Quasi Ghetto Grow

This is my first attempt at growing, so I went with the so-called no-brainer method of starting my seeds in a seed starter. I got the one by Ferry Morse at Lowe's. It's a heated unit that keeps the grow medium warm and moist.

With this thing, you get these round nugs that you start your seeds in. They have little netted surroundings. You warm them up and they expand upward.

So they're about 2" around and about 1/2" high, you add water and they expand to about 1.25"

You put your seeds in, put them in the warmer, cover it, and hopefully get some seedlings! Or you hatch some seeds. Or something.

Anyways, I did this, totally trepidatious, and left the thing on for a day.

Then I thought to myself...

I bet them seeds want theyselves some light.

So I got one of those lights at Lowes/Home Depot with the clip and put a big fat flourescent in it. Sylvania 150 watt replacement (using 40 watts) and 2600 lumens.

I put that on it, near my window, you'll see in the shitty cell phone pics (I cannot for the life of me find my digital camera) and shined it down on the whole assembly.

I started this last Monday or Tuesday I think... whenever I picked up the seeds, I was gonna wait till the weekend, but no... I couldn't wait, started that night.

I just got some seeds from High Grade Seeds (HGS), Monster Bomb and Super Bomb, whatever that is, probably just bag seed but I don't need quality right now, I just need BUDS. Probably better than schwag, at least. Not like I care. Anything's better than the Budweiser's I been tippin back.

Anyways

So nothing's happening by day three and I have this feeling... I have this feeling that the damn thing is getting dry, maybe needs more water.

It's important not to overwater, noob mistake and all, but I took off the lid and lifted out each little nug and they was all dry, real light.

I had been saving tap water to aerate off the chlorine, so I put some of that in.

Next day, that was yesterday, Thursday, I had myself a lil sprout.

But they was all dry again.

The pitcher didn't offer enough control to add just the right amount of water so I found this ice cream spoon in my drawer and used that to add water (see pics).

So I've wetted them all appropriately, and they're sitting in their little chamber.

I see that yet another seed is getting ready to sprout.

I also put, in different nugs some old seeds of chile peppers from 2005 (that's what it said on the container... they may not grow), just to have something else growing, and check it out.

So far, cannabis is starting a lot quicker, I got nothing yet from those chiles (though I planted them a little more carelessly, hee hee).

Anyways, I'm thinking I'll get these bad boys/girls going and transplant them to those holders where the roots grow through, I ain't takin chances ('cept for dumbness) on my first grow. I'm gonna waste money on those things and have to kill whatever boys come out... oh well.

I need to be learnin this.

So here's my "seed station" so far (see pics):

Well, I can at least say I'm learning faster and harder than if I had read this... by screwing up royally on my own, I perceive very clearly the error of my ways...

Noticed that buds in the grow thingy were stretching. I took the two best and put them in containers with starter soil.

One I put under a cool flouro and one under a warm.

When I first bought this stuff, I bought three different flouros:

One that was cool spectrum, but not many lumens...

One that was warm and still low lumens

And one that had 2300 lumens (the others were around 800-1200 lumens) and put that one over the batch.

They came up, but they fell over and died except for one hardy stretchy one. It's 3" under the light now (can't get it any closer with ghetto) and it's not doing much, though not dying...

The two healthies, the one under the cool flouro is fine, leaf size increasing, and the one under the warm flouro is just sitting there... it hasn't stretched more, but there's no clear veg development.

This tells me clearly that at this stage spectrum (cool vs warm) is way more important than lumens.

Lesson learned.

Good thing I have more seeds...

Wonder which ones of the 4 surviving (out of are girls?

Okay, so I have some pics of my tard lameness so that all of you can avoid my mistake.

There are a few variables which I could have controlled and will the next time around.

I'm still trying to save the three remaining survivors.

I started with a seed starter kit, all fine and dandy.

But I didn't put a light over it until 1-3 days in, not sure.

And the light I put was warm, lots of lumens for floro (2300) but not cool veg spectrum.

I took the hardiest, put it in it's own pot, and put it under a cool light.

By this I mean, I took the little nug thing it was growing in, found a little container I had, filled it with starter soil (VERY aerated, I used Ferry Morse Quick N Easy Seed Starter-- feels good and smells good, duh), made a little hole for the nug containing my little sprout, put the sprout in, and the first day I sprayed it though after that I carefully watered it with a tablespoon as I'm afraid spraying will burn the leaves.

