Grow #1 - 3x Mango Sherbet (Humbolt) & 3x Blackened Oranges (Useful)

I also added a filter to the front of the exhaust, to eliminate any large particles building up on the carbon filter outside the tent. It did increase the drag on the motor, but not any more than it's meant to handle. Hopefully this will help eliminate any of that white powder forming.
(I cut the pre-filter for the carbon filter and used half of it to go over the fan)

Apr 5-9

All the plants have been sexed as girls as far as I can tell, each are showing little pistils at the nodes instead of sacs (woo-hoo!)
Also seem to enjoy the 1G pots, which will be getting up-potted to their final home of 3Gal (_I'm guessing_) on the 11th or 12th. Going to begin buffering coir as soon as tomorrow depending on how root growth looks on the bags. I've seen one or two plants with a little root tip chasing out of the side of the bag on 4/8. If I notice much more I'll plan on the 11th for up-potting, if not I may give it a few more days -- 14th at the absolute latest.
I plan to flip them on 4/20, coinciding with the first day of their 6th week and want them to have plenty of time to adjust to the final up-potting.

They see a lot of growth daily. The Oranges get bushier and the Mangoes, particularly Mango Sherbet #1, go UP. Tallest Mango stands at 25", and that's with having buried a few inches during the second up-potting and letting her grow a bit of curve

Apr 6-7th
Noticed some light burn on the baby Orange (#2), and on Mango #2. I've shifted their location around and staggered the light height with the tallest plants on shorter totes and the light raised up a few inches above the other to create an even canopy and strength of light. This seems to have helped to stop any further light stress, and allowed them to focus on growth, with changes noticeable overnight.

Apr 9
I moved the pre-filter from in front of the fan to in front of the carbon filter outside the tent. Air flow was a little low and I wanted to test if this way improved it. It did, by a lot. Unfortunately noticed when moving the ducting off the carbon filter that it got enough of that white powder in it to be visible on the inside of the filter. I'm not really sure what to do with it besides wipe it down. I may try vacuuming it later. Haven't noticed it affect performance so far, but I don't doubt that longevity could have been impacted.

Apr 7
Group photos


Leaf burning on Mango Sherbet #2 & Blackened Orange #2

Apr 9

Group photos, Lights adjusted to different heights, plants spaced apart slightly



Showing sex (female)

Light burn recovery, lots of growth from Blackened Orange #2; no new signs of burning on any leaves




Growth shots, Stalks are at least as big around as my pointer finger, some as big as my thumb (except Orange #2, her stalk's about the size of a pencil, little bigger)

Apr 9

Fan Leaves compared to my hand

Apr 11

Wondering if I didn't misdiagnose that "Light Burn". I'm seeing some minor, but persistent, clawing on Oranges #1 and #3, and all girls except Orange #2 have some upward curling along the edges of the leaves. Mango #2 is showing light yellowish-green coloration along the edges of her newer leaves.
I wondered if Nitrogen levels were too high, that's a lot of people's first suggestions with clawing, but the clawing is only happening slightly on the 2 Oranges, none on the Mangoes, growth is not slowed at all on any, in fact I'd say it's still fairly vigorous, and slowed growth is a tell-tale sign of Nitrogen toxicity, along with it affecting more of the leaves than just a few. I've seen almost a word-for-word description matching Calcium and Magnesium deficiency though, so I think that's what I'm (still, increasingly) dealing with as the girls get bigger. I may need a surfactant, because at 5ml/gal of CalMag, and pre-buffering the coir with %150 doses, I don't think I need to increase my Cal-Mag supplementation. Many other coco-growers have said they use this dosage throughout the grow. GH Flora-Trio nutes are still at 1-1-1 tsp/gal and are leveling off at around 800ppm, pH is around 6.2 (raised from the 5.~ that it ends up at after mixing Cal-Mag+Flora-Trio)

After reading up, I plan to decrease water given at each feeding, without decreasing the feedings/day or the hourly schedule. I've been getting larger amounts of run-off than needed to keep the coir at %90-100 moisture. Schedule is still 20/4 light cycle, and watering 4x/day; at Lights-On, 6 hours later, again another 6 hours later, and finally 4 hours later, which is 4 hours before Lights-Off, making it 8 hours until the next feeding at the next Lights-On.
During Flowering I'll have to switch to 3x/day watering, as to not interrupt the dark-cycle of the plants. 3x/day at Lights-On, 6 hours later at "mid-day", and 6 hours later at Lights-Off.

