PNutGallery
New member
Greetings. I figured this as good a place as any to introduce myself, since I really enjoy the art of keeping mothers. Personally, keeping bonsai moms for a number of years taught me a lot about growing weed and container growing, in general. It taught me all about weed's response to pruning and shaping, how to water properly and avoid long term salt build up, etc.
All kinds 'o neat stuff.
This was a medical garden, but it was over x,xxx in plant count, located in a county that had a ban on medical grows, and lacked supporting paperwork. So, basically, it was a 100% illegal weed grow in the x,xxx range. Mildly asshole puckering in those numbers. It was supposed to be up to snuff and legit (I had a business partner that, well ...) and this was a few years ago right before the legislation regarding dispensaries in Colorado passed.
Keeping all of that in mind, I was judicious with the pics I took. Namely, not many, and, unfortunately, I can't show you a clone closet full, with x,xxx cuttings in it, 'cause I never wanted to have a pic of that available to the po-po ...
In addition to supplying my garden with clones, the new legislation required dispensaries start growing their own, versus what had been going on with most of them, which was dudes walking around with a pound of weed in a backpack, knocking on dispensary's doors. Most dispensaries were NOT started by growers, expert or otherwise, so they couldn't really supply all their own weed. But, with the legislation, there was a mad rush for clones.
Enter, well, me.
This is looking down a row of a 24 site RDWC system that was lit by 6 vertical thowies. I obviously had it top fed, a chiller, a big daddy air pump, etc. There are 24 different strains in that system, all on the same nutrient solution which starts at about 5.2, or so, runs to about 6.1 over the course of days and then is dumped and changed. Something, if you believe the 'weed forum banter', can't be done without issue, as each strain requires its own mix and I am in "like, totally the wrong pH range for weed and RDWC, dude." The exceptions were Sativa or heavy Sativa dominant hybrids, but for most Indicas and Hybrids, they are not as individually finiky as people say.
High production Bonsai Moms. PNutGallery style ...
I had just gone down this row and done a little maintenance haircut:
Another shot, with some mothers in PPV and Homers fighting for light:
Some smaller moms in an 4x4 Ebb & Flow under a bat wing thowie, with 5 gallon PPV buckets ringed around the tray:
The plant you see with the three woody stems is a Bubblegum mom that is probably 7 years old in that pic and spent most of her years in a 6" pot, bonsai'ed and under a CFL. When I opened that room, I up-potted her a couple times and buried the meristem, and she grew to fit a 5 gallon pot quickly. Bonsai plants can be, after years, grown out:
That plant center top that you can just see the woody stem and bucket? Right below the vertical light bulb? Well, that just so happens to be a Super Silver Haze. Probably 7-8 years old at the time, previously bonsai'ed for years. STILL one of my all time favorites. Kudos to the breeder of that beauty. That's an AK-47 on the right, also an ex-bonsai. It and a couple others got tagged hard by fungus gnats not too long before I upped their production. Got the fungus, lost a couple major stems coming off the meristems on a couple plants (that Bubblegum used to have two more major branches, too), and it took a while for stem strength to recover on the plant:
This is just some random mother, couldn't tell you what strain as I was running 60, or so, at any one time in that room and probably had 80 different strains run through there:
Earlier on in the room, seeing how many plants I can get under one light:
A random tray of rooted clones ready to go. I usually had multiple strains per tray:
Me getting some freshly rooted potted up and ready to go to another dispensary, and BubbaDog keeping an eye on things. RIP BubbaDog, RIP buddy:
A look at the closet with some clones in it:
Of course, you need power. My boot and some big ass electrical cables:
I'll take some 'o dat. Please and thankyou:
When that boot wasn't hanging out around clone trays and power cables, it was walking around ski area mountains in the summer, doing random, fun things and kicking ice off of a snowcat in the winter. Retired from all of that a few years ago and now at 42 and beat to shit with nerve damage, needing multiple back surgeries, etc., already having had multiple broken bones and surgeries. Lot's 'o crashin' going way too fast on too many things over the years ...
I'm obviously fan of the average grower keeping bonsai moms. Even if you just have a one light 400 Watt grow. You can keep half a dozen moms, your own strain bank, under a 27 watt CFL in a closet for years.
Being a Strain Chaser doesn't really pay off, these days. There are so many bullshit named strains out there, it ain't funny. Saw it with my own eyes - people taking a strain and renaming it for business purposes, to make it 'more appealing'. I guarantee you Shanti's SSH is being sold in Colorado dispensaries under another name or two, 'cause I personally put a whole bunch 'o those fuggin' awesome genes into the system a few years ago ...
But, we live in a world where names sell, most breeders are just Seeders, chuckin' pollen, chasing dollar bills, like dispensary owners, so they'll call it whatever they think their customers want to hear it called.
