My OBBT Bucket Build

[rrog]

Need some help. Hopefully some of you can offer opinions.

I have three plants cooking in OBBTs. 2 are Purple Diesel, 1 is NL#5.

The PDs have very small seeds in comparison. They sprouted much slower and had a much higher rate of no-sprout duds. Seeds are about 10 months old. NL#5 seeds are 14 months old.

Currently the NL#5 is kicking the ass of both PDs. I'm concerned that they may simply be weak. Here are some shots:

I have another NL#5 in a soil pellet under lights ready as a backup.

I'm tempted to replace one of the small PDs with the NL#5. I had really hoped to get a female PD and hate to cut down my chances by pulling one, but the NL#5 was such a great yielding plant...

Any opinions?

 

[h.h.]

Different pains for different strains. Some plants just grow faster and bigger. Males tend to do that as well. My buddy always said take your best plant and pull it.LOL. Probably just genes. My Willy's seed always look like something I'd toss.

 

[rrog]

Thanks H2. I know that different strains grow at different rates and grow into completely different plants. I had considered that, but when I saw the last batch of PD seeds produce such small seedlings and only 25% germination rate, I thought maybe they were doomed.

So you think I should let them keep on going?

 

[h.h.]

I figured I was telling you what you already knew. If the seeds were only 10 months old, I'd give them a chance.

 

[rrog]

I appreciate your feedback. What I sure as hell lack is experience. Thanks for yours

 

[h.h.]

Don't get me confused with somebody who knows something. Most of my experience has been in killing plants other than MJ.

 

[rrog]

I'm glad your here and contributing, I can tell you that. Thanks

 

[h.h.]

Everybody's bucket die or what? I found my setup staying too wet. I also have more plants than buckets so now each pot gets rotated. Nine pots, 3 buckets. I find each bucket has a slightly different environment so the pots go to a different one each turn.
Using a combo of sunlight extended by cfl's outside so the cold weather is slowing them down. Damn these 65* mornings. For my friends in Michigan...sorry.

 

[magiccannabus]

If your medium is too wet, try lowering the water table a bit.

 

[h.h.]

I did that and now am waiting to see the results. What I have are bubble buckets and not true OBBTs. They do the same thing, but adjustments are a bit different. Thank you.

 

[rrog]

Well, plants have been in 3 weeks (2 weeks for one plant). Tiny miniatures of big plants. Very pretty, clearly going bushy One not as much. Will get pics later but had a question.

What dilution of fish emulsion might be recommended?

Typically I look at the bottle and dilute quite a bit more than the instructions. I always have a concern that most instructions encourage concentrations right up to max levels.

I have not supplemented a thing yet. Looks like I'll be vegging an awfully long time to give these three enough mass to proceed to flower.

 

[MrFista]

Any updates?

So far I think Ive seen Silver Surfer pull weed out of obbt's, and LL's system crashed and burned? and DM's tomatoes had blossom end rot.

Don't get me wrong I want to believe, a good 100 pages of reading/wanting to believe later, having trouble with all this hype (science) followed by stunted seedlings, inconclusive benefits, and maintenance/complexity heavy flower.

I also see a disagreement of methodology, or backing theory, I hope can be cleared up.

DM says the biology are extremely efficient at utilising organic ferts. LL pours it into the soil, trying to get the nth degree out of a system designed to get the nth degree itself.

My take on this is that DM is correct. To my understanding a massive microbial consortium will be more efficient in utilising the available nutrients. Less nutrients for the same effect. I do it in soil using terra preta mixes to maximise fungi and bacterial consortiums with hydro type growth using less ferts than is typical for weed.

I think your design might be having troubles with the extra aeration and reservoir space creating a compost tea brewer in the bottom of your bucket. Though this is in a way the concept behind this design - a microbe mass to plant in - you may have sufficient air and nutrition in there for microbes to be continually going through boom and bust cycles in the water via growing exponentially till even your excessive oxygen can't cut it, then dying back, levels lift again, it continues...

