Indoor update: My seedlings are not liking this local 'coco number 5' starter soil, and have suddenly become very pale. the soil may be too acidic from having too much bark chips and coir in it. I'm going to try and save them today by transplanting them into my regular native soil. being a landrace cross, I really should have started it in the native soil. but I wanted to make sure the seedlings had plenty of aeration, so I went with the starter soil. I may try the eb stone seed starter soil again for hybrid seeds, but from now on I'm only using my native soil for landraces and heirlooms.
update: the ethiopian afghani seedlings are actually just rootbound, they're incredibly agressive growers. I didn't recognize it at first because I've never seen root lock on plants this small. When I de-potted the first plant to replace its soil, it had a complete root system filling the cup. Apparently they did like the starter soil. they'll be transplanted from their cups tomorrow into 3 gallon smart pots with native soil.
outdoor update: the lebanese are all looking amazing the females are getting pretty big, and putting out some really nice preflowers. I can already see some pollinated calyxes. this female is more compact, and has some striking light pink stems. the male looks great. the flowers actually have a little bit of resin, and they're dropping a huge amount of pollen. the bees are going crazy. the flowers and stems have some really nice vibrant pink/magenta streaks. dank spider taking care of some leaf hoppers the dank sinatra female and the little solos stash, which is developing nicely
I just ate some edibles made with leaf, stem and flower from the culled dank sinatra males, and it is surprisingly strong. I've made juice and several batches of edibles with these culled males,and it's all been strong and medicinal. I can't wait to find some keeper female phenos in the rest of that pack. This has the potential to be a killer indoor strain.
I guess this is true hybrid vigor expressed from these two pure heirlooms. I'm saving three seeds for the next outdoor season, with this root growth it should be very cool to see how this ethiopian afghani does when started in a ground plot. I might even save a female cut if it's something really special medicinally.
update (kinda) here's some photos from september 2nd and 3rd, I'll post a current update later today or tomorrow. indoor lemon balm, and a group shot of the transplanted Ethiopian Afghani seedlings recovering nicely. I transplanted them into native clay soil in 3 gal smart pots. They had a bad reaction to the starter potting soil I used for the seedlings. They didn't like peat and coir because it held too much moisture for them, and it reacted with the amendments and developed some kind of lockout issue. as soon as they used up their cotyledons they became incredibly pale very quickly. I put them in relatively dry un-amended native clay soil, and they greened up and recovered within a few days. these are very unusual plants, and definitely finicky growers. Extremely sensitive to amendments. They're very sensitive to irrigation, but don't want to dry out fully either. Their root systems were also very unusual, when I transplanted them some had filled their cups with a full root system. others didn't fill the cup but had a long, snakey loop of root circling below the soil. when I lifted those out of their cups, it straightened out and looked like a long braid of roots dangling off the bottom of the root ball. outdoor: solo's stash confirmed as a tiny female lebanese developing well wild shaggy indica nugs developing nicely. I'm very happy with the growth structure and resin production, as well as how quickly they are flowering. this will definitely be an earlier harvesting variety than most hybrids. they have a really interesting essential-oily smell, which is kind of a middle ground between citrus, mint, and cedar. you can see in these photos that by the 2nd and 3rd my plants were already getting dusted by ashes and smoke from the eagle creek wildfire. I wasn't able to work on the plants at all for a week when the smoke was too bad to go outside. I put up a cover on the clothes line above them to protect the plants from some of the falling ash. aside from the ash on the leaves and flowers, the plants were thriving in the smoky conditions. since then the air has improved. I've washed them down with a firm blast from the hose several times to remove as much of the ashes as possible, and shook the plants dry. they tolerated it surprisingly well, and dried better than I expected given their incredibly leafy buds. the lebanese are definitely very resilient plants. normally I would try to keep my buds as dry as possible, but it was important to find a way to remove some of the ash and dust contaminants. the lebanese are looking good now, although slightly stressed from their wash. they may have gotten a little more irrigation than they like, and one is slightly drooped from being over-handled during the wash.
