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homegrownboy

homegrownboy

Well-Known Member
hello all. recently i have planted a few seeds i found from some really good bud. I got a total of 5 seeds and they all started to grow fine. About 4 weeks in all but 1 died, and it seems to be growing kinda slow. i have checked all the possible things that contribute to slow growth, and everything seems to be in order. I am using the right nutrients, the soil is 6.6 and i only water when needed, usually when i can stick my finger 2 inches down and not feel alot of wetness. Any help on this would be greatly appreciated. Also, i just bought some 27W cfl bulbs in cool white 6500K and 1660 lumens, now my question is for this...is 1 cool white cfl good for growing 1 plant?...or should i use all 3 that came with it?...and if so should i use a warm white with it as well? Thanks to all that reply.
 
hey man... first off, i dont think sticking your finger in the soil is good considering your plants roots are down there and you deffinetly do not want to break those. water it when the top is dry which should be about every other day...but if ur waterign it that much make sure you dotn flood it. Now to the next question... 1 cool white is deffinetly not adequate...you need around 5000 lumens per sq ft. yes it will gorw ur plant if you use one but not very well and it may stetch for light making ur stem week...hope that helps bro.Peace
 
thanks...helps a bit, but still don't know why i am getting slow growth, the plant has been growing for 1.5 months now and it's only about 8 inches high, and has only 5 sets of leaves, the other thing i forgot to mention is that they all have only 3 blades..where as the other ones before they died all had 5 blades, im so confused.
 
Are you saying you've got a total of 4 27W CFL bulbs? That's not enough light, and that is why they are slow growers. The picture in my head of an 8" plant with only 5 sets of leaves is a fairly stretched plant, which further underscores your need for more lighting. They are REALLY gonna stretch when you switch to 12/12...

For four plants you'll want at least 8 of those 27W CFL's, if you can afford and figure out a way to rig them up. If you can't, get as many as possible in there, or leave it as-is and expect slow-growing, low-yield stretchy plants (hey, not the end of the world if this is the best you can do).
 
I think your are thinking that i have more then 1 plant...i used to but now all i have is 1. Actually i have 3 cfl's, they came in a pack. My grow space is VERY small..i'm talking like 1'x1', it was bigger before when i had more plants..but since they all croaked on me i made the space small...just enough for the pot and plant, i have the inside of the wall lined with tinfiol, and the lights have tinfoil on then acting as reflectors, could maybe i just be causing too much stress? I just recently moved about 3 weeks ago, and i also just transplanted yesterday from a 6" plastic pot, the smaller ones, to a 12" across and about 12" deep. Also is the pot i just transplanted to good enough? I think that i maybe should scrap this plant and start over with some seeds from a seedbank, anyone know of any seedbanks in Canada?...to be exact in Alberta?...i've heard that some are really bad and that there seeds are made to be used soley with there ingredients
 
First of all... take the tinfoil down. It dosnt reflect light evenly, and will cause hot spots, and burn your plants. Secondly, you deffently need more lights. For 1 plant, you are going to need alot of those 27watt cfls. They sell 47 watt ones or something in the 40's, I think you should pick some of those up at wall mart.

The slow growth is due to the light deffiency, get more lights, and you should be good to go buddy.

o and take down the tinfoil. If you can get some mylar, that works well, but no mylar.

Goodluck mate <3
 
o and sticking your finger in the soil 2 inches down, is ok to check if the plant needs watering. When the top 2inches is dry, then water. Not sure what cbdr was saying.

Good luck again mate <3
 
Yeah, thats how cfl's are. dosnt really make a difference, you are still going to need about 5+ of those for your plant, to see good growth. The more the merrier.

Goodluck mate <3
 
Nope, CFL's consume less power than typical household incandescents. A 27W CFL puts out as much light as a 100W incandecent, that's all that means.

If you posted pictures, we might be able to tell you if there are possibly other factors affecting the growth of your plants.

By the way, my opinion on the tin foil differs. The "hot spot" idea is true for the hotter industrial grow lights, but shouldn't apply to CFL's as they don't emit nearly as much heat. As for reflectivity, you should try to get some mylar or flat white paint. If you don't have access to either of those items, I'd tend to prefer the tin foil over, say as an example, cardboard.

As far as scrapping your grow -- don't. Chances are, even with better seeds, you'll end up with the same grow as now. Figure out what you're doing wrong and try to correct it (ie lighting). Might as well learn on free seeds, right? If your plants look healthy but are just taking a while to grow, you're gonna end up with some good weed at the end of the grow! Just might take you longer than some others :)

Regarding watering, learn to water by weight. You want the soil to dry out to the bottom of the pot, not just the top 2 inches. You can feel when the pot is dried out -- use this technique instead and you'll promote healthy root growth.
 
By the way, right now I'm growing 2 plants -- Dutch Passion Mazar & Dutch Passion Strawberry Cough. They are under a total of 293 watts of CFL lighting in a 2x2x4 area coated with Mylar on 3 sides and flat white paint on the 4th. They are 28 days from sprout and only about 6-7" tall, although beautifully compact and were just topped yesterday.

Hope that gives you an idea of what to expect from even ~300W of CFL lighting. You need more lights. :)
 
ok so i need like a bizillion lights...lol kidding.

Another thing too...it does look like it is stretching very lean looking, but very healthy, like i said before there are only about 5 sets of leaves that go up the plant, nodes are they called?
 
Plants stretch towards the light when they need more of it. :)

Nitrogen should promote compact growth, are you sure you've been using food high in N?
 
the first # is 20, should i go higher?...by the way, thanks for the help...i'll upload a pic as soon as i can find my camera, with the move i kinda "lost" a few things along the way, unpacked boxes DEEP in the back of the storage closet i bet...lol ..just my luck:wall:

i was just looking at it before i put it to bed...lol yes i'm one of those that talk to plants...my normal house plants love it so why not do it with these plants too, anyways, i noticed that there are 2 new sets of leaves growing right off the top, a good sign i hope that the stretching is stopping and the regular growth will start, seems just these 3 lights have helped enormously in just 1 day. I will be stopping to pick up 2 more tomorrow.
 
ok so it seems that the stretching on the plant has stopped finally and there is already ANOTHER set of leaves coming up so that's 3 sets in like a 1/2" node space, is that good?
 
Really you haven't let enough time pass to declare the end of stretching. Not that it matters -- you know to give it as much light as you possibly can, so it is what it is. Not to mention, when you change the lights to 12/12 your babies are gonna stretch like mad for the first week or two.

What is the N-P-K of your food? 20-?-?

You wanna make sure the phosphorus (P) is pretty low.Higher levels of P will promote stretchy growth as well. While many switch to bloom ferts (which contain higher levels of phosphorus to promote flowering) at the start of 12/12, some recommend to keep the plants on the veg high-N nutes for that first week or 2 of 12/12 to prevent stretching.
 
actually i took a ruler and measured and it was only an 1/8" of a gap and i already see another 4th new set coming up and the 3rd set is already 1/2" long, as for the nutes...i see that i made a mistake, i have bought the wrong kind as it was 20-20-20 bad choice i hear so i guess it's off to the store to get something better...ideas????
 
Find some organic stuff that's high in N. It's really the ratio that matters, not the how big the numbers are. For example, I use Fix Farm Grow Big and it is 6-4-4.
 
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