iriefarmer
Active Member
Hey there everyone,
I know there have been many other threads of this nature but I figured I'd give it a go. I've compiled this information by doing LOTS AND LOTS of reading, making many visits to my local hydroponics store, and taking advice from you lovely folks. As a general disclaimer I'll say that this is information is to be used at your own risk, I'm not guaranteeing anything. Knowledge, skill set, and means are all determining factors in a grows success
Hope this helps answer some general questions, just a newbie trying to help other newbies out. Everyone has a different opinion about the most effective/easiest way to grow while producing the most yield, so forgive me if you disagree and tell me if I'm just flat out wrong. There isn't much about hydroponics in this thread since I grow with soil! Enjoy...
The Life Cycle of Marijuana (this is really important to understand)
Germination is the initial stage of growth. When the seeds embryo cracks open and produces a root. Once the root has fixed itself into the soil and sprouted two emrbryonic leaves the plant has entered the seedling stage. Germination can take anywhere from 12 hours to 3 weeks to occur.
Seedling after the 1st pair of embryonic leaves are recieving light your plant will produce another set of leaes, these leaves are different from the last and should exhibit marijuana characteristics, The seedling stage may last 1 to 3 weeks, at the end of this stage your plant will have 4-8 new leaves.
Vegetative Growth the plant now begins to grow at a rate at which leaves produce energy. your plant needs all the food and light it can get at this point. Plant will continue growing taller, thicken stems, more fingers will appear on leaves, and will being showing sex. When it does this a plant has entered the next stage. It can take anywhere from a month to 5 months to occur.
Pre-Flowering during this stage the plant will slow down developement in height and beings to produce more branches/nodes. During this phase your plant will start to show a calyx (hopefully) which appears where the branches meet at stem and nodes.
Flowering During this stage the plant continues to fill out. The plant will show its sex clearly. The male plant produces little balls that are clustered
together like grapes. The female plant produces little white/cream
pistils that look like hairs coming out of a pod. Each of the plants will
continue to fill out more and their flowers will continue to grow. It can
take anywhere between 4 to 16 weeks for the plant to fully develop its
flowers. During this time the males pollen sacks would
have burst spreading pollen to the female flowers.
FLOWERING NON-POLLINATED FEMALES (SINSEMILLA CROP) During this stage the plant continues to fill out. The plant will show its sex more clearly. The female plant produces little creamy/white pistils. The plant will continue to fill out more and its flowers will continue to grow. It can take anywhere between 4 and 16 weeks for the plants to fully develop. During this time though there are no males to pollinate the female plants. The buds will grow larger and develop more resin glands. Resin may drop down onto the leaves and the plant becomes very sticky. The pistils on the buds begin to get thicker and cluster into balls. The reason for the high increase in bud growth is that the female plant is trying her best to attract male pollen.
__________________________________________________________________
Quick facts about growing conditions:
Climate Temp Range: During lights on cycle between 70 & 80 degrees Fahrenheit. During lights off cycle between 64-71 degrees Fahrenheit.
Root Zone Temp: 65-70 degrees Fahrenheit
Water/Nutrients Temp: 65-70 degrees Fahrenheit
Ideal soil Ph: 6.5-7
Ideal nutrients Ph: 5.7-6.4
__________________________________________________________________
Planning Your Garden
SIZE
Determining size accurately means a lot when starting a grow. The amount of space you're using determines lighting and ventilation needs so it's important to get this part right, as the rest of your planning is based on it. Before filling a huge room up with lights, fans, and other fun gadgets you should take into consideration your budget & availability. How much time do you have to spend gardening/reading to obtain proper information?
