Cannabis Growers Anonymous

[luckylager]

Well, had to drop the Cinderella99 today. 

Was probably 7-10 days early, but not only had I been battling mildew on it and had already lost a number of buds, two of the biggest colas showed bud rot this morning so i really had no choice.

I'm over it.

 

What I salvaged looks decent, but not great. At least the trichs were milky but still.. won't bother with that strain in the greenhouse again. Might see 2 oz dry.. maybe.

I'll smoke a bud in about a month to test but I expect to cook with it in the end.

 

Edited October 5, 2020 by luckylager

[RogersTowell]

On 10/2/2020 at 12:25 PM, luckylager said:

A few years ago I picked up a handheld 20x-40x microscope for like $15 from Bolan Books (kids science toys). I use it to check the trichomes on my buds.

Clear trichs will have very little THC. If they're all milky with a bit of opaque it'll be okay but not potent. 

All milky with a few amber is kind of my sweet spot. The more amber coloured trichs the more potent and couchy your crop will be.

 

Without a scope I'd say when you're at 30-50% red hairs the trichs should be milky but with no amber. Generally speaking

I picked up a jewelers loup from amazon (two pack, gave one to a buddy for the same purpose).  It does 30x, 60x and 90x, although the 60 and 90 require very very steady hands out in the green house.  I harvested my Violator today.  Probably 5% amber trichomes.  Very sticky fingers, may have gotten a contact high.  About 4 oz. of trim dried and decarboxylated.  I wet trim on the stalk and hang 'em to dry.  Once dry, will weigh them and then cure in glass jars.  My Ortega continues to be very mold resistant, for which I am very thankful.  My two Blackberry platinum struggle in the dampness, but are really starting to bulk up.  Will pull the plug if I have to, but would like another week or two for the Ortega and 2-3 for the BB Plat.  Nervous days for the greenhouse gardener this time of year.

[stawns]

We've been blessed with amazing late summer/early autumn weather here in the OKanagan, it's still shorts and tank top weather.  Looks like one more nice week and I've got all my Moby Dick on deck, but I think I'll have to finish about a quarter of my crop inside for two weeks.  I could probably harvest more, but I generally let them go a little than many do.  I'm that way with honey too, I don't harvest until I know it's fully ripened.

 

Mody Dick

 

 

[stawns]

We also made the deicion to get a trimmer to save us some time and effort, so we bought a Tom's Tumbler 1600.  It's a hand crank dry trimmer that can trim a pund in about 15 mins.  Normally, I'm about the wet trim, but after some research we decided on the TT and that means we'll be moving to a dry trim.  The ones we tried probably need another day or two of drying, but it worked pretty well.  The buds will need a bit of fine tuning, but it will save heaps of time.

 

 

[luckylager]

1 hour ago, stawns said:

We also made the deicion to get a trimmer to save us some time and effort, so we bought a Tom's Tumbler 1600.  It's a hand crank dry trimmer that can trim a pund in about 15 mins.  Normally, I'm about the wet trim, but after some research we decided on the TT and that means we'll be moving to a dry trim.  The ones we tried probably need another day or two of drying, but it worked pretty well.  The buds will need a bit of fine tuning, but it will save heaps of time.

 

 

Nice. I used a friends but it was more like a salad/lettuce dryer. Definitely a bit more cumbersome than yours.

 

As I sit here taking a  break from trimming I really wish I had one.

[Toni Zamboni]

lookin good boys.  

gettin ready to harvest bruce banner, guerilla glue and purple kush this week...just flushing atm....lookin real juicy.

 

[stawns]

8 hours ago, luckylager said:

Nice. I used a friends but it was more like a salad/lettuce dryer. Definitely a bit more cumbersome than yours.

 

As I sit here taking a  break from trimming I really wish I had one.

It's pretty nifty and seems pretty gentle so far.  I was a little worried about losing trichs, but doesnt seem any more destructive than hand trimming.  It wasn't cheap, but I'm designated to grow 50lbs in the next year, so we needed something

[luckylager]

7 minutes ago, stawns said:

It's pretty nifty and seems pretty gentle so far.  I was a little worried about losing trichs, but doesnt seem any more destructive than hand trimming.  It wasn't cheap, but I'm designated to grow 50lbs in the next year, so we needed something

I checked them out online last night after reading your post. Was hoping they made a "mini" for the home grower, but surprisingly yours is the smallest!

