A Pirate's Dinafem 2019 Outdoor Competition Voyage

[Happyeccentric]

2 hours ago, lattitudepirate1 said:

  Ive put the widows into LST early.

I'm sure this is a stupid question but what is LST ? 

[zug]

Low Stress Training.

 

I.e. bend that bitch over!

[lattitudepirate1]

Ahoy all, 

 

I hope everyone is being blessed with warm winds and fair sunshine on this spectacular record breaking easter bank holiday weekend. I had intended on working today but ended up sacking it off with the renewed intentions of checking up on the girls and maybe popping a few more beanies this afternoon! 

 

First up is the two WW autos, they're really starting to grow now. The last three days has been perfect in the greenhouse with temperatures peaking just below 30c. I fitted some new gas window vents this year and i'm still adjusting slowly to get the windows open to their full potential without them being pushed too far. 

 

 

Next up we have the Critical +2.0, Again - nothing to complain about so far. Looking very healthy. 

 

 

 

All have been fed with a 1:4 part strength soluble growmore @ 18-18-18 NPK. First feed was Friday the 19th and second given today just before I took these pics.

 

Hope everyone had a good and safe 4/20 if thats your thing! 

 

ATB,

 

LP

Edited April 22, 2019 by lattitudepirate1

[Dinafem-Mark]

On 22/04/2019 at 1:25 PM, lattitudepirate1 said:

Hope everyone had a good and safe 4/20 if thats your thing! 

 

If 4/20 ain't your thing then I'm not sure UK420 is the right community

 

Your getting some nice growth brother, they look to be coming out of the young seedling stage and becoming small plants 

 

Getting nice temps in the greenhouse which is definitely helping 

 

Thanks for the outdoor update mate 

 

All the best 

 

Mark..

[lattitudepirate1]

@Dinafem-Mark

 

 Thanks Mark, all smooth sailing so far with the Dinafem gang so far.

 

Im defiantly in the right community! However i'm long done with going to these big rallies/ Hyde park protests - I think must be getting old, boring and antisocial! 

 

Call me the antisocial pirate, yarrrrr! 

 

Atb! 

 

LP

[Dinafem-Mark]

On 24/04/2019 at 7:42 AM, lattitudepirate1 said:

Call me the antisocial pirate, yarrrrr! 

 

The wife calls me something similar mate but I can't repeat on a forum

 

I think we're just getting old

 

All the best 

 

Mark..

[lattitudepirate1]

Ahoy all, 

 

I hope everyones had a successful start albeit the weather now taking a turn for the worse for the next week or so. Here at Lat 51 its showing lows of 2 degrees tomorrow night. Supposedly one of the coldest May bank holidays incoming for 40 odd years. 

 

Just a quick update with a few snaps from yesterday in the greenhouse. I really feel I should change the name of this diary to 'Extreme bondage 101'. Heres why... 

 

You can see that both widows below have been bent and LST'ed, they're chucking out some nice branching which ill train the tops out on for maximum tops. Will be expecting some pistils in the next week or so, There may even be some already but my eyesight clearly needs a retest. 

 

The Critical below has also been bent and manipulated to keep a low profile. I made the decision to top mid last week and already she is showing 4 small shoots which ill again train up and out to become the main supporting branches of this girl. 

 

I will be starting the next wave of WW autos next week, I may even pop another critical in too. 

 

Cheers & ATB

 

LP

 

 

 

[lattitudepirate1]

Forgot to mention, they have been fed every watering with a 1/4 strength of 18-18-18 soluble growmore. I think ill start upping the feed to half strength after this next cold spell. Last night the farmers were out in force muck spreading - I think I remember reading that farmers will not spread muck or slurry unless the weather has a high chance of staying fair for them or its just washed and wasted or left to sit in cold temps doing nothing. All good signs despite the pong  Had one or two pesky greenfly about which were removed by hand. Luckily they seem to prefer the tobacco and I have many of them to suckle at! 

Edited May 3, 2019 by lattitudepirate1
Greenfly

[flighty]

Looking good mate.

 

A bit of advice for lst, the idea is to bend the top over so that when it rights it's self the top is below another node. Plants try to send the majority of the growth hormones to the highest point, so doing the above changes the highest point of the plant and thus where the hormones are sent. 

 

Hope that makes sense, I had the wife waffling in my ear while I was writing it

[lattitudepirate1]

@beezee Yeah dude, I get what LST is and how auxins redistribute when you bend a growing tip downwards.

 

Starting the LST early and keeping them as low profile as possible has converted what would be 10cm of upwards growth into 2cm of vertical height.

 

Without starting these off with supplemental lighting Im going to reduce all the height I possibly can. Plus it should allow me to pull secondary branching up and out easier without crossing any branches. 

 

Previous years i've started LST later and i've never got as much bend in as I wished. There was one year where I trained the tops out on a single plant and she was by far the best structured plant I have ever grown.  (Pictured below) 

 

 

Im not on a mission to keep them 100% flat! nor am I actually into bondage. Just need some lignification on that bottom horizontal main stem, then the branching will be pulled out to create an even canopy and as many tops as I can get. (similar to the picture above but if I can create more symmetry - its gonna do wonders for OCD matters!

 

Cheers dude! 

 

LP 

[flighty]

Ah right, I see what your doing now 

 

I'm lazy so I just bend the main stem right over and let the lowers grow big 

[lattitudepirate1]

@beezee haha I'm sure i'm just being extra & gives me more reason to check/ fiddle with the girls! The older I get the more of a perfectionist I am becoming. (or try to be) If everything could be perfectly uniform and symmetrical that would be great, thanks! 

 

Cheers! 

[Happyeccentric]

Thanks for the explanations on lst.  Great pics and descriptions on how to do it for me.  

[Dinafem-Mark]

On 03/05/2019 at 8:00 AM, lattitudepirate1 said:

Just a quick update with a few snaps from yesterday in the greenhouse. I really feel I should change the name of this diary to 'Extreme bondage 101'. Heres why... 

 

Love it

 

Getting that training and manipulation stated early. This should be fun

 

Thanks for the weekly update mate. Looking good from here 

 

All the best 

 

Mark..

[lattitudepirate1]

Ahoy all! Apologies for the slack updates, I tell myself i'm going to get out in the garden & take some pictures, resize and upload and never manage getting around to it. I ended up catching a few days away with the Mrs a couple weeks ago as a last min thing & now i'm playing catch up with life & work. 

 

Back to the garden... The gardens all looking great. The two early widows are chunking up nicely and showing some first frosty signs. I think ill move them to a spot with better airflow in the coming weeks to help prevent rot and alike. You might notice one of the widows is less horizontally trained than the other. This is because my wonderful moggy jumped up in the greenhouse looking for a sunny spot and snapped a branch. All was not lost, I sellotaped the partially severed branch up and a few weeks on, its as if nothing happened at all! Its worth noting that the final picture of the two widows together was taken approx 3 weeks ago compared with the first two showing close ups of the flowers stacking. 

 

No pictures of the critical gang, ill get them up for next week. The early critical I have taken two cuttings from approx 4 weeks ago, one rooted and is growing on and the other i'm not so sure about. 

 

The mum critical has been trained and semi mainlined after taking cuttings. I say semi mainlined as its not as neat nor as symmetrical as I would like but hey ho! 

 

Im gonna try my best not to be so slack with the updates from here on out. Tune in next week for more action from the high seas. 

 

Cheers! 

 

LP