Organic fertilizers added to soil for nutrients:
Material/NPK/Nutrient Release Rate
Alfalfa meal/2.5-0.5-2.0/slow
Blood Meal/12.5-1.5-0.6/med-fast
Bone Meal/4.0-21.0-0.2/slow (may cause acidity)
Cottonseed Meal/7.0-2.5-1.5/slow-med
Crab Meal/10.0-0.3-0.1/slow
Fish Meal/10.0-5.0-0.0/med
Bat Guano/5.5-8.6-1.5/med
Seabird Guano/12.3-11-2.5/med
Kelp Meal/1.0-0.5-8.0/slow
Soybean Meal/6.5-1.5-2.4/slow-med
Worm Castings/1.5-2.5-1.3/medium
Homemade "plant food" soil additives:
I've found all of these methods useful in gardening marijuana and other plants
Coffee Grounds (http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/composting-basics/coffee-grounds-gardening.htm)
Compost Tea (http://www.finegardening.com/how-to/articles/brewing-compost-tea.aspx)
Molasses (http://www.weekendgardener.net/organic-fertilizer/molasses-050805.htm)
______________________________________________________________________
Measuring Ph PROPERLY: (http://www.ph-meter.info/pH-measurements-other-procedures) Testing Ph properly has made a HUGE difference in all of my plants health, not only my girls.
I know it's a lot of information to take in at one time, but thanks for reading!
Namaste & Happy Growing
I know there have been many other threads of this nature but I figured I'd give it a go. I've compiled this information by doing LOTS AND LOTS of reading, making many visits to my local hydroponics store, and taking advice from you lovely folks. As a general disclaimer I'll say that this is information is to be used at your own risk, I'm not guaranteeing anything. Knowledge, skill set, and means are all determining factors in a grows success
Hope this helps answer some general questions, just a newbie trying to help other newbies out. Everyone has a different opinion about the most effective/easiest way to grow while producing the most yield, so forgive me if you disagree and tell me if I'm just flat out wrong. There isn't much about hydroponics in this thread since I grow with soil! Enjoy...The Life Cycle of Marijuana (this is really important to understand)
Germination is the initial stage of growth. When the seeds embryo cracks open and produces a root. Once the root has fixed itself into the soil and sprouted two emrbryonic leaves the plant has entered the seedling stage. Germination can take anywhere from 12 hours to 3 weeks to occur.
Seedling after the 1st pair of embryonic leaves are recieving light your plant will produce another set of leaes, these leaves are different from the last and should exhibit marijuana characteristics, The seedling stage may last 1 to 3 weeks, at the end of this stage your plant will have 4-8 new leaves.
Vegetative Growth the plant now begins to grow at a rate at which leaves produce energy. your plant needs all the food and light it can get at this point. Plant will continue growing taller, thicken stems, more fingers will appear on leaves, and will being showing sex. When it does this a plant has entered the next stage. It can take anywhere from a month to 5 months to occur.
Pre-Flowering during this stage the plant will slow down developement in height and beings to produce more branches/nodes. During this phase your plant will start to show a calyx (hopefully) which appears where the branches meet at stem and nodes.
Flowering During this stage the plant continues to fill out. The plant will show its sex clearly. The male plant produces little balls that are clustered
together like grapes. The female plant produces little white/cream
pistils that look like hairs coming out of a pod. Each of the plants will
continue to fill out more and their flowers will continue to grow. It can
take anywhere between 4 to 16 weeks for the plant to fully develop its
flowers. During this time the males pollen sacks would
have burst spreading pollen to the female flowers.
FLOWERING NON-POLLINATED FEMALES (SINSEMILLA CROP) During this stage the plant continues to fill out. The plant will show its sex more clearly. The female plant produces little creamy/white pistils. The plant will continue to fill out more and its flowers will continue to grow. It can take anywhere between 4 and 16 weeks for the plants to fully develop. During this time though there are no males to pollinate the female plants. The buds will grow larger and develop more resin glands. Resin may drop down onto the leaves and the plant becomes very sticky. The pistils on the buds begin to get thicker and cluster into balls. The reason for the high increase in bud growth is that the female plant is trying her best to attract male pollen.
__________________________________________________________________
Quick facts about growing conditions:
Climate Temp Range: During lights on cycle between 70 & 80 degrees Fahrenheit. During lights off cycle between 64-71 degrees Fahrenheit.
