Mandala F1's (Satori x Hashberry)

[Darth_Fader]

Hi all! I'm new to this site but I've been around since the good ol days at overgrow. Seems like there's lots of activity over here, with some pretty sound advice going around, so I figured I'd join the party :hi

A couple years back I made a cross between some satori and hashberry plants from the Mandala seedbank in Spain. They have superb genetics and are unknown in Cali, so it'll be fun for this little co op medi grow. Soon after I made the beans I took a little hiatus from growing while I went back to school. Now I'm back in action with some killer genetics..and some pretty killer biology knowledge :pimp: Should be really neat to see the different phenos I get with this cross. I think i'm already seeing some of that kashmir landrace from the hashberry coming through with those big fat indy leaves on a few of the plants. This pheno is definitely a slower grower..should be fun to smoke but I doubt I'll keep it in the line unless the smoke is total FIRE.

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A few specs on the garden:
-The space is 2 feet deep x 6 ft wide and about 8 ft tall. It's a DIY tent made with panda film and pvc inside a closet with those rolling mirror doors.

-They are under a 600W digital hps that's dimmed down to 450W right now. I may add a second 600 watt later on in the grow. I LOVE these new digital ballasts because of the versatility. If 2 600's is too hot in there I can always dim them back down to a total of 720...or 900. No heat issues or annoying buzzing or humming like I used to get back with the magnetic ballasts. They're much smaller, too.

This closet grow space is completely new so I'm not too sure what kind of light/heat issues i'll encounter along the way. I'm basically looking for a reason to get a water chiller and some ice boxes b/c I think this is the future for indoor grows. Seal it off with co2 and chill it down. Stay tuned for updates!

-The system is hydro. Using rockwool for now on a DIY ebb/flow table. They're 4 inch blocks until I sex them, then they'll probably go onto slabs depending on how many I grow out. I may change it up to a CAP ebb/grow style system later on with a controller. I'm already finding that I prefer the inert properties of hydroton a tad more than the RW. My growth has been superb, but pH seems a little volatile despite extensive flushes.

-nutes are botanicare primarily. Running PBP grow with LK and some dyna grow Pro-Tekt right now. I'm also trying some new stuff from holland for veg, it's called Aptus. I'm using the Startbooster...it's comparable to roots excel (seriously...this stuff is gold..pricey too though). I'm also using Mycos. It's a beneficial mycorhiz. that comes in a granulated form that looks like rocky sand. I distributed a pack of it equally to all the rw cubes

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Ok, so without further ado, let the diary begin!

Threw a bunch of old seeds in a shot glass and let them soak overnight. This seems to work really well with older seeds. A day later most had cracked. Put them in RR plugs and here there were a few days later...

..and a few days later...

...exactly five days after the previous pic. Here they are today. I'll call it veg day 8. They're looking a little wet at the moment after a foliar feed. I'm using my nute mix with pro-tekt @ 1/8 dilution.

Roots are taking off for sure! They're loving the rockwool and nutes.

I was getting a little leaf curling early on after transplanting into RW and I think it's all pH related. I'm hand feeding right now once daily, so it's pretty much just recirculating as I feed, and every morning the pH is back up from 5.5 to about 6.5. EC is relatively stable and I flushed the crap out of the cubes, even used a little clearex and flushed a second time, so I'm not sure what the cause of this pH drift is. It might be that I'm currently just using a 5 gal bucket. Hopefully it'll be a lot more stable when I go up to the 25 gal rez. I've never had a problem with drip systems or DWC using hydroton. Anyway, they seem to be doing fine so I'll just keep giving them daily feedings at ~5.5.

Thanks for stopping by! :rasta:

 

[Darth_Fader]

Fun with bagseed...

So I do have one baby in this mix that's not from my Mandala seeds. It's a bagseed I just found in some quality Fire OG from a local dispensary. She (?) is the little one in the center of the photo above. It's weird - I rarely ever find seeds in dispensary herb but every time I start a new grow it seems to happen. On the same day I also picked up some Sour Diesel and found 3 healthy seeds in it too! Maybe the force IS with me haha. :fighting0040:

And, right as I started my last mandala grow, I found some beans in a bag of totally killer Chrystal. This happened to be the absolute best herb I'd smoked in a very long time..at the time. It just works with my body or something...totally euphoric. Here's that bud, and the beans I made from the bagseed grown out alongside this mandala cross. I'll grow them out at some point in the near future...

