They seem really stretchy with long internode spacing. What kind of light cycle were they getting in veg?
Disclaimer: I still use HID and I'm NOT an LED expert. All of my LED knowledge is from other parties or research so I can't say from first hand experience one way or another. I also run a medical grow consulting business in SoCal.
SisterMaryElephant wrote:They seem really stretchy with long internode spacing. What kind of light cycle were they getting in veg?
SME, they were on 24/7 in veg.
I have been letting them get closer to the lights than the suggested 12", trying to minimize the stretch...but as you can see, it hasn't. I have started LSTing a few of the bigger girls to even out the canopy...
Disclaimer: I still use HID and I'm NOT an LED expert. All of my LED knowledge is from other parties or research so I can't say from first hand experience one way or another. I also run a medical grow consulting business in SoCal.
Did all of the clones come from one mother or several? If multiple mothers were started from seed and all of the stretchy clones came from the same mother then that could explain it. It could just be different phenotypes. Are you able to tell which clones came from which mother?
Disclaimer: I still use HID and I'm NOT an LED expert. All of my LED knowledge is from other parties or research so I can't say from first hand experience one way or another. I also run a medical grow consulting business in SoCal.
Hey Happy! Looking good man...seems like you really avoided a disaster there, and have resurrected your grow! Yeah, it does seem like these CLW SS400's really do an amazing job with the vegging process...like you, I have never seen such vigorous and healthy growth.
My girls also tripled in height in the few weeks after flipping to 12/12...despite all the descriptions from the seed banks...I know SME warns us all to flip early...I thought I did based on prior experiences...but wow, when 12-14" becomes 32-36" in just 3-4 weeks...damn!
Live and learn...next time, I'm gonna try to mainline mine...GR8 has me convinced we can improve on Mother Natures process! I do have some amazing flowers, but compared to most of you guys, I've grown a lot of leaves....
Because of the WPM I need to start some new genetics from seed(No clones available here)....dunno if you have ever done that...but it takes a good bit of time. When I added up how long it was going to take, I decided I would have to save something from all those babies! Sooooooo glad I did!!
The growth in 2.5 weeks is crazy! Tallest went from 5-5.25 to 20-22!!! And they are beautiful! The healthiest/ prettiest I have ever had...but I don't have much experience though...lol
My last grow was too big...byt the time they hit 7 weeks some were over 40"!!! Soon after one started leaning too far and the whole grow started laying down! What a freakin mess! I was hoping for better results...but I did learn from it.
This grow I was hoping to max at 24", but I am almost there already...time will tell...again!
I had my 6th AK-47 sprout raise it's head today...so my restart is on it's way!!
I have seen the mainline GR8 is doing, it looks great...but I am just trying to get a good basic grow under my belt.... The most I have done with these girls is topping and FIMing, and it is filling my space up!
I'm with you....I got a lot more leaves than buds last grow....and the buds could have been better....but I am learning!! In the meantime I make a lot of Green Dragon and bubble hash...lol
It seems that my vertical growth has slowed...at least enough for some of the rest to catch up...lol
Today when lights came on, the tallest are about 24"...but the cool part is they seem to leveling out some. Until this week I had a scattered few, maybe 5-7, that were out-growing the rest.....by a good bit. Today more than twice that many have tops around 24"....and the rest aren't too far behind. If they can catch up I am gonna have a beautiful canopy of pretty flowers. And 24" will be plenty...
I turned on a CFL, turned on the camera, and the batteries crapped out on the first click.....so that will be later.
Although the plants look great, I have been picking up a few leaves off the floor in the last couple days...so I pulled back the Orca panels. I guess it is due to the lack of light(?), but there are some leaves shriveling and starting to fall off the very bottom of the plants. I have looked closely at many of the leaves and can't see any spots or issues, other than they are fading, curling and falling off.
SME & Rkymtnman, you taught me well...lol As tempting as it has been to clean em up, I have been just picking them up as they fall...lol But it did cross my mind as to whether or not I might be inviting another bout with WPM by leaving them to hang so close to the base of the stems...?>?>?>?>?
