ExoticCannabis2021

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Seeds Arrived Today!

5 more days till start

Goodluck to everyone!

Edited May 3, 2021 by ExoticCannabis2021

[West Coast Vaper]

Seeds Arrived Today!
5 more days till start
Goodluck to everyone!

Good luck and have a fun grow.

Sent from my LM-X210(G) using Tapatalk

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Grow Strategy
For this grow I will be using two different methods of growing assuming a 100% germination rate. I will start all 3 plans in a the VEG tent and when I want to switch to FLOWER I will move them into the FLOWER tent. Details on the equipment used will be in a following post
Seed 1:

• Growing in 50-50-coco-perlite mix
• Adding in worm-castings
• Nutrients will be EHG
• Cover-crop of Marigold and dill will be used for pest control
• Stick fly traps and diatomaceous-earth will also be used for pest control
• Plant will start in a net pod and once they outgrow the netpod will be transplanted to a 20L Freedom pot for the duration of the grow.
• Training Techniques used will be topping and FIMing (depending on plant growth rate), LST and Defoliation

Seed 2:

• Growing in 50-50-coco-perlite mix
• Adding in worm-castings
• Nutrients will be Hortimix
• Cover-crop of Marigold and dill will be used for pest control
• Stick fly traps and diatomaceous-earth will also be used for pest control
• Plant will start in a net pod and once they outgrow the netpod will be transplanted to a 20L Freedom pot for the duration of the grow.
• Training Techniques used will be topping and FIMing (depending on plant growth rate), LST and Defoliation

Seed 3

• Growing in a hybrid hydroponic grow
• Nutrients will be Hortimix
• Plant will start in a net pod and once they outgrow the netpod will be placed into hydro system
• Stick fly traps will be used for pest control
• Training Techniques used will be topping and FIMing (depending on plant growth rate), LST and Defoliation
• Hydroponic system will be a 20L bucket that has a combination on DWC, Fogoponics and Low Pressure Aeroponics. (This is the first time I will be using this system and it will be built and tested within the next week – So this method of growing may change)

Germination Method

• The seeds will be started directly in 50-50-coco-perlite mix in their net pods
• The coco is first wasted with a hydrogen peroxide solution to remove any bacteria
• The coco is then washed with plain ph’d water (ph = 6.0)
• The seeds are then placed in coco 1cm deep
• The net pods are then placed in a tray which is placed on a 25W heating mat.

 

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Equipment 

• Ph Meter - Essentials PH Meter
• EC Meter - Bluelab-truncheon

VEG TENT

• 1.2m x 1.2m Tent (No name brand)
• Mars Hydro TS-3000 kept at 30cm above tallest plant and 75% strength
• Oscillating Fan
• SunBeam humidifier to keep humidity between 50% and 75%

FLOWER TENT

• Mars-grow-tent-1-5m-x-1-5m-x-2m 
• Mars-FC-6500 kept at 30cm above tallest plant and 75% strength
• IMF 150 Extractor Fan
• Oscillating Fan

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Seeds are now placed in coco for germination

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[CreX]

Shit son!! you got some power in your tents!! subbed for this ride! 

have you tried hydro before? you need to decide if you are gonna go sterile or living water right away... i suggest living water - add some of your mycos to the res and watch the love happen... and some enviroc actually... not too much... a little goes a long way in hydro... and then yea hortimix worked like a charm for me in veg and flower in hydro

[Ill_Evan]

5 minutes ago, CreX said:

Shit son!! you got some power in your tents!!

[Prom]

36 minutes ago, CreX said:

Shit son!! you got some power in your tents!! subbed for this ride! 

I think he is about spot on 

450 watts on a 1.2x1.2, sweet.. no sure about the 30cm at 75%.. those TS3 pack a punch, got 2 myself. Wanted to read how much distance is 500 micromol on full power.. but they just went dark.. tomorrow.

and the bar light for the 1.5x1.5 is also in the right area.. all done correct and a good yielding strain, should easy reach 2g/watt. Lower is not really recommendable and higher ruins your gram per watt calculation. I reached 2.34g/watt with TS3s as flower lights.

Nice setup! Man put some brains in his shopping list  me likey likey 

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Sorry about the late reply. Yesterday was a messed up day, so after work i just got stoned and passed out

22 hours ago, CreX said:

Shit son!! you got some power in your tents!! subbed for this ride! 

22 hours ago, Prom said:

Nice setup! Man put some brains in his shopping list  me likey likey 

Thank you, Thank you - I did put alot of planning into both my setups and im glad you guys agree

22 hours ago, Prom said:

I reached 2.34g/watt with TS3s as flower lights.

Wow. Daammmnnn, thats some next level yields! I haven't gotten anywhere near that yet in my flower tent unfortunately.

These lights are about 6 months old so they only seen 2 flower cycles - 1 of which i lost all the plants

22 hours ago, Prom said:

Wanted to read how much distance is 500 micromol on full power.. but they just went dark.. tomorrow.

You have a par meter?