Here's the current Fire OG baby and her mommy's bud. It's rooting like a motha :cool0019:

Until next time!

Darth

 

[Darth_Fader]

Darth Fader reporting for duty!

Been three days.

I figured out how to take slightly more decent pics with my camera. I turn my HPS off and light it with a fluoro strip. Twas looking strange with the HPS on. Still looks crappy but a little better me thinks.

So!

Here are my troops. Day 11.

Roots look freaking amazing :heart

little shot of the cab today:

A new member of the closet! :tongue0011: VERY excited to get it dialed in.

I think they're responding great to the foliar feeds.

I drench 'em. I like to shake the stems individually after like a wet dog. Gets off all the big pockets of water and straightens the leaves out a little.

hose going to the fan w/ co2

I'm le tired!

'Night yall. Thanks for stopping by :damnhippie:

 

[DieselBoy]

Hey Darth, I'm a big fan of Mandala in general and I've often thought of crossing a few of their landraces with other stuff for personal enjoyment. Lookin' good!

 

[Darth_Fader]

Thanks Diesel :hi Yeah I've been really impressed with their stuff too. It always grows so robust and healthy without needing much. Haven't really had the pleasure of growing out these buds to full size before without seeds and stuff, so I'm looking forward to the smoke...especially the satori x hb combo.

I think you'll find some of the landrace-y genes if you start making crosses. We will see. So far I've got a few with big fat indica leaves, but I'm kind of starting to wonder if maybe I accidentally got Chrystal pollen on the mandala girl last round. I think I was fairly smart about it but I honestly don't remember, it was so long ago. And its hard to imagine one pheno could be so so indica. But I'll know by the bud appearance and color if there's some chrystal in there when harvest comes around :bongsmi:

In other news, I'm struggling with the co2 at the moment. I sealed off the room with my closet and just filled that room with co2, with the tent recirculating it..but my temps got up to about 80-85 today without access to my central AC. It's too hot and humid in such a small space at the moment to do them any good like that, with or without co2. So I'm going to have to get an extra fan, run the cooltube recirculating in there with the room open to the rest of my house, and put the filter inside the sealed tent with my 4" fan scrubbing....and a controller/monitor for my gas.

So controller = $200
New fan = $100-200.

Dehumidifier is on the way - $200. Not to mention the tank and regulator.

Bahhh humbug this is an addiction for sure! But hopefully it'll pay off in the end. :ninja

 

[motherlode]

howdy - looking good

you know there is already a darth fader here at the farm

kind of confusing to say the least

just a heads up

 

[ookiimata]

Cool stuff. Thanks for sharing. I've been interested in Mandala for a couple years, but it seems the feedback on their genetics differs greatly (anywhere from amazing to generic) in smoke reports...so I've held off.

 

[DieselBoy]

Ooki - their prices are so reasonable, you can give them a try and find out for yourself with very little $$ at stake. They have reeled in a few awards (for Hashberry, I think) and been featured in a few of the MJ pictorial books for their beautiful strains.

 

[SLO Grown]

Thanks Diesel :hi Yeah I've been really impressed with their stuff too. It always grows so robust and healthy without needing much. Haven't really had the pleasure of growing out these buds to full size before without seeds and stuff, so I'm looking forward to the smoke...especially the satori x hb combo.

I think you'll find some of the landrace-y genes if you start making crosses. We will see. So far I've got a few with big fat indica leaves, but I'm kind of starting to wonder if maybe I accidentally got Chrystal pollen on the mandala girl last round. I think I was fairly smart about it but I honestly don't remember, it was so long ago. And its hard to imagine one pheno could be so so indica. But I'll know by the bud appearance and color if there's some chrystal in there when harvest comes around :bongsmi:

In other news, I'm struggling with the co2 at the moment. I sealed off the room with my closet and just filled that room with co2, with the tent recirculating it..but my temps got up to about 80-85 today without access to my central AC. It's too hot and humid in such a small space at the moment to do them any good like that, with or without co2. So I'm going to have to get an extra fan, run the cooltube recirculating in there with the room open to the rest of my house, and put the filter inside the sealed tent with my 4" fan scrubbing....and a controller/monitor for my gas.

