2019 Outdoor Auto Grow

Ok so I just ordered some seeds for some autos to do outdoors this summer. I know some people say not to transplant autos but I think i will start these seeds indoors about 2-4 weeks before they go outside... just to speed up the harvest time. The seeds i just ordered are a 3 pack of Mephisto Northern Cheese Haze, a 5 pack of Royal Queen Seeds Royal Cookies, and a 5 pack of Royal Queen Seeds Royal Creamatic. I haven't decided how many i am going to grow of each. I am leaning towards 2 of the NCH, 2 of the Royal Creamatic, and 3 of the Royal Cookies. I might do all 3 of the NCH.

I already have 4 Dutch Passion Frisian Dew started and looking bushy. They will be going out "weather permitting early to mid May... In my experience the Frisian Dew is usually done in September. I am hoping These Autos will be done between July and August. My goal is to extend my harvest so i can harvest more over a longer time. I don't want to be trying to trim 15 plants all in a couple weeks. I do all my trimming by hand. So if i can split up 11 or 12 plants over an 8-10 week period that would be awesome!

I will continue this thread when I get the seeds and get them started. I would really like to have 12" tall plants to put outside middle of May- first week of June.

Ok so here is the plan... We are going to do the Royal Creamatic in 3.5 gallon containers. I will fill the bottom with the great lakes water only and the rest will be either FFOF or Roots Organic Green Fields. I have a little of both I need to use up. I am also considering growing the Frisian Dew right in the bags of green fields so that may make my decision for me.

The northern cheese haze and Royal Cookies will be done in 5 gallon pots. With the soil the same as the Royal Creamatic. Layered with super soil on bottom and just a good quality top soil. I have liquid nutrients but prefer to use them as little as possible. I also have some compost teas I will probably use to keep the microbials happy.

My plan is to start in 1 gallon pots indoors about 2 weeks before I put the autos outside. Since this is my first real honest go with autos I hope I don't screw anything up. I know these things don't leave a lot of room for error.

I am still trying to decide how many of these autos to do this summer. I was thinking about just doing all of them but that leaves me with 17 plants in total to take care of and I just think this is going to be too much since I will have to be carrying jugs of water in by hand if the weather gets hot and dry. So now I am thinking about maybe just 2 of each... or doing all of the Royal Creamatic since they are the smallest and fastest to finish... and 2 of the cookies and 2 of the northern cheese haze... Decisions, decisions...

I transplant my autos and have no adverse results. Check out my current SOG outdoor grow ; with transplanted seedlings: Grape Yoda

Grow~Master said:

I transplant my autos and have no adverse results. Check out my current SOG outdoor grow ; with transplanted seedlings: Grape Yoda

Click to expand...

How do you transplant them? I was going to start them 2-3 weeks early in a 1 gallon pot before moving them outside into 5 gallon pots

I first plant 5 seeds in 3" peat pots. Once they sprout and aquire their third set of true leaf's, I transplant to the garden bed. Then when they show their sex, i leave the strongest female.

Ok so I didn't take pictures today but I will get some tomorrow. I planted 10 auto seeds today. I am running a little experiment with my soil. I am growing 2 seedsman northern lights. One of these is planted in fox farm ocean Forrest and the other is in miricle grow performance organics potting soil. I am growing 2 royal creamatic one of each in FFOF and miracle grow performance organics. And I am also going to do 2 Royal queen seeds diesel autos. One in the miracle grow performance organics and one in a 50/50 mix of FFOF and fox farm strawberry fields. I also am doing 2 royal cookies in the FFOF, another diesel auto in FFOF and a Mephisto northern cheese haze in the 50/50 ffof and fox farm strawberry fields.

2 of the diesel autos will be in 3.5 gallon plastic pots. The northern cheese haze is in a 7gal fabric pot and everything else is in 5gal fabric pots. I am starting indoors for 2 weeks then we are going into the great outdoors for the rest of the grow. The 2 plastic pots will be starting outdoors.

I used to grow auto's outdoors all the time. I got pretty good at it too (since i don't mind tooting my own horn). Its all about timing on these babys. If you are going to transplant, or top, do it early and everything will be just fine. I have grown auto's in the soil and in pots and I have ALWAYS had better yields in pots. I have found the inverse of this to be true with normal photoperiod cannabis pants.

My profile pic is a little auto-skunk I grew a couple years back, I sometimes top or FIM mine and always use LST. If you top too late, it will stunt the auto and you will hurt your yield. I did not used to top or FIM auto's but one year I accidently broke the main head off and was rewarded nicely. I started to expiriment with topping and fimming auto's and it's a crap shoot, unless you really can predict the short veg cycle of the strain.

I used to grow two batches of auto-flowers, one spring crop (harvest in summer) and one summer crop (harvest in fall). Auto's are great for people in colder climates. When I used to grow regular photoperiod plants outdoors, I always had to harvest early due to frost and mold.

