Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Quote:
Originally Posted by bigsby
Why only 2 under this screen? To fill that you are going to have to veg them way out. Why not go for 4 or even 6 smaller plants? You will reduce the veg time by half at least. Also note that you can FIM them quite a bit earlier. The common wisdom is after the fifth real node. Forced branching will help fill the screen faster.
:) You are probably right Bigsby. I have no idea how much this screen will fill, but when I have 6-8 clones sitting here I will no doubt be looking at using a few more to get a full screen. I like the idea of not having to veg out for 3 months before going to flower.
That 5th node was quite a ways back there... and I have read recommendations to do the FIM after the 3rd or 4th node too. I was then advised that after the FIM there wouldn't be a lot of vertical growth, so I figured that I had to get to at least 10-11 inches before doing it since that is the height of the screen. I need to see what happens after the FIM and how much growth happens after switching to flower so I can get a better idea how to best fill this screen.
I need clarification on 2 terms you used above... "real node" how does a real node compare to a "not real node?" Also, what do you mean by forced branching? Are you referring to the increase in growth from the lower branches after the FIM?
Emmie
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
I do larger plants like that under my screens because I'm limited to count, but Biggs has a point,... you can get a quicker turn around, (tho lower yield per plant) going with smaller plants.
Ideally one should keep the seed grown as a mother and flower clones from the F1, but there's nothing wrong with flowering mom while veging in a clone for round 2 :D
I keep 1 clone off of my seed grow as a Mother plant, at least if I don't get another girl from the rest of my beans I'll still have the genetic hangin around! ;)
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Quote:
Originally Posted by emilya
You are probably right Bigsby. I have no idea how much this screen will fill, but when I have 6-8 clones sitting here I will no doubt be looking at using a few more to get a full screen. I like the idea of not having to veg out for 3 months before going to flower.
Your estimate of 3 months veg to fill a 30" x 50" screen with 2 plants is probably/possibly ;) (likly) pretty accurate. Consider that you could do 6 plants @ 4 - 6 weeks veg + 2 months flower. That's a savings of 6 to 8 weeks! So in one year you could manage 4 harvests with the smaller plants vs. 2.4 harvests with the bigger plants. Yes, your yield per plant will be lower but overall yield will be similar. Essentially you double your potential yield per year. I have no idea about motives. I grow strictly for personal use within my house. No one else. Not friends, not family. It isn't worth the risks. So 3 harvests @ 4 - 6 plants is plenty in my case.
Considering the screen for a moment, there are a number of factors in play. Strain has a good deal to do with it. Some stavias will more than triple in size after flipping to flower. In such a scenario the screen will fill up pretty fast, even with a small plant. Some indicas might not even double in size. The rule of thumb is to fill the screen 40 - 60 percent before flip (strain dependent). Also keep in mind that FIMming will slow down your plant as does SCroG training. +1 week for each minimum. And don't get hung up on achieving a 9" stem... here comes a joke... no seriously - every plant will be different so you will have varying sizes. Go look at the grow logs by user bigtopsfinn. I learned a good deal about SCroG there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by emilya
I was then advised that after the FIM there wouldn't be a lot of vertical growth, so I figured that I had to get to at least 10-11 inches before doing it since that is the height of the screen.
That's not really accurate. You no longer have a main stem (or cola for that matter) so it is certainly easier to train flat after FIMming but the plant still wants to, and will grow vertically.
Quote:
Originally Posted by emilya
I need clarification on 2 terms you used above... "real node" how does a real node compare to a "not real node?" Also, what do you mean by forced branching? Are you referring to the increase in growth from the lower branches after the FIM?
The first real node is the set of leaves after the cotyledon leaves - I'm sure you know this... FIMming is a technique that forces or at least encourages branch growth when done properly. I definitely recommend FIMming with a SCroG.
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Thank you Bigsby! :postgood:
A lot of good information there. Now I see much more clearly how this works and what I need to do. Of course it won't go perfectly, but I can see now that I will be able to do what I want to do. I don't need crazy amounts here, its just me and my brother and we have a relative with MS that will be helped a great deal with our efforts. I can see that if all goes reasonably well, by the end of the first full scrog with 4-6 plants, I will have all I need for many months of this powerful strain.