I'll look around for a small version tumbler as opposed to the spinner that I've tried and wasn't a super fan of.

 

I've still got a bunch untrimmed from last year, there's some very nice bud in those jars but as the new stuff comes in it just seems like I always end up kiefing or cooking a bunch of nice bud from the year previous because I'm out of space and really dislike trimming.

[stawns]

Just now, luckylager said:

I checked them out online last night after reading your post. Was hoping they made a "mini" for the home grower, but surprisingly yours is the smallest!

I'll look around for a small version tumbler as opposed to the spinner that I've tried and wasn't a super fan of.

 

I've still got a bunch untrimmed from last year, there's some very nice bud in those jars but as the new stuff comes in it just seems like I always end up kiefing or cooking a bunch of nice bud from the year previous because I'm out of space and really dislike trimming.

We haven't put it to a serious test yet, but pretty happy so far.  The only downside is it needs to be pretty dry and that kind of goes against my dry/cure philosophy.  But, I think the juice of trimming a lb in 30 mins is worth the squeeze of compromising on drying.

 

We got ours from Trimleaf

[luckylager]

9 minutes ago, stawns said:

We haven't put it to a serious test yet, but pretty happy so far.  The only downside is it needs to be pretty dry and that kind of goes against my dry/cure philosophy.  But, I think the juice of trimming a lb in 30 mins is worth the squeeze of compromising on drying.

 

We got ours from Trimleaf

I hear ya on the cure philosophy. I process all of my A1 colas by the book and take a varied approach to the rest of the crop, a kind of trim as you go method. Curing perfectly trimmed buds lends itself to more compact/dense nug, a more appealing look and there's also a slightly better/cleaner flavour profile.

My A1 colas usually push me through until summer then I have to start trimming again right before I trim the new stuff. Bit of a vicious cycle.

 

I'm gonna do some research on smaller tumblers.

 

 

Edited October 5, 2020 by luckylager

[stawns]

2 hours ago, luckylager said:

I hear ya on the cure philosophy. I process all of my A1 colas by the book and take a varied approach to the rest of the crop, a kind of trim as you go method. Curing perfectly trimmed buds lends itself to more compact/dense nug, a more appealing look and there's also a slightly better/cleaner flavour profile.

My A1 colas usually push me through until summer then I have to start trimming again right before I trim the new stuff. Bit of a vicious cycle.

 

I'm gonna do some research on smaller tumblers.

 

 

Honestly, if you're handy you could easily rig something up. 

[luckylager]

6 minutes ago, stawns said:

Honestly, if you're handy you could easily rig something up. 

I'm handy with wood but metal isn't my thing.

 

S'pose I could try to find a smaller metal mesh drum and go from there.

Edited October 5, 2020 by luckylager

[Bell]

On 10/3/2020 at 5:17 PM, luckylager said:

Well, had to drop the Cinderella99 today. 

Was probably 7-10 days early, but not only had I been battling mildew on it and had already lost a number of buds, two of the biggest colas showed bud rot this morning so i really had no choice.

I'm over it.

 

What I salvaged looks decent, but not great. At least the trichs were milky but still.. won't bother with that strain in the greenhouse again. Might see 2 oz dry.. maybe.

I'll smoke a bud in about a month to test but I expect to cook with it in the end.

 

Thanks for your post Lucky.  This is the first year I've ever grown and I read your post last night, thinking I haven't seen any powder mildew or rot at all.  To my dismay this morning one of my plants had a substantial amount of powder mildew on it.   Like I have with the entire process used google and found a cheap home remedy to fix it.  Went back and applied it to the affected plant and looked over and a huge cola on my most advanced plant was rotten.  Panic set in and I found more rot on the most advanced plant.  Had no plans on chopping down weed today but there is one less plant alive in my garden now.  From bag seed from 10 to 15 years ago to four beautiful yet all different plants what a fun hobby.  Thanks again lucky and happy tokes everyone.

[luckylager]

3 minutes ago, Bell said:

Thanks for your post Lucky.  This is the first year I've ever grown and I read your post last night, thinking I haven't seen any powder mildew or rot at all.  To my dismay this morning one of my plants had a substantial amount of powder mildew on it.   Like I have with the entire process used google and found a cheap home remedy to fix it.  Went back and applied it to the affected plant and looked over and a huge cola on my most advanced plant was rotten.  Panic set in and I found more rot on the most advanced plant.  Had no plans on chopping down weed today but there is one less plant alive in my garden now.  From bag seed from 10 to 15 years ago to four beautiful yet all different plants what a fun hobby.  Thanks again lucky and happy tokes everyone.

