Losing My Virginity. Growing For The First Time.

Major Update:

As a result of the high humidity and the initial over watering issue, there was previously a small issue with mold beginning to form around the opening near the door, and on the door itself.
This was taken care of by cleaning the effected areas with a clorox and water solution and by repositioning the fan, aswell as leaving the door open.
A little less than a week following that mold issue, I spotted a small while mold patch in one of the pots. I can only assume thet if was from a stray spore that settled there when I cleaned the box, cause there was no trace of any mold in any other pots.
I removed the effected soil and decided to let the soil in the pots dry very well before watering again.

Soon I will be building a small activated carbon scrubber and purchasing a nice little exaust fan for the top of the box. I will also drill some "intake" holes on the bottom of the box and screen them off. I also am still waiting on those 2 "dehumidifying eggs" to arrive (currently a roaming postal strike going on in canada).

With the better air flow and air exchange, there should be no further problems with humidity or stagnant air in the grow box when the door is sealed.

Now that that is out of the way, I went and watered the plants tonight. But before I did, I wanted to make sure that I did all I could to make sure there was sufficient air flow under the canopys of the plants.

I decided I was going to remove all the hooks used to LST the plants (all 49 of them total) and trim any lower leafs that were not being exposed to sufficient light. And then I decided to remove any small growth from the bottom that had no potential to make it to the canopy. This was done also in hopes to give extra stimulation to the plenty of prime top sites that each plant has produced.

After doing this, I watered the plants well and let the pots drain thouraly and placed them nicely back under and lowered the lights.

These are some of the pictures I took before, during and after:

I have decided that it would be more convenient for me to have both my journal and it's discussion thread all in one. So from this point forward, all discussion should go right here in this thread.
I will copy and paste the text from my previous discussion thread here to catch up on.

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Welcome to my first grow. All help and insight appreciated, however, this grow is very simple and is being used as a benchmark for further grows.
I am growing 6 Blue Domino clones in 1.5 gallon pots which have been "LST'd" since shortly after they were potted.
MG .14 .14 .14 pre-ferted slow release soil is being used with MG .04 .01 .06 perlite at about a 70/30 ratio, and plain well water is being used.
They are under 12 4-foot 32-watt flourescent tubes using 384 watts and pushing almost 34000 lumens. During this grow, I will not be changing the 4100K bulbs (the only ones available at the local hardware store), but in future grows will be using the proper light spectrums for each plant cycle.
In the box, I also have a ionizing tower fan and will soon be using 2 dehumidifying eggs to help control the humidity as it is rather high when the box is sealed.
The box itself is about 2.5 feet wide, by 5 feet long, by 4.5 feet high. The inside is painted with flat white paint.
Thats about all the information I can currently give you.
Wish me luck!

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Plants are growing well, raising the lights 1 chain link (about an inch) almost every day. Now on the 12th day of flowering. Will need to make a small activated carbon filter to put on an exhaust fan still, but there is hardly any smell at this stage so far. They are being grown in my basement, and I am the adult of the house, so I am not too concerned about anyone giving my any problems, except for the in-laws (if they happen to stop by at the height of the stinky time).
I only vegged the plants for 15 days after I potted them, and they were 1-2 weeks old when I got them, so they had about a month of veg time. If they continue to grow at the rate they are now, they should end up the perfect size for my grow box.

I have a question though about watering. The soil is pre-fertilized, and when I water them, some water drains out of the pot. Now this water presumably has some nutes in it that it has leached from the soil. Would it be a bad idea to use this "ferted" water mixed with fresh water for the next watering? I mean, will the water turn bad so to speak as a result? Can I use this water, or should I use only fresh water every time I water?

And another about trimming or pruning. I would really rather not. I have only removed 2 dead leafs that came off with barley any tension at all. But if it would significantly have an impact on the main cola sites, I would be willing to consider it. There is a lot of green on the bottom that is not getting much light, and trimming or pruning would defiantly help the airflow through those areas, but I don't want to stunt the plants at all and was going for a "low as possible" stress environment for this baseline grow. But I have concerns of the airflow and moisture in the box and do not want to chance any major issues related to those.
Looking at the last few pics in my journal, what is your opinions about trimming or pruning these plants?

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As a result of the high humidity and the initial over watering issue, there was previously a small issue with mold beginning to form around the opening near the door, and on the door itself.
This was taken care of by cleaning the effected areas with a clorox and water solution and by repositioning the fan, aswell as leaving the door open.
A little less than a week following that mold issue, I spotted a small while mold patch in one of the pots. I can only assume thet if was from a stray spore that settled there when I cleaned the box, cause there was no trace of any mold in any other pots.
I removed the effected soil and decided to let the soil in the post dry very well before watering again.

Soon I will be building a small activated carbon scrubber and purchasing a nice little exaust fan for the top of the box. I will also drill some "intake" holes on the bottom of the box and screen them off. I also am still waiting on those 2 "dehumidifying eggs" to arrive (currently a roaming postal strike going on in canada).

With the better air flow and air exchange, there should be no further problems with humidity or stagnant air in the grow box when the door is sealed.

