DRAIN TO WASTE COCO

Drain to waste coco is a misleading title because DTW is actually not wasteful. In fact I am using less nutrients than a recirculating hydro system. Surprise! I avoided this grow method because the word waste is right in the title but I soon found it was a misnomer and drain to waste is a fantastic way to grow in coco.

Here I am running DTW with multiple feedings using a top feed drip system. It is doing great and I want to cover this grow system and some specific points about growing in coco and getting great results. The video below shows a brand new grow using top feed drip and drain to waste.

Although I like to experiment and sometimes that does not always work out so well. So this grow was a reset of a previous experiment gone south. In it I had a SIP planter going and a constantly falling pH. I fixed the problem but the plants were not healthy so I decided to start over rather than try nursing them back to health.

I decided it was time to go back to basics. Top feed drip and drain to waste are tried and true methods of growing in coco. I also decided to go with multiple daily feedings. Coco is a hydro medium and although you can treat it like soil you will never unlock its true potential that way. You can follow this grow itself at http://420dotcom.com/running-hps-vs-led.html

Drain To Waste With Short Frequent Feedings

Here is a video taken on day 7 with plants being fed 3 times a day. They get about a 15-30 second feeding. Just enough to produce some run off.

You Need To Automate Your Feeding For Maximum Results In Coco

If you want to get the best results growing in coco you need to automate your irrigation system. Coco is a hydroponic medium. Because it is somewhat similar to soil you can treat it like soil and get pretty decent results. But you are leaving a lot on the table growing this way and treating it like a peat based media.

Coco holds a lot of oxygen even when wet and because of this it can be irrigated much more frequently. Coco should never dry out! Salt build up only happens as drying occurs and the salts then have a place to build up. By always watering until you get run off you are not giving them a chance to accumulate in the first place.

Top Feed Drip For The Win! Easy To Set Up And Run

Because multiple small feedings are needed to unlock coco’s magic hand watering i8s just not practical. Can it be done? Yes. Is is practical? No!

You will have to be there every 3 hours or so to water doing it manually which does not make for much of a life. Even if you are determined to do this by hand you will miss feedings so you will need a pump with a seconds timer and a drip system.

Dont despair it is pretty easy to set up a top feed drip system and it is not that expensive either. Here is the drip system I use:

You will want to use the open bubbler . The other regulates flow and you dont want that. It is more prone to clogging and you want maximum water flow which is controlled with a timer instead. Each bubbler has 8 ports and I use two drippers per pot.

You can use any 1/4″ OD tubing but I recommend the green floraflex tubing because it is super flexible. You will have a hard time using the stiff black stuff sold at home improvement stores. However I do get cheap dripper stakes there to hold the tubing in place.

Dont run drip heads with this set up. Open ended tubing works great and doesn’t clog easily. You can add a tee to the end of the tubing to split the flow if you want. You will want to water evenly so it is important to cut all your dripper lines the same length.

Here is the EcoPlus 396 GPH pump  I use and I have found them to be very reliable and not to pricey. For most grows this will be all the pump you will need.

They come with an assortment of 1/2 and 3/4″ fittings and and intake screen.

But I take mine apart and use it as an inline pump. I also add a 1/2″ street elbow with a short length of pipe attached so I can pull from the very bottom of my reservoir.

Here is a pic of my modified pump:

You Need A Reliable Timer

This is the timer that I use. It is not cheap and can be a bit confusing to use at first. There may be cheaper alternatives out there but I have not found any.

You need a timer that can be set to run seconds, most I see run 1 minute intervals. You can use them but you may use a lot more nutrients than you need to. Then there are other timers that will run seconds but cant be set for 3 or 4 hour cycles so read the timer specs carefully before you buy something else.

Smart Pots For Coco

Smart pots work great with coco. I used 2 gallon smart pots and unless you are growing trees there really is no need to go larger. In fact smaller pots with a large root mass work best. They need frequent watering and can use up the feeding faster which is what makes multiple daily feeds work so well.

The smart pots will allow roots to breathe and will root prune to keep root circling to a minimum. Each time a root is pruned it creates additional side shoots.

