So my buddy BarleyBurningBarlyBurnHardly had these plants that got pretty big while vegging but he didn’t have room to get them in larger pots until recently. He said. I repotted them both into 3 gals 2 in hempy buckets and 2 in fabric pots to do a comparison. They were repotted about 6 days ago. Should I top them heavily and veg a while longer? The leaves are starting to rise again. I didn’t use buffered coco so it takes a bit to build up my calcium I believe I was seeing brown spots and droopy leaves until watering yesterday. The plants are pretty bushy and around 2.5-3 ft tall they were in the 1 gal pots for a lil over a month I believe. Feeding the captains recipe for gh nutes at around 700 ppm in coco perlite.
I guess my main question is when should I have enough root mass in these 3 gallon pots going from a 1 gallon that was pretty heavily root bound to safely flip? 2 240w hlg quantum boards and a 1200 (330W) blurple. I don’t want to have small larfy flowers but I have a really small veg which presents this problem with not having a large pot to move into flower. How do you guys get around this with small veg area? It is approx 2.5ftx2ftx4.5-5 tall light takes space. I can fit 4 one gals and some smaller stuff but can’t figure out how I need to go about this. I would like to have a harvest that isn’t all at once as in veggin in the flower tent to gain size then switching to flower instead I wanna just drop a plant from veg into my flower. I have a 4×8 for flower but only about 6ft of proper light coverage.
If this was your setup how would you go about this?
I could use a good lollypoping tutorial too if anyone knows of one. I have watched tons of vids on it but its hard to see what I really need to remove on most of them.
quart of nutes for scale
If you’re going to top them I would give them at least a week to recover.
If you have the room I would flatten out that canopy with whatever method you choose and lollipop. Try to take off anything that won’t reach the top when stretched and clean up any sites that won’t get light and take away energy from the tops. I usually wind up taking about a third of the growth off from the bottom.
I usually don’t worry about the roots filling the pot too much and don’t want to get root bound in flower.
You can try main lining if you want to extend your veg time a little, it keeps your plants height more manageable and the lollipoping is done in veg.
I may do some supercropping and def need to do as you say and remove a lot of the lower stuff. My last go I had a ton of mediocre stuff from down there I don’t want. You think it would be ok but that energy could have went to something better. I just have such a hard time cutting healthy growth i feel like I am hurting the plant lol.
The reason I ask about the roots is I hear them mention on the show often about how repotting in flower isn’t ideal so how long before flower is it that you do need to repot?
I have thought of scrogging again but I did that last time and couldnt get in and around my plants made it pretty frustrating and hard for ipm I ended up with spidermites bad. I am thinking of odering plant yoyos or maybe making something like a cage to sit around them this time instead of scrogging. Although the net did help with the skinny limbs.
I for sure dont have to worry about getting root bound they have 2 extra gallons of coco going from 1 gallon. I would think I would need to let it grow into that some before flipping. I want to have thick dense buds.
When you say main lining you are talking about what bending it over and letting the limbs for tops? From what i have read main lining is done when the plant is super small and is something like making a manifold. Could be totaly wrong there though I am still learning.
Have you found the lollypopping really increases your quality?
Lollipoping definitely gets rid of the larfy crap that never seems to pan out.
I’ve found that it makes the tops fill out more and some of the bud beneath the very tops get bigger also plus it helps prevent pests and gets more air circulation around the bottom of the plant.
My point with the roots was not to veg them too long or you will wind up in the same situation , I guess I could have phrased that a little different.
Main lining or manifolding is done when you have six nodes. You top at the third node and strip the bottom so you have two limbs growing from the same place on the plant tie those two limbs down and top until the desired bud sites are achieved.
There are a few tutorials online and I know what you mean about cutting on them but has to be done. I grow in hempy buckets and can easily overload my ass because in the time it takes to flower a run you can have veg plants too big to flower in a tent.
