My first grow

mared juwan said:

I've found that the last days of a plants life you have to go completely against your instincts and let it die a slow death. In the beginning I kept wanting to have super healthy plants all the way until harvest but that is not natural and doesn't give the best results. Now I flush until my leaves look like a tree in autumn. Yellows and purples and blacks. The plant will actually bulk up the buds quite a bit more when feeding off of itself rather than the nutes from the soil. Don't be worried about yellowed and dying leaves at this point.

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Yeah, it's tough to wait. I find it interesting though that many "sources" around tell you to harvest by the color of the pistils. If I were doing that I would probably chop them today. Like, right this very second.

But I've been diligently observing the trichs, and they just don't have the solid amber heads...

Took some pics...gonna post them up later...

Jerry Garcia said:

Yeah, it's tough to wait. I find it interesting though that many "sources" around tell you to harvest by the color of the pistils. If I were doing that I would probably chop them today. Like, right this very second.

But I've been diligently observing the trichs, and they just don't have the solid amber heads...

Took some pics...gonna post them up later...

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Argh....I just know you are not referring to me as one of those "sources." ......I just LOVE the earlier harvest....and that means less red hairs. When every last hair turns red, it's typical of it drying to the point of the crystals actually diminishing. I would take harvesting a day to three earlier rather than 3 days too late, know what I mean?
Crazy, long day. I hope that made sense.
.....or maybe I just need to experience the joy of growing a "true" sativa.

Babs34 said:

Argh....I just know you are not referring to me as one of those "sources." ......I just LOVE the earlier harvest....and that means less red hairs. When every last hair turns red, it's typical of it drying to the point of the crystals actually diminishing. I would take harvesting a day to three earlier rather than 3 days too late, know what I mean?
Crazy, long day. I hope that made sense.
.....or maybe I just need to experience the joy of growing a "true" sativa.

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LOL...I totally was NOT referring to you as a source Babs, as you make the daily caveat that you go by "instinct" and "feel" rather than conventional wisdom. Which is totally cool by the way--I'm just not experienced enough to go with my gut quite yet. Other sites that purportedly teach you how to grow marijuana indicate that you harvest based on the pistils and make no mention of trichs whatsoever.

And I definitely know what you mean about harvesting early vs. late--that's why I'm so concerned about my situation--I don't want to be late and miss my window of optimum potency. And those amber trichs are just not there yet...at least not the solid headed amber ones. I'm on day 67 or so today...and waiting...

I commend your diligence, Jerry.

rep and cheers,
Sleepless

Sleepless said:

I commend your diligence, Jerry.

rep and cheers,
Sleepless

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Thanks and back at ya sleepless

So I finally have a few minutes to throw an update out there. All the dried buds have been removed from strings and placed into a jar for curing (and smoking). The smaller buds each came to a meager 0.6 grams, while shorty's 5.6 gram bud came in at 1.3 dry. Doing the math it is almost exactly a 75% loss of weight. Kinda sucks, but what can you do.

This batch of testers seems more potent than the last. Not much different of a high for me, still rather cerebral, but possibly stronger. I don't know though, it's hard to gauge something like that. We'll see as the testing process continues.

I forgot to mention that a few days ago one of my teenage girls decided she didn't want to be all girl and started growing balls. By the time I noticed she had grown quite an elaborate set of them. Not sure what caused it to hermie...probably just the fact it came from bagseed. The others all seem fine and are budding up well, despite losing most of their fan leaves.

The big girls seem to be doing fine. While checking the trichs on Tall girl I thought she felt a little drier than normal. Not excessively dry, but dry nonetheless. I'm probably wrong...humidity is around 58% at night and 40% during the day. I've got an oscillating fan blowing on them 24/7 now (I had to forgo my curtain system of blocking light because the humidity kept getting too high, and I think moving the air to prevent budrot is more important than a little light leaking from the veg room).

Tall girl's top.


Lower little nugs. Not gonna weigh as much as I hoped...

Middle buds. Still haven't sampled one of these yet.



Side bud and cat hair.


Wide girl,


Top shot.


Another top shot.


Frosty little nugget of calyxes.


Side bud.


The triplets.


I need names to distinguish these girls apart


Nice little bud though.


Even some trichs!


Another girl.


Some of them have calyxes that are so large they look like seeds...I hope they aren't really seeds...I don't think they are...the calyxes just look like they are about to split.


Clone on the left, over-supercropped-repaired-with-duct-tape-girl on the right.



Still waiting for the trichs. I'm hoping by the end of the weekend things be ready...

Wow, awesome update dude. They do look to me me from appearances that they are just about done. Should be any time now. You don't have to chop all three at once anyway. You're not going to want to after trimming the first one anyway LOL. The younger plants look great too. That's crazy that they have absolutely no branching whatsoever.

Thanks Mared. After trimming three little buds for one hour I certainly don't want to sit and trim all these girls at once.

