RUJU's First Grow - The Mini Jungle (Start - 9/23/17)

Hey y'all & welcome! This is my first grow & first grow journal. It's also up on another forum, but there's not much traffic so I haven't gotten as much insight into my grow as I'd like... so I'll be posting here as well.

I'm running a perpetual grow with 27 strains atm in several 10'x5'x6.5' grow tents & a 3 car garage, but I'll be dropping several strains over time to make room for my breeding program. I've been using Vipar Spectra 1200w LEDs, however, I've recently decided to upgrade to Morsen Max12 3600w COB lights. Also testing out the REMO nutrient line for this soil grow.

This is going to be a long journal so buckle in, smoke multiple blunts, & enjoy the ride. All haters/lovers/etc. welcome!

Strains in Vegetative Phase: 4-6 Weeks In

1. Northern Lights - Seeds
2. Cheese Auto - Seeds
3. Big Bud - Seeds
4. Blue Dream - Seeds
5. OG Kush - Seeds
6. 420 Carat - Seeds
7. Julius Caesar - Clones
8. Green Crack - Clones
9. Orgasmic OG Kush - Clones
10. Gorilla Pineapple Express - Clones
11. OGKB (aka OGKushBreath) - Clones
12. Obama OG - Clones
13. Black Lavender - Clones
14. Do-Si-Dos - Clones
15. Pink Gorilla Glue - Clones
16. Bruce Banner OG - Clones
17. Gelato - Clones

New Strains: 11/2/17 Seeds Planted

1. Triangle Kush - Seeds
2. Sunset Sherbet - Seeds
3. Lost Coast OG (Emerald Triangle Seeds) - Seeds
4. Fire OG BX3 (Dr. Frost) - Seeds
5. Midnight Fantasy F2 (Farmhouse Genetics) - Seeds
6. Light Pink (THC Development) - Seeds
7. Lemon Sage OG (3RED 3Y 42) - Seeds Freebie
8. Dragons Hashplant F1 (Dragons Flame Genetics) - Seeds Freebie
9. Alpha Omega (Swamp Boys) - Seeds
10. Legend of Nigeria (Swamp Boys) - Seeds

Total = 27 Strains

Vegetative Week 5 - Day 4 (11/7/17)

All the NL, BD, OG Kush, 420 Carat, & Big Bud that I've started from seed are growing a bit all over the place... some are tall & bushy (22"), some are mid-sized with fewer leaves (18"), & some are squat (14"-15"). In comparison, the clones that I've bought are all growing pretty uniform (14"-16"). I think this is due to the genetics, but possibly due to my growing skills (or lack thereof). Anyways, the new seeds I ordered awhile back were from some reputable breeders so we'll see how they grow in comparison.

Indica Dominant Strains - Pretty uneven growth, but I believe this is due to the genetics since I've been feeding them the same nutrients with the same frequency. The other possibility is that the garage wasn't a great environment for the plants & some of the plants on the edges didn't get adequate lighting.


Top View - Northern Lights & Blue Dream - Pretty uneven growth, but I'm hoping with the CO2 & new growing environment the shorties will grow a bit faster.


Northern Lights - Mother: This is the original Northern Lights plant that I was considering for a Mother candidate & is now the official NL Mother I'll use for clones (a few more weeks before I can take cuttings)! She's continued to surpass the other NL plants (all plants really) in height (22"), bushiness, new growth sites, thickness, recovery from FIM/nutrient problems, etc. That said, it's showing more Sativa phenotypes (seen in the long thin leaves & height) compared to her sisters.



NL Mother Sativa Leaves - As you can see the leaves are large & thin with 11 leaf tips, which are characteristics of a Sativa.


Overview of Clones: All of these clones have been growing quite uniform even though there are 8 strains in this tent. While the Indica strains (shown above) suffered from mild nutrient burn, these girls were perfectly healthy & I haven't run into any issues so far. These girls are all ~14"-16" tall with the exception of the Dream Queen (aka Green Crack) in the corner right which is ~22" tall.





New Strains Germinating: I popped these seeds into Rapid Rooters on 11/2/17 & they're growing steadily. I'll be transplanting them shortly. The top portion of the picture without sprouted seeds are 420 Carat & Lost Coast OG from Emerald Triangle Seeds. I had issues with 420 Carat seeds before so I won't be using that seed bank again & the Lost Coast OG I think are either old seeds or duds. Still 0/12 on the Lost Coast OG is pretty awful... Any suggestions or tips for dealing with old seeds? I don't think I'll be buying Emerald Triangle Seeds again after this, but it could also be the seed bank problem. Anyways, don't want to chance it since I spent $125 on those seeds.

