Hempy Bucket Grow Question

I'm growing 6 seedlings right now in rockwool that I soaked in distilled water for 30 minutes each before putting in germinated seeds. My plan is to pick the 2 best (decision will most likely be heavily biased because I happened to get 2 seeds out of the last 7 months from my bags of doughty and the other 4 are from a friends schwag) and transfer them to my buckets. I have a stealth dresser grow going on for this, so I really only have space for 2 plants that I will let grow to about 18" before flowering.


Anyway, my question is when to transfer. I have 4" rockwool cubes, kind of big to me. My plan from my research on hempy bucket was to let them grow in the rockwool until the roots are coming out of the bottom and grown all the way into the rockwool. I have helped do soil transfers from party cups before so I know when the root system looks like when you pull that chunk out. Being that I have kind of big rockwool cubes (only size my local hydro store had), I'm not sure if they will last long enough for that with just the water that is soaked into the cubes. Also I wasn't planning on adding my nutes at least until the tranfer, maybe until a week after. Is that OK, or should I add the nutes at the transfer.

I guess my real question is how long will my seedlings last in rockwool with just water, before I need to add nutes? I didn't want to add nutes until I transfer and get them in their final growing place.

Here are some pics I just took. The two lone cubes are the good seeds.

I do hempy but, not 4" rockwool. I would wait until the leaves are about 1/2"-3/4" above the rockwool and get them into the buckets, leave an inch or two to add move hempy mix later. Use just water for the first 5-7 days and then go with 1/2 strength nutes for a week, if everything looks OK go to full strength nutes. Those look like CFL, if that is what you are going to use start to finish, I would start to flower earlier 9-12". Good luck with whatever you land on.

Thanks for the advice, that sounds like a solid plan. Why flower earlier though? Will the CFL not be able to fully light the larger plants later on?

Also, what would you suggest I start seedlings in if not rockwool? For next time.

Tark, I do start in rockwool but, use the 1 1/2 starter cubes, then move them to solo cups. Just poke a hole in the side of the solo cup with a pen about 1/2 up. After that, 1-2 weeks, cut the bottom off the cup and burry about 1/2 way into the bucket, this works for me.
Once you go to 12/12 they will still grow a lot, more light allows better penetration so you can go with larger plants. These are my thoughts, check the CFL forum and see what the others say. Larger plants don't always = more or better smoke. Experiment and see what works best for you.

Yeah I will definitely be making adjustments to how I'm doing things next time around. I'll get my hydro store to order some smaller rockwool for me, didnt think about it this time and thought the 4" would be cool but i definitely want the smaller ones. I couldve also cut the rockwool to smaller cubes before planting, but meh, hindsight.....

I just currently have 3 gallon buckets in waiting to drop the rockwool into, so I was just thinking I have the height in my box and the size of bucket to grow a little. I plan on LSTing early as it is anyway. Hopefully Ill be able to add more lights by the time i start flowering. I think my next try will be smaller rockwool > styrofoam cups > 1 gallon milk jugs. I'll be able to hopefully fit 4 plants in my space. Right now I have 100 watts total of CFL for 2 plants in a 16" x 32" space.

Thanks for the advice. I'm definitely learning a lot from the experience, that's the best advice anyone could give anyone I think. Try it out, and screw it up lol. Learn more from failing that from succeeding anyway.