White Widow: DWC: BOG? (Day 1-79)

Hi all! I'm new here, and new to growing. This is my second attempt but my first time to harvest. (killed the poor things first time around) For those of you who are impatient, this will be perfect for you! I'm already at day 79. So anyways, here's the sticky on my grow.

Cabinet Grow

Strain: White Widow (I'm pretty sure)
Method: Hydro DWC - single res bubbler
Lights: 400 watt
Nutes: Modified Lucas Formula

Notes:

- I started with 8 beans, ended with 2 females.

- I put BOG? in the title because well... I ended up doing some stuff to the plants and wasn't sure what to call it. LOL. As you'll see from the pics it kinda looks like a SCROG grow. but it's actually kinda the oposite of that. I was thinking... Bed Of Green... or Bent Over Green... lol.

See, the plants grew WAY out of control and literally the only solution was to break the stems and lay them down. I had to do this twice during the grow. I tried to just bend them but It was well passed the point where they wouldn't snap. So I tied strings across the cabinet and literally layed the snapped stems and branches down on top of it, criss-crossing them all in a pattern that that would provide the most room for bud sites. High-Stress-Training? I don't know. I know it's not good to do but man, seriously... they didn't skip a beat. 2 hours after snapping and laying them all horizontally... all the tops and branchest were pointing upward again. It was pretty awesome to watch.

Anyways... here's the whole grow up to this point. Thanks for checkin it out:


Awe, the cute little baby



Starts with 8 beans in rockwool



50+ liter res and lots of shiny walls



I killed 2 seedlings at this stage. Down to 6



Man they grow up fast. But they all look a little different despite being the same strain (supposedly) hmm.

In the beginning I had some odd growth due to crazy PH swings

 

I switched to 12/12 about 12 days before this shot. Pulled 4 males, left with 2 females. I thought these tops would be the budsights... boy was i WAY off



So this shows the first break I made. You can see the stem of the plant on the left goes up, then makes a 90 degree turn.



This is literally 6-7 days later. The stretch growth blew me away. The cab was out of control! The tops were turning yellow from being too close to the light and were going to hit the roof of the cab in a couple days if I didn't do something fast!




SNAP! I broke all the tops, litterally. I snapped the stems and branches. If I didn't tie string accross the cab for them to lay on top of, they would have hung straight down, It was a VERY tense moment to say the least.



Just a full shot of the cab at this point.



In a couple days... all the tops and branches were pointing straight up again and growing like crazy. I was amazed.

 

So many bud sites now... It looks like a SCROG, but the Srcreen isn't keeping the growth from going up, it's holding all the tops from falling down. Backwards, I know it's weird.



Flowers are all filling in nicely




at this point, I'm actually pretty blown away that I've created this vision in my closet. LOL




Closeup of one of the buds.




and a couple macro shots. I'm not 100% sure this is actually White Widow. I purchased the beans online, they said they are, and it sure is frosty.




I don't know if I'd call him lucky... But to die getting stuck in a field of trichomes.... not such a bad way to go (check the upper left corner and you'll see what I'm talking about)




So there it is! pretty wacky stuff. It really was a journey for me. I learned a TON, and had a blast at the same time. I can't wait for the next grow. Thanks for stopping by.

 

Thanks dragit. The grow you're planning does sound a lot like the this one. 2 plants, 1 DWC res, Scrog, 400 watt... well, as far as tips go I'm not really sure where to begin. I have a ton of info stored in my head for the next grow but I'm not sure specifically what info would apply to you... I'll give it a shot anyways


- Definitely get your hands on a HID light. I will make a HUGE difference over the CFLs.

- If you're starting from seeds, don't give them any nutrients until about the 2nd or 3rd set of leaves.

- When you begin the nutrient regime, start VERY slow. If you think it it might be too strong, it probably is.

- If this is your first grow, watch your PH and TDS(EC) religiously! Ideally throughout the grow you want to find that happy middle where both PH and TDS are stable without either swinging up and down (much) which i was only able to accomplish a few weeks out of the total grow.

- If you notice a possible defficiency, check your PH first, this was the root of my misdiagnosis several times.

- Keep the netpots submerged just bellow the water level until the roots are hanging from the botom of the pot. (if useing rockwool and hydroton combo, just make sure the rockwool never dries out until the roots have come out the botom of the pot)

- Once the roots are hangin out of the pot you can drop the water level anywhere from an inch to 3 inches so long as the bubbles from the airstones in your res are splashing up on the roots enough to keep them wet.

- Keep the res temps low. Too warm may = algae = root rot

- I live in a dry environment. Keep the humidity up above 40% RH

- Keep the grow as simple as possible

- Keep the environment as stable as possible

- Keep the grow area very clean and organized

- Be ready for the unexpected. I was told that with the formula I used, I wouldn't need any PH up throughout my grow. Well at one point I did, and I didn't have any. Be prepared.

- If you have the patience, keep a log. Take notes on everything you notice througout your grow.