I have began to notice the top buds on Tall girl and Wide girl are starting to feel a little dry...should I just cut one/both of them tonight to make sure they don't dry out too much while still on the plant? I'll probably leave 1/2 the side/middle buds for another couple days, again for comparison of the high, but I think if I wait too long for the top buds they will dry out before I harvest them, which probably isn't good...or is it?

I'm gonna post another thread and ask...but any info/input from you all would be appreciated as well!

Hmmm, yea I might have to defer to someone else for advice on that. I try not to touch my buds if I can help it. Of course accidentally it happens but I've never really taken note of the dryness of the bud. But IDK if you're noticing a sudden change maybe it's time to give it the axe.

OK, I'm just going to say it......Chop time. And I await the pictures of the cured bud......in every stage, LOL. LOVE the babies you have going on too. (Nag time--keep the sand going on the surface--til you see NO trace of those "things.")

You know, since you are not re-vegging and if you really wanted to "experiment".....you could just harvest the top, and then give the mid and bottom a "bit" more time. BUT, I really think it makes it a bit more interesting tasting from every site, but I said that already, didn't I?The worst case scenario is that it goes to seed...and in your case, that would be minimal seeds. That's not the worst thing that could happen, right?

BTW, I hope you realize I was just light heartedly messing with you earlier. I realize I can be a bit unconventional........what works just works. "Peace"

Hey, if you're planning on chopping those beauties now, you should make sure to get the slow dry and cure right. I don't talk from experience, but there seems to be an overwhelming majority of RIUers who believe this. Here's a sweet guide, and the guy actually says that you shouldn't trim all at once, you trim selectively at different steps in the drying process. Check it out
https://www.rollitup.org/harvesting-curing/120624-want-bag-appeal-curing-matters.html

It has been five days since my last update. Definitely a new record for me. I spent the weekend in a cabin on Portsmouth Island (part the outer banks of North Carolina) and was unable to check the plants for a few days.

Many things have changed since the last update. For starters, I chopped the main colas on all three girls. Hooray! Don't get too excited though, as the axe fell for a reason...SEEDS



That about sums up the range of emotions I experienced when my girlfriend said "what is that?" while pointing to a seed protruding from the lower bud of wide girl (*this happened on Thursday evening 5/28/09). After fully inspecting all three plants it was clear they were pollinated. The seeds looked very premature, so pollination must have occurred recently...I am fairly certain it was from the little plant that I noticed turned hermie about a week ago. It had a fair number of ball sacks, but none appeared to have split open. It could have been one of the other girls pushing out a banana somewhere I couldn't see, but I'm betting it was the hermie.

So I discovered this on Thursday night, and I was scheduled to leave for my trip on Friday morning at 5am. I decided the best course of action was to harvest the main colas to keep them as seedless as possible. Beginning with tall girl, I harvested and trimmed her main cola.

Here it is pre-trim. Not too much trimming required for this one...I finished in about half an hour.


After trimming tall girl, I took a similar sized cut of the main cola from wide girl. Substantially more leaves meant a much longer trimming session of about an hour.


Here is Tall girl (left) and Wide girl (Right) after trim and hanging to dry.


Unfortunately, I failed to photograph the cola of shorty pre-trim. She was way more leafy than Wide girl and required over an hour to trim. She is hanging in the front right in the below image.


After all that trimming it was 1:30am and I needed to leave by 5, so I called it a night and left the remaining parts of the plants to mature for a few more days. Here's what they looked like when I got home last night. Tall on left, wide in middle, shorty on right.


Shorty


Wide girl


Tall girl


Unfortunately, these three plants were not the only females in the room when the pollination occurred. Remember how I said the calyxes look so fat they resemble seeds...? Yeah. Two of the three triplets are about as fully loaded with seeds as a plant can be, though one looks like she may have avoided the pollen altogether.

Seedy triplet #1.


Seedy Triplet #2


Not so seedy Triplet #3.


The seedy plants will not even be worth smoking, so I'm contemplating throwing them away. I don't really care about them, they were experimental bagseed anyway. Plus I have 4 topped plants to move into the veg room after they grow out a little more. Is there any point to keeping the seed-infested plants? I don't want the seeds...

I took a pair of tweesers and went to town on shorty, removing most of the seeds. While I did want to preserve the genetics of shorty because I love the way she grows, I don't think the seeds would be useful as they likely came from a hermie plant, so the seeds would be more likely to produce hermie plants...right? I left a few to grow out in case I want to keep some, but here are most of what I removed.



Finally, an exterior shot of the entire family. You can't really see from the pics, but the clone has finally begun to grow! It's probably 2" taller than when I left it! And she doesn't appear to have any seeds at all.


I wiped down the walls and replaced the plastic to try and limit the lingering pollen. Once the big girls have finished their life cycle completely I'm going to tear down the mylar and put up new stuff, as well as thoroughly scrubbing the entire space with bleach and/or rubbing alcohol to eliminate any remaining pollen.

