Hey all. . . . In need of a little advice here. Basically, my buds are not as potent as I'd like and are much lower than the genetics threshold. I'll do my best to describe my methods and hopefully there's someone out there that can assist! Bud description. . . light and airy, not dense nugs. Showed good THC formation during flowering and when cut. They were cut with about 60% of the pistils darkening. Thanks in advance. . . . Methods. . . . Plants were started from seed. . . . Northern Lights #1, OG Kush, Blue Dream at approx 30 days of age they were put into flowering at 18"-20" tall (it may have been too early for the sativas) Medium/Fert - composted manure mix with vermicompost and hi calcium lime as a ph adjuster. Foxfarm 4-3-4 at 2.5 cups per 1 cubic foot of medium. Potted up to 3 and 5 gal pots for flowering from 1 gallon veg containers. High phos fertilizer used with water during flowering. Environment. . . . Closed growing environment. A/C for cooling. Air cooled lights. running two 600w hoods for two 3x3' areas. CO2 @ 1500ppm supplied by a CO2 Generator. Humidity 30-55%. Temps 85-90 degrees daytime, ~85 degrees night time. (issue?) Problems I ran into during grow. . . ph adjustment issues and fluctuations in ph of well water. naturally alkaline well water. adjusted with sulfuric acid solution, but i did have errors that may have caused significant ph fluctuations. Light burning as well? During flower and at harvest many of the plants had seen significant 'burning' of main cola fan leaves, but still produced solid 14" colas. Water quality. . . started out with RO water that was not PH adjusted. Switched to PH adjusted well water because RO unit could not meet capacity. Potential issues. . . . Light burning Temperature issues? PH fluctuations Fertilizer burn?? Don't think so. This stuff is not the med grade that I was shooting for. Any help getting there?
everything seems on par. Are you measuring your rh levels? Maybe dropping it the last 2 weeks of flower and waiting a tad bit longer for trichomes to change could help?
Man, you're on the right track. I wonder about the higher temperatures. Not far out of range. But if warmer, were lights further than 12-18"? Ph fluctuations will stress a plant out. This will fuck with potency. All my info from Ed Rosenthal's book. " I apologize to moderator if this mention not kosher". Get his growers handbook. Go to breeders website and look at strains desired environment. This is a broad statement, but this helped me a lot. 1 last thing, in the book he talks about the last 2 weeks of flowering to switch the HPS out with the metal halide and removing the protective glass from air cooled hood to significantly increase potency.
Do you have any pics of the plant the day of harvest? Especially any taken before actually chopping it down.
Potency is normally directly related to strain and length of flowering time. If flowered a few days too much or too little, that'll change your potency.
Could have nutrient lockout. I did because I was poor and using hydro nutrient and locked my plant up. Let's Smoke About It.... -Adam Demamp My Organic Grow Journal http://forum.grasscity.com/index.php?/topic/1357687-Sade's-Solar-Adventures