Rurumo's Mars Hydro FC6500 grow journal

Hobbes said:

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What's super cropping? I've seen posts about it but never dug deep to see how it's done.

I see that you take off the top or two sets of leaves.

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Supercropping is just crushing the plant stem and bending it over without breaking it. It actually doesn't even slow down the flowering at all and within days, the plant repairs the crushed spot so that it's much stronger and thicker than before. It creates a "knuckle" in that spot, sort of how when a broken human bone fuses back together stronger than it was originally. I just use it to control height, but it also does seem to increase yield. I do it to every stem, below the main flowering section whether or not it needs bending.

Stretch is slowing down now, so I went in and cut off the branches that couldn't make it to the canopy and become a primary bud site. I also cleared out quite a bit of vegetation below the canopy. This was an extremely thick group of plants and I probably vegged them a bit too long, but it's fine. Humidity was way down under the canopy this morning, which was my goal in doing this.

I don't totally strip them, I just want a breeze to be able to pass through.



I got this light tip burn when I increased the EC to 1.3, up from 1.2. Very small increase. I'm seeing some light mag deficiency on a couple of the plants, which is why I decided to go up. Now, I've backed it down to 1.2, slightly decreased the calnit, and slightly increased the mag sulfate. I love this plant, it's always the happiest of any group.



Just to see the difference in color from the first pic, I didn't realize how much lighter they look when taken directly under the light, rather than further outside.



Thanks for stopping by!!

tuksu6000 said:

Looks awesome man! What was height of those plants when u flip lights?

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I'm not really sure how tall they were, I usually flip when I have the basic plant structure and # of bud sites I'm shooting for, then train and supercrop to control height from there. Actually, height is usually an issue for me because I do like to grow big plants, and I like to veg for a good while too. One thing that bugs me is how much space the light's mounting hardware takes up, and also, how much space the rope ratchets take up when we have them pulled up as far as they will go. Once the ratchets are all the way pulled up, they still take up 4-5 inches or so of vertical space, so I just use a couple of large zip ties at that point. Here is a pic, maybe it will make more sense than what I just wrote sounds to me.

I leave the rope ratchets on, but use zip ties on each side to raise the light that last few inches, if I need that last bit of height.

Rurumo said:

Supercropping is just crushing the plant stem and bending it over without breaking it. It actually doesn't even slow down the flowering at all and within days, the plant repairs the crushed spot so that it's much stronger and thicker than before. It creates a "knuckle" in that spot, sort of how when a broken human bone fuses back together stronger than it was originally. I just use it to control height, but it also does seem to increase yield. I do it to every stem, below the main flowering section whether or not it needs bending.

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THANKS!

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Rurumo said:

Salicylic acid controls a plant's immune response to infection. There is a large and growing body of research showing that aspirin (which is acetyl-salicylic acid, and appears to work the exact same as regular salicylic acid in plants) can increase yield, reduce the impact of various stressors, and enhance immunity against bacterial and fungal pathogens. There are a lot of studies out there now, but it's hard to nail down a dosage that isn't totally arbitrary, I think weekly is too much. My last dose was on Tuesday, so from there, I plan on feeding it every two weeks during flower. Too much and you can stunt growth and greatly interfere with auxin transport. There is also some interesting research on grapes and strawberries as a post harvest treatment for botrytis. Basically, applying aspirin to harvested grapes/strawberries that have been exposed to botrytis greatly reduces it's spread. So I think it might also have a use in a post harvest bud bath, especially if you've had some bud rot in the crop.

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That's interesting for sure I remember my grandmother doing it when she planted rose bushes never asked her why though.

An old custom with cut flowers is to crush a half aspirin and add to the vase water to prolong blooms. No idea if it has any benefit but people have been doing it for a long time.

Enjoyable journal. Following.

My grandma would crush up two aspirin and put it into the soil when planting

Rurumo said:

I'm not really sure how tall they were, I usually flip when I have the basic plant structure and # of bud sites I'm shooting for, then train and supercrop to control height from there. Actually, height is usually an issue for me because I do like to grow big plants, and I like to veg for a good while too. One thing that bugs me is how much space the light's mounting hardware takes up, and also, how much space the rope ratchets take up when we have them pulled up as far as they will go. Once the ratchets are all the way pulled up, they still take up 4-5 inches or so of vertical space, so I just use a couple of large zip ties at that point. Here is a pic, maybe it will make more sense than what I just wrote sounds to me.
View attachment 5048437
I leave the rope ratchets on, but use zip ties on each side to raise the light that last few inches, if I need that last bit of height.

