Chief Bigsmoke's Fantasy Factory

[chief bigsmoke]

Also here is a great video on Using Clays in your soil

Enjoy!

http://www.greenhousegrower.com/video/c:171/growth-media/764/

 

[vStagger Leev]

wow man! Great thread, surprised I just found it! I love your attention to detail, you obviously have skill Much love, and great work!! SL

 

[chief bigsmoke]

The Future is here....

Things are just wrapping up with the first test cycle. Now things are already showing great improvement. I can already notice BIGGER flowers, MORE resin production, STRONGER smells and most importantly they are looking HAPPY and HEALTHY.


Quick point form update:

• Moved a new mystery white into the flowering room. I placed it off to the side so it adapts to the brighter light. First I transplanted all the larger vegging plants from the 2g plastic nursery pots into larger 3g Airpot II's and added my new soil recipe *will be revealed soon
• My Ushio Opti Blue Bulb crapped out. It was an awesome bulb but over $120 for under a year of performance. I'm going to have to test other brands to find out if their hot or not. My Grolux Full Spectrum Bulbs are still going strong though
• The new clones rooted quickly to the EWC based ACT
• Supercropped/Training with clothes pins of vegging plants are still taking place

Photos: First is a profile of the revegged RED and then there are two of the other regular red from the second cycle. Then there is a group shot. the finally a close up of the revegged red. yipee

 

[Clayton_Bigsby]

This thread has to much info for me to take in in one sitting! I'm Subbing

 

[chief bigsmoke]

This thread has to much info for me to take in in one sitting! I'm Subbing

haha thanks Clayton. You've got to have one of the best nicknames on here. thanks for poppin' by. bring a chair and a cooler and stay a while.

 

[heady blunts]

cloning with ACT? tell me more

 

[Bonzo]

 

[chief bigsmoke]

cloning with ACT? tell me more

I just went with intuition and just poured a little bit of some ewc act/RO at a 1:1 ratio a couple days after taking the cuttings. It was just a rookie "take a chance" move but it seemed to at least not kill them. . I figured why not. I can't see why it would be to harmful. Perhaps the healthy pop of microbes/fungi can battle some of the common issues like bacterial infections etc. who knows. I find myself just trying things... Experience is the best teacher and I have A LOT of learning to do.

I'm inspired by solid community here.

 

[heady blunts]

ya I've considered it myself but my cloning skills are pretty hit or miss so I haven't tried experimenting too much yet.

so what is your cloning medium/method?

 

[chief bigsmoke]

ya I've considered it myself but my cloning skills are pretty hit or miss so I haven't tried experimenting too much yet.

so what is your cloning medium/method?

you sound like me.. my cloning skills are miss, miss, hit hehe but I'm feeling more confident after this last session.

I use 1.5"(would like the 2" or a little bigger) grodan rockwool cubes. pre-soaked for 24 hrs in a 1/4 strength flowering nute. take cutting below at least 2 nodes at a 45 degree angle. I use to carve up the bottom of the cuttings but I don't make that mistake anymore. Then I use a powdered rooting hormone and place it 3/4 the way into a newly made hole in the cube. Cover then keep the cube moist but not soaked. Then cross my fingers... hehe and my toes This is when the calming opera music in the room helps

 

[heady blunts]

haha i feel you on the crossing fingers AND toes while waiting for roots to strike.

i had bad luck with those rockwools. i'm considering trying oasis cubes, but i am going to use the old seed-starting-medium-in-cell-trays technique this time around.

have you looked into kelp/seaweed extract or willow for organic rooting hormones? i didn't have great luck with just seaweed extract, but i might put some sprigs of willow into the water i use to moisten my cloning medium. i'll keep my fingers and toes crossed!

 

[chief bigsmoke]

haha i feel you on the crossing fingers AND toes while waiting for roots to strike.

i had bad luck with those rockwools. i'm considering trying oasis cubes, but i am going to use the old seed-starting-medium-in-cell-trays technique this time around.

have you looked into kelp/seaweed extract or willow for organic rooting hormones? i didn't have great luck with just seaweed extract, but i might put some sprigs of willow into the water i use to moisten my cloning medium. i'll keep my fingers and toes crossed!

I did put a tiny pinch of kelp/alfalfa combo in the ewc tea, but I haven't done a solo run with kelp. I do use it lots in veg and especially for the transition to flower. I'm interested in looking a little further into it. I'll have to do some experiments.

 

[heady blunts]

i had a bottle of alaska liquid sea weed extract and amongst the various recommended dosages for different applications was a suggested method for rooting cuttings. i suppose it might help, but it doesn't seem to be enough to use alone on harder-to-root plants.

 

[BCMaster]

If the cubes give you trouble try peat pucks. Its soooo easy with peat. Stimroot #1 is your friend.

 

[chief bigsmoke]

Another beautiful Day in the mountains. I had a big week of snowboarding (yeah I know its nearly June hehe) and trying to stay dry in the rain, so I took a break and switched to my skateboard for today. Life is good when you can snowboard, skate, wakeboard, chill at the lake and maybe even surf all in one day.