I've raised the lights up to around 22-24in, and spread them apart some. Changed the mounting to secure them a bit more as well.

Humidity is starting to become an issue. If the tent is closed, it almost immediately shoots up to around %61. With the door wide open and a fan pulling air out, it hovers around %55. Going to pick up a dehumidifier from Amazon soon-like. Very soon-like.
Temps have been good at between 70 and 74F.

Saw some dimpling/flat spots along the fan leaves of Oranges #1 &3 as well. Not sure about this texture issue. Will picture these issues, advice is welcome.

Still thinking they are outgrowing their current homes and need the up-potting soon. Started buffering a large batch of coir late night on the 10th and am doing the second buffer late night on the 11th (technically the 12th). Plan to up-pot to 3gal late-night on the 12th after a few rounds of fertigating the buffered mix.



Plenty of growth daily, but looking closer there are problems to be found....


yellowish centers on Mangoes


Dimpling/Flat spots, scattered around some fan leaves on Blackened Oranges


Rusty colored spots forming on some leaves, seems not to discriminate and affects Mangoes and Oranges both. Not all, but mostly on lower fans


Edges of leaves are curling slightly upward. Leaves themselves aren't taco-ing yet, just the slight curl. Mostly toward upper canopy.

I also had some red stems going on, that's gotten much better though since upping CalMag from 3 to 5ml/gal.

None of it has me too worried, but I would like them to look as healthy as possible and treat any symptoms before they're any more problematic. I just don't know how to treat it for what I believe it to be -- Calcium/Magnesium deficient. 5ml/gal of supplementation should be plenty, and these weeks (4 and 5) are scheduled for 1 tsp/gal of GH Flora-Trio in many grows I've seen. Until I can get some Armor-Si and some Diamond Nectar, I don't know how to make them uptake nutrients any more efficiently. Advice is appreciated, but I know I'm more likely to find it posting in the Help forums...

Great looking grow! Plants are looking solid. I wish I could help you diagnose the issue that's occurring on your leaves, but I was never able to get coco to work well for me. I had similar issues as you are having, and they persisted throughout my grow cycle to the end. The harvest was still decent, but I felt the coco ultimately hindered the performance of my ladies and I have since moved to #4 chunky perlite. Completely inert. That resolved my strange leaf issues.

There are some people on RIU that rock coco really well. Maybe ask around from some of the more experienced coco gurus. Keep up the good work though. Your tent is setup beautifully. Why are you pushing through your carbon filter instead of pulling through it? Would that not solve your intake concerns? I have to push through one of my filters on my 2 vegetative tents that are connected together via ducting, but that's only because the tent frame cannot safely support the extra 40# of weight hanging the inline fan and filter within the tent itself. As a result I had to mount mine outside the tent to a ceiling joist pushing through the carbon filter. Still works, but if anything gets sucked into your fan's intake your equipment is fucked not to mention the possibility of a fire. That's one of a few reasons why pulling through the filter is more effective and safe than pushing through it, but each garden has different constrains with setup. My flower room however has 2 inline fans each mounted at the front and end of the ducting that pull through a carbon filter and then through my HID hoods, through a 6" louver, and exhausted outside the house. That way nothing that enter my intake and either A) damage my inline fans or B) land on my 1000w bulbs creating a fire and damaged equipment while I'm sleeping at night. I have to occasionally clean my hood glass from minor carbon debris, but it's very minor and just part of routine maintenance after each flower cycle. Safety first. I notice when pushing through the filter I also get carbon debris that lands on the floor. Not a lot, but enough to be noticeable. I do not currently have a prefilter wrapped around it.

Keep up the great work! I'm subscribed!

jonnynobody said:

Why are you pushing through your carbon filter instead of pulling through it?

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Much thanks!

I had originally put the carbon filter outside the tent so I could skip the trouble of suspending it in the tent, and have a little more room to walk around and water them without smacking into more stuff (I'm a big guy so I found it kinda difficult to move around toward the backside of the tent especially now that they're all over a foot in diameter). I'm using it more as just a smell-scrubber right now so I can maintain local compliance laws, plus I had some concerns with being able to support it with my tent frame, I have some weak little 1/8"in bars that claim to support 10lbs each, but I was worried about stressing them too much. You make a good point though, it would be safer and increase longevity of the fan to have it in front.

