Maverick’s Timber 4vs Grow Journal

[twentyeight.threefive]

Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy.

So, I’m loving the way the plants are growing in the Rain Science Bags so much that I decided to grab some for this year’s outdoor grow. Grabbed 6 of their 25 gallon white Low Rider series bags on 4/20.

Turns out they were running a few promotions and one of them is what they call their “Stash N Dash” contest where they hide free stuff and then people can go try to grab them first. They were running it in Florida and New England. Well, it also happens to turn out that one of the places in New England that they hid some stuff was the next town over from where I live!

Got the email in my inbox with the picture clues to where it was hidden and was like, “I know that place!” Jumped in my car and drove there and guess what?!

View attachment 4543242View attachment 4543243
I got a free 2x4 raised bed!!! Sweet!!!

My best friend is in the process of Re-Vegging the Skunk #1 that I had in my tent in the last grow (I had figured, “what the hell?” and gave it to him to see if he wanted to try it and he was totally game). It’s growing well in his tent, but he already planned on putting it outside and has agreed to put it in this RS Raised Bed! It’s gonna be a monster!

Eastworks building in Easthampton?

Great grow journal! Latest crop looks awesome. I stopped in after seeing the Timber in the journal name. I've got future plans to purchase one for my grow, can't wait!

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Damn man those plants are huge in there. They're bigger than the 1st run without the scrog net right? Anyways you almost could've waited a lil longer to add the scrog net but either way looks great. You're definitely going to get your yeilds up by the looks of it.
I run hps and cmh in a sealed room with mini split. Getting another smaller room going and have been really thinking of rocking some led's. Been in the up in the air with getting timbers or HLG. Might run a 2nd room with in a 5x10 or 4x8 so was thinking a couple of timber fatty or 2-3 HLG 650rs. Just curious are you running a dehu outside of you tent? It could help with some of your problems, especially if you run a passive air intake with inline and carbon filter. Anyways you rock some super healthy plants, will definitely be following this.

Thanks! Yeah, I was actually not at all prepared for how big they were gonna get.

Definitely gotta give credit to the Living Soil and the Fabric Raised Bed for that. There is nearly 3x more soil in there total and like 20x more that each plant had to grow in. In hindsight I probably should have expected them to get way bigger, but being my first time ever doing it I’m just gonna chalk it up to experience.

A Dehumidifier and maybe heater at night (to bring the nighttime temps up which should help keep the humidity down as well) is a great idea. The only issue with the DeHu is that the tent is in the basement and it’s one big room, so I would need a huge one to handle the job (or some way to enclose it and the tent together, which I don’t know of off hand). Might still try the heater though as I could direct it to hit the carbon filter which should warm the air being pulled in by the intake fan, and my Daytime VPD is within the “safe range”. It’s really the nighttime VPD that’s the issue and was what caused the WPM last round.

The Foliar Compost Tea was also a huge factor thus far in helping with that this round as well as the Microbes on the leaves act as an ecosystem which prevents pathenogenic organisms from proliferating out of control. It’s also a reason I chose to not do a leaf strip on them this round as once those leaves were removed the new leaves would not have that protective layer on them and would be vulnerable to attack and you don’t really want to be spraying your plants with water (even Compost Tea) when they are in “Bulk”/full fledged Flower.

Thanks for following!

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Eastworks building in Easthampton?

Great grow journal! Latest crop looks awesome. I stopped in after seeing the Timber in the journal name. I've got future plans to purchase one for my grow, can't wait!

Thanks! And yes, Eastworks in Easthampton.

The Timber’s are awesome! Definitely happy I decided to purchase one. Mine absolutely cranks and with the addition of the Orca it’s actually too powerful for my 3x3. But, I’d rather have a light that is overqualified for the job (especially with the ability to dim them, which is awesome!) than one that is underpowered.

If I was gonna give @RainDan some customer feedback though it would be to possibly put some sort of indicator marks around the dimmer knob so that users could more easily adjust the power of the light (ideally in 10% increments, but even 25% increments would be helpful). I wound up buying myself a wattage meter to allow me to do it, but I wouldn’t expect a little decal or even paint on the light would add much manufacturing cost and would be very helpful for people trying to dial in their PPF.

Thanks for following along.

