High Plains Drifter is Growing Some Spice

High Plains

New member
Spice of Life: A Newbie Grow

Hello MNS Family. This will be my first grow journal… hopefully the first of many successful journeys. I want to give a bit of background to start… and I tend to be pretty verbose… so feel free to skip my ramblings (titled “The Back Story”) and just watch the grow (titled “The Spice Grow” further below) if you so desire. Any and all advice/constructive criticism is welcomed and appreciated. So to the back story… (I’m a fan of ellipses if you haven’t already noticed)…

The Back Story

I had my first toke off of a joint when I was 3 years old. I actually remember it… at least the hitting it part. I brought the experience up to my father recently, and he corrected me and told me that the day my mother got home from the hospital, she smoked a joint before breast feeding me, and I got pretty high, so in essence, I got high within the first 24 hours of being born. Well actually it turns out that my mother also ingested some LSD before she knew she was pregnant with me. So maybe that’s the first time I was high. But I digress…

I spent my first year of college at Humboldt State University, and I grew a great appreciation for the sacred herb in a way that I had previously not had. I knew I wanted to grow, but my focus was elsewhere. Besides, I didn’t really have the means or the know how. I tried once, but, as I just stated, didn’t have the means or know how to do it correct. I actively petitioned for, and voted for, prop 215 in California (my home state) in the 90’s. But considering that I have been fortunate enough to never have a debilitating illness, I never thought I could justify or qualify for a medical MJ card. I played with the idea for years of how I could convince a doctor that I should qualify, but also had a fear that somehow this would come back to haunt the career that I was working towards.

Fast forward to last April. I finally felt that I had enough evidence that I would not be prosecuted for having a MMJ card, and so I took the plunge and got one. As I’ve previously stated, I am fortunate enough to not suffer from a profound illness. The primary reason I use herb is to deal with stress and to generally improve the quality of my life. It does help me with stomach ailments, and it does help me deal with some herniated disc issues, if only to help me not mind the pain so much… not really take the pain away… but that’s kind of the same thing… right?

For those of you who don’t know, or more accurately, haven’t experienced, just how beautiful a thing it is to walk into a dispensary or collective and walk out with your choice of medicine… well all I can say is I’m sure you can imagine. But almost instantly it hit me that I was now in a position to grow my own. And not only that, I now had the means to do it… maybe not the know how… but I am a fairly educated individual, and believe that I have the ability to learn about things fairly easily… especially the things that greatly interest me. But there was a problem…

Where could I get seeds? At first I was thinking that I might be able to find someone who might gift them to me… but who? I have many friends who smoke, but none (at least at that time) who grow. And all my friends who smoke, smoke sensimilla. I was in a quandary. I began researching the topic on the internet. And what I found blew my mind. All of those names that they give to herb were not complete bullshit. Of course many of them are. But come to find out there is actually a whole scientific field dedicated to cannabis. And many of the names associated with strains have a very rich history. My interest was piqued to say the least. So I began to research…. and research I did. And I kept coming up with this particular strain as one of the most recognized and loved in the world… White Widow.

But I found it very confusing that White Widow was sold everywhere… seed companies… and with varying reports as to quality. And it occurred to me that the reason that this strain had garnered so much attention to begin with was because of its HTCC awards. And so I began researching pedigree. And where I was led was straight to MNS and, to one of my newest personal heroes, Scott Blakey A.K.A. Shantibaba. As I continued researching and learning, it became clear to me that what I really wanted came from MNS. But at the same time I was once again confused that I could not order directly from MNS, and that almost all of the strains were sold out at the links. I just assumed that MNS did not deal direct, and that the reason that the linked-sites were all sold out was just due to demand for great genetics. Needless to say, most of the strains I was interested in, that short time ago, were not available. At the same time I began trolling the MNS site and really getting a lot of great knowledge from the members there. I began toying with the idea of joining. However I was hesitant as I had never before, and not since, joined any forum on the internet. But as I read on, I felt that I just could not help myself, and I really wanted to be part of the community. I think that was right before some of all of the negativity that has been around lately had begun to surface, but once again, I digress.