DRAIN TO WASTE COCO – RESULTS

After running this DTW system on both my grows I have to say it was a total success. I have had no problems with salt or nutrient buildup at all. Even better I am seeing greatly reduced foxtailing in strains that are prone to it.

I just finished my first DTW harvest and here is a harvest video from it below. If you want to see the full grow it is here: https://420grower.org/double-tap-gg4-x-black-banana/

As you can see the results are quite good using DTW in coco. My other grow is still in progress at: http://420dotcom.com/running-hps-vs-led.html and it is doing very well also.

If you want to automate your watering you cant beat drain to waste coco but just remember the secret is running low nutrient levels with small frequent feedings.

Foxtailing In Cannabis – What Causes Foxtails

What causes foxtailing in cannabis? Is it strain related or are foxtails caused by other factors like too much light or heat. I experience foxtailing on some strains so I wanted to find out how to fix foxtailing buds. Can you reverse foxtailing or is it genetic and can it be caused by too much light or the spectrum of light used.

Here is a picture of some Double Tap a strain from Solfire Gardens which is a cross of GG4 and Black Banana on day 56. She definitely has major foxtails. You can see the calyx is built from one bud stacking on top of another.

Some people dislike foxtails and say they are bad but I happen to like the look of this bud. There are good and bad foxtails too. These calyxes are elongated but they are solid. The bad kind is wispy and not dense and in some severe cases the entire bud can just be white hairs that never really fatten up.

Genetic Foxtailing

Some strains seem to have a genetic predisposition to foxtailing. This is a natural trait in many sativa strains and many strains we grow have sativa genetics in them.

For example in the strain GG4 AKA Gorilla Glue foxtailing is fairly common. Let’s have a look at the genetics in this girl. Gorilla Glue #4 is a mostly sativa variety and a cross of Sour Dubb x Chem Sis. You can check out the full genetics line at https://en.seedfinder.eu/strain-info/Gorilla_Glue_4/Unknown_or_Legendary/

A quick look at the genetics shows Hawaiian and Chocolate Thai in the genetics which are sativa dominant. There is also Skunk in the genetics which carries sativa genetics too. In fact Thai is known to foxtail naturally. So with a genetic mash up like GG4 has it should  really be no surprise to see foxtails show up in this strain.

Does The Grow Room Environment Cause Foxtails?

If you look online you will see that too much light or high temperatures are the most common causes given for foxtailing. I think this is responsible for the bad type of foxtails but I think genetics or other factors are also responsible for causing this.

As far as heat goes HPS should be run at about 75 and LED at about 80-82. LEDs dont give off radiant heat like HPS lights do so they require a higher temperature for photosynthesis. However that certainly is not excessive for cannabis and temps for both can actually be raised when CO2 is added.

Light intensity is cited as another common reason for foxtailing. With HPS high light intensity usually goes along with high heat and symptoms like tacoing or leaf burn will often show up too.

But with LED lights there is much less heat so it is very easy to over saturate your plants. You normally wont see burning but you may see bleaching especially at bud tips. There can be tacoing or leaf rolling and also leaves can be yellow or look like they have a nutrient deficiency.

However in my case my temperatures are in check and I check my light levels with a par meter. I try to keep my levels between 500-800 but occasionally some taller colas can get a bit more. Lower buds on my plants that get less light still have foxtailing although it may be less.

Light Spectrum – Do LEDs Cause Foxtailing?

I grow with LEDs and I use COBs and Quantum Boards and yes I do get foxtailing on some strains and none on others. Both Tropicanna Cookies and the Double Tap shown above grow very similar bud shapes and both have a good amount of sativa genetics in them.

However, I know growers with the exact same cut of Tropicanna who dont get those elongated buds. Theirs are chunkier and more “normal” looking. But they are growing with HPS lighting. So is there something about LEDs that causes foxtails?

You can check out this grow journal at https://420grower.org/animal-cookies-in-new-sip-grow/ Although this Double Tap has foxtails it is neither too hot nor is it getting too much light. In fact I needed to add a small heater to get the temps to 81 and it has a par reading on top around 400 and the lowers are only about 200.

Then in this case it is not caused by too much light or high temperatures. This leads me to believe it is genetic and the COBs are allowing it to express itself.

