Second grow, budget grow - from zero to 420

Plants are just about eight weeks old now, and I'm a week into flowering. I've been able to determine the gender of all six plants. And the verdict is...

4 males
2 females

Not the greatest ratio, but that's the luck of the draw. Thankfully, this experience with regular seeds gave me a chance to identify the gender, as well as some of the initial signs the plants show before I flip to flower. This information will be useful for me in future grows. Ironically, the plants I attempted to clone turned out to be all male in the first place. I'm guessing in the future if I want to clone I'll either need feminized seeds, or a separate grow area for the mother plant. In the photos I included the overview prior to chopping the males, as well as some shots of the males.

Temps remain the same, 73F, 40% humidity. When I pulled the males out, I learned the soil I concocted out of yard dirt has decent drainage. The plants in the flowering stage seem to be thirstier than before, so I can up my watering amount safely.

And then there were two. The ladies now have all the space in the world to grow out sideways. I'd like to put up the net sometime this weekend, and I need to raise the light. I'm no watering every two days, a gallon per pot, with weekly grow + bloom nutrients.

Plants are now nine weeks old, and are two weeks into 12/12 flowering cycle. The weather here has been quite warm for February, and temps within the grow closet have been in the mid 70s with humidity in the 40%-50% range. Watering schedule is still the same, as is nutrient schedule. The plants have grown considerably taller after switching to flowering. Over the past two weeks, the plants are 1ft taller, now reaching 3ft tall from the soil. That's roughly one inch per day of growth! I have a hard limit of the plants reaching about 5ft tall, so I'm hoping they start to slow down their vertical growth later on.

This vertical growth has caused me to move the light up twice now. Just recently, I did some upgrades to the hooks holding the grow light up, since the old ones were starting to bend down from the strain. I also installed the net which will be used to keep the branches upright and spaced properly. With the light higher, I continue to space the plants a little further away from each other to allow for side stems to receive light and space to fill up the canopy once again.

The plants leaves have started to darken a little bit, possibly an adaptation to the reddish light hue they are receiving from the HPS bulb or the nutrients they are receiving. All the prominent stems are growing lots of pistils, and showing a slight amount of frostiness. I routinely trim some of the bottom leaves that the plant decides it no longer needs, otherwise I am allowing to plants to stay bushy. The way I see it, thousands of years of natural evolution beats out my inexperience, so I'll let the plant decide what it wants to do and keep it simple.

Here is an updated accounting of all costs that went into this grow.

Plants are now 10 weeks old, three weeks into their flowering cycle. We're back to regular winter weather here, and humidity is down a bit. Plant maintenance remains the same since last week. Vertical growth has slowed a bit, with the plants only adding about three inches each of height since last post. Most of the growth has been around the flowers, and/or side stems.

The flowers continue to add tons of white pistils, as well as growing lots of "sugar" leaves on the main stems. The under-story has been naturally shedding some of the lower leaves that no longer receive light. Overall leaves and flowers look healthy. I'm relieved that vertical growth has slowed, hopefully the plants will take their time producing flowers. Odor has noticeably increased. So far my results seem to be in line with other more experienced grows, so I assume I am on the right track. The remaining time should hopefully be low stress and low maintenance, watching and waiting.

Plants are now 11 weeks old, and four weeks into flowering. They have mostly stopped growing vertically. They reached 40 inches tall from the soil. Most of the growth has been around the bud sites. They're showing white pistils everywhere, leaves are starting to become frosty, and there is now obvious bud growth filling out. I'm continuing with the watering schedule, and occasional removal of dead leaves from the bottom. Things are on autopilot while the flowers mature.

I'm a bit behind on tracking progress, been busy with family affairs. I did take photos last weekend however. These photos show the plants at 12 weeks old, five weeks into flowering. No change in growth, flowers continue to mature. The flowers are beginning to become heavy and are leaning into the net a little bit. Pistils are beginning to turn amber. I've changed the nutrients to only the Fox Farm "Bloom" which is 2-8-4. The plants have an unmistakable odor of cupcakes, it's quite strange.

I'm back up to date here, these are plants at 13 weeks old, six weeks into flower. Status remains relatively the same since last week's photos. The jewelers loupe I purchased finally arrived, so I can take a look at the trichs to see how they're progressing. They're still mostly clear but some cloudiness is beginning, based on my uneducated observation.

The right plant seems to be a week ahead of the left plant in terms of flower maturity, depending on what I do it may end up getting harvested first. Both plants still have an unmistakably strong cupcake smell. The plants overall are still very bushy, and aren't shedding leaves that quickly. As flowers continue to mature I'll take more photos of the trichs up close.

Plants are 14 weeks old, seven weeks into flower. Leaves are starting to die off here and there as the plant focuses on flowering. I'm still feeding 2-8-4 bloom nutrients. Triches are a mix of clear, with some cloudiness. No amber triches yet. Low and slow for the remaining weeks. I might harvest at nine weeks into flowering, but it's ultimately up to the plants to tell me.

