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420SA

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Posts posted by 420SA

    First Timer - Outdoor Grow.

    in Grow Diaries

    Posted

    Totally agree with Tote there! Certainly gonna need bigger pots. Especially when you're growing in coco. I recently harvested a relatively short plant, about 50cm high, that was grown in a 20l pot and the roots filled that 20l pot extensively!! Very large build up of roots on the bottom too. Might be able to provide a pic for you

    Green House Seeds Powder Feeding

    in The Food Court

    Posted

    Not for me thanks. I know only what I've read on their site, but the ingredients don't appear any different or special. I'd rather have a 3 part like GHE or Nutri. Hydro should be about control. I want to be able to adjust my feeds to perfection, not just rely on what GHS say. Just me 2c.  :-peace

     

    You have a point Max. Hopefully someone will throw up a log using those nutes eventually

    Green House Seeds Powder Feeding

    in The Food Court

    Posted

    Hi Folks

     

    Hydro Herb have just started stocking Green House Seeds feeding powder. Looks quite interesting with nutes for short flowering strains, long flowering strains and Hybrids. Being a product made by Green House Seeds one can be pretty sure this was more than likely made specifically for cannabis growing Has anyone ever tried these by any chance? What do you guys think about this new alternative?

     

    :-peace

    Plant Of The Month - 10/14 - Entries Closed - Winners Announced

    in Monthly Competitions

    Posted

    Ok lets get this grow show officially on the road!! ;D

     

    Hydro Herb Africa has been so kind as to sponsor this month's prizes as well and they only get better :-clap

     

    hydro_herb_small_static.png

     

     

    1st Place wins an All In One Clone Kit consisting of the following:

     

    Humidity Dome

    Holds 16-32 cuttings

    imagesCAJTCJOQ.jpg

    Heating Mat

    untitled_6.png

    32 x rock wool plugs

    25mm_rockwool_cube-300x300.jpg

    Rooting Hormone Gel

    image.jpg

     

    Also a Trimming Scalpel and a set of rubber gloves.

     

     

    2nd Place has a choice of prizes ;D

     

    A choice between a 50 liter bag of Promix 50/50 or 90/10

    Pro-Mix-HP-600_2-300x300.jpg

     

    OR

     

    A portable Microscope 60x-100x

    microscope.jpg

     

    Entries close on 28/10/14. Please read the competition rules carefully by clicking HERE.

     

    GOOD LUCK!!!

     

     

     

     

    Morocco mulls legal pot growing, breaking taboo - News24 - 08/10/14

    in 420 News

    Posted

    Article by News24 - 08/10/14 - http://www.news24.com/Africa/News/Morocco-mulls-legal-pot-growing-breaking-taboo-20141007-3

     

    Morocco mulls legal pot growing, breaking taboo

     

    Kettama - In the rugged Rif mountains, Abdelkhalek Benabdallah strode among towering marijuana plants, checking the buds for the telltale spots of white that indicate they are ready for harvest.

     

    Much of the crop had been picked and left to dry on the roofs of stone-and-wood huts that dot the valley, the heart Morocco's pot-growing region.

     

    Benabdallah says he openly grows the crop, while understanding the risk: "We are regularly subject to blackmail by the gendarmes", he said as he scythed through stalks and wrapped them into a bundle.

     

    Morocco's marijuana farmers live in a strange limbo in which the brilliant green fields are left alone, while the growers themselves face constant police harassment. A new draft law may bring some reprieve: It aims to legalise marijuana growing for medical and industrial uses, a radical idea for a Muslim nation.

     

    It could alleviate poverty and social unrest, but the proposal faces stiff opposition in this conservative country, as well as the suspicions of farmers themselves, who think politicians can do nothing help them.

     

    Morocco is joining many other countries in the world, as well as some US states, in re-examining drug policies and looking to some degree of legalisation. Morocco's situation is unusual, however, in that Islamic traditions create deep taboos against drugs, despite the centuries-old tradition of growing marijuana in the north.

     

    There are some 80 000 families in the northern Rif mountains of Morocco who make their living from growing pot, according to UN estimates; the region supplies nearly all of Europe's hashish and is the world's top supplier along with Afghanistan.

     

    The world customs authority reported that in 2013, 65% of hashish seized at customs worldwide came from Morocco.

     

    Detention

     

    Estimates vary wildly for how much the business is worth but legalisation would certainly provide a substantial boost to farmers and to Morocco's anemic economy, which is forecast to grow by just 2.5% this year.

