Working it out Indoor AK-47/Chemdawg/Afghooie 2011

[greenmentat]

Hi,
This is not my first grow but it's my first this size. It's all legal and %100 organic too, since that's what good for my collective. Things have been going OK considering that I had to build the room myself while taking care of all the plants at the same time (and also doing a decent sized outdoor medical garden too) but it's undeniable they have suffered because of some mistakes that I made while biting off more then I can chew, AGAIN. I'm hoping to work out what they are and learn from them and maybe other people can learn from what I learned and so on. This is going to be like a grow journal for the grow I have in progress and I'm also going to do a post tomorrow in the sick plants section with pictures of what's going on. So, I'm open to all feedback.

Stats:
15x15 room with 52 plants in foxfarm/light warrior soil, 5gl smart pots, resting in 14" saucers for run off
6 Lumatek dual 600 watt ballasts/12 Digilux HPS bulbs burning in 12 CAP Lumenaire 8" reflectors
4 8" CAP fans, one for cooling each row of three lights
Gen2 LPG CO2 generator with Sentinel CO2 controller
Klimaire 28,000 BTU Mini-Split AC

Veg room: Coming soon...

Strains: AK-47, White Russian, ChemDawg, Afghooie

Nutes: CannaBio Line at PH6.6-6.8 (see note about mistakingly not PHing until only recently)
Compost tea (Liquid humus, Fish, Dry humus, Kelp flakes, Rhizoboost-- bubbled for 24 hours)
Typically, I'll alternate between the two every three days (20-25 gls of CannaBio nute solution, 20-25gls compost tea)
CO2: Been keeping at 500PPM and I raised it up to 600PPM this evening -- I find that plants that haven't been raised on CO2 freak out if you give it to them too fast, so, I'm raising it slowly... they could probably take more but I don't want to push them because they aren't looking very hardy, although they have been packing on some bulk.

Temps: Ambient temperate of around 75degrees lights on 70 lights off with %25-%45 humidity

The Story so far...Bought some clones from a dispensary in town and set them outside to veg in mid June, slowly bought all the equipment and built the room, moved the plants inside the flower room around August 15th so they were already two to three feet tall and two weeks into flower at that point. Right around August 6th I noticed that the plants had shifted in color from lush dark green to a lighter lime green and a few of the lower fan leaves were yellowing and dropping off, was only mildly concerned as some plants do this when they shift into flower. August 20th, shortly after moving the plants inside fans were yellowing and dropping off like mad, very concerned. I thought of three possible scenarios: mag deficiency, potassium deficiency, and nitrogen deficiency. So, I started giving them extra 'heavy' doses of General Organics Cal/Mag and Earth Juice Meta-K-- have done this twice so far. Around the same time I discovered a "majorly sucky thing", I had heard that I didn't need to PH with my nutrient system, so, I never did, but then I went on the website and discovered that they're kind of vague about it; they say that because of the configuration of the nutrient system that nutrients will be available to the plant with a PH up to 7.0 -- it doesn't say anything about what you should do if your solution is PH 4.9 without PH adjusting... So, in short, I went through the whole veg period and two weeks into flower without PHing and can safely assume the PH was always around 4.9. I've been using Earth Juice PH up for the last three feeds or about two weeks. There are still a lot of yellow leaves on the plants but they aren't dropping off at the rate they were. To describe it, it looks like the plants have dropped off %60-%75 of their big fan leaves and but left all the small to medium leaves. I still have hopes for a decent harvest as long as they don't start dropping leaves again. Thanks for reading this. Peace to you.

Shot from the corner of the room


AK-47 -- It seems like the AKs received the brunt of the 'attack'


Some Chemdawgs

 

[Sol]

:cool2: I'll have to keep an eye on this grow. I want to see how you do with the chemdawg. I'm thinking of trying some myself, as i found out that i have access to some clones if i want them. I'de like to see if its an easy grow or one of those finicky strains. I still operate at the enthusiast level.:farm:
Good mojo and post lots o pics ok?

 

[Mountain209man]

hope things keep getting better for ya...if u got sum close ups of those girls with better lighting im sure we could aprreciate them a little more looking good either way , maybe we could get that outdoor update? that desiel has to be huge by now:hubba:

 

[greenmentat]

Welcome, Solanero, you got it! So far I have this to offer: chemdawg seems like a slow vegger and rather sensitive and 'finicky'. My AK47s just took off and left the Chemdawg in their dust. Also, she doesn't seem like she likes to be topped. However, the ones I didn't top are packing on bulk faster than the AK-47s so... it could be that they're a keeper or at least an intriguing experiment. Thanks for the green mojo. Enjoy the complimentary peanuts, and I'll have one of my evil leering dwarf minions massage your feet. It's quite refreshing, I recommend it. Pics with the lights off coming up!