I also skipped out on getting a second carbon filter for my other tent; when I get the CoVid money I plan to get a better light and run both tents in a perpetual set-up. But I've been told I didn't really need a carbon filter set-up on the Veg tent, that plants won't get that smelly unless they're in flower. I haven't ran the tent without the filter to test the validity of that statement, but when I open up the tent I can definitely smell'um and they're still in Veg. Would you recommend carbon filtering for every tent, then?

Also, what do you think of Blackened Orange #2 (the stunted girl)? Is she likely to fruit for me? I know it will be less yield for sure than her sisters, but I'm hoping she's seeing a lot of root-growth and taking her time to bust out in Late-Veg/Transition, but at this point it might be wishful thinking. Think it's worth continuing to see where she goes?

CitrusCustard said:

Much thanks!

I had originally put the carbon filter outside the tent so I could skip the trouble of suspending it in the tent, and have a little more room to walk around and water them without smacking into more stuff (I'm a big guy so I found it kinda difficult to move around toward the backside of the tent especially now that they're all over a foot in diameter). I'm using it more as just a smell-scrubber right now so I can maintain local compliance laws, plus I had some concerns with being able to support it with my tent frame, I have some weak little 1/8"in bars that claim to support 10lbs each, but I was worried about stressing them too much. You make a good point though, it would be safer and increase longevity of the fan to have it in front.

I also skipped out on getting a second carbon filter for my other tent; when I get the CoVid money I plan to get a better light and run both tents in a perpetual set-up. But I've been told I didn't really need a carbon filter set-up on the Veg tent, that plants won't get that smelly unless they're in flower. I haven't ran the tent without the filter to test the validity of that statement, but when I open up the tent I can definitely smell'um and they're still in Veg. Would you recommend carbon filtering for every tent, then?

Also, what do you think of Blackened Orange #2 (the stunted girl)? Is she likely to fruit for me? I know it will be less yield for sure than her sisters, but I'm hoping she's seeing a lot of root-growth and taking her time to bust out in Late-Veg/Transition, but at this point it might be wishful thinking. Think it's worth continuing to see where she goes?

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Room in those tents gets tight quick. Do what works best for your situation. As long as it's safe and gets the job done you're doing the right thing.
Veg tents can generate considerable odor. I do filter my 2 tents for that reason.

By all means continue. I don't think you need to hit the abort button yet. I beat my head against the wall with coco man. I had the same problems you're having. Mutated leaves growing in swirl formation. Rust spots. Everything that indicated a calcium / magnesium deficiency, but I charged the coco and fed according to recommended rates. It just didn't make any sense. I put coco in the rear view and never looked back. I did finish my grow cycle though and with success. It just didn't yield as much as it would have under ideal conditions.

Keep pushing through and doing your best. The plant will flower and you'll learn more by the experience. You'll get some smoke off her yet.

jonnynobody said:

Room in those tents gets tight quick. Do what works best for your situation. As long as it's safe and gets the job done you're doing the right thing.
Veg tents can generate considerable odor. I do filter my 2 tents for that reason.

By all means continue. I don't think you need to hit the abort button yet. I beat my head against the wall with coco man. I had the same problems you're having. Mutated leaves growing in swirl formation. Rust spots. Everything that indicated a calcium / magnesium deficiency, but I charged the coco and fed according to recommended rates. It just didn't make any sense. I put coco in the rear view and never looked back. I did finish my grow cycle though and with success. It just didn't yield as much as it would have under ideal conditions.

Keep pushing through and doing your best. The plant will flower and you'll learn more by the experience. You'll get some smoke off her yet.

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Thanks again. Really glad to have someone with experience following and commenting.
I put the carbon filter in front of the inline like you suggested. Though I can't feel it sucking air at all with my hand, it will just barely grab a napkin if I put it in front of the filter holes, and it's outputting plenty of CFM out the ducting on the other side and it's cleaning out that powdery residue that was left inside the filter (I'll have to clean the fan again, but hopefully for the last time). I used two bars for hanging it, just in case things were too heavy, but all looks good so far. I've also took the base off my standing fan and hung it from a top corner of the tent, it was getting crowded in there and that cleared up a ton of space. I'll be posting pics later on tonight after I get them up-potted into their 3gal homes. Hopefully they're going to be as happy with this up-potting as they were the other two.

