Thai's Blooper Reel

[thailer]

hey moses, are you talking to that ice river guy or just reading his stuff? these totes are too big and its difficult to arrange them so the line doesn't kink. i want to make his system but i talked to him to get the details on how to set up the irrigation lines. i'm seriously impressed he can grow those huge beasts in such little soil but i think its because it stays saturated 24/7. you can pick up the buckets and leave the bottom bucket in place so it's easy to switch from veg to bloom or harvest. you can clean out and inspect the reservoir because its accessible. i just need to go buy a drill bit.

 

[moses wellfleet]

I think we all have that one ‘canary in a coal mine’ strain that we use to gauge if conditions are optimum. I did that with the Cheese, to check that the SIPs were all that and they passed with flying colors!

SIPs are going really well, want to get a few more runs in before I start a thread.

 

[thailer]

man i just gotta say this forum is the best. i don't really wanna start ranting but the crowd at ICmag is great. i don't talk much and i don't read every single thread here but from my impression is that the members care about how our community interacts with each other. fights seem to get squashed fairly quickly and discussion stays constructive. i really feel like i can talk amongst my peers and it's not some high school drama at every post. so just a big thanks to all.

 

[thailer]

I think we all have that one ‘canary in a coal mine’ strain that we use to gauge if conditions are optimum. I did that with the Cheese, to check that the SIPs were all that and they passed with flying colors!

SIPs are going really well, want to get a few more runs in before I start a thread.

what's the thread gonna be about? just your findings on your runs? what exactly are you doing over there?

 

[thailer]

ok well this past run, i made more SIPs but i didn't have enough soi to fill them up so they have a few inches shy of where they should be. this round has been a PITA. every day a plant falls flat and bends right at the base where it meets the soil. i didn't add enough soil so stakes will not stand up straight to hold the weight. i'm just so frustrated. i have a couple more weeks left till i can chop.

i'm not sure if i should redesign the whole SIP containers or just add more soil? i want to grow 3' tall plants so i feel like i should have lots of soil but with this system keeping the soil moist constantly, i've been finding i can grow them out just as big with less soil because the key is the moisture consistency. with large pots that don't dry out as quick, it stays moist longer. if you look at the yogurt cup trials avanish did, it really shows how effective irrigation works for small containers. so i want to try and do this in five gallon buckets instead of totes that hold 21 gallons but its shallow. the buckets will provide the depth i need for stakes and i will have floor room for my feet. i can not step into my room because if a plant branch isn't there, its a irrigation line or tote. that's what has made the staking so difficult. i am covered in resin when i come out of the room. i feel like i am a bull in a china shop.

so the five gal buckets will be doubled up and the bottom bucket is the reservoir. it uses rubber grommets and the same irrigation line setup. the res is accessible too for cleaning and i can take the top bucket from the veg room to the bloom room without having to disconnect the lines and all that. it would work great but i am not sure of the size. i watched icemans videos over again and his five gall setup has nice sized plants but when he upgraded to ten gal buckets he bought at a hydro store, the plants and bud size was noticeably better. so i am trying to find inexpensive ten gallon containers i can make into sips but i might have to just do five galls. the buckets he bought are around $20 each for hydro growing and he needs two for each sip. i don't want to pay $40 per container. homer buckets are $4.

 

[moses wellfleet]

All those issues you are mentioning I am experiencing. One thing I did solve was a kind of home made tomato cage using wire fencing. It supports the plants great and if they get too tall I weave bamboo stakes into the wire and it holds them up no problem.

 

[thailer]

i can't explain it moses. its like the plants feel heavier when i go to pick them up and stake them. the buds are just filled with moisture and the leaves transpire all the time. i find wet spots on leaves each day. they take a lot longer to dry at harvest. i get more weight.

i think that having the water table of the SIP and such shallow soil depth causes the soil to be more saturated than when i kept only a two inches of water in the reservoir when i hand watered the SIPs. on the irrigation lines, the water table is higher i think. i can't see it now like i could before with the pvc watering pipe and dipstick dowel. so i am just guessing i didn't set it up right after i cleaned the room for the mites. that albopepper guy who had the youtube videos, mentioned that soil moisture is determined by the depth and he liked 16" but mine is like maybe 8 inches right now. they performed better when i had them filled with soil so it was more like a foot or more. the soil seems a lot more moist this round.

so i think having deeper containers will help with this and also keeping the stakes up. use some tomato cages or bamboo stakes. i dunno. but i need to do something because before the SIPs, these strains didn't need much besides a stake or two at the end of flower.

 

[thailer]

I think I am gonna chop a tote today and harvest the jelly breath. the calyx have swollen and the hairs have retracted back inside. then i can take the soil out and see where the water table line is inside the tote. i suspect it is higher than i wanted and that the bottom of the soil is sitting in water when there is supposed to be a 2-3" gap.

 

[Benny106]

Damn

 

[moses wellfleet]

I want to try maintaining the water level around 2 inches. 4 is too wet I was starting to get fungus gnats colonizing the soil surface. I have also greatly increased the perlite content of the soil.

