Hey guys I’m new here this is my first post. This is also first ever outdoor grow or any grow for that matter so any help will be greatly appreciated. I have a dozen autos I planted outside. Each plant is planted in a 7gallon fabric pot in Fox Farm Happy frog Potting soil. I’ve done my fair share of research plus I’ve watched a lot of videos about growing autoflowers. Some say never use nutes and never train them then you have Some guys who are using nutes and training their autos. I guess it’s all a personal preference kind of thing. What are some DO’s and DONTs to growing autos and if it’s okay to give your autos nutes what would you recommend and how often?
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Welcome to the forum, lots of experience growers to help you. Am on my first grow too, however indoor and photo. Best of luck!
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Welcome aboard ! The Happy Frog should keep your autos going 4 to 5 weeks. Then you will need to start feeding. Autos usually start flowering 4 to 7 weeks. As you mentioned lot of techniques. Personally I usually try to top my Autos one time . And try to keep them healthy throughout the grow . Good luck with your new grow.
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Thanks for the feedback. How many weeks in until you top them?
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Don’t top them, give me a second I’m replying to your thread.
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@Biggerbudsarebetter welcome to the forums and I’m glad you have been reading up, @kellydans has some good info for you there.
I have almost always grown autos since growing indoors personally and now am growing them outdoors or attempting to for a second year (my season is really cold and short)
I have grown autos in soil and autos in soil less medium (ie coco/perlite) and this is one of the biggest variables in determining how much abuse your auto can take before stunting.
Autos in soil don’t do well with much plant training, basically your best to LST only or FIM them which may also include some LST but not much as they don’t have the vegetation time before flowering.
Your looking at 3-5 weeks before you notice its flower /pre flower if the genetics are stable.
Some autoflower genetics are stable and thus they don’t autoflower, I’ve notice this with companies that don’t focus on autoflowering even ILGM white widows tend to do this from time to time so in my book genetics matters sooooo much with autoflowers.
You will need to feed your plants come flower, as @kellydans was saying, so you will need a tds/PH pen to read your run off (start taking a sample at least once a week come week 4).
For soil it should basically go like so.
Germinate, grow in jiffy puck or rapid rooter, once propagation starter dome is out grown transfer to final fabric pot (in your case 7gallon), your soil should be 30% perlite and you should have also added Mykos.
Ideally layer it with fox farms happy frog and fox farms ocean forest/ coco loco but any good quality soil that’s not to hot in the center /top will do good.
Use a dome to keep your plants in high humidity u til they out grow the dome, make one if you have to out of something clear and plastic and cut in half.
Always PH your water and make sure its chlorine is filtered out or let it sit out for 24hr, ensure water is room temp before giving as well.
Water until flood and let dry, this flood dry encourages root growth and this helps push the plant as best we can in a limited amount of time.
Avoid run off in soil unless taking a run off sample, which shouldn’t be done until week four and then sparingly until your seeing yourself below the 2k mark.
Once at about 1400 to 1200 you should be feeding.
Always water first, read run off decide how much to feed and then feeds again to 10% run off minium.
Reading run off will determine how often you need to feed.
Autos in soil can be Fim’d at the 4th node for plant training, it’s the best method I and many other auto growers have found to work and be easy.
Autos in soil can also be Low stress trained, but to a degree! Hence the low stress point, nudge it don’t force it.
Avoid topping an auto as its a high stress methods and doesn’t yeild as good as results as a FIM.
Avoid super cropping.
Avoid mainlining unless you do alot of research and want to try your hand at the cusp of the auto grow frontier.
Autos in soils prefer if you tuck leaves and do a light deflation in about week 5 or so in flower.
Autos in coco you can defoilate in week 3 and again in week 8, this is not so much the case for soil.
Also coco you can give them more abuse on the LST where as soil not so much.
I prefer to FIM and I encourage new auto growers to FIM because I think it gives the best results for work done, it is a medium stress method that produces 4 main colas to split your canopy out more evenly
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I usually layer Happy Frog an ocean forest in the bottom. I started to tag the gray cat .I knew you were super up on autos. Thanks for the help my friend.
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@Nicky I just started two autos along with a couple photos. I am going to try the FIM method on the two autos when the time comes. THANKS
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Great stuff! A lot of amazing info. Thanks a lot for your feedback. I feel like I should already know this but whats FIM?.
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A FIM is a F&(k i Missed! When trying to top
A top will create two main colas, it stops the Christmass tree effect and branches it out.
A FIM creates 4 tops and is less stress. You cut about 80% of the node growing.
@kellydans tag me when your gonna do it! I’ll drop in
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You got it ! My Autos just popped heads through about an inch going to be a few weeks.
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Welcome to the Forum,
With Fox Farm Happy frog Potting soil you shouldn’t need Nutes for the first week 4 or 5, then start giving them nutes. I use the Fox Farm Trio.
I’m just trying to finish my first In Door grow.
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I also plan on using the fox farm trio. Thanks for the tips
Here’s my gorilla garden… She’s coming along great! I also have some photos that will eventually be moved into the ground at a different location. This spot is for my autos only. I have a variety of genetics. Most of my seeds came from growers choice.
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Looking good , you’re going to be busy this summer.
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@Biggerbudsarebetter, I started our using about 1/3 of their recommendations and gradually moved it up !!! As the forum says the Girls will tell you what they Need.
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@Biggerbudsarebetter, Looking awesome ! And I thought 5 was enough. LOL I try to stay away from the number 13 in your picture of your autos and I refuse to Harverst on the 13th of the month. LOL
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Yeah I also hate that number. I have more seeds germinating right now. I’m going to go with 15 autos. My original plan was to try and do two runs of autos this Spring/summer but corona slowed my packages down and it took over a month to receive my seeds so Im just doing one big run.
Ok, my first post. I’ve been growing reg. An fem. Seeds for years outdoors, now I’m having probems with theives so I want to try autos, I see your saying 3 to 5 weeks of veg time. I have purchased seed from ilgm to give it a try, so its safe to say that’s a fairly accurate time frame for their seeds?
Accurate veg time with autos isn’t really a thing to be honest, each strain has been bred differently by different breeders as well and the stability of the genetics will play a huge role.
The by the 6th week you’ll be done your stretch unless the genetic is not stable.
You may see pistil hairs as soon as week 3 but still stretch to week 5 or 6.
The odd auto vegges for a long time, some genetics are not stable and don’t auto flip.
You can fix this by doing a 48 darkness period followed by switching to 12hr on 12hr off light scedule.
However if a plant did this to me I wouldn’t trust the breeder.