Rurumo's Mars Hydro FC6500 grow journal

I started seeing some slight leaf curl about a week into my daily CSL feedings on that little clone, so I backed off 1 gram per gallon, now they're getting 8g CSL/g as well as kelp extract and fulvic acid. The larger clone looks great! I have two clones of the same plant going in 4 inch pots, one being fed maxigrow at .9 ec, and one being fed CSL at .8 ec, and the corn steep clone is beginning to look a little better than my maxi clone. I'll start getting side by side pics of them. Of course, being an "organic" ingredient, I'm not 100% confident on the EC readings for Corn Steep Liquor, due to he N excess symptoms I'm seeing at a low ec. But, the readings are consistent at least, so I can still use my ec meter to dial in this nutrient based on observing new growth. I'm impressed so far! So far CSL works just as well as the better liquid "organic" type nutrients, like Pure Blend Pro for example. I'm really excited to take a plant through flower on this stuff to really test it! I found out the extreme acidity is due to lactic acid which forms during the CSL process and guess what? Lactic acid is good for plant growth, just like so many other organic acids! It takes my tap water to 6.0 ph every time with no citric acid, really cool stuff. I also found another place that sells 50 lb bags, this one is a 7-7-7! How cool is that, I might pick that one up if I ever use up my current bag-https://www.7springsfarm.com/products/nature-safe-7-7-7-soluble-powder-50-lb-bag?_pos=3&_sid=1f2e7070e&_ss=r. I got the powdered fulvic at the same place...anyone interested in it, I'd wait to get it until I see some good or bad results. I'd stick with Mr. Fulvic in the meantime.

I'm trying out a new powdered fulvic product called Ferti-Fulvic. I always see it on the bulk hydro nutrient type sites. I know that they are considered inferior to the best liquid fulvic extracts, but I'd like to see what kind of effects I get from it and whether or not it ends up being a considerably better value than Mr. Fulvic. Mr. Fulvic is excellent, as far as I'm concerned, it's the best on the market, even if you do need to use more than recommended to get up into the 50 ppm range. I just need to experiment and figure out how much Ferti-Fulvic I need to get to 50 ppm in my solution.

I have ESB and Sweet Tooth #4 coming from FDM right now. I'm really happy to have the opportunity to grow both of these out, as I was never able to back in their heyday. I kept up with SOTF420's Sweet Tooth thread on ICmag back in the day and it's a classic thread and a good read-https://www.icmag.com/threads/sotf420s-sweet-tooth-4.204784/. SOTF420 was a great guy and he disappeared suddenly from the forums back in 2012 and I wish him well wherever he is.
Sweet Tooth is a Breeder Steve strain from the Spice of Life seeds days. Sweet Tooth #1 is Sweet Pink Grapefruit x Blueberry. Sweet Pink Grapefruit, is a Vancouver cannabis legend and very possibly the best strain to ever come out of Vancouver in my humble opinion. With #2, #3, and #4 further backcrosses were made to the original SPG clone (it's not a simple bx though, other places have a more detailed explanation of the steps Breeder Steve took in selection. This was when Breeder Steve was in Switzerland and making selections from thousands of plants.
Both strains are some seriously positive and uplifting herb (as is ESB) and I'm looking forward to growing out some of the best work of Oldtimer1 and Breeder Steve.

I know you like the Mr Fulvic but have you heard of Wallace Organic Wonder? Its a humic, fulvic and seaweed blend. Humic and fulvic are at a 5:2 ratio which is supposed to be a good mix. I'll put the link below but Virginia Tech supposedly did a study and found the 5:2 ratio improved root and fruit mass. I've been using it with my current Panama grow. I'm only in week 9 flower but so far at least there's no negative growth. I'llhave to wait until I chop to decide if its worth it.
Heres the link:

Here is that same clone 4 days later. You can see, it's growing quickly on the CSL but I've curled the tips a bit. It's going to take a bit more effort to dial in than I had hoped, but that's all right, I think I'm close to the perfect dosage for these clones. I also find that a lot of very N sensitive plants as seedlings grow out of it as adults, and can take ordinary EC levels at that point. I'll start some seeds soon so I'd like to figure out the right amount to feed these little ladies. If 9 g/g was too much for this size, I'm thinking I could start at like 4/5 g/g, then ramp it up to 9 g/g by mid/late Veg.

