First grow. "Opium" clones in soil, 400w MH/HPS. Comments/advice welcome

Day 68 (32 of flowering): 70-82 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Well, been a slow week overall. The girls are all putting on lots of bud, but really aren't gaining all that much in total height. I've reached the conclusion that the roots are running out of room in the pots since the pots are only about 1/2 full of soil at this point (started at around 2/3 full). They've only put on about 6-8 inches of height in the last month, which isn't anywhere near what they should have done. One of the plants is showing some signs of PH issues, but other then watering with no nutes there isn't much I can do. The local water is a bit high, but not so high that it should be causing the issues I'm seeing. My best guess is nute lockout caused by a salt buildup, so I'm going to stick to giving it straight water for the next 4-5 days and see what happens.

Based on what I'm seeing today I really think I'm going to be pushing it to expect to get more then 2 oz of dried bud out of each plant at harvest. I may just be expecting things too soon, but I'm guessing the spider mite problems and some of the other issues I've seen since are going to keep them from reaching their full potential. They definately aren't going to reach the 5-6 ft mark the person i got them from originally told me to expect, though when he looked at them last week he didn't say anything about them being short. Right now they are all between 24-28", and I'm guessing they will all end up being around 3 foot or so at harvest. I suppose they could surprise me and suddenly put on two foot of growth in the 4-6 weeks they have left, but i highly doubt it.

The main colas/flowering sites on them are all between 4-7 inches currently, but they aren't the big thick buds a lot of the pictures I've seen on this site show. It may be that it's too early (they just really started to show obvious crystals a few days ago), but at this point the buds don't look anywhere near as dense or as wide as I had expected. The plus side is that this strain doesn't seem to put everything into the main cola, so I've got a ton of secondary bud sites that are 3-4 inches long themselves, and almost as thick/dense as the main cola. The loss of leaves from the spider mites and other problems has also meant that my lower growth is getting a ton of light, so I've actually got bud sites 3-4 layers thick all the way down on the lowest areas of the plants.

Other then the PH problem with the one plant my only other major concern is that I'm continuing to lose fan leaves. I'm starting to think it might be something nutrient related, but I can't get the picture taker to actually email me copies so I can't post anything to get other peoples opinions. My best guess at this point is that the fox farm nutrient mix/schedule for the flowering cycle just isn't right for this strain, because I seem to have all sort of nutrient problem symptoms. First I had some slight nute burn signs, then I had fan leaves dying from what looked like an N deficiency (even though the mix equal parts of a 6-4-4 and a 2-8-4), then I've had some other stuff that didn't quite fit any of the pictures/descriptions I've seen. Thing is, the FF schedule adds in other things (beastie blooms, ka ching) that have really skewed values, and even though they are only used in small amounts it's made it hard for me to really figure out just what ratio of N-P-K my girls are getting. I'm just going to try and get through the rest of this grow and then switch over to jacks classic.

The other half of the grow is starting to pick up steam. My first two dj shorts blueberry plants were ready to move over to the flowering room last week, but I've been holding off on it so i can take clones from them. Both around about 20", and a lot bushier then I was led to expect. The third still hasn't done much, and I'm starting to wonder if it ever will. It's been in the pot for a full month, and while it hasn't died it also hasn't grown, and has not replaced the big fan leaves i was forced to pinch off when it was first transplanted. I added a second set of blueberry clones last week, and both came through the transplant process just fine. I also finally ordered my own cloning equipment (rapid rooters, heat mat, gel, etc), so by this time next week I should be taking clones off my oldest blueberries, and the I'll really have this perpetual grow thing going.

I have also added a new goal- I absolutely must acquire seeds or clones from the strawberry AK strain. To the best of my knowledge there is only one source of it locally, and the dispensary i have been frequenting has an exclusive contract with the growers. They won't sell the clones, so I'm currently hoping to find some seeds. The stuff smells like strawberry, it tastes like strawberry, and it gives you a very, very nice sativa high.