I also upgraded my Molasses today. I had another unsuplhurized version and I made the switch to Blackstrap Molasses (last extraction). Which contains higher amounts of micronutes like calcium etc. There was also a Barbados Molasses which is from the first extraction of the sugarcane but I chose the blackstrap because it had a higher level of Calcium. compared to my old molasses, the blackstrap was superior in aroma and texture. We'll have to wait to see the results on the plants and ACT's.
*note: I'll still be using Raw Blue Agave Syrup as a carb source

 

[vStagger Leev]

^^^ Now your talkin bro... snowboarding, and skating all in the same day?! THat's wha'ts up... I've got homies here in OR who go board on Mt.Hood Timberline, and go surfing in the same day... lol it's rediculous! Much love, glad to see the molasses upgrade as well SL

 

[chief bigsmoke]

^^^ Now your talkin bro... snowboarding, and skating all in the same day?! THat's wha'ts up... I've got homies here in OR who go board on Mt.Hood Timberline, and go surfing in the same day... lol it's rediculous! Much love, glad to see the molasses upgrade as well
SL

Thanks for kind words SL

I'm sure me and your homies may have some mutual friends



This is also my 600th post, holy moly it's been a busy year. Can't wait to see how things change in the coming years. As my rookie status fades, my philosophy and methods are changing just as quickly. Each day brings a new wonderful change in the garden.



Let me share some photos of our humble little garden:

I moved a new bigger and badder RED (3rd cycle) into the mix today. Joining the lone WHITE (second cycle) in the batters box. They are chillin', getting used to the big show of the full spectrum grolux. As we slowly get our game together I'll be vegging longer and longer. These two will be the longest vegs I've done to date.

Group Shot (White and Red up front, 2 Pinks on left and 3 Reds on right):

 

[chief bigsmoke]

NEWS Article

NEWS Article

80 Year-Old Puzzle Of How Plants Know When To Flower Solved
May-25-12 8:11

Contacts and sources:
University of Washington


Scientists believe they've pinpointed the last crucial piece of the 80-year-old puzzle of how plants "know" when to flower.

Determining the proper time to flower, important if a plant is to reproduce successfully, involves a sequence of molecular events, a plant's circadian clock and sunlight.

A poster with twelve species of flowers or clusters of flowers of different families

Understanding how flowering works in the simple plant used in this study – Arabidopsis – should lead to a better understanding of how the same genes work in more complex plants grown as crops such as rice, wheat and barley, according to Takato Imaizumi, a University of Washington assistant professor of biology and corresponding author of a paper in the May 25 issue of the journal Science.

"If we can regulate the timing of flowering, we might be able to increase crop yield by accelerating or delaying this. Knowing the mechanism gives us the tools to manipulate this," Imaizumi said. Along with food crops, the work might also lead to higher yields of plants grown for biofuels.

At specific times of year, flowering plants produce a protein known as FLOWERING LOCUS T in their leaves that induces flowering. Once this protein is made, it travels from the leaves to the shoot apex, a part of the plant where cells are undifferentiated, meaning they can either become leaves or flowers. At the shoot apex, this protein starts the molecular changes that send cells on the path to becoming flowers.

Changes in day length tell many organisms that the seasons are changing. It has long been known that plants use an internal time-keeping mechanism known as the circadian clock to measure changes in day length. Circadian clocks synchronize biological processes during 24-hour periods in people, animals, insects, plants and other organisms.

Imaizumi and the paper's co-authors investigated what's called the FKF1 protein, which they suspected was a key player in the mechanism by which plants recognize seasonal change and know when to flower. FKF1 protein is a photoreceptor, meaning it is activated by sunlight.

"The FKF1 photoreceptor protein we've been working on is expressed in the late afternoon every day, and is very tightly regulated by the plant's circadian clock," Imaizumi said. "When this protein is expressed during days that are short, this protein cannot be activated, as there is no daylight in the late afternoon. When this protein is expressed during a longer day, this photoreceptor makes use of the light and activates the flowering mechanisms involving FLOWERING LOCUS T. The circadian clock regulates the timing of the specific photoreceptor for flowering. That is how plants sense differences in day length."

This system keeps plants from flowering when it's a poor time to reproduce, such as the dead of winter when days are short and nights are long.

The new findings come from work with the plant Arabidopsis, a small plant in the mustard family that's often used in genetic research. They validate predictions from a mathematical model of the mechanism that causes Arabidopsis to flower that was developed by Andrew Millar, a University of Edinburgh professor of biology and co-author of the paper.

"Our mathematical model helped us to understand the operating principles of the plants' day-length sensor," Millar said. "Those principles will hold true in other plants, like rice, where the crop's day-length response is one of the factors that limits where farmers can obtain good harvests. It's that same day-length response that needs controlled lighting for laying chickens and fish farms, so it's just as important to understand this response in animals.

"The proteins involved in animals are not yet so well understood as they are in plants but we expect the same principles that we've learned from these studies to apply."

First author on the paper is Young Hun Song, a postdoctoral researcher in Imaizumi's UW lab. The other co-authors are Benjamin To, who was a UW undergraduate student when this work was being conducted, and Robert Smith, a University of Edinburgh graduate student. The work was funded by the National Institutes of Health, and the United Kingdom's Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.

Contacts and sources:
University of Washington

 

[chief bigsmoke]

Red Update

Red Update

Same cut... two different looking plants.

Here is the RED from the 2nd cycle and the revegged Red that was a couple weeks or so behind. All the plants are showing a big improvement over the 1st cycle.

The revegged plant has boosted the yield considerably and it has a healthy coat of trichs; and the 2nd cycle reds are a more refined version of the 1st.

Better smells and bigger flowers and overall higher quality meds... not too shabby.

2nd cycle reds. A lone pink flower in the background of the second picture.

 

[vStagger Leev]

Great work man!! What is the lineage of the Red?? Much love! SL