I'm envisaging a thick forest humus, nothing like hydro on top, just fluffy light loam that springs to the touch. Underneath a wee stream bubbles away, the air currents cooling as they rise through the loam. This is heaven for a plant.

Good organic nutrition in reasonable amounts, gentle soothing environment, let the babies walk before you make them run. As plants grow so do their needs. Fortunately, so does the microbial consortium in your soil assisting the plants development. When the plants grow a bit it's time to start adding extra. As the plant gains mass get your favourite organic treats, and remembering the adage "less is best" try a few shots of this and that and check for response.

I'll run a couple of these at some stage if I find quiet bubblers. I love the concept of the microbes keeping the pH in check. I can't get myco products but I can add soil of innoculated plants and 'brew' longer at startup.

Questions - what happens between runs? Dump everything? dump top and rinse lava rocks? Flush and reuse?

 

[rrog]

In general, the way I explain this method is that it's aerated soil with beneficial microbes. So from that perspective, this isn't a very alien method to grow plants.

I'd agree that this may set us up for a constant brewing tea, but not sure that's a bad thing.

I'm pleased as ever with the concept

 

[h.h.]

The tea question is one I had myself. I have had no problem in experience other than one bucket where the fines settled not letting in air. My own recipe, my fault.
I'm not sure of the concept of preloading everything either. I've yet to build one as described, ending up with bubbler buckets full of char and alfalfa. A little coconut milk for flavor and now I'm thinking a little bit of the willow to stop the headaches. I wonder if there would be value in using hempmilk? I found some stuff at HD with myco and some microbes.
I expect failures. If you don't fuck something up, you're not trying hard enough.

 

[rrog]

Hows the gang? Any OBBT-ers left?

I started three seedlings 6 weeks ago. One was male, so two females. One NL#5 and the other is Purple Diesel. Both looking great in the SCROG.

Started 12/12 on Xmas day. Have done a flower tea and flower foliar.

So end of February for harvest, I guess. 8 weeks of flower is common?

 

[h.h.]

I had my bubblers outside until it finally got too cold. After moving them insidewhile getting ready to move them to the room, my dog had her way with them, tearing the plants to shreds. I was quite pleased to that point. Running them inside had a certain odor that the wife didn't like, so I'm back to soil. My plan for next season is to use underground bubblers underneath the plant with a side access.

 

[rrog]

Holy smokes hh. That's just awful.

I haven't noticed any odor beyond the teas and the leaves themselves.

I'll get some pics up. I was weaving and weaving the NL#5 to keep low while the P.Diesel caught up. Now they're both at the same height for the flowering.

 

[McDanger]

The tea question is one I had myself. I have had no problem in experience other than one bucket where the fines settled not letting in air. My own recipe, my fault.
I expect failures. If you don't fuck something up, you're not trying hard enough.

This seems to be exactly the problem I keep getting. Clogging of the airstones, and flexible airwands also. When I try to blow out with compressor I end up blowing the airstone off the end of the line. I am still running them that way since I cannot access them on the bottom of the bucket. They have turned into a kind of hempy bucket. Yield does not come close to my soil plants, and every one of them got hermies.

 

[rrog]

I have two 4" airstones per bucket and a 950gpm pump. Big air movement. I anticipated this would be tempered as roots started wrapping them, but they're still pumping 6 weeks into this. I can see the water level move up and down a bit, indicating the air is moving quite a bit down there.

I used flexible blue wands when I did hydro and found they clogged too easily.

 

[MrFista]

Methinks this design is close but no cigar. I would get the soil mix, brew it in a bucket (not an obbt bucket) for a few weeks or so so the dry nutes are absorbed/taken into the microbial consortium. Then I'd put it in the obbt buckets.

Less leaching, less danger of your microbes in the water growing too thick and causing problems.