but at this stage I’m not sure. I recently seen the ‘lollipop’ technique and am wondering if I should have done that prior to the switch or am I okay to do so now? I don’t want to stress the plant and lose and growth due to stunting her. My second question is, if there are things that I should definitely be doing now, what are they? I do have them on nutes and did notice a little burn on top so I will be flushing them and cutting back half dose to see how she responds. Any help is much appreciated! I never knew this could be so exciting haha I find myself looking at them several times a day. Thank you so much for reading. Hope to learn something new. Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
Those are nice looking. Remember those sucker leaves are solar panels for the plant. I only remove the ones that are blocking light to the tops and this allows light to penetrate deeper. I would have topped the main stem 2 weeks before going to flower, and done a lot of LST'ing, you can still bend the main top over to allow the growth of the lower limbs to catch up and be the same height
LST’ing is one of the things I learned about after I started growing - which is something I plant to do on my next grow. I want to start earlier in her stages so I can result better. As far as bending the main top, what would you recommend using to ‘pull’ the bend? My plant is about 33” tall. Below I attached a photo of the branches, are any of these ‘smaller’ fan leaves okay to trim? The ones extending off the branches, not any growing off the main stem. A lot of photos and videos I’ve seen, these are all trimmed. Is that the lollipop technique I’ve heard of? Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
No don't trim the suckers, they ain't blocking light to other tops and they look healthy, so they are feeding her. You should bend the top now, don't wait. You will be amazed at the growth you will cause. I use grass twine to bend mine over. All along the top of my bucket lids, I have small holes drilled and small hooks screwed into them. I then take the twine, make a loop, wrap it around the top(s), limbs, etc...that I wish to train. This way is kinda like a SCROG, but I can open the buckets and inspect the roots this way, you can't when you SCROG em'. Just keep doing that all the way into flowering, the goal is make as many tops the same height and you will gain more class A bud, and not so much class B or C.
Day 7 into flowering and she’s looking good (pic1). My other girl (pic2) is 4 days into flowering and it looking great as well. I’m 99% sure they’re both female due to how they’re showing. If you see differently, let me know. I have also attached a third pic that shows a bit of yellowing on one leave. Thinking maybe this is from it being up against the tent? I also have this curling of the leaves and not really sure on wha it could be. I don’t have a lot of the other symptoms that cause the curling so I’m not sure what it could be? Possibly heat? The tent fluctuates between 72-76 degrees F. Any suggestions or insight, please let me know! Thank you [pic1] [pic2] [pic3] Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
Leaf curling is your lights are to close. Classic sign of stress, back them up just even a few inches and give it a day to see if that helps. Like HardDrive said remove light blocking leaves to your bud sites and leave all the outer leaves that are not blocking anything, so they can absorb the light. Your going to get different answers on defoliation, some strip em completely bare and some people do it like HardDrive. Im in between , I trim light blocking leaves but i also lollipop the bottom of the plants to push more growth to the upper bud sites.
I think SGT is on the right track. Raise the lights a bit. Those blurple lights are hard to tell on the intensity
As far as my light setup, I am running an adjustable 1100 watt Cob light setup. Unfortunately I’m not 100% sure on the manufacturer but it is currently set to 75 on both dial out of 100. I am currently headed to grab items for a pulley system on my lights and will update you all on how she’s responding in the next couple days. If anyone has any info or links on how to properly set these lights that would be greatly appreciated. Thank you Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
If this is your light, it says 110 actual watts from the wall. It also shows to hang 16 inches from the plants. The 16 inches they suggest would be a starting point so if they are getting burned back it off a few inches. For a grow example using this light in a 2x2 tent with only 110 true watts in a 4 sq ft space that would make it around 27 watts per sq ft. I would run 100% power and play with the height that wont crispy the girls.
I just turned it up to 100 on both dials. My light is currently moved up to 24 inches from the top of my tallest girl. My tent size is 2x4x6. Would you recommend a higher watt light? Or is this one good for two plants? Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
You will need more light when in flower if indeed your light does only draw 110 true watts from the wall. In led lighting the usual amount of wattage for a 2x4 size tent is around 300 true watts from the wall. The single most important investment into a grow is a good quality light that the wattage and par footprint matches the grow space. If you flower with a low wattage light you will get small airy buds.
If its a good brand they will provide that info, and if not you will have to do some research on the light and track the info down. A good brand of blurple led lighting like kind , black dog or california light works will sell say a 600 watt led light with actual wattage of 300 watts. The advertised 600 watts is a comparision of the light output to hps bulb set up. Their 300 actual watt led will put out the equivalent hps light of 600 watts. Same goes for cob leds, and there actual wattage is listed on the size of the driver being used.
Thanks for the info! I will see how these two respond with this light and if she needs more juice I’ll upgrade the lights
Just an update photo for myself to look back. Today was the first water of my schedule week into flower. Plants are growing strong. Only concern I have is that I saw a black flying bug. Killed it. Looked like a fruit fly, which I have had in the house. Put down a fruit fly catcher just in case it is. If not, I’ll be looking at fungus gnats - which I’ve looked into treatments on how to handle them, most commonly being to flush the water after they completely dry out with a 3% hydrogen peroxide/water mix *QUESTION* Does anyone have a simple solution for lowering the temperature in my grow tent?
First you need to make some type of stand to bring your smaller plant up to match the canopy level of the taller plant. You want a even canopy so each plant gets the same amount of light. Also what size exhaust fan and filter are you using?. What is the ambient temp outside of your grow tent, and the temp inside the tent with the lights on and off?
I just put her up on a stand to match height. Inside my tent is 78-80. The temperature throughout the house is roughly 75-77. Unfortunately, I do not have a filter or exhaust fan but I do have two fans that are in there that run 24/7. One on top to blow down on the tops of the plants and the other that blows horizontally to keep air moving throughout the tent. I have two vents open in the tent.
If your not worried about the odor, you can get a high cfm fan to set towards the top of the tent attached to ducting that goes out of the tent towards the top, and open the bottom fresh air vents to make passive air flow. This will help cool your tent down by sucking in the cooler room temp outside the tent in the room, and forcing the warmer tent air out. Try to exhaust the air out of the tent out a window or into another room, so that temp air doesnt mix with the cooler room air around the tent. If you exhaust the expelled tent air out a window you will need a filter to cover the odor.
So I know that I have to back down on nutes a bit as they have signs of burning. From the picture below, is this also a signs of burning? Or is this something more of a deficiency? Last pic is just a little pre flower porn for all you. As a first time grower I am equally scared as I am happy lmao. You really catch a connection to your plant and I’d hate to hurt her haha