At that point I just wanted to experiment a bit. I do love White Widow and I will probably keep one going for several grows so I can judge other strains against what I have learned about its growth patterns, but I have many strains I am very curious about and have never smoked... Jack Herer for example... Diesel... Kush... and I plan on trying them out.
I also got a package of 20 free seeds with my last order and as far as I understand these are seeds that growers have given back to the Amsterdam folks as examples of the strains they grew. This is pretty exciting to me... a grab bag of possibly 20 different types of beans! I can not see how this will be anything but very interesting as I work through that bag over the next couple of years. I fully intend to have a collection of Mason jars someday with a connoisseurs collection of tastes and heads that I can enjoy with my closest friends.
Immediate plans:
I am still waiting on my clone dome to show up. Tomorrow is day 49 and a week after my transplant to the 3 gal pot. The top growth is at the perfect point for the FIM. I think I will do that instead of the cloning tomorrow and then wait another week to do the clones when I am all set up and ready for them.
I still have some more reading to do about cloning anyway as I find I still have some questions. Such as, if my lower branches now are long enough that I could take just part of the branch as the clone... is there any advantage in this for the new clone? Is it better to be taller and have to strip leaves off... or is it better to leave half of the branch so that it can split off a couple more branches for cloning on the mother?
The fun thing that I can report as of tonight is the reduction of stress in my current grow. No longer am I looking at it as 4 plants that may or may not survive and all this time and money invested that I may or may not have wasted. Now I know that this is going to work. I may just have one plant left, but she is going to now turn into many more, and that makes me feel good. It's a good place to be in, and I hope that all the new growers out there get a chance to get to this point if they are serious about learning how to garden. I know I still have a lot to learn, but I definitely feel I have reached a milestone. Already the work is going to pay off as my mother now will provide for the future as she gives back the love I gave her.
It is a good day here. I hope yours is going as well! :thumbsup:
Emmie
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Quote:
Originally Posted by emilya
Thank you Bigsby! :postgood:
A lot of good information there. Now I see much more clearly how this works and what I need to do. Of course it won't go perfectly, but I can see now that I will be able to do what I want to do. I don't need crazy amounts here, its just me and my brother and we have a relative with MS that will be helped a great deal with our efforts. I can see that if all goes reasonably well, by the end of the first full scrog with 4-6 plants, I will have all I need for many months of this powerful strain.
At that point I just wanted to experiment a bit. I do love White Widow and I will probably keep one going for several grows so I can judge other strains against what I have learned about its growth patterns, but I have many strains I am very curious about and have never smoked... Jack Herer for example... Diesel... Kush... and I plan on trying them out.
I also got a package of 20 free seeds with my last order and as far as I understand these are seeds that growers have given back to the Amsterdam folks as examples of the strains they grew. This is pretty exciting to me... a grab bag of possibly 20 different types of beans! I can not see how this will be anything but very interesting as I work through that bag over the next couple of years. I fully intend to have a collection of Mason jars someday with a connoisseurs collection of tastes and heads that I can enjoy with my closest friends.
Immediate plans:
I am still waiting on my clone dome to show up. Tomorrow is day 49 and a week after my transplant to the 3 gal pot. The top growth is at the perfect point for the FIM. I think I will do that instead of the cloning tomorrow and then wait another week to do the clones when I am all set up and ready for them.
I still have some more reading to do about cloning anyway as I find I still have some questions. Such as, if my lower branches now are long enough that I could take just part of the branch as the clone... is there any advantage in this for the new clone? Is it better to be taller and have to strip leaves off... or is it better to leave half of the branch so that it can split off a couple more branches for cloning on the mother?
The fun thing that I can report as of tonight is the reduction of stress in my current grow. No longer am I looking at it as 4 plants that may or may not survive and all this time and money invested that I may or may not have wasted. Now I know that this is going to work. I may just have one plant left, but she is going to now turn into many more, and that makes me feel good. It's a good place to be in, and I hope that all the new growers out there get a chance to get to this point if they are serious about learning how to garden. I know I still have a lot to learn, but I definitely feel I have reached a milestone. Already the work is going to pay off as my mother now will provide for the future as she gives back the love I gave her.
