First grow journal! LED+DWC+Winter (PICS! :D)

Hello everyone!

For a first time grower, not the usual route taken, right? Lately I've been stressed out over school, and I found that one of my favourite things to do when stressed is to read up about cannabis. I did this so much during November that I decided to start a little project!



Strain
The strain is a cross of Lowryder #2 and Hindu Kush, dubbed "Devon Maid" by my seed supplier. It's an autoflowering Indica that he claims needs nothing more than 2L of soil and 24/0 CFL lighting, and is designed to be as easy to grow as possible.

Lighting
Homemade LED lights, as per knna/pinstripe (of icmag) inspiration. Osram Golden Dragon Plus. Constructed on aluminum U-channel (used to be part of some vertical blinds) using no-name thermal paste and miscellaneous adhesive. Flower light will be made using thermal adhesive!

Driver: Waterproof 670mA 36W Power Constant Current Source LED Driver (85~265V)-42906 from DealExtreme.

Vegetative (Kinda useless for AF strains, but why not): 10 Red 625nm, 4 Blue 470nm, 1 White "Cool" 6500K.
Current draw: 630 mA (bah, that's China for you!)
Voltage across 15 LEDs: 35.5 V (also a bit overvolted at 2.37V/LED, but whatever)
Wattage: ~22 W
Orientation: B-B-W-B-B sandwiched between two rows of R-R-R-R. About 50 mm seperation between LEDs.

Flower: 10 Red 625 nm, 4 White "Cool" 6500K. (not yet built)

Medium
When I started the grow I was going to go all-out soil, but decided to try Hydro since the startup cost (at least, low-scale) was in my budget. At least that's what I thought, until I considered nutrients. And hydroton. My advice to first timers: Try soil first!

Seedling: Peat Pellets
Once roots show: Peat in net pot, surrounded by hydroton. DWC.

Nutrients
Botanicare Pure Blend Organic
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And with that, on to the actual grow!

November 27th, 2012
Started germinating today. Lined a match box with sandpaper and scarified the 3 seeds. Paper towel method, heat blanket. Tap water. No idea on PH.

November 30th, 2012
No luck so far! Tried lots of different methods for keeping them warm. Most were too hot and dried out the paper towels too quickly. I was scared that I cooked them more than once, but read up and found that germination at 90 F (32 C) is sometimes more successful than germination at lower temperatures.

December 1st, 2012
Gave up and just planted the damned seeds. Peat pellets (not Jiffy), since I didn't have access to rockwool (at the time - future grows, rockwool all the way). Again, I had no good way of keeping the soil warm. Ambient temps in my house are around 17-19 C (63-68 F). I whipped up a temperature-controlled extension cord using an Arduino, a temperature sensor (TMP38GZ, I think), and a 240V solid state relay (which can be used at 120V just fine). Plugging a heat blanket into the socket keeps the soil at a steady 25 C (77 F), as long as the temperature sensor stays near the soil.

December 3rd, 2012

Two! Nice. The seeds husks are still on.... These seeds have really hard shells. At this point, I'm worried they won't be able to get the husks off!

December 4th, 2012 - Parcel day!




Stunned by the brightness of these LEDs. Definitely harmful to unprotected eyes. Got some sweet Lennon-esque shades to wear when I'm in here..

December 5th, 2012
Made a novice mistake today. Helped the shell off one seedling relatively safely, but with the other... I accidentally ripped the seed away from the stem. Rest in peace..
With that done, I berated myself for a long time, telling myself I should have just left them alone - and then promptly started germing another seed (skipped the artificial shit and went right to peat).

In other news..



December 6th, 2012
Oh what a good day.. Passed at least one of my courses (with a 13% buffer from the average I need to maintain)!
And then came home to this incredible cutie:


Also figured out how to work the manual focus on this DSLR I'm borrowing.. Expect better pictures from now on!




Is it normal for the leaves to curl back a little like that? The cotyledons aren't curling much though, so I'd assume heat and overwatering are out.. but what about light intensity? I went and raised the lights an inch or so. Today, I hooked up my light timer, and I'll set them on 20/4 starting midnight.
Also, I've started watering the bottom portion of the pellet instead of the top. I need the roots to grow down!

And for now you're all caught up. I'll (hopefully) be doing daily updates (or at least taking daily pics) for a while, because this is a pretty quick stage of growth for the plant. Sorry about the monster first post. Feel free to ask questions!

Nice job on that panel, but will you have enough wattage for flower with your new one too?

Starting to think i'm overdoing it with 125w

SnotBoogie said:

Nice job on that panel, but will you have enough wattage for flower with your new one too?

Starting to think i'm overdoing it with 125w

Click to expand...

Check out Pinstripe's 2nd try (over at the icmag forums). I'd link you but I'm on phone. He uses 22W in a stealth PC grow just fine! More is more effective, for sure.

December 7th, 2012

Pic updates. Took a couple shots this morning:

7 hours later (leaves look quite a bit more bushy, but maybe just the lighting difference..


EDIT: Also, got a bit of work done..