     

    For now, the profits go to the buyers and smugglers who pay the farmers little for their crop and reap huge profits in Europe, where consumption in places like Amsterdam's famed coffee shops has been decriminalised. The trade has brought little wealth to the region, with farmers saying a kilogram of kif, as the plant is known locally, sells for $8 and they make an average of just $3 000 to $4 000 a year.

     

    They say they are completely neglected by the state, except for its police force.

     

    Growers say that neighbours with scores to settle file anonymous complaints with authorities resulting in a visit from the paramilitary gendarmes, confiscation of the crop and months or years in prison, unless a bribe can be paid.

     

    Nourredine Mediane, a lawmaker from the region, said some 15 000 people from the area are currently in detention and another 30 000 are wanted by authorities.

     

    Clutching his wide-brimmed straw hat, one deeply lined farmer described how he learned he was wanted by police when he went to renew his national ID card in a nearby town. Since then, he has not left his mountainside village and relies on family members to pick up supplies.

     

    "I am scared to even go to the doctor," he said, asking that his name not be used for fear of arrest. "I don't even have the national identity card and I'm stuck in the village."

     

    Despite fear of arrest, many locals have no choice but to grow pot. The valley's rocky soil is poor and the only crop that seems to thrive is marijuana, which was legal to grow under royal mandate in certain regions of the Rif until 1974, when the government passed a blanket ban on the cultivation and consumption of all drugs.

     

    The marijuana ban was passed just as European visitors to the marijuana growing regions taught the farmers to produce hashish for export to feed rising demand across the Mediterranean. The ban also brought Morocco in line with the 1961 UN convention against drugs it had signed.

     

    Economic saviour

     

    The security-centered approach to the problem has failed, argued Mehdi Bensaid, a lawmaker with the opposition Party of Authenticity and Modernity that was founded by a close associate of the king.

     

    The party's draft law would keep pot consumption, widespread among young Moroccans in parts of the country illegal, but legalise production.

     

    Under the legislation, the entire crop would go to a state agency that would use it to produce new cannabis-based medications that have been developed to aid cancer and multiple sclerosis patients, and eventually for industrial uses as well. Under the UN drug conventions, marijuana can be legally be grown for industrial and medical uses.

     

    Factories would be set up in the region to process the plant and provide jobs. The state-driven industry would prevent cannabis from being turned into hash and going to the smugglers.

     

    Bensaid added that he has already been contacted by European and American pharmaceutical companies interested in investing in the venture if the law passes. It is not clear, however, if there is sufficient demand for medical purposes to meet the vast supply coming from Morocco's fields. And UN conventions would prevent the state-sanctioned crop to be sold abroad for recreational purposes.

     

    Still, Bensaid sees legalisation as a potential economic saviour.

     

    "If Morocco has a crop that could produce these medicines that could be sold today in the US, Canada and France, it is an employment opportunity for citizens living in a miserable situation," Bensaid told The Associated Press.

     

    "It's a win-win, for the state, because there is tax, for the citizens, because they are in an illegal situation, and for the sick, who get their medicine."

     

    Bensaid's party is backed in its effort by Morocco's oldest political party, the Istiqlal or Independence Party. The two have presented a draft law to both the upper and lower houses of parliament. It is unclear, however, if the draft is on the schedule to be debated when parliament re-opens this month.

     

    The laws have received some high-profile backing, including the ministers of health and higher education, who have supported the idea of using marijuana for scientific research.

     

    However, the Islamist-led government and the powerful palace have remained silent, with few wanting to break a deep-rooted taboo against illegal drugs. While not specifically banned in Islam, marijuana's effects are likened by most imams to alcohol, which is banned by the religion.

     

    Mustapha Khalfi, Morocco's government spokesperson and communications minister, refused to discuss the draft law, pointing only to government efforts to combat drug smuggling and reduce the amount of land under cultivation.

     

    Members of the Islamist Party for justice and development have accused those behind the law of merely looking to boost their standing in the Rif Valley region ahead of key local elections next year.

     

    "These people are not just trying to get votes from the poor peasants in these regions, but are also looking for the sympathy and money from the drug barons ahead of the 2015 elections", said Abdelaziz Aftati, a leading member of the Islamist party.

     

    'A festival of hashish'

     

    The growers themselves express suspicion about the plans concocted by politicians in Rabat. Farmers worry that legalisation would mean a fall in the already low price for their crop and competition from wealthy estates with vast acreage and the latest agricultural technology.

     

    "If legalization happened for all of Morocco, we could never compete with the other farmers that have lots of land and the price of cannabis wouldn't be any different than that of carrots, we'd make nothing", said local activist Mohammed Benabdallah.

     

    More than any other region in Morocco, the wild Rif mountains have seen little government investment, in no small part due to a history of rebellions and the marijuana cultivation itself.

