has anyone had good experiences with this strain? it's my latest grow and it seems slow as hell. it's about 6-7 weeks into bloom, only starting getting sticky the last couple of weeks and buds are so small. brown stamen is about 50% now so it can't have much longer to go - seeming like a huge waste of electricity right now. they just aren't hungry and i'm starting to think it's the soil i'm using; the feed drains out almost straight away and stays drained. gonna have to switch to hydro soon - the last 6 months or so, i've just had no luck with growing. poor me.
anyway - do people like this strain? is it just me?
Full Version: California Orange
Had some cali orange x blueberry. Twas a very strong smoke at the time for me, wipeout.
As far as what you are saying about watering, do you use a wet/dry cycle to water and leave your pots to stand in the run off?
As far as what you are saying about watering, do you use a wet/dry cycle to water and leave your pots to stand in the run off?
QUOTE(Leprechan Sweet Leaf @ Jan 3 2008, 02:57 AM) 
Had some cali orange x blueberry. Twas a very strong smoke at the time for me, wipeout.
As far as what you are saying about watering, do you use a wet/dry cycle to water and leave your pots to stand in the run off?
As far as what you are saying about watering, do you use a wet/dry cycle to water and leave your pots to stand in the run off?
sorry mate but am not sure what you mean by wet/dry cycle but I do leave the pots to stand in the run off. this has to be the worst crop I've ever had - was wondering if it's a strain you really need to put a lot of effort. I'm not careful with feeling; don't check PH or EC and feed them whenever they seem hungry...I tend to judge that by the amount of run off. usually it's once every other day and no plant has ever drunk so little. say, when i grew top44 - they were really hungry and drank about a litre a day with no run off. at the moment i have three plants about 4'10 tall and they can't take in 1.5 litres a day between them. it's very disconcerting. there's next to no bud...it looks like my normal grow at about 4 weeks (unsubstantial bud, mostly hairs) and it's got to be at 7 now. i know this strain takes longer than what I'm used to but it's showing me next to nothing! in its specs it said the budding was above average. gonna give it another 2 weeks and if I see no improvement, harvest what I have. this stuff grows for a long time after you put it into 12/12; about a month after, they got so big I had to move them.
could temp be a factor in this? i really have let that slide but it doesn't feel cold enough in my room to merit such poor results.
I have been using a compost called J Arthur Bowers Multipurpose lately - don't know if it is a coincidence but I haven't had a good crop since using it and it doesn't hold in feed. Very much considering investing in a hydro set.
This explains how to use the wet/dry cycle
QUOTE(oldtimer1 @ Nov 6 2003, 01:12 PM)
Hmm a bit of compost science myth and magic, ramblings for sr to take to bits and play with.
The advise going back over a hundred years, was to crock pots to improve drainage and stop compost seeping out of the pots and keep worms out. All has proved to be totally wrong.
Especially with the advent of capillary beds or matting. What you really want is the same medium going from the top to the base of the pot so its capillary profile constant without a break. If you want to change the water/air/drainage capacity of a medium it is best to change the whole medium.
For the most healthy root profile, it is best to water with a fine rose over the entire the compost surface untill you get run through, this oxygenates the water/feed when applied, it also drives stale and toxic gasses down through the rootball drawing in fresh air as it drains down from saturated to its natural holding capacity.
It has been found that crocking pots rather than helping drainage to the surface a pot is standing on, in fact it inhibits it. This means whatever potting medium you use holds more water and less air than its natural capacity, the thicker the crocking level the worse the problem.
The best growing results come from a wet dry cycle, by dry I mean down to 5 or 6% of the composts wet capacity, if you go much lower than that the root ball will shrink away from the pot walls killing a large percentage of the fine feeder roots, you don’t want to do this as it sets the plant back and every time you do it, it will reduce the final yield a bit more. Another problem where a rootball is allowed to dry out to the shrinkage stage is that it is very hard to wet it properly again, What happens is the water runs off the surface and down the gap round the pot edges leaving 70% of the rootball dry.
If your plants are on a sand/matting bed providing there is no crocking the odd over dry rootball will fully rehydrate its self from the bed after the area has been watered.
It is not a good idea to water or feed from a capillary bed unless you have a very very open medium, if you are going to do this you might as well grow hydro.
Where the myth about needing 30 to 70% perlite in compost an an ideal medium for growing cannabis came from:-
In the early days of cannabis growing in the states, the heads growing indoors did not have a clue about gardening or horticulture at all. They wanted to grow plants like outdoors, big plants, so they would use a big pot 10 to 50 gallons fill it with a couple of bags of Schultz container compost, water, sow a few seeds.
Now we all know what happens to 10 gallons of saturated compost in an enclosed container, with no roots to pump the water out and just a little surface evaporation, within a couple of weeks the whole mess goes anaerobic and sour. To compound the problem, the surface dries so they keep watering the seedlings that in turn get sicker and sicker as root fungus get a grip in what is now an ideal environment for it.
Did they look at what the plant industry did? No they were growing cannabis they had to resolve the problem, they stuck with big pots. One method was to fill the pot and just use a tiny amount of water around the seed. Of course this meant watering several times a day as the surrounding compost sucked up the water. Then they tried adding more and more drainage! Grit, sharp sand and finally perlite. Until the 10 gallon pot was only holding 3 or 4 gallons of compost and the rest was inert filler ie they were nearly growing with just water and nutrients. They never learnt about standard potting on techniques or considered them irrelevant or too time consuming.