So I joined after having ordered my first batch of seeds, MNS Master Kaze, from Dr. Chronic. I was suspicious that they would not arrive, but figured it would be a learning experience. While waiting, I found a dispensary in my area that was selling Cali Connection seeds, and so I decided to pick some of those up too. I have read that some members here are not too fond of Cali Connection, but I will leave that one alone for the moment. So the day that I went to pick up the Cali seeds, I get home, and what do I find waiting in my mail box…? Well you already know. Now I had three strains… CC Sour OG, CC Raskal’s OG, and MNS Master Kaze. Well I didn’t have a grow space set up yet, and I knew that I needed to do some more research to figure out how I would construct it. But I had beans! So it occurred to me that I should just try to pop some and grow them outside… after all it was June… plenty of time in Cali… right? So that’s what I did. I popped 5 of each. Well it didn’t take me too long to figure out that I didn’t like the idea of my prized beans being outside on my own property… birds will eat them… teenagers will look over the fence and steal them… nevermind that at this point it was really just an experiment to see what I could do. I got motivated real quick to build myself a grow space… and so I did. And those babies are about 30 days from harvest right now. I must admit that they went through some shocking times. After about 60 days, the Master Kaze babies were not much more than 4 inches tall. I kept them outside, then switched their light cycle to an MH bulb, then left them root locked for way too long. But like I said, this was an experiment to begin with, and I still have 14 Master Kaze seeds in my fridge. So out of the 5 Master Kaze babies I popped, 4 made it, and they’re all female. I’m sure they’re not living up to their potential, but they are loved and will be loved even more in the next couple months. They are actually looking alright. I’m sure that they’d look better if they had been treated better. But I’m excited nonetheless.

So after this I decided to try ordering from Attitude. I chose MNS Spice as my test run with them. They arrived no problem. It was around this time that I read a post from Shanti that indicated that he was coming back from his travels, and that ordering direct from MNS would soon be possible. This was a revelation to me as I still thought that MNS did not deal direct. I must admit that I’m still not clear on how MNS markets, but I do understand that members can order direct. I was overjoyed to discover this fact. I PM’d Shanti and got a list of strains to order, and am very close to placing my order… but one again I digress. Thank you to all who have kept with me this long.

The Spice Grow

Okay. I decided to try to pop 9 of the 18 Spice beans that I got in my pack from Attitude. I also popped some gifts and giveaways that I’d gotten (fems). But my real focus is on the spice. Well it seems I screwed up right from the beginning. After shaking them in a properly set up match box for 30 seconds, then dropping them in RO water for 24 hours, and then placing them in warm moist paper towels for an additional 24 hours, 7 of 9 Spice beans had nice tap roots exposed. I waited another 24 hours for the last 2 to show root, but no luck, so I placed the 7 in a very light mixture of Aurora Root Organic Coco Fiber Hydroponic Soilless Media. I’m still trying for the other two, but still no luck. But here’s where I screwed up. I placed them in the mixture while it was dry, and then gave it water. Well what happened is that the mixture was so light that when the water hit it, most of it floated. So my careful placement of tap root toward the earth may have floated around underneath the mixture. I recognized this as it was happening, but hoped for the best. I’ll tell you this much, I’ll never screw up and hope again. I should have changed techniques as soon as I realized the problem. But I will live and learn. A couple of the free giveaways also suffered, but I’m not too broken up about that fact. I placed them all under my new 6 bulb 3” by 4” T5 light for seedlings and clones and waited anxiously. Well to make a long story short, I have 6 Spice seedlings that have done a groundhog and seen their shadows. But I was so broken up that I got reckless and decided to try to pop the other 9 Spice seeds that I had left. I skipped the matchbox and placed them in RO water about an hour ago. So this grow will at least have 6 Spices, and hopefully 15. I could try to post seedling photos tonight, but I think I’ll have to wait to do that in the next day or two. I will be looking for a mother… and possibly a father. I still need to create a space for mothers and fathers, and given the fact that I travel for months at a time, will have to identify some good grow homies to look after my parents. But I’m pretty sure that I’ve already got that one on lockdown. As you can already tell, if you’ve read this far, I am very much a talker, and fairly detailed. My goal is to grow the quadruple double… Mango Haze, Super Silver Haze, La Nina, and… the holy grail… without actually being Neville’s version of the grail… Neville’s Haze. I realize that I’m not ready yet, but I can’t wait till I am! I have learned that I am a haze head. I’d really appreciate it if some of you old MNS heads would join in my experience and gift me with your knowledge. The one piece of progress I can report at this point is that the Spices popped out of the soilless mix first. And after some of the other non MNS’s dug their way out, the Spice sprouts were noticeably a darker green than any of the others. That goes for all 6. And beyond that, all of the Spices that germed showed tap roots before any of the others. Anyway… thank you in advance to anyone who pays attention to this grow. I’ll be posting photos very soon. Peace out to all who care about peace.
 
