Is it time? Check my trichomes, pwease

BarcaGrow2016

BarcaGrow2016

Member
First-timer here. After battling caterpillars, mealyworms and god knows what else in an outdoor grow, our Silver Haze and Chocolope are nearly ready. I've tried to take some up-close-and-personal shots of our 6 plants' trichomes. We're aiming for cloudy, just hinting at amber (less couchlock is preferable).

What do you think? Harvest now? Wait a week?

And any opinions on giving them 24-hrs of blackout before harvest? Or on the honey/molasses a couple days beforehand thing (heard that somewhere)?
 

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roseypeach

roseypeach

Well-Known Member
BarcaGrow2016 said:
First-timer here. After battling caterpillars, mealyworms and god knows what else in an outdoor grow, our Silver Haze and Chocolope are nearly ready. I've tried to take some up-close-and-personal shots of our 6 plants' trichomes. We're aiming for cloudy, just hinting at amber (less couchlock is preferable).

What do you think? Harvest now? Wait a week?

And any opinions on giving them 24-hrs of blackout before harvest? Or on the honey/molasses a couple days beforehand thing (heard that somewhere)?
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Beautiful buds!! If it were me personally, I'd give them at least another week. Don't see any amber whatsoever, just mild clouding.

As far as the black out period goes, it's a hotly debated topic that in my opinion, is completely unnecessary. It could raise or lower your price, depending on your buyer. It's either going to go from dark green to a pale green (the most desired) or do nothing for it at all. Depends a lot on your growing techniques, temperature, genetics, etc.
 
BarcaGrow2016

BarcaGrow2016

Member
roseypeach said:
Beautiful buds!! If it were me personally, I'd give them at least another week. Don't see any amber whatsoever, just mild clouding.

As far as the black out period goes, it's a hotly debated topic that in my opinion, is completely unnecessary. It could raise or lower your price, depending on your buyer. It's either going to go from dark green to a pale green (the most desired) or do nothing for it at all. Depends a lot on your growing techniques, temperature, genetics, etc.
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Thanks! Great to have extra eyes on it - we got two diff magnifying glasses but just no experience to know what we're looking for haha. OK we'll give it some more time. I'm just worried about my whole harvest being eaten up by the critters - don't want to spray again if I'm harvesting within the safety period of the pesticide.
 
roseypeach

roseypeach

Well-Known Member
BarcaGrow2016 said:
Thanks! Great to have extra eyes on it - we got two diff magnifying glasses but just no experience to know what we're looking for haha. OK we'll give it some more time. I'm just worried about my whole harvest being eaten up by the critters - don't want to spray again if I'm harvesting within the safety period of the pesticide.
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Oh no, I wouldn't spray again at all. Easy fix for the caterpillars and mealy worms..get a pair of gloves, pull them off the plants and smash them in your fingers and throw them on the ground. Just keep an eye out and enjoy that harvest!
 
roseypeach

roseypeach

Well-Known Member
Absolutely and if you take pics on a regular basis and do decide to go for the 'all done' factor, plants take on a definite hue change at peak harvest time. One day you'll look at them they are the same then the next you see a true change in color (more of a golden cast over the entire plant instead of that pure green tint). It will look more of a white one week then golden the next.

Cloudy will give you a more energized and typically shorter buzz while a deep amber gives a more heady, long lasting couchlock high.
 
T

THE KONASSURE

Well-Known Member
looking good

I have to see the plant and go plant by plant

I normally shoot for more amber or brown than you

but they look like 1 to 3 weeks off of being finished

I like to finish with potassium sulphate or dextrose powder

some people are recommending potassium sulphate and brown sugar as the "terpinator" recipe, but dextrose and glucose and other such fine sugar powders mix with water very easy and they sell them cheap in huge tubes you know for making dextrose gym drinks with

That stuff mixes up so easy I can`t see how I`d make less mess with molasses or brown sugar ? and I can`t think of a brown sugar that`s as cheap and easy to get and mix with water as Mono dextrose powder is.
 
roseypeach

roseypeach

Well-Known Member
THE KONASSURE said:
looking good

I have to see the plant and go plant by plant

I normally shoot for more amber or brown than you

but they look like 1 to 3 weeks off of being finished

I like to finish with potassium sulphate or dextrose powder

some people are recommending potassium sulphate and brown sugar as the "terpinator" recipe, but dextrose and glucose and other such fine sugar powders mix with water very easy and they sell them cheap in huge tubes you know for making dextrose gym drinks with

That stuff mixes up so easy I can`t see how I`d make less mess with molasses or brown sugar ? and I can`t think of a brown sugar that`s as cheap and easy to get and mix with water as Mono dextrose powder is.
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Aside from the potassium sulphate, I can't imagine what they think dextrose will do for the overall plant/product. Sugar water does nothing but encourage pests, which encourages some of the worst enemies to the cannabis plant.

Please don't advise others to do this, it does nothing for the terpenes as you believe it to and really gives nothing to flowering, especially at this stage of the grow. If the plants have been properly fed throughout vegetation and preflowering, flower nutrient can be used to push for extra dense buds up until the last week.

