"Harvest time?" aka "Daddy are we there yet?"

[Doink]

So trawling the internet (as I do) for growing tips and guidance I came across an interesting site when I was looking for pitures of amber trichomes, that stated

"Some CBD herb genetics, even in the full ripening phase, will never get to have amber trichomes, so before attempting the impossible to achieve this coloring, it is important to be sure of the variety of hemp you are dealing with."

Now the strain in question is a White Widow CBD hybrid which is supposed to be a 50/50 CBD/THC mix and is fairly "weak" at 5-8% of both which suits me fine as a first grow.

What do you think? Rubbish or may be something to consider?

MJ

Possible, I've heard the same thing with some sativas.

[barney_b]

So trawling the internet (as I do) for growing tips and guidance I came across an interesting site when I was looking for pitures of amber trichomes, that stated

"Some CBD herb genetics, even in the full ripening phase, will never get to have amber trichomes, so before attempting the impossible to achieve this coloring, it is important to be sure of the variety of hemp you are dealing with."

Now the strain in question is a White Widow CBD hybrid which is supposed to be a 50/50 CBD/THC mix and is fairly "weak" at 5-8% of both which suits me fine as a first grow.

What do you think? Rubbish or may be something to consider?

MJ

I was waiting ages for tichome ripening on a sativa I grew once and Blue61 told me that some strains just aren't going to change on you. So then I had to consider the entire plant. The leaves (fading out), the pistils (lack of new white pistils) and the water uptake (bitch ain't drankin').

I usually try not to give "advice" but rather share relatable experiences. So I'd believe that it's possible that your plant may not go amber. That said, I'm still seeing a fair amount of white pistils so you may have some time yet.

Oh yes, meant to tell you earlier that you should avoid shots of the sugar leaves as they tend to mature faster than the calyxes.

Interested in hearing how this strain hits you.

Cheers
B

[MadJohn]

I was waiting ages for tichome ripening on a sativa I grew once and Blue61 told me that some strains just aren't going to change on you. So then I had to consider the entire plant. The leaves (fading out), the pistils (lack of new white pistils) and the water uptake (bitch ain't drankin').

I usually try not to give "advice" but rather share relatable experiences. So I'd believe that it's possible that your plant may not go amber. That said, I'm still seeing a fair amount of white pistils so you may have some time yet.

Oh yes, meant to tell you earlier that you should avoid shots of the sugar leaves as they tend to mature faster than the calyxes.

Interested in hearing how this strain hits you.

Cheers
B

Yeh just impatient

More seriously though I'm keeping a close eye on it so I don't think I'll miss it.

This plants been a bit of a nightmare from the start and it doesn't help I didn't keep good enough records of when I started and how long it's been. I can extrapolate from my emails of when things were delivered that it was probably potted on 26th Feb so this weekend coming will be week 11. According to the fantasy dates the seedbank give it's only supposed to be 7 weeks indoors so I'm definitely WAY over that. Worst guess I think we'd be coming up to the end of week 9 so either way I'm well over their figures.

I'll just twiddle my thumbs and be more patient. No harm in keeping the flush going another week if it's not ready, EC today was still 1.2 so it's pretty much stopped all neut uptake considering I'm using RO water.

Not sure I can give a good review as I have no frame of referrence for how it hits me. The last time I smoked anything was a single bowl of White Widow 20 years ago grown by a m8 of mine who didn't really know what he was doing. Before that it was another 15 years and some (in retrospect disgusting) slate, squidgie black and if I was REALLY lucky "afghan goldbar" that was all you could get back in the 80's, blim burns an all.

Not sure if I'm going to miss not "fluffing" the slate and burning my fingers or not...

Going from vague memories of that rubbish to my own grown is going to be....interesting

Thanks again

MJ

[MadJohn]

Here I am again with another week on update.

I'm somewhat confused....Again

So two weeks on from the first pictures I don't think I'm any further on.

Here's some new pictures.