Day 70 (34 of flowering): 70-82 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Ok, so it's only been a couple of days, but since they are about to hit their 5 week anniversary and I made some changes i figured I'd post an update. First, i took Riddles advice and replanted 3 of my girls today. They are still in the same pots, but i slide them out and added enough soil to bring them back up to the 5 gallon mark once my girls were back in. I had plenty of roots poking out the sides and bottoms and the soil itself wasn't nearly as thick as it looked from above, so my theory that they were running our of space for the roots to grow in seems to have been accurate. Hopefully this will help fix some of the lack of upwards growth issues, as well as some of the PH/Nute lock out issues that seem to have been occuring. If they respond well after about 3-4 days I will go ahead and repot the other 3.

I also decided to give molasses a try, and picked up a jar of grandmas unsulfered from the grocery store today. I'll start giving them some with the next watering, and hopefully that will also help my girls out and get them back on track.

Day 77 (41 of flowering): 65-75 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Ok, another week gone by. The plants I repotted are doing fine, though it hasn't solved the problem with the one plant. It still looks like it has PH problems, but it seems to slowly be clearing up. At this point I'm only two weeks from harvest (more or less), so I'm not going to sweat it too much. The plants still aren't growing much, and i've got to conclude that the the problem with the spiders mites/neem oil back at the end of vegging totally stunted their growth and messed up their resistance to other problems. None of them has added more then 6-8 inches in height during the flowering cycle, and they've gone from one problem to another ever since that happened. They have flowered fairly nicely and the colas are shaping up on all of them, but there closer we get to harvest the more It looks like I'll be lucky to get more then an oz out of each plant (well, maybe 2 if I'm lucky).

I'm going to have to start a new thread for the newer parts of the grow soon, but for now I'll just use this one since the differences make an interesting comparison. I fimmed the oldest set of blueberries last weekend and as of today the 4 new branches are all coming in nicely. I also got in my cloning equipment this week, so took a half dozen clones from them which will hopefully all root well. I really should move these over into the flowering room, but i want to give the new growth from the fimming a few more days to develop. They are currently just about 20" tall, and I'm hoping to see them hit at least 48" by harvest if all goes well. The other two blueberries that are two weeks old got fimmed today. They are both about a foot tall, and are scheduled for two more weeks of vegging before they get flowered. Assuming all the clones root properly they will become three sets of 2 plants in the rotation, and the oldest will end up having at least 2 full months of veg time before being flowered. This strain is a bit wierd though. The shape of the leaves and bushiness of the plant indicates that it's a primarily Indica strain, but it acts like a Sativa when it comes to adding height. Assuming my flowering goes right this time and these girls really do double or triple in size I'm going to be looking at plants that are between 4-5 ft tall.

Day 85 (49 of flowering): 65-75 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Well, it's getting close. As of today we're into week 7, and the buds seem to be starting to swell and a fair number of hairs are starting to go red as well. The trichomes seem to be going milky/cloudy on most of the plants, so I'm guessing another 7-10 days should do it. At least I'm hoping that it won't be much longer then that, since I really want to find out whether I've grown something that's at least in the same ball park with what you can get at the dispensary or not. I still think I'm going to be disappointed with my yield, but considering the problems I've had during the grow (and which continue) as well as the fact that I didn't top them or train them in any way I suppose I can't gripe too much.

I've finally got pictures! Sorry it's taken so long, but the camera isn't mine and the person who owns it has either forgotten to bring it or to send the pictures after taking them for the last several weeks. There are several that show a sort of tannish spotting on my fan leaves, and I'd really like some input on what i'm dealing with here. I've been thinking it was a PH problem, but since it's only effecting one plant seriously (another shows some slight signs of it) and they are all in identical soil and have been getting identical nutes, etc I'm starting to wonder if it's something else. I know my water is a bit alkaline, but between the nutes and adding molasses on non nutes days its always been in the right ph range when I've taken the time to test it before watering.