Up-potting went rather well, I expected a little more trouble out of the 1gal transferring, but after cutting slits down the side of the pots (I plan on pinning together next time if possible) I was able to roll the pots down easily and pop them out, and dip them straight into their new homes. They all look happy in the new pots, and I didn't screw up this time and buffered extra coir, so they all got a nice full potting. All of them but Orange #2 had vigorous root growth that was beginning to exceed the size of their containers. Orange #2 still had some good growth though, with roots visible, just not enough that peripherals were tearing off the bag, like the rest.
I did notice that the roots were hairy suckers! I'm not sure if they're actually supposed to be that frosty looking? I pictured them, but didn't get great shots, the dang blurple lighting isn't always photogenic. Still, if zoomed in on, you can see the frostiness I'm talking about. Almost like trichome heads...Is this normal? I didn't notice it like this last time I up-potted, and there were roots clinging to the bag before as well, but maybe I missed it...
Hopefully just being paranoid

TIA anyone


Frosty, hairy roots...Normal or...is it mold? More of it visible in the first shot


Group shots/Tent changes

Ordered a dehumidifier from Amazon and an RO system from Hydrobuilder.com., a Growonix RO200. Expected to arrive around the 16th. Until then, I'll battle with this humidity. Ugh.
Also read up on Sexing the plants and realized I did not know how to sex them when I thought I had determined them as fem's. I plan to take cuttings later and bloom-cycle them until they show sex.

A quick google search told me the white fuzzy roots are a sign of healthy roots and nothing to worry about
I am still left to wonder if it's bc of the mycorrhizae being a fungus that the rooting branches have that fuzzy 'moldy' look to them...

Apr 19

Hey there all you cool cats and kittens,

Since getting the dehuey in the tent, things have been MUCH more manageable! The RO system is nice, I'm impressed with the build-quality, even though I didn't have a drill-bit large enough to install the faucet, it's %90 hooked up and able to output RO water at about 40+ PSI. I'll be wanting the storage tank for it soon, if I had any complaints, it's that even for a 200GPD, it runs kind of slow - like a faucet filter would. Still, it gets PPM below 150, which is much more manageable than the tap.

Did some trimming on the lower canopy (lollipopping? at least my attempt) on the 18th and earlier in the week, a few days after up-potting. Didn't want to do too much before the flip, which is quickly approaching. I think I could have taken more off, but I was hesitant to take many leaves, other than those that saw little-to-no light, and a few grow shoots that looked like they were going absolutely nowhere.

The Blackened Oranges still have strange formations of dimpling, but it's not inhibiting their growth by much, if any (from what I can tell). Mango 1 & 2 are still towers, which I NEED to get on finding supports for, but getting out during the covid shutdown has been hard. I'll probably need to fashion some at home, to tie down the tall girls before they grow any more. Mango 3 is on par with Oranges 1 and 3, size wise, but without the dimpling and clawing that some of the Oranges leaves are getting. Orange 2 has grown substantially! She's still the "runt" of the litter, but she's no longer a baby! She's standing at 16in today! I have a bit more confidence in her producing some amount of flower, however little.

The cuttings that I'm sexing still haven't flowered, and I'm thinking there may be enough light leak (even though its VERY little), to prevent full darkness. I've taken a few small measures to ensure more darkness.

I've also ordered a line of nutes/amendments to run in a routine throughout the next grow. I'll be following the internet cannabis-horticulturalist "Dr Coco's" line of nutrition, of GH Flora Trio, CaliMagic, Armor-Si, Diamond Nectar, and KoolBloom, in hopes that it will maximize the intake of proper nutrition, and prevent any of the leaf issues I was seeing in this run.
Speaking of the next run, I got some multi-packs of, yet again, Humboldt SC, and a 10 pack of Useful. This time I got (from Humboldt), Caramel Cream, Blueberry Muffin, Bigfoot Glue, and SolMate Auto. From Useful I got (Blueberry Hashplant x Chocolate Diesel). I plan on grabbing some Ethos genetics some time soon too, if possible to fit in my budget, but for right now these will be something to mix into the next few runs.

Some things to do today; clean up, get new light hung, build a light-trap for the back of the flowering tent, rearrange area to open up both side-ports for bloom tent, figure out the best/easiest/cheapest drain-to-waste solution for bloom tent. ((Suggestions welcome for that last one))

All right, now some pics! Tell me what you think, did I "lollipop" properly? Should I take more? Should I have taken less?