sorry again about the slow updates, Here's another series of photos showing whats been going on since the last update. ethiopian afghani plants looking good I also finally planted my rooted black cherry soda purple pheno clones. here's a shot right after they were planted. I forgot to take a photo of the root systems beforehand, but here's a much older photo of one of the cuts- the root systems were very complete by the time I planted them. I usually root my clones directly in soil, but this is a good way to evaluate whether a plant has favorable traits for easy cloning. these were very small clones, it will be interesting to see how they grow in. Here's a few shots of the lebanese right before the first fall rain the red/pink pistils on number 2 are amazing. dank sinatra I harvested about 30 seeds from lebanese pheno 1 after the first rain. all the base calyxes at the nodes were ready to drop their seeds. mostly very mature nice looking seeds.
outdoor update: pictures taken Monday. the lebanese are crazy. Lebanese Pheno 1 pheno one is producing shaggy kush-like buds with intense neon green highlights. very oily resin. the colors on pheno 2 are amazing. extremely vibrant magenta highlights, this pigment is crazy the pistils practically glow in the sunlight. love the resin on this one soloi's stash. I'll definitely never be starting a plant from seed this late again, looks like a tiny clone. It's definitely happy though, and it will be nice to have a little bit of seedless bud in my harvest. definite kush growth characteristics. I'm getting more impressed with this dank sinatra. incredible resin. classic hashplant dense totem structure, with most branches almost directly against the stalk. super dense slow vegging indicas aren't my favorite for outdoor, but this will definitely be a great indoor strain. I'm really looking forward to popping the sinatra x lebanese male f1's.
harvest has begun. the first plant ready is the neon green lebanese female pheno 1. I gave the entire plant a final spray down the night before I started harvesting. the washes have definitely helped reduce the amount of wildfire ash trapped in the resin. here are some photos of the main cola and a few lower branches right before chop. I just finished chopping lebanese female pheno 1. The smells I'm getting while trimming pheno 1 are incredible and complex. first I get a cold earth/ fall air smell mixed with rich pine. there are brighter notes of freshly peeled mandarin and tangelo, and sour cream or ricotta. there is just a hint of cedar and elmers glue. a very fun trim session. buds are wild and leafy, with a somewhat kush like structure. the resin is more oily than sticky, with absolutely tiny trichome glands. it smells very christmasy. should make some amazing hash. seeds have been dropping from the buds as I trim, so far the ratio of immature to mature seeds is pretty good at about 8 / 260. this pheno is producing so many seeds it would probably make a good food staple crop. I'm about to get back to work harvesting.
sorry for the lack fo updates everybody. between my health problems and general turmoil, I haven't been able to focus on the indoor grow as much as I should. I've been nursing a fragile clone of the lebanese 2 pink pistil pheno for 2 months since harvest. It's rooted, but was shocke by the temperature difference when I tried to introduce it to the grow tent. hopefully it will be able tpo recover from that. everything in the tent is in a holding pattern right now, all my testers are rootbound in veg waiting for me to transplant and start flowering. the black cherry soda clones have finally re-veged, and are really starting to take off. again sorry bout the lack of updates everyone, I'll put up a complete update with photos, and bud shots and smoke reports for the outdoor harvest withing a day or two.
notes from trimming lebanese pheno 2: here are some photos of lebanese phenotype 2. delicate foxtailing buds with magenta pistils and a nice coating of resin. harvested before it dropped all its ripe seeds. the smells I'm getting from this pheno while trimming are amazing. the flowers themselves smell like jasmine tea pearls with a hint of ripe fig and cedar. rubbing the resin, the aroma is pure aromatic cedar. I left several branches on the plant, they are developing a bit more color in the buds as it gets exposed to rougher fall weather. this plant has been incredibly resilient, pest resistant, and low maintenance. it has weathered several blasts of hail late in flowering with no problems. these plants were grown in lightly amended native clay soil, and mulched regularly with worm castings and chopped fresh herbs (lemon balm, oregano, mint, and hops from the garden)
been hitting this batch of alpine og sugar leaf hash from the 2016 harvest. it's really nice. it's been curing for a little over a year in the pyrex it evaporated in. in the dish, the hash smells like buttery brown sugar with a complex savory finish that lingers. nice translucent red amber, with a few clear crystals. started off oily, now it's somewhat crystalized, but still stretchy and yielding. the flavor is amazing. it has buttery caramelized sweetness, the bitter sweet flavor of spicey root beer or sarsaparilla, a hint of savory-sweet yakitori/terriyaki flavor, and somehow, an intense experience of fresh ocean air. after I hit it, these flavors remain on my pallete for a long time. very sweet while it's burning, fresh ocean air and complex savory-sweet japanese flavors while you hold it in, with sarsaparilla and ocean air on the exhale. the balance of these flavors change as the bowl gets more burnt up, but it's very sweet and consistent all the way through. It's a very tasty and complex experience that can trigger a lot of different sense memories, and the high is both medicinal and incredibly chill. I hope my alpine og x lemon cherry male seeds from that grow are holding a similar pheno.
tomorrow some friends will help me put up a totally different indoor setup. I'll be using two 3.5x3.5 tents, flourescent in veg, light emitting ceramic in flower. I'll finally be able to veg and flower simultaneously, and will be able to run a continuous grow for the first time.