Lookn good so far. Just my personal opinion I would use the Viparspectra leds over the morsen cob light. If you get it from Amazon. It says 3600 watt it' no where near that. You'l be lucky it pulls 600 watts. Maybe 550 watts. I've flowered with those Viparspectras and they are worth the price. But to do a 10x5 tent you would need atleast 2 for veg. They will veg a 5x5 foot print. But not even close to that size in flower. Just my opinion. Except the wattage of the light and footprint of the light. What I said is really close to what they are capable of. Good luck. I' following along

whytewidow said:

Lookn good so far. Just my personal opinion I would use the Viparspectra leds over the morsen cob light. If you get it from Amazon. It says 3600 watt it' no where near that. You'l be lucky it pulls 600 watts. Maybe 550 watts. I've flowered with those Viparspectras and they are worth the price. But to do a 10x5 tent you would need atleast 2 for veg. They will veg a 5x5 foot print. But not even close to that size in flower. Just my opinion. Except the wattage of the light and footprint of the light. What I said is really close to what they are capable of. Good luck. I' following along

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Thanks for stopping by whytewidow & thanks for the advice! I actually just got a lux meter late last night & you're absolutely right, the Morsen COB isn't really that much brighter & puts out way too much heat. My grow tent went all the way up to 97F this morning... I'm switching back to my 3x ViparSpectra 1200w per grow tent. How would you suggest supplementing my grow lights for flowering period (HPS?)? Or any other tips for flowering you'd suggest for a noobie? Thanks for your help!

MrS1lver said:

Thanks for stopping by whytewidow & thanks for the advice! I actually just got a lux meter late last night & you're absolutely right, the Morsen COB isn't really that much brighter & puts out way too much heat. My grow tent went all the way up to 97F this morning... I'm switching back to my 3x ViparSpectra 1200w per grow tent. How would you suggest supplementing my grow lights for flowering period (HPS?)? Or any other tips for flowering you'd suggest for a noobie? Thanks for your help!

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Look on Amazon for far red and infraed lights. They kind of look like spot lights, like from a motion light. The Viparspectras will honestly flower them just fine. But they need a little more red in them for flowering. Hps will help with yield. But will also add heat. So you could go with a few red lights. Maybe like one in each corner aimed diwn at an angle towards the center of your room. Or use a smaller hps and two Viparspectras. Like a 400 watt hps in the middle and a vip1200 on each side. If you have good temp control that' what I would do. If you have temp problems go with the smaller reds. I did one 400 watt hps in the middle and 2 Bloomspect 300s that I modded on each side of the hps. And pulled 366 dried flower from 2 plants.

Like these or something like these.

whytewidow said:

Look on Amazon for far red and infraed lights. They kind of look like spot lights, like from a motion light. The Viparspectras will honestly flower them just fine. But they need a little more red in them for flowering. Hps will help with yield. But will also add heat. So you could go with a few red lights. Maybe like one in each corner aimed diwn at an angle towards the center of your room. Or use a smaller hps and two Viparspectras. Like a 400 watt hps in the middle and a vip1200 on each side. If you have good temp control that' what I would do. If you have temp problems go with the smaller reds. I did one 400 watt hps in the middle and 2 Bloomspect 300s that I modded on each side of the hps. And pulled 366 dried flower from 2 plants.

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Thanks for the tips & insight whytewidow! I have a bunch (80x) of 41w T5HO LEDs (40x Veg & 40x Bloom) that I'll be setting up in the tents to get better coverage on the sides & areas that don't get much light from the main top lights... Do you think this would suffice for more light coverage & red light spectrum or would you still suggest taking a look into those led lamps?

Fantastic final yield on your 2 plants & I'll definitely take a look at possibly adding an HPS. Currently with my 3x ViparSpectra per grow tent the temps get to 88F, but if I tweak the various inputs (fans, exhaust, etc.) I should be able to get the temp more stable. That said, if I run the exhaust fans too often then the RH will drop to ~40%-45%. Would this RH be an issue since I've checked on various sites & they say for Veg phase I should stick between RH 40%-60%? Thanks for the help & I'll be posting more pics later tomorrow night once I've finished transplanting a few plants.

The lights you have that your going to add will help alot. But like I said the Viparspectras will flower just fine. There are tons of dank grows with them. Yeah jus keep an eye on your rh. I normally don' worry too much about it in veg. But flower cycle I keep an eye on it.

Just a quick update because the sky is falling...

My oldest plants (NL, BD, OG Kush, Big Bud, & Julius Caesar) are having some issues~. Their bottom leaves began slowly turning yellow, some with black spots (Cal deficiency), & then abruptly withered away. At first i thought my girls were eating themselves (sucking nutrients from their bottom leaves), but i fed them a bit last night & the problem got worse today...








This OG Kush plant is looking by far the worst. Looks like it’s rotting/rusting. Any ideas on what’s going on and how to fix? Thanks in advance!

