Oh great, apparently we're growing now!

[catbuds]

Ok. You said somewhere earlier you had 4' fluorescent fixture ( assuming 2 tube shop light)? I would put that back as over head light & use the cfls as side light. You can even go a couple wks into flowering with that before you add the 250hps. Their color is good. I'm assuming you don't have other lighting in place, just what is shown in pics? Correct me if I'm wrong. If you have lights not in the pic, that would void the first three sentences in this post. Crap! Unexpected company. Be back in a couple hours.

PEACE!

[Buggy]

Hi Catbuds. Don't think I haven't thought about the close up looks, but my daughter broke my good microscope a few years back (FOR REAL) playing with it and I'm too busy and dirt poor to get another good one. I also won't get a cheap one since it will just annoy me. This IS a ton of fun just learning, tweaking, and enjoying it. It's my way of dealing with my OCD/depression issues - I'm busy enough with kids, husband, full time work, and I make myself have something I concentrate on (generally gardening). But nothing much to do outside right now other than weeding and I used a lot of Preen out there.

Oh, and I'm working on paper the molecular level of the chemical reactivity of the ferts and how they break down and how the plants' reactions create pH changes with the ferts, etc etc etc. I want to add sawdust (maple only since they have less bad chemicals that can hurt other plants, unlike the walnut and oak that is also used a lot in our basement woodshop) which raises the pH (just a little bit of sawdust to counteract the woodash, bone meal, and 7.2 water)... but that requires adding nitrogen for the breakdown although not a lot but you have be cautious about how much because as it is broken down by the plant and bacteria it creates more acidic conditions which partially reverse as it is used... Also, I find it REALLY weird that wood ash is alkeline and sawdust acidic! So odd - on my list of things to find out why and what chemical structure changes happen with the burning process to make that happen...

Back to the plants. Girls look happy, the buds are REALLY starting to look like they "should" from the pics I've seen online. one plant is being a bit slow, but the others are really taking off. I'm looking into the gardening/botany debate of whether removing some/most of the vegitative growth helps to produce more and/or higher-quality fruit and how this corresponds to MMJ. I've seen some claims that it really helps, some that it hurts. I'm nearly wanting to try it myself with ONE plant to see what happens. It won't be conclusive as it's not the exact same DNA and conditions as any of the other plants (topping was different, different days... different amounts of water, different DNA, etc), but it may be a start of more research and information for myself and my growing habits both for MMJ and the rest of my garden (berries mostly, actually).


For lighting, I had planned on just the 2700K lights, but after a bit more research it seems there's better results with the combo of lights (more tricromes). It will also be easier to provide good coverage with the lights by adding the tubes back up. Will do likely tomorrow. Thanks!

The boy has not had any girly flowers on him at all, and he's gonna bloom shortly so he's outta the closet and in the garden for a couple days (burried in a variety of plants so people don't notice) - as soon as he blooms, I'm taking so pretty pics, gathering a tiny bit of pollen, and chopping him down. That pollen I'll be using to create a few seeds on one of the girls - that way, if husband likes the product, we can grow it again. I'm planning on trying to reveg the girls, but I don't know how successful I'll be and I don't know if we want to keep the plant going during the winter if we don't need to produce right away either. I want to try the fruit from the start of flowering phase next time, and specifically see if I can get a boy to throw girl flowers ONLY BECAUSE you can get a girl to throw boy flowers - I just want to see if I can make it happen without a ton of work and stress and effort and MONEY just for the fun of it. Just to see what it takes to do it - not for production of bud, not for how to make it always happen, but rather just see what it takes to make this plant turn female if already genetically male/leaning male.

So much I'm still researching. At least this is keeping me from drooling over all the plants I COULD BE ORDERING to put in my garden that I just can't afford to get right now. I could spend an easy grand or two each fall and spring in plants and supplies for my garden. But again, I'm poor. REALLY poor, until at least my husband gets his disability. It's why he's not yet certified with the state for MMJ use (we're saving up - next weekend we see the doc for the paperwork, and the paycheck after we'll send the paperwork to the state). Not having to pay for expensive meds every couple weeks will help - just a few more times of buying them and we'll have our own!