Plants are 15 weeks old, eight weeks into flower. Leaves continuing to die off. Triches are shifting towards a mix of mostly cloudy, with a few clear. The buds are looking very sugary. Watering/nutrients/environment remains the same. I included some additional trich photos this time around. Getting closer!

I was able to get some photos right as the light was starting up, so it wasn't completely washed out with intensity. Plants are 16 weeks old, nine weeks into flower. A good chunk of the leaves are yellowing and becoming dry. Humidity has been low so I'm not super concerned about mold. Flowers continue to mature, now triches are mostly cloudy. I've been giving the plants straight water for the past week, no nutrients.

I'm still pondering when I should harvest. I have some life events (travel etc...) coming up. I'll think on it and make a decision soon.

For science, I wanted to see what the triches looked like outside of the extremely bright HPS light. Now that I see them under normal lighting, they're definitely ready, so I'll be harvesting.

Harvest time! The plants received a final watering.

I included a photo of the final plant before trimming. Quite colorful. Having undergone little maintenance throughout its growth and flowering, in combination with the strain, the plants were very bushy. I trimmed the fan leaves on all of the stocks, but kept leaves around all of the colas. This should hopefully allow a small amount air flow to circulate between the stems. My main concern is making sure there is no mold, so I'm erring on the side of caution.

Drying will happen in the grow closet, which I've modified for this purpose. I've removed the grow light and some of the electrical, and I have updated the cooling system. Previously, cool basement air came in through an intake, circulated actively past the plants, and was pulled into the grow light and then exhausted back out to the basement using an inline fan. This kept the temps manageable, despite 1000 watts of heat from the lamp in such a small space. Now, cool basement air continues through the intake, but is then exhausted out of the grow closet via the inline fan and into the chimney. The circulating fan is off.

The plants already have a strong odor, and I don't want my house reeking for the next two weeks. I can open a small basement window to control displacement airflow. Temps are cool when the light is off, but humidity is a little lower then ideal for drying. We are heading into spring here so that may change. I figure most of the risk for mold is during the early days of drying, so I would rather be careful.

I don't have a good way to remove humidity being this is a budget grow, but I figure I can creatively add humidity. Going forward for drying, my plan is to check on them daily like I have been doing, and will adjust as needed.

Plants have been drying for a week now. First few days humidity was in the 50s. It's gotten cold recently and humidity has dropped back down into the 40% range. I've been very busy at work this past week so haven't had a chance to check on them much. Smell was strong first couple of days but now has decreased quite a bit. It has a very slight hay/chlorophyll smell, telling me that buds are probably dried out at this point, and remaining evaporation is coming from the leaves and stems. I get this impression from the feel as well.

I don't want them to get too dry, so I decided since humidity is so low, I'm going to go ahead and start trimming and jarring. I'm starting with the left plant closest to the air duct, which felt a little drier. I have boveda 62% packs which I'll throw in there with the buds, and will burp the jars regularly. My main concern is still mold, which so far has not been an issue. Visually they look great, super sugary and sticky. I'm in no rush on the finished product, however I am a bit pressed for time so I'd rather let them slow cure with the humidity packs. I'll provide an update once I have a total.

Nice job man. Decent 2nd grow.

Thanks for the good vibes!

Trimming was awful, I can see why people call it trim jail, and why strategies like lolly popping are used. Over the period of a few days I spent about five hours total, carefully trimming and harvesting all the little flower sites. I kept as much as the decent looking sugar leaves on as I could. This is to retain moisture and slow the drying process, as well as I might use them to make canna-butter down the road. There was a TON of small side flower sites, I believe this is called "larf?" Everything is super frosty though and quite sticky. A few of the buds had a slight hay smell, but for the most part a lot of it had a strong chlorophyll smell, like the leaves drying. I've been burping the jars for about ~15 minutes twice a day.

About mid-week, when I took some of these photos, I removed all the bud from the jars and "blended" it. I don't have any hydrometers, so I'm relying on my sense of smell and the Boveda packs. I tried to balance out the smell and perceived dryness in each of the jars, I figure it is a proxy for humidity.

I just finished burping the jars again, and can provide an end of the week update. Smell intensity has decreased a little bit. The smell is a mix of chlorophyll, and the unmistakable aroma of cupcakes I mentioned in previous posts. It doesn't smell like skunk or what I would expect cannabis to smell like. Thankfully, the hay smell is mostly gone and the chlorophyll smell is getting weaker. I tried to be super careful when handling the buds not to squish the direct bud area trichs.

I don't have a scale, so I don't really know what my yield was. I have 10 32oz mason jars filled about halfway, as shown in the photo. I'm pretty busy with work, however I'm aiming to sample with my spouse hopefully by 4/20. Once I do, I'll provide some feedback about the strain, and complete the cost analysis table with a final tally.

Nice job!

lmn8r said:

It doesn't smell like skunk or what I would expect cannabis to smell like.

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Strains nowadays are not what weed used to be. When we went to get a bag of weed from our guy he handed us a bag of weed. There was no what kind do you like, what flavor terps. It was pine and skunk and you got a bag of it.