Now that that is out of the way, I went and watered the plants tonight. But before I did, I wanted to make sure that I did all I could to make sure there was sufficient air flow under the canopys of the plants.

I decided I was going to remove all the hooks used to LST the plants (all 49 of them total) and trim any lower leafs that were not being exposed to sufficient light. And then I decided to remove any small growth from the bottom that had no potential to make it to the canopy. This was done also in hopes to give extra stimulation to the plenty of prime top sites that each plant has produced.

After doing this, I watered the plants well and let the pots drain thouraly and placed them nicely back under and lowered the lights.

Pics posted in journal.

I am expecting a stage of delayed growth resulting from the stress I just put them all through, but I am hoping that by doing so I have made the right decision and will ultimately be rewarded by my actions. I don't expect there to be much to update on for at least a few days.
Wish me luck.

Any feedback is greatly appreciated.

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So I pruned and trimmed and watered the plants at the beginning of their light cycle last night. This morning, everything still looks good. I did not notice any droopiness and the plants did grow a little since. Well see how they look tonight when the light comes back on.

I was thinking about giving them some flowering nutrients on next watering. Considering that the soil is still active at .14 .14 .14, and the plants are now strong and large enough to not be burnt by the slow release ferts, I figure that the plants should be able to handle a little something extra to help boost bud production.

Considering I put about 30% perlite, does this make my pre-release nutes more in the range of .10 .10 .10?
I was thinking I want something in the range of 0-.15-0 to .05-.20-.05.

These numbers are dependent on whether the 30% perlite made my soil more of a .10-.10-.10, of if it has no real effect and is still more like .14-.14-.14.
Next watering is not until the 16th of june (they like 5 full days to dry out), so I have a few days to make a decision if I want to get it in the next watering.

I have decided that I will basically be following these simple instructions to build my activated carbon filter.
Easy to Build DIY Carbon Filter

I will be attaching this to a fan like this.
http://www.canadiantire.ca/AST/brows....jsp?locale=en

I will have to reverse the wires on the fan motor itself, so that I can have the grill on the outside of my box blowing out (its a cheap fan and will look good, and I couldn't find anything like it with reversed air flow). I believe that this fan sucks through the grill like would a normal bathroom exhaust fan. But that sounds like fun, so for under $20, I'll give it a shot.


As always, any input is greatly appreciated.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by.

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24 hours after pruning and trimming. There are no signs of slowed growth and the plants all look healthy. Had to raise the lights again another chain link.
Can anyone give me a thumbs up on N-P-K of the fert I linked in my previous post mixed with the N-P-K of the soil the plants are in? I think I'm on the right track, but a knowledgeable "looks good" would do me a lot of good.

edit: While sitting downstairs smoking a little doobie, I was glancing over at the perlite bag still laying on the floor. Like noted in my first post, it has a N-P-K of .04 .01 .06
I also got to thinking about the change in N-P-K when the volume of the soil was reduced by adding the perlite.
I was thinking before that by adding the perlite, the N-P-K of the mixture would change as per volume of the components. But now I'm thinking that this is in fact not the case.
I am thinking now, that with the soil plus the perlite, my mediums N-P-K should in fact read like this: .14 .14 .14 + .04 .01 .06 = .18 .15 .20 .

Should I just go with the .10 .54 .10 bloom builder and start at 25% ? That would put me more like .18 .15 .20 + .025 .135 .025 = .205 .285 .225 for 25% strength, and .23 .42 .25 for 50% strength.

As always, any input is greatly appreciated.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by.

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Now we are all caught up.

Ill post pics of 48 hours after trimming and pruning later tonight when the lights come on.

Hope you have a lot of room. Looking great!

Well, I have about another 2 feet of height. Do you really think they will get larger than that considering the size they are now?

Guessing it depends on the strain but mine almost doubled in size when I flipped them. Your plants look great and should explode!

Plants are still looking good. No sign of stress resulting from the trimming and pruning. I took some pics last night I will post soon. Nothing much to see though, same plants just an inch or so taller.
I was looking at them last night and looking at their stocks. Because I LST'd them, they are low, but the length of the main stocks are close to 20-24 inches already. I'm glad I LST'd them, cause if not I would shortly be running out of room

Here you go.



Edit (The next morning): So I am down there having breakfast looking at my tops (of which there are more than 40 receiving direct light) and I notice that they made some progress overnight. I think the quantity of hairs almost doubled overnight. But I was smoking a joint, so maybe not doubled, but defiantly progress. Then I see it... on every one of the smaller leafs that are surrounding every top... Crystals! I'll take a few higher resolution pics tonight.
Having to raise the light an inch every single night, several tops grow slightly in between the fluorescent tubes every night (which I heard and assume is fine because of the low heat the lights put out).

I purchased today "Plant Prod" plant starter fertilizer with a N-P-K of .10 .52 .10
I am going to use this at next water at 25% strength.
I expect the total nutrients available to the plants to be about .20 .28 .22

Any opinions?

Hey Sativus, the plants are looking great! I'm in the process of planning my own first grow and I was just wondering out of curiosity, are 1.5 gallon pots big enough to grow in or are you planning on going bigger?