HSC Blueberry Cupcake clones out of control

splakow

Well-Known Member
Day 21 pm

I got a new pH pen in today. Checked the tank and it was at 4.9. If my old meter was that far off, I'm shocked at how well the plant is doing. Hopefully she does even better now that I can comfortably get the pH in range. So, I dumped the reservoir and mixed up a fresh batch of nutes. Mixed them the same as last time but I had to add 4mL of pH up.

4mL ArmorSi
8mL CalMag
18g MaxiBloom
17 drops of bleach
4mL pH up

727ppm
5.69pH

New pH pen pic for fun
View attachment 5307734
Bleach ?
Did I read that right?
 

TCH

Well-Known Member
Day 22 am

Here's your reminder to have a tray that can hold the entirety of your reservoir with blumats. I refreshed the reservoir last night and when I do so, the blumats usually flow pretty good for a while. I normally let them run for a while to work as a bit of a system flush and to saturate the medium. Sometimes they will slow to a drip relatively quickly. Sometimes however, they will run and run and run. The dreaded runaway carrot. Last night was one of those instances. Lol. I filled it up, and saw that it was running nice and steady. I went out to the kitchen to fix a quick dinner and I was going to check on it about 15 minutes later. Fast forward about an hour and I jumped up out of my seat and ran back to my room. Luckily, the saucer was only about 3/4 full and it didn't get to my overflow tray, but I instantly felt better about spending the $20 on the tray last weekend. All in all, it ran about a gallon through the coco and there are still 3 gallons left in the res. Probably not a bad thing since the res had been at 4.8 or 4.9 for who knows how long thanks to my negligence on maintaining a working pH meter. Anywho, plant looks great as always and shows no sign of hating any of the recent happenings and she continues to chug right along. Have a great day, all!!!!!

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Laughing Grass

Well-Known Member
Day 22 am

Here's your reminder to have a tray that can hold the entirety of your reservoir with blumats. I refreshed the reservoir last night and when I do so, the blumats usually flow pretty good for a while. I normally let them run for a while to work as a bit of a system flush and to saturate the medium. Sometimes they will slow to a drip relatively quickly. Sometimes however, they will run and run and run. The dreaded runaway carrot. Last night was one of those instances. Lol. I filled it up, and saw that it was running nice and steady. I went out to the kitchen to fix a quick dinner and I was going to check on it about 15 minutes later. Fast forward about an hour and I jumped up out of my seat and ran back to my room. Luckily, the saucer was only about 3/4 full and it didn't get to my overflow tray, but I instantly felt better about spending the $20 on the tray last weekend. All in all, it ran about a gallon through the coco and there are still 3 gallons left in the res. Probably not a bad thing since the res had been at 4.8 or 4.9 for who knows how long thanks to my negligence on maintaining a working pH meter. Anywho, plant looks great as always and shows no sign of hating any of the recent happenings and she continues to chug right along. Have a great day, all!!!!!

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I ran blumats for two years and that was my experience too. Consistently inconsistent.
 

TCH

Well-Known Member
I ran blumats for two years and that was my experience too. Consistently inconsistent.
I am still a fan of them. I am still relatively new to them though. I have changed my outlook on them a bit as far as I don't think they actually work like they say they do. Maybe I'm an idiot. That said, I like to get them setup to where they just barely drip and dial em back to the hanging drip and give them just a very tiny turn like half a line counter clockwise to get them between the hanging drip and the steady drip. That keeps everything moist in the smaller containers, saves a TON of time and I don't have to be in there once, twice, or three times a day dumping water in the pots and more often than not, making messes. All that to say, if they can keep my coco nice and moist for 4-6 days at a time and save me a lot of time through the week, I'll continue to use them. I'm getting ready to leave for 5 days and my son is keeping an eye on stuff that will be the real test. Time will tell.
 