I'm also going to start some of my real genetics today. A few blue cheese, the ppp, and maybe a thai super skunk. I've been thinking about germinating directly in the soil...any thoughts? I would just put it 1/4 inch below the surface and just water thoroughly...

Dear Jerry,

FUCKSHITASSTBALLS! That fucking sucks! I was so incredibly devastated when I read your last post, I actually almost cried. This is truly a tragedy. I hope that you can recover from this tragic loss of your loved ones, and if you'd like me to give a eulogy at the funeral, I will gladly do that for you. I think I'm starting to tear up. AND HOLY SHIT that motherfucker is as seedy as Peter North! Maybe if you grow the little seedy ones out, you can use them for making hash oil? Nothing's worthless, in my opinion. Good luck, and just remember, it's okay to cry. But only by yourself when no one else is watching, because it's not cool.

+Rep for being a sensible and articulate human being who doesn't let the bad things get to him.

Love and empathy,
Sleepless

Well, I was going to rep you, but apparently I have to rep some others before repping you again. I'LL BE BACK!

PH is key from what I have been reading.

Jerry, bummer about the hermies. As far as the two teenagers with seeds, perhaps you might think about letting one finish up. I mean, I'm a first time grower, and from what I've read, switching sexes could be either genetic or environment based. Two of my plants from bagseed decided to ball up and grow some seeds, and to be honest, I'm guessing that I screwed something up. Not suggesting anything, because, as I said, I'm just now reaching the harvest stage of my first grow and don't know jack, but an all female cast of characters in my next plant play sounds pretty enticing. What do ya think? By the way, the buds of Mr. Happy (one of the plants that opted to be true to his name and hermied up) also got extremely dry and brittle to the touch when I put it a bit too close to the light and is getting chopped tomorrow after 24 hour lights out. We'll see what happens. Good luck in all your endeavors.

excellent journal. I've found it to be something of a guide for MY first grow, and really appreciate it.

Jerry, bummer about the hermies. As far as the two teenagers with seeds, perhaps you might think about letting one finish up. I mean, I'm a first time grower, and from what I've read, switching sexes could be either genetic or environment based. Two of my plants from bagseed decided to ball up and grow some seeds, and to be honest, I'm guessing that I screwed something up. Not suggesting anything, because, as I said, I'm just now reaching the harvest stage of my first grow and don't know jack, but an all female cast of characters in my next plant play sounds pretty enticing. What do ya think? By the way, the buds of Mr. Happy (one of the plants that opted to be true to his name and hermied up) also got extremely dry and brittle to the touch when I put it a bit too close to the light and is getting chopped tomorrow after 24 hour lights out. We'll see what happens. Good luck in all your endeavors.

excellent journal. I've found it to be something of a guide for MY first grow, and really appreciate it.

Sleepless said:

Dear Jerry,

FUCKSHITASSTBALLS! That fucking sucks! I was so incredibly devastated when I read your last post, I actually almost cried. This is truly a tragedy. I hope that you can recover from this tragic loss of your loved ones, and if you'd like me to give a eulogy at the funeral, I will gladly do that for you. I think I'm starting to tear up. AND HOLY SHIT that motherfucker is as seedy as Peter North! Maybe if you grow the little seedy ones out, you can use them for making hash oil? Nothing's worthless, in my opinion. Good luck, and just remember, it's okay to cry. But only by yourself when no one else is watching, because it's not cool.

+Rep for being a sensible and articulate human being who doesn't let the bad things get to him.

Love and empathy,
Sleepless

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Thanks sleepless...I'm not quite THAT crushed by the situation, just a little disappointed in myself for permitting this situation to occur.

I though about using them for hash or oil, but they probably aren't even worth my time and nutrients. As I said, the young ones are experimental, so I am OK with the situation right now. And the big one's didn't get too seedy...thankfully it happened in the last weeks of flowering and not the first!

Marcus66 said:

Jerry, bummer about the hermies. As far as the two teenagers with seeds, perhaps you might think about letting one finish up. I mean, I'm a first time grower, and from what I've read, switching sexes could be either genetic or environment based. Two of my plants from bagseed decided to ball up and grow some seeds, and to be honest, I'm guessing that I screwed something up. Not suggesting anything, because, as I said, I'm just now reaching the harvest stage of my first grow and don't know jack, but an all female cast of characters in my next plant play sounds pretty enticing. What do ya think? By the way, the buds of Mr. Happy (one of the plants that opted to be true to his name and hermied up) also got extremely dry and brittle to the touch when I put it a bit too close to the light and is getting chopped tomorrow after 24 hour lights out. We'll see what happens. Good luck in all your endeavors.

excellent journal. I've found it to be something of a guide for MY first grow, and really appreciate it.

Click to expand...

Thanks Marcus. I'm not sure why the one plant hermed out on me...I think it was genetics, as the other plants were totally fine with their habitat to remain girls. Good luck with your chopping...it's quite the rewarding feeling!

Hey Jerry, how do you get your sig to show updates like that?