The beauties get nicer each day. Above day 55, Pheno2. Been too busy with work and nearly forgot about my moms birthday, so the documentation had to wait. Anyways, Plants had another day without me overcaring. Probably a good thing. We often tend to overdo. The ladies , they only care about looking frosty and sexy for the pornpics.
I accidently pulled a bud with a leaf down below pheno2 on day 53 - tiny one, dried in the tent unnoticed until today. Yammi…
Today is day 56 and the plants sleep for another 4 hours and 20 minutes. Humidity sucks at night atm and not much I can do about it. It’s still in range but hard at limit. I try keeping them little dryer now in general, the buds are hard as rock and luckily the canopy allows for airflow.
Pheno 1 still puts out single new pistils, Pheno 2 and 4 look nearly done visually. Checking on trichomes later. They probably need some time aka " just two more weeks " to fit my liking 
Smell of the ladies isn’t penetrating. Wife said “fruity and flowery”. Well, not arguing with wife… lost fight before starting.
Wife’s RTC auto is also close to the finishing line. She’s one of those 2 more weeks type of girls. This pheno is a bit darker , a little extreme in terp explosion too. She doesn’t want to finish. She’s in a room without filtration of air. True neighbours nightmare…
I also recieved my DP 420 order today. Nice packaging on the limited drop! 3 sticker, Auto skywalker haze and blue zushi been the freebies. Also got a grinder and a pack of night queens. Not to forget that cute postcard. I need more fridge-magnets now…too many postcards.
6 Likes
Just checked on the rtc. It revealed inner section is a bit cluttered and needs to be free asap. No mold or budrot yet but don’t wanna risk the rest. She has to leave today - at least the upper buds need to be chopped but in my oppinion, there’s no point in having her going another few days. Still a wonderful plant with 40-50 nice tops. Training and entire grow was better than the one from first bean, but lots to improve on rockwool.
I 've also done some gardening outside as the weather called for it. Tomatos are doing great, cucumbers do their best, first berries show a month early and somehow I’ve a monster poppy (beautiful but a guaratee for pests) growing under the wine. One of the silverleaf plants already reach the 1.80m mark. Nature is crazy early this year. And everything is exploding.
6 Likes
Wife’s RTC Auto on her final Day “xx?”. She’s now hanging to dry (the plant, lol).
9 Likes
The SMC are just stunning. Pheno 4 and pheno 2 are ready. Update soon. I would write and show more today but bare with me, I found my raven male on friday dead on the neighbours frontyard, which really hit me hard. I just burried that little guy on a bed of finest leaves. Such a cute and intelligent little creature, that followed me for 3 years…
6 Likes
Damn dude, been busy. Killin it.
3 Likes
THX M8, I try my best. But tbh, with such great help and mentoring past year on AFN, it’s not that hard to get some fire grown. Too me it looks like I just put a seed into coco, added water, probably added some doghair while defoliating and trying to untangle my arm from the stickyness, too, and waited it out until genetics did the rest to produce fire frosty buds.
The smell is off world this morning, my filter seems close to be done and the room is filled with some sweetness, lemon, forest berries and cotten candy. Soft earthy/musky undertones, very subtile but clearly there. I’m a bit blind in terms of differences inbetween the three, it’s intense and too much at once to make out a more specific per plant/ pheno analysis. You know that feeling trying to buy a eau de toilet and in the shop all you smell is all they have at once because everyone is test spraying … overwhelm.
So with this grow coming to an end soon, something new is coming and if you love a single frost tree as well as a meeting with a long forgotten friend, definetly stay tuned…
Todays plan is just taking images, clean up the tent a little , take some cuttings and especially clear up pheno 1 a little as her leaves block some light again. Wirh the other 2 leaving, there’s a little more room and light. The scrog and the right position isn’t optimal for repositioning that late. So she stays in position as is until chop.
Above: SMC pheno1, Day 61
6 Likes
Another short update, Pheno 2 and 4 will be chopped today - I 'm happy with what’s on them, even the lows, great buds once dryed and cured.
Really interesting to see a subtle change from yesterday evening to today. There also was 2 spikes last to days, 65% humidity at night. Noticed in time, yet it’s scary unnessecary worry. Pheno 4 showed a slight darkening and coloring towards a purple/violet, very soft, pastell like colour.
I could let them go for another day or too but to me it looks as if that peak just hit the sweet spot. There’s a single bud showing some crispyness on pheno 2. Stupid broken fan blasted that poor bud bit dry. Besides that, now all it takes is not to fuck up the drying , ideally also controll the spring weather, humidity and temperatures to stay dry-optimal-range… last years zushi first run ended in a harvest at worst time possible at a 27 degree celsius and high humidity - don’t want to repeat that (those zushis still was fire but … that few % that could be better…(sry my imposter syndrome at it’s best)).
Above: 2025 DP Blue zushi, Pheno 1.
Btw, @GasPlease, remember that fucked up hugoblock ? Here’s an image how the roots looked in the gallon of coco, that saved the plant from dying. Further investigation on the block itself revealed the plant never had focussed on that block in the first place, few thicker roots but mainly the coco was packed with roots.
9 Likes
Looking great in there mate, visually pleasing AF, nice!

The Blue Zushi pic you shared from last year is pretty nice too, cool fade and a budshot very similar to the main picture I shot before release.
