G4 - Julius Caesar - 2x600 and 1x400 on Lightrail

[LEBDOG]

Well, it's Saturday, and I just finished chopping down G3 which brings me here to G4. G3 was another learning experience and though I am sure G4 will still teach me more, I am hoping to exhibit a fairly state of the art high quality grow.

I dream of the XXL Undercurrent system I see others using, but until I have more space and more power available. I have to do the best I can with what I have.

I currently have 3 potential mothers of Julius Caesar in my veg room.

I have cloned each of these and have the clones under a single 400w light running 100% in my flower room (I know it's a waste, but easy right now). As my G3 drys, I will be able to lower the light and run it at 200w as all my lights are adjustable digital ones.

On my lightbar I have 2-600x AgroSun HPS on Quantum adjustable ballasts, and then a single 400w Hortilux MH on a Lumitek Adjustable ballast. The lights are cooled on a closed system by a 6" Vortex fan.

My room is cooled by a large portable air conditioner. I have a single 6" fan connected to a large Phat filter to deodorize the room air. My air conditioners exhaust runs through a custom baffle and then sucks in to a 6" Hydrofarm fan. From the 6" Hydrofarm fan it blows the air in to a CD-800 ozone filter to neutralize the stink. There's about 20' of ducting after the CD-800 which give the exhaust air a bit of time to mix with the ozone before totally evacuating my grow room

As my camera is on loan, I attach a photo of G3 and how I layout the plants. I plan to use the same layout, just trimming down the canopy and useless lower nodes before they effect yield:

I am very excited to get this grow underway and hope that my results will be worthy of this great strain from Cali Connection!

 

[CAPO]

Hey Leb...looks like all new Smartpots. I was on their website and people were suggesting to run them through the washing machine with Oxy-Clean.
At more than a dollar per gallon I find them to be pricey. Are you saving your old ones?

 

[robeartobrenton]

Wow you got the tables rocking bro! your mothers and Crones look GREAT--- i did this for a minute but decided to go AeroNFT route... when i learned to build my own incredible system for under 100$!!!! - just have to use a water chiller! to keep nutes circulated and at the perfect temp!

- but if you decide to try aero - i will send you the plans for my system. you get to get rid of all of the messy stuff, rocks, rockwool cubes, and all of the cleanup that goes with those mediums! - plus you dont need to worry about any algy growing or bugs laying eggs in your rockwool!! ( has happened to me )

 

[LEBDOG]

Hey Leb...looks like all new Smartpots. I was on their website and people were suggesting to run them through the washing machine with Oxy-Clean.
At more than a dollar per gallon I find them to be pricey. Are you saving your old ones?

That's some good advice. The first time I ran them I had bubbles coming out of everywhere. Fortunately I ran the system without plants in it to test the flow and saw soap bubbles coming from the Smartpots. I planned to rinse them this time in my kitchen sink. If you hadn't brought this up I may have even forgotten to do this:).

I am wondering if the advice-above is for re-using them? I am not gonna re-use my old pots for this grow as I already got new ones, but am thinking about it next grow if I wash them.

Last grow I stacked the 5 gallon pots inside with 2-1x1RW as a wick and then the 4x4 clone on top. This time I plan to stack the 5 gallon pots with 3-1x1RW and then the 4x4 clone on top. This should make better use of the 5 gallon pots which didn't seem to help at all over the 3 gallon pots under my conditions.

This time since I am using both 3 and 5 gallon Smartpots again but only 1 strain, I should be a more clear comparison between the two sizes.

 

[LEBDOG]

Wow you got the tables rocking bro! your mothers and Crones look GREAT--- i did this for a minute but decided to go AeroNFT route... when i learned to build my own incredible system for under 100$!!!! - just have to use a water chiller! to keep nutes circulated and at the perfect temp!

- but if you decide to try aero - i will send you the plans for my system. you get to get rid of all of the messy stuff, rocks, rockwool cubes, and all of the cleanup that goes with those mediums! - plus you dont need to worry about any algy growing or bugs laying eggs in your rockwool!! ( has happened to me )

Thanks very much Robert!

I have my hands full with hydro and wanna learn this route fully as it works with my setup. The next route I am seriously looking at and plan to implement space permitting is XXL Undercurrent DWC (as per many here).

I am very interested in looking at the Lucas formula for my Julius Caesar as Cali Connection has seen great results with this and I think there's something to it. I am just not certain it is the way to go with my entire grow all out. I would like to try the lucas formula after seeing the results of another with this strain. I also would like have an area where I can run Lucas on 1 plant side by side comparing results.


I have reconsidered my results with GH from G3 and find them quite acceptable as far as GH is concerned. I will just use the Floralicious Grow and Bloom as I believe this enhances the plant substantially comparing the results of G3 to G2. I believe the omission of Floralicious from G3 caused the plants to be a bit on the light side as far as plant color (where my nute schedule called for it). I just couldn't imagine adding it at the very high nute levels I already had. This time I will run a lower overall nutrient schedule, but higher where it counts. I will post my updated nutrient schedule as it develops.

