First grow (stealth) Day 53 input/advice appreciated please post.

Whats going on Rollitup. This is my first grow, and I probably wouldn't have gotten this far without the community's help, advice and expertise. I figured instead of dropping random posts with numerous posts I'd just create a journal to clean up the boards, and maybe someone else will get something out of the process. Plus i've came too far now too screw it up. All input is greatly appreciated

Now, On to the grow.

Strain : Auto Northern lights ordered from the single seed center (cant remember the breeder but it was one of the cheaper seeds, I'm a broke mofo)

Soil: Fox farm ocean forest with 1/4 perilite

Nutes: Started Fox farm Trio about 4 weeks in. I've been laying off the grow big because available growing space is becoming an issue. I've LST"d the crap out of this girl (see pics) to keep the height under control. Would not have expected a Auto to be such a big robust plant!
Also, I started the nutes at about 1/4 strength, moving up in strength to 2/3rds strength.

Lighting: 90 Watt UFO LED. I think it's called tao tronics. Not a big time name brand but I did make sure it wasn't the Chinese junk before I ordered it.

Temps: Lights off around 68-70 lights operating 84-90.

More about the grow box. I purchased the Medicab growbox http://www.dealzer.com/medi-cab-micro.html.

I'm not in the business of bashing companies but I wouldn't recommend this box to anyone. For one the lights that it came with were crap (40 watt home made led, and 2 15 watt cfls). The fans are also garbage utilizing a PC style fan for in put and output. Initially when I installed the 90 watt led in place of this garbage lighting I ran into temp problems, which I now have under control to a degree. I think in the future i'll be buying a real fan and can filter combo, but for now this will do. These boxes retail around a grand. I picked mine up for $300 off craigslist from some kid in the ghetto who got caught trying to grow herb at his moms house lol.

I will say that the box is very stealthy which is a big concern of mine as I live in a major metro area and couldn't have anything large as it would stick out in my time apartment.

Nice and very happy you included perlite in volume to your FFOF

@vostok Yes I think the Perilite has helped with the watering. I was concerned with over watering as this is my first grow. At one point at about week 4 she actually started to droop from under watering.

The problems been corrected now. I've been giving her about a liter and a half every 2 days and she seems to react well to that.

Day 54. Not really that much to report, but i wanted to make a habit to try and post daily so here we go. I gave her Fox farm nutes at 2/3rd strength yesterday, she seems to be doing well with them.

As you can see below I'm beginning to get pretty tight for grow room so i've been tieing the plant down like crazy. Any advice on how to control her height more so than what i'm doing now would be appreciated. Two things that really surprised me as this is my first grow....

1. How tall a auto flower can get. I was always under the impression that autos are short plants.

2. How funky the plant is. I purchased auto northern lights because i thought it would be a stealthy (low smell and short) plant. I've read reports online saying the plant didn't smell at all throughout the flowering cycle. That simply isn't the case with my girl.

Any guess when this plant will actually be done seeing as we're on day 54 and we obviously have quite a bit of time left?

silv3rbull3t said:

@vostok Yes I think the Perilite has helped with the watering. I was concerned with over watering as this is my first grow. At one point at about week 4 she actually started to droop from under watering.

The problems been corrected now. I've been giving her about a liter and a half every 2 days and she seems to react well to that.

Click to expand...

Thats OK, on my first grow 1 thousand years ago ... I mistook vermiculite for perlite ...I'm not gonna do that again ...lol

Day 55

@vostok Lol no disasters like that so far Vostok/

I noticed some of the smaller leafs by the bud sites look like they are hanging a bit. I'm not sure if this could be due to the fact that I recently watered her or some type of warning sign. Any thoughts?

Keep a temperature and humidity gauge in there, will give you much needed info

@vostok Temp while lights are running is usually around 85-88 sometimes but rarely hitting 90. Humidity is usually around 50%

Gotta start somewhere, anywhere, there! @silv3rbull3tCheers and that cabinet is sick. Great work man! Can you put a mini-scrog in your cabinet?