Two summers ago I grew a mix of autos and photos, last summer I went to 100% autos for my outdoor and that's all I'll grow outdoors moving forward. The large diverse gene pool that autos are sourced from (adding ruderalis to the normal sativa/indica diversity) would explain the huge variations I've gotten between them. In last year's crop, the plants harvests varied from 1/2oz to over a pound. The biggest producer was one I had grown before, and the previous year had nothing close to the beast that I had that time, so the variation was even huge between seeds from the same package. Also, last spring was very long and cold, and I think that had different amounts of impact on different strains -- some seemed to get over it, some seemed to be stunted by it.

I've had some similar and some different results than @Voodu , I agree that topping can be hit or miss. I had some plants that grew a couple of feet taller past the point that I topped them, and others stunted at the topping point, just sort of growing a pair of snowball like buds but not filling out in a normal way. That said, I will always top every plant I grow from seed -- especially outdoors where bud worms tend to hit the highest point and if the plant focuses on one main cola and I lose it, that sucks.

In contrast to @Voodu , I have found that the ones I've put in the ground have been the biggest ones I've grown by far. It may have to do with how we prepare our in-ground holes or differences in our native soil (?). But it's no guarantee, I got a one stem 1/2 oz plant that was grown in the ground. It's funny, I would definitely recommend growing in the ground because it keeps the roots cooler and makes watering much easier and less frequent... but because of garden logistics and our new veggie beds, this year I'm growing the few autos I've popped in pots. Oh well.

As far as transplanting goes I've tried a few tricks and techniques (like putting one pot with vertical slats cut into it inside another pot...), and in the end just carefully transplanting them as I would any photo worked best.

With the ones I grew there was a significant window of time in how long they took to mature and finish. I did not have to worry about staggering my planting to spread out the harvest, I put them all outside at the same time and the harvest from first plant to last happened over about six weeks. I think I had 15 plants out there last year, all different strains, about 4 or 5 different breeders -- I guess if you are using several seeds of the same strain, planting in waves might have more impact.

...got pictures?

this is what I have so far. I am actually planting the last 2 today... I'll start them outdoors in pots and bring them inside at night for the first couple weeks... I'll get pics of them later today and post more tomorrow...

If I had been thinking ahead of time I would have done all the fox farm plants with a 50/50 mix of the ocean forrest and strawberry fields. The strawberry fields feels so soft and wonderful when you work it with your bare hands... If everything works out as I expect i will be doing all my autos next summer in an ocean forrest /strawberry fields mix .. I use fabric pots outdoors and I know people won't like it but since fabric pots dry out faster, I mix some silica water crystals in with my dirt. I didn't mix it with the miracle grow because that already seemed a little heavy and I think it retains water...

I was going to do one of the 3 diesel autos in miracle grow so I could have 6 plants to compare but I'd have to go buy more miracle grow... And I don't want to. So they will both get the fox farm 50/50 mix.

wish I had nice individual humidity domes but I am pretty sure these clear Solo cups will serve the purpose...

I think I have 3 more 5 gallon fabric pots. And I have a lot of auto seeds here with many more on the way. I am thinking about doing 3 more autos outdoors... Possibly a couple dinafem critical 2.0 I got as freebies sure the 420 promo... Or one of the rhino Ryder I should receive any day now...

Planted seeds 4 days ago and 7 of the 8 in the tent have broken the surface... The northern cheese haze popped but hasn't broken the surface yet. I know it's a little hard to see because of the blurple lights but once they are outside in a couple of weeks I'll be able to post better pics.

Ok so everything has popped and broke soil... First we have the 2 seedsman northern lights

Next we have the 2 Royal Creamatic

The 2 Royal Cookies

The royal queen seeds Diesel seems to have burnt false leaves but the first true set of leaves is showing and I think this will be fine.

The Mephisto northern cheese haze broke through the soil but the seed she'll was completely wrapped around the leaves... I had to gently break it open and peel it off....

Not really sure why the last pic posted differently... Sorry. Here is the northern cheese haze

Ok here we are at day 11. I dropped the light a little and put a fan inside the tent today to help strengthen the stems. We have first the seedsman northern lights freebie in fox farm ocean forrest. It is bent over a little because I just watered.

Next is the northern lights in miracle gro.


Then the royal creamatic in FFOF.




Royal creamatic in miracle gro.


The 2 royal cookies


The royal queen seeds diesel auto. It seems to be looking better.


And lastly the Mephisto northern cheese haze.

I'll join in! Never grown an auto before, but they seem fun, and the rain is almost over.

Aaaand, the post man just brung me muh' mephisto delivery. And I order direct. So you KNOW I got freebies!!!

I'll pop a few "Creme De Le Chems" tonight and we will see what we get!

Starting to look ready to go outside... Not really sure how my outdoor grow ended up being a bunch of autos... But here we are