Light Spectrum And Bud Shape

So this also brings up the question of what is normal. HPS is a very incomplete spectrum with very little blue light in it at all. It is about as far as you can get from natural sunlight but it works very well for flowering.

Sunlight has a kelvin temperature of about 5000 degrees with a CRI (color rendering index ) of 100 while HPS is around 2200k. It also has a very low CRI of 22 so colors are not rendered very well.

Given the differences in spectrum it should not be surprising if plants grow and flower differently. So is a HPS flower normal or are we just used to it because they happen to be the predominant spectrum most growers use? I dont grow outdoors but I would guess the flowers in sunlight are different and probably have more foxtails.

LED lighting is a different animal entirely and a cross between the 2. My COBs are rated at 3500k and my HLG 550 quantum board is 3000k. Both have a high CRI of about 90.

I would have to conclude that LED lighting allows foxtailing to occur if it is in the plants genetics because it is closer to the suns full spectrum and HPS does not do this because it is a much narrower and more red based spectrum.

How To Fix Foxtailing Buds?

Unfortunately I dont have an easy answer for this. I am not about to switch back to HPS lighting. I am a closet grower and dealing with the extra heat is difficult and so is looking at my electric bill. My power bill is half what it was and my yields are the same so at least for me it is not an option.

In most cases high temperature and too much light are the cause of foxtailing so the obvious fix is to adjust your environment accordingly.

Make sure your HPS lights are not too close. If using HPS make sure your buds are not getting too close to your light. Check leaf surface temperature with a  temperature gun. They are cheap insurance. You can not go by room temperature.

LEDs are a bit trickier because they dont give off enough heat to burn your plants. This makes it very easy to have them too close. Ideally you want to use a par meter to check the height. There really is no other definitive way to know if they are getting too much light and using manufacturer guidelines may not be right for your situation.

Daily Light Integral Possible Fix

I can not change the spectrum of my lighting nor do I want to. I believe the closer we can get to sun light the better our grows will be. Plants have spent millions of years evolving and growing under the sun. The main advantage of indoor growing is really climate control not better lighting.

Daily Light Integral or DLI  may have potential to help stop foxtailing. It is a formula used by greenhouse growers to determine how much supplemental lighting to use. Plants have different light needs. Cannabis and tomatoes for example have high light requirements. But as these photons accumulate during the day it is possible for a plant to receive more light than it needs or can use.

What DLI does is determine how long they need that intensity. So it is possible with high power LEDs, especially the white light ones, the length of intensity might be too long and encourage foxtailing. Perhaps running 11 on and 13 off would help.

I have not tried this so it is just a theory. Personally I dont have a problem with good foxtailing and in fact I really like the look.

Do LEDs Cause Foxtailing? Experimental HPS Test Grow

Sometimes something just bugs me and  I want to find the answer and solution to my problem.  So I decided to do a test grow and find out if my lights are causing plants to foxtail or if there are other causes.

I have 4 strains that I am familiar with and have grown multiple times. Two of them, Tropicanna Cookies and GG4 always foxtail under my COBs and quantum boards.

So I took down my HLG 550 and swapped it for a 600w HPS. The plants were only 7 days into flower when the change was made. By the end of this grow I should know if lighting is the cause or if other factors are in play.

1000w HPS Upgrade

The 600w HPS I was running was not really giving me the coverage I needed so I pulled out an and hung it with a

Hoping the light switch does the trick. Everything looks happy and temperatures have stayed around 76-78 degrees. With the air cooled hood temperatures are lower running a 1000w bulb than running the with a 600 watt bulb.

SIP Planter To Drain To Waste Conversion

I have decided to change my growing system from a sub irrigated planter to a DTW top feed drip system. Many people say you can’t recirculate coco. I have done it in the past but at this point I am having issues with dropping pH and until I figure out a work around I need a system with proven results.

I like to automate when possible and although hand watering is effective it can be problematic lifting pots under a trellis. Since I already have a drip system that is what I will be using. Canna recommends DTW and advises against recirculating in coco. So that is what I am going to do.