 

[heady blunts]

some hardware stores carry 1,3,7, & 10 gallon buckets in addition to the 5’s. look in the paint section.

brewing supply stores should also have 7s & 10s.

you guys are doing a lot of r&d on these sip designs. thanks for sharing!

 

[thailer]

so i figured out what the problem is. four SIPs were in there and three of them had plants that fell over. the three that fell were of the old design meant for hand watering and i think the placement of the inlet tube effects how the irrigation works. the one plant that did well was in the design meant for the irrigation system. when i put it all back together, i had dumped all the SIPs and cleaned them. i did not pay attention to what tote i was grabbing when putting them back.

the totes designed for handwatering have holes that the water is meant to overflow from. the design for the irrigation lines have holes on the bottom. i don't think the higher holes allow for the water to know when to stop adding water. i hope that makes sense.

so after i put it all together, i noticed what i did and i filled them up anyways. the three didn't work and i didn't want to put it all back together the right way. so i raised the water level up till it worked.

well that was also a mistake. so i am going to put the system back together correctly starting today and see if the water level is low enough because i think it needs about two inches of water and two inches of space with the perlite. hope that makes sense.

 

[moses wellfleet]

I’ve started making the soil mixes much higher in perlite. I took one apart after a grow and the soil looked extremely dense and waterlogged. The earthworms are doing great in the sip so they are converting everything to castings.

I think I can do a no till manouver with my SIPs because the roots don’t go down into the res and neither do the worms. I was originally worried about roots rotting in the res and the whole shindig going anaerobic.

I figured in an environment that moist there is no such thing as too much perlite, within reason. It seems to wick just fine with the new mix!

 

[heady blunts]

one of my favorite budget cloning methods is a deep bed of perlite with an inch or two of standing water on the bottom. basically mini hempy/krusty buckets. wicks all the way to the surface no problem.

i have been wondering about the potential for anaerobic conditions at the bottom layer that is constantly saturated. good to know you’ve been looking out for it.

have either of you ever caught a whiff of ammonia or sulfur when cleaning out the tubs between runs?

 

[moses wellfleet]

one of my favorite budget cloning methods is a deep bed of perlite with an inch or two of standing water on the bottom. basically mini hempy/krusty buckets. wicks all the way to the surface no problem.

i have been wondering about the potential for anaerobic conditions at the bottom layer that is constantly saturated. good to know you’ve been looking out for it.

have either of you ever caught a whiff of ammonia or sulfur when cleaning out the tubs between runs?

I had one go anaerobic in the beginning. Believe it was my second attempt. Was following instructions to pour 1 cup of EM 1 into the res. EM 1 contains molasses, after a couple weeks a foul smelling jelly like substance was coming out on the dipstick.

Thailer suggested leaving the EM out and going with RO water. Haven’t looked back since then. The water only ever smells of roots kinda like onions and sometimes it has a yellowish tinge.

Believe me if your sip turns anaerobic your plant will let you know long before you go digging around in the container.

I was also very skeptical at first. Cannabis doesn’t like wet feet, the roots won’t be able to breathe blah blah blah. But it does work. I think the two inch layer of air between the start of your medium and the water level is key!!

 

[thailer]

one of my favorite budget cloning methods is a deep bed of perlite with an inch or two of standing water on the bottom. basically mini hempy/krusty buckets. wicks all the way to the surface no problem.

i have been wondering about the potential for anaerobic conditions at the bottom layer that is constantly saturated. good to know you’ve been looking out for it.

have either of you ever caught a whiff of ammonia or sulfur when cleaning out the tubs between runs?

i haven't. smells like nice clean soil to me. i do get a little yellow water like Moses mentions but it hasn't been an issue yet. you can add an overflow hole at the last SIP on the line and raise the control bucket up above the overflow hole, causing the water level to raise up and it will flush out the system by running water through it.

hempy buckets are what inspired me to use the perlite for the bed.

 

[thailer]

so far i have one boy, one suspected boy and one female Lemon Shiv with two others not showing sex yet. there's six other plants at a friends house and he said he hasn't noticed sex yet on them. i should remind him to check.

i need to update my lemon shiv journal soon. i think veg is so boring and to get pics on icmag, i have to email them to myself and then upload and so if i'm gonna do all that its gonna be buds and bloom pics. lol i'll upload some veg shots soon though because they're getting bigger and one is varigated.

 

[moses wellfleet]

Did you keep any of those cheese dogs in the end?

 

[heady blunts]

i mean skepticism can only last so long in the face of the healthy plants you and thailer keep posting.

i wonder if the tinge in the water is humic acids or even root exudates? if either of you are feeling daring taste a little and tell me if it's sweet or not.

either way sounds like you all are keeping things increasingly happy with the tweaks and attention to detail.

 

[thailer]

Did you keep any of those cheese dogs in the end?

no, i didn't. every time i get something with chem in it, the strain is a nanner factory. lol