As the title stated, outdoors was an absolute failure. I got maybe 4oz's from a starting plant count of 20. Several died and others never fully matured. Looking back I think these are the major factors that caused such failure. I live in the Northeast USA, so keep the following in mind. 1. Grew a sativa strain that took 12 weeks to flower fully. 2. The native soil was once a riverbed which I thought was a great thing, but it turns out that it was basically heavy clay with huge rocks... I think this suffocated the roots. 3. Bugs, everywhere... chewing my leaves and lord knows what else. Surprisingly deer, rodents etc. were not a problem because I used predator urine around the grow area...worked great! So, after some planning I have came up with the following plan. Let me know what you think or if you have any suggestions. 1. Growing a 7-8 week mostly indica strain... should finish on time. 2. I decided to go with a simple water only organic soil...Vic's Super Soil. Mainly because I can grab all the ingredients locally, it's cost effective and again, simple. When they start to bud, I will use a bat guano as a top dressing - flower booster. 3. To combat bugs I will foliar spray the plants with Neem oil once a week and probably add it to the water once every month or so. From what I have read on this product it is great as a bug repellent and 100% organic so it won't hurt the earth or interfere with the plants. I do have a question about the soil mix and bringing in soil. 1. I plan on digging the native soil out and filling with the Vic's recipie... how big should I make the holes? I was thinking the equivalant to a five gallon bucket, but I'm not sure. I think once the plants establish themselves in the holes and get a nice root system in the good soil mix, it should be able to penetrate the native soil and thrive. Just my guess though. 2. I'll post the recipie below for Vic's Super Soil, but does anyone know how much this recipie makes? Say I want to fill 5 gallon pots with this recipie, how many full pots will I end up with? Here is the revised recipie for the soil which I will be using... Revised recipe - after several failures due to bad manure sources, I now use the following recipe. Results have been excellent and the clones seem to take off right away instead of having a slow growing settling in period. 1 Bale sunshine mix #2 or promix (3.8 cu ft) 8 cups Bone Meal - phosphorus source 4 cups Blood Meal - nitrogen source 1 1/3 cups Epsom salts - magnesium source 3-4 cups dolmite lime -calcium source & pH buffering 1 tsp fritted trace elements 4 cups kelp meal. 9kg (25 lbs) bag pure worm castings - Mix thoroughly, moisten, and let sit 1-2 weeks before use. Thanks in advance for your help!
Find a wild water source and from there find your spot(s): elevated spots in thick medium sized forest. Tell no one and it will work out. Don't grow more than 10 but take care of them well and separate them in 3-4 plots. Scouting is key. Work at night.
Thanks for the advice Corto. Fortunately for me, I have the luxury of growing on private property surrounded by mountains with thick vegetation and a healthy stream coming off a river very near by. That being said I have little to worry about in the security department.
You might want to look at some "Hollands Hope" in the strain you choose. These seeds grow well at the 48 degree Latitude (near the canadian border). They are 100% Indica and are mold resistant...They also have a shorter flowering period. Good Luck !
kc brains KC33.... about as stout and tough as it gets outdoors. make ur holes bigger...more like 3x3 and as deep as you can stand. like 3-4 feet.
if there is bears, or other scary shit in ur area, u should use bat guano, or something that doesnt smell of blood as ur nitrogen source. blood meal invites predators to ur grow area and sometimes they dig up ur holes looking for that scent. scary enough when a deer jumps out at u, fuck, i couldnt imagine seeing a motha fucken bear. neem oil is good. i would use it earlier on in the development. really effects the taste of the bud. smells pretty fucked up. i like the plan tho. how many u thinking of putten out this year?
I thought about the predators being attracted to the scent of the blood meal and yes there are lots of bear and deer where I grow. Either one popping out would scare the shit out of me, but I always work during the light time hours. If it becomes an issue, I have all kinds of real predator urine and also could put up a temporary fence. If all else fails and I am confronted in a life threatening manner... it's the bear or whatever that is going to pay the price. Hopefully it never comes to that. I will be pissing around my site and also using mountain lion urine as a deterrent. Are you sure about the Neem oil? I read all the time that this stuff is great and causes no ill effects. I want to do around 15-20 plants this year and the area that I cleared out last year was perfect with 20 tall sativas. Maybe will have to cut back to 15 because of the indicia's bushiness.
I've had very bad experience with KC Brains seeds germinating in the past. I tried several packs with several different methods and still had a tough time. I respect his work and will probably try again, but I think his seed stock that the suppliers have are very old or something. 3'x3'x4' holes? Damn that's a lot of digging. Is that overkill or is that seriously what you recommend? I have seen plants in 5 gallon containers produce 1lb per plant outdoors, so I was going off of that. My thinking is that once the roots really establish themselves in the good soil, they will be more than strong enough to penetrate the native soil, no?
ive had nothing but good luck with his stuff. ive heard the stories of bad germ rates tho. where did u get the seeds that didnt germ? thats not a real big hole if you are only digging a few. i thought u said you had nothing but rocks and clay, so id suggest a large hole. if you are planting somewhere else where there is decent topsoil, then just dig a deep hole...not so big around. mj roots deep, so the deeper u make ur hole, the better it will grow.
I don't dig holes that big, just 2x2x2 at the most. The bigger holes would be better but would take a hellava lot of soil to fill them and I am just too lazy for that. In a cold region start your plants indoors and if possible buy clones. Around here you can get them for about $100 per dozen in the spring. That way you don't waste time and holes on males.
If you don't have access to clones, if you don't have femmed seeds, try to see the sex in preflower with a jeweller's loupe (end May-June). Or use 3 gallon pots, wait for sexing, kill the males in July 15-30, and only put females in the holes. Put the pots on your spots (or elsewhere).
I got them from grasscity about a year ago. Yeah my soil is pretty much crap, but I think... like I said before that once they establish a strong root system in the soil mix it will penetrate the native soil and do fine. But, I am going to take your advice and dig deeper holes... probably about 10 gallons worth instead of the 5 gallons I was planning on.
I already started seeds so that I can find a suitable mother for cloning. I chose Master Kush and Pot of Gold, both are great producers and should finish on time. Once the clones root I'll break them in with my 250W MH and then I'll put them under a 1000W HPS for a few weeks before they go outside. I'm excited about this season, hopefully everything will go well with some great advice from everyone here and some extra planning. Thanks to all who had suggestions, keep them coming!
i figure, you are standing there with a shovel, already digging, might as well go a little deeper, right it cant possible hurt. if you arent doing alot of holes, the extra work will make you enjoy it even more come november all mine were from attitude and dope-seeds. no troubles. dope-seeds had far better prices and shipping. and jim's a nice guy