 

[CAPO]

Can't wait to see if you find a difference in the Smartpot sizes, Leb! The Oxyclean suggestion was definitely for cleaning in between uses. I use them with OceanFloor soil, so I don't get them too wet and wouldn't have noticed a bubbling....interesting.
I plan on using mine again. The only thing to think about, when you're in dirt, is how quickly the pot will dry out due to plant size.
Yours got huge last go...it's been fun watchin the last 2...I remember when you had the "winners table" back when you popped the seeds. ...Good Stuff!

 

[LEBDOG]

I remember when you had the "winners table" back when you popped the seeds. ...Good Stuff!

Good memory! Because of the new Federal removing the restriction on plants (in short), I will be hopefully producing enough JC clones to trash anything less than a winner this time!

 

[LEBDOG]

Potential Mother Clone Shots - Flower Day 13

These guys are very small and have been in flower ever since they started showing roots in their 1x1RW cubes. I transplanted them to 4x4RW squares and put them in flower on the same day.

If I had my good camera we could probably see details enough to almost sex them. Hopefully tonight my light will go out like it's suppose to (yea, digital timer quit working last night).

Can you believe my digital timer which has worked for 68 days+ without adjustment or even dusting just didn't turn off last night (redundant)? This is why I cut down G3 today. I figure this was a message from the powers that be to commence G4, they were close enough in G3 nothing but G4's clones were effected:(. Hopefully tonight the timer will resume operation. I went through it and re-setup my schedule. Bugger!

Oh well, my veg station is doing pretty well and I am hoping to take cuts from mothers within the week. Hopefully last nights catastrophic light schedule interrupt won't kill me too much! I caught it at about 3:45 and the light should have been off at 2. 1-3/4hr.

I plant to basically clone my mothers to near death leaving only main limbs which I will LST (tie down) for later cloning. I plan to start another round of mothers from a few cuts of what ever ends up being female and put that in a second side of my veg room. The more mothers, the more selection of clones at this point under this new ruling.

 

[edux10]

very nicely done. This is gonna be good!!

 

[LEBDOG]

very nicely done. This is gonna be good!!

Thank you, I am more eager for this than you I am sure! I hope I can deliver!

 

[Shady]

Nice job on the setup again LEBDOG! Someday we shall both rock an Undercurrent system... ;)

 

[winta]

lookin good my dude! cant wait for the show!:rofl

 

[LEBDOG]

Making BHO today and last night from my trimmings (G3). Amazing how easy it is to make and how much better smoking trimmings is this way! I got 5x refined butane ($5) each in the SFV yesterday. I will actually smoke every bit of my trimmings this way. The quality of the honey oil is top notch with the quintuple refined butane and I am just glad I learned how to do this. I really don't want to post a tutorial on this as there are so many out there. I am just glad to share how easy and effective it is. Those who smoke skillets should take note here. This is the cheapest way to smoke in this form I have found!

I made about 4 grams of oil last night from 4 cans of butane. It basically costs me $5 per gram using trimmings. I wonder if my trimmings dry or I use more substantial trimmings if I will get more oil per can of butane. The stuff really looks like honey! I will take a few photos of my product to show you what you can get with no experience!

 

[LEBDOG]

First attempts at Honey Oil.

Looking sweet LEBDOG!! I wanna see the blasting photos!!

I will try to get some blasting photo's in the near future. I am getting about 3g per Honey Bee Extractor fillup. I got about 1g when I did it without grinding the trim. Now grinding the trim I get 3. I use about 22g of trim (I think, my scale needs batteries), to get this 3g of Honey Oil. The 5x butane works great, almost no smell, taste at all and golden extraction.

Here (minus a bit I poofed already) is what I got from my first 8 cans of butane. I know that I basically trashed about 4 cans of butane doing this without grinding the trim (1g BHO).

I also stirred the BHO to blend the several extractions and this killed the pure look, making it look more budder like that honey oil. I will try to get some more of these jewelry containers (I will ask my co-op where they get them) and get some better product shots as I process my trim this weekend. Hopefully I can find a lot more 5x butane in stock locally so I can get all 2lbs of G3's trim processed this weekend. That would be great.

 

[Shady]

Very nice oil shots Leb!!! I was checking out the other thread and they mentioned something about CO2 extraction at low temps... I wonder if that's feasible. LMAO, imagine doing CO2 runs in your bloom room. :D

I also wonder how people do large runs of BHO as TK asked that Q near the beginning of that thread... I'll have to research it some more.

 

[LEBDOG]

Very nice oil shots Leb!!! I was checking out the other thread and they mentioned something about CO2 extraction at low temps... I wonder if that's feasible. LMAO, imagine doing CO2 runs in your bloom room. :D

I also wonder how people do large runs of BHO as TK asked that Q near the beginning of that thread... I'll have to research it some more.

I will for sure get one of these, probably only the single for me though...

I think the CO2 is cool, but am too ignorant to comment on that. I am just stoked to have good results with 5x. I got golden before stirring! The only dirt is from my fingers and the blade and repeated testing of how to do this. I will keep a better seperation between medium in my later runs. I just gotta get a little better equipped... That BHO post is great! Not so much info though, more pictures! There actually is a way better extractor that the link above, it's just overkill I think for me. At least for now, but I am looking at it!

