Critical Skunk Grow Journal

OK here we go again!

19-08-14 seeded
21-08-14 15 sprouted seeds
23-08-14 15 babies, 3 are behind

3 needed 1 day more to sprout and are very slow. I think by tomorrow they'll come up. It's like MNS is mixing old w/ fresh seeds because the 15 and respectively 3 seeds behave exactly the same: 15 fast and fresh, 3 dormant.

I put them in clean water for the first 24 hours, then 24 hours between cotton gauze @ 25-27 degrees celsius, then one day in a propagator w/ the lid closed and now open. At the left 2 OG Kush that are about to come up. Left top a Serious Seeds AK47 I try to save.
 

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Little update w/ some pics. 100% success rate!!

First pic, Aug 27: I staked the ladies. See the 3 at the right bottom. Those are the ones that were behind, 2 currently are still smaller than the rest.

Second: A closeup of the 3.

Third, Aug 29: The ladies under 2x Philips 2G11 Master PL-L 55w 6500K. This day I fed them 450ml nutrients w/ an EC of 1.0 (half dose). The soil I'm using barely contains any nutrients.

Fourth, Aug 29: A closeup of 2 fem OG Kush Seedsman freebies. These serve for making cuttings for a friend w/ a 60x60cm grow tent.

Aug 31 I fed them 450ml 10ml/liter root stimulator (Bio Nova Roots).

Sep 1 I fed them 450ml full dose (EC 2.0) because they were a little pale. They changed to a nice dark green in only a day.

All other waterings w/ RO water pH 6.0.

Fifth, Sep 2: The ladies waiting outside for their new home to become ready.
Sixth, Sep 2: In their new home, a 90x90 tent w/ a 250W MH bulb. Not much light but I have to keep them small. It doesn't say but I think the pots are about 1,25 liters. I used 3 liters of RO water w/ nutrients EC 1.0, pH 5,8-6. I'm using Bio Nova Soil.

In the next update I start the process of abusing the ladies. Cut some side branches and top them twice. I'm gonna grow them Bonsai style. Root-bound, low light and little nutrients.
 

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I subscribed to your grow. Hope to see a lot more pics this time. I really liked your rooftop grow. You seem to have this strain dialed in.
 
I subscribed to your grow. Hope to see a lot more pics this time. I really liked your rooftop grow. You seem to have this strain dialed in.

Thanks for your interest. The first grow was a real big bummer w/ that virus. Destroyed everything. The second grow I was not happy w/ I believe only 5 females and some idiot told a Moroccon where I lived so I had to clean everything up.

Now this third grow the mothers will be kept bonsai style to prevent them from getting too big and I'll be flowering them in another 90x90 tent w/ a 600W Lumatek. I learned that you can go up to 80x80cm per 600W lamp and still get 1 gram/watt (in larger grow rooms). The flowers then simply grow bigger and juicier.
 
First image taken yesterday. The boys and girls are at their third set of adult branches so time to top them.

Second image a sharp knife and nail scissors cleaned w/ alcohol and before cutting each plant I clean them again w/ a 1% H2O2 solution. Better be safe than sorry.

Third and 4th image before and after the cut. I removed the lower single-finger leaves and branches because these grow too small to make cuttings from.

Now they have 3 sets of branches and in a few days when the branches in the middle start growing I top them again. I leave the top set of branches for now because that will stimulate growth of the branches in the middle. At the end I want to have 2 sets of branches total for the bonsai-style tree.

Fifth image taken after the abuse. I stop feeding them nutrients for now. Because I use RO water I'm gonna water them a couple of times w/ tap water. I have the feeling they are a bit short on Ca and I don't have this supplement at hand at the moment.

6th and last image are an AK47 and the freebie OG Kush. I tossed the other one.

This AK47 has a history: For a friend we purchaded 11 seeds from Serious Seeds and I made cuttings before flowering them. Only 1 survived because it was way too warm w/ temperatures exceeding well over 35 degrees in the propagator. This one, number 9, also seemed to be the best of the 6 females. But then it got stem rot. I cut it away, dipped the end in cloning gel again, stuck it into the soil w/ a plastic cup on top and miraculously enough it developed a healthy root system! These seeds were very disappointing btw. Only 2 out of 6 females w/ nice flowers.

In my next update I'm gonna do low stress training on the plants by pulling the branches down w/ ropes/wires. Once the total width of the plants reach 30 cm I'm gonna use the ends of all 4 branches for cuttings and one of each 4 cuttings will be flowered.
 

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Different stages of the growing process. 4 branches and I topped the upper two twice. I'm not gonna bother growing them into nice bonsai-style trees because the upper branches took off way much faster than I expected. This is because of the genetics of the plants. Lower branches of seedlings always grow slower. So I'm just gonna keep them small by cutting them down every week or so.

I made 36 cuttings, 2 of each plant, of the lower branches because these shoot roots better so I get back as soon they developed roots and I put one of each in the 90x90 flower tent.
 

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Let the race begin!

I had to leave to Honduras for my work so last week Wednesday I made new cuttings. This time in soil and to my surprise in only 5 days the first roots were poking out! I never found the holy grail in making clones on rockwool so I sent my findings to Bio Nova and asked them for a recipe to get the same results. They forwarded it to their R&D department so let's see what they come up with.