So controller = $200
New fan = $100-200.

Dehumidifier is on the way - $200. Not to mention the tank and regulator.

Bahhh humbug this is an addiction for sure! But hopefully it'll pay off in the end. :ninja

Really great Mandala. Have grown most of what they have to offer. They have first class genetics. Not a bunch of "Pollen Slingers." I won't say it but most who know me know who i am talking about....

Mandala takes the time to complete Landrace selection trials. They do it right!

 

[phenotyper]

I just popped some Satori and waiting to pop Point of No Return. Excited to see how these turn out!

 

[Kaybee]

Have done Satori and got substandard results in the potency dept. They stayed short too, and looked very sparkly, lots of triches but it didn't hit well at all and the taste was nothing special. Perhaps a perfect cure would do her better...

 

[Kaybee]

Did one called Sadhu (from my memory) also, same type of results compared to other gear... substandard potency.. I've stayed away from them ever since.

 

[MTM]

Ive grown all of Mikes older strains and Ive grown out over 70 Mandala#1 seeds and had some strong phenos,the best was the fems he made one time and wont make anymore.I grew hashberry and found it to be weak but its all in the phenos you get,thats one thing mandala strains are not short on(phenos)

 

[Darth_Fader]

Glad I sparked some Mandala discussion. Thanks for dropping by everyone and welcome :hi

I've definitely had some really top notch Satori before. It may be more of an heirloom strain. It can be quite leafy depending on the trim job because the leafs get so sparkly...same with hashberry...so a lot of times you can be smoking leaf...your results may vary. I'm probably going to be making a nice batch of bubble after this grow so I won't be too stingy with the trimming :cool0041:

I can say that the Mandala I've grown have all been robust growers. Excellent tolerance to just about everything and they always end up looking real pretty. These things are growing like monsters. As far as potency is concerned, I may have this batch tested, so we'll see. I've seen Satori tested at 20+ THC before so it's not unthinkeable. One thing about Mandala genes is they do their breeding outdoor, spread out over tons of acreage. The plants are selected for using low strength, mostly organic nutrients. So the nutrient profile and demands are quite different than your average club cut.

But I do have the chrystal, fire og, and sour diesel genes to play around with if I can't find a pheno with uber-potency. With everything else held constant it'd be a real winner.

Speaking of phenos, I'm seeing a lot of subtle differences. Definitely some landrace indica popping through. The OG bagseed next to the rest of them is looking so puny...although she is about a week behind. The stem development with the Mandalas has been unreal.

Pics coming :fighting0085:

 

[Darth_Fader]

howdy - looking good

you know there is already a darth fader here at the farm

kind of confusing to say the least

just a heads up

Good lookin motherlode. Is there a way I can change my username?

 

[motherlode]

I do not have the rights to change a username - easiest rout would be to make a new user bro

 

[CaptainObvious]

Thanks! I'm back w/ a new name.


Fear not, it is I. :character0095:

So a couple updates on everything. This is a diary after all!

-got the co2 crackin but once I sealed off the tent, humidity and temps went way up

-plugged in the dehumidifier, went to get some food. Came back in a couple hours and the temps were breaking 100. OOOOOOOO scarry. So I just learned that dehumidifiers blow off a lot of hot air.

-I rigged up an exhaust for the dehumidifier. Problem - Co2 leakage. You get to the point that you start fixing problems and every fix creates a new one. Setting up a sealed growspace is a total battle of the variables.

here's the exhaust:

the dehumidifier is in it's own little tent now, with a circular fan in front and back clearing out the heat.

-Got a new 6 inch inline fan. I'm running the cooltube with that, it's just taking air from outside the tent in the room -> tube -> out of the closet and into a different room in the house. It's on a light dimmer as a speed control, but I've got it all the way up because there's basically no noise. I put the fan itself in a rubbermaid box and insulated it a little.

-I built a little intake for it up top. It's directly above the dehumidifier exhaust so I figure it might clear out some of the heat.

-The old fan and filter are now continuously scrubbing in the tent.