Group shot

Orange 2 at 16"

Lower canopy, after defoliating

Subbed! I've got some Blackened Oranges on the way, looking forward to seeing the rest of your grow here.

Gentlemencorpse said:

Subbed! I've got some Blackened Oranges on the way, looking forward to seeing the rest of your grow here.

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Thanks Gentlemencorpse!

4/20
Happy holidays, everyone.
The new light is up, and the girls look prettier than ever! I'm definitely not feeling any buyers remorse after turning it on and seeing those leaves' colorful green hues. Had to move the fan/filter some, but it gave me a reason to arrange the ducting and connections a little better.

I moved the second thermo-hygrometer from next to the cuttings to inside the tent, so now I have 2 readings in the tent - above the canopy and below.
Above is significantly higher temps right now, with the light on, at ~84F and ~%35RH (it's sitting right above the dehuey in the tent pocket). The lower canopy is about 73-75F and about %45RH (sitting about a foot across from, on equal level with the dehuey, in-between plants. When I get the 4in inline's I ordered, I'll use one in each tent as intake, and vent out the ceiling with my 6in fans. Hopefully when I'm not recirculating the same warm air through the room I'll fix any heat soak I have and regulate the humidity/temperature a bit better for the whole room.

Well, with 4/20 here, it's week 6 for these girls, and the flip-time is here! Started their feeding routine to 3x per day now, every 6 hrs, at 6:30PM (lights on), 12:00AM ("midday"), and 6:30AM (lights off). I'll get Mango Sherbet #1 tied down later on, after they wake up this evening. I also plan to put supports on all of them.

Here's some shots showcasing the new light, and fan/filter setup

Subbed

Looking good dude

Hi all! Time for an update on the girls.

They're girls! (At least for the ones I can see, I'm positive this time)

Another few pieces of news, not all of it on the positive side.
Some of the leaves are showing damage, signs of what I'm guessing is a mixture of light and humidity stress.
I haven't got my intake fans installed yet, waiting to get screens on the fronts of them so I'm not blowing dirt and hair into the tent.

Unless I change how I've hung the light (which would be an enormous pain at this stage of the grow), the light can't raise any more.
I took some steps to training Mango #1 to stop towering over the other girls because she grew to the point where she was touching the light. I wish I had mainlined, or at least topped, but I've read that topping this late won't help, and can actually hurt -- so I tried my hand at training. I put a support stake into the pot with her, and tied a string over her top, bending her away from the light. The next morning, she slipped out of the string. When I re-affixed the string, and tightened it, I went a bit too far, and she buckled under the tension Her top folded sharply over, and I immediately removed the string. I didn't hear any snap, and the skin didn't break, but she remained slumped over, as if I cracked her spine. So when looking to see if I should top that now at the 'break', a lot of people with similar situations said their plant recovered from this, and others even compared this to 'super-cropping', saying it could have been done intentionally,were it somewhere else on the stalk, and that it should recover just fine.
Lo, and behold, the next morning, her top had bent back toward the light, and she was producing little pistils on almost all her nodes. So, I'm hoping that I ended up doing myself a "favor" by breaking her top away from the light....we'll see.


A bit more bad news. A few of the leaves closest to the dehuey are seeing some abuse, they're drying up and fraying at the edge with heavy, ugly discoloration. Other leaves are too close to the light, so they're showing some discoloring. One leaf had some rusty spotting, another has a large rusty patch.
Also, a bit of yellowing at the tops of a lot of cola's on the newer growth, not sure if that's normal, but it happened the day after I switched them to 12/12 under the SpiderFarmer.

I've added Armor-SI and DiamondNectar to the feeding regimen, hoping it brings the overall health and production up.

I can't include all the pics in one post, so I'll start with the good, then I'll post the bad and the ugly in a second post.

The Good

Group photo; I can hardly tell anything is amiss looking at them in this picture


Some under-shots, they have some nice beard's growing out of their bags. I was surprised how quickly they reached the edge of the 3gals

Some shots of Orange #2 (little girl), she's growing steadily
Sex Pistils - Mango #1

Nice bushy tops on the Oranges, looking like a jungle along their main colas. (Orange 1 and 3 pictured)