Right after my post last night, I went out to play poker. When I returned at 5am, I found an alarming situation! First of all, the HID had turned off because it is on a timer. The first thing I noticed was the temperature and humidty. The temperature was around 73°F, which is acceptable and normal. The humidity was at 22%!! The reason for this, I soon found out.

After taking a look at my hygrometer, I next looked at the plants below the HID. The fan was still blowing on them gently and they were all looking okay except for one. One of the three pots, specifically the XXX-420 seedling, had its soil completely dried out and the true leaves were browning around the edges!!! Yikes! I immediatly gave it some water, misted it and placed it under the T5 FL again. The other two plants under the HID had amazing rapid leaf growth. I am so pleased with their results, that I am going to water them a little more and put them under the HID again. The massive loss in humidity was due to my growing cubes. They had completely dried out! I'm assuming the heat from the HID caused this to occur. When this happened I saw 2/3 seedlings do a face plant onto the cube next to it. When I noticed how dry it was, I fed it lots of water into the spongey cubes so that everyone would be quite moist. Sure enough 10 hours later, they have sprung up again facing the light. The third (Afghani) seedling in the grow cubes, remained strong through the whole experience! This is just one more example of amazingly strong the Afghani is! I'd really love to get these cubes into the soil to see what they can do under the HID, but they aren't ready yet. I am going to check up on my plants a lot more frequently now that I have the HID turned on. This is dramatically affecting the climate of my grow room. The amazing part is that the light was 4' away from the plants and everything still dried out!

Attached Images

	Best seedling -- Afghani.jpg (34.1 KB, 68 views)
	Tutti-Fruiti seedling.jpg (40.8 KB, 74 views)
	XXX-420 - seedling with dried and burnt leaves.jpg (43.9 KB, 49 views)
	Grow Cubes - XXX-420 and Tutti-Fruity.JPG (56.1 KB, 36 views)
	Grow Cubes - long stretchy and bent stem from Tutti-Fruity.jpg (46.8 KB, 24 views)

thats why hydro waters a few times a day mate a HID'll do that and youll need to set out a seperate flower room not only to stop the light at night but also to get the correct spectrums to each, lookin good so far, youve just inspired me that my next grow'll be an afghani keep up the good work n happy smokin

__________________
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how can somethin with no recorded fatalitys be illegal

Today I made up some signs for the plants. I've labelled the plants according to the discussion we had in this thread (Plant Number System). The three seedlings inside the grow cubes are labelled A1, T1 and X1. The ones in the 4" pots are labelled A2, T2 and X2. The codes are made up of the first letter of the strain and a number starting from 1 increasing each time there is a new one.

A2 and T2: I needed to water A2 and T2 today and they are doing very well. These seedlings have the largest leaves so far. I have decided to put these ones under my HID again since I just finished watering them. I can tell now that the first set of true leaves need to be larger than the original seed leaves before it is ready for the HID. Technically I could use the T5 FL for the whole seedling stage, but I feel the stems are stretching too much for light and I know the HID will help that issue. An alternate solution would be to get more T5 FLs.

Exhaust fan: When the temperature is above 25°C, I turn the exhaust fan on. At the moment, I'm having issues with the thermostat I bought. I'm having a challenge keeping the RH% up when the exhaust fan is on. Also, I've noticed a really annoying whistling noise coming from the exhaust duct. I suspect this is caused by not enough incoming air, so it is actually sucking. This is not surprising considering this was one of my concerns before I started. I have an idea of installing a vent grill in my floor. Under my room is a small 3' crawlspace. I also want to install another duct inside my bedroom going from the bottom of the plants (under the HID) to the top of my room outside the plastic poly. This will allow a more constant temperature in my grow room. Please feel free to post your comments.

Top shelf looking at exhaust



400W Metal Halide HID

Attached Images

	Day 11 - T2 and A2 under HID.jpg (58.5 KB, 37 views)
	Day 11 - X2.jpg (11.4 KB, 22 views)
	Day 11 - Seedlings under T5 FL.jpg (30.7 KB, 21 views)
	Day 11 - A1.jpg (22.8 KB, 31 views)
	Day 11 - T1.jpg (21.6 KB, 41 views)

I've been thinking about my grow room setup and reading the various feedback I've received regarding the issue of the flowering cycle. I've decided to keep it simple for the first round. I am going to germinate about 6 more seeds or so and have them grow up the vegetative stage along with the ones I already have. When I feel they are all ready for flowering, I will flower all my plants by setting the HID to 12 hours.

It is a whole lot easier for me to move my T5 FL and clones to another room than it is to create a flowering room. I will keep the clones under the T5 FL (and purchased more of them if I need to) while the mothers are in flowering stage. Hopefully by the time the mothers are done flowering, the clones will be ready for flowering and I will trade them with the mothers which I'll put back under the T5 FLs for vegging again.

Note: Idealy I'd like to have flowering and vegging in the same area. For this I assume it will cost money for wood and other construction materials. Also I would like to have an HPS for flowering and use my MH for vegging only. All this could cost up to $400, whereas an additional T5 FL would cost $50.

hmm your humidity problem is easily sorted 1. why dont you try putting a humidifier in front of your air inlet as air comes through it will be humid air.2 i like this method fill two litre pop bottles with water and place in your room close the door watch your humidity rise.good luck bruv.

