My first UDWC grow NL and FOG

I'm gonna give hydro a go with a 42l udwc system for 2 plants as space is very limited. Northern Lights and Fire OG are the seeds I started last weekend in rockwool. They popped up this week and now have their first true set of leaves and the root coming through the bottom of the cube. Tomorrow will be the day I throw them in the system. Using hydroton for the medium and Advanced Nutrients Ph Perfect line of nutes. Heres a couple of crappy pics to get us started.

I was getting quite a stretch from them so I put a 50 watt COB on them and turned on the fan to strengthen them up. The long stem should help with burying them in the hydroton anyways. Please stay tuned hydro growers because I am probably gonna have a lot of questions.

xjking said:

I'm gonna give hydro a go with a 42l udwc system for 2 plants as space is very limited. Northern Lights and Fire OG are the seeds I started last weekend in rockwool. They popped up this week and now have their first true set of leaves and the root coming through the bottom of the cube. Tomorrow will be the day I throw them in the system. Using hydroton for the medium and Advanced Nutrients Ph Perfect line of nutes. Heres a couple of crappy pics to get us started.
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I was getting quite a stretch from them so I put a 50 watt COB on them and turned on the fan to strengthen them up. The long stem should help with burying them in the hydroton anyways. Please stay tuned hydro growers because I am probably gonna have a lot of questions.

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I don't think they're stretching at all. I wouldn't overload them on light, as they really don't need full strength yet.

Now things are getting exciting. I got them transplanted into my udwc system and now I wait....nope, no buds yet...lol. Water temp is at 67*F, Ph at 5 .7 , TDS 433 and 1/4 strength AN nutes. Hopefully everything goes as planned. I'll be checking Ph a couple times a day until I'm comfortable with it. Some pics

xjking said:

Now things are getting exciting. I got them transplanted into my udwc system and now I wait....nope, no buds yet...lol. Water temp is at 67*F, Ph at 5 .7 , TDS 433 and 1/4 strength AN nutes. Hopefully everything goes as planned. I'll be checking Ph a couple times a day until I'm comfortable with it. Some pics


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What's your base tds (water with no nutes)? 433 is too high for those little ones. You want to be around 150. If your base tds is 100, then your tds meter should read 250.

5.7 is a tad low. Between 5.8 and 6.0 is where you want to try and be at.

Also, those starts are really small, and could've waited until they were a little more established before going into the big net pots. What you'll need to do is hand water the hydroton, right around the plant, as droplets won't reach that high. Just until she's a little bigger.

JSB99 said:

What's your base tds (water with no nutes)? 433 is too high for those little ones. You want to be around 150. If your base tds is 100, then your tds meter should read 250.

5.7 is a tad low. Between 5.8 and 6.0 is where you want to try and be at.

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My base is around 80, I went by AN's feeding chart for first nutes. I know I should have given them another week or two but I am anxious to get started. I am top feeding straight water ph'd to 6.0 for now to make sure they stay moist. I am suspecting the ph in my reservoir will creep up during the week. As I said I will be monitoring it daily. I ph'd my rockwool to 5.5 so I figured my reservoir ph should be just fine. I had a couple of roots coming out of the bottom of the cubes so I'm hoping they will find their way down quickly. I'm anxious to see the progression.

Being anxious is going to get you in trouble while growing. You really do have to have patience. If you over fertilize her, which is what you're doing, she'll end up with nutes burn, which will delay growth. Might even kill a little one like that. Seriously, dump 3/4 of your water, and refill with tap to bring down the tds.

JSB99 said:

Being anxious is going to get you in trouble while growing. You really do have to have patience. If you over fertilize her, which is what you're doing, she'll end up with nutes burn, which will delay growth. Might even kill a little one like that. Seriously, dump 3/4 of your water, and refill with tap to bring down the tds.

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Understood and thank you for helping me. I will get that done now.

Yea I will just echo what JSB said.
I found that if I wait until 3 or so sets of leaves and lots of roots coming from everywhere they transplant much better and begin growing almost immediately. You would be surprised how long you can keep em healthy in the cubes.
I did the exact same thing you did. I started @ around 400 my first go. I paid for it with some yellow leaves and learned that 100-150 is good. You can add a little extra micro since you are running such a low ppm. (or whatever is your equivalent of micro)
Don's sweat your PH a ton either. I wouldnt change mine unless its above 6.5 or below 5.4. Anywhere in between, just let it ride.

JSB99 said:

Being anxious is going to get you in trouble while growing. You really do have to have patience. If you over fertilize her, which is what you're doing, she'll end up with nutes burn, which will delay growth. Might even kill a little one like that. Seriously, dump 3/4 of your water, and refill with tap to bring down the tds.

