[MEGA]Growing advice, tips, tricks and experience: Mark 3

[SpanoonapS]

Read the bottom. For Soil mixes. That's the grow version.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

Which goes back to my original point. Just because it says soil it doesn't mean it's designed for soil, or will work well. You'll see that a lot of manufacturers of hydro or coco nutrients will say on the label that you can use them in soil, but this is definitely not advisable.

Are you aware of the fundamental differences between coco and soil nutrients? Coco coir has a very different cation exchange capacity and nutrients designed for each are not interchangeable. Sure they'll work, but they won't work well.

I wish manufacturers would be banned from this practice but it gives them better sales figures and they can get away with it. Unfortunately many new growers are not aware of what makes a coco nutrient unique from a hydro or a soil nutrient or what the difference between an inorganic mineral ion chemical type nutrient and an organic-type nutrient is and this can cause confusion and disappointing results.

 

[SpanoonapS]

I use it in conjunction with this.

 

[SpanoonapS]

I duno man... The dudes who helped me have been growing with these products for years and never had any problems. They use soil mixes and yield tons. I hear different things from hundreds of people a day... some say THIS is good, others say THAT is good. I duno what to do anymore.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

How do you know they 'yield tons'? You need to be wary of advice coming from anyone who is trying to sell you products at the same time.

They're not there to help you. They're there to make sales.

 

[SpanoonapS]

I've seen it. I know them personally. I hear what you are saying though.

I'm going to continue with these nutrients and see what happens. I will post a bunch of updates.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

Good luck anyway. You need to make your own mistakes to learn at the end of the day (I don't mean that in a bad way).

 

[SpanoonapS]

What should I look for if this isn't working out? So far, the plants look beautiful.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

Well, a lot of people when they start out have non-specific problems with discoloration, burnt tips and all sorts of problems with deficiencies when they use nutrients that don't work in the right way because they're not designed for compost or have the wrong NPK levels etc. Just keep an eye on them and you'll know if and when they start to look unhealthy. Compare the photo of them when you got them with how they look and it should alert you to any problems, but failing that, I'll be able to help if I can see a photo.

I would think trying something else if it doesn't go to plan, but see how it goes anyway, you might be pleasantly surprised.

You don't have to do the same to all the plants. You could try an organic nutrient on just one plant as an experiment.

edit: I'll just say one thing. If they could make nutrients that worked equally well with coco and soil, we wouldn't have so many of the manufacturers making separate coco and soil nutrients.

 

[SpanoonapS]

My little girls are sleeping right now so I can't take a pic

They wake up in 2 hours... I will take a bunch of pics and post them.

 

[SpanoonapS]

My little girls are sleeping right now so I can't take a pic

They wake up in 2 hours... I will take a bunch of pics and post them.

 

[SpanoonapS]

Ok here is the update. They are all beautiful. They have grown taller (a few inches) and wider. They look very healthy and green... new shoots are sprouting each day. Check picture A out. I was concerned with the slight burning on some of the leaves in Picture B. Only a FEW of them have this characteristic. I hope it's nothing to be concerned about.

Picture A:

NSFW:

Picture B:

NSFW:

 

[Artificial Emotion]

They look fine, but from what I can see here's a very slight and subtle hint of overfertilization in the second photo (I can see slight tip burn, but it's not very obvious). I would stop feeding them like I was saying earlier, and hold off until they start to show some yellowing. You can always feed more but not less.

I might be wrong about the signs of over feeding but that's neither here nor there, since I would hold off feeding anyway until the plants tell you they're hungry.

...........

It would be great if there were a growing FAQ as a sticky in this forum.

 

[Wise420]

They look fine, but from what I can see here's a very slight and subtle hint of overfertilization in the second photo (I can see slight tip burn, but it's not very obvious). I would stop feeding them like I was saying earlier, and hold off until they start to show some yellowing. You can always feed more but not less.

I might be wrong about the signs of over feeding but that's neither here nor there, since I would hold off feeding anyway until the plants tell you they're hungry.

...........

It would be great if there were a growing FAQ as a sticky in this forum.[/QUOTE]Couldnt agree more with you there mate. I think thats an exellent idea.

How are your young one coming along, have any shown yet?

 

[Wise420]

Spoonaps there looking great by the way. Like AE said you are worrying to much. Keep your eyes on the new growth and as long as thats healthy your plants should be fine.

 

[Prelude2TragedyII]

Thanks for the advice about the green house, I think I may just let the plants outdoors do their thing and not really bother much with them, Indoor is a different story though, lol.

For some reason we are receiving about 16 hours of daylight per day, and my plants that Ive been starting to put outside are just automatically starting to flower, I dont know what to do to reverse this problem...

Also, for a plant that has bud in it, and say I just want to get the biggest buds off of the plant, is there a way for my to get the bud without completely killing the plant or no?

And as for the plant that I just put outside, it JUST started to flower, but it doesn't look like it's going to finish flowering, will it go back to Vegging during summer or what? Summer here starts in about 2 weeks (maybe 3) , we have been having pretty odd weather, right now normally it'd be about 80-90 during the day but its been staying in the mid 70's , and at night , it gets down to 40-50F
Wondering if that has anything to do with the flowering factor

And the plant I put out their first still seems to be making VERY slow progress on growing, but it is still growing (the buds) none the less.
Im waiting to see a few amber trichomes then I plan on harvesting what I can without killing the plant if possible.