I put this under a 'cool' (blue spectrum) light and while it is small, it looks like other first "so-far-successful" first grows under floro. It looks healthy.

The other one I did the same with, though it had already stretched, and I put it under a warm light, as that's all I had.

It has not grown, but it has not stretched, and I'll share pics.

I should point out that I live 5 miles from work and came home on my lunch break to check the babies and see if they needed water. After taking off the plastic top, they dry out pretty damn quickly... but I needed the light to hit them better.

Not sure how I will do this in the future.

Because it's so warm here in Cali now (end of April) I could easily put them in small containers with starter seed each under their own cool light (I would do 4 at a time) and probably have much better results than this heated pad, though in the winter I would have to find a way to have them under lights with the heated pad.

Also it should be pointed out, in the beginning, I did not even turn the light on, I had them sitting near the window for at least a day and a half with no light before I suddenly decided I should light them, so that is a factor as well.

All in all, the factors relating to my reduced ability to successfully start little babies can be attributed to:

1) Using warm, not cool spectrum of light (blue=veg, tard!) Because a veg, or blue spectrum (cool) will create more leaf mass and more root mass, your plant automatically has better odds of surviving than if it is stretching toward a warm spectrum, trying to find blue, and lacking that, not developing roots.

2) Not turning the light on until 1.5-2.5 days after planting. Could be a big mistake. I didn't, because I didn't want my landlord to see the light on, all the time in my kitchen. I have since moved my babies to a more private place.

3) Not getting the light close enough. I only have it close enough on one of my plants, the hardiest of them, at 2". I couldn't get it closer on the others due to physical constraints and it may not matter much anyway as those lights are not cool spectrum.

Okay, pics:

1)

The plant on the right is a stretchy, under a warm light, not moving.

The plant on the left is obscured by the cool light

2)

A shot of the plant that was placed under the cool light

3,4)

This plant again.

I meant to include my pic of mr. stretchy, who is still in the starter box. I feel kinda bad for him. I gotta get cool lights asap, will buy during my lunch break tomorrow (can't go out tonight, been drinkin... can't wait to switch over to the REAL)

This is Mr. Stretchy, notice how he is falling over. Since I took this pic, he has fallen even more. I think the warm light is too much. I checked his 'nug water content' and he's totally dry.

I know over watering is a noob's first mistake, but I gotta water this boy, perk him up. Wish I could get him some cool spectrum light.

Well, I'm learning.

The other pods contain seeds of chiles, they take 5-7 days to germinate, not sure if they will-- also the seed bag said 2005 so I don't know how much of a factor that is.

By the way, I saw this thing that said, Don't post to someone's grow unless asked or something.

Well anyways I am a noob.

You can post all you want.

This is noob kingdom.

I feel so dumb, here, but excited. This is the first time in years and years that I have gotten a hobby that I can't get my head around!

This thing is kicking my ass!

It reminds me of when I was 13 trying to figure out music or building speakers or meeting girls.

Man, I suck at this!

But I am really enjoying learning.

So obviously for this thread post all you want.

I have the feeling that out of this we will save two plants (sad, I planted 8 eight) and maybe the healthy one will be a girl.

Well, education costs money and I can't think of any better way to spend my money than educating m'sef like this.

i am pretty new to growing too. sometimes things will make you scratch your head when growing. i try to keep it as simple as possible. with cfls i keep them an inch or less from my seedlings.

Wow, thanks Masta, now I know what I can get away with, will apply this knowledge

good2bkind said:

This is Mr. Stretchy, notice how he is falling over. Since I took this pic, he has fallen even more. I think the warm light is too much. I checked his 'nug water content' and he's totally dry.

I know over watering is a noob's first mistake, but I gotta water this boy, perk him up. Wish I could get him some cool spectrum light.

Well, I'm learning.

The other pods contain seeds of chiles, they take 5-7 days to germinate, not sure if they will-- also the seed bag said 2005 so I don't know how much of a factor that is.

Click to expand...

Incidentally I added water to Mr. Stretchy after that post and he perked right up.

Okay, basically switched to entirely cool floro's. In the store, these 'cool' floros are advertised as 'sunlight'... it seems counterintuitive since to me the soft and bright floros look warmer and therefore more like sunlight but I'm in a hot state, so go figure.

Although I did notice, when I walk into this room my mind always assumes there's sunlight streaming through an open window... so it must be realistic enough.

