How often to feed a sativa?

[#1cheesebuds]

I am planning on flowering her 12 to 15 weeks. She is in around 3 gallons of fox farm soil in a smart pot. She is around 4 weeks of 12-12 and she is from a good bagseed. I think her flowers should be bigger by now for a sativa right or not? She is flowering under a 230 watt cob LED grow light.

I cant remember how often to feed a sativa. I don't want to over or under feed her and I don't want to burn the leafs.

How often do you feed your sativa ladies?


First pic is from last week.

Next 2 pix r from yesterday.

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[thejact55]

Less is more with sativas. Never give them a heavy blast like you would with indicas. I dont veg my long flowering sativas long, so no veg feeding for me. Personally, I do a few earthworm teas with kelp, fishbone meal, rock dust, crab meal and castings. My soil is also fortified with many ingredients, so I don't need to feed much. Just read the plant, if she shows lack of vigour or the start of a deficiency, but her. If she's happy, let her be.

Bagseed huh, was it from a super sativa type but? What makes you think up to 15 weeks? If she is indeed a 15 week plant, she is looking very good for 4 weeks, I would expect less. There is already resin showing, 4 weeks out of 15 weeks with resin already is good.

 

[#1cheesebuds]

I was thinking of that amount of flowering time because over the passed several years when I've grown bagseed sativas they seemed to flower between 12 and 15 weeks. I would rather she flower closer to the 12 week and or less time. and I can only grow bagseed because I cant afford to buy good seeds. plus I have several hundred bagseeds that I've saved from over the passed 12 years of what I call good mid grade buds that were nice and green with a great high and good trich coverage.

 

[thejact55]

I think growing bagseed is just fine. I've never had seeds from bags turn out bad...plus there is the a surprise of seeing how it turns out with no idea what to expect.

 

[#1cheesebuds]

Hey 55 your so right. and I've stopped feeding her. now just give her tap water mixed with blackstrap molasses.

Also during the dark cycle only she stinks just like a good old sativa.
But why only during the dark cycle does she stink?

New pix soon. I'm making this her official grow log.

 

[Kiiara - Gold]

600ppm rockwool. then just never plain water.

 

[#1cheesebuds]

new pix. the leafs aren't looking too well at all. I'm thinking it might be Magnesium Deficiency or bloom food burn but I don't know. if it is magnesium deficiency would Epsom salt help AT ALL?

Even though I stopped the bloom food on 4-19 it might be too late for her.
Is there any to save this one from a quick death? the buds still look ok for now.

 

[Floridian]

She may stink more during the dark cycle because of the rise in humidity.Are you using a dehumidifier?You need genetics bro don't take me the wrong way,that looks like hell.I've seen a lot of sativa type bagseed grows and tried one myself long ago.Big mistake for the most part.Decent seeds aren't that damn expensive.

 

[Lester Beans]

A pic of the plant without the LED would greatly help for diagnosis.

The first thing I see is leaf twist, which points to pH issues.

Make sure to pH the water properly, 6.5-6.8 for soil.

I would feed the plant a bloom nutrient along with cal/mag, ph'd properly.

 

[GoatCheese]

new pix. the leafs aren't looking too well at all. I'm thinking it might be Magnesium Deficiency or bloom food burn but I don't know. if it is magnesium deficiency would Epsom salt help AT ALL?

Even though I stopped the bloom food on 4-19 it might be too late for her.
Is there any to save this one from a quick death? the buds still look ok for now.

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Hey.
Your plant could be over-watered abit. Haven't grown alot of sativas, but i've read that pure landrace sativas and Hazes don't like to be watered too much.

Over-watering causes leaves to turn yelow and fall off and leaf damage that can look like nutrient defiencies.
Your plant looks well fertilized so i doubt it's real nute deficiency.

Let the pot go fairly dry and light before you water the plant.
When you grow under leds/small lights your plants wont drink as much as under high watt HPS lights

 

[#1cheesebuds]

Cheese

She is flowering under a 230 watt cob LED grow light plus 2 other led lights that are facing her on both sides plus a 2 foot fluorescent light at the bottom of the plant facing up to light up the underside of the plant. temps are in the low 80s. I do let the smart pot dry out between watering's.

lights out pix.

 

[#1cheesebuds]

Today the soil was dry so I gave her some water with the PROPER PH right around 6.3 to 6.5 so I see if this helps or not.

 

[Smittyfun83]

Looks good to bro! Keep it up. Don't over think it, she will begin to bulk up soon. Take it easy on the nutrients. Better to be light on the nutes than heavy at this stage in the game, imo.

 

[GoatCheese]

hey.


"Dry soil" is a relative thing if the plant is abit too small for the container size, cause then the top soil can be fairly dry but there can still be a good amount of moisture in the bottom half of the container.


How much soil do you have for the plant?
At least in the pictures the soil looks fairly moist (dark in color).


