The Adventures of Mr VerdantGreen

[VerdantGreen]

The plants looked more like my idea of 'happy plants' today, so i took a couple more pics. Notice how the leaves are more horizontal and seem to be presenting themselves to get maximum light ? - that shows me they are in good shape and drinking in the LED. Many factors such as time of day will influence this but i think it is a good overall indicator. They are in 2 litre pots with a mix of ready made organic potting compost and a few extras.. including 5g/litre of gypsum and 2g/litre of Dolomite lime (remember that? ) in an attempt to ward off calmag deficiency under LEDs... they seem to like it .
The Bubba D S1s are the tallest but only just:

The Chem Zhuzh are the next tallest: (the one on the right is a good example of what i like to see re. leaf angle etc.

and the Bubba Zhuzh are the shortest... but not by too much.

VG

 

[VerdantGreen]

Hey Chevy cHaze thanks for checking in mate! we cross posted ...

 

[JustGrowing420]

Great looking plants!
So 5g/litre gypsum and 2 dolomite huh?
I am using 1.5g/litre of each and worried it might be too much. I will try mixing up a batch with more next time to see.
Have you experimented with different ratios?

 

[VerdantGreen]

Hi JustGrowing420 , thinking about it, it is 4g/litre Gypsum and 2g/litre dolomite lime powder. I started with just 2g/l gypsum and the plants seemed to like it... so i upped it and added the dolo as well... and they seem to like that even better ! because my cabs aren't so tall it is sometimes hard to get the distance required between vegging plant and LED - so they get a bit 'battered ' by too much light which can fade them fast. Having a longer dark period helps to reduce DLI too.
I used to recycle my soil but, with making seeds and testing plants, as well as a problem with the dreaded 'funga snats' (damp garage that the cabs are in) i am trying to concoct a 'quick and easy' mix out of ready made garden centre soil with a few additives. the 5.7 litre pots i have to flower in to get 9 plants in the cab are a bit small and i need a rich mix and topdressing / liquid nutes to avoid too much early fade.
Also as an organic gardener for 20 years or more i have a slightly 'grumpy' attitude to some practices such as companion planting and no-till - which experience has made me feel are 'ideological' rather than actually making much positive difference when growing weed indoors.

VG

 

[.............]

Bastard 'fun gal snaks'

 

[VerdantGreen]

Bastard 'fun gal snaks'

lol, i find i can hate them slightly less by calling them an amusing name... hence funga snats !

hope you good mate
VG

 

[VerdantGreen]

Bastard 'fun gal snaks'

The also only have themselves to blame... - (i'm gnatlighting them!)

 

[VerdantGreen]

So i went ahead and topped all the plants on thursday... they would mostly end up growing too tall for my cab un-topped.. and although i do sometimes N-bend the stems, i don't think my nerves would stand doing it to half a dozen or more plants ! i also want to take cuttings and see how they respond to the topping, i have a vague idea of how i want to run the grow but i need to see how it pans out over the next week or two.
I left them in the new pots for 4-5 days after up-potting to root into the new soil a bit before topping- because, after the main growth tip is removed, the plant will divert energy into growing the sideshoots and root growth will be slower for a while.

VG

 

[q3corn]

I've been waiting for my plants to get tall enough to top/clone in the same snip. Do you think there's an advantage to topping earlier and taking cuttings later? I guess doing it later means I could take more than one cutting from each plant

 

[VerdantGreen]

hi q3corn , i can see the attraction in doing that, but the main growing tip isn't the best material for good cuttings, because they root much better taken from the lowest/lower branches (which contain more starch which provide energy for the root formation) - so i discard the growing tip when i top, and the topping encourages the sidebranches to grow and i use them for cuttings... thats not to say it is impossible to use the main tip for rooting so try it if you want.
My rules for topping are - leave at least 4 pairs of nodes on the plant to avoid topping too early and stunting the plant, and if possible, top down to a mature set of leaves as the plant will recover a bit better, so don't be scared to take a node or two off the top, and try not to just nip out a tiny bud at the top because the plant will respond more slowly.
cheers
VG

 

[q3corn]

Thanks! I hadn't heard the argument about main stems being bad for cloning, but I have noticed they don't root very well for me. I thought it was my own technique, but I guess it's not *all* my fault after all!
I'll try topping the tip of my plants next time I get to that point and take cuttings of the size branches, see how that goes. Thanks

 

[VerdantGreen]

Hi all, here are the plants a few days after topping.
The Bubba Zhuzh have slightly less sidebranching as we might expect.
The plants that have less sidebranching seem to have elongated the main stem between the nodes.