I did a couple pre-emptive moves to save the babies.

There are three.

There is Mr. Stretchy, Stretchy2, and Lady Luck.

They're all Super Bud from High Grade Seeds.

I started out with 8, I now have 3-- that's what I get for being ghetto.

But I'm learning.

Anyways,

The first pic is Mr. Stretchy, he had keeled over at one point and I'd watered him upright, just a tablespoon or so. Yesterday I replaced the 'warm' floro I was using, 150-watt equivelent with these two cool floros. Obviously this is not an ideal setup. They're about 2.5 and 3.5 inches from him on both sides. Not close enough. I have since moved him to about 1 inch on the left and about 4 on the right. Because light drops off so quickly with floros I think that closer is better with one bulb than equanimity with two. I can always move him right to get closer to that bulb, if he starts to twist.

This is all experimentation, and while I expect to save him and the other two, I know that my ghetto ways are causing hardship on my plants.

I am watering about 2 tablespoons every day or so-- this would normally be too much but since I've already put it in a large pot (for it's size-- about 4.5 inches (hereafter "), it will probably not be too much water.

His leaf size has gotten bigger, but his stalk is still too small and weak, and I must buy some fans asap, like... tomorrow at lunch. They should have been on this thing, already, but that's how I'm rolling on this one.

Note the ghetto styrofoam reflection technique and the ghetto tea bottle holding up the light.

The next pic is stretchy2, he also was under a warm light. Like Mr. Stretchy, after putting him for a day under the cool light his initial leaf size has increased.

Like all three plants, his stalk is weak and needs a fan asap. I will get this tomorrow and re-do my setup so that I have two fans, one on this pair and one on the original Mr. Stretchy.

The cool thing about this grow is that I keep making mistakes and correcting them.

Presumably fairly soon I will need to correct my mistakes much quicker.

I think the first mistake, the wrong lights, has been corrected.

2nd mistake, no fan, will be corrected tomorrow.

3rd mistake is: you need more light ASAP.

I will have to build a new setup for this and we will see if I come through on this.

For this particular grow, I have a feeling that fix will be just as ghetto as all these.

I have more seeds, I just want to see how long I can do this.

I may save these peeps, but not if I don't get a fan.

And possibly more light. And possibly more reflection.

So life goes on.

The third pic is Lady Luck, and she is not stretched like the others but still has a fairly weak stalk.

I have the hope that through my scarce watering and the big containers the roots are digging down to seek water.

I have hope.

***

Had a cool thing happening, was reading on here about the Buds for Less book, and people were saying they got it at Barnes and Noble (I can't buy online very easily right now), and I was like damn... that must be Canada.

But I went to their website and it said they had a copy of this book at my local Barnes and Noble here in the US!

Sweet!

So I also will buy that, but I will wait until next week, when I get paid again.

I continue to post this, even though these peeps have been growing for something like 10 days, because I think it will develop my skills to try to rescue them, but also because I want people to be able to see what happens when you go ghetto and ignorant, which is basically how I'm doing this. I want to document so that others can learn from my mistakes, and I can... and what if after all this I had at least one plant that gave bud?

That would be sweet.

sounds like you have done your homework and willing to do what it takes to grow some good dank.

Thanks!

I woke at 4:30 this morning and went out to Wal-Mart to get a couple fans. They had 'em for 8.88 and it came to less than $20.

Put 'em on the babies which are now jiggling gently. Gave 'em all small amounts of water (about a tablespoon) because they looked very dry and picking them up, they all felt very light.

The pics below are from 6 PM (not that there's any difference at this point)

Mr. Stretchy and Stretchy2 have bigger leaves than they originally did but not much else. Lady Luck looks the same, even maybe a little tired. Probably pissed that I'm not giving her enough light. The stretchies are happy because it's more than they originally had, but Lady has less.

I noticed the leaves on the two stretchies are slightly darker green than that on the Lady... the leaves of stretchies now actually look healthier than hers.

I'm hoping that until I can get more light, the fans will strengthen the stocks at these small sizes and allow some time for decent root growth.

Trying not to overwater, want the roots to search.

Here's some ghettoriffic pics:

1) Mr. Stretchy with fan in background
2) Lady Luck (moved the left light closer just now, she's looking slightly ill with that bit of yellow-- will have to research that)
3) Lady Luck and Stretchy2-- the green light info at top is wrong, I am no longer using that spectrum (soft white) but all sunlight. If you can call 4 bulbs for three plants "all sunlight..."
4) Stretchy2's increased leaf spread. Like, wow. It's so increased.

