JD1stTimer's grow log.

[JD1stTimer]

Strain: Blosser
Lighting: 26w CFL
Grow Media/Soil Mix: Unknown
Fertilizer: Unknown
Temperature Range: 60-70F
Humidity: Unknown (Very Dry)
Started From: Clone
Start Date: Jan. 24, 2008

Other Details/Images: This plant was purchased on Ebay from coinlobby.  He mostly sells coins, but right now salvia is his biggest item.  He included a packet of unenhanced leaf as a freebie.  I had a religious experience chewing that leaf and meditating, but it could have been just the meditation talking.  The plant looks very healthy, with some slight drying of leaf edges, and a few insect marks on one leaf.  One leaf has a broken stem, but isn't wilted.  Plant is one foot tall, nicely packed.  I picked it up at the post office at 3:45 pm yesterday, and as of right now it is standing almost straight with leaves extended.

This is right after unpacking.  I unpacked in the bathroom with the shower going on hot water.  Over the next few hours it started leaning over more and more and more.

It doesn't show too good in this picture but there is a brown circle on the stem on the lower side of this node.  I hope it's not a stem rot.

Here is the leaf with broken stem.  It looks as turgid as the rest of the leaves though.

You can see it's starting to leeeeean over even more.  I honestly thought the stem would break when it was a 90 degree bend. This is about 30min after unpacking, and obviously it's humid in there.  I think being suddenly exposed to light made it transpire a lot faster than normal so it could put some sucrose back in its phloem. (I'm scientifical.)

Here's my humidity tent.  For some reason I thought that bag was a lot more transparent, I need to find a better one.  It's supported by a coat hanger bent into what looks like a gigantic doll stand.  I then tied the bag around the pot.

[MstryShovel]

looks like you got a decent plant offa ebay (a rarity ive heard) she should sprouce up as soon as she gets over the shock of shipping(give her a day or 2 at the most). The same thing happened to one of my plants durring shipping (refering to the leaf with snapped stem.) amazingly (against my assumption) the whole leaf remained completely green and eventualy looked like a whole normal leaf (turgor across the whole thing), with only a small brown dash across its middle. This leaf was one of the first to get discarded once she had a replacement, but still remained healthy and green for a month at least.  Happy growing, thanks for sharing, and keep us updated!

ps, that brown circle could be any number of things, bugs, humidity variation, shock, initial stages of root rot-return (close calls of near-root rot(one of mine has done this I beleive aswell as getting strange brown dots along the stem. they havent spread or gotten worse since I re-acclimatized my plant to its new indoor living situation for winter though)

[JD1stTimer]

Thanks MstryShovel, now I'm wondering what to do next, should I repot or take a cutting, and should I do it asap or wait a week?  Here's this beautiful girl, her name is Sally, (Not very original, I know, but if I ever am elite enough to get her to set seed the babies will have new names) and she is straightened up.  We'll see what happens when her tent comes off for an hour again today. 

Ain't she preshish?  BTW, for some reason Salvia really really wants me to find a girlfriend and awaken sexually, and convinced me that my only purpose on Earth is to make children and raise them well.  Another time I got the distinct impression that Salvia is a woman, and her husband is infertile.  It made me think the pollen is defective somehow, but if that were the case any viable seeds would grow just fine, right?  Isn't the health of the embryo determined more by the female contributions? Endosperm, germplasm, etc?  Anyway, anyone else have salvia trying to get you all family-minded when you smoke it?  She flat out told me that at the age of 28 if I'm not fathering yet I could be broken in the same way a TV with no picture tube is broken, which scared me a bit.  And telling me to date more women is the ONLY thing she ever tells me anymore.

[Arcygenical]

After your plant gets acclimated to her surroundings (about a month) pinch her top, and remove the large side leaves of the lowest node. This lets those tiny buds above the side leaves flourish.

That way you'll get lots of nice branching on the lower node!