 

[Dividedsky]

Eastworks building in Easthampton?

Great grow journal! Latest crop looks awesome. I stopped in after seeing the Timber in the journal name.

Me as well, thinking of getting a timber

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Me as well, thinking of getting a timber

They are awesome lights! If you want to go the COB route, I think they are the best lights on the market.

 

[RainDan]

Thanks! And yes, Eastworks in Easthampton.

The Timber’s are awesome! Definitely happy I decided to purchase one. Mine absolutely cranks and with the addition of the Orca it’s actually too powerful for my 3x3. But, I’d rather have a light that is overqualified for the job (especially with the ability to dim them, which is awesome!) than one that is underpowered.

If I was gonna give @RainDan some customer feedback though it would be to possibly put some sort of indicator marks around the dimmer knob so that users could more easily adjust the power of the light (ideally in 10% increments, but even 25% increments would be helpful). I wound up buying myself a wattage meter to allow me to do it, but I wouldn’t expect a little decal or even paint on the light would add much manufacturing cost and would be very helpful for people trying to dial in their PPF.

Thanks for following along.

@LCPGrower1980

Thank you for the feedback. We really appreciate user feedback with any changes/modifications that we can make to our existing lineup in order to make it better/easier for the end user. I will work this into our near term modifications.

Love following this journal - your plants look really healthy, you do a great job.

Have a nice weekend.

Take care,
Dan

 

[LCPGrower1980]

@LCPGrower1980

Thank you for the feedback. We really appreciate user feedback with any changes/modifications that we can make to our existing lineup in order to make it better/easier for the end user.

Love following this journal - your plants look really healthy, you do a great job.

Have a nice weekend.

Take care,
Dan

Thanks Dan! Love your lights and your customer service (and honestly pretty much every aspect about your company )! Awesome that you guys are always looking to improve your product. Add that to the list.

Have been extremely happy and satisfied with my 4VS! Couldn’t recommend them highly enough.

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Day 28 of Flower update.

The girls have almost certainly stopped their stretch (finally) and are now putting their efforts into their flowers. The Trichome development and smell is noticeably better than last run (at least for the Jamaican and Lambsbread plants, can’t even see the Acapulco ).

Had to tie down the Lambsbread colas that I Supercropped because they were attempting to grow back into the Timber. Man does that plant like bright light!

Plan on harvesting my top most colas at around the week 9 mark (will see how they are doing at that point, have no problems letting them go longer if I feel like they could continue to fill out), then I’ll probably turn the light up a little and let the lowers finish before chopping them too.

Also been having a heck of a time getting my Blumat System calibrated the past week. For some reason it went all wonky and the meter starting reading extremely dry. Checked my reservoir and it had water in it, but wasn’t sure if maybe it has dropped below the level of the bulkhead. So pulled the carrots, reconditioned them, hand watered and waited till my meter read what I wanted, then installed the carrots back in. Also decided to move the moisture meter as there could have been possibility that it was hitting an air pocket. Well, when I came back to check on them tonight the meter was reading far above where I had set them. However, as you can see from the pics, they seem happy enough, so I’m not gonna stress about it anymore. ‍

Can’t wait to see these plants after they’ve filled out completely!

 

[twentyeight.threefive]

Day 28 of Flower update.

The girls have almost certainly stopped their stretch (finally) and are now putting their efforts into their flowers. The Trichome development and smell is noticeably better than last run (at least for the Jamaican and Lambsbread plants, can’t even see the Acapulco ).

Had to tie down the Lambsbread colas that I Supercropped because they were attempting to grow back into the Timber. Man does that plant like bright light!

Plan on harvesting my top most colas at around the week 9 mark (will see how they are doing at that point, have no problems letting them go longer if I feel like they could continue to fill out), then I’ll probably turn the light up a little and let the lowers finish before chopping them too.