A good method to make sure that the soil is dry enough for next watering is to lift the pot to estimate when the whole container is fairly dry
..you can also look at the leaves when they start to droop a little bit, thou over watering can also make the leaves look somewhat droopy

 

[#1cheesebuds]

Here some new pix. My plan is to let her just keep growing and see what happens maybe add something like kelp or seaweed but not sure atm.
I did figure out why she is burning. It is because I had repotted her before the 12-12 cycle in a hotter fox farm soil without even knowing it was hotter than the ocean forest which is a much better not hot soil because of all the great things it has in it, which this new soil doesn't have what ocean has in it. so when I bought this new brand of fox farm soil I didn't know it would burn my plants.

from now on ill just buy the much better ocean forest soil because I've used it before with a great outcome and no burning of the plants.

pix of lights out and she got misted with ph balanced water cuz the buds/leafs seemed kinda dry from the fan.
she does have a nice smell.

 

[GoatCheese]

To me that looks like over-watering damage, i can't see that much real nute burn damage. I can barely see a little tip burn which shouldn't be the cause why your plant looks like that.


Over watering was my main problem until i started growing my plants in smaller pots. Google "cannabis over watering" and you will find pictures of plants that look similar to your plant.

To me, in every picture you have posted, the soil looks quite moist (dark)
Like i wrote earlier, it's quite easy to over water plants if the plant is a bit too small for the container size and i think your plant could have been little bigger for the amount of soil you have there.


That's not the worst case of over-watering i have seen (my own old grows were worse) so she will pull thru. But if i was you, i'd start watering her less.

 

[#1cheesebuds]

you have a point. but when I lift the pot the soil seems dry so I water her. but ill water less to see if that helps. just how light should pot/soil feel before I water each time?

 

[GoatCheese]

you have a point. but when I lift the pot the soil seems dry so I water her. but ill water less to see if that helps. just how light should pot/soil feel before I water each time?

Soil is surprisingly light when it's really dry. Some soil bags have dry weight printed on them.
On the soil bags that i have at home the weight of the soil is 490 grams per litre of material and 40% of that is moisture ..so the dry soil-material would weigh around 300 grams per litre; so around 1200 grams per US gallon.


Allow the soil to dry enough so that you see the leaves droop a little , so that the lower leaves go limp a little bit, and then lift the container up so you can get the feel of it's weight.

Over watering can also make leaves look droopy, but they won't limp, so it actually looks different.


When the soil is quite moist, it can take many days for it to dry well enough thru out the container and it's the top half of the container that dries out faster.
Even thou you're not giving the plant proper watering, you can still give small dosages to moisten the top of the container a little bit so that roots near the surface won't get damaged = you're not really watering the plant, but moistening the top soil abit



Trial, error and reading has shown me that RIGHT CONTAINER SIZE FOR THE PLANT makes watering and especially the flushing before harvest much, much easier. When the plant is right sized for the pot it can take heavier watering without getting damage.

The thumb-rule "let the top soil go dry abit in between waterings" does not apply if the plant is too small for the container size cause there can still be alot of moisture in the bottom half of the pot even thou the top seems to be cracking-dry.
..and so the better way to estimate the moisture content of the pot is by lifting the thing up and learning how a dry pot+ plant feels when you lift them up versus how they feel just after you watered the plant.


Sativas in general don't need as much root-space as indicas to yield well cause the growth is more vigorous, and is a think i mentioned, pure sativas don't many times like heavy watering.
Smaller pot size is also a way to control the height of a tall sativa indoors.
If i was flowering a plant that sized under my 250W HPS i would have her growing in 4-5 litres of soil, so in about 1 - 1½ gallon pot.

Your plant will make it to harvest if you'll ge t the watering sorted. Some of my old plants looked much worse.

 

[Floridian]

They are looking better bro,having the plant in the right sized container for the plant size is about the only way you know when it needs hydration.Everyones different but I start out in 4 inch pots and after the plants roots establish themselves,water until runoff.When the soil dries out every third day I know its time to upsize and I go to a 2 gal nursery size container[1.6 gal actual size},I veg and sex in these containers.Then I go to 5 gal and flower{a lot of folks prefer 3 gal and it really depends on plant size},I veg large plants and a 5 gal gives me a lot better yield.Anyway the idea is to basically let the rootball fill the container before uppotting,I always water until runoff when I know the plants roots are established in the containers and that's usually just a couple days.I know when I must water because the soil drys out every other day.Every third or fourth day watering is about right for me.Of course factors come into play,temperature or how much perlite you use,a number of things.When you water until runoff and you're in the correct sized pot for the size of the plant,you can tell by the weight when it needs hydration.Otherwise you're basically just guessing and hoping.When you're in the right sized container for the plant,it lets you know when to water/pot up because it drys out too quickly,let the plants do the guesswork.I wouldn't mist your plants again too its not a good practice to mist flowering plants especially after a couple weeks 12/12.Looks good bro!

 

[#1cheesebuds]

OK thanks for all the great help and info guys it means a lot. I'll take your advice's and see how she plays out in the end.