1 Gallon Smartpot T5 HO Perpetual Grow. END OF A ERA!

I start this with first saying I am ending this style of growing and moving on to something new. I have officially been growing for a year. I have done a lot of reading and research for this past year. I have taken so much info from RIU that i felt compelled to add to that knowledge base. So here is a break down of my setup. This is mainly to share. Not doing a full blown grow journal. However I'll be able to show the entire system at work.

Genetics: Bagseed, Indica strain.

Light: Sunleaves Pioneer 8 T5HO Fluorescent, Sun Systems New Wave T5HO 4 bulb

Container: 1 Gallon Smart Pots

Nutrients: Fox Farms trio nutes

Soil: Fox Farms Ocean Forest soil. (I don't amend mine at all)

Tap water

Training: Topping - Supercropping

Clones all come from a Bonsai Mum.

There it is. I dont do anything fancy.

So this whole thing started one day when I inherited a couple of HO T5 grow lights. When I inquired about what they were used for I was told "we don't buy weed from people...". She didn't want to do it anymore, He was gone, and here we are. So after raiding his grow op and seeing what he was doing, and about a week here on RIU, I had a general understating of how to get started. Light cycles, nutrients, Hydro vs soil, on and on and on and on and on. lol

So i started out with plastic pots. Square. Most of them pink. A few black ones and some blue ones. 1L pots. All free from the local nursery. I had some little starter cups. Went to the store and got some jiffy seedling starter and WENT CRAZY.

I thought I got way over my head very quickly. I germed 20 seeds Paper towl ziplock method. And after about 3 weeks I had 20 seedlings. So I x-planted them into the square 1L pots and and 3 weeks later I took 1 clone from each plant and a second from the BEST looking 3 of the bunch. Then I moved all the 'from seed' plants to the bloom area. And as luck would have it I got one female from 20 seeds. FML.

After the male genocide, I was left with 1 plant in bloom and 2 little clones. Both of them took right off. I got a little sentimental with those 2 girls. One was named Bridgett. And kept. Shes my Mum. The other one had a litter of clones and then was bloomed.

Here we are 3 months into growing 2 plants in bloom 10 clones in veg, nothing to smoke, some yellow leaves here and there causing me to freak out over every single spot and can i water them and nutes and research and RUI and OMG FACE MELTING MENTAL EXPLOSION.

Then I read this. https://www.rollitup.org/do-yourself/218468-if-you-have-ever-grown.html and a friend came by and got me baked and life was ok.

Now I knew I wanted my grow to sustain me and 2 others people usage. I knew I wanted to continuously harvest and have smoking coming in. So I needed a way to keep everything straight for where each plants were at. Ah Hello Growbuddy grow software.
Using Growbuddy I found out my current strain takes 9 weeks to bloom. I could get 6 plants under that 8 light with 3 gallon plastic pots and some LST. And holy crap that was a lot of dirt a lot of tying So back to RIU and oooo Smart pots. what about in 1 gallon pots. Nothing on the forums. F it. Well do it ourselves. So back to the local hydro store after a short phone call. Fresh bag of FFOF 20 bucks, 10 1 gallon smart pots, 20 bucks. Woot.

So after my first harvest I started 3 Plants in 1 gallon smart pots In bloom. 3 weeks later I moved in 3 more and 3 weeks later I moved in 3 more. Yes there's an echo. 9 plants in 3 stages of growth. Im averaging just shy of 3 oz every 3 weeks. A zip a week and its better cheaper then what I was buying from a friend. So now For some pics.



From Right to Left" 3 Plants that were just cloned/being cloned. 3 in the foreground are to be xplanted into 3 gallon smartpots in a 3 weeks



the 3 in the back are next to go to Bloom in 3 weeks. And the one to the very far right is Brigett. These plants do get root bound. I care not. If it gets too bad ill trim the roots. Just pull the root ball out, shave a inch off all 4 sides and 2 inches off the bottom and repot with some fresh dirt. Thats how I do Brigette.

So thats all being vegged under a 4 ft. 4 bulb T5HO.



And here Is the bloom room. You should be able to tell where theyre at by what they look like.

So now I'm Changing some things.
First im going organic. Making my own soil that I can reuse over and over. Sick of FFOF and its crustyness. Was nice. And all my holes in my yard are all nice and filled in and I have a good size raised bed going for veggies next year. but im done with buying bags of dirt.