[catbuds]

I know what would be right up your alley.... on line studies, biophysics/biochemistry & horticulture. High humidity ruined my microscope one wet summer. Lense fungus grew inside the lenses. I used it for fecal flotation, testing my animals for intestinal parasites. I also zoned out looking at insect eggs. Yeah, I can't afford to replace anything either. Sm disability check. We have a lot in common, tec freak, science geek & no money to pursue our interests.

On the sex change thing, there are rooting hormones that can influence gender too. Go online to get their names & which ones influence which gender, since I forgot, & that will add to your arsenal. I think playing is fun. So, if all this can affect a complete sex change, male to female, would the plant then be trangendered, or just a drag queen? LOL! (Just kidding, it would be transgendered ofcoarse!).

Girls just wanna have fun!~~~~~~~PEACE!~~~~~~~~

[catbuds]

P.S. Remember photosynthesis. Don't remove the leaves. When I harvest, I pop off all the sunleaves just before I cut the plant. Only because when you cut the plant & they start to wilt, they want to cling to everything & they're easier to remove before they wilt.

[Buggy]

OK, after a NASTY week of illness, nutty work issues (people out from being sick, too!), and regular life, I'm back!

I've done NOTHING until today since last I posted other than lifting the lights and redoing the lights completely.

After being sick, I looked at the girls after 2 days without checking and found one with a burned leaf right ON one of the lights. OOPS. But it's just 1 fan leaf at least. Also, a few fan leaves' stems are a bit red, so I'm trying to make sure the CFLs are a bit further from the plants now. This is a bit of a conundrum though: The closer the lights are, the more efficient the lighting is - but the closer they are, the HOTTER the plants are! Sheesh! Instead of being 2-4" away, they are now 6" from the CFLs and about the same from the fluros (have to have that space so as the CFLs can have access to the plants, too).

So, for lighting, I have 4x4' 6500K fluro tubes directly over all 9 girls (they JUST reach from the center of 1 side to the center of the other), then 9 CFLs around the edges so far but more will be added soonish. 3 cfls directly on one end, 2 on the other, and the others in between on the back side. More will be added on the near side mostly when I'm able (need a few more parts and possibly more bulbs - only 3 are unused right now for lack of parts needed to use them). 12 on, 12 off of course.

The soil is still quite damp since last weekend, which is normal in my situation for some reason. So they are not going to be watered likely until next weekend. If any seem too light or dry during the week I may water then - we'll see. Very few gnats around now, although I did stir the soil slightly to check for larva - I did find some so I made a Dunk slurry that I sprayed on the top LIGHTLY (heavy amount of dunk ground up in there, though) to kill them. 1 spray bottle that fit 16 ounces was not even half-used over 9 pots.

One anomaly: #19 still is not "budding"! I SWEAR I saw tiny hairs on her, and I didn't look really close again... But there are no signs on her of being a boy either. So... I don't really know! It's been 25 days - TWENTY FIVE! - since I switched the lighting, but... but... I don't know! So the side that has the 3 cfls have them surrounding her in the hopes that the extra light helps. Two theories: 1) was a boy that the fruit around him changed him but not enough to throw flowers, just to stop the male flower production. UNLIKELY, but ya never know. 2) Something has shocked her that she's not coping with well, even though all leaves seem healthy, she's quite bushy, and she's not growing out like in the Veg cycle. 3) She's an anomaly which just doesn't flower properly - genetic malfunction. Most plant species occasionally have such problems, especially with inbreeding if there are any bad genetics - same with animals. It's possible that whatever strain this is, that there was enough inbreeding of the strain that the bad genetics just combined on this one plant to keep it from maturing. Most likely from what I know of animal biology, although I know little other than some theory of this in plant genetics.

With the single male, I've put him outside now as he was flowering. The tiny boy flowers are actually quite pretty in their own way before the pollen is released. I will be repeating this experiment with just the fruit next time. I am thinking it is likely that females show their gender more easily with increased outgasses from the fruit (but how much is enough I wonder? hmmm...), and it's POSSIBLE that a male will throw female flowers with it as well IF the gasses are in enough proportion and introduced early enough in the flowering process to work. Because of how late I started, I've given up for this time. BUT, next time I'll be using the fruit from the time they could begin to make preflowers - before I switch the lighting. Heck, I may even do it from the time they have their first set of true leaves just to see if it works.