Also been having a heck of a time getting my Blumat System calibrated the past week. For some reason it went all wonky and the meter starting reading extremely dry. Checked my reservoir and it had water in it, but wasn’t sure if maybe it has dropped below the level of the bulkhead. So pulled the carrots, reconditioned them, hand watered and waited till my meter read what I wanted, then installed the carrots back in. Also decided to move the moisture meter as there could have been possibility that it was hitting an air pocket. Well, when I came back to check on them tonight the meter was reading far above where I had set them. However, as you can see from the pics, they seem happy enough, so I’m not gonna stress about it anymore. ‍

Can’t wait to see these plants after they’ve filled out completely!View attachment 4669817View attachment 4669818View attachment 4669819View attachment 4669820View attachment 4669822View attachment 4669823View attachment 4669824View attachment 4669825View attachment 4669826

Looking beautiful! Look at those leaves praying to the Timber gods! What do you feed them through your watering system, if anything other than pHed water? I saw that you are in Promix, didn't know if that was precharged or inert to start, and if the plants were feed nutes.

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Looking beautiful! Look at those leaves praying to the Timber gods!

Oh yeah!

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Looking beautiful! Look at those leaves praying to the Timber gods! What do you feed them through your watering system, if anything other than pHed water? I saw that you are in Promix, didn't know if that was precharged or inert to start, and if the plants were feed nutes.

They only get water through the Blumats.

I use mostly rain water, but occasionally, if it doesn’t rain for a while I will have to give them tap water but add some sodium thiosulfate to neutralize the Chloramine and Chlorine in my water (I use a “water conditioner” product from my local pet store which is designed to be used in aquariums with tropical fish which are a lot more sensitive to those chemicals than plants).

I haven’t PH’d any water in probably 4 years.

In the past that was because I was using rain water, but on top of that factor that’s actually one of the benefits of growing in Living Soil. Your plants will communicate with the microbial life in the soil to adjust the PH around its root zone to exactly the levels that the plant wants (which will change during different times in your grow and may even be different in different parts of the root zone to allow it to absorb specific nutrients from the soil better).

Nature is pretty freakin cool and smart like that. She’s been successfully growing plants for Billions of years with no person there PH’ing the rain, rivers, streams, oceans, or ground water supplies.

As far as what I feed them, my initial soil mix was approximately:

-1/3 recycled M3 (with the root balls of the previous crop’s plants still in it)

-1/3 Promix (basically Peat Moss, some perlite for aeration, and some mycorrhizae)

-1/3 locally sourced Compost (some from a Compost pile I made myself and the rest from already finished Compost I found locally for a great price)

Then I added Red Wriggler worms, some local Composting Worms (most likely Night crawlers) that I pulled out of my pile, and of course the 13 species Cover Crop (which I eventually crimped and mulched over so it would die and be broken down by the worms and bacteria so that the plants can use the nutrients sequestered from those plants).

I also gave them a Top Dressing at the Flip (which went onto the soil and got mulched over along with the Cover Crop) which consisted of:

-bone meal
-alfalfa meal
-Kelp meal
-greensand
-Azomite
-Glacial Rock Dust
-Soft Rock Phosphate

This was to help make sure they had everything they needed to power through their Stretch/Transition period

Finally I added a “Bulk” Top Dressing at the end of Week 2 after the Flip of:

-Bone Meal
-Kelp Meal
-Alfalfa Meal
-Kelp Meal
-Langbeinite
-Soft Rock Phosphate
-Greensand
-Azomite
-Glacial Rock Dust
-Basalt

This will give them everything they need to thrive and “bulk up/build their flowers” till Harvest.

After I harvest everything I will do another “Veg specific” Top Dress for the next Crop and repeat the process.

It sounds quite complicated but it’s really not. Plus I mix up large batches of Top Dressings for each phase and then only use about 1-2 cups per plant for each dosage/round. So it’s not too crazy time consuming either.

And this is just one way of doing it as well. A couple of my Living Soil buddies use what they call “Avocado Tech” which is basically hollowing out two halves of an Avocado and then blending the “meat“ with amendments in a food processor, then scooping it back into the Avocado shells and putting the shells down onto the soil under each of their plants. The worms then come up and eat the contents and as they poop and crawl back down into the soil and poop those nutrients become available to the microbes Who break the down further and plants to use.

So several ways to do it.

I also brew Actively Aerated Compost Teas (AACT’s) for them every week to two weeks to keep the biology in the soil at optimal levels and to inoculate the leaf surfaces and other above ground surfaces with a protective layer of biology (to help stave off possible pests/infestation as well as pathogens (molds, blights, etc...).

Hope this wasn’t too much information at once.

