Ace Seeds Malawi...1st pure sativa grow

[Old Toker]

They look very healthy, may react well to supercropping or just plain bending/tying down.

I'm at day 17 of flowering so I think the supercropping ship may have sailed. Are there people who supercrop after the beginning of flowering?
As far as tying down.....I don't really have a direction in which to tie down. To the left and right are more sativas.....which I think will need the wall space above them. And the 860w CDM is less than 24" in front. The only direction that my newbiness can see is up to the ceiling and tied onto the ceiling.....when/if they ever stop stretching. Never seen any plants tied to a ceiling in a vertical grow. Can it be done....or is there a seriously bad/sad reason why you can't do that with a cola....even if it's far enough from the light not to get burned?

I pretty much panicked when my 5x5 got overtaken by 4 Panama clones I had vegged for 2 months outdoors.

Similar situation...too much veg and 8 sativas. I confess to much newbie stupidity.

Yours are going to be BIG yielders should they make it to the end.

I'd be happy with reasonable/respectable amounts of yield from each. Enough for me to try out a few strains and phenos....for about a year. That shouldn't be too much for an Old Toker to ask....is it?

 

[SB7]

. oops

 

[deepwaterdude]

I'm at day 17 of flowering so I think the supercropping ship may have sailed. Are there people who supercrop after the beginning of flowering?
As far as tying down.....I don't really have a direction in which to tie down. To the left and right are more sativas.....which I think will need the wall space above them. And the 860w CDM is less than 24" in front. The only direction that my newbiness can see is up to the ceiling and tied onto the ceiling.....when/if they ever stop stretching. Never seen any plants tied to a ceiling in a vertical grow. Can it be done....or is there a seriously bad/sad reason why you can't do that with a cola....even if it's far enough from the light not to get burned?
Similar situation...too much veg and 8 sativas. I confess to much newbie stupidity.
I'd be happy with reasonable/respectable amounts of yield from each. Enough for me to try out a few strains and phenos....for about a year. That shouldn't be too much for an Old Toker to ask....is it?

Top o' the marnin', OT, your newbie "stupidity" (i usually sub "enthusiasm" in my case) may turn out to be newbie "genius" by the end of the grow Big plants = big buds, so you'll have that year of tasty variety no worries. Can't think of any problem tying those puppies anywhere you can, leaving some consideration for air circulation, should be more than fine.

 

[Old Toker]

Can't think of any problem tying those puppies anywhere you can, leaving some consideration for air circulation, should be more than fine..

It's not like I have a choice.....it's either tie them to the ceiling or cut the tops off.
My central AC in my house stopped working yesterday. Guess where the breaker box is? In the garage next to my tent. What's the chances an AC guy is going to believe some ingenuous story about why he can't go into the garage to personally pull the 40 amp breaker on the AC? Tough decision time.

 

[deepwaterdude]

It's not like I have a choice.....it's either tie them to the ceiling or cut the tops off.
My central AC in my house stopped working yesterday. Guess where the breaker box is? In the garage next to my tent. What's the chances an AC guy is going to believe some ingenuous story about why he can't go into the garage to personally pull the 40 amp breaker on the AC? Tough decision time.

Uh, oh. No trustworthy pals around with the knowhow?

 

[Old Toker]

Uh, oh. No trustworthy pals around with the knowhow?

No....recently (end of Spring 2016) moved to this part of FL. I'm going to try the ingenuous story approach. I have an AC guy scheduled....so I'll let you know if it works. If it doesn't......I'll probably need some bail money.

 

[ChaosCatalunya]

I'm at day 17 of flowering so I think the supercropping ship may have sailed. Are there people who supercrop after the beginning of flowering?
As far as tying down.....I don't really have a direction in which to tie down. To the left and right are more sativas.....which I think will need the wall space above them. And the 860w CDM is less than 24" in front. The only direction that my newbiness can see is up to the ceiling and tied onto the ceiling.....when/if they ever stop stretching. Never seen any plants tied to a ceiling in a vertical grow. Can it be done....or is there a seriously bad/sad reason why you can't do that with a cola....even if it's far enough from the light not to get burned?
Similar situation...too much veg and 8 sativas. I confess to much newbie stupidity.
I'd be happy with reasonable/respectable amounts of yield from each. Enough for me to try out a few strains and phenos....for about a year. That shouldn't be too much for an Old Toker to ask....is it?

Supercropping can work, if you are fast.. with the first flush of buds, you can, if you do it later, what happens is it forces yet another round of flower formation, making your flower cycle over a month longer (approx)

Buds that are forced over horizontally puff out new calyx's in a vertical direction, yes you get "bigger buds" but 6+ months of flower...

 

[Levitationofme]

Similar issues here. My grow is in my converted garage. But it is smallish. I can shut down the power and cover the box's with a Tarp. I need to rearrange the room as now its below my AC air handler. This summer my oldest kid goes off to collage and I get the whole garage back. Yes, I have managed to keep it stealthed from a teenager. My advantage is dual oversized carbon filters,
a teenaged self centered brain and my habits of getting up very early. And, I am Captain Paranoia himself.

 

[Old Fogey]

I recently had to kill two magnificent Malawi regular females about 6 weeks from harvest due to spider mite.

Here is a fruity pheno that finished about two months earlier and was unaffected.

Photo 1 was at day 105 from seed at 11:30 on/12:30 off. Photo 2 is the same plant 20 days earlier.

I took this plant at day 111 but I later realized I probably should have taken it the day Photo 1 was taken.