Im going to be adding a second light. Same thing. T5HO 8 bulb. I like T5s. I think that HPS are also great if you're wiling to spend the money to keep them cool. I am not at this time ready to spend that kind of money yet. I can get a fixture for t5s for about 160 bucks. Hang it and go. I will be throwing a few daylight bulbs into these fixtures at some point. Right now thy're alll 3000k. Going to go to the 2700s with 2 6500 in them.

As you can see from the veg room pics, I'm already headed back to 3gallon pots. Just using Smart pots this time instead of the black nursery freebies.

Ill be going to single pot scrogs. I have a source for some 12ga welded wire mesh. some bamboo and zipties, done.

I am also buying new genetics. THC Bomb, Barneys Pinapple Chunk, Medicann Blue, Cheese Bomb, and Eva Pink Plant.
From what i have found all 3 of these are 6-8 week bloom plants (ececpt for the pink plant says 6-10 weeks). I decided i wanted a mix of types. Indica, indica/sativa, a sativa, indica dominate and a sativa dominate

They'll be growing in this soil mix
alfalfa meal
glacial rock dust
Dolomite lime
Kelp Meal
Happy Frog Tomato and Veg
Earth worm casting
Crushed lava rock/vermiculite
Canadian Sphagnum Peat Moss. (Thanks to InTheGarden on GC.)

Thanks for Reading. Im open to critisizm. Hopefully this helps someone.

M4S73R

Very Nice!
I hope to run perpetual one Day.

Thanks. Nice Hamlet quote in your Sig

Nice, how long did you veg in the 1 gallon pot? Or do you just transplant from 1 liter to 1 gallon and immediately start flowering? How long do you veg before transplant? I'm trying to get into a perpetual micro grow which is why I am asking.

I dont veg in one gallon. At least not for long. Long enough to get them over xplant shock. once thats done then i move them. Now I will say that vegging in one liter is much better with clones over from seed. if you do from seed after about 3 weeks in the 1L you may find yourself trimming the root balls a little. I did this with great results and a thicker root ball. There is no need for this with clones. I start clones in solo cups and they stay there till I need them. If your doing a micro grow, id skip the 1L pots and xplant them from starter cups to 1gallonn wait for the xplant shock to wear off and then flip them.

m4s73r said:

I dont veg in one gallon. At least not for long. Long enough to get them over xplant shock. once thats done then i move them. Now I will say that vegging in one liter is much better with clones over from seed. if you do from seed after about 3 weeks in the 1L you may find yourself trimming the root balls a little. I did this with great results and a thicker root ball. There is no need for this with clones. I start clones in solo cups and they stay there till I need them. If your doing a micro grow, id skip the 1L pots and xplant them from starter cups to 1gallonn wait for the xplant shock to wear off and then flip them.

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Thanks so much, this is very helpful. I was actually thinking of flowering them in 1/2 gallon fabric pots so that I can fit 60 plants in my 4x4 space instead of 30 1 gallons. Do you have any experience with 1/2 gallons? Based on your results do you think it would work?

This is kind of double sided. Can it be done, yes. I have flowered clones in 1L pots. Should it be done. Sadly id say no. For the amount of smoke you would get from 60 plants in 1L pots vs 1 gallon is HUGE. you will yield more with 30 1 gallon then 60 half gallon.

m4s73r said:

This is kind of double sided. Can it be done, yes. I have flowered clones in 1L pots. Should it be done. Sadly id say no. For the amount of smoke you would get from 60 plants in 1L pots vs 1 gallon is HUGE. you will yield more with 30 1 gallon then 60 half gallon.

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Thanks for the heads up, I'm gonna start this up within the next few weeks.

Good luck, if you do a grow journal hit me up or post a link to it here.

m4s73r said:

Good luck, if you do a grow journal hit me up or post a link to it here.

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Thanks, I will make sure I do.

Hi, great write up! I'm wondering, what distance did you try to maintain between the top of your plants and the light (5T HO)? I just got the same light configuration, 4ft x 8 HO's, and am quite new at this. I grew up in Humboldt many (many) years ago but never needed to grow it. Now, need to grow my own. Oh ya, what is a 'Smart Pot?
Thanks

an inch. A smart pot is a fabric bag used to "air prune" your root ball. Doing this prevents your roots from growing in a circle at the bottom of the pot. For dirt its awesome. However the way i was doing it isnt the best way imo for this type of light. this light is great for Scrog setups.

Thanks so much. I appreciate what you have to say. So honest!