RottyRzr said:

I know you like the Mr Fulvic but have you heard of Wallace Organic Wonder? Its a humic, fulvic and seaweed blend. Humic and fulvic are at a 5:2 ratio which is supposed to be a good mix. I'll put the link below but Virginia Tech supposedly did a study and found the 5:2 ratio improved root and fruit mass. I've been using it with my current Panama grow. I'm only in week 9 flower but so far at least there's no negative growth. I'llhave to wait until I chop to decide if its worth it.
Heres the link:

5-2 Humic / Fulvic Acid + Seaweed Extract Wonder Blend Wallace Organic

Wallace Organic Wonder, Wonder Blend 5-2 is a combination of WOW's soluble Humic/Fulvic Acid and Seaweed Extract. Based on a 10 year study from Virginia Tech University that showed the combination of Humic Acid & Seaweed at a 5:2 ratio proved 50% more root, and fruit mass than either product...

wallacewow.com

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I do like combining seaweed and fulvic. I'll check out that Virginia Tech study, I've seen that ratio mentioned before. Awesome to have some Panama coming down in a few weeks (in its own sweet time anyway), that's a great strain, I'd love to have some around right now.

I've just finally assembled all of the stuff I need for my next couple of projects. The ESB seeds are stuck in the mail an extra day, so I'll get those started soaking in h202 solution tomorrow and plant them Wed morning. Last night I opened up my fresh new 5 lb bag of 6 row Malted Barley and ground up a little to try in a coffee grinder. In the past, in my living soil/organic grows I'd use something like 1 tablespoon per gallon, which is what I think I might use when I mix up my coco for this next run. I would top dress it at the same rate, but I never liked topdressing MB because it would always clog up the soil surface until I really dug at it a lot with my fingers. So this time, I just added 1 tablespoon to 1 gallon of nutrient solution and it seemed to work just fine-actually, the plants look especially happy and healthy the next morning. I think the malted barley will really compliment the Corn Steep Liquor and keep the coco life thriving.

I've been looking around about using aspirin in grows and I am finding conflicting answers. I think Ive seen you post about using aspirin and wanted to know how you use per gallon. I keep coming across someone named Martha (I think) that used 1 aspirin to 4 gallons. (Maybe) So I wonder how many milligrams was that 1 aspirin. I've read that 1 aspirin per gallon is right but no mention if it was 81mg or 325mg.
Whew, I hate googling sometimes!
Any help?

RottyRzr said:

I've been looking around about using aspirin in grows and I am finding conflicting answers. I think Ive seen you post about using aspirin and wanted to know how you use per gallon. I keep coming across someone named Martha (I think) that used 1 aspirin to 4 gallons. (Maybe) So I wonder how many milligrams was that 1 aspirin. I've read that 1 aspirin per gallon is right but no mention if it was 81mg or 325mg.
Whew, I hate googling sometimes!
Any help?

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Yep, I use 1 325 mg aspirin per gal, and I do 3 treatments-the first when I transplant to their final container, the 2nd at flip and the 3rd 4-5 weeks into flower. I also spray it a few times in veg as a foliar at the same strength. I like to spray new clones with it too-it has good direct antifungal properties as well as triggering a SAR response in the plant.

I have a little Strawberry Cough clone very ready to be S1'd, so I will be mixing up my sts spray soon, and I wanted to share the recipe I'm using. It's just the basic Sigma-Aldrich formula. I decided to try it over the "forum recipe" from some good feedback I've seen.

To mix up STS solution you need silver nitrate and sodium thiosulfate anhydrous.

For the (.1 m) sts stock solution you dissolve 1.58g sodium thiosulfate anhydrous into 100 ml distilled water.

For the (.1 m) silver nitrate stock solution you mix 1.7 g into 100 ml water.

Next, to make the (.02 m) STS solution- Slowly pour 20 ml of .1 m silver nitrate stock solution into 80 ml of the (.1 m) sts stock solution while stirring vigorously. Now you have 100 ml of very concentrated (.2 m) sts base solution that needs to be diluted to the strength you want, this is where people have very specific opinions about what strength to use, as well as the dosing schedule. I've decided to go with a 3 mM STS solution. to get that, I will mix 100 ml of (.2) base STS (which is 20 mM) with 557 ml of distilled water.

One problem with the Sigma recipe is the leftovers (see Tony's thread for another recipe without leftovers). Another is, the forum recipe is more economical with the measurements, but I see a lot of people doing well with Sigma so I want to go with what works for people I respect. When you look at these recipes, you'll see them talking about a 1:6 or 1:9 dilution ratio. That's the ratio of the (.2) base solution to distilled water to make the final dilution. I prefer to simply go by mM.

