Super Nova

Growing in electric sunshine
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Maribou Stork
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Post by Maribou Stork »

I got the seeds for Super Nova while in Ottawa about 18 months ago. Bred by Ustad Seeds, they are a cross between Sensi Star and Old Time Moonshine, I see they are not offered any longer....

http://www.crosstowntraffic.ca/

I grew out 8 and got 2 females with two different phenotypes. I had labeled them A ~ F (1 to 8) according to how vigorous they were growing the day I put the labels on. The two females happened to turn out to be the ones labeled "A" and "F" and I have kept the designation until I decide which pheno to keep in the mother room with the Trainwreck. My preference right now after flowering and harvesting the two seed grown plants is the "A" pheno, but I am waiting to see how they do from clones before I cull the "F".

I transplanted 20 clones into pots on Thursday evening, 20 Aug. I will set the timer for 20 hours of light until they get about 6 inches high then flip to 12/12. Twelve of the plants are the "A" pheno and 8 are the "F" pheno.

As I say, I am biased towards the "A" pheno.
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The cabinet is 30 in by 48 in or 10 sq feet total area. The pots take up a footprint of 8 sq feet. The 400 watt light is run by a digital ballast and is raised above the canopy about 3 feet right now while the clones adjust to the intensity. The bulb in the picture is a compact florescent 130 watt 14000K that I can raise or slide back and forth to augment the HPS, which, according to the light meter, favours the right hand side of the cabinet when hung horizontally.
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Post by Dick Hertz »

looking good! :tup:

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Post by JapanFreak »

2 females out of 8 seeds? That kind of sucks but very cool setup. What are you looking at? Coco run to waste? Can you explain the chicken wire baskets please?

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Post by Maribou Stork »

The ratio was not good as you noted, but I prefer growing from clones so I would have still been happy with one female that showed decent growth patterns. :tup:

The wire baskets were formed by wrapping hardware cloth around net pots at the bottom and using plastic ties to hold everything together. Wooden dowels on either side of a group of four baskets hold them in a straight line and serve as handles to lift them out of the bin. Since the handles rest on a ledge around the bin they are suspended and not resting on the bottom of the bin. Any excess water will freely drain into the bin and I can pump it out of there whenever I get around to it.

The individual baskets are about 5 inches in diameter and 12 inches deep. IIRC each hold about three liters of coco. I use the run-to-waste method and actually waste very little water and nutrients. Way less than when I was doing hydro and changing the tank every week.

The baskets are lined with landscaping cloth so I believe the roots are getting maximum air exchange. The roots will tend to air prune when they reach the landscaping cloth and look like Uncle Ben's spinout method.


I am handwatering right now but in the photo of the 20 plants you might notice some drippers bunched up out of the way. If I have to go away for a few days I can set it up for automatic watering.


I plan on flipping them to 12/12 when they get 6 inches tall and will prune them much like Pistlewhipped recommended on CannabisWorld. That is a little shorter then I previously grew before flowering, but as it is first time from clones, I would rather err on the conservative side. I don't like a cabinet that is too overgrown if I can help it.
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Post by Maribou Stork »

I just have to rave about a product I am trying. A couple of years ago someone gave me some plants to keep over the winter so he wouldn't lose the strain. I will never do that again as it introduced thrips into my garden.

I tried a couple of products but was only able to keep the population down enough so there was not much damage to worry about. End-All was quite effective but I would only use it in the early stages on the vegetation that would eventually become worm food.

Another product was Safer Soap, but it burned the plants I had for mothers so bad I had to throw them out. Good thing I had taken clones before spraying. I probably used too much, but some Trainwreck clones I had didn't burn like the Super Nova so perhaps the SN is just more sensitive to the soap.

I bought a pre-diluted product called Spray Safe which will target thrips, mites, aphids, etc. It says it is a product of Australia but the company name is Canadian Express. It was very expensive at $35 Canadian at the local Hydro store. It claims that you can spray right up to harvest too.

I used it three times so far. The first two applications were a week apart and the third was after two more weeks as we were away on vacation, with everything on the automatic drippers. The mothers that is....the tray of rooting clones came with us to the trailer. Even the clones got sprayed with the Safety Spray and everything looked so healthy afterwards. I don't know what is in the Spray as it doesn't say on the bottle or website. Maybe a bit of nitrogen since they greened up a bit more. No sign of thrips any more, but I have enough spray left for one more application. It has been 9 days since the last treatment, so I'll probably finish the bottle off tomorrow.

The stuff even smells good enough to use as an aftershave.

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Post by Maribou Stork »

Dick Hertz wrote:looking good! :tup:

Thanks Dick :wave:
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Post by Maribou Stork »

Thanks Boo....I find 5 racks of four pots easier to handle than 20 individual pots. Here is a photo of one of the racks close up.
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When the plants get a bit bigger, I'll start making the effort to turn off the HPS light when I take the photos. The clones in this rack are about 3 inches tall right now.
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Post by JapanFreak »

Marabou Stork wrote: I use the run-to-waste method and actually waste very little water and nutrients. Way less than when I was doing hydro and changing the tank every week.
Yeah man it's that "waste" word in there that scares us hydro guys at first. I found that I use 8 times less water/nutes in my hempy run to waste compared to dwc.

Very nice well thought out garden. Very cool. :tup:

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Post by Maribou Stork »

I like to spend quality time with the plants so I usually water them manually once a day. I just dip into a bucket of nutes with a 250 ml (1 cup) and pour it on each pot. If one cup per pot is not enough to get some runoff (~10%), then I go aound them again until I do. I am guessing from previous experience that I will be using 5 ~ 6 liters per day for the 20 plants. Different plants than previously so we can't really be sure. It has been a year since I used the wire pots as well since I was trying some Dutch Bateau (sp?) pots for a few crops.

I'll talk about the drippers I sometimes set up in a later post.
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Post by JapanFreak »

Just to compare you don't have to water daily in perlite, I water about once a week. Coco probably uses more water than other hydro-run-to-waste systems.

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