Get a harvest every 2 weeks

[Al B. Fuct]

SoG style plants do have a somewhat lower per-plant yield than full sized plants, but when you consider that 80+% of the total yield of full sized plants is on the mainstem in the top 1/3 of the plant and knowing you can fit about 4x (or more) the number of SoG plants per lighted sq ft as opposed to full sized plants, you can see that SoG gives you a much better overall yield, provided you absolutely pack the lighted space with SoG plants. You get much better average bud density and weight with SoG, too. However, you do need to pack the lighted space with plants.

If you like, you can get away with 1x 1000 over your 25 SoG plants if you want to save a bit of dough on electricity. I run pairs of 900x900mm trays which each hold 23 plants, with a single 1000 over each pair.

[john]

Al, do you know much about light movers? I've searched and found no results here or other forums, and nobody on this forum replied to a thread i made.
I've been think about using them for quite a while. I've seen you over in RIU, and you've had quite a few discussions, did light movers ever come up in any of you threads? If they did, what to you think about them.

[soul rebel 619]

so by putting our babies in @ 5in instead of your recommended 10in will our yield be affected?

[defcon]

how many plants is optimal for max yield under a 400 watt hps? im planning on doing 2 gal. grow bags with 40% perlite 60% soil no veg period of course.

[Al B. Fuct]

Originally Posted by john

Al, do you know much about light movers?

Plenty. Not desirable. If you need to cover an area larger than you can do with one light, you need more lights. With light movers, you have a new figure to consider: lumen-hours. With movers, when the light is on one end of the traverse, it's not over the other. Consequently, you must derate the amount of light being laid down depending upon how long thelight isn't over certain parts of the grow area.

Originally Posted by soul rebel 619

so by putting our babies in @ 5in instead of your recommended 10in will our yield be affected?

Nah, it'll be fine. I make mine a bit taller than that for a couple reasons, tho. Taller clones yield plants with a bit more air circ space between the pot top and the lowest foliage and a taller clone can be recut in case I stuff up the watering of the cubes and rot the stems. She'll be right, mate.

[Al B. Fuct]

Originally Posted by defcon

how many plants is optimal for max yield under a 400 watt hps? im planning on doing 2 gal. grow bags with 40% perlite 60% soil no veg period of course.

You can do as many as 4 plants per sq ft in SoG. A 400 will cover 8sf, so at absolute max, 32 plants under a 400. I don't run things quite so dense- about 2.5 per sf in my op.

[e3ment444]

hey man i got a couple questions, you said your clones have no veg time, but what if im Starting from feminized seed(blue cheese : ), would I do 12/12 with a veg bulb, or Should I Do 18/4 until It devolops It first Real set of leaves? im doing Sea of green in a mini caddy, added a inline too it to cool the temps down to about 75-85 Light on, light off 70-74,?

and also if you Know about the Mini caddy I Re-did the Lid to hold 6 net pots INstead of 14.
Is that a suffieciant Move?

also have a 400hps

[Al B. Fuct]

Originally Posted by e3ment444

hey man i got a couple questions, you said your clones have no veg time, but what if im Starting from feminized seed(blue cheese : ), would I do 12/12 with a veg bulb, or Should I Do 18/4 until It devolops It first Real set of leaves?

Can't do SoG straight from plants raised from beans. 'Feminised' seeds are not a sure thing, they usually come up about 70-80% female. If you tried to do SoG with plants grown straight from beans, 20-30% would be male, wasting a lot of time and money. You first need to establish known-female mother plants.

When starting from beans, grow the plants under 18/6 or 24/0 to a size suiting taking cuttings, do a batch of cuttings, marking each cutting so you know which donor plant they were cut from. Once those cuttings have set root, put them under 12/12 light to get them to flower and see if the donor they came from is female.

im doing Sea of green in a mini caddy, added a inline too it to cool the temps down to about 75-85 Light on, light off 70-74,?

I don't know what a 'mini caddy' is.

85F (29.4C) is too hot. 75-85 is not precise enough temp control. You're looking for 24C (75.2F) -26C (78.8F) with 26C as your absolute max temp.

[LBH]

I think the hardest part of growing is the start up time period as illustrated above. TO DO IT RIGHT, you have go through all the growing pains. It's worth it in the end but it weeds out anyone without the means or dedication to commit to doing this.

[Al B. Fuct]

Originally Posted by LBH

I think the hardest part of growing is the start up time period as illustrated above. TO DO IT RIGHT, you have go through all the growing pains. It's worth it in the end but it weeds out anyone without the means or dedication to commit to doing this.

Quite so and very well observed, LBH.

There's a lot more to this than a few fluoros in a closet, that is if you want to a) succeed in producing anything smokable and b) have continued success in doing so.

A basic home grow op has 3 primary components; a mother plant area, a cloning facility and an area for flowering. These units can come in many shapes and sizes but you have to have all three ticking over reliably, which means meeting certain parameters in each, to make it work for you. If there were any magic shortcuts to any of them, you can bet I'd have told everyone about them by now.

[77401]

Subbing
Nice Shit you got going on Al.
+rep'd

[Al B. Fuct]

thanks for that.

Hope there's some useful stuff in what I've written. However, the most useful stuff is in what I haven't written. I haven't invited readers to be skeptics, which they surely should be. When you scan randomly around stuff that's been said about growing cannabis, quite a lot often rely on articles of faith. If you're going to run a grow op, always have a good botanical science-based reason for any technique or process you employ- and you'll have success. Understand the plant's requirements and how you create a suitable environment and it all becomes rather plain.

[apollo45]

this thread should be stickied!

if not, i found it informative and worth saving... *bookmark*

+ rep dude!

[Al B. Fuct]

thanks, apollo.

Just so you know, even long-experienced growers have op probs from time to time. I've been fighting a vexatious problem with poor strike rate on clones for some months. Stem tips are rotting, despite sterilising my clone watering solution with H2O2 50% grade at 1ml/L of watering solution. I've cleaned, sterilised, babied, watched, verified and reverified every aspect of my cloning process, only to come up goose-eggs.

However, I think I just found the problem- and just in time, too. I'm down to my last 4 mother plants.

The heat mat in my clone box is moulded silicone with a built-in fixed temp thermostat. It's supposed to run at a constant 30C. Turns out that the thermostat has failed. The heat mat is running at 41.1C- way too hot. It has been cooking the stem tips. I'm off to buy a new heat mat today. Hopefully the next batch of clones will go back to popping in 7-10 days as they are supposed to.

[Skye]

Hi Al, You should try Rapid Rooter cloning plugs - can you get these where you are? I had trouble with rockwool cloning too and the rapid rooters fixed the problem. They make it VERY easy to clone.