After a 3 week cure this plant was awesome. The fruity aroma would fill a room when the jar was opened. Perfect daytime smoke that was great in the evenings too. You could drift in and out of the stone at will, depending on what you're doing. If you needed to concentrate on something, no problem. As soon as you were finished the job you just let the stone back in. I found the overall effect to be very peaceful and relaxing, which is not really the description for this strain in general but I think it is true of the fruity pheno.

Truly beautiful smoke and the potency was an 8/10 for sure. I had a smaller Killer pheno which was stronger, but not any more desirable.

Malawi from Ace Seeds is an awesome plant, you won't be disappointed. Good luck with your grow.

Peace

 

[Old Fogey]

As a guide, I use a 40% rule and a 50% rule.

The stretch is 40% of the overall flowering time.

The time to cease srogging, supercropping etc is at 50% of the stretch.

I had some Peak Seeds Kush X's that I worked on the basis of 55 days flower with a 22 day stretch and a cutoff on day 11 for any stress/training activities and it was close to perfect timing.

Hope this helps.

Peace

 

[Old Toker]

Buds that are forced over horizontally puff out new calyx's in a vertical direction, yes you get "bigger buds" but 6+ months of flower...

Thanks ChaosCatalunya! Unfortunately I don't have any horizontal room. Actually I'm just about out of room in all directions except the ceiling. I barely have enough room to stand in the middle of the room where the light is. Not complaining.....just trying to describe the situation that I've put myself in.

 

[Old Toker]

Similar issues here...

I remember when my first left for college.....and the second a year later.....good memories....and more expenses.
Hopefully Levitationofme you were wiser than me and controlled the size of your girls during veg.

 

[Old Toker]

Malawi from Ace Seeds is an awesome plant, you won't be disappointed. Good luck with your grow.

Thank you Old Fogey! I grew (well attempted to grow) a Malawi outside last Summer/Fall. Despite mine, and Mother Nature's best efforts......she survived and is currently providing my current smoke. No complaints from me. In fact I liked her so much I'm attempting to grow two more!

 

[Old Toker]

As a guide, I use a 40% rule and a 50% rule.

It does help. How much pruning/defoliating did you do during the 40/50% period?

 

[Old Toker]

Welllllll.....the AC is repaired and I'm not in jail......yet. Life is good!

 

[Ichabod Crane]

Clean out some of the less desirable bud sites. These will be the ones close to the main stem or on branches that are small.

This will leave the center of your plant empty of bud sites with almost all your remaining bud sites at the branch tips where they will overlap the plant next to them. So take these and bend them back towards the center. If they can go past the center no big deal to run them to the other side.

For your main stem near the top where it starts to be flexible snake it back and forth to reduce the height. This will take up some of the stretch. You can also use this lower on the branches to fill in the middle as well. You may need to remove a few branches to stop over crowding.

The best way to go about this is by bending the branch over then trimming the less desirable buds or branches. This way if you break a branch you will still have some thing there.

If a branch is to stiff you can snap the center to get it to bend. This is done by placing your thumbs on two branches next to each other .and wrapping your fingers around the branch. Give the branch a gently twist till you hear a light crack. Be careful not to twist the bark off when doing this.

Once it cracks try to bend it over. If it will not bend enough go on place over and repeat. Just gently bend it slightly till you get it to where you want it. The branch will need supported for a few days but will stiffen up. This will also slow this branches stretch for a few days till it heals.

If you do twist off the bark put it back in place and cover loosely with tape or stretch wrap for a week. This only works for bark that is still attached.

 

[Old Toker]

Clean out some of the less desirable bud sites. These will be the ones close to the main stem or on branches that are small.

This will leave the center of your plant empty of bud sites with almost all your remaining bud sites at the branch tips where they will overlap the plant next to them. So take these and bend them back towards the center. If they can go past the center no big deal to run them to the other side.

For your main stem near the top where it starts to be flexible snake it back and forth to reduce the height. This will take up some of the stretch. You can also use this lower on the branches to fill in the middle as well. You may need to remove a few branches to stop over crowding.

The best way to go about this is by bending the branch over then trimming the less desirable buds or branches. This way if you break a branch you will still have some thing there.

If a branch is to stiff you can snap the center to get it to bend. This is done by placing your thumbs on two branches next to each other .and wrapping your fingers around the branch. Give the branch a gently twist till you hear a light crack. Be careful not to twist the bark off when doing this.

Once it cracks try to bend it over. If it will not bend enough go on place over and repeat. Just gently bend it slightly till you get it to where you want it. The branch will need supported for a few days but will stiffen up. This will also slow this branches stretch for a few days till it heals.

If you do twist off the bark put it back in place and cover loosely with tape or stretch wrap for a week. This only works for bark that is still attached.

Thank you Ichabod Crane!Perfect tutorial on what I need to do. Will start on this tonight when the lights come on. Cleaning out the interior of the plant at day 20 of 12/12 won't cause a problem for most sativas? Thanks again!

 

[ChaosCatalunya]

Good call on the cleaning, I just chopped a panama malawi that shot up above the lit area... the taller part of the plant only put on wispy useless growth, the middle that got good light, grew fat. I got the idea, rightly or wrongly, that bud production in Sativas is more localised and light dependent than Indicas/Hybrids

 

[Ichabod Crane]

When you clean it out spread it over several days. If you do it all at once you will slow the plant down. But more importantly if the plant is prone to herming it could cause it to from the stress.

 

[Old Toker]

When you clean it out spread it over several days.

Will do. Thanks for the advice!