PlatoGrow 1st Grow Ever

[PlatoGrow]

Initial purchase and potting

• Clone from Harborside purchased and potted April 4, 2020
• 
• Initially planted in shitty miracle gro potting mix with the rockwool planted into the soil
• It did fine, but leaves were yellow and soil was very very dense which when I transplanted, I discovered there was very weak root growth
• April 7:
• 
• April 9:
• 
• April 12:
• 
• You can see the leaves faded to a light green/almost yellow color and were pretty wilty. I had not watered it again as I was checking the moisture of the soil and it stayed moist
• Clones will take moisture from the air so you need to have it around 70% humidity
• They also will feed off the original leaves of the clone so yellowing/burning of those leaves is normal until there is enough of a root system to feed off the nutrients in the soil
• Do not spray a clone because then the clone will rely on taking moisture from the spray on the leaves and the humidity instead of allowing root growth to find moisture
• This is what the plant looked like without any fertilizer and regular 7pH distilled water
• After receiving the liquid fertilizer, I added 3tsp Fox Farm Big Bloom (6tsp suggested, but cut in half based on online forum recommendations)
• April 17:
• 
• A much greener, healthier looking plant with good growth 5 days later
• I used the fish aquarium pH up/down kit to turn a 5-gallon container of tap water into 6.2-6.4pH which was used to mix the fertilizer into and water the plant (in a 1 gallon container)
• April 21:
• 
• Last picture before transplanting. It looks pretty healthy, but still with a little yellowing and burned leaf tips. The burned tips indicate that the plant cannot properly ingest the nutrients likely due to improper pH which makes sense in this miracle gro soil.
• I did not measure any run off of this soil

[PlatoGrow]

Transplanting to bigger pot, new potting mix

• Transplanted April 24 (almost 3 weeks after planting clone)
• I discarded all the miracle gro soil that fell off the roots and planted directly into the new mix
• The plant’s roots did not grow very far and the soil was extremely dense – not good for cannabis, don’t use miracle gro or any regular potting soil. It needs to breath and roots need to grow to make a strong plant
• Transplanted into a 3-gallon fabric grow bag, and raised the light so it is 24 inches above the canopy of the plant
• April 24:
• 
  
• After testing the water run off (on April 27), the pH was a 6.3 which is perfect for cannabis
• Used black magic coco coir mix unless you wanna come up with your own soil mix (very expensive and time consuming – maybe once more experienced). I added perlite and vermiculite.
  • A popular soil option is Fox Farms Ocean Floor Soil, might be worth a try, but it is not sold at Home Depot
  • If Black Magic mix works, why change it?
• Fed the plant with Fox Farm Big Bloom/Grow Big/Tiger Bloom following the soil feeding schedule found here

[PlatoGrow]

Vegetative Feeding

• The feeding schedule says to feed Grow Big during week 3, but I started week 4 (April 27 after transplanting April 24)
• I think this worked well… you need to have the transplant as you shouldn’t start a clone or seedling in a 3 gallon container. The original container I used was probably a half gallon
• Also received a better pH reader and a EC/PPM reader to take proper readings
• April 30:
• 
  
• You can see the difference in green of the new growth vs the old leaves. It’s much darker
• May 2:
• 
  
• More growth, but it still seems when new leaves stem from an old leaf, the old leave starts to burn and turn lighter. Is it because my PPM readings aren’t high enough?

[PlatoGrow]

Hey ILGM Forum . I posted 1 question about soil mixes, but this is my first substantial post and first ever grow/grow journal. Please let me know if any of the links/pictures aren’t showing up. I’ve been keeping this journal on my Google Drive so pretty much copied/pasted here so I can get some input from experts

If someone could take a look through what I’ve typed up and then look at my water run-off tests, maybe you can figure out why I still get tip burn and slight yellowing? Is this normal when new leaves grow from the corner of the stem of older leaves?

[PlatoGrow]

Also, I have some 5 gallon fabric bags now, would it be worth transplanting again to the 5 gallon grow bag at some point? Since this is my first grow, I only bought the one clone to see how it works out.

I have a 4x4x8 grow tent with a Wireless Tag device that lets me automate the environment with an AC/heater/humidifier/inline fan.

[iGrowBud]

Just keep going at the rate you are going. You are doing fine and it seems that you read enough to fix problems when they occur. Great job so far, and I mean in the trouble shooting and fixing deficiencies department. You will do just fine as you move into flower. I recommend cloning that clone so you never have to “start over” plus you can replicate your grow the same way because you are using the same exact plant. You’re doing great.

[PlatoGrow]

Thanks! Appreciate the kind words.

I am a little unsure about flushing on the foxfarms grow schedule. It seems to take about 5 days before I need to water again. Does this mean I flush with water/sledgehammer, then have to wait 5 days before adding the new nutrient mix?

