Gorilla Dubble

[Guest antheis]

well i've had a few problems growing, and i lost all of my plants and couldn't even get any seeds to make it past the seedling stage.

the good news is that i feel that i may be out of the woods by going back to basics (and doing a lot of reading/note taking).

these are seeds that i made and are either cjsb x gdubb OR gdubb f2's. i did not label the jar, and well, forgot what exactly they are.

i popped a lot - 27 - because i've been having trouble growing. i figure increase my numbers then naturally my odds increase to get past my slump. on 25 march i put them in a cup of water with fulpower, aloe flakes, and agsil 16 and soaked them for ~30 hours. none of them had tails showing, but all of them had sunk to the bottom.  on 27 march i put them in a seedling mix of 1:1:1 of ewc:spm:perlite which was brought to field capacity (wet to where you can almost squeeze a drop of liquid, but not quite, from a handful) with the same mixture of water, fulvic acid, aloe, and agsil. 

as of today, 31 mar, there are 24 above ground and it looks like i just might be out of this slump.

[Kind024]

Cool stuff going on in here @antheis! Sorry to hear about you lamp failure. You roll with it well. Keep on keepin' on!

I love watching seed to harvest grows, thanks for sharing. 

I was reading through the thread to catch up. A couple things to offer for your (take it or leave it file). You already have great advice in here and great folks helping you along. I don't want to tread on anyone. As I have unconditional respect for everyone here. I believe everyone helps from their hearts.

So please take my advice as a grain of sand. Science is an ever revolving door. I learn one thing and by the time I think I have an understanding...there are multiple variables that need to be considered. Seems everything is connected and relevant with natural growing methods. We have just started to scratch the surface of understanding the relationship soil microbiology plays in the mix...pun intended.

Your seedling mix sounds great. I would be careful adding things at this point. Seeds can be very sensitive to anything at this stage. A quality vermicompost or ewc will have everything a seed needs at a 1:1:1 ratio for the first set of true leaves and beyond (depending on pot size).

I like to take raw aloe leaves ( a 1/4 cup) and blend them well with a quart of clean water. Strain it, dilute it, or use as is. Aloe is a great soil activator and surfactant. It's rich in enzymes, simple and complex sugars, saponins, salicylic acid, the list goes on. Did you know aloe has all 8 amino acids the brain needs to convert proteins...the body only produces 4...sorry it's late and i'm off on a tangent. Your aloe powder will work great too. I haven't used fullpower but I hear it's a good product. I would use 1/4 what they recommend. A little fulvic goes a long way.

I don't defoliate more then necessary these days. Enough to keep light to the flowers and clear out the underskirt a little for better air flow (trim the suckers some might say). From my experience I've learned that when 1/4 - 1/3  of the biomass is stripped from a plant at one sitting the plant can shut down, stop growing. That's when we can start to see issues with nutrient deficiencies and/or lockout. The plant is cycling (taking up water/nutrients, photosynthesizing, transpiring, all the above) at a rate relative to the amount of biomass above and below ground. The plants growth rate and its ability to respond to environmental conditions drops relative to the amount defoliation. 

I do my trimming under the skirt over a few days or a week (a little each day). I feel this give a little time for the plant to shift its biological  processing and not give such a shock. I never remove for then 1/3 of leaves from a plant even over a week. That's just me and to each their own.

If I was on a feeding schedule I would back off on everything during the defoliation phase, lower the co2 and maybe even raise the lights a little. Then ramp things back up to speed as the plant reacts. I see leaves like solar panels. The plants processing power is dependent on its leaves and roots. Take one away and we lose power.

It's late, i'm stoned and I hope I didn't come off like an ass...I apologize if I did...if anyone see's it like that please tell me. I really just want to help and not offend. Even sound advice can be discarded if it's handed over in a bag of shit. I know we're all in this together and there as many paths as there are people. I want to see everyone growing and sharing the best fruit of their lives. So if I come off like an ass...better off I just smile and wave. It will save a lot of heart and energy.

peace,

kind

[Guest antheis]

thanks for the feedback. i welcome any advice and you weren't disrespectful at all. 

i use the freeze dried aloe because its just like fresh aloe once reconstituted and it won't go bad for at least a few years. one gram of the freeze dried powder mixed with 199 grams (199 mL) of water makes 200 mL of pure aloe juice. 

all my old soil got moved outside and i'm going to mix up a new batch of soil soon. i just need to get down to the box store and rent a cement mixer because my ass is not about to mix 10-12cf of soil with a shovel. i'll post up the mix and pics after its done.

[Kind024]

True that! I wish I had a mixer for soil! Right now I use a tarp and mix soil 2-4 cf at a time then fill my barrel as I go. Still plenty of elbow grease involved. A mixer is the way to go.

One thing to caution about using a cement mixer. Concrete is very alkaline (12-14 pH). The liming agents in concrete can eventually leach out and raise soil pH. Considering your not mixing concrete chunks to your soil this is irrelevant. Although I would make sure its extra clean from debris and dust.