Cheers Bell! 

Make sure to remove the rotten buds and the healthy looking buds on each side of it then treat the exposed stem with peroxide or rubbing alcohol before bringing it inside for drying. Also make sure to remove all leaf/buds with mildew on them.

 

Was about to post a few pics of what's left in the greenhouse.

[luckylager]

Grapefruit Kush tree. The one I've been fighting stem rot on.

Probably 10-14 days out if conditions allow. Ideally 14 days. About 10% red hairs and trichs are starting to get cloudy.

 

Blue Dream, she got huge. This one is way behind, could probably use another 3-4 weeks but I really doubt that'll happen. Been fighting back the mildew with decent success and removing the odd moldy bud. Got too big for its spot so airflow is a bit of an issue as that corner doesn't have any sliding doors.

Probably move a heater and fan into the greenhouse before first frost.

 

Grapefruit Kush that I FIM'd early and didn't really do any leaf pruning to, just removed lower branches.

It's definitely in the best shape/healthiest and resisting the mildew and mold better than the others. Massive cola growth, but I figure it's still minimum 14 days out, just starting to show the odd red hair.. so I'm not holding my breath.

 

Estimating weeks can be a bit of a crap shoot this time of year. The cold nights tend to accelerate things a little as they naturally start stressing to finish before winter.

[Bell]

Those are monsters. The weather sucked this year for weed and that sept. smoke didn't help.  All mine are sativas and they could go til at least halloween.  Good job on the plants.

[luckylager]

9 minutes ago, Bell said:

Those are monsters. The weather sucked this year for weed and that sept. smoke didn't help.  All mine are sativas and they could go til at least halloween.  Good job on the plants.

Yeah the GK tree is a beast (8'6 x 6 x 4) but has been very high maintenance for the last few weeks.

The blue dream got bigger than expected for sure. I FIM'd it pretty early but the main branches just kept stretching and turned into trees. It's all tied out/down but one of the main colas is standing at just over 7 feet, but it's the depth that's hard to gauge in the pic, goes back close to 7 feet and is about 5 feet wide. Just endless colas in there from FIM and LST but again, it's weeks out. Really wish it flowered 2-3 weeks sooner.

[stawns]

1 hour ago, luckylager said:

Grapefruit Kush tree. The one I've been fighting stem rot on.

Probably 10-14 days out if conditions allow. Ideally 14 days. About 10% red hairs and trichs are starting to get cloudy.

 

Blue Dream, she got huge. This one is way behind, could probably use another 3-4 weeks but I really doubt that'll happen. Been fighting back the mildew with decent success and removing the odd moldy bud. Got too big for its spot so airflow is a bit of an issue as that corner doesn't have any sliding doors.

Probably move a heater and fan into the greenhouse before first frost.

 

Grapefruit Kush that I FIM'd early and didn't really do any leaf pruning to, just removed lower branches.

It's definitely in the best shape/healthiest and resisting the mildew and mold better than the others. Massive cola growth, but I figure it's still minimum 14 days out, just starting to show the odd red hair.. so I'm not holding my breath.

 

Estimating weeks can be a bit of a crap shoot this time of year. The cold nights tend to accelerate things a little as they naturally start stressing to finish before winter.

awesome, they all look amazing, but I like the Grapefruit one best I think

 

helluva season

 

[luckylager]

1 minute ago, stawns said:

awesome, they all look amazing, but I like the Grapefruit one best I think

 

helluva season

 

I do too. Really hoping for a strong finish from the FIM'd GK. Those colas are horse dicks.

 

Here's a different angle on the Blue Dream I took about 20 mins ago. If it manages to actually finish it'll be a heavy yield.

 

[stawns]

1 minute ago, luckylager said:

I do too. Really hoping for a strong finish from the FIM'd GK. Those colas are horse dicks.

 

Here's a different angle on the Blue Dream I took about 20 mins ago. If it manages to actually finish it'll be a heavy yield.

 

that loos a lot like the BD's in my garden too and they are also my latest finishers.  They'll have to come inside for the last 10 days or so, for sure.