LED Grow update no.9, October 25th, 2011

After plenty of thought and research I decided to super crop the plants so as to keep them low. They are growing ‘too quickly’ under the Pro-Grow ! Ever heard that complaint before ? This will help with keeping the plants low and let the Pro-Grow penetrate nicely. Although, in defence of the Pro-Grow 260, I have heard that it has amazing penetration through the canopy.

I looked up many websites that proclaimed to understand cropping, I don’t ! I found a lot of conflicting ideas but I went with the one which caused ‘the least’ stress (I know it’s highly stressful). You can find a link to super cropping on the main page under ‘Links’. Another reason that I am doing this is to stunt the growth while I wait for my Secret Jardin DR90T grow tent. I want to take maybe 6 cuttings from each of the top 3 strongest, female plants before I bloom them out fully. The best plants genetics will be kept. I will begin SOG (sea of green) growing as soon as I get the next generation of cuttings and after I bloom the current plants. I’ll give each cutting approximately 1sq foot each in the new grow. This means that I will take about 18 cuttings and keep only the best 9 and destroy the rest, horrible thing to do I know. I wish I could keep them all The new tent, the DR90T, is 90cm x 90cm x 210cm so I will fit 9 plants in the bloom room. I have a feeling the Pro-Grow 260 will be a beast in SOG growing.

So what I did was I took the 4th or 5th node and began to squeeze it gently between my thumb and forefinger until I heard a crack. I then moved my fingers 90 degrees and did it again. I then bent the tops over while being careful not to completely break the stem. The nodes were young and didn’t put up much of a fight. I bent the tops toward the Pro-Grow 260 in an effort to keep the 9-plant footprint as tight and short as possible. The area of the plant where I super cropped will now become the imaginary line to where all new tops will be trained to meet. The idea is to make a line over the canopy and keep everything short.

There is a great link out there on how to super crop and here it is: step by step how to super crop

This is my first time super cropping so I might just make a mess of things. But we are here to experiment and see how best to do things. I have heard a mixed review on super cropping so I would like to put my evidence on the table, good or bad. I will give the nodes 1 week to repair and then I will see how the under canopy has caught up. The plant now believes that the top has been destroyed so it will give more energy to the lower branches. In the end I will have multiple bud heads. The idea is to make a greater amount of bud areas all the same height. This removes popcorn budding on the lower branches. I also fed the plants today; 25ml of seaweed and 50 ml of seaweed conditioner in 3 gallons of water. The 9 buckets took all 3 gallons of water with a little run off to be sure they were well watered. I also added a heaped spoon of bat guano to the topsoil before watering. This is pretty much all I will be using for this grow. It is 100% organic and will give no trouble with salt and there will be no need to flush each plant. See you guys in a week or so to see how the super cropping nodes have healed.

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