Root Zone Temp: 65-70 degrees Fahrenheit
Water/Nutrients Temp: 65-70 degrees Fahrenheit
Ideal soil Ph: 6.5-7
Ideal nutrients Ph: 5.7-6.4
__________________________________________________________________
Planning Your Garden
SIZE
Determining size accurately means a lot when starting a grow. The amount of space you're using determines lighting and ventilation needs so it's important to get this part right, as the rest of your planning is based on it. Before filling a huge room up with lights, fans, and other fun gadgets you should take into consideration your budget & availability. How much time do you have to spend gardening/reading to obtain proper information?
Length x Width x Height = Volume
Length x Width = Square Feet
______________________________________________________________________
Length x Width = Square Feet
______________________________________________________________________
LIGHTING
Once you know the size of your room it's fairly easy to determine what kind of set up you are going to need to properly illuminate it. Most of the questions I see in this forum are about lighting so I'm going to try and be as clear as possible.
High Intensity Discharge (HID)
HID lights such as High Pressure Sodium and Metal Halide bulbs are said to be more effective for enhancing plant life while still being energy efficient.
Metal Halide (MH) grow lights are believed to be most the most ideal light source for indoor growers because the provide a spectrum of light that is very close to natural sunlight. Their color rendering index ranges from 60-80, 100 being a perfect score. MH lights provide necessary colors in the light spectrum, including red to stimulate flowering & blue to regulate growth. It's important if you're running 24/0 to turn off MH lights for at least 15 minutes a week to elongate the life of your bulb.
High Pressure Sodium (HPS) are specifically used for encouraging plants to flower as yellow/red/orange rays are ideal for flowering, it's also believe that golden yellow sodium lights can increase yield. HPS bulbs are also cost effective lasting for up to a year.
FOR HID LIGHTS:
Watts/Sq. Ft coverage
1000W= 4-5
600W= 4-3.3
400W= 3.3-2.5
HEIGHT FROM CANOPY
1000W= 39-31 inches
600W= 31-24 inches
400W= 24-16 inches
(please keep in mind these numbers are for set ups with horizontally mounted lamps in normal open or closed reflectors. If using parabolic reflectors with vertically mounted lamps or air cooled reflectors you will advert direct radiant heat)
Fluorescent grow lights are beneficially because they are cost effective, energy efficient, and do not emit the same amount of heat as HID bulbs. Full spectrum fluorescent lights areideal for seedlings & CFL's can be used to grow a plant to maturity.
LED lights are optimized to provide a light spectrum that simulates daylight. The method by which this achieved is by using 2 types of LED lights at different light frequencies that recreate an ideal environment for chlorophyll to carry out photosynthesis. Many companies now make a LED fixtures that are able to produce both frequencies from one.
LUMENS
--A lumen is a unit of standard measurement used to describe how much light is contained in a certain area. Simply stated, the more lumens the more light, more watts DOES NOT MEAN more light, but watts per lumen measures a bulbs efficiency. You may see the term lux which is an abbreviation for lumens per sq meter, 1000 lumens lighting a one sq meter are is 1000 lux, 1000 lumens lighting a 10 sq meter area is 100 lux. I was given this rough draft of how many lumens a plant requires (per sq foot) during each stage of its life:
Seedlings 400-500 lumens per square foot
Vegetative growth 2,500-4,000 lumens per square foot
Flowering 10,000 lumens per square foot.