     

    The locals are mostly Berbers, North Africa's original inhabitants, rather than Arabs. In the 1920s, the region threw off Spanish rule and declared an independent republic that was subdued only after years of attacks by French and Spanish soldiers.

     

    The Rif revolted again in 1958, soon after Morocco's independence. In the aftermath, it was left poor and undeveloped with bad roads and few schools and hospitals. Locals say the police don't dare to destroy all the marijuana fields for fear of provoking another uprising.

     

    So instead, the economy remains firmly anchored to marijuana. Every year with the approach of the cold autumn months, villagers take their dried bundles of kif, place them over fine mesh and rhythmically beat them with sticks to extract a powder which is then rolled into bricks of hash. Pot is still smoked by the older generation in long-stemmed pipes called "sebsis".

     

    By November, the sheer walls of this valley will resound with the sound of tapping. "It is a like music", said Benabdallah, "a festival of hashish".

     

    The government has repeatedly tried to persuade farmers to grow other crops, but efforts have failed. By 2010, most alternative crop programs had been suspended.

     

    Walking along terraces of rocky earth, 63-year-old Mohammed Fathi said he tried to grow other crops, not least to fend off 32 police complaints against him. He was part of a cooperative that grew olives, figs and almonds, but it failed due to lack of rain, and he turned back to growing pot.

     

    "Marijuana", he said, "resists the drought that kills other plants".

    420SA's Guide To Knowing When To Harvest

    in Harvesting,Drying & Curing

    Posted

    Perhaps one of the more debated topics in the growing community is when is the perfect time to harvest your long awaited buds?  :-\

    In the end it boils down to personal preference but there are a couple factors that you need to know to help you decide when is the best time to harvest for you.

    You want to wait till the plant has matured in her flowering phase. How matured is a matter of personal preference and debate but this is when the plant will have produced the valuable ingredients that you seek ;D

    First & foremost, if you're considering harvesting before 6 weeks of flowering, you will be horribly disappointed as no strains mature in that short time! Just be patient and you will be rewarded :-meditate

    Pistil Hair Observation

    This is probably a more old fashioned way of determining the maturity of the plant but it can still be effective, although in a limited way. What you want to be watching is those white pistil hairs. Once 80 to 90 percent of all the white pistil hairs have turned orange, red or brown you could consider your plant to have matured as your lady has given up every last hope of being pollinated...however... this can be misinterpreted and in some cases the pistils will turn before the lady has actually fully matured. Other factors that could cause the pistils to turn before maturity can be high heat, pesticide, different strain characteristics and other factors. The way to make sure of this is by determining maturity with the next method which is probably the most effective way.

    Trichome Observation

    For this method you'll need to invest in some form of a portable microcope. Jewelers loupe's work well too. You'll need something that has a magnifying strength of 40x and upwards.

    What you want to do is observe the trichomes close up and determine their colour. For those who don't know what Trichomes are, they are the resin glands that store THC and the many other compounds. They appear as large stalks with a ball on top, some liken them to a mushroom like shape.

    Here's what you should see

    sp3r500w.jpg

    Once you've used your portable microscope to view the trichomes close up, you will be looking for the following colours in your trichomes:

    Clear Trichomes

    If you see that the majority of the trichomes appear clear and transparent it is too soon to harvest. This means that the maximum amount of THC and CBD hasn't been produced yet. You will want the majority of Trichomes to go Cloudy.

    Clear trichomes appear like below

    sp3r500w.jpg

    Cloudy Trichomes

    Cloudy trichomes appear with a milky white colour, and they will have lost their transparency. Once the majority of the trichomes have turned cloudy you can consider harvesting your plant but you may want to consider the different options and ratios with Amber Trichomes, especially if you're growing a sativa or sativa dominant hybrid.

    Cloudy trichomes appear like below

    trichrome-mid-300x225.jpg

     

    Amber Trichomes

    When the trichomes begin to show an amber or orange colour the compounds such as THC have begun to degrade and while this may be undesirable to some, it can be desirable to others as the compound CBN builds up once the THC begins to degrade. This is usually looked for in Sativa's and Sativa dominant hybrids. You will want to try go for a 70% milky and 30% amber ratio with them. However with indicas and indica dominant hybrids you don't really want many amber trichomes and you should go for a maximum of 10% amber 90% Cloudy when growing indicas.

    Amber trichomes appear like below

    Picture%2019_2.png

     

    As I said though, these ratios can vary and are just a general guideline. As you develop as a grower you should experiment and test the different ratios seeing what high you like best. Everyone is different and may enjoy a different type of high which is why trichome observation is the best way to determine when to harvest your lady/ladies!

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