23 hours ago, CreX said:

have you tried hydro before? you need to decide if you are gonna go sterile or living water right away... i suggest living water - add some of your mycos to the res and watch the love happen... and some enviroc actually... not too much... a little goes a long way in hydro... and then yea hortimix worked like a charm for me in veg and flower in hydro

Okay so heres where i've being losing most of my plants.

I have tried hydro. I have tried both DWC and NFT - using white gutter pipes (I tried to go SOG here).

But the problem i have been experiencing throughout both my hydro grows that i cant seem to find a way around just yet is root rot.

With DWC i can fit just around 20x20L DWC buckets in total. As a first pass i decided to go with 10. 5 that would go in the flower tent and 5 that would go in the veg tent. I went with the ACO 004 Electromagnetic Air Pump as apposed to individual air pumps. 90% of my plants got root rot. When i measured the temps in the reservoir, they were between 23 and 25 degrees C. 

With the NFT i went with a water pump. The NFT was setup so that there was 8 x 1,3m long gutter pipes, and 1 main reservoir. The water pump would pump from the reservoir into the gutter pipes and each pipe would drain into the reservoir. I had the same problem here. Root root. Reservoir temps were between 23 and 25 degrees C. 

So after all that i was pretty frustrated and then I switched to coco so i don't have these root rot issues. 

I gather that if i wanted to go back to hydro, id have to either buy a water chiller and go with a recirculating DWC setup so that all the reservoirs run through the water chiller, or invest in an aircon to keep room temps at below 20 degrees C so that the reservoir temps don't get too high. As i live in an apartment currently - i don't think both of those are an option right now. Plus Id like to see some return on investment from these setups before investing more 

One thing i haven't tried is living water, and to be honest because i don't know how. But if its as simple as you say i will definitely be interested in giving that a shot. 

Sorry for the essay

 

 

[Prom]

10 minutes ago, ExoticCannabis2021 said:

You have a par meter?

^^ I have access to a Quantum Flux Meter 

At 100% your TS3 reaches 500 micromol PAR light at 71cm distance... your 30cm at 75% is to much for your plants. If I would have a dimmer, I would test it.. but have none, so is also only a guess. go 45cm on 75% and see if your Veg plants grow faster, would be my suggestion. Or punch it up to max and hang 70cm above... that number fits  

[ExoticCannabis2021]

2 minutes ago, Prom said:

^^ I have access to a Quantum Flux Meter 

At 100% your TS3 reaches 500 micromol PAR light at 71cm distance... your 30cm at 75% is to much for your plants. If I would have a dimmer, I would test it.. but have none, so is also only a guess. go 45cm on 75% and see if your Veg plants grow faster, would be my suggestion. Or punch it up to max and hang 70cm above... that number fits  

Ah brilliant. Thats very useful information! Thanks for the help. Ill try both and see which one yields better results

[ExoticCannabis2021]

All 3 seeds successfully germinated.
Will be keeping them in these net pods until they outgrow them.
Currently they are placed just outside the veg tent.
They will now be placed in the tent.

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[ExoticCannabis2021]

Week 2 - Day 10(17/05/2021)

The plants have been growing steadily. The first signs of the second set of leaves are starting to show and the roots are slowly starting to pop out of the netpod. As i dont want the roots to get tangled in the holes of the net pod, transplanting will have to be done soon.

Edited May 19, 2021 by ExoticCannabis2021

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Week 2 - Day 11(18/05/2021)

Transplant day. Ive transplant 2 of the ladies into larger pots. They are too small for the 20L pots yet, so ive used some plastic pots i had lying around. Ive washed the coco with hydrogen peroxide before transplanting. The 3rd lady was placed in a 20L DWC setup. Due to loadshedding concerns i chose not to go the hybrid aero/fog/dwc route for now. Now that the second set of leaves have appeared, i feel comfortable feeding nutes. As suggested by @CreX, I've also added enviroc biodyne to all plants. This is the first time I have used enviroc and im definitely keen to see how the ladies respond. Lastly I've added some diatomaceous earth after watering to help with pest control.

• For the first lady, Ive watered her with EHG Nutes at 0.4 EC and 6.1PH.
• The second lady was watered with Hortimix nutes at 0.4 EC and 6.1PH.
• The DWC contains Hortimix nutes at 0.4 EC and 6.1PH.

Ive also pre prepared the 20L Freedom fabric pots with coco and cover crop so that the cover crop will have already been grown, once they Tortinis are ready for transplant. They have been coming along fine so far. The pre prep was started on 10/05/2021 and cover crop used is marigold and dill.

[CreX]

Whats up man! 

dont forget you need to update your diary by midnight tonight.

[Ill_Evan]

20 minutes ago, CreX said:

Whats up man! 

dont forget you need to update your diary by midnight tonight.

Every time I do my rounds you've already beaten me to it. 