Report

Well I must sadly report that I am down to only 5 living and breathing Spices. One that popped up didn't make it. However, as I previously reported, I've got 9 more in the hopper. And I plan a completely different planting and feeding regime. Not that I’ve fed them yet, but the mix I was using had some built in nutrients… worm castings, bat guano, kelp meal, greensand, soluble kelp & leonardite. I plan to use GH Coco 75% with organic soil 25% for the rest of the seedlings. I’ll probably throw some pearlite in the mix at some point as well. I’ll then consider how to use my medium and nutes. We’ll see what happens. Hopefully great green dreams.
 
Can't wait to see the progress. I'm growing the spice also. All the phenos I had stretched for the first 3 weeks of flower (even from clones) so I would keep that in mind if you have height issues. They get big real fast. Also plan on flowering to go 12-13 weeks not 9 weeks like the description says. From what I've read they are suppose to lean on the indica side but I haven't seen any indica in my phenos. Yields really well and no tolerance build up from smoking to much. Super potent and it gets my ass motivated to get shit done. Hope ya don't mind me posting up my experience. Spice will be in my garden for a long time but I do think Shanti should maybe rewrite the description. The flower times are way off ime. Peace and *bong* dude.
 
What's going on devil? Thanks for stopping by. I'm glad to hear that Spice is a get up and go strain. I am not much into being couchlocked. I hope to get phenos like yours... I tend to lean more towards a sativa high... as long as it doesn't make me anxious or paranoid... which sometimes does happen for some reason. I've found that there's not much out there for Spice as far as grow reports. That's part of my motivation for posting one. A bit surprised to hear that flower goes that long, but I really don't mind as everything I grow, or will grow, is primarily for head stash, and to give away to my friends. I have about 5 1/2 to 6 feet of height in my space, so I'm pretty okay in that regard. but I plan to top the hell out of them, so that should keep them a bit shorter. I'll plan on putting some pics up soon, even though they are just baby seedlings at the moment. But I plan to document everything, so seedling pics count too.
 
Look forward to the show.

Howdy High Plains;
I look forward to tagging along on your spice journey my friend. I've got a pack thats been calling out to be grown. Just might have to pop a few and join in the fun. Can't wait to see your babies.
 
sorry to hear

Hi High Plains,

Sorry to hear of your back issues. That is my problem. I noticed you have a few herniated discs. I don't know if surgery is in your future, but if so. I had the option to do a very minor procedure. I chickened out, and later it became a major issue. In my case the major issues would have come anyways I feel, but don't be scared off. I also hope you can contain the troubles, and don't have to go thru a fusion. Let me say one more thing. If they are ever going to do surgery, and they want you to take a test called a Discography, or Discogram. I think that is what they are called. Do you best to get them not to, and to use the MRI to find the bad areas. That test they stick needles into your back without pain meds. They have to see where the pain is. These needles get into your discs to see the bad ones which I felt the Mri should have already told them. It is a torture, and painful. By the time they give you the morphine when the test is done. You already hurt like hell.

Ooopps went off on a tangent there. Sorry for that. Be well, and there are many here who face the back troubles. Good sources of info to help you if needed. Good luck on the grow, and may it be heavy, and bountiful to you...Ns
 
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