I would like to give heads up to @BarcaGrow2016 that he will be losing weight by pulling at the cloudy to light amber stage. This may be of no concern for you if the plants are for personal use but if selling, you want all the weight you can get. In that case I would advise to push them till the leaves start to yellow and wither, and the buds have doubled or tripled in size and are nice and dense when you try to squeeze them.

The 'greenery' is of no consequence at the end, you can't smoke leaves unless they're sugar leaves, those have little THC compared to the buds. The buds can sometimes triple in size in the last stretch to full amber (last few weeks of flowering). If you feed up until the last moment, you should greatly reduce nitrogen and phosphorous. Excess N and P at the end will make for a harsh tasting, quick burning product.
 
T

THE KONASSURE

Well-Known Member
roseypeach said:
Aside from the potassium sulphate, I can't imagine what they think dextrose will do for the overall plant/product. Sugar water does nothing but encourage pests, which encourages some of the worst enemies to the cannabis plant.

Please don't advise others to do this, it does nothing for the terpenes as you believe it to and really gives nothing to flowering, especially at this stage of the grow. If the plants have been properly fed throughout vegetation and preflowering, flower nutrient can be used to push for extra dense buds up until the last week.

I would like to give heads up to @BarcaGrow2016 that he will be losing weight by pulling at the cloudy to light amber stage. This may be of no concern for you if the plants are for personal use but if selling, you want all the weight you can get. In that case I would advise to push them till the leaves start to yellow and wither, and the buds have doubled or tripled in size and are nice and dense when you try to squeeze them.

The 'greenery' is of no consequence at the end, you can't smoke leaves unless they're sugar leaves, those have little THC compared to the buds. The buds can sometimes triple in size in the last stretch to full amber (last few weeks of flowering). If you feed up until the last moment, you should greatly reduce nitrogen and phosphorous. Excess N and P at the end will make for a harsh tasting, quick burning product.
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does nothing ? really ?

Sugar is great stuff, its way better than straight water as it stops bugs going from the root zone up the plant and it encourages the bacteria and fungus in the soil/coco to breed up

Now you may think that`s a bad thing but it`s very hard to kill a plant in a few days and sugar water will show you if that soil/coco is good to re-use or if it needs some attention

Don`t tell me what advice to give people when tons of people are saying to use molasses or brown sugar with potassium sulphate and loads of companies are selling said stuff

Dextrose dissolves easy, if you check most beneficial bacteria and fungus products come with some dextrose or molasses in the recipe

Sugar is fine for the last week, way better than straight water and cheaper than full nutes even cheaper then potassium sulphate

it`ll keep any bugs in your root zone and may even attract pests to that pot over a younger plants pot

Don`t be so fast to shoot shit down you have not tried plenty of ways to use sugar, Spinosad loves some sugar mixed with it before flooding out to kill rootzone pests

I could go on but you get the point, not something I`d use in veg or early flower, I agree sugar if use incorrectly can cause problems but for the last week or 2 there`s benefits to using it in a lot of situations
 
Bud Farmer

Bud Farmer

Well-Known Member
Just from the pics, the best I can tell is you probably need another week to 10 days to get where you want. I'm like you, I like the heady stuff better and I feel like you're probably going after about the same finish that I do.
 
roseypeach

roseypeach

Well-Known Member
BarcaGrow2016 said:
Thanks! Great to have extra eyes on it - we got two diff magnifying glasses but just no experience to know what we're looking for haha. OK we'll give it some more time. I'm just worried about my whole harvest being eaten up by the critters - don't want to spray again if I'm harvesting within the safety period of the pesticide.
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So how are the plants doing so far, anymore bugs?
 
BarcaGrow2016

BarcaGrow2016

Member
roseypeach said:
So how are the plants doing so far, anymore bugs?
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As we have the six plants, we decided to go ahead and harvest three (a few days ago, curing nicely), and leave the others for another week. Those three remaining are being eaten by a bunch of little black caterpillars and what they call "barnacles", and a few more mealybugs, but no more big fat green caterpillars. I've sprayed one last time with a bit of dishsoap in water (at my mother's advice), and we'll harvest those in three or four days.

Which begs the question about washing; what's this about? Do you hose them down before harvest or once you've clipped everything you soak it? Or maybe in three or four days we won't have any residual soapy taste? Whatcha think.
 
roseypeach

roseypeach

Well-Known Member
BarcaGrow2016 said:
As we have the six plants, we decided to go ahead and harvest three (a few days ago, curing nicely), and leave the others for another week. Those three remaining are being eaten by a bunch of little black caterpillars and what they call "barnacles", and a few more mealybugs, but no more big fat green caterpillars. I've sprayed one last time with a bit of dishsoap in water (at my mother's advice), and we'll harvest those in three or four days.

Which begs the question about washing; what's this about? Do you hose them down before harvest or once you've clipped everything you soak it? Or maybe in three or four days we won't have any residual soapy taste? Whatcha think.
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The best spray I've ever used is my homemade chili pepper spray. Bugs hate the stuff and run or fly away the second the mist hits my garden plants. I don't know if I'd use it on the mj plants though as it would give you peppery soapy buds.

No, you don't want to hose the plants down unless you want moldy buds. Best bet is to pick all the buggers off that you can and once you've harvested, go through them slowly to be sure you got them all.
 
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