It is a good day here. I hope yours is going as well! :thumbsup:
Emmie
:twocents: Starting @ Page 31 Marijuana Botany, your cuttings should be from 4-18". You should have at least a couple of nodes on each was what I originally read and always do. but, I like RC Clarke's book (it was his Masters Thesis) to refresh on. And he gives a range of three to six weeks for hardening off. :D
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Cloning is pretty easy,.... and you have the fortune of growing in soil so it's even easier.
I like to go with slightly smaller clones than Gypski's post, I cut 4-5 nodes which are around 4" tall
Then I'll use the edge of a razor to lightly scrape the side of the stem for the bottom 1.5" or so. (I try to make sure there is a node in that space, just shave the node off, but not clean, leave a little bump, this isn't needed but seems to help IMO)
Most would do a second cut at a 45* angle and "Dip" in cloning solution like "Clonex" here,... but I like to have a puddle of Clonex on a piece of wax or parchment paper that I'll roll the stem in, then I'll do the 2nd 45* cut with the whole stem immersed in the solution.
Either way, from there,... insert into rapid rooter plug. (don't use the factory hole, get a bamboo skewer and poke a hole off to the side, then insert your cutting into that hole) Place into a tray and under a humidity dome.
Keep the humidity at 100% for the first week or so, and make sure the plug doesn't dry out,... but don't keep it soaking wet.
Once you've got roots poking out the sides of the plug you can start to "harden" the plant off to lower humidity by cracking the vents on the dome,.... Couple days later you're good to stuff your new baby's in some soil and get your grow on! :hippy:
Quickest roots I've seen (out the sides of the plug) was 4 days,... longest took a bit over 2 weeks. :)
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Just a little update...
I am a plant murderer. There. I said it. :rambo:
#4 and #1 are no longer with us. They were sacrificed for the good of the grow and to further my education. First, I wanted to see if you could smoke a male plant with any effect. Second, I wanted to run through some curing steps in my mind. Good thing I practiced now too.
Just leave out one little detail and so much can go wrong is the lesson I learned today. After the herbal evisceration I hung my two grow room rejects from their heels in the unused grow tent. Lights and heater were off. I figured, a week to dry. So this morning I went in to check and found mold starting. Guess what I forgot? A fan. :error: At least I did this now and not when real harvest comes along. Practice practice...:fish:
#3 still is a mystery. It is definitely a different phenotype and is maturing very slowly... or at least it isn't wanting to reveal its sex like the others did. This could still go either way, so I repotted him/her yesterday.
#2 got her first haircut today. FIM was the result and I took all but 10% of the new cola away and smoked it. Thats right... I'm not proud of it, but I smoked it. :jointsmile: The result looks like all the pictures and in a couple days I will show you the new growth that results from this lobotomy. Both plants seem to be happy and now are 12" tall. Next steps will be to get some clones and start putting them under the screen.
Emmie
p.s. The first picture is #3 still deciding to be an innie or an outie
The other two are scenes from the midair collision of #2 with an exacto knife
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Before you go chopping them bald, you might want to practice the cloning. One cutting per plant till you get the feel for it. Sucks chopping the mother plants all up, then lose all the clones for some unforseen reason.
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rusty Trichome
Before you go chopping them bald, you might want to practice the cloning. One cutting per plant till you get the feel for it. Sucks chopping the mother plants all up, then lose all the clones for some unforseen reason.
Thanks Rusty! Again great advice! And, proudly I can tell you that I was thinking along the same lines the other day and took some clones of #3 to practice with. They started out under DIY coke bottle humidity domes. 3 out 4 seem to be making it. In a few days it will be time to practice some more with #2. I promise not to chop her bald :)
While I got you here :)... check out the attached picture. This is #3 with some of the strangest preflowers I have seen. There are groups of 2 of these dark stalk things all over the plant embedded in a growth that almost looks like a male preflower... but today this dark thing broke free of its mass and if my eyes are not deceiving me, she is lifting her skirts to show us a brand new pistil. Its not like anything I have seen in any of the books though.
Emmie
Emmies Grow Log - White Widow
Well, I can say that is one of the best pics Ive seen on this site! ;) All round + 100 rep to you for that quality of pic! :clap:
As for sexing,... Yeah, that's F'n weird. :wtf: I have no idea what's going on there.