@DarthBlazeAnthony Thanks man. Your set up looks pretty damn nice yourself. I bought the set up I did because I was very concerned about having my grow stealthy. So far so good. When I open the cabinet the girl reaks like funk. However when the door is locked shut Most of the smell is contained. Yes, I defiantly plan on making a screen next grow. With the space I have it's needed. When I finally harvest this thing i'll cut away the over growth to show how crazy the stem has been bended in different directions due to scrog to keep the height under control. The stem almost does a full C.

I'm a transplant that lives in a major metropolitan city. With that being said I randomly have friends coming into town to stay with me. This weekend (the reason why I'm just now updating the journal) I had a female (non bud smoking) friend fly in and stay the weekend with me. She was sporadically in and out of the room where my plant is and she never noticed anything. I stick really hard to the stealth approach. I feel like allot of people don't know how to keep their mouths shut and that's how they get caught up. You guys at rollitup are the only ones who know about my grow

Anyhow, today I feed my her nutes at 3/4 strength for the first time in accordance with fox farms feeding schedule. However I'm not giving her a full gallon, only a bit more than half a gallon, so maybe I'm still going light on the nutes to a degree.

Also, Any guess as to how much longer I have till harvest? If I'm not mistaken we are at day 61 now.

@vostok noticed that some of the larger fan leaves that are undergrowth are starting to turn yellow and die. Is that due to a lack of Nitrogen because the plant is now into later stages of flower? Is that something I should be concerned of? This time around when I feed her nutes I gave her some Grow big as prescribed by fox farms feeding schedule. Hopefully if the yellowing, dying, fan leafs are a problem this will help remedy some of the problem. As always guys, your input is appreciated.

Also can someone tell me how to give reps out on here? I'd love to give you guys props for helping me along the way!

bump anyone with any ideal on the yellowing fan leaves?

silv3rbull3t said:

bump anyone with any ideal on the yellowing fan leaves?

Click to expand...

Time for a flush

@vostok That would make sense. I haven't yet flushed her. Thanks for the heads up. I just gave her a 1 gallon flush with ph neutral distilled water. (she got nutes yesterday).

Hello all. Wanted to throw a posting in this journal for an update. I just got home from a happy hour with co workers and dug into a new bag of blue dream. I have to say very impressed, one of the better strains I've tried in a while. Anyhow.

@vostok two days ago I flushed her with a gallon of ph neutral distilled water. The pots still wet. I think i'll hold off on nutes until sunday than start back at 25 percent. Does that sound like a good plan of action?

The buds are continuing to grow at a decent pace. The smell of the buds is absolutely incredible. I smoked northern lights while I was in Amsterdam a few years ago but I was so stoned I can't remember how it smelled. Anyhow if the smell of this weed while its growing is any indication of how it will smell when it's cured than I'm very happy. The best way I can describe the smell is very sweet, with a bit of pine, and very very faint hint of skunk. Teps are around 68 with lights off with a high of 85-86 when the lights are on.

Question do I need to worry about bud rott since I flushed I'm assuming that increases humidity considerably? All comments appreciated.

It will take 5-7 days for the effects of the flush to show ...so if in doubt underfeed than overfeed, look up foilar feeding too, as a simple alternative, I have used this many a time for hot soils and sore roots

@vostok Thanks for the heads up. I flushed her pretty good on Tuesday. I think I'm going to give her a little distilled water tonight as well than restart nutes at 1/4 strength. Speaking of which, at what point should I cut out nutes for harvest? I ask because I'm starting to see some brownish pistols appear on some of the buds, which is awesome. It shows that there is a light at the end of the tunnel lol.

I was thinking of harvesting when they're about 50 percent clear and 50 percent brown as I favor a well balanced slightly cerebra sativa leaning high.

The leaves are still yellowish brown, but like you said it can take a while for effects to show. My goal is to get an ounce off this plant. That would be enough but to suffice me for 3 months and stop me from buying bud. I'm thinking of adding some molasses but I need to read up and study more on it (as well as the harvesting and curing process in general).

Forget the pistols note the color of the trics, get a magnifying glass 30x plus, .. harvest at your favorite color, flush well 10-7 days before harvest