There are the same 4 plants under the same 1000w HPS and the plants sit on top of seed flats because I want them to drain freely. I want air space under the smart posts. The plan is to water 3 times during lights on for 15-30 seconds. Water will be held in the flood tray and pumped out into a bucket for disposal because I do not have a drain nearby.

Drain To Waste – Not That Wasteful

After running my pump 15 seconds I collected about 10 ounces of liquid from two drip lines. There are 2 per pot so I will go through 40 ounces every watering or 120 ounces a day. That is a bit less than a gallon.

Because my reservoir is filled with 20 gallons of nutrients it should last almost 3 weeks. I would actually use more nutrients recirculating if I changed my reservoir every 2 weeks. So maybe drain to waste really is not that wasteful.

The Advantage Of A Drain To Waste System

The main advantage of this system is stability. Your nutes are always the same every feeding unlike a recirculating system. This can help prevent over feeding and nutrient lock outs. When you recirculate plants take out different nutrients at different times so your reservoir can easily get out of balance.

One thing that can cause foxtailing is excess N or too high a nutrient level. So I am hoping the change in lighting and the change in my grow system will result in fewer foxtails.

Dropping PH In Hydro – Forget PH Up –…

Do you have a problem with dropping pH in hydro? Whether you are in DWC, flood and drain or other recirculating system you need to know how to correct it. Most growers will reach for the PH Up but that may not be the best choice.

If your pH is dropping like a stone as mine was there are other issues coming into play. This is especially true if it keeps going down and you have to keep adding it every day.

My Hydroponic System – Recirculating SIP

I think a bit of background information on my hydro system might be in order. Most are not familiar with a SIP or sub irrigated planter and those that are, probably have not seen one that recirculates and runs 24/7. But mine does and works very well.

It consists of a tote filled with growstones. Water runs below the surface of the stones constantly. Plants are placed on top of the stones in smart pots filled with coco, a coco mix or even just perlite.

You can read more about it here: https://420grower.org/diy-sip-grow-system-for-cannabis/

So my first trial runs went great. Stable pH, great plants and no issues at all. Then the shit hit the fan!! LOL

Day 28 Dropping PH Issues In The SIPs

Okay it is day 28 and the plants are doing just fine. In fact I had to pull one of the Animal Cookies tops down and to the side because it was squished against the light. My only issue is falling pH. Normally as plants grow and use nutrients it will rise. Mine has been dropping. Everyday I bring it up to 5.8 and the next day it is down to 5.4 again. I dont know if it will continue to fall if left alone but I do not want to see it lower than 5.6.

Dropping PH Causes And Correction Attempts

So first of all it is common for pH to fluctuate in hydro. If you use RO water there are no natural buffers to keep it steady. That can cause pH drift. Some people say a pythium infection can also drop pH. However pythium is pretty rare in coco even if it is kept saturated.

I thought the coco would act as a buffer but since it wicks water up from the bottom there is not much exchange of nutrients. So the conclusion I came to was it must be a lack of buffering that causes the problem.

The first thing I did was recalibrate my nutrient monitor. It was dead on so the problem was not due to a faulty reading.

The next thing I did was change nutrients from Green Planet to Canna Aqua Flores. I am happy with the Green Planet but I was not sure if there were any buffering agents in it. Canna Aqua is very stable and buffered. It is designed specifically for recirculating hydro with inert media like growstones or hydroton. It has proved to be very stable for me in the past.

Well the nutrient change made no difference so it led me to consider pythium, however unlikely or the solution needed more buffering than it had.

PH UP What Is In it?

Most pH up is a form of lye. You could use sodium hydroxide the stuff you pour in drains but since it also adds sodium it is not used much to raise pH. Most commercial PH UP is potassium hydroxide. Potassium is a necessary nutrient after all. So it adds potassium and the hydroxide part turns to water.

The problem was I had to use it every day. It would naturally raise my PPMs but the real problem was coco holds potassium and in doing so there are less exchange sites to hold calcium and magnesium and that is not good.

How To Fix Dropping PH In Hydro

Most hydro growers will use RO water in their systems. Tap water may contain reasonable amounts of calcium and magnesium to act as buffers but can also contain contaminates like lead.

