First Grow: Close to harvest?

big.MF.mike

big.MF.mike

Well-Known Member
I'm coming up on 10 weeks since flowering started and I'm wondering how much longer I have until they're ready to harvest. Also, can I remove the dead/dying leaves without causing any harm?

This is my first grow and, as you can see, the journey got a little bumpy in the middle of flowering. I believe the issue was a calcium deficiency due to low PH. The issue seemed to stop progressing after I corrected the PH.
 

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Indfireguy

Indfireguy

Well-Known Member
Hey man, unless my eyes are playing tricks on me. That looks ready. It’s a little tough to tell. But I’m pretty sure sure I don’t see any white pistils. (You could clarify for me). But looks like all your pistils have turned brown and curled back into the bud. The trichomes look right too. Your trichomes are definitely milky, and quite a few seem to have moved to amber stage. I’d probably take chop her this week if all that info I just mentioned sounds correct.
 
big.MF.mike

big.MF.mike

Well-Known Member
Indfireguy said:
Hey man, unless my eyes are playing tricks on me. That looks ready. It’s a little tough to tell. But I’m pretty sure sure I don’t see any white pistils. (You could clarify for me). But looks like all your pistils have turned brown and curled back into the bud. The trichomes look right too. Your trichomes are definitely milky, and quite a few seem to have moved to amber stage. I’d probably take chop her this week if all that info I just mentioned sounds correct.
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No white pistils on the tops, but I have a few on the lower buds. Although, I'm not sure how smokable they would be anyway.
20211008_072318.jpg20211008_072152.jpg
 
CheGueVapo

CheGueVapo

Well-Known Member
big.MF.mike said:
calcium deficiency
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Dude, i think the leaves look really shred due overfed. I agree that the triches look great and it is about time to harvest.

I dont think it is that.

Calcium defiency: lower leaves contort and curl.

Your last picture shows some lower flowers and leaves, they look good to me.

When you added Calcium and it did not revert the damage too, it might something else, like an excess.

The leaves tips and the dark green color of the leaves tell me they have a lot of nutrients in general.

Another hint is that the younger leaves (middle to top) are mostly affected from PK-excess having leave burns clorosis, brown spots too, similar too, same like Calcium defiency. The cervantes chart give you some good hint, for example that PK-excess runs into "calcium, magnesium,zinc, and iron defiency" the same time., because that excess locked the other ones out, so yousee the signs of defiency of those, but the reason beeing the PK-excess... so increasing feed for their Ca/Mg/Zn/I amounts does not help. Stopping the PK-macro-nutrient excesses helps stopping the micro-nutrient defiecies due to lockout.

Try feeding less macro-nutrients (NPK). I think you feed far too much than neccessary to achieve the same result with healthy plant. It influences the taste badly not running them into defiencies but still feeding the nutes last weeks..... if you do that for higher yielding some percent, Im sad about it!
 
big.MF.mike

big.MF.mike

Well-Known Member
CheGueVapo said:
Dude, i think the leaves look really shred due overfed. I agree that the triches look great and it is about time to harvest.

I dont think it is that.

Calcium defiency: lower leaves contort and curl.

Your last picture shows some lower flowers and leaves, they look good to me.

When you added Calcium and it did not revert the damage too, it might something else, like an excess.

The leaves tips and the dark green color of the leaves tell me they have a lot of nutrients in general.

Another hint is that the younger leaves (middle to top) are mostly affected from PK-excess having leave burns clorosis, brown spots too, similar too, same like Calcium defiency. The cervantes chart give you some good hint, for example that PK-excess runs into "calcium, magnesium,zinc, and iron defiency" the same time., because that excess locked the other ones out, so yousee the signs of defiency of those, but the reason beeing the PK-excess... so increasing feed for their Ca/Mg/Zn/I amounts does not help. Stopping the PK-macro-nutrient excesses helps stopping the micro-nutrient defiecies due to lockout.

Try feeding less macro-nutrients (NPK). I think you feed far too much than neccessary to achieve the same result with healthy plant. It influences the taste badly not running them into defiencies but still feeding the nutes last weeks..... if you do that for higher yielding some percent, Im sad about it!
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This actually makes a lot of sense because I hadn't had any CalMag issues before this started even though I'm growing in coco and I wasn't using any CalMag. I was feeding at 1.3 ec when I flipped to 12/12. During the stretch, I started seeing yellowing on the lower fan leaves, so I increased the strength until I stopped seeing more yellowing, eventually landing at 1.8. I went back down to 1.3 for the last 2 weeks. Is there anything I can do at this point to fix the taste issue?
 
CheGueVapo

CheGueVapo

Well-Known Member
Well they look pretty ripe, the main buds have high resin production. The "macrophoto" show clouded milky way triches, your state is extremely close to best moment to have the highest possible THC of the strain, nice example, the others are absolutely right.

If you not flushed it yet it (on mineral/non organic) it could benefit in taste a little from it but theres risk from damaged that damaged spots inside a bud, thats aeraes where a fungus might sprout.

A little harsh taste is not a "ruin", especially if the high-resin strain with the adequate lightning produced a high percentage of resin.
Others refer to this as "(resin-)swollen" :p

Regarding taste....
big.MF.mike said:
remove dead/dying leaves without causing any harm?
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Yes those burned spots contain a lot of catechols for example....

Chemically this happens in nature on purpose when the leaves falling the ground in autumn loosing its beautiful colors turning brownish...

The actual process looks like this, and differs from fermentation with "microbes":
catechols.png
These catchols taste horrible in my opinion!
They are result of denaturalisation of the plant tissues.

