Tired of low yield

[Night713]

Short story long I used to grow about 10 years ago.I would do far less work and get much better results than now. Fast forward to the last few years and I’ve gotten beautiful quality.. but my yield is nowhere near what I used to achieve…I’ve tried to mimic and rework variables in the but nothing seemed to help.

I’ve been having issues with fungus gnats which I never had in the past. And occasionally even seeing springtails. I notice my roots don’t seem nearly as developed and I’m not hitting my drybacks daily. Little bit of salt build up in the coco so I have a feeling the main issue may be somewhere in there.

Right now I’m on day 37 flower with a few new strains and running drippers for the first time and want to maximize the yield with any help I can get from you guys. Thanks in advance.

Lollipopped day 1 defoliated day 21
Trellis added way too late
4x4 tent w flood table
600 w hps
.5 gallon pots
Floraflex coco
Floraflex nutes avg ec 1.5 ph 6.0
Avg temp 76 rh 58%

 

[goingrey]

You are overpruning, overfertilizing, and drybacks during this stage only do harm.

 

[GF-Z]

Your plants overstreched, light is way too high IMO.
Plants also need a blue spectrum to grow bushier, shorter more sturdy structure (in veg stage). Thats why every LED light includes blue spectrum diodes, and there are MH / CHM lights for HID light lovers.
And fungus twats are real paintrain for your plants. I've been fighting with them for 3 months (hotspot was old plant from owner of appartament, all sticky traps in pot are black from those f***ers), caught hundreds of them if not thousands, used neem extract (eq. azamax), sticky traps, hydrogen peroxide to minimise damage they've done... Brough tons of problems to my garden, including oregano,dills, peppermint... All plants are stunted, I suspect even hop latent viroid infection from fungus cunts, seen hundreds of eggs laid into soil, imagine how much damage those hungry larvae is doing to your plant roots, when they need to actively work with constant feeding... Coco is perfect place to breed, as it is always wet.. Perfect conditions for larvae to survive... Because they dont like dry soil, and those buggers cant dig deeper into soil, so they choose 1-2cm to spread hundreds of eggs...
Not familiar with coco, but plant structure shows that there is not enough space for roots to develop bushy tree, thats why it goes 1 cola.
If you are going to continue use 0.5gal pots, i would suggest you to use topping after 3rd max 4th set of leaves. But with 0.5gal i would go right after 3rd to have 4-6 main strechy colas. Thats how you would make much more productive plant, because you have 600w. Keep in mind, plant will need more feeding to maintain branches...
Also defoliating at day 21 is a bit too early.
I have big 1 plant in 6gal soil and I see every week he takes like 4-5 lowest leaves and makes them completely yellow colour. It means plant is gently taking out resources and doing its things.
And with colour of leaves, its hard to see in HID lightning, but it looks like they have too rich nitrogen in them, which means EC is a bit to spicy.
GL !

 

[goingrey]

Or you could do exactly what you're doing (maybe with some feed adjustments) but just double the amount of plants. Most of that space is empty, that is the basic problem.

Or you could have just one plant and train it to fill the trellis net. Now it's used as some kind of safety net in case the tops fall over?

Or you could do this that or the other, more than one way to skin a cat. But sometimes it's good to stop and think about why you're doing what you're doing, and if it makes sense.

 

[BurntBacon]

Gnatrol ( bacillus t. variety israelensis) for the fungus gnats. Follow the directions and you’ll be done with them, naturally and with no negative effect on plants, no matter the species. Been growing in coco for 20yr.

 

[cfl...KING]

Over defoliating for hps lights, for sure.

 

[cfl...KING]

Also what bulb are you using? There are lots of fake/knock offs of name brand bulbs on Amazon an ebay

 

[dramamine]

Over defoliating for hps lights, for sure.

Especially for og type plants that have less foliage to start with. They can't transpire enough=low yield.

 

[stiff]

I'm with @BurntBacon on the gnats. Get mosquito bits or whatever they offer near you. It's got the BTI (Bacillus thurengensis israelis) in it. Have them in the tank for a while and always stir it before taking some out. Repeat that 2 weeks later and you quickly win the fight. Hitting them hard twice is better than underdosing continually.
I've got them everytime as they're around the house almost all year long here.
They can do some real damage when your in sprouting stages. Older plants deal much better with them

 

[BurntBacon]

The Gnatrol WDG is their commercial line BTI, very concentrated. 3 applications of 1 tbs/gallon, every 5th day (15 days). I’ve never had it fail, couldn’t survive the summers without it. Check Ebay for any size quantity.

 

[Brother Nature]

Lollipopping your plants on day 1 of flower isn't a great idea, it's going to stress the fuck out of them and that's way too much defoliation. Not sure what strain you're running either, but a lot of the recent cookies related strains are pretty low yielders in the best conditions, so chopping them back and stresin them unneessarilary isn't productive.

 

[Ca++]

This has never been right. It doesn't look there is a 600w hps in there.

Fungus gnats are no issue in coco. One root drench with neem, and it's no gnats for many months. I have to dig through old posts, but it's about a teaspoon in a liter, and that will treat 4 or 5 of them pots. It don't need to run out the bottom. I warm the neem so it's workable, and put it in pretty hot water with some wetting agent to mix it. First fertigate until runoff, then use this across the whole surface.

The gnats should be a matter of routine. The light is more interesting.

 

[exoticrobotic]

You sure your drippers are working ok?

The plant pots look really dry and like others have said there's not enough leaves present to support abundant flower growth.

Stop defoliating so much. I only defoliate if a fan leaf is blocking light to a bud but i just pinch off one or two fingers of the fan leaves and leave the rest of the leaf.

Try lowering the lights and up your feed/watering levels.

I would also go for a sog or scrog.

GL bro

 

[Lester Beans]

Agreed on pruning day 1, that is most of the problem I see.

Also it says EC 1.5, that seems high for regular coco feedings. Also agreed you don't want the media to dry out.

Yield is environment then genetics. Some strains just won't yield.

 

[Bio boy]

How long dya veg ? No training ? Just single colas ? Look at quadling cannabis training it’s the bomb

 

[Ca++]

There are some unusual leaf distortions. Crinkly in general. With one folding and rolling to the side.
As I look more, I realise that good practice, might not be the whole answer

 

[Fourtay]

water at least twice per day, use co2, get vpd dialed, deleaf at day 22 and 40

 

[exoticrobotic]

Might benefit from larger pots too.