Blueberry forever! My second (and perpetual) grow

Ed
I like your blueberry garden. just recently got a blueberry clone from a longtime grower and its doing amazing for such a small lady. my garden is nowhere compared to that many plants as Mz though...lol
I agree with your labor input though, i have 13 plants and 5 clones right now. and each plant gets about 15-20 seconds of work.

Thanks BM,

Wish I could get some updated pictures posted, but something wierd is going on with the email. I know the pictures were sent to me at least 3 times during the last week, and the email address is correct, but something is keeping them from being delivered.

I've been a bit surprised with the size of the blueberries myself. I knew they were an Indica, but they didn't put on quite as much of a height increase during the stretch as I had expected. They've gotten bushy as heck, so they are taking up a lot of sq footage, but have been topping out at around 33" so far. I can't complain about the bud development though. My main cola on the oldest plants are at least 6 inchs long, and I've got another 4 on each plant that are almost as big due to the fimming. I'm still roughly three weeks from harvesting the first set, but I'm pretty sure that I'll be satisifed with the final results. The plants I moved into flowering last week and the ones that are set to move next week are probably going to end up quite a bit taller, but thats because they had almost double the veg time.

Anyone know another strain that make a good grow companion to blueberry (i.e. it likes the same environment and feeding)? I like blueberry, but I'd really like to grow a second strain thats got a bit higher thc content and a slightly different high. It would need to be another Indica that had an 8 week flowering cycle as well, since it would have to be able to fit into my rotations.

Time for a new update. My oldest set of girls are right about two weeks from harvest now, and the red/brown hairs are starting to come in with a vengeance. The buds are also starting to swell, and I can already tell that I'm going to end up with a lot tighter buds then i got out of the last grow. The next set back are flowering nicely, but one of them is acting like it has a slight N deficiency. The upper leaves on it are healthy, but they are a very pale green that's almost yellow. I stopped giving it the 10-30-20 bloom booster about 4-5 days ago and its last watering was with my 7-9-6 dyna grow, but today i decided to get some use out of my FF veg nutes and gave it a dose of 6-2-2. Hopefully the combination of decreasing the P levels and elevating the N will green her back up in the next few days,then I can get her back onto the same nute mixture the other plants are using. This is the one that got hit by the lights, so my guess is that it had to use up so much of it's stored N on repairs that it didn't have much leftover in the leaves when the plant started demanding energy for bud production. The newest set of flowering plants have been in the room for about 10 days and haven't started to put buds on quite yet, but they are looking good overall.

My vegging plants are presenting me with a dilemma. The next 4 I have to rotate into flowering are already as tall (or taller) then any of my flowering plants because they've all had at least an extra 2 weeks of veg time (and 2 have had 4), and the younger plants and clones are likely to be just as big before their turn comes around. The way things are going I'm going to be growing incredibly bushy plants that top out between 4-5 ft tall, but my flowering light really can't cover more then 6 at a time. I can't really afford to add another light at the moment, so I'm left with the choice of either adjusting the rotation and letting my vegging plants get even bigger, or moving them in on time and accepting that they are going to have 2 weeks of flowering where they aren't receiving optimal light.

Love the grow so far Ed. Hope to see some new pics soon.

WW

Thanks WW,

The pictures exist, it's just getting them onto my computer thats been a problem. I don't own a digital camera and the person who does can't figure out how to put them onto my computer directly while they are here, so they always go home and email them to me. Problem is that they tend to be slow about it, and now there seems to be a problem with the email not getting through to me even when they do send it. I'm an accountant, not an IT guy, so figuring out how to fix the problem is taking longer then i would like.

Ok, update time again. My flowering room is starting to look like a flipping forest! I have 8 plants in there currently and there isn't a chance I could fit another under my light. I barely got them to fit as it is, and only by accepting that some of them were going to have marginal light conditions on one side and would require twice a day turning. Like it or not, I'm going to have to either start growing a bit smaller plants, or figure out a way to add a second light to that room.

Anyway, the oldest (no longer the largest) plants are about 10-14 days from harvest time right now, and they are looking nice. I spent about 10 minutes the other day tying secondary colas up to the stake because they were dropping under their own weight. I don't want to try and guess what the final yield is going to be at this point, but I can guarantee that I'm going to get at least 1.5 oz per plant based on what I see today. The next set are flowering nicely as well, but between being in smaller pots and one of them having the light fall on it they just haven't turned out as well as the first pair did. The one that got nailed by the light actually split down near the base and it's almost like it is two seperate plants now, each with it's own cola. It's a bit wierd though, because all the fimming ended up on one side so I have one cola by itself, then this cluster of secondary colas on the other side.

Set #3 has been in the room for 15 days now and started to flower about 5 days ago. They are currently the biggest of the plants, but that won't last long because the two I moved in yesterday are maybe an inch shorter and still have to go through "the stretch". I forgot to measure them before the lights went out, but rough estimate is around 34" as of today. From what i understand this strain rarely gets over 4ft, so these may be pushing the limits of the genetics sizewise. I know they are pushing the limits of my lights!