All clones shot roots except for, you guess it, plant number 13. At the time of making cuttings I couldn't cut inderneath 1 or 2 branch nodes. I planted it anyway but don't think it will survive so yesterday I made 4 new clones.

They are in 5.5 liter pots, I put them on 12 hours already, so they don't grow too big, at daytime so the noise of the extractor doesn't bother me at night. I ordered a 530m3 Katrina KSA 125-2E and if I like it I'll also order it's 400m3 smaller brother as intractor. I had a GSE controller laying around I'll be using.

Feeding them Bio Nova Soil and PK13-14 and nothing else. No need for a contest to get the most weight, we're just comparing them under similar conditions.

1st image: clone 8 days
2nd: my personal assistent checking if I did everything right
3rd: still in the same 1.3 liter pots. Time for a haircut again today!
4th: 4 clones of #13 from last night
5th & 6th: the boys and girls

I get back to you as soon as I am able to determine gender.
 

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In contrary of what I said last time I did put them on 18 hours for 3 days, so now they are in their 6th day of flowering and I was already able to separate the males from the females.

8 out of 18 are females which is not bad and I have some nice variations. They are under a 600W lamp powered by a Lumatek, first week at 400W SL (440W), currently 600W and when they form flowers I go to 600W SL (660W).

First image: The extraction system with the 530m3 Katrina. Works like a charm! So I'm gonna purchase an other one this week for the intake.

2nd: The boys and girls 2 days ago.

3rd: The 8 girls, at the left unlucky number 13 which is 90% sure male. In the center an original AK47, and at the bottom the OG Kush freebie which is so weak it's not worth making cuttings from.

Last image: Number 7, my favorite so far.

I get back to you in 2 weeks or so with some more pics.
 

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Almost 9,000 views so I don't want you to miss out on these beautiful plants :)

Attached the mothers that had a dramatic hair cut 2 days ago and a vitamin and nutrient shot so they'll recover.

The ladies are in 11 liter pots now.

And I put a high res image up, too big to upload here, so you can zoom in on how gorgeous these plants are. In the center still the AK47.
http://homegrowsystems.com/critical-skunk/cs1.jpg

10 days into flower, forming their first pistils. I bet some of these will grow huge buds!
 

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A Great read, and Awesome pics

Hi,
Thanks for the thread. I am enjoying the read. A thought, for those plants that don't branch like you wished they would. I only wanted to add, and since Advanced Nutrients have already been mentioned. They also have a great product that is mostly beneficial for Mother Plants, as it promotes branching, but would also improve this on your slips/clones. VHO (very high output) for mother plants and veg growth accelerator.


"VHO is a powerful vegetative growth producer which will force your mother
plant to produce enormous amounts of new shoots quicker, giving you profuse amounts of cuttings. VHO also stiffens the stems for easier sticking. VHO can be used on your production crop as well to shorten your vegetative time for a quicker crop turnover time.
Use VHO as a foliar spray only!"

Seriously though, those are looking really good... ;-)

RHP
 
Again a little update because these plants grow so fast.

First image: The ladies had sore feet so I transferred them into 3 liter pots.
Second: The AK47 mother I just flushed because it wasn't feeling well.

And now it comes. Third and last image. Number 8 from clone to tree in only 19 days!!
 

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Attached a feeding chart for Bio Nova that works very well for these plants. The first watering you can also give them 2.5ml BN N (Nitrogen)/10 liters and after one week (2nd or 3rd watering) 1.5ml/10l.

I'm currently not using X-Cel and Vitrasol because the yield is not so important for this grow.
 

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Hi

These plants have nice fat indica stem, all smells on hard buds.
I will go CS outdoor and will give chance to CH.

Thx for sharing
 
3 1/2 weeks into flower.

I have some very nice varieties. 2nd image is the tallest and ugliest but has the genes of an original Critical w/ that typical citronella smell. Image number 5 is a bit more Sativa-like with narrow leafs.

The others have either a sweet smell or a mixture of sweet and citronella.
 

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A little over 4,5 weeks into flower. 33 days to be exact.

First image the Critical-style tree. Tall, ugly, chunky but big buds;

2nd: This one is very much like a Skunk. Short and bulky flowers, very green. Not much resin production yet;

3rd: The AK47 taking off nicely. Curious if this one proves to be a winner. Sativa, very sensitive, adjusts itself to its environment (in good and bad ways), doesn't like to be root-bound;

4th: Number 7 from the first post on this page. Not a very big producer so far but very rich in resin already;

5th: The average nice producer;

6th: Is more like a Sativa with taller flowers. Not a very interesting plant.

And the last image the mothers completely recovered.

The intermediate champion as of this moment is number 7 from the 4th image. Decent enough production of a potent weed. But the race is not over yet!
 

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43 days into flower.

1st image number one which was a slow starter but is turning out to be a big producer! First pistils turning brown so I expect another 2.5 to 3 weeks, so 9 weeks total to complete.

Some are a bit further but don't produce as much.

2nd image the AK47 which is going to be a bomb! But will likely need many weeks more.
 

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