Even today 40 years on, where large pots and huge plants are no longer the thing. Then the firm belief was that for optimum yield you should not grow more than one cannabis plant under a 1kw light, no one even thinks about that now, its laughable.
Yet we still see people adding large amounts of inert perlite and vermiculite to compost. It just goes to show what a tough plant cannabis is, as it often survives and crops despite the things that are done to it. Its not done any where else in the horticultural industry. So why oh why, when its a completely groundless bit of nonsense does it still hang on in the cannabis world.
The advise going back over a hundred years, was to crock pots to improve drainage and stop compost seeping out of the pots and keep worms out. All has proved to be totally wrong.
Especially with the advent of capillary beds or matting. What you really want is the same medium going from the top to the base of the pot so its capillary profile constant without a break. If you want to change the water/air/drainage capacity of a medium it is best to change the whole medium.
For the most healthy root profile, it is best to water with a fine rose over the entire the compost surface untill you get run through, this oxygenates the water/feed when applied, it also drives stale and toxic gasses down through the rootball drawing in fresh air as it drains down from saturated to its natural holding capacity.
It has been found that crocking pots rather than helping drainage to the surface a pot is standing on, in fact it inhibits it. This means whatever potting medium you use holds more water and less air than its natural capacity, the thicker the crocking level the worse the problem.
The best growing results come from a wet dry cycle, by dry I mean down to 5 or 6% of the composts wet capacity, if you go much lower than that the root ball will shrink away from the pot walls killing a large percentage of the fine feeder roots, you don’t want to do this as it sets the plant back and every time you do it, it will reduce the final yield a bit more. Another problem where a rootball is allowed to dry out to the shrinkage stage is that it is very hard to wet it properly again, What happens is the water runs off the surface and down the gap round the pot edges leaving 70% of the rootball dry.
If your plants are on a sand/matting bed providing there is no crocking the odd over dry rootball will fully rehydrate its self from the bed after the area has been watered.
It is not a good idea to water or feed from a capillary bed unless you have a very very open medium, if you are going to do this you might as well grow hydro.
Where the myth about needing 30 to 70% perlite in compost an an ideal medium for growing cannabis came from:-
In the early days of cannabis growing in the states, the heads growing indoors did not have a clue about gardening or horticulture at all. They wanted to grow plants like outdoors, big plants, so they would use a big pot 10 to 50 gallons fill it with a couple of bags of Schultz container compost, water, sow a few seeds.
Now we all know what happens to 10 gallons of saturated compost in an enclosed container, with no roots to pump the water out and just a little surface evaporation, within a couple of weeks the whole mess goes anaerobic and sour. To compound the problem, the surface dries so they keep watering the seedlings that in turn get sicker and sicker as root fungus get a grip in what is now an ideal environment for it.
Did they look at what the plant industry did? No they were growing cannabis they had to resolve the problem, they stuck with big pots. One method was to fill the pot and just use a tiny amount of water around the seed. Of course this meant watering several times a day as the surrounding compost sucked up the water. Then they tried adding more and more drainage! Grit, sharp sand and finally perlite. Until the 10 gallon pot was only holding 3 or 4 gallons of compost and the rest was inert filler ie they were nearly growing with just water and nutrients. They never learnt about standard potting on techniques or considered them irrelevant or too time consuming.
Even today 40 years on, where large pots and huge plants are no longer the thing. Then the firm belief was that for optimum yield you should not grow more than one cannabis plant under a 1kw light, no one even thinks about that now, its laughable.
Yet we still see people adding large amounts of inert perlite and vermiculite to compost. It just goes to show what a tough plant cannabis is, as it often survives and crops despite the things that are done to it. Its not done any where else in the horticultural industry. So why oh why, when its a completely groundless bit of nonsense does it still hang on in the cannabis world.
Hey dude,
I have one Stella Blue and 2 Orange Buds in my grow room now. Today, they are at 18th day in flowering after 5 vegetative period. They seem perfectly healthy till now, and began to flower at many branches although they are under 220 Watt CFL s.
I have bought 20 kg organic soil, divided to 3 pots + 300 g sand and 2.5 lt perlite (for each pot)
I also do not follow any ph or EC values.
At third week I gave them 7-3-6 fertilizer, at 4th week I gave again. In flowering I gave 2 times 3-6-6 fertilizer.
I really don't know what am I going to get t the end, since it is my first grow ever. But I hope 1oz dry per plant. Hopefully I will get it at the end.
If you have any question about my grow, I would try to give any helpful information so far.
Cheers...
I have one Stella Blue and 2 Orange Buds in my grow room now. Today, they are at 18th day in flowering after 5 vegetative period. They seem perfectly healthy till now, and began to flower at many branches although they are under 220 Watt CFL s.
I have bought 20 kg organic soil, divided to 3 pots + 300 g sand and 2.5 lt perlite (for each pot)
I also do not follow any ph or EC values.
At third week I gave them 7-3-6 fertilizer, at 4th week I gave again. In flowering I gave 2 times 3-6-6 fertilizer.
I really don't know what am I going to get t the end, since it is my first grow ever. But I hope 1oz dry per plant. Hopefully I will get it at the end.
If you have any question about my grow, I would try to give any helpful information so far.
Cheers...
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