TCH

Well-Known Member
That said, I like to get them setup to where they just barely drip and dial em back to the hanging drip and give them just a very tiny turn like half a line counter clockwise to get them between the hanging drip and the steady drip. That keeps everything moist in the smaller containers, saves a TON of time and I don't have to be in there once, twice, or three times a day dumping water in the pots and more often than not, making messes.
Listening to an episode of growcast and the guy from sustainable village is on it and he just talked about using the blumat classics all tucked into a 5 gallon bucket and running like a manifold on it or something. As soon as it's done, I'm gonna rewind it and try to catch the details again. That may be a great answer if it works with nutes especially in veg.
 

Laughing Grass

Well-Known Member
I am still a fan of them. I am still relatively new to them though. I have changed my outlook on them a bit as far as I don't think they actually work like they say they do. Maybe I'm an idiot. That said, I like to get them setup to where they just barely drip and dial em back to the hanging drip and give them just a very tiny turn like half a line counter clockwise to get them between the hanging drip and the steady drip. That keeps everything moist in the smaller containers, saves a TON of time and I don't have to be in there once, twice, or three times a day dumping water in the pots and more often than not, making messes. All that to say, if they can keep my coco nice and moist for 4-6 days at a time and save me a lot of time through the week, I'll continue to use them. I'm getting ready to leave for 5 days and my son is keeping an eye on stuff that will be the real test. Time will tell.
Na you're not an idiot. They do work and I've grown some nice buds with them... but I had a couple issues with that I could not overcome. The flooding issue and wasted nutrients, and I was meticulous with the calibration. You don't really know how much each plant is getting, there's no way to measure that or be consistent, and getting proper runoff that coco requires. I'm still running drip but I'm using a pump based system now.


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TCH

Well-Known Member
You don't really know how much each plant is getting, there's no way to measure that or be consistent, and getting proper runoff that coco requires.

View attachment 5307895
That's why I've already quit trying to get them dialed like they describe. I go with the minimal drip method. Keeping everything moist enough and so far, the plants have reacted very positively to it and seem to love it. I also keep my ppm lower than suggested I think. The highest I ran it was around 1.6ec which is around 800ppm if I remember correctly. I'm currently running the 3x3 tent in this thread around 730ppm I believe. The veg stuff in the 4x4 is around 550ppm right now. I'll most likely bump it when I get back next week from my little trip. I just don't want to make any big changes or adjustments before leaving for 5 days.

I do like pumps and stuff but it's one more thing that turns into a nightmare if power is lost. That was the big draw for me with the blumats.
 

curious2garden

Well-Known Mod
Staff member
That's why I've already quit trying to get them dialed like they describe. I go with the minimal drip method. Keeping everything moist enough and so far, the plants have reacted very positively to it and seem to love it. I also keep my ppm lower than suggested I think. The highest I ran it was around 1.6ec which is around 800ppm if I remember correctly. I'm currently running the 3x3 tent in this thread around 730ppm I believe. The veg stuff in the 4x4 is around 550ppm right now. I'll most likely bump it when I get back next week from my little trip. I just don't want to make any big changes or adjustments before leaving for 5 days.

I do like pumps and stuff but it's one more thing that turns into a nightmare if power is lost. That was the big draw for me with the blumats.
I'd get an automatic condensate pump (thanks @manfredo ) and put it in your emergency blumat failure reservoir and route it back to your main res so perchance your blumats crap out on you during vacay your pump will move the water from the catch basin back to their res and just set up an emegency recirculating system.

I wonder if that would work, off to Amazon to price auto condensate pumps
 

Laughing Grass

Well-Known Member
That's why I've already quit trying to get them dialed like they describe. I go with the minimal drip method. Keeping everything moist enough and so far, the plants have reacted very positively to it and seem to love it. I also keep my ppm lower than suggested I think. The highest I ran it was around 1.6ec which is around 800ppm if I remember correctly. I'm currently running the 3x3 tent in this thread around 730ppm I believe. The veg stuff in the 4x4 is around 550ppm right now. I'll most likely bump it when I get back next week from my little trip. I just don't want to make any big changes or adjustments before leaving for 5 days.