I'd like to thank Tony Green for experimenting with STS concentration, and I copied the Sigma-Aldrich formula from his post at icmag https://www.icmag.com/threads/tonys-silver-thiosulfate-notes.378133/

I will be treating the clone 3 times with the STS, 1st dose 5 days prior to flip, 2nd dose at flip, and 3rd dose 5 days after, per the experience of Farmer Joe in that thread.

I want to see how small I can keep a male while doing this, I'll take pics of the setup I've put together for this tomorrow or the next day and get it started!

I'm starting to see some differences in my CSL clones vs Maxi clones-the new growth is a much lighter green with the CSL. I've been feeding all of the CSL plants at 7 grams per gallon the last few days, but I'm thinking of going back up to 9 g/g for the ones that are light green, and just feed the reduced amount to the clone showing N tox (it looks much better already, still growing fast). It's irritating when you have two plants with such difference nutrient demands. A lot of times, I just put up with some leaf curl in my sativas as mother plants, but I like to try to feed them more precisely when growing out plants to flower.

I just mixed up some test media, this is 7 liters of coco, 3 liters of rice hull, and .5 each of EWC and Biochar. I really like this mix, it drains as freely as medium/course coco, I'm going to use it with both my Maxi plants and my "organic" plants with the CSL. I love the rice hulls, they are so nice and clean, I should have traded in perlite for them years ago.

Last night I went to start soaking my ESB seeds in diluted h202 (30 ml 3% h2o2 to 500 ml water) then I realized I'm out of h202....grrrr. They're fresh seeds so it's not a big deal, I ended up soaking them in Mr. Fulvic and kelp extract, then I dipped the seeds in Promix Connect before planting direct to media, just to get the mycorrhizae started early. This is the first time I've used such concentrated mycorrhizae and I want to see if I notice a difference-the Promix Connect has 6,000 propagules/gram.

If you guys were around in the old Overgrow days you probably remember Oltimer1. There were some great growers active in the community back then, and Oltimer1 was always very generous with wisdom and seeds. He passed away last year, so I had to try growing out the ESB when I just rediscovered FDM seeds in my search for good Cindy 99. I almost scored a pack in the early 2000s on Overgrow and always regretted not getting one. This strain is one people talk about with such reverence, and for good reason! It reminds me a lot of Blue Dream but it's a bit heavier on the sativa side than SCBD and the anti-anxiety effects are very pronounced, if it's still the same as it was back then. I found this thread on the UK420 site, which Oldtimer1 himself participated in, so if you're interested in the strain, this is one of the few spots with info on it. I'm really happy that Fleur Du Mal seeds is helping to preserve these genetics. http://www.uk420.com/boards/index.php?/topic/52687-esb/

I also got my 10 lb bag of "Pescadero Gold" mustard pellets. Not sure how I'm going to use it yet...most likely, I'll use it on a test plant as a topdress just to see how long it takes to dissolve, how much N it contributes, etc-then if things go well, I'll use it later on when I get fungus gnats again. I want to see if it makes my trichoderma go nuts.

Mycorrhizae are very popular, and more and more people are using trichoderma now, but the endophytes haven't really seen the same popularity yet. There is an awesome product called Botaniguard 22WP which contains the Beauveria bassiana fungus, and the purpose of the product is to kill all sorts of insects, like aphids and thrips (and bedbugs!!). Yes, it's also a popular bedbug treatment, tuck that little morsel of knowledge away in case you need it in the future. BUT, what most people don't realize is that Beauveria bassiana is also an endophyte that directly promotes plant growth. These fungi are amazing. Here is an article specific to cannabis: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/257800081_Endophytic_fungi_harbored_in_Cannabis_sativa_L_Diversity_and_potential_as_biocontrol_agents_against_host_plant-specific_phytopathogens

There are several others that look at endophytes in cannabis-it's a very popular area of research right now. Here is a study specific to Beauveria bassiana, aka Botaniguard relating to growth promotion: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7565680/

Now, I just wish Botaniguard were sold in smaller quantities for home growers. As it is, we need to pony up $90.00 for the smallest package of it. I'm always looking for dual purpose products, and this one in particular is very cool in that it kills common insects and directly promotes plant growth and secondary metabolites.

Rurumo said:

I have a little Strawberry Cough clone very ready to be S1'd, so I will be mixing up my sts spray soon, and I wanted to share the recipe I'm using. It's just the basic Sigma-Aldrich formula. I decided to try it over the "forum recipe" from some good feedback I've seen.

To mix up STS solution you need silver nitrate and sodium thiosulfate anhydrous.

For the (.1 m) sts stock solution you dissolve 1.58g sodium thiosulfate anhydrous into 100 ml distilled water.