Thanks I appreciate the help. Guess I am just gonna have to bite my lip and go to cutting. I have 2 of these in some hempy buckets and 2 in the fabric pots wanted to compare them.
Dude I have the exact same prob. By the time my flower.
I believe I am past the time I could mainline these though. Does it give you a better effect than just tying the plant down and other methods to get more tops?
Yeah with those plants you just have to keep them from getting too close to the lights now by tying. You could use bamboo stakes and welded wire and make individual scrogs so you can still move them. I do this with some of mine but the ones that stretch like crazy I like to mainline.
The idea with mainlining is you have all the growth concentrated at the same nodes and the results are really cool and the buds are usually uniform. You can choose how many colas you want by topping.
It is more labor intensive though but it’s worth it in my opinion.
I mainlined my First Lady. That snip at the 3rd node was really tough for me to do. You’d think I was performing surgery (which I guess I was). She turned out beautifully with 8 symmetrical tops. Only regret is not taking that top for a clone, I know better now. It gets easier as you learn and get to know your plant
CWN
Yep knowing the strain is important, you can’t do it with some Indica strains because the stretch is so small that it really isn’t worth it. But something that will double or triple in stretch is a good candidate.
Seedlings are better to start with also, I’ve tried with a few clones but need more practice with them because the results weren’t as good due to the non typical growth.
Nugbuckets did a tutorial on mainlining which also includes how to mainline a clone which was compiled and edited by Nebula Haze
https://www.growweedeasy.com/mainlining-nugbuckets
These plants are 3 feet tall and pretty thick like finger thickness. Wouldn’t they be to big for mainlining at this point though. I have some smaller ones that will be in even worse shape though if I don’t try something. I may watch a tutorial and try one.
I do need to take a few cuts. Maybe put the strain on the back burner a while. I have grown it quite a bit and its a pretty resilient with pretty good bug resistance compared to others I have tried and its a strain with good yields but not so much in taste but I believe that was my fault more than the plants. Mites screwed up my last grow although I got to harvest I left to long and didn’t flush correctly.
Every go you learn that is for certain.
Sweet. More learning material that’s why I like this community.
Yes the 3 footers are too far along to mainline but can be tied down to even out the canopy and help with height in stretch if that’s gonna be an issue.
You can do individual scrogs with welded wire or pieces of netting and some bamboo stakes.
You can still move them around unlike a full scrog.
I may have to try that I already have the stuff to do it so its just a matter of taking the time. Only prob now is if I make them much bigger wide I wont have enough light again. If I was to trim everything that wasnt reaching the top most of the plant would be lost. I really have to work on my training game.
Not sure if we’ve helped with your specific questions as yet. You’re right, way too late to mainline. If it was me and I was tight on space, I’d move them to the flower room, shave the legs getting rid of bottom 1/3rd as well as clean up the middle and have a look through down from the top and prob take a few larger leaves that are blocking top 1/3 Potential bud sites or where there is leaf on leaf. Just remember it’s better to go light on the defoliation cause you can’t glue them back on. During this defoliation I’d take as many cuttings as I was looking for. You may also want to check out Kyle Kushmans utube video on chiropractic plant training where he heavily defoliates, twists and snaps the stems(Rasta Jeff also recommends this style of supercropping) as well as he shows how to fully supercrop to even out the canopy.
I’m still pretty new to growing but I’m committed to learning everything I can and I’ve had success to now with these techniques. You can also check out nebula hazes web page that has tons of tutorials. Hope this helps
CWN
Cool, I will check those out thanks. I really need to get that figured out. I took a ton of stuff out today but I am scared of taking the wrong stuff . Need to see it described what and where and why we are taking it. I hate cutting green growth but I like having a good yield but I wanna have the best buds as well. LOL makes it hard.
I have supercropped before and had good results with it.
Thanks for the info. I just checked a minute ago and the roots seem to have filled the pots in the week they have been in them. I couldnt push my finger down without breaking them in the new medium so I guess I could flip them anytime now. I wish I had more light and more room though.