HYDRO Big 4 month old GG#4 auto

[RaisingJanes]

Hey folks!

new grower here. I’m running my first DWC bubbleponic setup and my plants buds are just thin, and not worth harvesting. I was hoping some folks could take a look and give me some feed back. Here is my gear and system.

feel free to ask me any questions. I have ran into a few environment issues but since I’m new I just dont know what’s going on at this point.

*at one point many of my leaves started to turn yellow. I wasn’t sure if it was a sulfur, iron, or cal/mag issue.* (I corrected this in about 1-2 weeks with cal/mag and the plant is a healthy cream again.)

Set up:
5’ x 5’ x 72” $70 grow tent

-3 five gallon buckets

-6” net pots

-Hydroton clay pebbles

-3” x 1 1/2 cylinder air stones. (One in each bucket.)

-950 GPM 32w air pump with splitter.

-6” exhaust fan

-2 6” clip on fans

-Timers/digital therm/hygrometer

-Space heater

-Digital ph tester

-Digital TDS/EC/ppm tester

-Digital thermometer

Lights:

-(3) 1000w Giixer Full spectrum LED (Amazon) 90w from wall

-(1) 1000w Mars Hydro ( replaced 1 Giixer on 2/8/20)

Nutrients:

-Fox farm dirty dozen kit.

Following the provided fox farm hydro

Schedule. (Stopped using 2/1/20)

General hydroponic:

FloraGrow

Floramicro

Florabloom

Cal/Mag

Aerated Tap water 156ppm

Flush reservoir every two weeks

I replace each reservoir weekly when administering my nutrients.


PH solution to 6.2 in the beginning but recently switch to 5.8-5.9 after reading it is optimal for dwc.. ?


Sprouted Oct 5

Potted in DWC OCt 9th

18 hour light cycle.

[RaisingJanes]

[SirSmksAlot]

That's strange. When did you first start seeing buds appear?

[RaisingJanes]

SirsmksAlot I have daily photos and I would say it was late Dec or early January.

[RaisingJanes]

Lots of views. Was hoping for more input. Don’t be scared everyone.

[RaisingJanes]

[SirSmksAlot]

The only thing that I can think of is they were stunted by your higher ph in the beginning. I'd recommend just giving them some more time and see if they fill out. It could also be genitics. The ruderalis strain could be strong in these girls. Other than that I'm just not sure

[RaisingJanes]

That would be awesome if they did. I’ll ha e to read more on ruderalis too. I’m checking ph twice a day now and trying really hard to keep it at 5.7-5.9 hoping I can put some meat on her bones.

I’m just discouraged after all the time and energy spent already. Ready to start my next run with everything I’ve learned on this one.

Appreciated the input! I plan to be a regular so keep an eye out.

[9fingerleafs]

how about the temps? kinda looks like heat stress, the growth pattern is all foxtaily and leafy.

[RaisingJanes]

To be honest I have been fighting the cooler temps. I started in a small shed thinking my lights would keep me warm.. quickly learned that it was way to cold at night.. (50’s when the lights went out.)

I moved the set up into my garage.. insulated the tent and added a space heater on a timer. This helped keep the tent between 59 with no lights an heater running 30 mins every hour. Occasionally I would see a high temp of 90 if the outdoor temps would reach close to 70. But that high temp was always very short lived. 30 minutes or so. The cooler temps we more frequent since the heater had to cycle. Especially when the lights were off for 6 hours. .

Hope that makes sense.

I had to cycle the heater or it would run the temp up to 100 for sure.

What about humidity? In the past I was fighting it also. My temp may have been 71 but my humidity 68 as an example.

I’ve recent relocated the setup again. This time into the house. The temps are holding strong at 75-78 now with a constant humidity of about 45-55

[9fingerleafs]

i see, thats not it, those temps are perfect. then have you considered maybe its a wilder looking, slower flowering pheno. a member called mcubed had one gg#4 auto that took almost 20 weeks to ripen but yielded a massive amount and got pretty huge, maybe browse the web to look for how that plant is supposed to grow. heres the link to the massive plant https://forum.growweedeasy.com/forum...251#post282251

[RaisingJanes]

No, I have not! My growing partner says he’s never seen anything like it either and feels like it’s really healthy. Says let it go as well because it has to be a 5-6 oz plant at least.