KELVIN
--is the unit in which color temperature is measured. Think of it as a block of iron as it is heated to various temperatures. A warm light red is around 3500 Kelvin, when the block begins to heat about 6000 Kelvin the light takes on a blueish tone. Sunlight is somewhere around 5000 Kelvin. During your plants vegetative stage it's recommended to use a blue spectrum of light (6500K) often called "Daylight Bulbs" and during flowering needs a red spectrum of light (2400K) often called "Warm or Soft Light"
Light cycles: This is a pretty controversially subject, but personally I veg under 18/6 and will flower under 12/12 for those of you who are using 24/0 I would recommend reading (http://www.mcdb.ucla.edu/Research/Tobin/research.html)
**The more powerful a light the further from a plant it should be, meaning the smaller the room the more you will want to research how to achieve the right lumens to sq ft ratio without encountering problems with overheating**
____________________________________________________________________
VENTILATION
has two main factors: removal of heat and waste (depleted CO2) & the input of cooler fresher air. Once you know the size of your room and the lights you are going to use it's pretty simple how to figure out how much exhaust/input you are going to need. In America inline fans are rated in Cubic Feet Per Minute (CFM) & in Europe it is measured in Cubic Meters Per Hour (m3/hr)
EXHAUST FAN REQUIREMENTS FORMULA
CFM: Volume of Grow Area (ft) x 1.25
m3/hr: Volume of Grow area (m) x 60 x 1.25
A majority of indoor grows without AC or CO2 supplements require 1 air exchange per minute, when using a carbon filter in an exhaust the general rules is to expect a 25% drop in fan efficiency, to compensate for efficiency drop multiply by 1.25
Fresh Air: can be brought into a grow room using two different methods-
a) Making passive vents (holes) which air can be drawn through
b) Installing active inline fans that push fresh air in.
Passive intake: in order to use this method you must have ample supple of fresh air outside, pulling in stale or warm air will be ineffective
Vent should be 2-3 X surface area of extractor fan outlet
Active intake: Indoor gardens with active intake tend to be more efficient. During cooler winter months you may want to avoid pumping in extremely cold air inside, instead try pulling air in from somewhere inside your home (if it's drawn in from a well used room plants will also benefit from higher CO2 levels), during warm months it is recommended to use a bug filter when drawing from outside.
An intake fan should have a max capacity that is 10-20% lower than the output of the extractor fan:
Extractor size: 390 CFM
Efficiency impact w/ Carbon filter: 390 x 0.75 = 292.5
Intake Fan Size Req: 292.5 x 0.85 = 249CFM
________________________________________________________________
SOIL
Commercial Blends: For those of you who want to buy off the shelf, finding an appropriate growing medium can be challenging. I recommend doing lots of research before committing to a commercial blend. One indication a product is acceptable in organic production is a label that says "OMRI LISTED" (Organic Materials Review Institute), OMRI listed products are consistent with regulations of the National Organic Standard. It's also important to read soil mixtures labels and to learn about ingredients and desired ratio.
Making your own: A good potting mixture should meet the needs of your plants roots for air, water, nutrients, and support.
Ingredients allowed in Organic potting media:
-Top Soil
-Sand: in a growing mix can make a difference. Course sand--builders sand--is best it adds air space to the mix. Avoid plaster sands and other fine sands they tend to settle between ingredients and make a mixture too dense.
-Compost: premium compost mix should have:
-Pearlite: is a volcanic rock that is heated and expanded to become a light weight white material. It is sterile and Ph neutral. When added to a mix it will increease air space and improve drainage. (USE INSTEAD OF SAND)
________________________________________________________________
NUTRIENTS
On any "plant food" or nutes you are considering buying you will see 3 numbers on label this is an NPK ratio: an N-P-K ratio stands for percentage of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium in a fertilizer. Nitrogen is important for leaf growth and development, while phosphorous is important for root & flower development, and potassium is necessary for overall health as well as fruit and seed development.
When to start feeding nutrients: when cotyledons (round starter leaves) begin to yellow or fall off, this means your soil is no longer providing enough nutrients and your plant is starting to steal it from leaves. Start nutes at 1/4 strength to ensure you don't give your plants nute burn. Personally, I follow a feeding schedule of water/feed/water/feed etc
When using nutes its important to remember less is essentially more, too many nutrients will cause nute burn and harm your plants.
Once you know the size of your room it's fairly easy to determine what kind of set up you are going to need to properly illuminate it. Most of the questions I see in this forum are about lighting so I'm going to try and be as clear as possible.
High Intensity Discharge (HID)
HID lights such as High Pressure Sodium and Metal Halide bulbs are said to be more effective for enhancing plant life while still being energy efficient.
Metal Halide (MH) grow lights are believed to be most the most ideal light source for indoor growers because the provide a spectrum of light that is very close to natural sunlight. Their color rendering index ranges from 60-80, 100 being a perfect score. MH lights provide necessary colors in the light spectrum, including red to stimulate flowering & blue to regulate growth. It's important if you're running 24/0 to turn off MH lights for at least 15 minutes a week to elongate the life of your bulb.