 

[greenmentat]

Good call, Mountain209man! The Diesel are ginormous and just kicking into flower. I'm going to wait for some gorgeous evening lighting on the Diesel and take some pics tomorrow

 

[greenmentat]

Treated the afgooie with Mildew Cure for PM... Here are some pics I shot while they were outside...

 

[Parcero]

So, whats goign on here now?

 

[greenmentat]

'sup my man,
I'm at around week five flowering indoors (assuming that they started flowering on August 7th which is about right) .. I've treated with Mildew Cure for PM on the afgooies and it worked like a charm. About two weeks ago I started giving them heavy doses of nitrogen (age old grow + some fish emulsions) and PH'd it to 6.5 and they stopped dropping leaves. The leaves don't appear to have gained much color but at least they've stopped dropping. The buds on all the plants are getting big and dense, which is really beautiful to see. It still looks like I'm going to have a relatively small harvest...I'm _hoping_ to see 1 ounce per plant and I have 4 plants under each light so around 3 LBS for 7200 watts. I attribute this to having a hard time training the AK to the room, and of course the whole things with most of the fan leaves dropping off the plants. Some of the AKs are 5 ft tall with 3 to 4 main stalks of the that size so on a lot of them I wasn't able to find a way to get light to the lower parts of the plant, so, some of the plant was 'wasted'. I'm going to be doing %80 GDP on my next run and I'm vegging them vertical, so, it should be interesting. They're more my style of grow 'cause I have a 15'x15' room and they grow low and wide so I'll just fill the whole room with GDP so's I can't even walk in and install a drip system.
I'll keep posting here with updates and pics. Thanks everyone! :icon_smile:

This is an AK47 snap from about 3 days ago


This is a single pot with Three Chemdawgs -- They're about 16" tall


This is a group of 4 AK-47s under one light.. You can only see two of them though

 

[Lifted07Duramax]

Room looks nicely ventilated but where do you bring the fresh air in from and where are you sending the hot air too?

Id like to see pics of this as Ill be starting a big grow like this sometime next year and need to learn.

So you say the reason for low yield is because your PH levels were off at the beginning?

 

[greenmentat]

Hi, Lifted. I'm currently doing a sealed room with air cooled lights, a liquid propane gas CO2 generator, and a mini-split AC...so, there is no air intake and exhaust I just set the CO2 level and the temps and away we go. If you google cannabis ventilation setups large room it should probably give you a starting point for how to set something like you're talking about.

Yeah, I believe the low yields can be traced back to a nitrogen deficiency created by not PHing my Canna Bio nute solution. I didn't PH for the entire veg period and later found out that the nute solution was at 4.8, so there you go, the way I've learned it not much nitrogen is available at that PH.

Good luck on your room!

 

[Parcero]

They still have time to go and grow :aok:
:48:

 

[Rosebud]

Did I see a mirror in there?

 

[greenmentat]

I hope not, I try to keep my ganja growing identity separate from my super hero identity probably just the mylar

 

[greenmentat]

Plants are lookin' good... seem like they're getting healthier.. Thanks for the good grow vibes, everyone

I did some reading on organic nute lines and PH'ing and the guideline seems to be you don't PH your organic nute solution because the microbes in the soil and the plant itself will adjust the PH to the correct levels, if the soil is healthy.

...OK, makes sense.. but, doesn't explain why my plants are looking so much better since I started PH upping the solution from 5.6 to 6.7.

 

[Parcero]

my plants are looking so much better since I started PH upping the solution from 5.6 to 6.7.

Brilliant, keep doing what works best for you.

Good Luck

 

[greenmentat]

I thought it was going to be harvest time on the 1st of oct but it's more like the 10th. Some buds are nearly as big as soda cans. Got some bud rot too... no apparent PM on the plant but all of a sudden a bud dies and it's rotted from the center out. Argh! Good grief, charley brown. Things are going good, tho. Going to start posting pics of my new batch of GDPs which are going off.

I took a few snaps of the room.. They looked better on the camera.. hopefully the next ones will come out better.

 

[Sol]

I have been wondering about this grow, glad you did an update. Those buds are beautiful , bummmer about the rot Is that from humidity or something else? or do you know? It will be worth the extra 10 days by the looks of it.:cool2: :aok: