Turning my frown, upside down - Sadface's first grow - CFL

Hi fellow RIU members,

After seeing everyone else's wonderful grows and finally being able to convince the wife to let me grow. I have decided to share with you my first experience growing, so lets grow!

Materials for grow room/tent (see picture one for light raised and tent set up)

1. 2.6x2.6x5ft Grow tent
2. 190 cfm inline fan
3. 190 cfm carbon filter
4. DIY CFL light hood
   1. 2fx8inch Galvanized steel dryer pipe - spray painted white on reflector side with heat resistant spray
   2. plastic zip ties
   3. 2x power strips
   4. 5x light plug in adapters with 5 y splitters = 10 light sockets
5. 4x clip lamp with reflectors (can put y splits) for 4 - 8 sockets additional for side lighting
6. 2x fans (1 oscillating)

Seedling/Veg phase = 7x 6500k 23 watt CFLs @ 70 lumens per watt & 3x 2700kl 23 watt CFL @ 72 lumens per watt

I started with 2 seeds, Afgan Kush Ryder and Critical +2.0 auto, and germinated in moist paper towels in my upstairs closet which I had heated to 80 degrees. I saw the seeds crack in about 60 hours and planted in soil. Seeds were planted in 3 gallon smart pots with 70% FF Ocean Forest & 30% Perlite. Of the 2 seeds only one sprouted. The seedling was moved to the tent where it was kept under half the lights on. Temps ranged from 68 degrees to 75 degrees. Soil was misted 3 times a day for the first 3 days and then watered 16 oz of ph'd water on the 5th day from sprout.

About 7 days later i sifted in the soil in the 2nd pot and found the un-sprouted seed. It never actually cracked... so I got another seed and tried the germinate in shot glass method as an experiment. 24 hours later i broke the surface tension of the water and the seed sank, after closer examination the seed clearly cracked. I moved to moist paper towel for 24 hours before planting, into 2nd smart pot. I am now a fan of the shot glass method and next time I will be planting right into soil instead of waiting 24 hours for the tail to grow more.

So now I had 2 AKRs, 1 germinating in my closet upstairs and the other vegging in the tent. The seed sprouted with a helmet on the 16th, and has since been under a 23 wat cfl in my closet getting misted, I will be moving to tent tomorrow morning. As for the first AKR, she seems to be doing pretty decent in my opinion. I turned on the other 5 CFLs at about day 8 from sprout. Now is this day 13 from sprout for AKR 1 (I'm called her Aliyah) she is short and bushy!! I hope this means I have been keeping the lights close enough to reduce stretching. She has dark green leaves and the nodes and stem are a nice lighter green, which from my understanding means she is healthy. I was planning on starting to feed her soon (next Fri/Sat) at quarter strength, it is probably a little late but i'm too scared of killing her lol.

AKR 2 (named Zhara); is on day 3 with 2 small leaves, I plan to be a little more experimental with her. Feed earlier, maybe train a little.

Either way I posted some pics of the set up, 3 shots of Aliyah, and one with lights lowered. Let me know your thoughts, I am open to feedback as well! Thanks and enjoy.

very nice mate . im subbed

Novicehomegrower said:

very nice mate . im subbed

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Thanks I am going to try to do pics at least every other day if I have time, stay tuned!!

I dig the reflector! You can tell its working well from the stalks on your babies. I need something like that for a mom space that keeps very cool but provides enough light to keep em bonsai style bushy with lots of side branching. If your having any temp issues, just want to add some extra circulation, or want to prolong its life, I would disconnect your scrubber for the time being. They have a life span and at this point it is serving no purpose and wont be for some time. Since its a relatively small model I would assume you want it working at full capacity when the time comes in 8 weeks or so. Just my .02 GL -S0uP

Oo S0uP oO said:

I dig the reflector! You can tell its working well from the stalks on your babies. I need something like that for a mom space that keeps very cool but provides enough light to keep em bonsai style bushy with lots of side branching. If your having any temp issues, just want to add some extra circulation, or want to prolong its life, I would disconnect your scrubber for the time being. They have a life span and at this point it is serving no purpose and wont be for some time. Since its a relatively small model I would assume you want it working at full capacity when the time comes in 8 weeks or so. Just my .02 GL -S0uP

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Thank you very much and that sir is a great idea!