Anyway, all the Slush Mint Cake’s look amazing and I know what you mean smell wise, a tip, smell one plant once you enter the room, make notes, come back a few hours later do the same for the next and repeat again.
Keep up the nice pics, just lovely to see
Have you ever tried shooting those macro shots with a higher F to get a clearer picture overall, what are you shooting at now, F2.8-F5.6?
Are you using a macro lens already or not?
5 Likes
Hi and thx for the good advices.
I use a canon 35-70 Macro lens, the sigma 18-35, 28 + 50mm takumars with various tubes. The Macro is nice but I love and really want those arty shots absolutly close sometimes. using the taks I have a cm distance to the bud only, what you see above from those takumars was fully closed aperture, handheld. This works really when using a macro slider and stacking the images , ideally in studio setup without 3 ventilators microshaking the plants. I don’t have issues with having enough light to shoot fully closed, it’s the distance that makes the image blurry even at f22.
With the 'Canon 35-70 , well what you see here is maximum closed at minimum distance, it’s still handheld. and sadly the res gets down here on the forum anyway…at least my images got rescaled when using the mobile for upload.
anyway, that frost…
above the SMC Pheno4 shot with the 28mm takumar at f16 (max for this one).
8 Likes
That second picture though… beautiful frost and colour mate

Very typical looks and structure for my Slush Mint Cake
the way you want to see her at the end of flowering, this is taken around day 65?
Regarding the pictures, ye I know what you mean, I do most of my photography handheld as well, but I have to say investing in a good Macro lens really helps, mine from Sony was around 1k and it takes beautiful pictures, even in handheld conditions, and ye switch off your fans is a must to take good macro pictures in the grow room
I often find around F11-13 ideal for shooting buds up close, enough detail and sharpness combined. If you really want to go in close shooting at 2.8-5.6 is best, and like you say, stack pictures and change the focus point when shooting from a tripod is def a must then.
4 Likes
I will have to work with what’s available to me for now. I agree, good lens can make a difference - but that’s really the last 1% to enhance. There are a lot of ways that lead to similar results , even though it means to work around or using other tools. Also lets factor in crop factor of the sensor and it’s influence in DoF while trying to achieve the same framing.
Anyway, few more images for now. hope you still like them, despite the fact the lens isn’t perfect nor the image itself 
Pheno 2 final 5 mins…
8 Likes
Ofc we like them bro!
These are beautiful pictures 
Was just trying to share some views regarding photography and have a little chat about it. But it seems to me you know exactly what you are doing 
Which pheno was your favorite, smell-look wise? Really looking forward to a smoke-report once you have them dried/cured.
5 Likes
I love these nerdy talks and tips an tricks. I might know about that basic stuff , but there’s absolutely no limit to learn new things, especially when it comes to areas, I rarely work on like bud shots, that also ideally should be commercially visually appealing enough to be reused or shared. So I’m more than thankful for you sharing , what’s speaking to you, personally as well as the brand you are associated with. 
Pheno 2 I guess will be my favorite, most powerful smell , good plant , with some better spacing she would have killed it. yet I don’t want to make that final. Pheno 4 has something extra magically sweet and hashy , and damn i had a delicious, supermild allready 4 day dryed ultra tiny testbud yesterday as she was down a day before the other 2. Can’t wait for the development during cure.
not all been perfect though: Pheno 2 had 1 huge single bud rotting inside the top and i should have noticed around day 57 already.
Pheno 1 had nothing on day 62, day64 3 tiny white spots on fan leaves touching the tent wall in the right back. Potentially powdery mildew in it’s early stage. Carefully checked for more and parted from a good lot for safety. Still enough though…
Lesson learned, not stuffing that much plantS in this little space again.
Full smoke report and pics of the final product soon.
But for now, I need a 2 week break and care about the food and seed production. Not been outside in the garden a lot lately and it’s urgently needed to do that work in time.
4 Likes
As said been in the food and herb garden. Took several hours to clean out the bed from the bad stuff in a first pass. Now the “good”/wanted plants can breath again… but the hard part is yet to come - getting rid off the remaining roots of hop and greedy. Painstaking… And rain made it not the work for yesterday.
Check out this beauty in the pic below. Not “our” usual shown here flower but it’s purple. Some are violet black,cream to skull white, and some from soft to more vibriant tentacle-pink. Some of these come with a filled flower, but that’s kinda rare in my garden.
Used the free time to get myself a trimbin as early birthday present, which I wanted for ages but allways told myself, it’s to pricy for a plastic bin. Well, it’s pricy but worth every penny - and I allready love it for it’s simplicity. Less stressy and messy than my diy solutions. Got through the SMC trim today, made a few nice small oldschool balls from the waste. Holy…,frosty SMC seems made for this… Terps are wild for a piece of hash . Stickyness of the SMC in general is insane. Had to move a NP-F970 battery pack to make room on the table - nearly dropped it but it stayed in place , sticking to the glove while hanging. That thing weighs 1/2 a pound… so if you ever need to glue something 250g heavy, a piece of sticky SMC hash got you covered ;). Better than tesa…
4 Likes
Looks amazing 
Some of the best bud shots I have ever seen on a forum. Just spectacular
.
2 Likes
Sorry to hear that. Poor little fella.
2 Likes