- Expect the plants to stretch (ALOT) when you switch to flower. So make sure you have room to handle the growth

- Keep the plant tops atleast 12 inches from a 400 watt light (without any air cooling)

- When the flowers are near and you're ready to harvest... give it a little more time and see what happens I was ready to chop over a week ago, I'm SO glad I've waited.

- **** AND MOST IMPORTANT **** Don't allow ANYONE who doesn't know what they're doing to touch your plants!!!

Well I dunno if any of that applies to you... or would really help, but those are some tips just from the top of my head. Good luck with your grow drag, and thanks for stopping by.

 

Thanks for the kind words. Yea man, It was pretty amazing to see how resilient the plants were. It was funny though because just before snapping the plants, I was feeling very stressed out. Then after doing it and stabilizing them on the ropes, they gave off this vibe... this is gonna sound like crazy talk... but it's almost like they put me at ease, as if they were telling me it'd be alright... and they proved it.

and.. I wasn't sure if it'd be cool to do a whole show in one post kinda thing, but I'm glad you liked it. and thanks again for stoppng by.

 

!!! Before I reply to your posts I have to report some HORRIBLE NEWS !!!

Problem: The plants were severely damaged. 90% of the leaves have litterally yellowed, wilted and withered overnight. 50% of the Buds have slumped over and no longer are standing upright. There is no visible damage to the Buds themselves except for the slumping over. What I mean is... the color, weight, size, frostiness and overall appearance seems about the same as 2 days ago. But looking at the plant as a whole... damn it's killin me to even think about.

Reason: I was unable to chek the plants for 1 and a half days due to an emergency... so I had my girlfriend check on them. I had been flushing the plants for 5 days at this point. Over the first 3 days of straight RO water... the PH had been steadily dropping. I would PH up to 5.8ish in the morning and it would drop down to 5.1 by the evening. The PPMs were reading around 300 average. So then over the full day I was unable to check on them I knew the PH could very well have dropped bellow 5 even so I gave my girlfriend instructions on raising the PH. When I spoke to her she told me that she did exactly what I had told her... When I got home last night it was halfway into the Dark cycle and I dind't want to disturb them (I dont have a green light) thinking everything woulb be ok... I opened the cab this morning to a terrible, terrible sight. All the leaves were bright yellow, completely wilted and shrivelled, half the buds were slumped over at a 90 degree angle. I imediately checked the PH and TDS... the PH was 9.7 !! and PPM was 2780 !! I never went over 1200ppm the WHOLE GROW. What happened was she put too much PH up (obviously) but to correct it... she put more PH down... once again too much... so she re-upped with more PH up and thought she got it right that time... obviously she didn't

OMG... so of course the whole res was dumped that instant. Replaced with 6.0 RO water. This was at 6PM yesterday evening. I checked on them this morning at 7am they didn't seem any worse but didn't seem any better.. and I think if there is no change by tonight when I get home... I'm chopping them all before any more damage is done...

Man what a crappy way to end this grow. I'll post some pics of this disaster later this evening. Wish me luck.

zidave05, AugustWest: Thanks guys. Appreciate the kind words.

brokencage: I think that is what this method should be called from now on. LOL. "Yea I snapped all my stems" ... "Oh yea? you smoove moved?" MUAHAHA

420-420: Yes, the smoove move is quite crazy! and I got the seeds from weedfarmer.com


Well.. I'm off of work about to head out to check on the poor ladies. Here's to recovery, living, learning, and not letting anyone touch your res unless you're 100% sure they wont mess things up.

Cheers!

 

420-420, fearthebug: Well I'm trying to look on the brighter side of things, it could have ended worse than it did. I would have just cut the dead stuff off like you said and let it plump up more... but after inspecting the root zone I decided it'd be best to harvest it all now. The roots were severely damaged and parts had even turned to mush. Not from root rot though, because they were still very white and didn't smell bad. It looked more like they had swollen so much and started to soften and rupture or something. I'm pretty sure it would have progressed to root rot very soon though. Which is why I chopped them. I'm thinking the roots were just shocked from the massive dose up PH up (potassium hydroxide) and never would have recovered.


Well here are some pics of the damage:













And the Harvest. First trim:









So in the end... all was not lost. In fact, the stuff looks great once all the dead shit was trimmed off. It's supper dense, sticky (like woa sticky) and frosty. Maybe I'll come back and post some pics of of the final dried product. But for now, I'm letting out a sigh of relief, kickin off my shoes, chillin' with some home grown, and soon I'll be thinking up my next grow. Till then, Thanks for stopping by!

peace.

 

Mr.Denton: I couldn't agree with you more... and I have learned a TON. I'm now looking forward to producing a higher quality smoke and fine tuning my methods. Thanks for your words of encourgement.

420-420: Ask and you shall receive The camera is actually just a point and shoot, Canon Power Shot SD630 Digital Elph. Using the Digtal Macro setting and manually adjusting other features... Glad you like em! and here for your viewing pleasure..

Most of the Harvest:


4 Days Dry: Macro Shots.