I am going to remove the scrubber tomorrow, why waste its lifespan! With all 10 lights on for the last 2 days on a 20/4 light schedule it now ranges from 71 - 81, which is still within good range for optimal photosynthesis but getting little high for my liking. So Ill remove the scrubber and also up the exhaust fan (it is on lowest setting now) to create more circulation as you suggested. This should cool it a little bit to the perfect temps hopefully.

I am also going to throw in a DIY CO2 generator when I get my flexible pipeing from amazon.

If you are pulling air out of your tent and exporting it you will receive no benefit from a Co2 source be it DIY or not.

Oo S0uP oO said:

If you are pulling air out of your tent and exporting it you will receive no benefit from a Co2 source be it DIY or not.

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Also good to know! thank you will not waste my time. I thought they would still get some benefit from it! Thanks again

Scrubber is disconnected and exhaust is turned on highest setting, tent is a nice stable 75 degrees with lights on. So should be perfect! Should be feeding and moving other plant into tent to be with her sister tomorrow, will post update then!

Okay quick update, tent is staying nice temps low of 69 and high of 77. Was 73 when I took pics about 5 mins ago! Humidity is 39% to 49% so a little low for the younger one, but oh well.

Fed my older girl for the first time this morning (day 15 from sprout), put quarter strength nutes in a gallon of water and phed it. I watered half the gallon, expecting a little run off but did not see any so watered another quart. I waited 45 minutes before putting in the last quart and still did not see run off. From what I read and from the directions on the nutrients is you want to see run off so I watered another half a gallon of water and still didnt see run off, but the bottom of the smart pot was damp. I decided to let it be and see how it was when I came home from work.

As for the 2nd one, I moved her to the tent and she seems to be doing okay. Day 4 from sprout and she is showing her 2nd set of leaves! Pics of both below

Okay time for an update been 4 days since the last, have not done much besides adjust the lighting. I did water Zhara 8 oz of water on the 22nd. Both plants seem to be doing well but it looks like I may of had some heat or nute problems earlier in the grow i didnt see. I also did not see any nute burn on Aliyah so will move to 50% on next feeding, but next watering (probably Monday) will be just pure water. Hopefully get run off this time and will ph the soil.

1. So I noticed that my 2nd set of leaves have crinkles in them, but not growth above the 2nd set has this. Not sure but I think this happened when I may of had the lights to low and temps to high and caused some heat stress.
2. I also noticed that on 1 of my bottom set of leaves had a brown spot in the middle of it, I am assuming that there was some nute deficienty in the beggining of the grow but again not sure. No similar spots are present on any of the other leaves so right now I am not too worried, but am open to your feedback!



Okay and now for some other pics

First my little Girl Zhara aka AKR#2 - Day 9 from sprout 2nd set of leaves forming, she seems like she is on similar pace as other one although I am debating on taking her out of the tent and under her own lights. As right now my light fixute is hanging at almost a 45 degree angle to get lights positioned correctly over the different sized plants!



And now the for Alyah aka AKR#1 - day 19 from sprout. I have NO prior experience growing but from what I saw in other grows and grow buds for less cfl book she is super short and bushy. She is about 4 inches high and 7 inches across at her largest. I do not think she is showing sex yet, but I got feminized seeds so should be set (I know I could get bad seeds or stress it to be hermy, but again chances are very low of that supposedly). Also on the side shot view you can see the location of the leaves with the brown spot and other with crinkles. Nodes look healthy to me, but again I am novice grower so any feedback is more than welcome!



Lastly light fixture at angle, which is why I think I will move the little girl out until she actually requires the additional light from the tent. I can get 2 clip lights with 2 - 4 23 watt cfls running in my closet up stair and probably work he same if not better.



