Fun Grow

Ladies and Gentlemen may I present my Caribbean balcony grow in the Northeast USA.

During pre-pandemic travels I acquired a few seeds. 10 seeds from St Lucia. 5 from Antigua. The flowers I found the seeds in were nothing remarkable to report on. With the lock down in place I decided to start a grow. Plus I don’t like paying the dispensary rates $$$.

The idea here is to perfect my green thumb using less than desired genetics. After this trail I will partake in a much more sophisticated grow.

As I indulge myself into the nuances of growing cannabis this website has a vast wealth of knowledge. Here’s my attempt to contribute.

Seeds:
3 from St Lucia and 3 from Antigua.
All grown within same parameters. The medium, water, nutrients and pot sizes same except 1 slow grower.

Started seeds in moist paper towels then transferred to 1 gallon then to their current and final pots of 3.7 gallons. 1 plant still in 1 gallon pot.

Medium/soil:
Coco coir mix 50%
Espoma Land and Sea 40%
Worm castings 10%

Nutrients:
Unsulphured molasses 1 tablespoon per gallon. Given every other watering.
Only 1 feeding of blood meal tea at 25days old. Used 1 tablespoon per gallon of water.

Water:
Chloride free water via faucet tap water filter. Just picked up a pH meter today. Tap water is 7.5 pH and 038 TDS.

Topped 1, Fimmed 1, 3 still within range of my acceptable height. Monitor is I need to top of fim; however, it may be too let in season to top at this time.

They Caribbean ladies (fingers crossed) are 29 days old today. All were look great until 2 days ago. They are presenting some fan leafs browning.

The suspicion of the cause is

1. High nitrogen from the blood meal.
2. High pH. The new discovery of the tap water pH being 7.5 may have made the soil alkaline. Blocking some nutrient such as phosphorus

Question:

1. What’s the cause of the brown leaves?
2. How to identify the cause?
3. How to correct the issue?

For starters I will be pH my water to 6.5.
Discontinuing molasses until flowering. Investing in some more nutrients. Not sure which brand or products to purchase. I will test the pH of the run off water tomorrow morning and report my findings.

Looking for some advice on what to do next.

Day 33

Check out this topping job on my tallest plant. Topped it five days ago. Didn’t grow much first two days. Now it’s growing out from where I cut the top off.

On another plant. What’s wrong with this leaf? Top fan leaf. Lighter green color. Must be some deficiency.

Day 44
Transplanted.

3 plants in 4.8 gallon pots
1 plant in 6.5 gallon pot
1 plant still running in the small 1 gallon pot. Slow grower.

•Medium and ratios:

Coco coir chocoloco. (5 parts)
humus compost .7-.5-.5 (2 parts)
Cow compost .5-.5-.5 (1 part)
Perlite (2 parts)
Espoma soil pH lowerer. 2-3 table spoons.

All mixes evenly

•WaterIng and feeding:

Schedule is water, feed, water, feed
It was every other day in smaller pots. Might be longer intervals in the large pots. However, the medium is slightly different

Feeding-
Filtered tap water. pH 7.5.
Add FF grow big 5 ml per gallon of water.
pH drops to 6.8 after adding FF big grow.
Then I dissolve 2 table spoons Espoma pH lower in tap water. Add that to the did grow big and water. pH 6-6.5.

Watering-
Filtered tap water pH down to 6.5ish

run off water pH tested at 6.8ish. Never over 7

•Starting LST to promote even canopy growth. Still can not determine male or females. Should have 7 weeks of veg expecting pre-flowers to appear early September.

Losing about 2.5 hours of sunlight per day.

At this rate these plants will be twice the size as I expect.

On the plant with the regrowth of the growth tip. You fimmed it instead of topping it. Happens as I assume you topped it when that shute was very small. I have done that before and usually cut it off again as it crowds the 2 new growth tips. As to your earlier pics with the browning fan leaves thats some sort of deficiency. You should not mix soil and coco. Coco needs nutrients with every watering and presents a conflict of interest. Looks good still. Good job.

Southside112 said:

On the plant with the regrowth of the growth tip. You fimmed it instead of topping it. Happens as I assume you topped it when that shute was very small. I have done that before and usually cut it off again as it crowds the 2 new growth tips. As to your earlier pics with the browning fan leaves thats some sort of deficiency. You should not mix soil and coco. Coco needs nutrients with every watering and presents a conflict of interest. Looks good still. Good job.

Click to expand...

Thank man!

The unintentional Fimmed plant is the biggest of the 5. Growing out good with 7 cola canopy with the help of lst. Unfortunately it might be a male. Bummer. I’ll give it another week?!

Good point on the coco and soil mix. My rational is the NPK of the soil is low and by the time flowering comes along and a few flushes it’ll be minimal. Trial and error. I read somewhere on the forum coco and compost mix is a good medium. Next season I’ll try a few different mediums. 100% coco vs 50%coco/50%soil, maybe some straight compost too. On a side note, the coco I used is not 100% coco. It’s fox farm coco loco. added a picture of the soil. I’ll use it again. next time I’m going to try FF Lucky dog.

Day 48

This is my male plant. Still can’t believe it’s a boy. It’s looking good. I’m torn between keeping it to pollinate my potential ladies. Would be a good breeding male.
Need to research how to store the pollen. I would imagine the pollen would fertilizer my other plants before I can harvest it.