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Ok i see, thanks! Im doing pretty much same usually. Now i switched to leds and first round with them show me that penetration is even stronger than i expect so this time im going to grow littlebit taller plants and see if there is more/bigger buds or just useless long stems which need more support. Here is some pics if interested, probably 1-2 weeks more vegging, some defo and cropping.

tuksu6000 said:

Ok i see, thanks! Im doing pretty much same usually. Now i switched to leds and first round with them show me that penetration is even stronger than i expect so this time im going to grow littlebit taller plants and see if there is more/bigger buds or just useless long stems which need more support. Here is some pics if interested, probably 1-2 weeks more vegging, some defo and cropping.

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You're doing good. Bigger plants mean bigger yields for sure. Each strain/individual plant can form buds differently though-some of them stack bud sites close together and grow fast making massive long colas. Others spread their nodes out and make a bunch of golfball or baseball size buds. You get the biggest yield by fitting in the most primary bud sites in an even canopy, it's all about making the most out of your light footprint-then combine that with a high yielding strain, and that's when you start to see really big yields. You have a nice canopy there, you're going to do very well.

MisterKister said:

My grandma would crush up two aspirin and put it into the soil when planting

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That's hilarious, I first learned about aspirin from my Grandma using it on her rose bushes too. She had a prize winning rose garden, all the old ladies from church would come over to see it. It's one of those old timey things that has been found to be based in solid science the entire time. As far as I know, the more recent interest in it started at Cornell almost 20 years ago. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2003/12/plant-gene-offers-disease-control-without-pesticides.

And now, they are looking at using it for ecological restoration-coating grass seeds with it help them to survive adverse conditions long enough to get established. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/06/210609143346.htm. I like it because it noticeably makes the plants happier in the days after a dose.

Looks amazing... whats your fertigation schedule?

oill said:

Looks amazing... whats your fertigation schedule?

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Thanks oill! I just handfeed twice per day, around 1.2 EC of Megacrop a/b (at Jack's 321 ratio). I also add seaweed extract and Mr Fulvic to one feed per day, and a powdered hydrolized amino acid sup to both feedings @ 1/4 teaspoon per gallon. The aminos really boost up the nitrogen content so sometimes I reduce the calnit from Jack's 321 slightly.

Rurumo said:

You're doing good. Bigger plants mean bigger yields for sure. Each strain/individual plant can form buds differently though-some of them stack bud sites close together and grow fast making massive long colas. Others spread their nodes out and make a bunch of golfball or baseball size buds. You get the biggest yield by fitting in the most primary bud sites in an even canopy, it's all about making the most out of your light footprint-then combine that with a high yielding strain, and that's when you start to see really big yields. You have a nice canopy there, you're going to do very well.

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Yep thats right. I had same strains when i was using cmh and hps and its pretty amazing how much denser and overall better that bud structure is with high quality leds. Thanks for feedback, appreciate that!

Rurumo said:

Thanks oill! I just handfeed twice per day, around 1.2 EC of Megacrop a/b (at Jack's 321 ratio). I also add seaweed extract and Mr Fulvic to one feed per day, and a powdered hydrolized amino acid sup to both feedings @ 1/4 teaspoon per gallon. The aminos really boost up the nitrogen content so sometimes I reduce the calnit from Jack's 321 slightly.

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Thanks bra.... what temps you running the room too? Day and night?

oill said:

Thanks bra.... what temps you running the room too? Day and night?

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Lights off 75ish, lights on around 79/80 with leaf temps in the low 80s. RH is around 50% all the time, I pretty much run my dehumidifier 24/7.

Well, I realized that today is exactly 3 weeks from 12/12 flip, so I took a few pics. I'm pretty happy with where things are at.



Here is the Josh D #5, developing a nice sharp OG scent already, if you stick your nose up close. I'm a compulsive flower sniffer. So far this is the most mag hungry plant, showing slight deficiency symptoms, which I've seen in the past with other OGs.



Here is the Old Red Sour. Little slower to flower, but also the biggest plant with the most bud sites. This one likes the feed right where it's at.



This is the White Widow, she's a little mag hungry too and showed some tip burning when I upped the feed slightly. Since then I've backed off the calnit and increased the mag sulfate slightly. These little buds smell like pure peaches, which sort of surprised me.



Last but not least, the Petrol Skunk. This plant is incredibly vigorous and already flowering like crazy. I wish I had access to the Critical Mass bilbo cut just for breeding purposes, so many fun crosses to be made with it. This vigor is the reason I like Delicious seeds critical crosses so much. If you've just grown out modern polyhybrid crosses, you might have missed out on the vigor and massive yields seen in the old Skunk#1 (and later, Critical Mass) f1s. The Road Dawg daddy really punched up the potency of this plant, but it kept the sleep inducing powers of Critical Mass, which is either a good thing or a bad thing depending on your needs. Still, a very fun plant to grow.



Thanks for stopping by!

Love seeing happy plants...

Nice thread mate!

Very impressive you little witch..

Plants are looking very happy and healthy.

I picked up a white critical strain from g13 to run a little while back. Widow x critical.

Hopefully by summer the beans will be in.