For the (.1 m) silver nitrate stock solution you mix 1.7 g into 100 ml water.

Next, to make the (.02 m) STS solution- Slowly pour 20 ml of .1 m silver nitrate stock solution into 80 ml of the (.1 m) sts stock solution while stirring vigorously. Now you have 100 ml of very concentrated (.2 m) sts base solution that needs to be diluted to the strength you want, this is where people have very specific opinions about what strength to use, as well as the dosing schedule. I've decided to go with a 3 mM STS solution. to get that, I will mix 100 ml of (.2) base STS (which is 20 mM) with 557 ml of distilled water.

One problem with the Sigma recipe is the leftovers (see Tony's thread for another recipe without leftovers). Another is, the forum recipe is more economical with the measurements, but I see a lot of people doing well with Sigma so I want to go with what works for people I respect. When you look at these recipes, you'll see them talking about a 1:6 or 1:9 dilution ratio. That's the ratio of the (.2) base solution to distilled water to make the final dilution. I prefer to simply go by mM.

I'd like to thank Tony Green for experimenting with STS concentration, and I copied the Sigma-Aldrich formula from his post at icmag https://www.icmag.com/threads/tonys-silver-thiosulfate-notes.378133/

I will be treating the clone 3 times with the STS, 1st dose 5 days prior to flip, 2nd dose at flip, and 3rd dose 5 days after, per the experience of Farmer Joe in that thread.

I want to see how small I can keep a male while doing this, I'll take pics of the setup I've put together for this tomorrow or the next day and get it started!

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I know very little about this so I'll be watching closely. Hope you don't mind questions. I assume the Strawberry Cough is a female and by spraying with the STS solution, it will cause female flowers to change to 'female' pollen producing flowers. Are your plans to save that pollen for another female or pollenate the Strawberry Cough clone? Are you gonna spray the whole plant or just flowering sites?
I've got a couple Blue Dream clones I could try this on if I can get my head wrapped around what's going on.

RottyRzr said:

I know very little about this so I'll be watching closely. Hope you don't mind questions. I assume the Strawberry Cough is a female and by spraying with the STS solution, it will cause female flowers to change to 'female' pollen producing flowers. Are your plans to save that pollen for another female or pollenate the Strawberry Cough clone? Are you gonna spray the whole plant or just flowering sites?
I've got a couple Blue Dream clones I could try this on if I can get my head wrapped around what's going on.

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I actually just mixed up a batch of that Sigma recipe I posted, and have a big amber jar nearly full of 3 mM STS solution now. I'm just going to spray the whole plant- I might do a few of these as experiments, but for this first one I want to see how small I can keep it and how much pollen I get, if any. For now, I'm just going to store any pollen I get, but pollinating the same Strawberry Cough cut to get S1s will definitely happen soon-I'm going to take another SC cut shortly to get that started. I love blue dream too-combining a great sativa with a great blueberry has created some classic strains, like the ESB I'm germinating now. If you like Blue Dream, definitely try ESB from FDM seeds at some point. They also sell mixed seeds, 50 seeds for $50, in case anyone out there needs some inexpensive seeds to practice germinating, which are still great quality. I just realized there is no topic for FDM seeds at RIU so I'm going to make one.

Rurumo said:

I actually just mixed up a batch of that Sigma recipe I posted, and have a big amber jar nearly full of 3 mM STS solution now. I'm just going to spray the whole plant- I might do a few of these as experiments, but for this first one I want to see how small I can keep it and how much pollen I get, if any. For now, I'm just going to store any pollen I get, but pollinating the same Strawberry Cough cut to get S1s will definitely happen soon-I'm going to take another SC cut shortly to get that started. I love blue dream too-combining a great sativa with a great blueberry has created some classic strains, like the ESB I'm germinating now. If you like Blue Dream, definitely try ESB from FDM seeds at some point. They also sell mixed seeds, 50 seeds for $50, in case anyone out there needs some inexpensive seeds to practice germinating, which are still great quality. I just realized there is no topic for FDM seeds at RIU so I'm going to make one.

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Thanks for the reply.
I looked at FDM earlier due to your post and tried to order some seeds but they don't take credit cards and I don't have Zelle or whatever.
I got the Blue Dream clones from a friend that is growing them outside. They absolutely loved the hot humid weather we had here this summer. His plants are over 7 feet tall now and picture perfect! I'd like to get some seeds from this stock.
So I am confused. If you spray the whole plant, won't that make all of the flowering sites produce pollen. If so, how can you pollenate these same sites that are producing pollen?