[CreX]

Just now, Ill_Evan said:

Every time I do my rounds you've already beaten me to it. 

i am speed 

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Thanks guys for the reminder, will be updating soon

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Week 2 - Day 14(21/05/2021)

Since transplanting, no new growth has been noticed. Starting to rearrange the tent abit to make sure the plants are getting all the light. Whilst moving around, my clumsy ass self dropped the HORTIMIX COCO plant. Think I tore a few roots. Didn't want to cause more damage by checking, placed her gently in place and added some new coco. Watered with Hortimix nutes at 0.4 EC and 6.1PH. Started to raise humidity now to  60 - 70%, plants are old enough to not lose them to damping off. 

 

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Week 3 - Day 19(26/05/2021)

Starting to see some new growth but definitely not as fast as i'd like. Also starting to see some signs of stress on the leaves of the plants. 

Humidy kept between 60 and 70%

Temps between 23 and 28 degrees.

Seed 1 EHG-COCO:

• Realised that i did not measure runoff since transplanting and watering. Proceeded to water with plain water PH'd to 6.0.
• Runoff was measured at 6.5PH and 0.9EC. Way too high. Thinking this is my reason for slow growth. Stupid mistake to make
• Completely flushed coco in pot with TAP Water.
• Washed again with PH'd water until runoff was of PH 6.0
• Rewatered with EHG Nutrients with PH of 6.0 and EC of 0.5, Biodyne added to nutrients
• Runoff measured to PH of 6.1 and EC of 0.3

Seed 2 HORTIMIX-COCO:

• Realised that i did not measure runoff since transplanting and watering. Proceeded to water with plain water PH'd to 6.0.
• Runoff was measured at 6.6PH and 0.8EC. Way too high. Thinking this is my reason for slow growth. Stupid mistake to make
• Completely flushed coco in pot with TAP Water.
• Washed again with PH'd water until runoff was of PH 6.0
• Rewatered with HORTIMIX Nutrients with PH of 5.9 and EC of 0.4, Biodyne added to nutrients
• Runoff measured to PH of 6.0 and EC of 0.3

Seed 3 HORTIMIX-DWC

• Measured PH to be 6.5 and EC to be 0.4. Thinking PH here was definitely my reason for slow growth and yellowing of leaves.
• Added 4 drops of PH down. Measured PH to be 6.0 and EC to be 0.4.
• Also noticed water level dropped abit. So added 2L of  HORTIMIX Nutrients with PH of 5.9 and EC of 0.4
• Measured PH to be 6.0 and EC to be 0.4.

Looking forward to better growth in the coming week. This is their current state.

 

[highchome]

Nice update :) Its going to be interesting to compare the three as they grow

[ExoticCannabis2021]

18 hours ago, highchome said:

Nice update Its going to be interesting to compare the three as they grow

Thanks. Yeah im definitely keen to compare EHG vs HORTIMIX, and then COCO vs DWC. Never done something like this before but it will definitely go along way in answering what nutrients to stick to and what method to use going into the future

[ExoticCannabis2021]

Week 3 - Day 21(28/05/2021)

What a F***ed up day.

Spent the day in the tent having a closer look at the plants to make sure theres no other issues.

On close inspection, i found some pests eating away at the seedlings.  After that i took a look at each and every plant in the grow room and found a variety of issues. All listed below. 

• On all 3 of the Tortini seedlings i found Thrips.
• On multiple other plants in the Veg grow room i found a combination of Thrips, Fungas Knats and Spider Mites. There was a fair amount of bugs, but not too serious. Ive also been aware of the Fungas Knats and i control them with the sticky fly traps which usually works for me
• In the flower tent, the situation was much more horrific. In two of my plants in flower i found an entire Spider Mite infestation. 

NB: The flower tent and veg tent are next to each other.

Absolutely frustrated i proceeded to purchase a bottle of Bioneem and diluted 10ml per 1L and took out every single plant from both tents and sprayed them with excessive amounts of the mixture. I also sprayed the tent walls and floor with the mixture. In retrospect i should have calmed down before spraying down my plants. Nonetheless, in my haste, i dropped the EHG-COCO, and tore a bunch of roots.

I washed off the roots with plain tap water, then repotted with new coco, added in some mycos, watered with EHG nutes at PH of 6.0 and EC of 0.5 with Biodyne added. Run off was PH 6.1 and EC 0.4.

I've now dropped both the EHG-COCO and HORTIMIX-COCO plants in a space of two weeks with both plants having damage to roots. They most probably will be out of the comp but Im too much of a sucker to give up hope on them, so i will include them in all updates as apart of the comp. Plus Im still keen on HORTIMIX vs EHG and i hope others are aswell.  

I will not be at home for a week, so i wont be able to really have a look at how the plants are doing, but ive got a friend whos going to just pop in and take some pics and water them if required, so ill post those updates. Whilst away i will be researching the most efficient way to get rid of my spider mites infestation. 

If anyone knows someone that sells lady bug colonies in SA please let me know.

Here are the pics:

Edited May 29, 2021 by ExoticCannabis2021

[Pants]

Sjoe that’s rough for one day. I’ve had a visit from the spider mite family. Think I got them early hopefully


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[ExoticCannabis2021]

Yeah it was man. I hope you got them early too. I wouldn't wish those monsters on anyone. Did you use neem oil aswell?

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