Because of the rocky start these girls had, would it make any sense for me to clean up the bottom 3-4" on these girls? It would also improve circulation....and possibly prevent another outbreak of wpm??? Thoughts? Advise?
The other little bit of excitement is that as of yesterday I have 6 little AK-47 sprouts up!! The first round only produced 2...the second round got me the other 4...over about 4 days.. I want to get 6 plants to about 5", then flip them until I can determine sex....hoping to find 2 healthy females to become Mothers for me...lol (Boy, if that last part don't sound strange!?!?! LOL)
A lot of people lollipop (remove lower growth) in SOG/SCROG type grows for circulation and since your plants stretched so much it PROBABLY wouldn't hurt much (some shock/stress possible) If you cleaned up 1" every 3-5 days it might hurt them less than all at once. Most of what you want will be at the top so you wouldn't be losing much flower yield, you'd just have less trim. You definitely want to clean up whatever falls off on its own and if you touch it and it falls off that's fine too. You'd have to do a test of lollipopped vs non-lollipopped to determine if one is better than the other. If you want to try it now on your salvage grow it's up to you but if they get too stressed from the PM or the pruning they could turn hermaphroditic and then you would be worse off. They are your plants so it's up to you...
24"or less is probably where I'd be aiming for LED but no more than 36" due to LED penetration issues, imho.
ICB: I'm not convinced that "mainlining" will live up to the hype. It appears to be nothing more than selective pruning/topping combined with LST to pre-train plans for SCROG or to flower as normal. While it will distribute the colas from one main cola to several smaller ones, they certainly will not be as big, each, as a non-topped plant. Additionally, mainlining adds more time to veg cycle to train the plant before SCROGing, which requires even more time to train under the screen. Perhaps something like this would be better suited for outdoor grows. Without experimenting and setting baselines it's hard to compare the technique to others.
I used to use the selective pruning/topping part of mainlining (without the LST part) when I grew trees to get a flat top but that was because I was limited by my ceiling height. I'm not saying that people shouldn't try it but they shouldn't get their hopes up for extraordinary results. I just think it's a lot of work/time/cost for minimal, if any, improvement in yield.
For example: assuming each area is the same size and over 50w/sqft then I would think that 1 giant plant under 400w that fills the space would yield about the same as several smaller mainlined (or not) plants that fill the space. One of the few exceptions to that might be SOG from clone, where you might end up with better g/w numbers and little to no veg time in exchange for requiring a LOT of clones. As I've said a thousand times, there are pros and cons for virtually every growing decision we make.
Disclaimer: I still use HID and I'm NOT an LED expert. All of my LED knowledge is from other parties or research so I can't say from first hand experience one way or another. I also run a medical grow consulting business in SoCal.
Yea, with all these girls have been through already I am kinda just letting them do their thing. The re-occurrence of PM scares me so I am not pushing them or being as rigid as I was last round.
But last night I did start some clean up around the bases...I am taking it slow as you suggested. While doing this I discovered something that I never would have seen from above or side....because it's so thick. I found 5 plants that haven't kept up! While the majority of the girls are between 20-26", these 5 are lost in the grow at only 10-13"! They look like they are very healthy, showing no signs of deficiencies, and have some nice flowers....just real small.
First thought was to trim a little off the bottom, like the rest, and let time tell... But as I am cleaning them up I'm realizing that these pretty little girls won't have much of a chance of having a good finish if left mixed in with girls more than twice their size! It actually crossed my mind to pull em & trash em instead of watching them slowly fade....but I can't do that! This is my "Salvage Grow", which started with me trying to save some of my babies, which didn't have the best chances....so I have to save these little cuties!
I've decided that when my lights come on I am going to set up one of my home made tubs, with an air pump or two, at the end of the Aeroflo & hang one of my Magnums over it. I'm going to try and salvage something good from these little girls rather than let Mother Nature run her course....isn't that one of the benefits of indoor growing?? LOL