I'm trying to decide what i should do about lower growth. I'm getting a lot of little interior popcorn buds on the lower branches, as well as little buds forming all around the lowest part of the plants stem. I know a lot of people cut all that little growth off so the plant doesn't spend energy on it, but I didn't bother my last grow because my yield was already screwed, and I really didn't notice that the loose popcorn stuff smoked all that different from any of the bigger/tighter buds.

Well, time for another update.

My oldest set of girls are just a few days away from harvest now and are looking wonderful. Can't wait to see how they came out!

My next set of girls decided to give me another headache though. The one that had the light dropped on it now has itself a case of spider mites. The little bastards have been a problem for me before, and if memory serves this plant had a slight problem with them 6 weeks ago before it moved into the flowering area. I thought I had killed all of them off back then, but not such luck. I went ahead and sprayed all the plants with einstein oil today, and after inspecting the infested plant went ahead and cut off a lot of the little growth on the bottom where the majority of the eggs and damage seemed to be at. I havent really trimmed these plants at all, so all the stuff I ended clipping off were the tiny bottom buds that never really develop fully anyway.

The last two sets of plants are coming along really well. All 4 plants are over 36" tall and are putting out far more bud sites then the older plants have. Only bad point is that they are so wide that they don't fit into my light coverage as well as I would like. Much as I enjoy growing these big plants, I think I'm going to have to go back to a one month veg time until i can afford to put in some heat control and add another light. If I were just growing for myself I'd keep doing the big plants and grow fewer at a time, but since my partners can't seem to make their stuff last I'm pretty much stuck with needing two plants every other week.

Anyway, thats pretty much it for this week. If all goes as planned my oldest girls should be ready for harvest around wednesday, though my guess is that they are going to need a few extra days based on current trichome colors.

EdGreyfox said:

Well, time for another update.

My oldest set of girls are just a few days away from harvest now and are looking wonderful. Can't wait to see how they came out!

My next set of girls decided to give me another headache though. The one that had the light dropped on it now has itself a case of spider mites. The little bastards have been a problem for me before, and if memory serves this plant had a slight problem with them 6 weeks ago before it moved into the flowering area. I thought I had killed all of them off back then, but not such luck. I went ahead and sprayed all the plants with einstein oil today, and after inspecting the infested plant went ahead and cut off a lot of the little growth on the bottom where the majority of the eggs and damage seemed to be at. I havent really trimmed these plants at all, so all the stuff I ended clipping off were the tiny bottom buds that never really develop fully anyway.

The last two sets of plants are coming along really well. All 4 plants are over 36" tall and are putting out far more bud sites then the older plants have. Only bad point is that they are so wide that they don't fit into my light coverage as well as I would like. Much as I enjoy growing these big plants, I think I'm going to have to go back to a one month veg time until i can afford to put in some heat control and add another light. If I were just growing for myself I'd keep doing the big plants and grow fewer at a time, but since my partners can't seem to make their stuff last I'm pretty much stuck with needing two plants every other week.

Anyway, thats pretty much it for this week. If all goes as planned my oldest girls should be ready for harvest around wednesday, though my guess is that they are going to need a few extra days based on current trichome colors.

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Right on! Like to see some pics of them I'm thinking we are going to have to cut out veg time back a little bit too or just get some bigger pots and buckets.. haha a couple of our new strains like to EXPLODE when put into flower - I guess that isn't necessarily a bad thing!!

https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/331497-our-indoor-grow-room-videos.html


incase you're interested.

MZ,
The problem with the pictures is that my brother in law can't seem to get his email to send them to me. He and my sis come over every saturday and take a new set of pictures, but since my computer doesn't have the right programs to work with their digital camera he has to send them to me once he gets home. That worked up until about a month ago, when for some reason the emails stopped coming through.

The plants I've got growing look quite a bit different from the ones in your videos in terms of bushiness-are you trimming and training yours to focus on the main cola(s) and keeping bushiness to a minimum, or is that just the strains? Other then a Fimming during week 3 of veg I haven't bothered trimming my plants (well, except for taking clones off them), so the fact that most of mine are almost as wide as they are tall may be because of that. Or it might just be that they are Indica dominant while yours are more Sativa- I don't know enough about your strains to be able to guess.

I like the way you tapped into the water heater, and that may be what I end up doing myself once the summer heat finally forces me to move my grow into the basement. The lack of water down there was a major reason why I haven't bitten the bullet and moved one of my two rooms down already. The lack of sufficient electrical outlets is the other problem, since I've only got one set to work with for the entire basement (well, I also have the outlets for my washer/dryer, but those don't count). Out of curiousity, was the noise in your rooms caused by the inflow and exhaust fans, or was that street noise coming from the other side of the walls? I don't have any of that kind of equipment yet, and I hadn't expected the exhaust fans and filters to make that much noise.