 

[twentyeight.threefive]

They only get water through the Blumats.

I use mostly rain water, but occasionally, if it doesn’t rain for a while I will have to give them tap water but add some sodium thiosulfate to neutralize the Chloramine and Chlorine in my water (I use a “water conditioner” product from my local pet store which is designed to be used in aquariums with tropical fish which are a lot more sensitive to those chemicals than plants).

I haven’t PH’d any water in probably 4 years.

In the past that was because I was using rain water, but on top of that factor that’s actually one of the benefits of growing in Living Soil. Your plants will communicate with the microbial life in the soil to adjust the PH around its root zone to exactly the levels that the plant wants (which will change during different times in your grow and may even be different in different parts of the root zone to allow it to absorb specific nutrients from the soil better).

Nature is pretty freakin cool and smart like that. She’s been successfully growing plants for Billions of years with no person there PH’ing the rain, rivers, streams, oceans, or ground water supplies.

As far as what I feed them, my initial soil mix was approximately:

-1/3 recycled M3 (with the root balls of the previous crop’s plants still in it)

-1/3 Promix (basically Peat Moss, some perlite for aeration, and some mycorrhizae)

-1/3 locally sourced Compost (some from a Compost pile I made myself and the rest from already finished Compost I found locally for a great price)

Then I added Red Wriggler worms, some local Composting Worms (most likely Night crawlers) that I pulled out of my pile, and of course the 13 species Cover Crop (which I eventually crimped and mulched over so it would die and be broken down by the worms and bacteria so that the plants can use the nutrients sequestered from those plants).

I also gave them a Top Dressing at the Flip (which went onto the soil and got mulched over along with the Cover Crop) which consisted of:

-bone meal
-alfalfa meal
-Kelp meal
-greensand
-Azomite
-Glacial Rock Dust
-Soft Rock Phosphate

This was to help make sure they had everything they needed to power through their Stretch/Transition period

Finally I added a “Bulk” Top Dressing at the end of Week 2 after the Flip of:

-Bone Meal
-Kelp Meal
-Alfalfa Meal
-Kelp Meal
-Langbeinite
-Soft Rock Phosphate
-Greensand
-Azomite
-Glacial Rock Dust
-Basalt

This will give them everything they need to thrive and “bulk up/build their flowers” till Harvest.

After I harvest everything I will do another “Veg specific” Top Dress for the next Crop and repeat the process.

It sounds quite complicated but it’s really not. Plus I mix up large batches of Top Dressings for each phase and then only use about 1-2 cups per plant for each dosage/round. So it’s not too crazy time consuming either.

And this is just one way of doing it as well. A couple of my Living Soil buddies use what they call “Avocado Tech” which is basically hollowing out two halves of an Avocado and then blending the “meat“ with amendments in a food processor, then scooping it back into the Avocado shells and putting the shells down onto the soil under each of their plants. The worms then come up and eat the contents and as they poop and crawl back down into the soil and poop those nutrients become available to the microbes Who break the down further and plants to use.

So several ways to do it.

I also brew Actively Aerated Compost Teas (AACT’s) for them every week to two weeks to keep the biology in the soil at optimal levels and to inoculate the leaf surfaces and other above ground surfaces with a protective layer of biology (to help stave off possible pests/infestation as well as pathogens (molds, blights, etc...).

Hope this wasn’t too much information at once.

Nope not at all, thanks for the breakdown! I'm always impressed with organic grows. So many different ways to grow and none of them are wrong!

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Flower Day 35 update. Had some battles with my Blumats this week. Digital Moisture Meter started giving off some crazy dry readings so I wound up hand watering, and recalibrated my carrots. Plants never showed any signs of drying out or stress (which I can only attribute to all of the organic matter in my soil being able to hold water) but if the soil did dry out as much as the meter said it did, then it may have slowed down the nutrient cycling.

The plants do seem like they are back in full swing now though. Way frostier than they were at the same point last grow (especially the Jamaicans) and they are definitely bulking up.

I’d say the Lambsbread looks to be a solid week (maybe more) closer to being finished than the Jamaicans, but only time will tell.

Wish I could give an update on the Acapulco, but she has been so dwarfed by the other 3 plants that I can’t even see her to tell how far along she is. Am going to have to wait till the Lambsbread is finished and I chop her tops before I’ll be able to get a good look at her and see whether she too is ready to start harvesting.