As for my plants indoor, Ive got something weird going on, Ive been watering my plants regularly, and I just bought a clone (rooted) female Master Kush (bought two) , one of them took of and is doing absolutely amazing, the other, well, Its pot that it is in is ALWAYS heavy, which makes me think it has water in it, but, its always wilting and looking pretty bad, I was thinking of re-potting it , but, I dont want to rip any roots since this plant seems so delicate, the other master kush I have is already towering twice the size of my other plants (all started the same size)

Well, hopefully I can get some pictures posted up soon.
Thanks for the green house info again , I appreciate it,
Ive been able to keep my temps down to about 71-76 with the lights on, prob 60,65 with the lights off, (run lights at night and off during the hottest part of the day (1-7pm)

-edit-
And yea, having this thread as a sticky would be nice, Wondering what mod is going to be in change of the next thread or if I should start it like I had been when it hits 1000 posts. Mods PM me please if you know whats going to happen or what the options are, thank you , I greatly appreciate it.


-edit- again- lol-

And by the way , I know what AE says might be interpreted the wrong way, but he seems to know his stuff pretty damn well,
I started off just doing what the guy at the shop told me, didn't work well, came here, started to learn from my mistakes, and I'm on crop 2 now, hopefully the finish will be better than the last , but as they were saying, you're worrying alot (like I do), and weed is weeds, cut it in half and it will still grow I'm sure, just take the best care you can for them, and that should be what those little babies need , just some TLC

 

[SpanoonapS]

Ya... we are following AEs advice. We already fed them - but after that we just watered. We will wait until we see signs of hunger and then feed them.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

Also, for a plant that has bud in it, and say I just want to get the biggest buds off of the plant, is there a way for my to get the bud without completely killing the plant or no?

Yes of course. I would recommend doing that! In fact, there's no rule saying you have to harvest a whole plant all at once. You can harvest whichever buds look like they are ready to harvest the most after inspecting with a pocket microscope. Or you can harvest just what you want, as long as you don't remove too much of the plant foliage, and then rejuvenate the plant by putting it back into the vegetative stage. Once you're right into flower it takes a while for it to go back into the vegetative stage once the no. of hours of light increase to 16h+. So, it might look like it's not doing anything for quite a while. If you're wanting to reveg it you need to remove most of the buds to leave just foliage, to help it along as much as you can.

You will find that once it's gone into flower and the no. of light hours increases, you should start to notice the plant to behave weirdly. Some of the leaves will actually start to spiral, which you might find surprising. A grower/breeder discovered that phenomenon (or I should say, documented it) relatively recently.

As for my plants indoor, Ive got something weird going on, Ive been watering my plants regularly, and I just bought a clone (rooted) female Master Kush (bought two) , one of them took of and is doing absolutely amazing, the other, well, Its pot that it is in is ALWAYS heavy, which makes me think it has water in it, but, its always wilting and looking pretty bad, I was thinking of re-potting it , but, I dont want to rip any roots since this plant seems so delicate, the other master kush I have is already towering twice the size of my other plants (all started the same size)

Most commonly wilting is caused by not watering enough, however when you water the roots too much and the soil is always too wet, wilting also occurs, counterintuitively, since they are literally drowing/being smothered. I would check to see if the soil is able to drain properly by looking at the holes underneath to see if they're being blocked in any way. It might be that the compost is not draining well enough (the fact that it's heavy all the time rings alarm bells). I would say this is almost certainly the problem if a) you're watering all the time, b) there's wilting despite a) and c) the pot is heavy all the time, which suggests the medium is always saturated with water.

The roots shouldn't rip if you can let it dry out and then tap the bottom so that the rootball slides out easily. I do this all the tme with no issues.

 

[Vader]

It would be great if there were a growing FAQ as a sticky in this forum.

People don't read stickies, and we already have a grow thread. If you guys want an FAQ on the front page of this thread, I'd be happy to stick it there if you write it.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

How are your young one coming along, have any shown yet?

Hi there Wise. Here are some pics I just took! Shown are some pics of the plants, and also shown are photos of my compost tea brewer with some worm compost that I made myself for the purpose of making compost tea for my plants. The pump is used with the tea brewer. I just made a batch of compost tea yesterday and used it and started to see the results about 16 hours later. I'm not sure what aspect of the tea had such an immediate effect but it's great anyhow.

The worm compost is of such a high quality compared to the worm compost made by companies like Biobizz etc. It's no doubt very active in beneficial bacteria, fungi and protozoa etc. and is rich in water soluble trace nutrients and beneficial substances that improve plant growth.

...........

People don't read stickies, and we already have a grow thread. If you guys want an FAQ on the front page of this thread, I'd be happy to stick it there if you write it.

^ I just thought it might be good if someone has a question and writteen in the FAQ under numbered headlines is a concise, succint and easy-to-understand explanation of a concept, such as what potting up is and why it's needed, then you could refer them to section 7a) for example, with a link so all they have to do is click on it. This would save having to explain the same thing to various people over and over again. Perhaps people would be more inclined to read it if you link it to a specific section and all they need to do is click on the link rather than trawl through loads of info.

Or instead you could write it at the beginning of the thread as you say and then whenever we need to refer the person to it, you either give a hypertext link or copy and paste it.

It's just an idea anyway, so if you don't think it'll work that's up to you since you're in charge, vadar.