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First harvest morning, me and Bee, Fruitcakes coming down.

This has been the summer of purple in my growing beds. I have never had a grow with so many purple flowers. I’ve had lots of purple leaves over the years, but this season, I finally had three plants that grew true purple flowers.

Fruitcake 21

Both Fruitcakes are purple, but the biggest surprise from this year is having a purple Royal Kush phenotype. I was not expecting this plant, nor did I know she was capable of such a pheno. If this was the first time I’d grown from these seeds, I might have doubted this was a Royal Kush. But she is, and were it not for the Fruitcakes, this would have been the surprise of the year.

Royal Kush 20

Harvest began at 9:00 Saturday morning by taking down both Fruitcakes. Both of these plants, especially the one in bed 18, were overrun with flea beetles. We’ve seen these before, but never in abundance. This was a complete infestation. They were running up and down flowers in bed 18 while being harvested. Bee tasked themself with that plant and it required removing every flower off the stem and looking at it under a magnified lamp. It was the only way to be sure to get all the visible mold. The flea beetles did not survive the washing.

This was our first ever infestation from this particular pest. It seems to have been entirely cultivar based, as only these two plants faced such an onslaught of tiny pests. The Fruitcakes were not next to each other. They didn’t spread to other plants, even those next door. Fruitcake was what they wanted. It’s going to take us some time to opine the reasons why. But we completely acknowledge the event, and as much as we love this cultivar, Fruitcake should only be grown indoors in coastal Northern California. You can grow her outdoors, but depending on where you live, you’re going to lose a significant portion of flowers to botrytis. She needs a dry environment.

While we will probably not grow this cultivar again, this does not get us off the hook for the flea beetle infestation. It won’t be a problem eradicating them, because I’ll be solarizing the growing mediums as soon as the grow concludes. But going forward, I need to address flea beetles. I’d like to learn what specifically attracted them to those cultivars, so that in the future, I might avoid growing cultivars that attract this pest. Fortunately, this is a correctable mistake.

But just to make sure, even after solarizing, I will be applying regular foliar sprays of both Neem oil and Dr. Bronner’s soap to the surface of every growing medium in our beds. I’ll do this multiple times prior to planting fava beans, vegetables, or cannabis again. I’ll do it again as needed, even while vegetables grow. Infestations require a proactive approach.

Mind you, all of this nastiness has happened while next door to both Fruitcakes, multiple cultivars are growing without any mold at all. 

Cherry Punch 15 is happy to get some rain, and still without mold. That can’t last.

The flea beetles were the mold vectors. They carried it and spread it wherever they dug. They got into stems and behind flowers. The Fruitcake in bed 21 that I took down was relatively straightforward, with minimal mold to remove (after a lot was removed a couple of days before). But the pests had really gotten into Fruitcake in bed 18. 

In the drying room, Fruitcake 21 is hanging on the lines. Fruitcake 18 are buds laying on two levels of a six level hanging rack. There was nothing for us to hang. The rack is literally perfect for this use.

As often happens around this time of year, weather played a significant role in what came down and when. More rain is slated to hit from Monday through Wednesday, so a slight change has occurred in the order. First to come down were both Fruitcakes. We brought them down on day 50. I would have loved to let them limp along for ten more days, but we were losing too many flowers from each of those plants every day to spot mold. As I previously wrote, these two plants seemed to serve as companion plants for the rest of the grow. They attracted all the bad stuff and we finally had to bring the plants down in order to preserve the medicine. Not only for both Fruitcakes, but for all the plants. I don’t want mold lingering near other plants at flower time. Mold spores can spread quickly in conditions like those that we’re facing.

Fruitcake 21, waiting for fan leaf removal.

Two more plants are definitely coming down prior to the rain, the only question is which plants. I’m looking through a jeweler’s lens twice a day to determine readiness. Last evening, it appeared that Purple Punch’s trichomes are beginning to fill, so she is likely to come down at first light today.

I’m waiting for the trichomes to fill on both Cherry Punch 11 and Purple Royal Kush 20. Cherry Punch 11 actually hit her projected harvest date, yesterday, but her trichomes are not yet full and she’s not moldy at all, so I’m waiting.