-Without a controller, I set everything up on timers. Co2 turns on at top of the hour for 15 minutes. Just enough to flood the tent to about ~1800 ppm... I figure there's bound to be some leakage over the hour (edit - turns out it's down to about 1000-1200 ppm before I exhaust). At 45 minutes after, the dehumidifier w/ it's exhaust turn on, along with an exhaust fan up by the ceiling of the growspace. Temps are very steady now. It's running at about ~80 degrees and fluctuates from 45-48% to 52-55% humidity over the course of the hour, every hour.

I was a little concerned about co2 efficiency with this method, but I calculated that even after topping off my entire closet space to >1500 ppm every hour, it's the exact same volume of co2 per day as filling the whole room that the closet is in just once.

I'm going to play around with testing the co2 at certain time intervals until I get a controller. I'd like to have everything on a controller with co2, dehumid, and temp (exhaust) running independently. Then I'm going to work on my most anticipated project, a DIY pH controller/top off. Can't wait for that one. :sad0104:

Smell and heat have come down a lot now that the humidity is down. It had shot up to almost 70 during the day and the odor was out of control too. Carbon is scrubbing continuously in the cab now, and got some ONA outside as well that's doing an awesome job. So everything is under control and my babies are starting to recover from a couple days of torture :passingjoint:

Last but not least, my favorite new toy:

No more paranoia about my watts! I think if I get another light I might have to experiment with installing fuses. The fuse box is in that room so I'm thinking it would be relatively easy.

Thanks for stopping by :friday:

For now, you're welcome, as always,

Cpt. O. :bong-hits:

 

[motherlode]

lol love the new handle

 

[CaptainObvious]

pt. 2

Haha thanks!

Almost forgot. Here's the kids today, day 16

Recovering from heat STRESS :sweating Hopefully it wont mess with the M/F ratio... I've thrown a lot at Mandala plants in the past and never experienced that so I'm not overly concerned...but i've read about it. (knock on wood)

Stem and root growth has been great with this setup! I think they'll really take off now that the cab's dialed in.

:icon_animal26:

Here's the bottom of the system. I'm using the same tote for a res as I am for the two trays. The trays are just cut down to about 6" height.

Cheers :banana1sv6:

 

[CaptainObvious]

Howdy :hi Quick update for yas. Still vegging

Here they are today, day 21-ish...

apologies for the light...makes them look yellow..

I replaced the ebb/flo tables I had made with some large plastic mixing trays. Found them at home depot and they're pretty much a perfect size for my little room, about 35" by 24" each give or take.

The canopy continues to fill out...

About 10" tall right now. Should be fun to measure them tomorrow :banana1sv6: Gonna flip to flower at 15 to 20". I have space for ~30" total height for the plants themselves, but I could lower the table another 8 inches if needed.

Added a raised screen for the rockwool to sit on. I don't like them in puddles of water after feeding, so this will elevate them a bit and let them drain/dry more.

Growth has been great over the last few days with the Co2 and humidity all dialed in. They're really filling out from the sides and getting new tips of growth. Tops shooting up too. Can't wait to sex these so I can put the gurls down on slabs.

I'm wondering if I should do some trimming down below the canopy? I have basically no experience with trim jobs so advice is appreciated!

Re. Co2: I ended up bumping the gas to fill every 15 minutes. The cost/efficiency just wasn't a factor considering how cheap co2 is in the grand scheme of things... Until I get a controller at least! If I'm going to let my temps drift into the mid 80's I want my co2 on point.

I'm going to let the humidity float to about 60 every hour or so since maintaining it at a constant 50 has diminishing returns as far as electricity and co2 waste is concerned..I have experimented with taking the dehumid off the timer so we'll see what works best. I will crank it up more at the end of flowering.

Feeding: I'm bumping them up to 1200 ppm right now. I have a feeling I've been under 'nuting a bit. Been using about 1/2 strength on the suggested botanicare feed schedule at 800-900 pmm. My tap water is pretty hard at about 350 ppm and I'm just dechlorinating, so I'm not too sure whether to compensate for those ppms. I think I can basically subtract ~200 from the total and be ok using nute strengths I'm used to. pH is more or less stable now with the 25 gal res but tends to run on the higher side.

Cheers :cool0041: