Swimming in a Sea of Green - blueberryxhaze SoG from clones

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Originally Posted by IMgreen

yet another thing I can build!

Yeah, Mr.Goodstuff put a couple of these together and I was going to copy his plans, but then I found this little thing, which is perfect for my small grow op. And I almost couldn't build one for the price.

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The clones are continuing to put on some nice healthy growth. And it looks like the roots on all six have grown down into the reservoir so I'm expecting an absolute explosion of greenery over the next few day.

On Saturday I noticed there were some clear solid particles floating in the reservoir - probably pieces of damaged root that broke off. Just to be safe I added some Hydroguard to the nute solution. The particles were almost all gone when I checked this morning.

Adding the Hydroguard has created a minor complication. It looks like it's upped my PPM by about 150, but I wasn't smart enough to note the TDS reading before I added it. So I don't know exactly how strong my nute solution really is right now. I'll just have to gradually increase the nutes until I start to see burn, and then back them off a bit.

Reservoir temps are being problematic too. It's been unseasonably warm the last few days and my reservoir was up to 82F Sunday morning. Fortunately it snowed yesterday, and the res dropped to 77F during lights off. I was planning on firing up my ghetto res chiller yesterday, but I need to flush out all the hoses with some bleach water before I hook it up. Unfortunately, the roommate struck again - she decided not to go to church because of the snow. So I didn't get a chance to work on it. Hopefully this afternoon I'll get that done.

Pics - better color this time . You can see the healthy new growth coming in although the tips of some of the "new" leaves are showing some damage still. I think it's because they had actually started growing while the plants were still nute starved. And yeah, there's a plant missing - not sure how that happened lol.

[Help_Needed]

As expected the plants have started putting out a ton of new growth now that their roots have hit the water. They were getting taller than I wanted them to be at this point, so I topped 5 of them. The short little runt in back will be left alone. My plan is to veg for another 5-6 days and then switch to 12/12.

Vitals:
pH is at 5.8
TDS is at 950ppm - still can't decide if that's at 0.5 or 0.7 lol. Gotta go to the hydro store today so I'll ask them.
Ambient temps are 82F at lights on, dropping to 74 with lights off
Res temps are down to 75F - still too warm, but tolerable.

[W.A. grower]

is your hydro set up store bought?

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Originally Posted by W.A. grower

is your hydro set up store bought?

Yes. It's General Hydroponic's Eco-Grower. It's a drip-fed DWC system. I think I paid about $180 for it, which included everything you need to get started - hydrotron, netpots and GH's basic 3-part nutes. You can build your own for a lot less, but at the time I don't think I knew enough to really pull it off. If I ever decide to expand my grow - say maybe tomatoes or something - I'll build my own next time.

For a really good example of a fairly simple DWC with waterfall, check out IMGreen's Current Grow. He's done a really nice job on his set up. And if you really want to get fancy, check out Mr.Goodstuff's grow log. That guy's homemade systems are something else.

[Help_Needed]

I was thinking about switching to 12/12 today, but after looking at the plants I decided to wait a couple more days - maybe Monday or Tuesday.

All of the girls are putting out some good growth, and they're a nice healthy green color. Now that they're all healthy enough to support themselves, I went ahead and removed all of the damaged vegetation. I'm amazed at how much they're eating and drinking already. This is the first time I've run 6 plants in this system and I've got a feeling I'm going to have to really work to keep them in food and water. Since they've all grown their roots down into the reservoir now, I decided to shut off the drip feed to cut down on evaporation loss.

Nute concentration is up to 1100ppm. I've been increasing the concentration by about 50ppm per day. Once I see them start to burn I'll back off. I'm hoping to get up around 1350ppm, but that's up to the plants.

Reservoir temps were at 74F as of this morning. Not optimal, but at least it's tolerable. Ambient temps are running 68F during lights off, and 79F during lights on.

The only other note of concern is that I don't think I planted the clones in the hydrodron correctly. This morning while I was pruning them a couple of them actually leaned over, so they're not completely stable yet. This could be somewhat problematic when they start to flower since the weight of the buds might pull them out of the hydrotron. I'll probably have to tie them up when they start to get top heavy.