Can’t wait to see (and smell!) these girls once they have finished building their flowers!

 

[GrOwThMoNgeR]

Plants are still drying from last grow, today is 10 days since I chopped the first few (didn’t get to all of them till Wednesday of last week though so tomorrow will be Day 7 for those). Moved them all to a makeshift dry room made out of a big huge Amazon box. Checking them daily, but seems fairly safe that they will all make at least 7 Days before I put them into jars. Will get some pics up of the final haul once they are all in jars.

In the meantime got my GeoPot fabric bed in the tent, placed the root balls from last grow in there, then filled the rest of the space with a mix of local Compost and Promix. Then put the Blumat soaker hose in (buried it) and carrots in, first time using it so hopefully I got it set right, but am fully prepared that I may have to adjust it as I go.

Got some red Wigglers in there and sprinkled my cover crop seeds across the soil. Hopefully in a couple days they’ll start sprouting and in a couple weeks it’ll be ready to put my plants into.

Speaking of my plants, got 2 Jamaican Shipwrecks, 1 Lambsbread, and 1 Acapulco. Already had one of the JS in a 1 gallon Smart Pot, but decided to put the other 3 into Net Cups instead as it will take less time for the roots to fill out the space and they also slip out of them easy peasy. Only thing is you have to bottom water them, which is kind of a pain, but not too bad.View attachment 4617407View attachment 4617409

Would be great to know more about your living soil. Which cover crop you use? You answered alot of questions I had in your thread already but wondering about the cover crop tilled-under. Were you worried about damaging the roots when mulching and is there any mold risk to tilling under during same grow?

 

[LCPGrower1980]

Would be great to know more about your living soil. Which cover crop you use? Red Wigglers are worms? You left the root balls for them to eat right?

Yes, I only had 8 of the 9 root balls from the plants I grew (as I had previously trashed the male Jamaican plant and threw away the rootball not realizing that I would be going full Living Soil at the time), but I placed them on the bottom of my bed more or less spaced out like I had my pots.

I then layered Promix, Compost from my home made pile (which wasn’t fully broken down), and finished Compost that I locally sourced (a private household who had bags for sale in their driveway for a great price) between the root balls until I had a nice flat soil layer, then continued with another couple layers of Promix and finished Compost (the final top layer being about 2” thick of Compost).

I used the Cannaisseur 13 species Cover Crop blend available off Amazon for my cover crop, threw in some Red Wrigglers (supposedly bought 500, but honesty it didn’t look like that many when I dumped the worm ball in, though admittedly I’ve never counted large numbers of worms so my eyes could definitely deceive me), and a couple dozen composting worms from my outdoor pile (my guess is that they were night crawlers based on their size and the fact that they all wanted to burrow down into the soil as soon as I threw them in).

Have seen the Wrigglers come up to the surface to eat on several occasions (actually there are tons of baby and juvenile Wrigglers up in the mulch layer chowing on the leaves that I cut off when I lollipopped them right now), but haven’t ever seen the crawlers. My guess is that they are down chewing on the root balls and not completely broken down Compost that I put in deeper down.

Hopefully that answers your questions. If not just let me know and I’ll try to clarify. Thanks for checking out my grow journal.

 

[GrOwThMoNgeR]

Yes, I only had 8 of the 9 root balls from the plants I grew (as I had previously trashed the male Jamaican plant and threw away the rootball not realizing that I would be going full Living Soil at the time), but I placed them on the bottom of my bed more or less spaced out like I had my pots.

I then layered Promix, Compost from my home made pile (which wasn’t fully broken down), and finished Compost that I locally sourced (a private household who had bags for sale in their driveway for a great price) between the root balls until I had a nice flat soil layer, then continued with another couple layers of Promix and finished Compost (the final top layer being about 2” thick of Compost).

I used the Cannaisseur 13 species Cover Crop blend available off Amazon for my cover crop, threw in some Red Wrigglers (supposedly bought 500, but honesty it didn’t look like that many when I dumped the worm ball in, though admittedly I’ve never counted large numbers of worms so my eyes could definitely deceive me), and a couple dozen composting worms from my outdoor pile (my guess is that they were night crawlers based on their size and the fact that they all wanted to burrow down into the soil as soon as I threw them in).