Next update I may do an video update, but will see.

Nice setup.

Thank you very much

Stay tuned I plan on updating 2x a week

So i know there is no real update today, but have some bad news and good news

Bad news:

Some additional crinkling, another brown spot appeared, and some tip discolorations. I put a post in the Plant problems forums

https://www.rollitup.org/marijuana-plant-problems/659352-dont-think-i-need-worried.html

Good News:

Its a girl - probably could of sexed her much earlier but i'm a noob at growing.

Looks good! Crinkles definitely look odd, but I'm no expert so don't think I can help. Keep us updated

Allright time for Wednesday Update

First we will do the boring update on slow Zhara (AKR#2), she is 11 days from sprout and going slow. I do not think I have been watering her enough thinking misting 2x a day was enough. I dont think water was getting to the bottom of smart pot meaning roots wont want to go down. She was not seeming very stable in the soil either. So 2 days ago I put a little more soil around her base, and watered 2 cups of water (still afraid to over water). I think this is the problem going straight into large pots for germination (but a necessary evil for autos). I may try to transplant on my next auto grow for experimentation.

Okay now to the pics, oh real quick. She is in my closet under 4 23w CFLS (3x 6500k 1x 2700k) going 24/0 right now.



Okay now for the Aliyha, one more leaf showed sign of distress. Monday was watering day, and watered 2 quarts initially and got a little bit of run off. I PH'd the run off and it was VERY acidic. I waited about 1 hour and watered an additional quart of water and got a lot more run off (15%) I ph'd it and it was 6.0

So I think the problem was when I fed her the first time I didn't get enough run off, which made the soil acidic which caused some lock out (thought I saw slight signs of burn). People in the plant problem post I made said it didnt look like and issue, I tend to agree the burn nor lockout was that bad as it was 2 leaves with very small spots and a small leaf with clear signs. I have not seen any new signs since watering but will keep a close eye.

Yesterday I changed some of the lights in the tent to get more 2700k in there, I want to add some additional lighting but am getting worried about temps, and upgrading to LED seems better and better everyday...

All and all I think she is looking good, stem seems thick and healthy. Ill stop typing and just get on with the pics!



I have a 1 foot high by 5 foot long cabinet that we removed so we could fit our new refrigerator. I am going to stand it long ways (so 1x1x5) and make it into 2 layer a veg box this weekend. Ill move Zhara in there I think, hopefully can post pics this weekend.

Oh one last pic, close up!!




ENJOY AND THANKS FOR WATCHING

Just checkin in...Looking good in this direction, I wouldnt worry bout the spots could be splash from feed....happens to all of us! Keep the pics coming, if you run into something its nice to be able back track a problem on a first grow. Keep em green! ~S0uP

Hello all!

Time for Sadface's weekend update, I decided to do some rework on the grow room. I was blowing the exhaust into my basement which was raising the ambient temperature of the room. Which of course was where my air was coming from, the central AC doesn't hit the basement, so heat was becoming an issue in the tent.

SO it was time to knock a hole in the wall:



A little better of a set up for the exhaust I think. Although slightly less stealth. I decided to ditch the cabinet idea of the veg box as I think it would be WAY too hot, since veg rooms dont really need to be enclosed decided to just have a veg space next to the grow tent. End game is to have the DIY CFL reflector in the veg space and a LED with a bloom color ratio in the tent, and have a 2 plant perpetual grow going on. Also all the nutes and such are now nice and tidy in the cabinet below.

I also stole someone else's idea for a way to cool your CFL reflector. Basically it is as simple as hanging a 4 inch desk lamp off it. Basically the fan blows across the reflector to where I currently have the exhaust ducking, so the hot air of the bulbs is sucked up right away! Oh also bought some T splitters to make the lights set up better in my reflector this added on 2 additional 23w CFLs so total wattage is now 322.