First guess is toxicity. Second guess is humidity issues. Third guess is a combo of both. How heavy and often are you adding nutes? Are they organic or chemical? I've found from personal experience too many plants with all that soil having water added to it transpires and you get a muggy, muggy environment where a myriad of shit can go wrong. What are your RH%'s? I've also found if your soil is fresh and full of microbes and starter nutes that come in the soil you don't really need much for nutes. People are over fertilizing plants rampantly nowadays to up yield. In that sense they are hurting the quality of the overall yield. 9/10 times these plants yellowing and "eating themselves " is not a deficiency but an overabundance of unnecessary nutrients build up. People are literally cooking the plants they 'love'
I'm only saying that because my plants are usually still a lush green by week 7-8 in flower. Nutes don't equal yield. Understanding what the plant wants environmentally equals yield AND quality.

After studying the symptoms i decided to partially flushed each plant twice today with 1 gal RO water & also plucked the dead leaves. They aren’t looking as sad as before, but would rather avoid such issues in the future so any advice is much appreciated. Luckily, there hasn’t been any new dead foliage or spread of the symptoms so hopefully the RO flush worked.





After a few puffs of my Mimosa, i think these issues were created by overfeeding til toxicity & a possible salt build-up that created a nutrient lock-out. I used a variation of Subcool’s Super Soil mix & then fed nutrients every 4 days, which might’ve been overkill. If i use Subcool’s Super Soil can i still nutrient feed every week or at what frequency would be best? I’ll go back to feeding once a week or every other week with plain RO feedings in between. If you have a better suggestion I’m all ears.

ColoradoCheshire said:

First guess is toxicity. Second guess is humidity issues. Third guess is a combo of both. How heavy and often are you adding nutes? Are they organic or chemical? I've found from personal experience too many plants with all that soil having water added to it transpires and you get a muggy, muggy environment where a myriad of shit can go wrong. What are your RH%'s? I've also found if your soil is fresh and full of microbes and starter nutes that come in the soil you don't really need much for nutes. People are over fertilizing plants rampantly nowadays to up yield. In that sense they are hurting the quality of the overall yield. 9/10 times these plants yellowing and "eating themselves " is not a deficiency but an overabundance of unnecessary nutrients build up. People are literally cooking the plants they 'love'
I'm only saying that because my plants are usually still a lush green by week 7-8 in flower. Nutes don't equal yield. Understanding what the plant wants environmentally equals yield AND quality.

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Hey Cheshire,
Thanks for stopping by and i really appreciate your advice! I think your diagnosis is spot on since i was overzealous with the nutes/feeding. The RH roams from 45%-65%, temps 75F-86F, & my fans bring air in & out of the tent every hour for 15 min. That said, it does feel muggy every now & then in the afternoon so I’ll open the tent up & let them all breathe.

How often do you feed with nutrients &/or water? Any insight is appreciated.

I will space feedings out about 4-5 waterings. I'm real careful now because as soon as you see burned tips you have at least 2-3 waterings of straight water to dilute your nute levels. Once your soil is saturated it needs time to dilute. Plants can only metabolize so much nutes at a time.
As far as humidity. Once you get over 20 plant count a good dehumidifier is necessary. Otherwise you have a 75%+ chance of mold. A plant will show when it wants nutes by losing vigor. Which if you use good soil is rare.
Nutes sully your end product. Too many growers want yield instead of quality and it's hindering our understanding of the plant. Let it do it's thing. People need to stop misdiagnosing nute shock. Plants shouldn't look raggedy and yellow at finish. People think it's loss of nitrogen, but if we remember once the stretch is done, the plants need for nitrogen is near nothing.
Instead of using nutrients for huge solid nuggets, instead do LST and topping to get the most vigor you can naturally.
My current grow I topped each plant for 8 colas, and did some heavy duty LST, and I can say they've been the most robust plants I've had so far. Still not at soda bottle stalks, but getting closer.

ColoradoCheshire said:

I will space feedings out about 4-5 waterings. I'm real careful now because as soon as you see burned tips you have at least 2-3 waterings of straight water to dilute your nute levels. Once your soil is saturated it needs time to dilute. Plants can only metabolize so much nutes at a time.
As far as humidity. Once you get over 20 plant count a good dehumidifier is necessary. Otherwise you have a 75%+ chance of mold. A plant will show when it wants nutes by losing vigor. Which if you use good soil is rare.
Nutes sully your end product. Too many growers want yield instead of quality and it's hindering our understanding of the plant. Let it do it's thing. People need to stop misdiagnosing nute shock. Plants shouldn't look raggedy and yellow at finish. People think it's loss of nitrogen, but if we remember once the stretch is done, the plants need for nitrogen is near nothing.
Instead of using nutrients for huge solid nuggets, instead do LST and topping to get the most vigor you can naturally.
My current grow I topped each plant for 8 colas, and did some heavy duty LST, and I can say they've been the most robust plants I've had so far. Still not at soda bottle stalks, but getting closer.