Mcubes plant is incredible. I remain hopeful. Do you recommend anything? Defoliating again? Do you think I’d be fine stripping her down to the buds only since it’s so leafy? I’m not noticing any more upward growth.

inwas considering removing any leaf with a stem 1/2” long.. thoughts?

lastly.. can thin buds get thicker or does the bud start to grow new healthy flower and the tip of that is the older skinny portion?

[9fingerleafs]

the buds will get fat and swollen at the end of flowering, ive never grown autos but i dont think you should defoliate too much because stress can really mess up with autos, i would stick to removing just a few leaves once in a while

[RaisingJanes]

Update. As of today every plant is in GH flora series.

[Toker1]

Not enough light.
What is the actual drawl from the wall on the LED?
Those blurple lights are not very efficient at converting electricity into light.

[Toker1]

Never mind the last question. 360w total is not enough light for a 5x5 space. That’s 120w average per plant how you got it set up. Even if you were yielding 1 gram per watt, no where near 5oz per plant.
Lastly, I would recommend some larger oscillating fans that blow across the plants tops. And maybe some LS training to get a flatter even canopy.

[RaisingJanes]

I have considered draping the Mylar floor pan down the middle to cut the room in half. Do you think it’s too late to see better results?

[Toker1]

Reflected light is nothing compared to direct. I think you need more powerful lights for this size and depth of those plants go.

[RaisingJanes]

Hmmm. But here’s the reason I have to question that.. the plant in the pic below is in a 5x5 with another plant and the setup only has a Mars and a giixer. I have more pics of that plant also. It puzzles me.

[HygroBigBudz]

That plant looks amazing!!. I would listen to whatever that guy has to say. I would guess by the picture he is prolly a very wise man.

[Toker1]

Could be the genetics... but judging from all the 3 finger leaves seen in the other pics tells the story of a plant doing anything it can to gain more access to usable light.

[RaisingJanes]

Could too much defoliation cause this?

[Toker1]

Possibly, but the pictures look very leafy. Doesn’t seem to be the issue. Unless this photo was taken after the foliage starting filling back in.
3 finger leaves are definitely a sign of stress. You see them mostly on young seedling growth and on a re-vegged plant if all other environmental conditions are optimal.
Then again, it could just be the strain. Look up the strain and see if others are seeing 3 finger leaves on their plants. If they were photoperiod plants, I would be majorly concerned about seeing that.

[RaisingJanes]

Update: I have replaced all the LeD with an Ipower 600-1200 ballast and a ipower hps. They plants seem to be responding greatly. Since the temp moved in and this light has been installed the temps and hum are much more stable. Holding at about 79 degrees and 45% hum with light on and 67 low and 40% hum with light off. The light is set to 750w for now and the girls are still in there 5x5.

does anyone think the two larger plant in flower are worth saving?

lastly my third plant with the flatter canopy isn’t showing signs of transition yet. Is showing female. I had held back on the nutes to see if that helped catch it up but learned that with autos you can prolong the veg stage by sticking with the nutes recommended for veg. Anyone else heard this?

i quickly jumped her up to bloom nutes and she has responded greatly. Growth but no signs of flower.. She is 80 days from seed.

I am wanting to defoliate but I’m trying to wait for it to commit to flower.. is this a good practice or should I just trim her big leaves out now and remove the lower growth? Tons of great clones..

thanks all! Hope to read some great info!

[RaisingJanes]

Oops forgot pics

[Toker1]

Looks good. Now spread out those branches so light hits the lower areas. Look up low stress training. I think it will help as wel. Nice work!

[RaisingJanes]

Toker1 Thank you! I attempted some LST on the largest plant in the photo. It looked great for a while but the main top ran off on me. I kept pulling the lower/putter branches down but being new to the scene I was nervous. I also did t know I was supposed to keep adjusting and pulling down.

Do you think it’s ok to trim all those large fan leaves and smaller under growth right now? Is it best/safest since it’s still in veg? If so I’d like to do that and spread the branches out. It’s looking like I’ll need a trellis?

This whole first attempt has been information overload and I have 5 new seeds germinating now. I feel confident I will see a much better yield on the bushy girl and with everything I’ve learned and the new friends I’m making here, I’m positive this next round will be worth photographing! Haha

[Toker1]

I would just tie them down. The goal is a flat even canopy where branches are spaced out so that they don’t cast shadows on the other branches.
As for trimming leaves, I would wait. Might not be necessary after you spread the branches. At week #2-3 of flower is ehen you want to trim off the light deprived areas and leaves that block bud sites from light.