 

[VerdantGreen]

The Chem Z have the most sidebranching overall, but there is also variation with 1 showing very little and again an elongated stem.
these are the two with the most sidebranching:

close up of the one on the left which is the winner when it comes to sidebranches:

but still there is one with very little branching, and the last one:

VG

 

[VerdantGreen]

The S1s show quite a mixture: the one on the right is the tallest of the lot!

and the last one (in the foreground)

VG

 

[.............]

The S1s show quite a mixture: the one on the right is the tallest of the lot!
and the last one (in the foreground)
VG

Interesting

looking healthy

 

[VerdantGreen]

Interesting

looking healthy

Thanks, yeah they look ok, i could get quite geeky about this lol, and 3 or 4 of each is a bit of a pathetic number of plants, but the S1s should show the largest variation, being an 'F2' style segregation between the original Bubba and Chem parents, and overall they do.
Also that pic you quoted show how the extra height of the plant on the right bought it slightly too close to the LED fixture and the top leaves have curled away from the light that must be a bit too strong... whearas the one on the left is shorted and so a bit further away - and and the leaves are catching as much light as possible.
later this week i hope to take cuttings, repot and then start flower soon after.
VG

 

[Panconqueso]

how wonderful to see the variety between different phones from the same strain. Are you thinking to manage the height of the tallest one somehow before flower?

 

[VerdantGreen]

hey Panconqueso thanks. tbh i am hoping that the topping of the plants will dilute the stretch enough to flower them in my cab... but it is only a kitchen base unit so less than 3ft tall, so i may have to take further action.. we will see.
I used to specialise in modular scrog (where each plant has a separate screen attached to the pot) and normally with that method i would run 4 plants in this 2x2 cab... but when you are doing breeding projects and testing out plants you really need to be able to flower more plants each time so i am trying to devise a method to do that... and i am hoping to flower each plant with 4 main branches held vertically - for which i will need some stretch but no too much, and i have an idea to tame it if they get too tall. All that said, you can plan all you like but the plants may not behave in the way i want or expect... and the Bubba Zhuzh is likely to me a lot less stretchy than the Chem Zhuzh, whilst the Bubba D S1s could go either way !
Short answer: im going to play it by ear

Planning to repot in the next day or so and flip them to flower very soon afterwards, otherwise they will start to look hungry i think, and i should be able to get clones off all of them by now too.

VG

 

[midwestkid]

I used B.T. - Bacilus Thurengensus (may have spell wrong) anyways I mixed this into my water as a soil drench and eliminate fungus gnats quite easily.
if you read what is in gnat nix or mosquito bits I believe it's the B.T. that does the work. I think it also sells as Monterey. Anyways. I'm not the best at IPM but when I find something that works I try to pass it on.

 

[Panconqueso]

hey Panconqueso thanks. tbh i am hoping that the topping of the plants will dilute the stretch enough to flower them in my cab... but it is only a kitchen base unit so less than 3ft tall, so i may have to take further action.. we will see.
I used to specialise in modular scrog (where each plant has a separate screen attached to the pot) and normally with that method i would run 4 plants in this 2x2 cab... but when you are doing breeding projects and testing out plants you really need to be able to flower more plants each time so i am trying to devise a method to do that... and i am hoping to flower each plant with 4 main branches held vertically - for which i will need some stretch but no too much, and i have an idea to tame it if they get too tall. All that said, you can plan all you like but the plants may not behave in the way i want or expect... and the Bubba Zhuzh is likely to me a lot less stretchy than the Chem Zhuzh, whilst the Bubba D S1s could go either way !
Short answer: im going to play it by ear

Planning to repot in the next day or so and flip them to flower very soon afterwards, otherwise they will start to look hungry i think, and i should be able to get clones off all of them by now too.

VG

Excellent, I'll stay tuned