~ 8 weeks
@hesh, thanks for the props! Here's a quick, preliminary smoke report for you, as I've sampled two of the plants so far. I dried the tiny buds from GW8, the plant that went full hermie on me at 6 weeks. The taste is nothing, as you can imagine, but the effect is potent, even at 6 weeks. After smoking it I immediately want to get up and do something. Provides a good bit of motivation and two tokes is plenty to get me buzzed. I have also smoked the tiny "leaf nug" that i picked from GW2 last week. It was enough for only two hits, which I took before I went to bed after a long day that involved lots of cross-country skiing, sex, eating and drinking. I was exhausted, but I could feel my heartbeat accelerate right after I toked the Grail Widow. Despite the long day, a full meal and two big-ass martinis, I no longer wanted to sleep so I stayed up and did some reading. The words "cerebral" and "clarity" bounced around in my brain as I tried to characterize the high. Not at all debilitating or stupefying. Real nice glow. I don't know how long the buzz lasted but I went to sleep about two hours later than I should have. Based on my limited, preliminary experience with seriously immature buds, it looks like the Grail Widow will live up to its reputation and hopefully give me what I've been looking for. I'm really psyched about these plants and looking forward to smoking some properly finished and cured bud.
OK, it's time for a full update at F58 (~ 8 weeks). Here's the executive summary.
GW2 at F58. She's still my favorite plant and the upper colas are slowly and steadily swelling. I still think she's going to go 14 weeks.
The smell starts with a sour camphor-astringent that fades to a floral incense. I found two small nanners which I attribute to two power outages over a two-day period that interrupted the light cycle. We have another Noreaster coming tomorrow with 6"-12" of wet heavy snow forecast here so there may be more power interruptions.
GW2 cola at F58. The pistils in the main colas are still white/creamy (except for that funny little patch of brick-colored pistils), although the pistils in the lower buds are reddish. Looks like the lower buds are more mature, so maybe I'll clip and dry one each week so I can see how the effect develops as the buds ripen.
GW3 at F58. Odor starts out as pungent sour haze, then lime, then floral. I think this one will go 12-13 weeks. This plant doesn't appear to be swelling as much as GW2, and I don't think it's going to yield a lot.
GW3 flower at F58. Gorgeous. Gotta love those stacked calyxes and foxtailed leaves in the colas. I call it a very porous cola, it's like a skeleton with the bones made of stacked calyxes and you can kinda see through it.
GW7 seed plant at F58. Odor starts out as something sour on top of peanut butter, then fades to a beautiful sweet incense. Man, I love how this plant looks to be a good yielder. Bud morphology definitely toward the widow side of the spectrum. The upper colas have white/cream pistils while the lower buds have more reddish pistils. Best guess is this is a 12-week plant, maybe more due to all the white pistils.
GW7c clone at F58.
GW7 cola at F58.
GW7c main cola at F58. This thing is enormous. Perilously close to one of the COBs but seems to be happy there.
NHM 2 at F58. Highly resinous runt of the litter with a beautiful odor of lime, pine and sweet haze. The NHM plants lack the acrid smell of the GW plants and I think will taste incredible. This one has leaves and even a few calyxes that are getting purple, probably due to low temps (59F) in the tent during lights off.
NHM 2 flower at F58. Dense, small buds, but very resinous and fantastic smell.
NHM3 at F58. Similar smell as NHM2 but more faint. Pretty good yielder for it's size, as the colas continue to swell. I did something this plant didn't like as a lot of the leaves are brown and crunchy. Could be the fact that this pot has reused coco.
NHM3 cola at F58. Lots of foxtailing going on.