Harvest Time! Well, I harvested one of the two oldest plants today, and I was really happy with the amount I got off of it. Not sure what the wet weight was, but I should have my dry weight in about 4 days if the drying goes the same as it did on my last grow. I should have some pics to post in the next couple days as well-partners are going to put all the old and current photos on a flash drive and bring it to me later this week.

I'm trying really hard not to count my buds before their weighed, but I can't help but compare what i see hanging on my racks now to what I had hanging there after the last harvest. That harvest was staggered, but we ended up taking 4 of the plants at once, and it looks to me like I've got more bud from this single plant then I did out of those 4. I've got so many buds hanging down there that are bigger then the main colas from those plants were that I can't even estimate just what the final yield is going to be, but I think it's going to be better then anticipated.

And here comes the pictures! Or at least some of them. These were taken today with a cellphone camera so the quality isn't fantastic, but at least I've got something to post. The first is a picture of my flowering area, and the second two show my handy dandy home made drying rack with the harvested buds hanging down. Note- the big bud in the the front of the rack is NOT the main cola-That's shown in the second picture, and is the big fat bud in the back left corner. It's not as long as some of the others, but it's a lot thicker.

What we do is get our veg ladies 6 inches tall and then we top them one time - that's all. Then we "lollipop" them and clean off the bottoms of the stems to allow better airflow and it gets rid of all the little popcorn buds that wouldn't be getting any light. As for the noise, it was all of our inflow and exhaust fans. It can't be heard from the outside though If you do decide to tap into your water heater make sure to invest in a good double headed faucet - all mettle.

Your harvest looks great!! It feels so nice smoking your own herb - GOOD JOB!!!!!!

Ok, you do clean off the bottom of the stems then. I haven't been doing that for a couple of reasons. First, we haven't been able to harvest enough before now to be able to afford to lose even one gram. Second, trying to convince my partners that cutting popcorn bud producing stems off is an uphill battle, because from their perspective it's all equally smokeable. It burns quick and doesn't taste that great, but it still gets you stoned, and thats all one of them really cares about.

I may be able to start doing some of the work I needed to do to relocate my grow soon. I got a surprise refund check from the bank today on my houses escrow account, so I'll have a few hundred dollars to put into new equipment after taking care of a few neccessities that I've been putting off. I've been telling myself that I was going to replace my work shoes for two months now (ever since the side split on one of them), and now I don't have any excuse left for not spending the money.

EdGreyfox said:

Ok, you do clean off the bottom of the stems then. I haven't been doing that for a couple of reasons. First, we haven't been able to harvest enough before now to be able to afford to lose even one gram. Second, trying to convince my partners that cutting popcorn bud producing stems off is an uphill battle, because from their perspective it's all equally smokeable. It burns quick and doesn't taste that great, but it still gets you stoned, and thats all one of them really cares about.

I may be able to start doing some of the work I needed to do to relocate my grow soon. I got a surprise refund check from the bank today on my houses escrow account, so I'll have a few hundred dollars to put into new equipment after taking care of a few neccessities that I've been putting off. I've been telling myself that I was going to replace my work shoes for two months now (ever since the side split on one of them), and now I don't have any excuse left for not spending the money.

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From experience a lot that the popcorn buds that your friend wants to keep actually take away from the growth of the top colas resulting in equal or less amounts of bud. When we remove all the popcorn buds the energy that the plant would spend putting into those little buds all shoots up to the top cola and makes them FAAAAAT!!!!!

Woot woot for the refund check - that's always exciting!!!!

loving the blues my friend....check out my only blueberry, a clone from a friend whos been waiting for the right pheno for years. but this is what he hooked me up with cant wait to keep her going
its the one in the front to the right...

Yeah, that looks familiar. Be prepared for plants that get nice and bushy, especially if you give them a long veg period. You'll end up needing to put a stake down into the pot to secure the main stem to, and will also end up tying a lot of your branches off to it as they start to lean under the weight of their own buds.

thanks man...i know the bushy type..lol if you check out my grow i got a freakplant bush...its big red but had to tie her down everywhere because of the growth. just recently put her in flower though so cant wait. but that blue will bush as well!

MZ, You and i know that it takes energy away from the main buds sites, but trying to explain that to one particular person hasn't been easy. He has certain notions about how MJ should be grown, and getting him to hear anything that doesn't fit those notions is a pain. Nevermind the fact that I'm the one doing all the research and that all his experience is 20+ years out of date and is based on outdoor grows in a totally different climate.

EdGreyfox said:

MZ, You and i know that it takes energy away from the main buds sites, but trying to explain that to one particular person hasn't been easy. He has certain notions about how MJ should be grown, and getting him to hear anything that doesn't fit those notions is a pain. Nevermind the fact that I'm the one doing all the research and that all his experience is 20+ years out of date and is based on outdoor grows in a totally different climate.

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Haha yeah you should show him pictures - he can't argue with you if you show him pictures to prove it.