Water level juuuust touching the hydroton (net pots double stacked for rigidity and strength, zip tied). Balanced this water with vinegar. Added 1/4 strength nutes (grow blend).. not sure if this was a good idea but 1/4 is fairly weak.

Left this 5 gallon bucket on the cement floor for a few days and it hit 15 degrees C (60 F) which is way too cold. Managed to scrounge up an aquarium heater which has temperature control. Way easier than rigging something myself, this time..

Humidity's way up already. Was down around 20% while sprouting, and I had to keep misting around the place. Temperature, as shown, climbing quickly to ambient (set at 20 C).

Way cool, nice job with everything. My light is also knna-inspired... that is, Osram GD+ mounted on an old heatsink. I'll tag along since I really am a hydro newb and am interested in trying it soon. Your seedlings look fine... the hardest part at this point is being patient and not over-babying, because it does take a week or two for them to really take off.

Yes those LEDs are bright aren't they? If I watch my plants for too long or accidentally look straight into them I'm seeing stars for awhile

Oh i've been meaning to ask: Devon Maid, named geographically?

Nice one keep on coming diyers

bassclef said:

the hardest part at this point is being patient and not over-babying

Click to expand...

Yeah, definitely. I'm glad I'm not using soil, I'd be overwatering them like crazy. It was hard to do it right even using peat (really dry environment, watering like everyone said only lasted for 8 hours or so).

SnotBoogie said:

Oh i've been meaning to ask: Devon Maid, named geographically?

Click to expand...

Kinda. Looking up the hybrid, I can see another strain with the same blend - "Auto Kush" and Auto BlueKush which is Lowryder #1 X Hindu Kush. But perhaps the "breeder" I got my seeds from bred them together himself. He says Devon Maid is a pretty hardy strain, but then that's true of most Autos.

December 8th, 2012
I feel like an overprotective, pampering parent, just having one plant. My next seed better hurry up and germ!



Leaves look a bit longer since I switched to DWC, at least. Was afraid it'd go into shock.

Have you already bought the flowering reds? The binning of those, at least the one available to the end user isn't the greatest (pinstripe's was a higher bin as knna had his way of ordering them).

Check out a golden dragon platinum it's also 120degree lenses but you spend slightly more!

Nevertheless, it's going to kick some ass if you have the reds already gathered eh eh

jubiare, I have.. They're http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/LR W5AM-HZJZ-1-Z/475-2821-1-ND/2176360 . No idea what bin that is. Does Digikey even specify?

Edit: http://flashlightwiki.com/Osram
Ah hell, they're bottom bin. Feels like a huge waste of money. Paid $2/pc.. Should've known.

Am I going to have to revert to sucky HPS lighting to continue growing now? Fuck.

Yes friend you have the one I thought, click on the datasheets for reading on flux/bin and get familiar with those ... for your next project you might want to look for something more efficient but that's all right for now. Unfortunately with osrams you never get to chose between the group bins (that red has three group bin, knna was able to get the middle bin somehow, you'll get the lowest group)

If it makes you feel better H-caine...I did the same thing

Oh well. I'll try and continue with what I've got, and if it doesn't work I'll upgrade later and try again.

Pick up some of those philips xt-E from stevesleds. Theyre super super cheap at the moment and pre-mounted on stars. I wouldve scooped em up now if i wasnt getting similar price on ledengin units.

Think they're linked in my thread, otherwise google will have it... Theyre at like a third of normal price for specified bin ($3 each or so, for 3w modules) might be worth getting them now even if you dont upgrade anything else yet.

That said, i bet your shit works how it is, its a weed after all right? my poor girls been beaten and burned, now shes languishing under 69w of cfl... It could be worse

SnotBoogie said:

That said, i bet your shit works how it is, its a weed after all right?

Click to expand...

I guess you're right, haha. Seedling still looks great to me, no yellowing, the leaves have started growing more out than down (curl).

I might just permanently attach the "flower" light to the "veg" light, 'cause even combined they likely have less output than a commercial light.

Got my pH meter today. Went and picked up some calibration solution too, and the cheapo $10 meter read exactly 4.0 when switching to pH 4 solution after calibrating at 7.

What did my reservoir read? 7.8. This is AFTER attempting to pH down with vinegar when I set up the system on Friday. I obviously didn't use enough! Or maybe this vinegar is diluted?

I added some more 'till it was down around 6.5.. Didn't want to overdo it too quickly plus I don't know what other affects vinegar has on the plant :c My municipality claims their water rates around 6.6-6.8..

Maybe worth buying cheap bottled water? that does seem super high even for tap water. mine is like 5.8, cant complain

edit: From what i understand overdoing it on the ph up/down can be super nasty for your plants, which makes sense. I dunno how it is in hydro but i imagine in soil you're genociding the microbacteria whenever its done.

I'll look into it, Snot.. don't want to be buying giant jugs of water every other day though :c

Anyway, small update since I haven't had a picture in a couple days.


Does this seem appropriate for 3 days' growth as a seedling?

Looks fine from what little I know. no stretch, the leaves are maybe a little too curled but that could just be the strain. is it yellowing on the tips though, or just a trick of the light?