Have seen the Wrigglers come up to the surface to eat on several occasions (actually there are tons of baby and juvenile Wrigglers up in the mulch layer chowing on the leaves that I cut off when I lollipopped them right now), but haven’t ever seen the crawlers. My guess is that they are down chewing on the root balls and not completely broken down Compost that I put in deeper down.

Hopefully that answers your questions. If not just let me know and I’ll try to clarify. Thanks for checking out my grow journal.

I edited my post to but you still have great info. Maybe you could have a look again and give me tilling info. Your grow journal is great and informative. Great work, so happy you are using living soil, I am growing organically too, but the living soil indoors is really interesting to follow. <3

 

[LCPGrower1980]

I edited my post to but you still have great info. Maybe you could have a look again and give me tilling info. Your grow journal is great and informative. Great work, so happy you are using living soil, I am growing organically too, but the living soil indoors is really interesting to follow. <3

I actually did not “till” my cover crop (you don’t really want to till at all in Living Soil as it destroys the mycorrhizal network in the soil and can kill worms as well), just basically bent it down (crimped it) by hand for the most part and used my trimming scissors to cut anything down that didn’t seem to want to stay down from being crimped or was just too big and needed to be chopped into smaller pieces. I then Top Dressed, put a nice thick layer of Barley Straw mulch over top of it to smother (block light from getting to) anything else that may not have died, and then applied about a gallon of Compost Tea to moisten the mulch and get the bacteria down into the dead Cover Crop and top dressing to start breaking them down into the soil food web/plant available form.

Hopefully that makes sense.

I also pulled back the Barley mulch and applied my Flower/Bulk Top Dressing directly you the top of the soil (before covering it back up with the mulch) again because I want it accessible to the soil biology and at that time there was very little signs of the Cover Crop left (the biology had already pretty much completely composted it/broke it down into soil).

Mold/Fungus/Mycelium is actually a good thing in a Living Soil bed, especially in Flower, so no I was not concerned about it.

Again, hopefully that answers your questions.

And awesome you are growing organic! I grew in Michigan Made Mix (which is organic) for about 4 years before making the full switch to Living Soil this grow. It’s honestly been a pretty easy transition. If you are on the fence about it, I would definitely encourage you to make the switch. I have never grown plants that were this healthy or happy before, even growing Organic.

 

[horribleherk]

Looking good my 4x4 is starting to gain momentum

 

[horribleherk]

I have always wanted a timber like yours or a rapid led & kinda built the one I'm running now using the luminus cobs as an economical compromise & I had my doubts at first but first run in the 3x3 was my best run in a 3x3 yet but not thoroughly convinced on it running the 4x4 yet this grow will tell the story it's one thing to see a guy crunching numbers & efficiency on you tube it's quite another to do an actual grow from a-z I have another vipar spectra Identical to the one I hacked so another build could be on the horizon

 

[LCPGrower1980]

I have always wanted a timber like yours or a rapid led & kinda built the one I'm running now using the luminus cobs as an economical compromise & I had my doubts at first but first run in the 3x3 was my best run in a 3x3 yet but not thoroughly convinced on it running the 4x4 yet this grow will tell the story it's one thing to see a guy crunching numbers & efficiency on you tube it's quite another to do an actual grow from a-z I have another vipar spectra Identical to the one I hacked so another build could be on the horizon

Yeah, I’ve seen Shane’s tests on the Luminous vs Veros (during which he tested an older model). Like you said though, unless you have the Quantum Sensor there constantly monitoring your PPFD and you do a full run under the light in your grow space it’s all just an educated guess at best how any light will perform.

I am currently running my Timber at roughly 270 Watts (about 63% power) and my buds are swelling up nicely (especially the Lambsbread which is probably about a week further along than the Jamaicans).

Timber actually rates the 4VS for up to a 3.5x3.5 in Flower, which actually matches up with the Coco For Cannabis calculator exactly. That would equal running it at about 70% power. Since I have the Orca in there too though, I’m pretty confident that 63% should be enough (especially based on how close they are and how they are filling out).

Bet with Orca a 4VS could do a 4x4 in Flower.