I have amended a bunch of native clay soil for indoor use- soil from my garden, a mix of dark rich topsoil and dense volcanic clay from lower down. worm castings a bunch of perlite to aerate the clay seaweed neem meal and a blend of trace amendements like oyster shell flour, bone meal, guano, and other stuff like that i'm definitely forgetting a few minor things, but thats pretty much it I have 2 new tents set up, but I still need to get the light hung in tent number 2. once it's set up, I can start transplanting my ehiopian afghani testers , which are very rootbound. I haven't been able to give the grow as much work and attention as it really needs, but they are very sturdy plants. they'll be going into 7 gallon smart pots for probably another month of veg to recover from being rootbound and grow more branching before flowering. the black cherry soda clones are looking great. the lemon balm companion planting in the same pots seems quite beneficial.
big update on the bodhi ethiopian banana x afghani testers: these are really interesting plants. after spending some time root-bound in 2 gallon pots, the females were transplanted into 5 gallon pots of my clay soil and continued to veg under a new light emitting ceramic fixture. when the roots have room to expand, overall growth can be explosive. they completely recovered from root lock in a week and a half, and then got to work filling up my tent. they got 2.5 weeks of veg in their final pots, and started 12/12 lighting on february first. they are currently on day 18 of flowering, and to my eye they are developing quickly. here are my observations so far: 7 out of 7 sprouts seedlings are sensitive to irrigation, mature plants are sensitive to drying out all phenos preflowered under 18/6 lighting when root bound, 5 females 2 males after preflowering, veg growth stopped. as if root lock triggered sexual maturity, but the lighting period wasn't conducive to flowering. root growth is incredibly aggressive in all stages, most phenos have root fuzzy white root tips poking out of the topsoil, and through the fabric pots. these are stretchy in all stages, but for the most part, growth is not sparse. some phenos will snake and bend toward the light, other phenos have crazy asymetrical lower branches that suddenly grow higher than the apical growth to reach areas with strong light. they need constant training to manage stretch and keep them out of the light they smelled like basic dank during veg, and now that they are flowering they smell like banana. in fact, the whole tent smells like bananas. 2 phenos smell like beeswax banana dank 1 pheno smells like a perfectly ripe banana (pale yellow, no brown spots) and dill pickle 1 pheno smells exactly like an over-ripe brown banana 1 pheno smells like a starchy green banana and sweet tarts candy here are a few quick shots of the tent taken 2 days ago:
Alpine OG 2016 I'm hitting the last bud of alpine og from the 2016 outdoor. This plant was kind of unusual. it was between 9 and 10 feet tall with papery leaves and some hints of pink on the stems. It grew small, open buds which were very resinous but not dense at all. the open structure gave it excellent moisture resistance, and it was able to mature much longer than most strains can in this environment. the open structure had a lot of surface area for hash making, so hash yields from the small buds were very high. despite the small berry like buds, the plant had very good structure/bud distribution and yielded just over a pound. (likely my highest outdoor yield for a single plant.) what really made this plant special is the smell and flavor of the flower. I already described the effects in a smoke report earlier in the journal, but didn't go into much detail about the flavor and smell. opening up the jar, it smells very buttery. a sweet, caramelized butter smell with a hint of apple. The flavor is creamy caramelized butter and sugar, brown butter, and fresh cut apple with a hint of forest air. A really pleasant, light, sweet smoke. zero harshness , a very fine smoke. root beer, marshmallow, and apple notes come out in the aftertaste, which lingers. I'm going to miss having this flower around. it's very potent, with a strong high. calming, happy, and relaxing. I love this butter and apple flavor. I have about 8 seeds from a selective pollination with the lemon cherry male. hopefully some of these traits will be evident in the outcross. I also might find similar butter flavors in bodhi's sunshine daydream.