I am letting him live a little longer for two reasons: 1) I got some pollen to create seeds on ONE bud site so if he likes this strain enough we can create more, especially if my reveg attempts don't work. 2) I'm going to keep an eye out on trics to see where "peak" harvest may be, just to see what quality they are for medicinal use for my husband - we'll see what he thinks, as he wants to try it. It's just for fun, and as he's outside I have no worries about more pollen going anywhere I don't want it to.

Also, as we have so many girls (8 or 9, don't know!) I decided to go ahead and strip the fan leaves off one girl that is nearly exactly like one other that was just next to it - same size pot, same number of bud sites, same height, same health from what I can tell, etc. JUST to see how things go. I fully get that more photosynthesis means better growth, but what sort of growth do the fan leaves promote? do they promote better bud growth, or would the lack of fan leaves allow more bud growth as they see more light and the bud's leaves get all the light then? I do know it goes against the SOG method in many ways since there is no sea of green anymore there, but... Well, we'll see. Also, when I was redoing the lights, one of the lights fell on that plant and snapped off the top of the bud - the top-most bud and the set right below it both came off. Because of that and because I wanted to see what happened, I decided to experiment with this plant. It's also the one that was pollinated - luckily the bud site I chose for that was below the break point! So I thought, oh well, since it's already trying something new, lets go all out! Heck, we still have 7 or 8 more girls after this one, so... I'll be keeping an eye on how it does. I also did mark the spot I pollinated just to make sure I know where to check.

Other than that, the only news is that I don't see much of a difference for me really between the effects of marijuana and alcohol - at least, past the first 20-30 minutes - other than I have a slightly befuddled brain in the morning. I don't drink much even when I do, so... My husband suggested trying marijuana for a nasty headache I had this week that my regular meds didn't touch. I didn't help, in fact. It may just be the strain, but unless we have a specific strain that helps generally for migraines, I doubt I'll use again anytime soon. Meh, just not my thing - I like my mixed drink on occasion. Heck, if we get a tincture sometime together and I have a migraine and don't work the next day I may try it then. But... *sigh* no real point for me. Alcohol hits me just as fast - I'm a lightweight!

(Once a king or queen in Narnia, always a king or queen in Narnia! Love these stories - watching the end of the older movie right now... Can't help it!)

BTW, pics when I can. Seem to have lost the cord for the camera.

[Buggy]

OH! Totally forgot. I found a site that has NPK values for basically EVERYTHING. LOVE IT.

N-P-K Value of Everything

Very good for thinking about what needs adding. I'm looking specifically for P and K right now for what I have easy access to that I can add right in as a top dressing or water in, which is why I found it.

[Buggy]

My favorite possible additions:

Banana! (has TONS of k)
Apple skins (PK)
cantaloupe rinds (PK)
coffee grinds (mainly N)
Lemon skins (more P actually! surprising as Grapefruit and oranges are mostly K!)
Molasses (K)
Orange rinds (K)
potato skins (p but BIG K)
Potatos in general, too (K)
Firepit ashes (K)

Note to self - things that can be used when we need certain ingredients. (common for my home, at least!)

[Buggy]

Hi all.

Looking back at everything and guessing at the planting time, it looks like we're just over 11 weeks into this entire process, 4 weeks into flower now.

I have two leaves total showing issues. One plant has what looks to be either K or Ca issues (all will be solved later today with the watering) - just started showing yesterday. One other has one leaf that looks like heat stress so the CFL was moved back away from the plant to help and the plant turned. Everything else looks happy.

Top couple inches of soil are nicely dry, so I'm doing a full watering today - just enough to allow a LITTLE water start to come out at most. I've added some wood ash as a top dressing with sawdust mixed in to even out the pH between them (also with the bone meal added previously and my just-over-7 water, all should even out nicely with their chemical interactions).

So, adding crushed TUMS and a bloom fert here in a little while after going out to buy milk.