High Pressure Sodium (HPS) are specifically used for encouraging plants to flower as yellow/red/orange rays are ideal for flowering, it's also believe that golden yellow sodium lights can increase yield. HPS bulbs are also cost effective lasting for up to a year.
FOR HID LIGHTS:
Watts/Sq. Ft coverage
1000W= 4-5
600W= 4-3.3
400W= 3.3-2.5
HEIGHT FROM CANOPY
1000W= 39-31 inches
600W= 31-24 inches
400W= 24-16 inches
(please keep in mind these numbers are for set ups with horizontally mounted lamps in normal open or closed reflectors. If using parabolic reflectors with vertically mounted lamps or air cooled reflectors you will advert direct radiant heat)
Fluorescent grow lights are beneficially because they are cost effective, energy efficient, and do not emit the same amount of heat as HID bulbs. Full spectrum fluorescent lights areideal for seedlings & CFL's can be used to grow a plant to maturity.
LED lights are optimized to provide a light spectrum that simulates daylight. The method by which this achieved is by using 2 types of LED lights at different light frequencies that recreate an ideal environment for chlorophyll to carry out photosynthesis. Many companies now make a LED fixtures that are able to produce both frequencies from one.
LUMENS
--A lumen is a unit of standard measurement used to describe how much light is contained in a certain area. Simply stated, the more lumens the more light, more watts DOES NOT MEAN more light, but watts per lumen measures a bulbs efficiency. You may see the term lux which is an abbreviation for lumens per sq meter, 1000 lumens lighting a one sq meter are is 1000 lux, 1000 lumens lighting a 10 sq meter area is 100 lux. I was given this rough draft of how many lumens a plant requires (per sq foot) during each stage of its life:
Seedlings 400-500 lumens per square foot
Vegetative growth 2,500-4,000 lumens per square foot
Flowering 10,000 lumens per square foot.
KELVIN
--is the unit in which color temperature is measured. Think of it as a block of iron as it is heated to various temperatures. A warm light red is around 3500 Kelvin, when the block begins to heat about 6000 Kelvin the light takes on a blueish tone. Sunlight is somewhere around 5000 Kelvin. During your plants vegetative stage it's recommended to use a blue spectrum of light (6500K) often called "Daylight Bulbs" and during flowering needs a red spectrum of light (2400K) often called "Warm or Soft Light"
Light cycles: This is a pretty controversially subject, but personally I veg under 18/6 and will flower under 12/12 for those of you who are using 24/0 I would recommend reading (http://www.mcdb.ucla.edu/Research/Tobin/research.html)
**The more powerful a light the further from a plant it should be, meaning the smaller the room the more you will want to research how to achieve the right lumens to sq ft ratio without encountering problems with overheating**
____________________________________________________________________
VENTILATION
has two main factors: removal of heat and waste (depleted CO2) & the input of cooler fresher air. Once you know the size of your room and the lights you are going to use it's pretty simple how to figure out how much exhaust/input you are going to need. In America inline fans are rated in Cubic Feet Per Minute (CFM) & in Europe it is measured in Cubic Meters Per Hour (m3/hr)
EXHAUST FAN REQUIREMENTS FORMULA
CFM: Volume of Grow Area (ft) x 1.25
m3/hr: Volume of Grow area (m) x 60 x 1.25
A majority of indoor grows without AC or CO2 supplements require 1 air exchange per minute, when using a carbon filter in an exhaust the general rules is to expect a 25% drop in fan efficiency, to compensate for efficiency drop multiply by 1.25
Fresh Air: can be brought into a grow room using two different methods-
a) Making passive vents (holes) which air can be drawn through
b) Installing active inline fans that push fresh air in.
