First Grow - 5x Girl Scout Cookies Auto.

Brandon137

Well-Known Member
Hi all, was very cautious about posting a grow journal, however I feel it could be beneficial to me, in terms of tips and advice from others! This is my first ever grow. I would really appreciate any tips, pointers, anything you can give me to help.

Set up;
I’ll be growing 5x FastBuds Girl Scout Cookies Autoflower.

1.2 x 1.2 x 2m grow tent.

600W HPS bulb dual spectrum with reflector, ballast.

Full extraction system, carbon filter, 5inch extractor fan, ducting.

I’ve got 5x 12 litre pots, filled each with 10 litres of soil, which is 2.2 gallons approx. I read this would be more than sufficient for a decent auto.

Soil - plant magic soil supreme

Nutrients - plant magic old timer organic bloom and grow.

I’ve got a full digital thermometer which monitors temps and humidity.

I’ve also got various PH testing kits, and PH adjust.

Lights will be on 20 hours light 4 hours dark, controlled by a heavy duty timer.

I have fans inside the tent for air circulation. I have a 4 inch passive air duct. No intake air fan.

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You may want to have more than one air intake if it's just passive I had the same set up and needed 2 or 3 if I remember correctly otherwise the fan was working hard even with it slowed down with a fan speed controller
 

Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Haven’t done a proper update for a few days. The plants are doing well. The 5 Girl Scout cookies are all doing amazingly well, even the smaller one is now catching up. The glue gelato plant had a few issues, mainly with heat stress. I’ve lowered the temps to 27-28C now. Humidity is 53% at the moment.

They have all had a good water, and are doing well. They’ve had 3 feeds now where I’ve added plant magic Old Timers Grow Nutes. First feed was 1ml per litre.. each plant had a litre. Second feed was 1ml per litre and each plant had a litre. (that was in week 2, so total feed was 2ml in 2ltrs water within 7 day period) Third feed was about 12 hours ago as they hit week 3 - they had 1.5ml per litre and each plant has had a litre. I’ll water again in 2 days time and add another litre, with 1.5ml of grow in (so total feed for week 3 will be 3ml of grow per plant with 2ltrs water in 7 day period)

The plants are showing absolutely no signs of having too much nutrients or any signs they’re not liking what I’m doing - so I’ll continue as I am.

plants are ranging currently between 10-13cm

4 plants are now on day 15
2 plants are now on day 13

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Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Plants? What plants... these are bushes now. Aha!!

Day 20 update.
Tallest plant - 30cm height
Smallest plant - 21cm height

plants have grown... a lot... since the last update. These last few days they’ve gone a bit wild. Growth everywhere. 3 out of 6 have now started showing signs of flowering I believe (will make separate post on that) .. lots of nice branching.

I have got to the point where I’m just taking each day as it comes. Each day I check a few times and they always have grown more. No plant is showing any signs of any nutrient burn.. I’ve given them a total of 3ml of grow per plant in total over the last 7 days at week 3. They had 1.5ml in 1ltr water which was given to them at the start of the week, then a mid week feed of just water; then just before the weekend they had another 1.5ml in 1ltr. I will repeat the process for week 4 then into week 5 depending on what state the plants are in I will consider giving them bloom nutrients for the beginning of flowering. I plan to mix grow and bloom nutrients initially from week 5 till around week 6/7. but more on that when the time comes. Until then it’s a step learning curve.. I’m not letting my guard down for one second. I’m still constantly monitoring my temps which are between 27-28C and RH 50-55% currently

Pictures;
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Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Day 26 update. Wow. I honestly don’t know what I’m doing, but whatever it is, the plants are just loving every single day. Guess playing them Ed Sheeran paid off ahaha !

I’ve had to do some light deforestation on some of the lower leaves a few days ago.. this was because there was some yellowing on the leaves at the very bottom of the plant. I was concerned that it was a nitrogen problem, but everything I read suggested it wasn’t. The issue wasn’t spreading to other leaves, the plant was growing faster than ever.. they had also just had a full 2ltr feed with 4ml of grow nutrients in, it didn’t make sense. By chance I looked underneath the leaf and saw mud and soil on it, so my only deduction was that when the plant was smaller, maybe the leaves touched the soil which had fresh nutrient water in, and maybe burnt the leaves?

When I pulled the leaves off they had a proper growth spurt. They say you should listen to what your plant is telling you, observe the plant, it’s a living thing.. it was telling me it was happy and still is - there was no signs of slowing growth, no signs of yellow leaves, no signs of curling or crispy leaves...so I guess it’s happy ahaha I’ll just carry on as I am.