Other than that, everything is growing GREAT. My one "test" subject is doing OK, but it's hard to tell with less leaves whether it's growing more bud or not. It seems to me to be either equal or slightly less than the gal next to her, but the real way we'll know is in about 4-6 weeks when harvested to see how all is after being cleaned up for drying. She's still peachy keen and growing, but nothing extraordinary so far in any way. One girl is looking GREAT - trichromes on a TON of the leaves as well as buds developing very well. I will be pollenating her later I think on one bud in hopes they will keep so nice.

#19 finally started getting hairs this week on all shoots, things look really good on her even though she's a late bloomer... I think we'll be chopping them over a few days or even weeks! - each plant when she's ready. I'll also be trying to reveg them after the chop, so we'll see how that goes.

My male is outside and has been attacked by bugs. So sad. So he's being fed MG bloom and sprayed thoroughly with pest spray to keep it from continuing. Just hoping to get some more pollen as I want to get seeds outta the one lady that is growing so well! I'll also be marking that bud site to make sure that I leave it in place longer (it will be a LOW bud site) so as we get better quality seeds. Just hope we can get the pollen soon enough! Also hoping that it will do well for his pain.

Husband's new pain doc not HAPPY that he's using MMJ as it is still technically illegal with the feds, but he'll still treat him. One med was upped and really helps although the doc stopped another pain med that's the "main" type of med used for pain... He's still in a lot of pain, even with the MMJ. He's also having issues sleeping so I'm looking into what types to use next time for his issues. We'll use bag seed for now, and we have a few batches. I'm also planning on using 1 gallon containers only next time and topping more for more branching, likely vegging for only 4 weeks to allow a 12 week grow. Currently he's using less than 1 ounce per month of decent strength, so we should be able to grow more than enough. Heck, we'll be able to start playing with trying different forms rather than smoking - need a vaporizer, but can try that, cooking with, tinctures, etc.



Buggy

Attachment 295204Attachment 295205Attachment 295206Attachment 295207Attachment 295208

(last is #19)

[Buggy]

Hi all. One week later, all is still good. No water needed today for most of them, so I'm holding off a few more days on that. Everyone seems happy other than the couple bad spots from light burn from before, and then one bud spot that acted weird.

I didn't get a pic, but some of the sugar leaves started turning black and then white right at one of the buds. I looked VERY close but did not see any evidence of rot or mold, so I'm not worried. It didn't grow or expand, and those leaves were no where near a bulb (6-8" from any CFLs, 4" from the tubes). So no idea. The bud is continuing to grow nicely, so I've decided it's a NOOB's anomaly.

Some of the buds are 3ish inches tall now and 1.5" across, so it's a good start. Others are smaller (especially #19 - she's quite small in bud still, but she'll be harvested much later I think since she started much later!), but all seems to be doing very well. One plant has GORGEOUS big buds all over and tons of "sugar" sprinkled on her. Another has one cola with nice size and the other about regular size (compared to the others). Most have buds from the tips to the bottom leaf nodes all over. So excited to see how well everything is growing!

Side note: I didn't get to see them, but apparently a friend of ours that we KINDA know decided to grow some himself. He ended up with two girls (cut the boys down) and both were over 6' tall! He just chopped them, which I'm wondering might have been a bit early since it's still in the 70s most days in our area and we're a month away from decent freezes from the looks of it - he might have had a LOT more growth I'm thinking, but again I didn't see them. My husband did though, and he says the colas were over a foot long and easily wider than a can! WOW! Oh, and the friend doesn't use cannabis: it's for my husband! Likely no need to grow again until spring I'm guessing! But we'll see what the quality is. Also, if he just chopped, we'll likely not need to get any from our normal source again! Well, maybe a LITTLE while we wait for the friend's crop to dry and cure.

It's so much fun seeing how everything grows. Also, I think we'll make some into oil or tincture to see how well that works for him - I'm hoping it works well and he likes it. It will be a LOT better for him, and then there will be no need to worry about the kids or anyone else smelling the smoke on him. Much more discrete, and likely will work longer and better for him from what I've read/heard about. I'm also looking into doing capsules for him too.