I have heard the large particle size of calcium in tap water makes it unavailable to plants. Problem is although RO water is clean it has no buffers. Buffers are what keep pH stable.

I dont think using PH Up is a good idea, especially in coco. Most nutrients already have plenty of potassium and we add even more if we use bloom boosters. If your pH keeps dropping and you have to constantly use it your nutrient profile will get out of whack. There is a better way to deal with a falling pH and stabilize it.

Kalkwasser To The Rescue

Kalkwasser is German for lime water. It is calcium hydroxide also known as pickling lime. Cant make corn tortillas without it and it is non toxic. It is eaten, and fed to fish, corals and inverts where it is used to add calcium and raise alkalinity in reef tanks. It is not caustic like regular lye either. Notice your bottle of PH Up probably has a warning label on it.

It will bring your pH up and its buffering action will help keep it stable. Calcium is something plants need especially coco and in hydro it is much less available than in a garden. There are all kinds of biological and chemical reactions that make it available there but are lacking in our grow rooms. Best news of all it’s cheap and way cheaper than that bottle of PH Up you are slinging around.

If you mix a teaspoon in a gallon of water you will have about 2000 ppms of calcium to buffer your reservoir. In my 20 gallon reservoir it adds 100 ppms and brings my pH up a full point. You can mix less but if you add more than a teaspoon to gallon the excess will precipitate out of solution.

Never add it directly to your reservoir, always dilute it first and you do want to use it soon after mixing it up. A little goes a long way and a pound of this stuff would probably last a small grower a lifetime. Not bad for $13-14!

 

 

 

Tribus Microbes Review

I want to share my Tribus microbes review and test results. I am using Tribus Original and seeing fast results from it. It is a mix of 3 growth-promoting rhizobacteria from Impello Biosciences out of Fort Collins, Colorado

They are: Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus amyloliquefaciens and Bacillus pumilus. While some of these are in some other products the concentration in Tribus is billions per CFU/ml while others are only in the millions. CFU is an acronym for colony forming units BTW. Although I am not a math whizz I think that’s 1000 times more than the competition.

I am still not 100% a believer in spite of some encouraging early results with the Tribus Original microbes. So I will keep updating this review and save my final determination for a later time. At this point I will simply say the early results appear promising and you might want to test it out in your grow.

Here is my first Tribus microbes video review. Shot about 24 hours after the first application and I can see results. Plants were not fed anything other than Tribus at 1 ml per gallon.

Tribus Vs Mammoth P Vs Recharge

I believe the high concentration of bacteria are at least part of the reason why this stuff seems to work so well. I have tried other inoculents like Recharge and Mammoth P several times in different grows for extended periods of time. To be honest I did not see any measurable results from them and I am not alone.

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It’s rare that I find a product that really impresses me with actual results. Tribus Microbes from @impellobio straight up impressed me beyond belief. I actually didn’t even want to try it when I first got it. I didn’t think it would do anything better than what I was using. Holy shit was I wrong. My roots blew up like a nuclear bomb. I buy results, not hype…and that’s what Tribus Microbes gives me. I used the original. And am now starting to use the specific Grow and Bloom microbe blends. I will continue to show my results on my story and feed. #tribusmicrobes #impellobio #microbes #bacillus #trytribus #greengenes #cannabis #ledgrown #growyourown #prop215 #prop64 #jackshydro #jacks321

A post shared by Greengenes Garden (@greengenesgarden) on Apr 15, 2018 at 11:33am PDT

After trying numerous beneficial bacteria products I must admit that I had my doubts this stuff would work. But I was looking for something that would promote vigorous root growth. I tried Roots Excelurator too and was very disappointed by its performance.  So why not try something new?

Here is a pic of some new growth less than 24 hours after watering it in:

What Tribus Microbes Are Supposed To Do

According to Impello some of the benefits of Tribus are:

• Increasing yield above what nutes, light and CO2 can do alone
• Increased root growth for better nutrient uptake and bigger plants
• Plants grow better even under less than favorable conditions
• Improves plant health and flower quality
• Increases nutrient uptake over a wide pH range by chelation

They are claiming a +14% increase in growth rate, +16% increase in stem diameter and a +15% increase in biomass yield. Now these are some pretty bold claims that they say are backed up by research. If true that’s great, but like most lab testing it does not tell me what it will do in my garden.