You should not smoke the burned leaves for superior taste, but you can try sieve them for example to extract the resin without those catechols. Extracting them with solvents alcohol or butane high likely extracts the catechols too, so I would prefer dry sieving the broken leaves with lots of resin, not trashing them.
 
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CheGueVapo

CheGueVapo

Well-Known Member
big.MF.mike said:
Is there anything I can do at this point to fix the taste issue?
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Those heavily damaged burned leaves close to the bud, inspect them wisely when harvesting. My suggestion is collect them seperately and dry sieve those triches.

I'ts not a big deal consuming them, as far as I know, they are not specifically toxic, smokers know the risks of smoking, these catechols just taste harsh when smoking. If I'd had nothing I still would smoke them, not buying from other. ;)

If those chlorosis spots are induced by nutrition, what is most likely the case, wether it be defiency of excess, then these often cover the hole leaves, not just what you see in the light - it sometimes goes deep into inside the buds on the small flower-leaves and if you have big dense buds these small rotting tissue spots are high danger catching fungus, depending on how dense they grow, how strong the circulation ventilation is, whats the ambient rH temperature...

That's why maybe flushing and waiting several more day might not be a good idea, as this high likely raises humidity, too.

I would just harvest them. Still I think the flower-buds is excellent result, especially considering that damage with the leaves. Im enjoying them buds looking so great. Thats amazing. The plant dont mind the leaves too, it only cares for her fruits. Enjoy it! My criticism is not meant to undermine your good results, I just hope my thoughts analysing what might could have gone wrong with the leaves there helps you a little avoiding it next time.

Im experience with soil, Im not experienced with coco. With good soil you start with no feed (mineral) and low feed (organic) then start or increase it with the first since of defiency.... that makes finding out what it is a lot easier. Can't be excess, thats for sure. Defiency signs is reversible and under low-medium light intensity nutriants are not the limiting factor, so thats the safest way to proceed, slowly, calm with the wild horse, cowboy :). I think with coco you need to maintain generally a lower optimum PH and start feeding right amountsof minerals earlier, because there is no great ion exchange capacity like clays and loam have for depositing nutes, similar to hydroponic, you must feed or the soon run into defiency. Still coco can be strongly prefertilised for veg-stadium, Im not exactly sure about that, so don't mind me if im wrong. Im not a coco expert, sry.

Enjoy it! Keep growin'!
 
CheGueVapo

CheGueVapo

Well-Known Member
I only found a german source explaining the "catechols" in the "autumn" pretty easy if you know the language.


(By fact they are technically a "polyphenol" haha, but even the taste on the tounge is bitter and unpleasant IMHO.... just chew some brown dried out leaves compared to green.... uarghs)
 
big.MF.mike

big.MF.mike

Well-Known Member
CheGueVapo said:
Those heavily damaged burned leaves close to the bud, inspect them wisely when harvesting. My suggestion is collect them seperately and dry sieve those triches.

I'ts not a big deal consuming them, as far as I know, they are not specifically toxic, smokers know the risks of smoking, these catechols just taste harsh when smoking. If I'd had nothing I still would smoke them, not buying from other. ;)

If those chlorosis spots are induced by nutrition, what is most likely the case, wether it be defiency of excess, then these often cover the hole leaves, not just what you see in the light - it sometimes goes deep into inside the buds on the small flower-leaves and if you have big dense buds these small rotting tissue spots are high danger catching fungus, depending on how dense they grow, how strong the circulation ventilation is, whats the ambient rH temperature...

That's why maybe flushing and waiting several more day might not be a good idea, as this high likely raises humidity, too.

I would just harvest them. Still I think the flower-buds is excellent result, especially considering that damage with the leaves. Im enjoying them buds looking so great. Thats amazing. The plant dont mind the leaves too, it only cares for her fruits. Enjoy it! My criticism is not meant to undermine your good results, I just hope my thoughts analysing what might could have gone wrong with the leaves there helps you a little avoiding it next time.

Im experience with soil, Im not experienced with coco. With good soil you start with no feed (mineral) and low feed (organic) then start or increase it with the first since of defiency.... that makes finding out what it is a lot easier. Can't be excess, thats for sure. Defiency signs is reversible and under low-medium light intensity nutriants are not the limiting factor, so thats the safest way to proceed, slowly, calm with the wild horse, cowboy :). I think with coco you need to maintain generally a lower optimum PH and start feeding right amountsof minerals earlier, because there is no great ion exchange capacity like clays and loam have for depositing nutes, similar to hydroponic, you must feed or the soon run into defiency. Still coco can be strongly prefertilised for veg-stadium, Im not exactly sure about that, so don't mind me if im wrong. Im not a coco expert, sry.

Enjoy it! Keep growin'!
Click to expand...
I won't be able to trim them until tomorrow anyway(maybe even Sunday), so I'll try to get at least 1 or 2 days flush. I have pretty good air circulation, so I think I'll be ok.

Also, I like the criticism. It will help me have a bigger, better harvest the next time.
 
twentyeight.threefive

twentyeight.threefive

Well-Known Member
big.MF.mike said:
I won't be able to trim them until tomorrow anyway(maybe even Sunday), so I'll try to get at least 1 or 2 days flush. I have pretty good air circulation, so I think I'll be ok.

Also, I like the criticism. It will help me have a bigger, better harvest the next time.
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Make sure you run like 50 gallons of fresh water through each to get those nasty nutrients out of the buds. You don't want black ash either.
 
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