So I don't think, looking at the main bud 2 weeks apart that it's changed shape or size. Certainly a number of the calyx have turned amber but apart from that it seems the same.

The treich pictures are a little confusing. I took the plant out today and took some more in depth pictures (so deeper into the canopy) and it's a mixed bag. I think I can definitely see the odd amber (tried to take a picture above) but it's still mostly cloudy with actually still the odd clear to my eye.

I'm tempted to give it another 2 or 3 days or maybe another week. Whats the thoughts? As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm WAY past the date it's supposed to be ready.

FWIW my EC is now down to 0.2 out (using RO I'd expect that to tend to 0) and I'm getting about 20% runoff from 2.5l (which in a 12l pot certainly implies the plant is still taking in water at least)

As always, hugely grateful for any responses.

MJ

[Farmer Geddon]

Have you done any snip tests?

When to harvest is personal preference. I would have chopped as soon as I saw one amber tric. Some like to see a lot of amber before they chop.

[V8]

The top and leaves will look milkyer then mid, lower and the center of the bud. I still see white pistols on her. I would give her a week to 2. Remember you want the center of the bud to be milky to.

V8

[MadJohn]

Have you done any snip tests?

When to harvest is personal preference. I would have chopped as soon as I saw one amber tric. Some like to see a lot of amber before they chop.

Yes I chopped off a bit of the lower flower same day you suggested it. Not taken one more recently (and not tested the other stuff though I did rapid dry it and grind it last week).

Hillariously I don't even have anything to smoke it with yet. Cost is always a consideration and so are my lungs. Want to get a vape but the decent ones (Mighty/Volcano) are pretty pricey. this month I needed a new light for the mini tent so next month I might have a bit of spare cash for one.

No rush it's my first try and if I mess it up I'm not going to mind too much. I have another 2 of those seeds anyway so I'll give them another go once I have another 2 or 3 grows under my belt and hopefully have a better time of it.

Blue Dream is already growing and looking a lot better than the WW CBD did early on so should be a better grow.

Cheers again

MJ

[MadJohn]

So this weekend I took the plunge and harvested. I'd been noticing amber trichomes on the part of the plant I could see and every other trichome I could see was cloudy. So harvesting I did and here's the result (obviously after trimming).



For my first ever grow I'm pretty chuffed overall. No idea on the weight I'll just have to wait for the dry weight. They're all now drying in my "drying" tent so I'll check on them in a week or so see how they're doing.

A few observations

1. The very bottoms of most of the buds were clearly getting no light and probably not much airflow so some of them came out a little "light" to my eye. No frame of refence so no idea if that's normal or not. Might just be because they were pretty large too.
2. Trimming is pain and I can see from the photo I didn't do as good a job as I thought I had. If there's any obvious stuff left over I will trim it dry
3. I'm worried with the size of the buds they're not going to fit into my bags. I assume they're ok to break up a bit once they're dry?

Overall as I say, pretty happy and thanks to everyone who chipped in. I have some Blue Dream Auto's growing now and starting their first week proper veg today. It's already looking a HELL of a lot healthier than this bud ever did so going to be interesting to see the results. I think I'm going to top it and LST it into a SCROG net and see if I can get a more even spread out canopy this time. I'm also going to be a bit sooner on the pruning so it gets a bit more air earlier on.

Thanks all again

MJ

[Farmer Geddon]

Congratulations.

Not that confusing once you've done it eh?

Beware drying too fast. Overdrying reduces the quality. Ideal humidity ime is more than what you want them to dry down to. ie. more than mid 60s. Fascinating how they'll dry down to RH62% in an RH 80% environment. Keeping the buds in brown paper bags will slow down the drying if your humidity is too low. Open the bags once a day to turn the buds and give a change of air.

The colas can be broken down to whatever size you prefer. After a rough hack, I give a proper trim when they're ready to be burped and end up with nothing larger than 1" diameter or they won't fit in my day to day stash jar.

[V8]

Enjoy your harvest man!

V8