If it can make my roots explode I will be a happy camper. Since I dont grow under unfavorable conditions overcoming stress or nutrient deficiencies are not really a problem.

How To Use Tribus Original

Tribus is being billed as a seedling to harvest product which makes it pretty versatile. They do make a Tribus Grow and a Tribus bloom but those will not be covered here at this point.

Usage rates are 1 ml per gallon and with a price tag under $60 for a 250 ml bottle it is not cheap but a little goes a long way. This is not a nutrient so you need to continue your regular feeding program although if the research holds true you may be able to reduce your nutrient usage somewhat.

Because it consists of beneficial bacteria you really cant overfeed with it. Indeed, the bottle states 1-2 ml per gallon in veg and early flower and 2-3 ml in full flower can be used. More wont hurt but probably wont give better results.

For best results apply it to your grow media at least once a week. Impello says Tribus is compatible with all grow media, including hydroponics and even field application.

My Tribus Microbe Testing

My main goal is to find a product that greatly enhances root growth and Tribus is supposed to do that. I am running it in 2 grow closets. One is 3 weeks into flower and the other is my clone and veg tent.

Actually, I am not really expecting much from the flowering plants because they dont grow roots that much once they are growing flowers. Also they are in smart pots so I really cant monitor root growth. Maybe I will see roots popping through them and maybe not. You can follow this grow here: https://420grower.org/animal-cookies-in-new-sip-grow/

My veg and clone tent is a different story though. Everything is in a solo cup or hard pot so it is pretty easy to slip them off and check the roots. I have seen some early new growth on the one solo cup plant I checked. Also I noticed a growth spurt and slightly better color on some Double Tap clones I am growing out. They had appeared to be kind of stalled out before.

Because plants grow and make roots anyway regardless of what is added I am looking for some out of the ordinary results that would confirm it is the Tribus microbes that are making the difference. So follow along as I continue my test of Tribus Original.

MAKING FEMINIZED SEEDS USING STS

I am making feminized seeds using STS (silver thiosufate solution) and will show you how to make your own feminized seeds without spending a ton of money.

Here’s a video explaining the process of making fem seeds with STS solution:

Female Seeds Get A Bad Rap

First lets dispel the myth that feminized seeds are hermies or are hermie prone. If you use stable genetics and reverse a female to male the plant is no more hermie prone than a normal female plant.

But many “breeders” let their greed get the better of them and want to release the latest hot strain and so they self strains often without testing the genetics and often without testing the cross. Very often these crosses are unstable and even made with seeds from a high demand strain that hermied. No wonder fem seeds get a bad rap.

How Feminized Seeds Are Made

There are a number of ways to make feminized seeds. One method called rodelization allows plants to over mature and make seeds. Plants will often produce seeds without a male by making their own male flowers. It is a survival mechanism that works in the wild but not in the grow room. Plants that produce seeds with this method are naturally hermie prone.

Colloidal silver can be used to reverse plant sex. It must be sprayed every day until male flowers form and many people have used colloidal silver to reverse their plants. I am not going to cover this here as there is lots of info online about how to use it and even build a generator to make it.

STS or silver thiosufate solution is the preferred way to make fem seeds. It is what is used by professional cannabis breeders and in commercial horticulture in general.

Making STS Solution

Here is a link to a PDF that explains how to make STS https://phytotechlab.com/media/documents/TechnicalLiterature/PreparationOfSTSsolution.pdf It should be noted that this solution needs to be diluted further before spraying plants with it.

Also it uses silver nitrate and sodium thiosulfate already diluted to 0.1 M but dont worry if you are not a chemist because I have an easy way to do it. You can buy both ingredients from Amazon already properly diluted and it will cost only about $40 to buy it. With seeds going for $100 a pack and more and fem seeds often going for $10 each it is cheap.

Make Your Own Feminizing Spray

I started my seed project by buying a premixed spray off eBay. It may have gotten to old or may have been diluted too much but it did not work well.