RottyRzr said:

Thanks for the reply.
I looked at FDM earlier due to your post and tried to order some seeds but they don't take credit cards and I don't have Zelle or whatever.
I got the Blue Dream clones from a friend that is growing them outside. They absolutely loved the hot humid weather we had here this summer. His plants are over 7 feet tall now and picture perfect! I'd like to get some seeds from this stock.
So I am confused. If you spray the whole plant, won't that make all of the flowering sites produce pollen. If so, how can you pollenate these same sites that are producing pollen?

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Sorry, I see what you mean, I should have been clearer. Yes, you can absolutely spray just one branch to reverse it, then pollinate another branch on the same plant. I just have a small clone I want to spray for fun, just to see what happens in stretch, so I'm just going to spray the whole thing. Those Blue Dreams sound dope, I think you'll have a blast reversing it to make S1s. Growing out S1s and observing all the different genetic expressions contained within the plant is fascinating.

Speaking of fungi, up until recently only two kinds of mycorrhizae had been proven to interact with cannabis, Glomus intraradices and Glomus mosseae, but now we can also add Rhizophagus irregularis, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34209987/. The study showed a solid increase in P uptake in the myco treated plants. Of course, mycorrhizae work best with organics, that's based on MANY studies on the topic-I'm actually unsure if they have any benefit in a mineral salt grow, so I might do a few different side by sides, one with Maxi and myco, one with just Maxi, and then one CSL with myco. I think the mycorrhizae will grow extremely well with the CSL (which is essentially a fermented plant extract). I'll use my promix connect this time, to test it out as the most potent mycorrhizae on the market, but next time I'd like to test it against the rhizophagus irregularis. Promix connect is just Glomus intraradices. Eventually I'd like to test various combinations of trichoderma + mycorrhizae too at some point. There are some very interesting studies looking at the interaction between trichoderma and mycorrhizae and the effect on the plant, like this one https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-48269-z.

Rurumo said:

Speaking of fungi, up until recently only two kinds of mycorrhizae had been proven to interact with cannabis, Glomus intraradices and Glomus mosseae, but now we can also add Rhizophagus irregularis, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34209987/. The study showed a solid increase in P uptake in the myco treated plants. Of course, mycorrhizae work best with organics, that's based on MANY studies on the topic-I'm actually unsure if they have any benefit in a mineral salt grow, so I might do a few different side by sides, one with Maxi and myco, one with just Maxi, and then one CSL with myco. I think the mycorrhizae will grow extremely well with the CSL (which is essentially a fermented plant extract). I'll use my promix connect this time, to test it out as the most potent mycorrhizae on the market, but next time I'd like to test it against the rhizophagus irregularis. Promix connect is just Glomus intraradices. Eventually I'd like to test various combinations of trichoderma + mycorrhizae too at some point. There are some very interesting studies looking at the interaction between trichoderma and mycorrhizae and the effect on the plant, like this one https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-48269-z.

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And once again thank you for your time and effort in the information Gathering that you do

Just like how you can reverse a female plant with STS, you can reverse a male plant with something called Ethephon. Sts blocks ethylene, but ethephon does the opposite. This is an interesting idea because you can use it to flower out your males before breeding with them, as an extra selection tool. I love the idea of being able to smoke your males before committing to using their pollen, and then further evaluating them by growing out their offspring. Of course, you never know what a combination of two plants will do without growing the offspring, but at the same time, this could be a major time savor in the quality male hunting process. I've put some Florel (ethephon product) in my Amazon cart and will reverse a male once I get one from my ESB seeds-fingers crossed!! Here is a good thread on this topic: https://www.icmag.com/threads/male-clones-transformed-to-female-to-judge-male-smoking-quality.95646/

Here is that clone that I repotted 12 days ago and have fed it CSL daily. Keep in mind, this is under t5s and I don't keep it super close to the bulbs either, so I've been pretty happy with it so far. I have one older bonsai mother plant on the CSL and it started to get really light, lime green growth, which I think is down to micronutrients, possibly Mg, iron, zinc. I realized, this is the perfect time to use spirulina, due to the way it increases micronutrients, especially iron and zinc. So I started feeding it Spirulina yesterday and started with .5 g Epsom salts per gal. If that doesn't fix it, I'll dose it with tm-7 early and see if that works. All of the CSL plants are growing very quickly, equal to Maxigrow, but the color is much lighter than Maxigrow across the board. This seedling actually looks the best of all of them, probably due to actively filling out it's pot.

This is the Beleaf Truffaloha #3. If I have to make room for other plants, I may get rid of this one first, but I'd like to flower one out first if possible, after bringing it back from the dead and having it tested. It's a good grower, easy cloner too.