Passive intake: in order to use this method you must have ample supple of fresh air outside, pulling in stale or warm air will be ineffective
Vent should be 2-3 X surface area of extractor fan outlet
Active intake: Indoor gardens with active intake tend to be more efficient. During cooler winter months you may want to avoid pumping in extremely cold air inside, instead try pulling air in from somewhere inside your home (if it's drawn in from a well used room plants will also benefit from higher CO2 levels), during warm months it is recommended to use a bug filter when drawing from outside.
An intake fan should have a max capacity that is 10-20% lower than the output of the extractor fan:
Extractor size: 390 CFM
Efficiency impact w/ Carbon filter: 390 x 0.75 = 292.5
Intake Fan Size Req: 292.5 x 0.85 = 249CFM
________________________________________________________________
SOIL
Commercial Blends: For those of you who want to buy off the shelf, finding an appropriate growing medium can be challenging. I recommend doing lots of research before committing to a commercial blend. One indication a product is acceptable in organic production is a label that says "OMRI LISTED" (Organic Materials Review Institute), OMRI listed products are consistent with regulations of the National Organic Standard. It's also important to read soil mixtures labels and to learn about ingredients and desired ratio.
Making your own: A good potting mixture should meet the needs of your plants roots for air, water, nutrients, and support.
Ingredients allowed in Organic potting media:
-Top Soil
-Sand: in a growing mix can make a difference. Course sand--builders sand--is best it adds air space to the mix. Avoid plaster sands and other fine sands they tend to settle between ingredients and make a mixture too dense.
-Compost: premium compost mix should have:
- Ph of 6.5-8.0
- no (or very little) sulfides
- <0.05 parts per million ammonia
- <1ppm nitrites
- <1% CO2
- moisture content of 30-35%
-Pearlite: is a volcanic rock that is heated and expanded to become a light weight white material. It is sterile and Ph neutral. When added to a mix it will increease air space and improve drainage. (USE INSTEAD OF SAND)
________________________________________________________________
NUTRIENTS
On any "plant food" or nutes you are considering buying you will see 3 numbers on label this is an NPK ratio: an N-P-K ratio stands for percentage of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium in a fertilizer. Nitrogen is important for leaf growth and development, while phosphorous is important for root & flower development, and potassium is necessary for overall health as well as fruit and seed development.
When to start feeding nutrients: when cotyledons (round starter leaves) begin to yellow or fall off, this means your soil is no longer providing enough nutrients and your plant is starting to steal it from leaves. Start nutes at 1/4 strength to ensure you don't give your plants nute burn. Personally, I follow a feeding schedule of water/feed/water/feed etc
Vegetative Growth 20-10-10
Flowering 10-60-30
(I know these are debatable)
Flowering 10-60-30
(I know these are debatable)
When using nutes its important to remember less is essentially more, too many nutrients will cause nute burn and harm your plants.
Organic fertilizers added to soil for nutrients:
Material/NPK/Nutrient Release Rate
Alfalfa meal/2.5-0.5-2.0/slow
Blood Meal/12.5-1.5-0.6/med-fast
Bone Meal/4.0-21.0-0.2/slow (may cause acidity)
Cottonseed Meal/7.0-2.5-1.5/slow-med
Crab Meal/10.0-0.3-0.1/slow
Fish Meal/10.0-5.0-0.0/med
Bat Guano/5.5-8.6-1.5/med
Seabird Guano/12.3-11-2.5/med
Kelp Meal/1.0-0.5-8.0/slow
Soybean Meal/6.5-1.5-2.4/slow-med
Worm Castings/1.5-2.5-1.3/medium
Homemade "plant food" soil additives:
I've found all of these methods useful in gardening marijuana and other plants
Coffee Grounds (http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/composting-basics/coffee-grounds-gardening.htm)
Compost Tea (http://www.finegardening.com/how-to/articles/brewing-compost-tea.aspx)
Molasses (http://www.weekendgardener.net/organic-fertilizer/molasses-050805.htm)
______________________________________________________________________
Measuring Ph PROPERLY: (http://www.ph-meter.info/pH-measurements-other-procedures) Testing Ph properly has made a HUGE difference in all of my plants health, not only my girls.
I know it's a lot of information to take in at one time, but thanks for reading!
Namaste & Happy Growing