Pics - Nothing special, just some nice healthy ladies .

[AugustWest]

looking good man.. they recovered nicely compared to the last set of pics.

GL!

[Help_Needed]

Well, the rapid growth has continued. There is now an unbroken ring of green around my hydro setup and they're all about the same height. So it's time to switch to 12/12.

The girls are eating and drinking like crazy. Yesterday morning I topped off the reservoir and brought the nutes up to 1100ppm. This morning the nutes were down to 1000ppm and the res was 3 quarts low. I topped it off again and added enough nutes to bring the concentration up to 1150ppm. Still aiming for 1350ppm or so, long term. I think these girls are gonna need it lol.

Reservoir temps are still an issue. It was up to 78F this morning. I've hooked up the chiller, but it will take a few days for it to make a difference. So far, though, the high temps haven't seemed to bother the plants.

[Help_Needed]

Can't believe it's just been 5 days since I posted the last set of pics. These babies are growing like...well...weeds . I bumped the TDS up to 1250ppm this morning. If it looks like they can handle it, I'll shoot for 1350ppm tomorrow.







Thanks to my ghetto chiller, reservoir temps are slowly but steadily dropping. The high temp this morning was just 75F. Ambient temps are still too warm, and the air has been very dry. The plants are showing just a touch of heat stress.







At this point, I'm still expecting the plants to double or triple in size. I'm a little worried about over crowding, and I'm thinking about cutting back to just three plants. What do you guys think?

[HighHopes420]

3 plants would allow more space for growth. id say wait until they are done with their stretch to find out.

[lobsters]

Hey dude I love your grow. What are you using as a water chiller? I can't really tell from the pic....

[Help_Needed]

Originally Posted by HighHopes420

3 plants would allow more space for growth. id say wait until they are done with their stretch to find out.

Uh....find out what? If I need to remove some plants, I need to do it now. If I wait until they're done stretching the roots will be too intertwined to safely remove them.

Originally Posted by lobsters

Hey dude I love your grow. What are you using as a water chiller? I can't really tell from the pic....

The chiller is outside the hydrohut. It's a homemade one. Basically I bought a small fridge from Walmart, took the door off the freezer compartment, drilled a couple of holes in it, and coiled a bunch of tubing inside. I've got a pump in the reservoir cycling water through the tubing, into the fridge, and back into the reservoir. The fridge is kept at maximum cooling so the entire compartment is slightly below freezing. As an added bonus, the fridge is a great place to store my special brownies so my roommate doesn't find them .

[Help_Needed]

Well, I got up this morning and one of the plants is showing signs of nitrogen toxicity - dark leaves with a bluish cast. Strangely enough, it's only affecting one plant, which is weird since they're all feeding out of the same reservoir and they're all genetically identical. You'd think if I had a problem with the nutrients, it would affect them all equally. So I'm guessing something else is wrong.

Vital Stats:
Ambient temps - 72F lights off, 82F lights on
Reservoir temps - 74F
TDS - 1250ppm @0.7
pH - 5.7

Anyone have any ideas? I'm stumped.

[Help_Needed]

Spent some time discussing my grow with a couple of experts on another forum and we came to the conclusion that my system will probably not support all 6 plants, at least not as big as these girls have already gotten. I'm only 4 days into 12/12 now and they've got a ton of growing to do. The concern is that if the plants get too big, then their root masses will become to tightly packed in the reservoir. If that happens then there won't be enough nute or oxygen circulation and I'll have problems with disease and rot.

So I made the decission to go with quality over quantity and I removed the three smallest and weakest plants from the reservoir. This will give the remaining three plenty of room for growing.

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The setup after I removed the plants and rearranged the others to give them maximum space.



I was looking at the plants this morning, and it looks like I've got a total of 17 "tops" that will turn into primary colas - six each on two of the plants, and five on the third one. That's gonna be quite a harvest in 6.5 weeks or so .

Closeups of each plant, starting in the front left and moving clockwise-

[IMgreen]

it is indeed!

But you'll be richly rewarded by the remaining plants

How big is the root zone?

and btw - nice take on a chiller, had no idea you was THAT crafty, but then again, given how stealthy you need to be that must come in handy!