[Paradoxic]

Ain't she preshish?  BTW, for some reason Salvia really really wants me to find a girlfriend and awaken sexually, and convinced me that my only purpose on Earth is to make children and raise them well.  Another time I got the distinct impression that Salvia is a woman, and her husband is infertile.  It made me think the pollen is defective somehow, but if that were the case any viable seeds would grow just fine, right?  Isn't the health of the embryo determined more by the female contributions? Endosperm, germplasm, etc?  Anyway, anyone else have salvia trying to get you all family-minded when you smoke it?  She flat out told me that at the age of 28 if I'm not fathering yet I could be broken in the same way a TV with no picture tube is broken, which scared me a bit.  And telling me to date more women is the ONLY thing she ever tells me anymore.

Thats very interesting, cool interpretation. So during the experience did she, as a being, really say those things to you or were those more interpretations of the experience? I'm curious to hear more about those experiences, you should post an experience report about them. Btw, the plant does look nice and healthy.

[JD1stTimer]

Well, I've actually been using amnesiac doses, but I always have some sort of "Moral of the story" knocking around in my braincase for about 30 minutes afterward.  I know it sounds dumb to knowingly OD yourself but I have a friend who is very much a hard-head and he really wanted to go to salviaspace, and I couldn't afford to buy one for him and one for me, and I have trouble measuring small doses accurately.  He doesn't really see visions without .1 grams of the SalviaZone Blue (Whatever strength that is.. 120 mg/g?), but as I reported before that dose totally kicked my ass. (And yeah, I was trying to be the big man, cause it takes him like four hits to clear the bowl, so I was showing him how I clear .1 gram with one hit.  Reminds me of that one about the zendo and the paint boy.  Does salvia kick your ass just for feeling cocky? I didn't even think of this aspect until now.)  The journeys I remember in detail were on lower doses or a second journey within an hour or two.  I find that it is much less effective if I try to go twice in one evening, but I find myself in a visionary state much more easily now than when I first started with the Lady.  A reverse tolerance over time, but regular tolerance in the short term?

[JD1stTimer]

I have been taking the tent off of Sally trying to harden her.  She stayed in the tent 24 hours after I got her, then Friday I took off the tent for one hour and she sagged a little bit, then Saturday I was going to go for an hour and a half or two hours, but after an hour and fifteen minutes she was leaning over so bad I misted her, misted the tent, and put the tent back on.  Today I went for 1:25, and she was COMPLETELY limp, she was making an arc with the top leaves almost touching the table.  I put the tent back on, and when I got home from church tonight, she had grown visibly taller and the top of the tent was keeping her from standing straight up!! That means she's basically over the shipping shock right?  I raised the tent a couple of inches, and there is more airflow now, so I think from now on I will just raise the tent a little each day and lower it again if she starts wilting.  A picture will come tomorrow.

[MstryShovel]

when plants move liek that... its liek... venus fly traps, every time they close the trap they are actualy growing, one side of thier "trap" then opening grows the inside to balance, (growing is simmilar if not exchangable to streaching but it does both )  the same is for other plants but when wind or another force pushes/pulls/saggs them they must fight back, simmilar to how muscles grow when used, if you are always using your left arm (wind blowing from the east) then your left arm will get stronger.... anyways enough of my babbleings your plant sounds like a strong one, just needs to get used to new conditions

[JD1stTimer]

Well, this morning I went in to see her completely laying over to the side.  I thought she would die, but I misted the inside of the tent (I think it might invite rot or fungus to get water on the leaves), and lowered it to only one inch higher than it has been.  Two inches was just too fast.  Surprisingly, within a few hours she was standing straight up again! It's unbelievable how resilient this plant actually is in a certain way.  Here's a photo I just took:

[JD1stTimer]

It amazes me how sensitive this plant can be.  Monday I set her humidity tent to have one inch of clearance off the table top.  It is at least 12 inches high.  She was apparently just fine through Tuesday morning, then when I was at work the wind began to switch, the house to pitch (We had 59 mph straightline winds), and when I got home from work she was all crumpled up against the side of the tent. (She's in the house BTW, on my dining room table.). Egads!  I tied the tent closed around the pot, and about three hours later she was standing tall again.  I'm starting to think she might be too fussy for me, although I fuss over her all the time.  Those falling-down-limp episodes shock me every time though.