The plant that looks most ready to go is the purple Royal Kush in bed 20. I am loath to take her down, simply because I enjoy looking at her so much.

Royal Kush 20

Purple Punch came down on Sunday with minimal mold removed. She made it to her exact harvest date and her trichomes were filling. From the start of the chopping down, through the fan leaf trim and the eventual washing, taking down this plant took about 4 ½ hours. 

Of course, at harvest time, I know approximately when each plant should be ready. But few things in harvest go exactly as planned. 

During a plant inspection after hanging Purple Punch in the drying room, I noticed an increase in flower mold on Royal Kush 13. Closer inspection showed small bits of mold close to, but not touching flowers, in classic Stargus mode. To my eyes, at day 54, this plant looked like it needed harvesting. Bee came by, inspected and agreed.

Royal Kush 13 gets to leap frog the other plants that are supposed to be ready now. The kind of small mold found on this plant reveals now is the time to harvest. That mold isn’t going to get smaller, it will only increase by the hour. This is the perfect opportunity to save the medicine, so she’ll come down Monday morning.

All plant inspections are in high alert situations now. The humidity is not dipping below 80%, with spotty rain in the forecast for three straight days. In these conditions, I have to be ready to harvest everything at any time.

Plus, I have an appointment on Tuesday that will keep me from the garden all day. I need to make choices today, so that I won’t be thinking about the plants tomorrow, while I’m gone.

With that in mind, we finally removed one branch from Rosé that had stem rot and was causing some spectacular colors, though possibly threatening the rest of the plant. 

Rosé–this beautiful stem needed harvesting before the rest of the plant.

Those flowers were washed and are now drying. Where the branch was removed was sealed with alcohol and then honey, and the rest of the plant has 15 more days to harvest. Removing the one bough guarantees the rest of the plant will finish properly, without being impacted by nearby stem mold.

This flower from Rosé is now safely drying.

Impressively, the plant that I thought would be harvested first, Cherry Punch 11, is still standing, and her trichomes have not yet filled as of day 63. I’ve read that Cherry Punch can harvest outdoors anywhere from 60 to 80 days. Since there is no mold on either Cherry Punch, I’m pushing them as long as possible to fill their trichomes before harvesting.

The other plant that I thought would come down by now is Royal Kush 20, the purple pheno. Just like Cherry Punch, her trichomes are holding out. As with the other Royal Kush, I’m looking hard for any botrytis break out that would force me to take her down early. But right now, it looks like the soonest she’ll come down is Wednesday, and I’ll be shocked if her trichomes are not full by then.

You know it’s harvest time when flowers start drooping into the aisles.

A quarter inch of rain has fallen Monday and Tuesday. Another third of an inch is slated to fall tonight and tomorrow. Bee is coming and we are already discussing which plants might need to come down during and after this rain. At this stage of the season, with continued sustained humidity apparently never stopping, that much rain could mean a very sudden harvest for one or more of the remaining plants. Because of the conditions, I am probably going to have to break my one plant a day rule this year. Tomorrow, it is realistic that four plants will come down. Two in the beds, Cherry Punch 11 and Royal Kush 20, and the two plants not in the beds, Apple Crumble next to the lavender and the tiny AK 47, in the aviary. It only took one glance about five minutes ago at both to decide they have to come down tomorrow, as well.

Apple Crumble

AK-47

So . . . the plans of the entire summer largely become moot when late season weather changes everything. Plans change when plants need rescuing.

All of this recent rain also means that as soon as it stops, ground based termites are going to emerge from the loam and en masse, start flying all over our valley, looking for a home to start a family. This happens every year after the first real rain. They emerge by the thousands.

That means with the still standing plants, I’ll have to soon start inspecting for dead termites, severed wings, and/or termite parts, as dragonflies dissemble them in mid-air. Many are the times I have used my long handled tweezers to remove termite wings from flowers. I have attempted, and will attempt again, to video this annual exercise in carnage.

I’ve written many times, do not ever fear harvesting early. Save the medicine. 

Happy Harvest!

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