Hi GC. Im days away from harvesting my first crop, and thanks to the fine folks here, have a handle on all but one of my plants. I have a strange Nirvana White Widow sativa-dom pheno that I have no idea what to do with still.....It is 9 weeks into flower (since it showed sex), and still has 100% snow white, fully erect pistils despite showing signs that its approaching maturity. New bud growth has been nonexistant for a week or two as the buds have been fattening up and putting on weight. Buds look really fluffy in the picture due to foxtailing (none of my other plants dis this, must be generic) bud are actually much denser than they appear. Calyx's have begun to swell, the plant is starting yellow up and shed its leaves like my other plants, and the trichomes are 90-95% cloudy with 5-10 percent already showing dark amber! Will some strains pistils remain pure white right up until harvest? I cant go on the breeders info as this pheno is unlike all the other WW in my garden which have oranged up as per usual. Not sure what to do with this, anyone with any experience with this strain/situation? I have no clue what to do with this weirdo plant, so any and all help would be a huge help. Ive attached current pics of todays bud shots. Cheers!
Clone that fucker! could be some dope genetics. Id love to see dried white pistils all over my bud, would almost look alienesque
Personally, I've never encountered this, but in my years of research & reading I have heard that some strains' pistils will will not correlate to plant readiness. The old legendary Matanuska Thunderfuck (or reworked Tundra) comes to mind; the only way to tell for sure is to monitor the color of the trichromes (as you are doing, GREAT!!!). Keep in mind, when you harvest will somewhat affect the quality of the high. Clear-to-cloudy = a more "up" high, while cloudy-to-amber = a more couch lock type of high. The nice thing about cloning is that you can experiment with the exact same plant harvested at different intervals, and select the finishing time that suits you best. Sometimes, you never know what you've got until it's too late!!! Just in case, I'd recommend keeping that plant after harvest, and if the product turns out to be that 1 in a 100 pheno, re-veg it. Take a cutting and grow it into a mother and you've retained the strain. WHOOO HOOOO!!!!
Thanks for the responses guys. To answer the questions, my other ww is a tiny indica dominant plant (as nirvana describes) which is super frosty and ready for harvest with approx. 20 percent amber trichs, the rest are cloudy. This white widow is completely different....super stretchy, sativa like skinny leaves, etc. This made me think it could be an 11-12 week pheno, so i wasnt alarmed until i started seeing amber in the bud trichomes and the plant showed signs of ripening.....totally threw me off. I only flushed it a few days ago as i thought it was weeks away from harvest, this was before the trichs started to amber up. As such, ill leave it for at least another week for a proper flush and keep a close eye on it.....i may let it amber up a bit more than my other plants to ensure ripeness, or harvest in a few stages as was mentioned. Ive also read about sativas sometimes having windows of ripeness open and close, has anyone experienced this? Ie. the plant shows signs of being ready for a week or so, and then undergoes another spurt of fibrous growth before ripening again. Could this be playing a factor here?
Sorry, forgot to mention that the pistils on my other white widow began to orange up in week 5-6, and are now 95% orange just prior to harvest. The pistils on the plant in question are as white, long, and erect as the day they popped.....super weird.
ShovaBlaster, I'm thinking two thoughts on this one: 1) Here's a user-generated strain profile from others who have grown Nirvana's version of WW: Known Phenotypes: 1.: short, compact, fastly blossoming, indica-dominant Phenotype #1 2.: long, stretched, fastly blossoming, sativa-dominant Phenotype #2 3.: Very homogenous variety. Could be you have both pheno's, not that uncommon. 2) this one concerns me more, as you said it "...shows signs of being ready for a week or so, and then undergoes another spurt of fibrous growth" This could be a sign that the plant has hermied, & that sucks. This has happened to me on occasion; once from erratic light cycles during an extended period of power failures; and again from an undetected pest infestation. My bet is the pheno, as anything in #2 should have affected all your plants. Not to blast Nirvana, but in past years I have heard they sell F2's of other breeders' strains. I suppose there's nothing wrong or illegal with this, as that's how they keep their costs lower. Main point being, as you move successive generations away from an original breeder strain, the more likely it will be that you experience more variations in phenotypes toward the original parentals. Let it ride & let us know how it turns out.
I will definitely let you know how it turns out....im keeping a journal (link in my sig), and will continue to update it up until my final smoke report Im not worried too much about hermying, ive been scouring the plant daily for any nanners and dont see any. I havent had any fibrous growth spurts yet, i was just quoting something i read about flowering sativas. Ive read the same about Nirvanas strains.....the evidence is in my garden. 2 WW, 3 Northern Lights and 5 completely different looking plants, haha. The NL is particularly comical, i have a huge sativa-ish pheno, a little indica bush, and then a third pheno that went completely purple in flower.....it looks purpler than any purple strain ive ever seen! I dont mind the variety, itll be like having 5 different strains to smoke until my next grow is done I didnt want to use bagseed for my first grow, and also didnt want to break the bank on prime genetics....nirvana was a happy medium. As all plants are healthy and look to have produced some nice smoke, im not disappointed. I knew i wasnt getting award winning genetics at $5/seed This grow was hugely successful for my first try, and exceeded expectations, so ill be stepping up my genetics game for future runs. Already looking into what i want to grow next.....with so many great options, its tough to decide!!!
And thanks a ton olde school! im on my phone, but will dish ya some rep whenever i get onto a computer next
And out of curiosity, where did you find that strain info/ user report? Ive been scouring the net for info on the known Nirvana WW phenos and couldnt find much.
Lots of people like Nirvana for their selection and price, & to get 5 strains out of one grow is pretty cool. You've done well, Grasshoppa... now go forth & prosper!!!! P.S. - Thanks for the rep & watch for a PM on the strain link.