 

[LEBDOG]

Wow, I have felt like a bit of an alchemist lately thinking back upon who used this technology first. I can imagine some chinese alchemist making oil extracts using early solvents B.C. Crazy! Well, I got about 50g of oil from about 1lb of CVK C trimmings! Not bad for something I'd almost throw away... I still have about the same amount of ROG cutting to extract and a 1/4lb HOG. It's funny that I have seen a strong preference toward the budder style (ear wax) BHO rather than the crystal clear honey style I seem to prefer from the strains I have. I one time got a Ear Wax at a Co-Op that was dark brown and more like hash than BHO which was my favorite I have ever had.

After scraping my last tube of CVK, I decided to melt out the corners and scrape up the melted oil. I used my flame to melt the oil to the easier to scrape area and when I scraped it, I ended up with this rich almost amber cherry colored oil which has no bubbles or budder chunks. This was a nice scrape!

After finishing this weekend's BHK endeavors, I checked again my 3 Julius Caesar mother candidates and found all 3 of them to be female! With this find, I put my flower room timer on manual (24hrs on) and pulled the veg room JC mothers out to the flower room for space. Tomorrow I should clone the JC enough (I will probably clone like 24-36 or so for selection) for G4 and probably LST the tall branches down so I can put them back in the closet in a few... I only need 16 clones to let flower so I will transplant only the best rooted "winner", clones and trash all the others. This is what's going on with G4 for now.

 

[LEBDOG]

Cloned 27 JC

Today I was able to clone myself 27 JC candidates for flowering. Of these 27, I will flower 12-16 again. I just don't know how many I will flower this time. Again I can't tell how stoked I was that all 3 seeds were female. My luck (Swerve chime in), they were already female seeds from Cali Connection (I don't know about this). All together though this is great! This gave me a lot of selection for cloning.

I have noted that the JC already doesn't love super cropping (from attempts in my mothering room) as much as the Raskals OG or CVK. I plan to top the JC one time at week1 of veg, then super crop them one time only at week3 of veg. The last stressing will be in week2 of flower, when I plan to remove all excess lower 1/3 development and remove any really large fan leaves through the upper canopy.

I still need to junk my old tanks gunk and get to cleaning out the crud in the cracks of my trays. I just don't look forward to this anymore than the dentist.

Currently I am still curing my last harvest (A & B class nugs). Smoking the C class (a lot of budder) has been a blast! I can't wait to dry some better stuff. I didn't cure the C class at all.

 

[LEBDOG]

Budder

Today I wrapped up all my endeavors this harvest in to making budder. I have been trying to get a local sense of what is the most popular form of BHO and budder is the clear winner. I can't say anything for areas other than mine.

The CVK's budder retains a deceptively butane like smell. Actually this is the fuel smell of the ChemVK. The hit of the CVK is pretty good, but the sweeter tasting yet more lemony smelling ROG really is the winner here. The ROG has retains no butane like aroma and just knocks you out! My HOG is also a very nice combo, retaining no butane but a bit more on the chill side. Having 3 of my own oils to select from has been a real luxury. I hope I can make them last!

This budder process wasn't that messy at all, as long as you contain the various components of the system well. Today it took be about 2 hours to make 18g of budder. I pretty much get 3g per extraction. I guess I was being silly, but I never weighed the amount of ground C class I was using. I estimate it to be around 22g or so.

I am glad to be done with this budder process as it just isn't my cup of tea. Making this budder and getting my hands and everything all sticky (not for me - hate dirty sticky). Next time I think I will pass this budder process on to a friend who specializes in baked goods. She is a really good cook and I'd like to see what she comes up with. I'd like to try German Chocolate Cake with budder in the frosting. That already tastes good to me just imagining that combo!

The 27 clones I cut yesterday have all survived their first day of misting! This is great! I am really kinds worried about this strain as I don't see too many others here that grow this, but I really love the concept. Today, I also topped the sexing clones I had used and when I did, I ate the tops to see what I had. I am pretty sure that my JC is a master leaning hybrid as I could clearly taste master in the bud. It's funny that so early in the plants life Master could be tasted in the top of the tree.

Instead of reverting these sex plants, I simply chopped them and tossed them in the trash. I put the 3 mothers I cut from back in the mothering room and will let them go for a while until I decide if I will use a clone for future mothering or keep them going a bit. I am pretty sure I will cut the mothers and use a clone to start some new mothers in new soil. I did not use worm casting in the soil and will implement them in the future for all my mothers. I believe this will allow the plants to draw from a more consistent nutrient pool in the future.

 

[LEBDOG]

New Piece

I gave my buddy my old Delta9 (a great tool) and picked up this new one a few days ago! I had my eye on this piece for about 3 months. Daddy's in Sherman Oaks has a great selection.

I love this tool 'cause I don't have to stare at too much guck as it's used. I also like the extra large water tree!

I use this with the skillet attachment for budder pretty much exclusively and mostly use another favorite old tool for sinkers.