Feed within the last 7 days - 4ltrs water with 8ml grow in, split into two feeds. This is per plant. Appreciate it’s heavy on the nutrients, but the plants are responding very well.

average height of all 6 plants; 50cm tall.
HPS light distance to top of plants - 21inches.
Temps in tent; 27.5C
RH ; 55%
Day 26 - showing signs of flowering but I’m holding off on introducing bloom just yet. I’m gona stay hard on the grow nutrients for 1 more week into week 4, then in week 5 I will introduce a mix off 50/50 grow and bloom, then into week 6 onwards itll

apologise the pics aren’t the best. Didn’t realise how hard it is to take pics with a HPS lamp on aha

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Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Beautiful looking ladies!
cheers! They’re doing alright! Noticed a bit of light nute burn on the tips of some of the leaves today, but I’m not surprised, I’ve heavily fed them the past few weeks... so I’ve decided that next feed when I introduce bloom, I’m going to lower the amount of nutes I’m using so it doesn’t make the situation worse lol
 

Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Day 32 update. In their 5th week now. 2 days ago I gave them a mix of feed, 50/50 grow and bloom. It was 2ltrs of water per plant, 2ml of grow 2ml of bloom.

ive noticed a definite slow in growth. I’m not sure if I’ve stunned them by giving them a mix of grow and bloom nutrients, or if giving them the bloom nutrients has kick started flowering properly and the plants are simply taking time to focus on the beginning of bud growth instead of the plant growing bigger. I’m unsure. 4 of the 6 plants are showing clear bud sites and flowers, 2 are almost there. Coincidentally the 2 that are almost there are the 2 plants which were planted 36 hours after the other lot. In terms of size they’re still on par with the rest.

I’ve kept my temps and RH consistent between 40-50% I did have a day where the RH was 70 and I panicked, I almost brought a dehumidifier and blasted my fan on full and it went down fast.

Being a first time grower I’ve learnt a lot. I would stress to anyone growing that it’s important you learn from what your doing - just to improve for future. I’m massively regretting not using bigger pots and more soil. Because I didn’t compact the soil down enough over time the soil level has dropped massively. I’m not sure if this is normal, but when I look at it I can’t help but wonder if the plants would be doing even better had I put them in bigger pots with more compressed soil. I am also regretting not growing more. There’s still comfortably more room for at least 3 more. I might backtrack on that if these plants get much bigger but at this level of bushing there would have been enough room for 3 more. Maybe the next grow will be 9?

anyway. Few pics I’ve taken. Reminder to all I’m not a professional and it’s hard taking pics with a HPS light on.
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Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Forgot to add; in terms of smell. No smell at all yet. Ok a very faint smell... but honestly on the whole nothing. In terms of predicted yields, i reckon I’ll be extremely lucky if I get an ounce per plant. But hey it’s the taking part that counts right? Lol
 

KootenayDIY

Well-Known Member
Still looking good!
You might get an increase of stretch in the next week and the smell will start to creep in by week 2 of flower. Smells sweet and earthy. I’ve got my journal in the organic section if you want to look at my growth. I’m using 5 gallon pots.
Keep up the good work!
 

Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Still looking good!
You might get an increase of stretch in the next week and the smell will start to creep in by week 2 of flower. Smells sweet and earthy. I’ve got my journal in the organic section if you want to look at my growth. I’m using 5 gallon pots.
Keep up the good work!
will defo check it out, you’re growing GSC too right? Will defo be worth checking out especially if you’re ahead of me I can see what to expect
 

Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
Day 35 update.

flushed with 2 ltrs of 6.5PH water. Noticed nute burn on the tips of some of the leaves and did not want this to get progressively worse. I’ve been hard on them with nutrients.. every feed has had high amounts in. It’s not had just pure water at any stage except the start and so with new found knowledge on nutrient lockout, and nutrient burn, I decided the best course of action would be some water only with no nutrients.

surprisingly, the glue gelato plant has now laid claim to queen of the tent. She’s outgrown all the Girl Scout Cookie plants. She’s only just showing signs of flowering, and is still growing new bud spots and sprouting new leaves daily.

This is a bit of a concern, as I naively thought they’d be finished all around the same sort of time so I could use the tent to dry the bud, however this glue gelato plant is at least a week behind the GSC plants, not in terms of size, as it’s bigger than all the GSC plants, but in terms of flowering. The GSC plants are all budding beautifully whereas this isn’t yet, so I now have to contend with the fact that I’m gona have plants finishing at different times which means whilst the Glue Gelato Plant is still growing I’ll need to find somewhere else to dry the bud from the GSC which will finish before the GG.:wall:

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TheDifferenceX

Well-Known Member
These are looking good. Really, you've got 2 things to focus on.

1) Mix some perilite with your soil next time. 20-30% perilite is ok, it helps so much with not having to water so often. You can go 2-3 days between waterings.

2) Do anything in your power to drop your temps to 75 F. If not it's ok because you've already went through a decent amount of stretching, so there's not much you can do this run about that. But with lower temps, you can lower the lights and keep the plant from stretching as much. I still struggle with this, but a shorter bushier plant will allow all bud sites to get good lighting.
 

Cillit_Bang

Well-Known Member
I’ll do a proper update in a few days, but today is the first day I’ve really looked at the plants and got super excited over the potential finished product. Throughout the grow I’ve been so concerned over making sure the plants grow healthy that I didn’t give much thought really to the end product. Seeing the buds form like this just makes me beyond excited ! :bigjoint:
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TheDifferenceX

Well-Known Member
I’ll do a proper update in a few days, but today is the first day I’ve really looked at the plants and got super excited over the potential finished product. Throughout the grow I’ve been so concerned over making sure the plants grow healthy that I didn’t give much thought really to the end product. Seeing the buds form like this just makes me beyond excited ! :bigjoint:
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I love this stage of their growth. They are done stretching and just keep swelling and plumping up. I agree, it's beautiful.

My favorite is to rub the stem and then smell my fingers. :weed:
 
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