One other thing I want to point out, is my take on pH. All of those plants, including the mothers in peat/perlite/vermiculite (PPV), were fed the exact same nute regiment (ppms varied, but pH and proportions the same). And a fresh nutrient solution for them started at about 5.2, or so.
I know many weed forum veterans have seen this chart:
It isn't any good. The guy who made that, St0ney, was a mediocre hydro grower when he made that chart. No insult, just an objective observation of a knucklehead, me, who happened to be a member of the same site, Hemp Cultivation, that he was when he made it. He was also a mod, so we all know how that works. Every new member assumes mods are kick ass growers (whether they are or not), and people like to kiss mod's asses and lavish praise on them.
No offense, anyone. Considering the intent here was for no mods, I hope ya'll understand that I am trying to explain how that chart is incorrect, yet managed to get popular and plastered everywhere, not comment on anyone here. Incidentally and tangentially, it's not funny, but I did snicker when I read it was Japan Freak that pushed things over the edge - I've dealt with that knucklehead jackass on the weed forums over the years.
Anyway, that chart is incorrect because a bar graph does not accurately represent the process. Absorption occurs at different rates at different pH. Further, St0ney's numbers are wrong. Certainly for hydro. This is what I believe to be a much more accurate pH chart to consult:
One of the reasons I wanted to bring that up in this thread, is because it pertains to the maintenance of those mother in PPV. PPV is NOT soil. It is a soiless mix, for it lacks clay and sand, which affects ionic exchange. I always add more perlite, and once you do, those 5 gallon Homer buckets are nothing more than a Hand-Watered-Drain-To-Waste Hydro system. They are soiless hydro gorws, NOT soil grows.
And respond very, very well to being treated such and with the soilless pH ranges of 5.1, or so, to 6.1-2, or so. Feed low pH, as medium dries out and exchange occurs, the rootzone pH will swing, floating a range. 10-15% runoff to clean out the old, get the pH back down.
There are obviously some nutrient manufacturer selection issues (like choosing one that starts in the low 5's when mixed), but I've seen a lot of issues, over the years, for trying to treat Indoor PPV like soil. It can be pulled off, but ...
And there was not one drop of Cal/Mag, one lick of Epsom Salt, nor any pH Up or Down every used in those nutrient solutions. With the pH I run being anything but coincidental to that. It, I believe, is responsible for my not needing any of that stuff. Stuff, that when used, can actually create problems, more so than is pointed it out or discussed on the weed forums ...
So, I'm a farmer. Figured my introductory post belonged in a farmin' sub-forum. And I looove the art of mother keeping.
So, Howdy MNS Folks, how the hell all ya'll doin'?
All kinds 'o neat stuff.
This was a medical garden, but it was over x,xxx in plant count, located in a county that had a ban on medical grows, and lacked supporting paperwork. So, basically, it was a 100% illegal weed grow in the x,xxx range. Mildly asshole puckering in those numbers. It was supposed to be up to snuff and legit (I had a business partner that, well ...) and this was a few years ago right before the legislation regarding dispensaries in Colorado passed.
Keeping all of that in mind, I was judicious with the pics I took. Namely, not many, and, unfortunately, I can't show you a clone closet full, with x,xxx cuttings in it, 'cause I never wanted to have a pic of that available to the po-po ...
In addition to supplying my garden with clones, the new legislation required dispensaries start growing their own, versus what had been going on with most of them, which was dudes walking around with a pound of weed in a backpack, knocking on dispensary's doors. Most dispensaries were NOT started by growers, expert or otherwise, so they couldn't really supply all their own weed. But, with the legislation, there was a mad rush for clones.
Enter, well, me.
This is looking down a row of a 24 site RDWC system that was lit by 6 vertical thowies. I obviously had it top fed, a chiller, a big daddy air pump, etc. There are 24 different strains in that system, all on the same nutrient solution which starts at about 5.2, or so, runs to about 6.1 over the course of days and then is dumped and changed. Something, if you believe the 'weed forum banter', can't be done without issue, as each strain requires its own mix and I am in "like, totally the wrong pH range for weed and RDWC, dude." The exceptions were Sativa or heavy Sativa dominant hybrids, but for most Indicas and Hybrids, they are not as individually finiky as people say.
High production Bonsai Moms. PNutGallery style ...