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OK, I drained 7.5 gallons and replaced it with ph 6.1 water. Now I am at Ph 6.0 and TDS 184 (minus my 64= 120 ppm). Hopefully this will get me off to a better start. Thanks again for the info. As I said I was going by AN's feeding chart but that is probably better suited to plants that are a little further along. I'm ready to slow down now.

5BY5LEC said:

Yea I will just echo what JSB said.
I found that if I wait until 3 or so sets of leaves and lots of roots coming from everywhere they transplant much better and begin growing almost immediately. You would be surprised how long you can keep em healthy in the cubes.
I did the exact same thing you did. I started @ around 400 my first go. I paid for it with some yellow leaves and learned that 100-150 is good. You can add a little extra micro since you are running such a low ppm. (or whatever is your equivalent of micro)
Don's sweat your PH a ton either. I wouldnt change mine unless its above 6.5 or below 5.4. Anywhere in between, just let it ride.

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I was a bit weary of how long they would remain healthy in the cubes without nutes so I was anxious to get them in the system. Thanks for your input. I'm learning this whole new game.

When I started seeds I just soaked the cubes in around 200 ppm solution to begin with.
Whenever they dried out and were very light I just dipped them back in the said nute solution.

xjking said:

OK, I drained 7.5 gallons and replaced it with ph 6.1 water. Now I am at Ph 6.0 and TDS 184 (minus my 64= 120 ppm). Hopefully this will get me off to a better start. Thanks again for the info. As I said I was going by AN's feeding chart but that is probably better suited to plants that are a little further along. I'm ready to slow down now

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Perfect! She'll take off real quick. Every day you'll see a good amount of growth. Once she's got some shoots growing, you can bump 8t up a little at a time. When you have six pairs of shoots, and you top her, you should be around 300ppm. When you start flowering, you should be around 550ppm. I don't tend to go above 700ppm the entire grow. Those are rough numbers as each strain is different, but it should give you an idea of how low your tds will be compared to the charts.

Just thought I'd throw a couple end of the month update pics in. Things are going well so far.

Update and a couple of questions.

I've noticed this white forming on my hydroton. I would assume it is salts from the nutrients but I have never top fed these plants any nutrients. Should I be worried?



I've also noticed that every day my tds/ec increases a bit. I would have thought it would decrease as the plant absorbs nutrients. I had intended to use this as a guide as to when I would do a water/nutrient change but if it doesn't drop then that is out. Also my Ph rises every day and I adjust it almost every day to compensate. Is it because I am only using a partial dose of the AN Ph Perfect nutes that it does not maintain or does the product not work as well as advertised?


My girls are doing fantastic, I'm finally getting some roots growing out of the net pots.





I think things are going well, If you see anything I should change please advise me, comments and suggestions are always welcome. So far I am really enjoying the hydroponic side of things.

xjking said:

Update and a couple of questions.

I've noticed this white forming on my hydroton. I would assume it is salts from the nutrients but I have never top fed these plants any nutrients. Should I be worried?

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I've also noticed that every day my tds/ec increases a bit. I would have thought it would decrease as the plant absorbs nutrients. I had intended to use this as a guide as to when I would do a water/nutrient change but if it doesn't drop then that is out. Also my Ph rises every day and I adjust it almost every day to compensate. Is it because I am only using a partial dose of the AN Ph Perfect nutes that it does not maintain or does the product not work as well as advertised?
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My girls are doing fantastic, I'm finally getting some roots growing out of the net pots.

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I think things are going well, If you see anything I should change please advise me, comments and suggestions are always welcome. So far I am really enjoying the hydroponic side of things.

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Just salts. Nothing to worry about. You'll see salt buildup on the inside of your contrainers, when you clean everything between grows.

Help, I think I may have root rot...I just changed the soup last evening and the roots were white...today when I checked on the girls the roots are all brown. I'm not sure how this happened or what I should do, the plants are still doing fine, is it too late?

xjking said:

Help, I think I may have root rot...I just changed the soup last evening and the roots were white...today when I checked on the girls the roots are all brown. I'm not sure how this happened or what I should do, the plants are still doing fine, is it too late?

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What’s your water temps? Do you use hydrogaurd or any bennies? Does it smell? It could just be nute stained

Mikenike said:

What’s your water temps? Do you use hydrogaurd or any bennies? Does it smell? It could just be nute stained

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I am running chiller at 67*-68* I used voodoo juice for first 2 res changes but none on my third (this change). No hydrogaurd.

Does the soup stink? Are the nutes you use really dark? It's possible that it's just stained from he nutes. You're water will usually have a foul smell if something's gone wrong.

JSB99 said:

Does the soup stink? Are the nutes you use really dark? It's possible that it's just stained from he nutes. You're water will usually have a foul smell if something's gone wrong.

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It does not stink, the nutes are dark in the bottle, but not once they are diluted in the soup. Its weird they were pure white yesterday and so brown now, I increased the dosage slightly.