Indoor Journal-White Widow (Ministry of Cannabis) First Grow

[Trapper]

Hello. Once the leaves turn yellow you can remove them, they won't come back. The plant took everything from those leaves and wants more. Give only bloom nutes not grow big, 10ml tiger bloom and 20ml big bloom per gallon in ph 6.5 areated water, 1000-1500ml each plant. The plants are in bloom and don't need as much N, try and give them everything they want for bud development.

While I would tend to agree with you, VAGent.

This is a 35 day old plant that's been in bloom for a while and is sucking it's fan leaves already...Couldn't he put it on artificial life support for a little while by giving it something with some more Nitrogen to it? So it doesn't completely drain the fans and mature? I get the feeling that he's trying to keep it from maturing so rapidly so he can generate some more bulk before she "heads for the light".

 

[Bayes]

Thanks Gent, Trapper, Waira and others--

There were/are two schools of thought. One was to whack them hard with bloom nutes and the other was whack them hard with nitrogen-rich nutes. I chose the latter and last night hit them with a 1.5 tsp of Grow Big. ( I think I've been brainwashed ... I could not give a full 2 tsp because I've read so often "Be very careful...OF is SO hot or "OF is too hot" etc. It was even difficult to give them 1.5tsp on top of the 1 tsp Grow Big last watering. But they keep taking it ...

My best estimate using drops was ph of feeding was 6.8 (1/8 tsp of baking soda added), runoff was about 6.2.

My thinking was that if I could not stop leaf loss then the plants would lose overall transpiration "pull" because of reduction of leaf surface area. This in turn would have had a negative effect on budding longer term, making bloom nutes less effective in the future. I guess it came down to short term gain (bloom nutes) vs long term gain. (high nitrogen feeding.)

I have no idea if this was the right decision or not. I'll just have to wait and see ...

No sense in posting pictures today as its been less than 24 hours since their feeding. However, there are no visible negative effects (tip burn, etc.) so far.

Thanks for visiting and your comments.

T.

 

[robwars]

I would look in to Big Bloom and some Ca/Mg+ (General Organics) and work them into your feeding schedule. I grew with the trio for a while and things went a lot better when I started adding Ca/Mg+ to the mix. The Hanna Combo Meter will help things as well. As for your dead (yellowing) leaves I would start plucking them at the rate of 2-3 per day. They are causing the plant more stress with their condition. But really, 2-3 leaves per day.. you can also cause stress by plucking to many leaves at one time. I killed a beautiful Blueberry plant on my first go by plucking practically all of her leaves off. Funny now but it wasn't so funny then. LOL. :Sharing One:

 

[Bayes]

Day 39

Hi -


To summarize up to this point:


Things were going unbelievably well until the plants became a victim of their own success. In order to continue fueling their( unexpected) extremely rapid bud development, they began to devour the energy stored in their fan leaves causing extensive yellowing and subsequent dropping. A smart grower would have foreseen that this was going to happen and would have upped nitrogen feeding before the situation became critical. However, being a noob who planted in soil ("Hot, hot, hot...") and following a conservative feeding schedule, I was WAY TOO cautious. Lesson learned.


For corrective action, on 5/2 I fed a tsp of Grow Big and 1/2 tsp of Tiger Bloom. On 5/5, I fed 1.5 tsp. of Grow Big. To my thinking, that's a pretty fair amount of N (2.5 tsp) in a short time (3-4 days) in soil.

I believe (hope?) that the accelerated yellowing has slowed down and thinking that N (except in cases of toxic doses) takes almost a week to be fully absorbed from soil, I feel that the N deficiency has either been fixed or it won't be safely fixed. It is what it is it is -- it is now time to RAPIDLY change gears to address bud finishing.


Unless someone has a better idea, this is what I plan to feed later today:


2.5 tsp Tiger Bloom

1 tsp of Blackstrap molasses

.5 tsp Epsom salt (Really don't know about whether I should add this or not)

Baking soda if needed to adjust ph. (Hanna combo meter and ph up/down won't arrive until late tomorrow afternoon at the earliest)


I did add some OF& perlite to top off the pots yesterday.



What do you think of this feeding plan for later today???


What overall comments or advice do you have??


Thanks in advance -

T.


This is Day 39,

Here are the pics of one plant, the other is identical, and a shot of the plant's fattest cola . (I just got a new camera this PM so I'm just learning this camera. Note: the brownish spots on the yellow leaves appeared after they yellowed if this is important to know.