Okay enough of me talking! more pics for you

Zhara (AKR#2) - small girl under 4x 23w CFL in veg space. 14 days from sprout

I was going to start feeding her earlier than Aliyha, so will probably feed her next watering (25% str fox farm trio).



Aliyha (AKR#1) - in tent under 322w of cfl with 3:1 ratio of 2700k & 6500k respectively. 26 days from sprout.

I got my soil PH testing kit on Thursday and tested the soil PH on Saturday evening. The Soil PH was actually high at around 7.0ph. If you look at thr last pic, I think that is a start of a mag def and the brown spots being cal deg as it was getting locked out from high PH. So today was feeding day, I fed at 50% strength nutes. I am hoping that the feeding should lower the PH in the soil back to the ideal 6.0 - 6.5 and she will be golden!



Questions I have if people could answer for me:

1. Temps range from 72 (lights off) to 82 (lights on), would it be beneficial to take off some CFLs to reduce temp in tent to optimal? So example what is better? 207watts at perfect temps or 322watts at high temps?? Only way I can reduce tent temps now is to invest in a AC unit or LED lighting, LED is coming later I am NOT buying a AC unit just for my growing.

2. Is my prognosis of the Alyiha correct about the high soil PH and Calmag def?
2a. If so will feeding the plants reduce the PH oh my soil back to ideal levels hopefully fixing the problems, if any?

3. Feeding an autoflowering; Do I consider Alyiha in flower and should I be feeding her on a flowering nute schedule. As an FYI I have the only 2 times I have fed her has been with veg nutes (grow big and big bloom). So I guess the question is, Should I flush next watering and then feed with flowering nutes next feeding??

Thank you to anyone reading and even more thanks if you answer my questions! I know I am long winded, so can be hard to read sometimes, so I apologize!

Enjoy and hopefully another update Wednesday (sooner if anything weird pops up!)

Both girls seem to be doing okay

Zhara Day 17 from sprout @ veg station

Soaked the medium for first time yesterday, stem base seemed week in soil. Wasn't running a fan on her, fan was added to veg station in effort to increase stem base strength.



Aliyha Day 29 from sprout in grow tent for flowering

Decided to take out 4 of the CFLs for temp reasons, removed the outermost bulb don't think they were doing much as were about 6 inchs away from closest section of plant anyway. She seems to be doing well although couple brown spots on new growth which I think is calcium def from soil PH being slightly too high. Will be testing soil PH before next watering, if it is still at 7 will be feeding again with 50% nutes.

Lastly she is BUSHEY, wider then she is tall with no training. I think it is because of how close the lights are she doesn't feel the need to grow tall! Granted she is only about 35% of the way done supposedly.



Here are the spots, same as before pretty much


Comments and any feedback are appreciated, thanks! More pics will come this weekend!

- Face

okay sorry about the lack of update this weekend I was very busy! Either way lets get going

Zhara - Day 22 from sprout

Dam did this girl just grow, she was coming close to hitting lights so i upped them about an inch. Next day she was about to hit again, so she is growing very well but still short and bushy like her sister. Also she LST'd her self, she kept leaning in one direction and now is growing up towards light which has made her about 1 inch closer to soil. Also sexed her today we got a GIRL!



Aliyha - Day 34 from sprout

So I let her dry out way to much which caused some lockout and worsening the calmag def I thought I already had, but I think i caught it in time. So watered her and she perked up, got some calmag coming in the mail so will be adding that to all my watering. Swear she is not growing any taller! Just wider, more fan leaves, and more buds. I must of gotten a very indica dominant strain, as I cant believe how short she is. I also cant believe how far along she looks for only 34 days. Will be switching to flowering nutes next feeding!



And now it is time for my favorite, and I hope yours too!

BUDSHOTS!!

Thought I would do a video update! Hopefully will make updating easier to do and see.

Update on Plant:
[video=youtube;rNIzEdXtmRc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNIzEdXtmRc[/video]

Oh and just for S & G, stem shots and a bud shot of main colo



thanks for your time, and if you DONT like the video format let me know and I can go back to pics!

- Face