Reason I ask is this will throw off the feeding schedule by a week. How exact does this schedule have to be?

[iGrowBud]

I use the same FF nutrients. When I use sledgehammer I use up to 3 gallons. I will place my plant in the tub/shower on top of a cookie tray, one for letting cookies cool off. Then I will pour one gallon and let it drain thru and immediately follow that up with the second gallon, at this point just watch the run off until it goes clean/clear. I use the third gallon just to make sure to wash and remaining salt/build ups thru the pot. After this the soil is pretty saturated so it should take any where from 3 to 5 days before your plant dries the soil back up. I always pick my plants up so I kinda know the weight of a plant that has dry soil vs wet.

[PlatoGrow]

Okay cool, so basically a flush adds 3-5 days to the feeding schedule.

[iGrowBud]

there really is no “feeding schedule” as all strains are different and take different lengths of time to mature. The Vegetative stage with photo periods is very lenient because you are controlling the light schedule and growing your plant to your desired size before you flip the lights to make it flower. So you don’t really need to have an arbitrary date in mind that it should be ‘fed’.

As you’ve notice the color of your plant lets you know how healthy it is, your clone started turning yellow in that bad soil because there was no nutrients, as soon as u added the big bloom tiger and grow big the plant instantly started to show great growth and a nice lush green color. FF recommends doing a nutrient feeding and then a clean water feeding “every other”. I dont really follow that to the tee, because your plant can start to get too much nutrients, just watch the color of your plant, that’s the best indicator if you need to feed or not.

[PlatoGrow]

Cool, this is exciting – decided to start this now that I’m in a house (moved from a city apartment) and tired of paying for hit or miss delivery weed

[Kilgoretrout]

Oh boy. Get those girls out of MG potting soil and into something more friendly like Happy Frog, Ocean Forest, or SoHum living soil. These products are meant for cannabis cultivation.

[PlatoGrow]

@Kilgoretrout they’ve been out of it a couple weeks.

[PlatoGrow]

May 2

• 
  
• More growth, but it still seems when new leaves stem from an old leaf, the old leaf starts to burn and turn lighter. Is it because my PPM readings aren’t high enough (last run off tested 1171ppm)? The grow guide says I should be in the range of 1260-1470 for week 2 and 1610-1960 for week 3. I’m not really sure what week this is and just using the feeding schedule more as a guide.

May 4

• 
  
  • Leaf tips of old leaves start turning lighter, then burn when new leaves start growing
  • Eventually as seen on the right they get really yellow and start to die
• 
  
  • I also noticed that the stalk/branch of the leaf turns brown/red when it starts burning
• 
  
  • This is the top of the canopy and this bigger leaf grew once I transplanted/added nutrients
  • But you can still see the beginning of a tip burn starting
• When I test the moisture of the soil medium, it says it’s borderline moist/wet still after feeding 2 days ago. My inclination is that this plant needs more nutrients, but not sure whether to feed it now while still wet or wait for it to dry out some more? I want the burning to stop

@iGrowBud what do you think?

[iGrowBud]

If the tips are burning you fed too much nutrients. From the looks of ur leaves that’s not bad it’s pretty normal actually. Just feed it water with no nutrients until you see it starting to fade a lighter green then give it some nutrients.

[iGrowBud]

I always feed less than what the chart says. Unless I know the strain and I am familiar with what it can withstand. Less is better than a burnt plant.

[PlatoGrow]

Okay will try thanks

[iGrowBud]

What’s new

[PlatoGrow]

May 6

• Did a mini-flush. Just fed the plant 6.2pH water with no nutrients. Gave it a whole gallon and let the water drain out of the bottom. Did this in an effort to get rid of burnt tips
• 
  
• She looked pretty damn good outside of the tent. The burnt tips aren’t as obvious as under the LED light. I am wondering whether I need to start trimming some leaves now that she’s getting bigger.
• 
  
• Watered her and took the runoff readings in my spreadsheet.

May 8

• Just took some pictures today to record progress:
• 
  
• Looks good still, but can still notice slight yellowing at the tips of new leaves.

May 9

• Took more pictures today to record progress:
• 
  
  
  
• Looking good, but still seeing slight yellowing of the tips of the leaves

[PlatoGrow]

@iGrowBud, thanks for checking in. Took your suggestion and just fed her water 4 days ago. I think she’s ready to be watered again today. Given the above, should I just give her water again until the tips stop even slightly yellowing, or do you think she looks good enough to start eating nutrients again? Didn’t take any pics today, but I think she great a couple inches in height last night, so she’s doing really well.

Also, when should I start pruning leaves that may not be getting any light? Should I always prune off dying/yellowing leaves?