 

[Waira]

:smoke: Hi Bayes- No problem mate, you're learning a lot fast here,... plants look fine for this stage, I see nothing alarming at all,... skip the epsom, the molasses has that covered,... Good to hear the yellowing has slowed, but from here out, it won't stop,... all normal! This round of nutes looks fine, and maybe in a few days, blend some Grow in again, just to keep up; your girls are making lots of bud, putting on mass, which is why the demand for more N,... harvest timing is something to start thinking about, reserving about 10 days for final cleansing, meaning no nuthin', let her deplete the soil and eat fans... you have a ways to go stil, just something to keep in mind as you evaluate them on the final lap here! :thumbs:

 

[Bayes]

Waira, thanks for your response.

I fed them last night as per my plan (post#34) and they have responded well. I could swear the colas have swelled overnight. Although I may not be in a hurry, I think the plants are ... they seem to be racing to the finish.

My plan for the next feeding (thirsty little buggers now) may change, I tentatively plan to hit them pretty hard with Tiger Bloom, a tsp or less of molasses, and probably .5 to 1 tsp of Grow Big.

I really have NO idea when I'll start rinsing because I don't think yellowing fan leaves, if any remain, will be indicative of when to start. If the trichs don't change color this will make it even more difficult. I'll probably need some advice from members. I have some time...

However, does anybody have a GUESS of how much time is left before beginning a 7-10 day rinse??? (Day 39 images are in Post #34)

The ONLY reason this is important right now as I'm planning to overlap grows; the WW will dry in the upper chamber of my cabinet and the seedlings germinated outside the cabinet will be moved to the lower growing chamber. (I believe I can maintain 30-35% RH in the upper chamber for drying.)

I finally received my Hanna Combo meter late this PM. Interested to know what TDS is. Drops are pretty useless with Tiger Bloom, and even worse with Blackstrap molasses.

Next up: Two Heavyweight Fast and Vast

Thanks for reading.

Here's some pics of my growing assistants and the cabinet so you can see the upper chamber where I'm going to dry the WW.

 

[Trapper]

Sweet Cab!

I didn't realize that was the space you were working with....your plants are the perfect size for that setup

And the density of buds on those little gals seems like exactly what you would be aiming for.

Very cool.

I think you have to decide between 2 paths, though, as they may be mutually exclusive from one another.

The trichs may not amber up as long as you are prolonging the life of the plant with N rich Grow Big because you are staving off maturation.

So determining the flush may have to do with allowing the plant to consume its fans and mature.

If I were you, I may be inclined to only do one more feed with GB then hit it with Tiger.

I've also been told to cease molasses right at the beginning of the flush as the sugars and carbs will do something bad (I can't remember, I have to read back in my thread, Waira or AB told me...)

It's going to swell during the flush...maybe it's just time to wrap her up (2 weeks and change), cut her down and smoke her.....

 

[Bayes]

I think its too early to begin the flush but I'm probably not too far away. The apical (dominant) colas are still putting on weight.

Not only am a noob grower, but up until my plants flowered, I had never seen a maturing/mature cannabis plant in my 65 years of life. This is in spite of the fact that I spent two years in Thailand (not in Bangkok or the service). I'm certainly a very experienced consumer (45 years) and can make the opposite claim of Bill Clinton regarding inhaling/exhaling.

My point regarding my first grow is that I feel like I'm walking on the moon...a totally new and foreign experience.

Reading extensively is one thing which helps with understanding the science of growing but nothing other than experience will help with the art of growing. And the art is more than 50% of growing IMO (uninformed).

As for timing of the flush, I wish I could use a loupe but hand tremors prevent its use. Yellowing leaves, not useful here. One member on another thread suggested a pair of 2.5 or 3X cheap reading reading glasses with a mounted loupe from Harbor Freight (ordered today). I'm going try this. Failing these methods, I'll keep an eye on pistil coloration/retraction and follow my gut.

Although my number one objective was and remains, to learn, and now that I've made it this far w/o killing the plants (remarkable actually) I would like not to mess it up by screwing up the end game.

I love growing ... its a real challenge to do it well and I have a long way to go to become even modestly proficient . I tell my supportive wife (she hates the MD prescribed pain pills that I take as a last resort) that its like having an Ant Farm, but more challenging and for adults only.

New photos will be added when I feed either tonight or tomorrow.

Any and all future advice much appreciated.

Thanks for reading.

 

[Bayes]

Day 44 Images

Here they are, Day 44:

Comments?

 

[Trapper]

The plants look fantastic...

But what I'm noticing is that you have a beautiful living room. nice ceiling!