I do like pumps and stuff but it's one more thing that turns into a nightmare if power is lost. That was the big draw for me with the blumats.
The no power requirement is what initially drew me to them. I think Annie's idea to use a condensate pump is a winner. You could run a little extra flow to make sure you're getting runoff and mitigate lockout a bit better.
 

TCH

Well-Known Member
Day 30 from flip

Good morning, beautiful!!! Those familiar with Blumats know that the reservoir has to be up so high for the gravity fed system to work correctly. This morning, I checked on this beauty and her pot looked drier than normal. Checked for clogs and kinks, found none. Disconnected the line from the res and she started flowing freely. Hmmm, no way the bulkhead is clogged so hooked it back up and nothing. Lifted the res up about 1.5" and it started dripping right away. So I found that with right at 1 gallon left in the res, it loses the pressure to drip how it should. So, for the time being, I flipped an extra plant saucer upside down and slid it under there. The 4 gallon res lasted 5 days though while I was out of town, so I couldn't be happier about that. I plucked a few yellowing leaves from underneath the canopy and she is right back on her way. My bedroom started smelling like blueberry cake this morning too. That smell is sooooo good. When I chop this one, I am going to try to wait until a day that it smells just like this morning. The @Spiderfarmerled G3000 is cookin right along at 100% and the plant appears to be lovin it!!

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TCH

Well-Known Member
Day 33

Just because... brush up against any part Of this plant and its like you rested your arm in syrup on the table at IHOP. Her mom went 97 days from the flip and I unintentionally stress tested the shit out of her when I forgot to feed/water her for a few days and she almost died. HSC says 60 days (I know I know). My thoughts are that it should finish between 75 and 80 days if I tack a couple weeks on for when it starts flowering versus when I flipped her. Anybody that's grown Blueberry Cupcake? Did you keep track of the days from flip to finish?

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Seanf610

Active Member
So, I took clones of my HSC Blueberry Cupcake plant quite some time ago. They rooted and I put them in coco on blumats, feeding maxibloom with calmag in RO water. Fast forward a couple months and they are pushing 6' tall and they are out of control. They have grown up and above my bar light. I am going to cut them way back so I can flip them in the next week or 2. My question is should I just pick a height and cut straight across and then give them a week or 2 to heal up and then flip them? Or is there a better strategery to cutting them way back?
I'm not sure that I'll keep all 5. I may gift a plant or 2 to a buddy just for the sake of having enough room.

View attachment 5290260View attachment 5290261
Can you put it outside? Your really crammed, how many gallons on your pots
 

TCH

Well-Known Member
Can you put it outside? Your really crammed, how many gallons on your pots
Post #53 is the plant that I kept and flowered in the 3x3 tent. The others went to live on a farm somewhere. The white square pot it is in is approximately 2.5 gallons.
 

Seanf610

Active Member
Post #53 is the plant that I kept and flowered in the 3x3 tent. The others went to live on a farm somewhere. The white square pot it is in is approximately 2.5 gallons.
Just curious do you organic garden at all? Or have you noticed the difference between organic nutrients? 2.5 gallon pots with those results take some skill
 

TCH

Well-Known Member
Just curious do you organic garden at all? Or have you noticed the difference between organic nutrients? 2.5 gallon pots with those results take some skill
Nope. I'm running coco with MaxiGrow in the veg tent and maxibloom in the flower tent. Truth be told, I could have kept her in the smaller 1/2 gallon pot and just fed more, but I wanted to not have to feed quite as constant so I put her in the 2.5. Plus, they are much sturdier when it was free standing. Obviously not an issue once she's tied up in the net
 

Seanf610

Active Member
Nope. I'm running coco with MaxiGrow in the veg tent and maxibloom in the flower tent. Truth be told, I could have kept her in the smaller 1/2 gallon pot and just fed more, but I wanted to not have to feed quite as constant so I put her in the 2.5. Plus, they are much sturdier when it was free standing. Obviously not an issue once she's tied up in the net
Impressive
 
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