Need room cleaning technique/advice

Short story, directly to the question:

I have a grow space I built in half a closet, a girl went to seed in there so even though I never saw pollen sacks (i.e. no signs of going hermie) she got pollinated. What is the standard procedure for making sure there is no pollen remaining in the room?

Long story:

I've been growing a plant from a random mystery seed a friend gave me a while ago, and it was doing really well. I was kind of psyched, the stems were strong, it was filling out nicely with great colas forming. Recently had to take another plant down early, so I was determined to let this one go as long as it needed. It seemed like the calyxes were filling out more and more, so it ended out going 10 weeks and then this morning I finally cut her down.

Bottom line, those were not just calyxes, they were also seeds. I inspect my plants daily, but I've only grown about a half dozen varieties so far. Each had slightly different bud structure and shape, so nothing seemed out of the ordinary on this one. I never saw pollen sacks -- and I have seen boys. In giving it the initial trim before hanging to dry, I saw one tiny yellow thing that looked like it could have been a spent pollen sack, but I'm not sure. The other possibility is that I may have spaced out, and on the day I took down the boy I found among the outdoor plants I may have handled this plant on the same day. I may have pollinated it...?

At any rate, the buds have a fair amount of seeds, mostly clustered around the bottoms of the buds. It's been so long since I've seen seeds on a bud, I was in shock when I saw them. Now its time to clean the room because I have another plant that has outgrown the veg space and needs to come into this flower space... which brings me full circle back to the initial question...

Tiny yellow thing most likely was a pollen sac. Sometimes they are barely visible on the surface of a bud and actually grow hidden between calyxes. Sometimes this happens late in flower, so the resulting bud still either has no seeds or immature seeds.

Use a sanitizing bleach solution or a hydrogen peroxide solution and spray everything down. It's good to do this between grows or whenever possible anyways to preempt any pests that could be lingering.

Nullis said:

Tiny yellow thing most likely was a pollen sac. Sometimes they are barely visible on the surface of a bud and actually grow hidden between calyxes. Sometimes this happens late in flower, so the resulting bud still either has no seeds or immature seeds.

Use a sanitizing bleach solution or a hydrogen peroxide solution and spray everything down. It's good to do this between grows or whenever possible anyways to preempt any pests that could be lingering.

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Thanks for your reply. I was so frustrated this morning when I pulled the plant to trim and hang it, that I did a half-assed job. Upon closer inspection, I found ONE clear example of pollen sacks. I didn't have much luck with pictures this morning, everything is a bit blurry, but there's the evidence. The plant looked "normal" to me, until I had the stems upside down for the rough trim.

I will definitely wash down the space as best I can, HP is less smelly than bleach, so I'll probably go that route.

Yeah H2O2 will do fine in your case. If you had a pest problem like PM or spider mites I'd say bleach for sure.

I have had gnat/aphid problems in this space...

What percentage/parts (or how many ounces?) of H2O2 would you mix with how much water?

How about if I go with bleach... how strong would you recommend that mix be?

Well they make hydrogen peroxide in different strengths, I think 3% is most common and you can use it as is or dilute 50/50.

For bleach a typical sanitizing solution is about a tablespoon per gallon of water. Disinfecting solutions are stronger- half cup of bleach per gallon. A sanitizing solution is probably fine in your case if you want to use bleach. I use the stronger disinfecting solution to clean out my tent if there was any sign of a pest the previous grow.

If you're trying to get rid of pollen just use water. Spray down every inch of the closet with a spray bottle. Water kills pollen on contact.

Humanrob said:

Short story, directly to the question:
At any rate, the buds have a fair amount of seeds, mostly clustered around the bottoms of the buds. .

Click to expand...

FWIW if the seeds are concentrated around the bottom of the buds, that indicates is was pollinated Early in the flowering cycle.Got a little blast of pollen, made a few seeds, then the buds continued to with no additional pollen.

Thanks for all the help. This closet is a DIY thing, where I put up reflective insulation I had left over from another project, that is stapled to the walls. For pollen I suspect the wipe down should do it, for bugs I'd really need to take the room apart to clean it. Hopefully after this grow I'm going to tear it down and just put up a tent in the space, I assume they are a lot easier to clean.

AimAim said:

FWIW if the seeds are concentrated around the bottom of the buds, that indicates is was pollinated Early in the flowering cycle.Got a little blast of pollen, made a few seeds, then the buds continued to with no additional pollen.

Click to expand...

Thanks for that, that's new information. That would imply that it went hermie for a short while early on, and then stopped...? Once its dried and cured we'll be tearing up the buds to clean the seeds out as we go, so I'll have a better idea of how pervasive they are.

I don't know that much about what types of stress will cause a plant to hermie. We had heatwaves throughout the summer, and some of the early ones came on hard and strong and I was still adjusting my lights and fans, so the plant may have experienced some 90 degree nights (lights on at night) -- don't know if that could do it. I also switched lights on this plant several times over the course of its life -- all LEDs but it started under a 4000k led, then went to a burple LED, then a 4000K COB, then back to burple LEDs (don't ask... there was no plan, it was a crazy summer). I'm not sure if changes in the 'color' of the light would have messed with it.

It would be good if there is something to be learned from this, if I could learn it.