I like the two ideas you've suggested. In the short term I will just place some water inside the grow area to evaporate. In the long term, I'd like to seal the bottom of the plasitc to the wooden platform and then connect a duct from the bottom of the plastic to the top of my bedroom. Inside my bedroom (outside the grow room) I have a vaporizer running which does keep the humidity high, and for some reason that humdity isn't be transferred to the grow room. I also know the door to my bedroom is closed most of the time because it's cold inside the house outside my room. I have thought about putting the vaporizer inside the grow room but I realized it could blow a bulb with the water droplets, and I can't afford to risk that.

The challenge with installing the duct for intake is money. I will need about 8' of ducting and a fan for the duct. If I purchase the same parts that I used for my exhaust, it should be less than $75. I believe the inline booster fan cost me $45 (Which is really high for homehardware, I think they're making more than 400% profit!). The ducting cost me something like $10, I really don't remember. However, before I install this intake duct, I will need to completely seal off the plastic around the bottom because that is where the air is currently being drawn in. I am going to see if I can borrow a staple gun from a friend to hold down the plastic and then reinforce it with packing tape for an air seal. I don't really need an air seal, but I know if I do that I won't have to worry about light pollution.

Germination: I picked six more seeds (2 of each strain) and placed them in water to soak for 12 hours. After the 12 hours all the seeds sank to the bottom, so they should all be viable. Applying the knowledge I gained from the previous six seeds, I will put all the seeds into their own 4" pot right away and place them under the HID.

The HID: I've put the HID about 4' away from the pots. I will be watching the plants under the HID very carefully so that they don't dry out too much. The timer is set to 18 on, 6 off. I've also syncronized the T5 FL to 18/6. Before, I had the T5 on 24 hours. Last night I turned off the T5 for 6 hours (using the timer) and I was surprised to find the noticable growth during the night. From my experience so far, I am able to say that the plant does grow faster during darkness and therefore using a 18/6 light cycle saves money and encourages growth.

Heat: When the HID is turned on, the amount of heat generated is incredible. With my exhaust fan on constantly, the temperature hovers around 30°C/82°F!! While the plants under the HID are safe from the heat, the seedlings on the shelf are not. I know that the idea temperature for plants to grow is 23°C. I'm not sure if this will slow or stop the growth, all I can do is watch carefully for results.

Attached you will find pictures of the plants, all except X2 which I can't seem to get a good close up pic. First are the seedlings in the grow cubes, X1, A1 and T1. Second are the two best seedlings A2 and T2 surrounded by the ones I've just started: A3, A4, X3, X4, T3, T4. Finally the third picture is a fruit salad I made a couple nights ago when I was really high. The impressive part is that my creativity increases significantly when I'm high. This kinda stuff doesn't happen often.

Attached Images

	Day 13 - Grow cubes.jpg (43.9 KB, 39 views)
	Day 13 - Under the HID.jpg (90.8 KB, 72 views)
	mmmm Fruit Salad.jpg (69.4 KB, 128 views)

Hey brotha things are looking good for you. I have just started my first germination and things are going a bit slow for me. I got the chronic and afghani growing. But I hope I get the results with my afghani, and good luck to ya.PeaceSmokes UpSmokenchoke310

Thanks man, I wish you good luck as well. I can assure you the Afghani will be no trouble at all. I'm interested in your Chronic strain. If you've got a grow journal, I'll be sure to check it once in a while to see your progress .

Under the HID: I've been checking up on the plants under the HID every 4-6 hours. So far everything is okay. Each time I checked on them, I needed to mist them as the soil at the top 1/2" was dry. The small fan I put near the two seedlings A2 and T2 is helping strengthen the stems. After a good watering the plants no longer pull a face plant due to the heavy leaves. It's been over 24 hours now since I first planted the seeds and still nothing to see. I'm hoping by Saturady (3 more days) I'll have sprouts.

X2: I've been watching the soil conditions because I want to water this plant. Today it finally dried out so much that I was able to water it. I gave it a good soaking and let it drain out. I noticed today that a new set of leaves is starting to sprout out, let's hope these ones don't burn. I've put the X2 pot under the HID since I would like the water to dry out faster than last time and If these new leaves are exposed to the HID in an early phase, I feel it will adapt to the light.

Grow Cubes: These plants are still doing well under the T5 FL, but nothing really worth mentioning. I've noticed the edges of the leaves are starting to ripple. I remember seeing in a video that this means the plants are hot and they are trying to increase the surface area for extra cooling. I believe this as the temperature at that height in my closet is about 30°C. I've been misting them occassionally to help. I've also thought about putting the tray under the HID at a distance that will not hurt them. I'm hesitant about doing this due to what happened with X2. Perhaps I should relocate them in a different area.

Side Note: Today while trying to connect to the server rollitup.org, I was having DNS issues. It wasn't until I switched my dns to SHAW cable that I was able to access the site. I tried a couple of U.S.A. dns servers without any luck. No doubt the feds are causing shit. I also noticed in the Support forum the great administrators of this site have let us know about the changes coming about. It's always a good thing when you have more traffic than your site can handle and thus need an upgrade!