Pics:
1) How low buds go (also shows fertilizer splash on bottom leaves from a watering where I didn't pull the front plants out to water the back ones - thus the water splashed and I forgot to rinse after)
2) one of the larger buds
3) another bud, shows upward growth of bud
4) sugar everywhere!
5) one of the largest buds
6) Some of the plants wide view! (color differences are from the tubes, CFLs, and the camera flash - they all look good to me other than a couple brown spots!)

Attachment 295524Attachment 295525Attachment 295526Attachment 295527Attachment 295528Attachment 295529

Also, I've decided the next time we grow inside we'll be adding perilite to the soil for better drainage. The right-most plant in the front still shows some water stress a week later and the soil is quite damp (not sitting in water, but was watered enough a week ago for it to drain just a little through). I'll also be using screening in the bottom of the pots instead of jiffy-7's to block soil from escaping - they drain pretty well, but I think the soil is a bit compacted.

Oh, I also added some CO2 with vinegar and egg shells this week, and put in a fan for added circulation. I moved a few leaves back to the stem a bit so they were out of the way as best as possible from the buds. I'm also planning next time to add side lighting - but we'll also likely be growing more consistantly starting next time inside a wardrobe which could fit up to 6 of my current size plants on each level I'd do, likely just 1 level though. Already have the wardrobe, just have to use it! I'll also be composting and being careful about what I compost for the planting material to make sure I have the right levels of nutrients the plants need. It will be mixed into the soil when planted, but then we'll do a top-dressing at bloom time.

Oh, I also noticed that there was very little stretching of the plants since we started the bloom period. Some, yes, but not the 50%+ I expected. I MAYBE got anther 25% at most on any of the plants. Well, #19 may have reached 50% now, but that's about it. Didn't expect that - it's why I made sure to keep them short. Next time I'll do a little topping to make sure there are 2-4 branches but tie them down for better lighting instead of more branches. The light in SOG is just not getting down enough so far with all the leaves to grow the buds enough I think. We'll see how they look at harvest, but...

I'm also going to progressively harvest them as they are getting ready. Some of the hairs are starting to turn on a couple plants, so I know it's time to start watching the trichs in another week to see when they are ready. Some plants will for sure be ready ahead of others - #19 likely will be harvested 2-3 weeks after the first if not even longer! We'll see. So much fun with all this! At least I'm not turning any marble yellow with this... LOL!

[Buggy]

Catbuds! Guess what? IT WORKED!!!!

It's been weeks since the boy got pulled out of the girls and set outside. I had planned on spraying it with insecticides to kill off whatever was eating the leaves (Can't remember the name of the bug off hand - odd as I like bugs!)... Also all the pollen sacs were dead when I last checked. I left it, said "whatever - no big deal"...

JUST checked it less than 5 minutes ago. Lots of pollen sacs all over which is nice as I don't want to lose this strain if we like it. Gonna pollenate a couple gals that we like to looks of as soon as the flowers open on the pollen...

BUT THEN I LOOKED AT THE BOTTOM SET OF SACS!!!! THERE IS A FEMALE FLOWER! Sorry for the shouting, but I'm SOOOOOO EXCITED!!! WOO HOOO!!!!!!!!

Ok, not gonna be doing this normally, but still!!! This means that this plant will get seeds from which can be used just for making another male specifically, and maybe I'll work at continuing the experiment next time with the fruit for this plant's seeds specifically just to see what happens.

For those of you who don't understand the purpose:
This is just for fun. I'm not *TRYING* to make all male plants female for increased production - although, if I could find a way to do so it would be kinda neat just for the fact it can be done. But a male throwing a female flower??? YAY!!!! I'm a nerd, I love trying new things and seeing if I can make things happen or seeing what will happen with different conditions. I'm growing for my husband's medical use, but enjoying my own science experience with it too.

EDIT: (at least to what I was going to first post) I looked harder and found ANOTHER female flower and took some more close ups. THEN, when I cropped and saved the REALLY close up photos, I see a THIRD flower with hair coming out!


Whole plant:
Attachment 295531

First female flower I found with the original pic:
Attachment 295530

Same one from above:
Attachment 295533

Other female flower I found, look at top right to see tiny white hair emerging as well!
Attachment 295532


Anyone else have experience with males throwing female flowers? Just curious. Looking forward to drying this guy too with all those crystals too!