I started to notice on Friday (this is Sunday morning) that Lady Luck was looking a little yellowish. She seemed tired, almost like she wanted water but she's very small and this made no sense.

But I started thinking... I put her early in a larger container, what if her roots are going down deep and the water I've been giving is not enough?

I looked at the bottom of the container and it looked like roots.

But the soil also has these stringy things.

I took her outside and tried to remove the nug she was growing in but all the soil seemed attached. I managed to lift her a little and yes, there's a bunch of roots coming out the bottom.

So even though she's hardly grown, her root system seems quite developed, for her size anyway (the roots are very thin, but long).

As they increase I will probably have to cover the sides of this container-- someone said light is bad for roots, that could be a problem I'm already having, as well.

If anyone has any thoughts on this, please feel free to share.

Today Lady Luck had an overall lighter green look... I had watered a little, but she seems to have roots all the way down and while I may be making the noob mistake of too much water, it seemed that the few tablespoons I was giving were not doing the job.

So today I cut 4 drainage holes in the bottom and filled the container with the water I set out a few days ago.

We shall see. I just now read up on auto-flowering so that is what I will grow exclusively from here on.

i was gonna ask if you had drainage but i guess you addressed that. you are doing a good job, and overwatering/underwatering is a problem we all face being a new growers. i went through overwatering with my current grow.

Defiantely change those into some Pot's that arent Clear.

Those roots wont enjoy that bright light. Plus, thats not a good shape for Bud anyways, its Wide and shallow, Try to get Wide and Deep.

Okay, thanks about the containers. I need to look up why Lady has slowly turned a light green. When I look at nute tables, it seems she needs the usual Nitrogen, Phosporus, and Pottasium (NPK)... which I have.

But I can't add it to test yet because I just watered her.

I wouldn't give her the whole dose, of course-- it calls for 7 drops to a quart for a regular plant so I might give her 3 to a quart, if that.

I know she shouldn't need it being so small, but her root system is more developed than the others and this is starting soil-- so the nutes are gonna be really weak, here.

Maybe the reason she's deficient where the others are healthy dark green is because she's used up the soil already, not sure.

Anyways, in a day or two when she needs water again I'll try the nutes.

That'll be dried by the Weekend and I can put her in a decent pot.

Thanks also MastaKoosh for reading and feedback.

Anyone know if when I put her in a bigger pot... I have some organic soil, should I maybe mix it in with starter soil 1:1 ratio? Maybe less? Maybe more.

She's still very small, she ain't growing, that's because of my lights. Getting some more floro's this weekend.

Okay, check out these pics. Lady Luck is in the middle flanked by the original Mr. Stretchy on the left and Stretchy2 on the right.

Mr. Stretchy is now in the lead with Stretchy2 trailing and Lady Luck having fallen behind.

Mr. Stretchy is in the tallest pot and he is the healthiest. Seems to indicate what was noted above about pots.

Lady Luck's soil is already dried out-- I watered her thoroughly just yesterday. I held her upside down and tapped, and she fell right out, so I'm going to transplant her to a decent container tonight.

Also her soil was lighter brown than the others possibly further indicating depletion of nutrients (or dryness, ha ha).

Noticed that Mr. Stretchy still has water weight in his container, then realized this container has no drain holes-- BAD-- this could induce mold, so quickly cut four holes in the bottom and some slits on the sides at the bottom to aerate. Once he dries out, new bucket for him, too.

I only have one other tall bucket, going to Mr. Stretchy so Stretchy2 will either have to wait until I can buy more or go in a more traditional planting pot which may be interesting for comparison if I feel he can't wait to get out of the current (shitty) clear bowl.

Pics

1) The original Mr. Stretchy, Lady Luck, and Stretchy2
2) Mr. Stretchy now in the lead
3) Lady Luck is last, and lighter

This pic is Mr. Stretchy still in that clear container. It was deeper than the others (see background) so he actually lasted the longest.

I couldn't transplant him yet because this container had no drain holes so the bottom was still wet.

I cut four holes and some slits in the side at the bottom for drainage and aeration.

Since I can't transplant him, I went ahead and added more soil so he's not so Mr. Stretchy any moe!