Notice how the leaves with large numbers of the spots are all withered, deformed and dried out? They don't actually seem to die and fall off (at least one have yet), thet just add more and more spots and seem to shrink a bit more every day. Additionally, the stuff seems to be spreading to some of the small leaves on the main cola, and it looks like its killing the trichomes. At least there aren't many visible on the top of the leaves anymore, where they were very think just last week. I'm wondering if i should just chop that plant down now even though its a bit early, or if there's anything I can do this late in the game to turn her around.

Day 91 (55 of flowering): 70-85 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Well, another week down. Had one of them decide to hermie on me earlier this week so I took the cola off of it and have itdrying currently. Was only a single set of banannas, and I haven't seen any more on that or the other plants, so I guess i got off easy. The cola I harvested was from one of the smallest and weakest plants and only weighed 9 grams wet, so I'm guessing at this point that none of these plants are going to end up yielding much more then an oz of dried bud.

Been watching the trichs through my jewlers loop, and a few seem to be going amber, but the rest are still milky or clear. The colas are starting to swell and put on weight though, and I've had to tie several of the plants to keep the main stalks from bending all the way over. I'm thinking about going ahead and taking a couple of them when they are around 10% amber and leaving the rest to continue to ripen, since I haven't had a chance to decide which "stone" i like better. I'm really hoping that will happen in the next few days, because I'm sick of paying dispensary prices. Don't get me wrong- I've got nothing against dispensaries. It's great to know that I can go pick up what I need anytime they are open if I run out between harvests, and I like being able to sample different strains to see what I want to grow myself. I just don't understand how anyone that's not making VERY good money can afford to pay their prices in the long term. I"d end up spending somewhere in the neighborhood of 7k a year, and I don't know all that many people who can afford that sort of extra expense.

Day 95 (59 of flowering): 70-85 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Ok, these girls are starting to annoy me. The plant that actually grew more or less properly and developed the best cola looks like it's done until you get out the glass and look at the trichs, at which point you see pretty much nothing but milky. Maybe just a hint of amber, but thats been going on for a week now. The runt looks like it might be done a few days after the good one (whenever that finally happens), but the others seem like they would be quite content to spend another 3-4 weeks soaking up rays. They can't hold their cola's up without help, but they don't seem in any hurry to finiish. They don't seem to be adding any new layers to the colas or other bud sites anymore, so i don't know what to think at this point.

Oh, I let my sister convince me that one of the plants trichs had gone at least somewhat amber on Sunday, so we went ahead and harvested it. I've got it hanging out to dry right now, and guess it will be another couple days before it's ready to start curing. I did get to sample some properly dried bud though! Remember the cola I had to talk about 10 days back because the plant was trying to go hermie? Well, it dried up just fine and we decided to sample a couple of bowls before putting what was left in the jar to cure. I thought it had an interesting taste. Not bad, but sort of odd. Not sure how to describe it. Everyone else thought it tasted good, so i guess it couldn't be too bad. It's also got an odd smell to it. It doesn't smell like cut grass or hay, but it definately has a "planty" smell. That may be the strain, or it may be the fact that I didn't get a chance to flush the thing. As for the high, it was a good high, but it didn't last all that long. That was probably because I was impatient and harvested early, though it could also be because I screwed up so badly with the spider mites back at the beginning of flowering. Either way, I should have enough cured and ready to smoke within the next few days that I won't have to take a trip back to the dispensary anytime soon. Once it's all dried I'll post the final weight from that plant, but I seriously doubt it's going to be more the an ounce (probably more like 1/2 an oz).

Day 100 (64 of flowering): 70-85 during light, 62-70 at night. Humidity=25-30%

Well, this grow is definately taking longer then advertised. I've completely harvested two plants now, and one of the other four MAY be ready sometime this week.
The first plant I harvested turned out to have a total of 22 grams on it, which is much less then i wanted, but I suppose it's not too bad for a first grow, especially since it wasn't one of the stronger plants. The second plant was just harvested 3 days ago and is still drying, but it will probably yield between 1 and 1.5 oz. The main cola is probably going to give me between 10-14 grams by itself.