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Hey Cheshire, Thanks sharing your knowledge! I’ll follow your watering instructions & am currently just focusing on RO watering til the nute toxicity gets fixed. I have some decent sized dehumidifiers that I’ll be putting in each tent, but was going to save them til I begin flowering. Luckily the weather is getting a bit chillier here & my tent is sitting at RH 50%-65%, Temp 75F-86F & doesn’t feel muggy like it did a few days ago.

I’m gonna FIM & LST all my plants tomorrow, but many of them have multiple main tops (already FIM’d ~4 weeks ago). Is it okay if I FIM all of the main tops or should I just focus on one (FIM, wait a week, FIM another top, etc.)?

Also, I tried liking your posts, but I don’t see an option for it. I just joined this site so noob status. Anyways, I just wanted to let you know I’m thankful for the advice.

Hey y’all,
I hope you’re all having a great night! I spent today slowly transplanting some of my girls (Julius Caesar, Green Crack, Pink Gorilla, Gorilla Pineapple Express, Obama OG, Orgasmic OG, Gelato, Bruce Banner, Do-Si-Dos, Black Lavender, & OGKB). It’s been an exquisite lazy day filled with bong rips & gardening. Haha I don’t have a 9-5 so my days are pretty free. Thank god for cannabis & gardening!

Pre-Op


Post-Op



This OGKB (OGKushbreath) smells absolutely amazing. I rubbed the stems & it smells like a floral grape candy with citrus undertones. It kind of reminds me of how the Mimosa strain smells... DELICIOUS! I will get some better pics tomorrow when I begin FIM & LST.


Here are some younger girls in veg (~3 wks) along with my seedlings (red SOLO cups).




Some of my Sunshet Sherbet & Triangle Kush seedlings. Hopefully one will be a real beauty in a few weeks. Excited to see how they grow since I definitely want to breed them.


Toxicity Issues (Update):
My NL, BD, OG Kush, 420 Carat, & Big Bud are all feeling much better since feeding them plain RO water. They’ve perked up quite a bit & grew 1.5” since yesterday! The shorties are all ~16” now & my tall ones are ~23.5”. No new toxicity stricken leaves so hopefully they’ll all get a clean bill of health after a few more plain RO waterings.

Don't put a dehumidifier directly in your tent. I see this happen all too often. If you run different light cycles in the same room I guess it's somewhat unavoidable. I personally don't because it blows warm air out the exhaust so that will up your temps at least 5-10*. I instead zip the tent opening as closed as I can around the dehumidifier with the exhaust pointing away from the tent. I've seen grows where the ballast is in the tent. Tent space is reserved for three things; lights, plants, and fans.

ColoradoCheshire said:

Don't put a dehumidifier directly in your tent. I see this happen all too often. If you run different light cycles in the same room I guess it's somewhat unavoidable. I personally don't because it blows warm air out the exhaust so that will up your temps at least 5-10*. I instead zip the tent opening as closed as I can around the dehumidifier with the exhaust pointing away from the tent. I've seen grows where the ballast is in the tent. Tent space is reserved for three things; lights, plants, and fans.

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Thanks, I’ll make sure not to put dehumidifiers in the tents & not put needless things in the tent!

Hey y’all,
I hope all’s well & everyone’s a lot fatter after Thanksgiving! Just a quick update... I recently began supercropping & LST for my girls though a bit late since the stems were difficult to bend. Anyways, I showed my gf how to LST a week ago & she went a bit overboard with the plants & cracked 3 stems & completely broke one limb (I turned it into a clone though). It’s been a good learning experience for her & I definitely appreciate any help I can get!

I know a lot of people get heated when discussing high RH (70%+) & temps (85F+) due to potential PM/botrytis/etc issues, but I’ve been running my tents with CO2, RH 75%-80%, temps at 85F-90F, lots of air circulation, & the girls are loving it! They’re “praying” & lots of new growth popping up all over. So far it’s been 1.5 wks and there haven’t been any issues, just strong growth.

Indica dominant plants: These girls have been FIM’d & LST’d a few days ago with several also supercropped. I’m going to give them ~3 wks to fill out then I’m going to switch to flowering since they’re ~28” now & I’m starting to wonder how much they’ll stretch while flowering.




Sativa dominant plants: Before, these girls were were pretty thin & small (14”), but they’ve been filling out quite nicely in the past week. They’ve grown more tops & are getting slightly bushier. I’ll begin flowering these girls in ~3 weeks as well since they’re ~18” tall now & I expect they’ll stretch quite a bit more than the indica dominant strains.

Updates?

Chef420 said:

Updates?

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i'm used to this now here and elsewhere too. at least if i have to stop i tell folks. smdh