That aloe powder sounds great. Aloe plants grow slow and I find myself constantly transplanting the pups to increase my supply. Now they own a full counter and window of valuable real estate . I do love them, but they take a lot of room and attention to keep a good amount of fresh aloe on supply. The freeze dried aloe powder is great if a counter full of aloe plants doesn't sound interesting. Makes me think how convenient a sack of freeze dried aloe powder is compared to an unruly aloe plant...food for thought. Thank you.

How big are the pots you plan to use? I like to add an 1" or so layer of medium/large aggregate pumice in the bottom of my no-till soil pots. This way things don't get anaerobic at the bottom over time. They sit on old rubber floor mats to increase airflow under them too.

I'll try to sit quietly and follow along...

Great thread @antheis , thanks again for sharing.

[Guest antheis]

i built a ~15 cf box out of 2x4's and 1/4" hardware cloth. its a little over 3 feet square and 16 inches deep. i haven't grown anything in it yet, but i plan to do 9-15 plants in it. maybe more maybe less.

i did get a late comer to the party - another seed broke the surface today.

 

[Guest antheis]

these little guys are at the stage where i have been failing. on previous grows once they have been above ground about a week  and working on their second set of leaves they just stall out and seem to be in stasis. no progression, but also not withering up and dying. so right now, naturally, i'm a bit nervous.

i've never grown cannabis in these tiny starter cells and roots are already coming out of the drainage holes.  they may be ready for a transplant (anyone have any experience starting seeds in these?).  my plan is to put 3-4 seedlings in 2 gal smart pots. or if im extra ballsy i may put them in 16oz solo cups and put them in my cold frame outside. plan on mixing up soil tomorrow and filling up my planter.

 

[Coastal]

If you have too high of cations or if your ph is above 7 or below 5.5 your plant will have a hard time getting the feed and moisture it needs out of the medium.

 

do a slurry test with ph neutral low ppm water and see what comes out. 

 

The roots are easily damaged if you take seedlings too quick out of nursery flats... they need to wrap the sides a bit or the weight of the soil breaks the roots off. Happens fast but I usually let mine get on to the second or third set of leaves coming out.

[Guest antheis]

i mixed up some soil - not the whole batch just 2cf (with a shovel, a tote, and two 5gal buckets. talk about work!) and just couldn't resist the urge to transplant them. i picked out the best 14 and put them in solo cups. i think i planted the seeds too deep because the top  ~1/2" had nothing to hold it together and was dried out.  below that, however, the roots looked great. they came out of the cells fine and held all the medium together. 

the base mix is equal parts compost, sphagnum peat moss, and lava rock (forgot to add: there is some shredded leaves from last fall as well as ewc)

to each cubic foot i added 

1/2 cup of kelp, crab, fish, and fish bone meals

1/4 cup biochar 

1/2 cup pelleted gypsum

4 cups mineral mix (4parts azomite, 1 part oystershell powder, 1 part basalt, 1 part bentonite)

i wet it to field capacity with a gallon of water with 2oz fulvic acid and 1/2 tsp of agsil 16h added

[Guest antheis]

it looks like i've gotten my mojo back. all the little babies are moving along nicely. i've taken to calling these MGD - mystery gorilla dubble.

one has a 'mutant' look to it. the white residue is from watering with agsil.

[Guest antheis]

these pics were taken 13 apr after a full soak of seed sprout tea. everything is moving along nicely and they're starting to stink. not strong as i have to bury my nose and take a good whiff, but there is something there. it's like a sweet lime skunk. that leads me to believe they are gdubb f2's.  i'll never really know, or care, because i'm sure they'll be amazing. 

gonna hit them with some more sst today/tomorrow. maybe even snap a few more pics. they're moving along at a pretty good clip (it's been so long since i've grown from seed).

[Guest antheis]

how they look right now. they are starting to separate in terms of tall/short phenos. the shortest one i did it no favors; it has the least amount of dirt in the cup and it's definitely one squat motherfucker.

need to get to work on wiring in the lamp for the new planter i built, but i've been putting off because i'm nervous about really fucking something up. 

[Tonygreen]

Super uniform looking. Gd f2 ya say?

[Bugman]

3 hours ago, antheis said:

how they look right now. they are starting to separate in terms of tall/short phenos. the shortest one i did it no favors; it has the least amount of dirt in the cup and it's definitely one squat motherfucker.

need to get to work on wiring in the lamp for the new planter i built, but i've been putting off because i'm nervous about really fucking something up. 

there realy starting to take off , still nice & tight nods

[Guest antheis]

7 hours ago, Tonygreen said:

Super uniform looking. Gd f2 ya say?

not a 100% because i didn't label the container they were in but its a 50/50 between gd f2 and lou dog's cjsb(ix1) x gd. i'm pretty sure we'll be able to tell as they get older.

7 hours ago, Bugman said:

there realy starting to take off , still nice & tight nods

they really like the seed sprout tea. 

[Guest antheis]

today marks one month since i soaked the seeds and i wanted to get some pics up.

a few are starting to  throw out some branches, but one in particular has a jump on all the rest. the ones that aren't branching have thicker trunks.

they're starting to get too big for my light footprint and are really cramped in the tray i have them in. i'll work out a solution for that soon enough; i'm leaning toward getting my cmh light wired up and using it, since it has to be done anyway.