[JD1stTimer]

I bought a humidifier yesterday, and the bag it was wrapped in was perfect for a tent! It's nice and clear, it's sturdy enough to stand without support, and it even has little holes spaced about five inches apart!  Today Sally has been with me for one week.  I cut off one broken leaf which had wilted completely, then I took the tent off for one hour, and here's what I got:    
That's even with this guy running full-blast in the room:
.  What's she trying to tell me?  Her sensitivity to dry air has just gotten worse and worse.  I haven't watered her yet, her soil was soaked when she arrived and it's still moist enough to stick to itself.  Is it root-bound or root-rot?  I bought a four-gallon pot with a reservoir to put her in, and 10 quarts of seed and cutting starter soil and eight quarts of perlite.  Should I repot ASAP?  I was thinking that waiting closer to ten days is even better than just one week.  I know there are some experts here, any help is appreciated. Thank you!

[Arcygenical]

I'm going to read the entire thing, and see if I can figure out what's going wrong for you. Give me a second.

Well, first off, I think your plant is sitting in water-soaked soil. Not too much you can do about this, I'm afraid... But you can pour a layer of sand on the top which will bring the water level down.

Next, I think she's just hypersensitive to dryness. This is honestly fairly normal. You've got a really TALL cutting, which wilts easier. I would stake her up immediately, so she doesn't risk snapping off. Keep her in her humidity tent, but turn off that humidifier. A single spritz a day should be fine.

Make sure your humidity tent has some holes in it for gas exchange.

Get your supplemental light as close to her as possible (within 3-4 inches), so she stops stretching.

Also, I think it would be worthwhile to pinch her top leaves... and force her to grow outward.

Don't stop taking her out of her tent though... Keep doing it until she's fine for an hour a day, then continue on.

[JD1stTimer]

Thanks Arcygenical.  I was just getting her new pot ready.  Should I hold off on the repotting?  The mix I used is 10 quarts seed and cutting soil, and eight quarts of perlite.  I did not know how fine-grained the seed soil would be, wow it is very small particles.  It does have a lot of vermiculite in it though, so together with lots of perlite it should both hold water well and be fluffy.  She hasn't even perked up in her humidity tent overnight.   I don't see any brown on her stem though.  I guess I will stake it, though I don't know if I should stake it before or after repotting.  Also the humidifier is for me too.  It really is extremely dry and it has been taking a harsh toll on my skin.  It's not putting mist directly around Sally, it's about ten feet away and there's a heat register between the two.  I know, heat register is bad.  I'm thinking about closing it, but it's so cold!  I'm already keeping the house at 65 which to me is pretty chilly.  Looking back I wish I had waited until spring to order her, but she's here now so this is what I have to deal with.  Maybe if I attach a cloth to the register to diffuse the air more... hmmm I think I'll try it.

[JD1stTimer]

Thanks everyone for all the help and advice!  I went ahead and repotted her because I really wanted to see what condition the roots were in.Thank goodness, they were BRIGHT WHITE and nice and fuzzy (the good kind, not the fungus kind).  They had just barely reached the pot though, so evidently the cutting had very little root development when it was shipped.  No wonder she seemed so temperamental.  I set her just 1/3 inch below her previous soil level, but not down to the first node.  If I understand correctly, any stem that is below the soil line will develop roots, so this should help her root more quickly.  She was starting to perk up a bit before I even staked her! Arcygenical, should I go ahead and pinch the top now or wait a few more weeks? Here's a picture:
   

[JD1stTimer]

Is modifying the original post preferred over using replies to update a grow log?