After spraying pistils should be turning brown and drying up but most of mine were not. After using my homemade spay the sprayed buds were turning brown within less than 24 hours. So mix your own because the solution needs to be fresh.

You will need to mix the two in a 4:1 ratio always adding the silver nitrate to the sodium thiosulfate. You can use plastic to mix them although glass is better. Do not use metal containers anything metal to stir the 2 together.

I took 10 ml silver nitrate and 40 ml sodium thiosulfate and put each into a clean shot glass and mixed them together. I used a syringe to measure the amounts.

After they were mixed they were poured into a pint spray bottle and I added some distilled water and a drop of dish soap to it.

Common recommendations are a 9:1 dilution rate but I found that some breeders use a 5:1 ratio and I decided to go with that.

Keep the silver nitrate and the finished spray solution in the dark. I store mine in the fridge. No special storage is needed for the sodium thiosulfate. They will keep for a long time and you should be able to carry out several breeding projects with them.

Just remember that the STS solution is only good for about a month and you will get your best results using it right after making it.

MAKING FEMINIZED SEEDS USING STS

You want to start spraying your plants about 4 days before moving them into 12/12 lighting. Some people just spray the buds or a selected branch and some spray the whole plant. However you do it you need to spray every 4 days until you start to see male flowers and then you can stop.

You will probably see white female pistils at first. They will turn brown and dry up from the spray and become male flowers usually in 2 or 3 weeks. Remember this plant is female so it is natural for it to start out with female flowers. Perhaps if I had started with a stronger and fresher spray in veg they would have been male to start with.

The silver interferes with ethylene production. Without ethylene the plant can not make female flowers. But because it is going to flower anyway it can only produce male flowers. So you are not producing a hermie plant. You are producing a female with male flowers and as a result anything she pollinates will make fem seeds.

Some Strains Are Harder To Reverse

It seems some strains are harder to reverse than others and my guess is the more stable the strain is the harder it is to reverse. The Black Banana I am trying to reverse seems to be one of these. That is why I chose to make a stronger solution and I have not seen any burning of foliage even at a 5:1 dilution rate.

Timing is everything?

I started everything into flowering at the same time. I assumed that the spray I used would work and that males flower sooner. But that did not happen this time. Normally my plants are flowering within 14 days of flipping them over. So it might be better to start your treated plant a week or two before the others.

I am hoping that pollen will fly before the other plants are done flowering. If it doesn’t I will have a bunch of bud to harvest. But I would expect to find some seeds in my target plant at least.

Do not try to smoke the treated plant. You need to throw it out.

Making Feminized Seeds Day 26 First Male Flowers

Been spraying STS regularly starting in veg about 4 days before switching them over to flowering. I have been checking for male flowers daily and have mainly focused on the top buds.

Today I decided to check the lower buds on this Black Banana plant. Guess what? I found some too! They are hard to see and harder to pick up on camera. But trust me, they are there. They will be more obvious in future updates.

Blackberry Auto Fem Seeds – Looking To Add The Color Purple

I have some Blackberry autos in with my seed project. Although I am not really interested in growing autoflowers I saw some really deep purple show up in grow journals of these. Since I like purple buds I thought they might be good in the mix.

My plan was to cross them with my Black Banana. But I was worried she may not make pollen soon enough to get to them. So I put 2 plants back into my veg tent and started treating them with colloidal silver and then STS.

The autoflowering gene is recessive so any cross made with a regular photoperiod plant will produce photoperiod plants with an autoflower recessive gene. An f2 cross would produce some of both but the autoflowering ones would show themselves in veg and can be easily removed if that is your goal.

Day 35 Female Plants With Male Flowers

Today is day 35 and there are definitely male flowers showing on my plants but they have not opened yet. They should start to shoot pollen in a few days.

The BBC is really hard to turn. If you count the time she was treated while in veg it has taken 42 days to get to this point. Conversely the Blackberry had male pods ready to open in 2 weeks! So some plants are much harder to reverse than others.

Fem Seeds Update Day 56

It is day 56 and although I am seeing lots of male flowers none are opening and dropping pollen. This entire process is taking way longer than expected. The Black Banana is very stable and took over 40 days before she started to turn.