I had just gone down this row and done a little maintenance haircut:
Another shot, with some mothers in PPV and Homers fighting for light:
Some smaller moms in an 4x4 Ebb & Flow under a bat wing thowie, with 5 gallon PPV buckets ringed around the tray:
The plant you see with the three woody stems is a Bubblegum mom that is probably 7 years old in that pic and spent most of her years in a 6" pot, bonsai'ed and under a CFL. When I opened that room, I up-potted her a couple times and buried the meristem, and she grew to fit a 5 gallon pot quickly. Bonsai plants can be, after years, grown out:
That plant center top that you can just see the woody stem and bucket? Right below the vertical light bulb? Well, that just so happens to be a Super Silver Haze. Probably 7-8 years old at the time, previously bonsai'ed for years. STILL one of my all time favorites. Kudos to the breeder of that beauty. That's an AK-47 on the right, also an ex-bonsai. It and a couple others got tagged hard by fungus gnats not too long before I upped their production. Got the fungus, lost a couple major stems coming off the meristems on a couple plants (that Bubblegum used to have two more major branches, too), and it took a while for stem strength to recover on the plant:
This is just some random mother, couldn't tell you what strain as I was running 60, or so, at any one time in that room and probably had 80 different strains run through there:
Earlier on in the room, seeing how many plants I can get under one light:
A random tray of rooted clones ready to go. I usually had multiple strains per tray:
Me getting some freshly rooted potted up and ready to go to another dispensary, and BubbaDog keeping an eye on things. RIP BubbaDog, RIP buddy:
A look at the closet with some clones in it:
Of course, you need power. My boot and some big ass electrical cables:
I'll take some 'o dat. Please and thankyou:
When that boot wasn't hanging out around clone trays and power cables, it was walking around ski area mountains in the summer, doing random, fun things and kicking ice off of a snowcat in the winter. Retired from all of that a few years ago and now at 42 and beat to shit with nerve damage, needing multiple back surgeries, etc., already having had multiple broken bones and surgeries. Lot's 'o crashin' going way too fast on too many things over the years ...
I'm obviously fan of the average grower keeping bonsai moms. Even if you just have a one light 400 Watt grow. You can keep half a dozen moms, your own strain bank, under a 27 watt CFL in a closet for years.
Being a Strain Chaser doesn't really pay off, these days. There are so many bullshit named strains out there, it ain't funny. Saw it with my own eyes - people taking a strain and renaming it for business purposes, to make it 'more appealing'. I guarantee you Shanti's SSH is being sold in Colorado dispensaries under another name or two, 'cause I personally put a whole bunch 'o those fuggin' awesome genes into the system a few years ago ...
But, we live in a world where names sell, most breeders are just Seeders, chuckin' pollen, chasing dollar bills, like dispensary owners, so they'll call it whatever they think their customers want to hear it called.
One other thing I want to point out, is my take on pH. All of those plants, including the mothers in peat/perlite/vermiculite (PPV), were fed the exact same nute regiment (ppms varied, but pH and proportions the same). And a fresh nutrient solution for them started at about 5.2, or so.
I know many weed forum veterans have seen this chart:
It isn't any good. The guy who made that, St0ney, was a mediocre hydro grower when he made that chart. No insult, just an objective observation of a knucklehead, me, who happened to be a member of the same site, Hemp Cultivation, that he was when he made it. He was also a mod, so we all know how that works. Every new member assumes mods are kick ass growers (whether they are or not), and people like to kiss mod's asses and lavish praise on them.
No offense, anyone. Considering the intent here was for no mods, I hope ya'll understand that I am trying to explain how that chart is incorrect, yet managed to get popular and plastered everywhere, not comment on anyone here. Incidentally and tangentially, it's not funny, but I did snicker when I read it was Japan Freak that pushed things over the edge - I've dealt with that knucklehead jackass on the weed forums over the years.
Anyway, that chart is incorrect because a bar graph does not accurately represent the process. Absorption occurs at different rates at different pH. Further, St0ney's numbers are wrong. Certainly for hydro. This is what I believe to be a much more accurate pH chart to consult:
One of the reasons I wanted to bring that up in this thread, is because it pertains to the maintenance of those mother in PPV. PPV is NOT soil. It is a soiless mix, for it lacks clay and sand, which affects ionic exchange. I always add more perlite, and once you do, those 5 gallon Homer buckets are nothing more than a Hand-Watered-Drain-To-Waste Hydro system. They are soiless hydro gorws, NOT soil grows.
And respond very, very well to being treated such and with the soilless pH ranges of 5.1, or so, to 6.1-2, or so. Feed low pH, as medium dries out and exchange occurs, the rootzone pH will swing, floating a range. 10-15% runoff to clean out the old, get the pH back down.
There are obviously some nutrient manufacturer selection issues (like choosing one that starts in the low 5's when mixed), but I've seen a lot of issues, over the years, for trying to treat Indoor PPV like soil. It can be pulled off, but ...
And there was not one drop of Cal/Mag, one lick of Epsom Salt, nor any pH Up or Down every used in those nutrient solutions. With the pH I run being anything but coincidental to that. It, I believe, is responsible for my not needing any of that stuff. Stuff, that when used, can actually create problems, more so than is pointed it out or discussed on the weed forums ...
So, I'm a farmer. Figured my introductory post belonged in a farmin' sub-forum. And I looove the art of mother keeping.
So, Howdy MNS Folks, how the hell all ya'll doin'?
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