South Africa - First Outdoor Grow - Heatwave!

Hi all. It's been years since I have posted over here. I had a tiny little stealth box back then, but due to the size I could not grow anything worth a damn.

Since weed has been decriminalized in SA, I obviously had to take the chance to try again, but outdoors this time.
It is mostly going smashingly but for the ongoing heatwave - we're talking 100deg plus temps for weeks on end.
Does anyone have any advice for this situation? Some locals say they water twice a day, while others say the plants do not drink at all when it's this hot. Instead I resorted to misting the leaves at midday when it's hottest.
I must just add that since I installed a 40% shade net, my 3 ladies seem much more content.
It would be interesting to know how the heat actually affects the progress; does it halt the growth at all, or just slow it down?

Of the 5 seeds I planted, 3 turned out to be girls. They are pre-flowering now and I am anticipating some monster buds in time for my birthday in mid-April. Unfortunately I seem to be running out of space; I had not anticipated how large they would get, so first of all they are too close together and in addition they have grown high enough to touch the shade net at 3 meters high! Next year I will almost certainly mainline and spread out a bit.

Nice females you got there mane! Hope you have a bountiful harvest

Thanks bro! I can hardly wait. I have had no bud for months (when I planted, I decided the next spliff I enjoy will be from my garden), so it will be sweeeet!

No they will definitely be drinking lots of water, I dont think twice a day is necessary but heavy watering will do them good. They look great tho nice trees.

How often are you watering?

Since your plants are in ground, I'd go for a long, slow soak early in the day, and probably water 2-3 times a week.

New Age United said:

No they will definitely be drinking lots of water, I dont think twice a day is necessary but heavy watering will do them good. They look great tho nice trees.

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Thank you socaljoe.

socaljoe said:

How often are you watering?

Since your plants are in ground, I'd go for a long, slow soak early in the day, and probably water 2-3 times a week.

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I normally only water when the upper soil layer seems entirely dry and some of the leaves only start to wilt ever so slightly. Lately though I have not watered much at all as we seem to be getting a light thunderstorm at least every other day. The girls LOVE those thunderstorms.

Can you buy an moisture meter dude.they are pretty cheap 10-15 bucks...that way you will know and work out how much to water before the girls show you they need a drink.atm mine are on 8ltrs a day outdoors in 32 deg celcius days...they can get heat stress through lack of water..

Cheers max

Tas devil said:

Can you buy an moisture meter dude.they are pretty cheap 10-15 bucks...that way you will know and work out how much to water before the girls show you they need a drink.atm mine are on 8ltrs a day outdoors in 32 deg celcius days...they can get heat stress through lack of water..

Cheers max

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Thanks Tas.
Noted. I don't mind stressing them a little while still vegging; I want them to keep stretching those roots. However it must be mentioned that I work from home and the plants are right outside my workshop window, so I can see immediately when some leaves start wilting. A little mist of water then sees them through until they take on some water again.
I will def invest in a moisture meter though as I am about 2 weeks or so into flower now and want to impose no more stress. However we are getting frequent showers right now and the soil never dries out completely.

This tree is about 2 weeks behind the others and while they have shown pre-flowers for at least 10 weeks there is not a single pistle to be seen on this one yet (fortunately no balls ether). It is however stretching like a beast and quickly catching up with the other 2 in height, Strangely it also smells much stronger than the older ones.



I have pulled a lot of the big fan leaves to let more sun reach below. (As I'm still about 3 weeks from 12/12 in my region and the other 2 have flowers on literally every node, I was willing to take the risk and see what effect this has). You can see on the pic how pale the now-revealed leaves are.



A day after pulling the big fans and color is returning.



The 2 older plants have little nugs starting on every single node.

I would like to acquire some Durban Poison feminized seeds for next years grow, but ironically being in South Africa (the home of DP) I am having some trouble finding a supplier. I have managed to track down some at GSR under their locally (South African) held stocks, but I'm a little dubious about their claim of 9 weeks flowering time. Seems a bit fast for a true DP from what I've read.
Has anyone grown those or have a lead to finding a local supplier?
Even if I cannot find feminized seeds, I believe there is enough time under LED lighting indoors to create a viable mother by September/October.

don't mist, that slows down transpiration (sweating for plants) . you have to keep an eye on the soil, you can water them daily as long as they're using it up. shading during the hottest part of the day can be helpful, without slowing down growth.
i used to use a cargo net stretched out on poles, and add a few leafy branches on top of it if it was savagely hot.

Great, excellent. Thanks to all who contributed to my learning. Now, ironically (with regard to this thread's heading i.e. "heatwave"), that is now no longer an issue thanks to the daily rain we are getting.
Instead I would like some input from those in the know on feeding; the soil is now wet all the time, so I am loathe to feed with more water based nutes. Any alternatives?

I just give them a bucket of water in the afternoon if their heads are hanging.

Hi All. Not so sure how to do it, but can I perhaps request a mod to move this thread to the grow journals area instead.
I started this thread hoping to gain some advice to deal with a several weeks long heatwave (and have gotten said advice in abundance).

Reading around the forum, I noticed an absence of any journals documenting a "Southern Hemisphere" outdoor grow...at least not this season at least. Perhaps I am just not getting the search function.

I would like to chart my progress (good or bad) in the hopes of connecting with other RSA growers to exchange info and "compare notes". As it is has recently become legal to grow for yourself in your backyard, there surely has to be many of us.

ANC said:

I just give them a bucket of water in the afternoon if their heads are hanging.

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Hey ANC. NIce to "meet" you. Interesting that comment...seems you will get a different answer depending on who you ask, he-he.

It makes sense to me too that you would want to lightly stress them like that to encourage the roots to do their thing.

Compare that to professionally growing grapes for instance; it is well known that you get the best grapes form areas where they (the grape plants) must work harder to survive. You will often find that some of the most famous vineyards (like Tuscany for example) are on hilly and almost rocky land. This makes rainwater run off and not penetrate the ground very well, forcing the plants to put down deep strong roots and fat stems.

Since an outdoor grow takes months anyway I see no reason to rush things, as there is ample time to react to bad (harvest threatening) stress. I want humongous sticky buds in the end. I don't care if I have to wait for it. Since this grow is for personal use, I should get enough bud from these eight foot monsters to last me a year easy.

Having said all of that though, I will not want stress them during flowering at all, except for some LST when absolutely required. By then, the small amount of stress that you as the grower "allowed" the plant to deal with will have built enough character to weather the storm to come. Almost like raising kids then if you think about it.

Sorry for the long post. (quite baked).

this is only one page, just go to the grow journal tab and start one up.

by the way, ANC lives in Africa, so i'm guessing he would have better advice than most of us in the u.s. could give you, we're just guessing about the weather, and what you have available to use

It's literally so bad in summer, you can drench these girls in the morning and they will hang their heads by 3 or 4, unless you use giant containers.
I told you we had 115 degrees this week. tomorrow we are expecting 108ish. The two plants I have outdoors for seeding I keep under a shade port.

I have started a grow journal, as the heatwave issues are now a thing of the past and instead replaced by relentless rain!
Here is the link: https://www.rollitup.org/Journal/magicflame.135765/