By contrast the Blackberry was sprayed weeks later and had male flowers within 2 weeks. I may need to collect flowers and pollen to dry for later use.

Because of how long this is taking the plants I wanted to pollenize are maturing and have very few white hairs left to catch pollen.

The day after shooting this video I found some pollen grains on the Blackberry. She was moved back with the other plants hopefully to make some seeds. It is not what I planned on but I am glad I decided to spray her too.

Tropicanna Cookies Day 60  Of My Fem Seed Project

Here is a Tropicanna Cookies on day 60. Nice plant fed only on Jacks. My selected pollen donor was a Black Banana that did not want to reverse. Doesn’t look like she will get seeded this time around.

On a happier note I saw some seeds developing on my Blackberry plants. I will take this project to day 70. Then everything will get hung and dried. Maybe I will get lucky and find seeds in some of the other plants.

DIY Self Watering Planter Bed And Seed Project

Here’s my latest DIY self watering planter bed. A true sub irrigated planter ideal for large plants and perfect for growing cannabis or peppers and tomatoes if that is your preference. It was designed as an indoor garden but it could be adapted to run outdoors too.

My first sub irrigated planter beds worked very well. I recently harvested one of my highest yielding plants ever. A GG4 in my SIP yielded 10 ounces in a 3 gallon smart pot and gave me over 8 ounces cleaned and manicured. So I know this method works!

My first system used growstones as a wicking bed and for the most part it worked well. The large stones worked flawlessly. Unfortunately they no longer make them.

All I could find were smaller perlite sized growstones for my 2nd planter bed and they were problematic. They actually wicked better than the large stones but the smaller size led to problems with clogging.

Since I recirculate the nutrients everything needs to flow freely. If it doesn’t they drain slowly causing the water level to rise too high. My first build with larger growstones works very well and you can see it here https://420grower.org/diy-sip-grow-system-for-cannabis/

My New DIY Self Watering Planter Bed

Hydroton would work as an alternative medium but I wanted to find a way to eliminate the need for stones entirely. So I put my thinking cap on and came up with the system you will see in the video below.

Sub Irrigated Planter Bed Smart Pot System

This is a very easy DIY build. If you watched the video you will see there is not much to it but I want to bring up a few points about this system.

You dont need to use a flood tray

Any container, tub or tote will work for a self watering planter bed but if you plan to water manually bigger is better. If the container is small you are going to have to add water back frequently. I really recommend using a reservoir and pump that recirculates the water. If a flood tray is too expensive you can get 2×3 mixing tubs at Home Depot for about $13. Here is a diy build using these mixing tubs:  https://420grower.org/diy-sip-grow-system-for-cannabis/

You dont need a drip irrigation manifold

I used what I had at hand because that tray was set up for a top feed drip system. You could simply use a length of 1/2 tubing and connect it to some pipe with holes in it. You could even just flood the tray and skip the manifold entirely. I like a little bit of slope so water drains to the outlet more easily and I wanted to spread the water flow out more evenly.

You do need to use smart pots

You absolutely need to use smart pots with this system. Hard plastic pots will have trouble wicking up water. Besides roots grow better in smart pots and most plants will yield more in them.

You dont need to grow cannabis to use this system

I designed this system to grow large plants. Even though I am growing cannabis with it that doesn’t mean you have to. This SIP system will grow amazing peppers and tomatoes too.

It is an indoor system for me but you could easily set something like this up outdoors too. Or you could grow peppers, tomatoes or fresh greens or herbs inside during the winter. Use a closet or any spare space provided you can provide enough light for them and control temperatures.

You might enjoy my GrowBucket review where I grow tomatoes and peppers with a self watering planter  bucket system.

DIY Self Watering Planter Bed And Seed Project Day 14 Update

Things are going well in my new SIP planter bed. Plants are growing and drinking well. No algae growth or other issues so far. My seed project is now on day 4 of 12/12 and my planter bed has been running continuously for 2 weeks now.

I have gone through about 20 gallons of water so far and pH has remained stable during that time. Plants have gone through about 600 ppms of nutrient. I am using Jacks 3 2 1 mix and also some Veg + Bloom so nothing fancy.