I had been reading up on growing mj for quite a while now, pretty much since I joined this site, and finally decided I should try my hand at it. I am in a fairly populated house (well over 20 people in it at any given time) but I have my own room where I will be growing. I constructed a 26 inch (w) x 14 inch (d) x 28 inch (h) grow cabinet out of a small dresser. I took out the drawers and screwed all the drawer fronts together, hinged it at the bottom so it's out of view, and put a lock on the top "drawer". I have 6 26watt/2700k cfl's (100 watt equivalent) attached to 3 y-splitters at the top of the grow cabinet. They are oriented horizontally. I also have 3 80mm 36cfm PC fans (1 intake at the bottom, 1 exhaust near the lights, 1 in the box for airflow). The lights are on an 20/4 schedule. The box is completely lightproof, except for the exhaust fan since I haven't attached a carbon filter yet, but when I do, that will become lightproof as well. As for the plants, I was able to get Sweet Seeds Fast Bud feminized Autos for extremely cheap, so I will be starting with 3 of those (I got 6). Seemed fairly easy. Also, there was a delay shipping them, so I got quite a few extras for free. Not sure if these would have been included anyway, but I got: 1 x Pyramid Feminized White Widow 1 x Pyramid Feminized Northern Lights 1 x Pyramid Feminized Lennon 1 x Pyramid Feminized Galaxy So once I finish this first attempt, I'll look into expanding slightly and growing those non-autos, hopefully keeping some mothers around. I have 3 1 gallon black plastic pots and Fox Farms Ocean Forest soil. The pots are elevated to 6 inches under the lights for now, since the plants are still seedlings. I will move them closer when the plants get more mature. I germinated the seeds before the soil had arrived via UPS (delivery was delayed because of weather), and you may have seen my thread asking what to do about that. I kept the seeds in the paper towel germination setup until the soil arrived. So the seeds were sprouted for a few days before they were planted. They are now at day 7 and seem to be rooting, since they are recovering from the stress nicely and starting to grow pretty quickly. The fun part of this grow will be the stealth aspect. My room is fairly heavily trafficked, so making sure no one notices what's going on in the dresser in the corner will be slightly challenging. If anyone does find out, it shouldn't be a problem though, most of the people here smoke anyway. I just don't want it getting out. Without further ado, the pictures.
I've been misting the plants along with having the soil watered, just in case a root system hasn't started yet so they can get water. The 3rd seed is almost fully broken out of the shell and the other 2 seem to be doing really good considering how they started their first week. The second set of leaves is already forming in the 2 that are fully sprouted too. Hopefully this time next week I'll have some decent fan leaves.
Greetings! "I am in a fairly populated house (well over 20 people in it at any given time)" thats a shit ton of people.... "My room is fairly heavily trafficked, so making sure no one notices what's going on in the dresser in the corner will be slightly challenging" good luck to you on this one, man. once that shit starts to flower its going to wreak! i believe your going to have a hard time keeping it under wraps, but if you do, more power to you! if it was me, i would configure a simple camera system to minitor your room when your not there. i wouldn't trust growing in a room where it can be easily accessed by 20+ people. there was a quote i read somewhere on these threads, something like this: "each person that knows about your grow will increase the possibility of you getting caught/ripped/anything bad by 10%." look forward to seeing your progress. good luck with your grow! -Monkey
I've read the same quote, and heard it a dozen times, which is why I'm trying to keep it as secret as possible. Grows have happened in this house before though, just not for some time. For those ones, it was made public right away in the hopes that since they were being open about it, it wouldn't be a secretive thing that would cause people to have a hard time keeping it to themselves, I'm taking the other side of that view. (their grow also failed before it got to flowering anyway, so it ultimately didnt matter) I also already have a security camera in my room. I set it up when our house got broken into last December. We installed a pretty nice security system for the house, so I doubt any burglars will be getting into the house anymore, but it's there just for the added security. Everyone in the house knows I have the camera too, so I doubt they will snoop around my room and accidentally find the plants. Also, they are auto's, I know all plants smell, but are 12-18 inch autos really going to smell that much? I will have a carbon scrubber installed by that time anyway. Also, everyone in the house knows I smoke too, so they might just chalk it up to me having just lit up if they smell anything.
good shit then. i also have set up a nice security system at my house. streams to my iphone and everything. look forward to seeing how you do.
The third seed has finally completely sprouted, although it looks a little weird... The cotyledon are yellow and shriveled, but the first set of leaves look great. That was the other weird thing to me, that the first set of leaves had already formed before the shell came off... Is this normal, or does it look like there's something wrong with it? For now I'm chalking it up to the extended germination.
I'm curious to see how this turns out. Ordered a 3pack a few months back. only 1 of the 3 made it to flower. The last one turned out okay as far as the potency... but the size lol. It ended up being about 9 inches tall. If I ever grow autos again it will be under flouros. They NEED a little stretch. Was much happier with the freebies I got though. Good luck man, I'll be watchin!
Mind me asking the yield? Just as an idea of what people have gotten with this strain. I picked it because it was cheap, fast, and seemed like an easy intro to growing, not really for yield, so you could tell me you got 2 grams off of it and I wouldn't care. Also, what was your grow setup? Any idea why only 1 made it to flower? Just trying to make sure I don't potentially make any of the same mistakes. Thanks, hopefully it goes pretty smooth.
Quick question in case anyone can help. Do autoflowers yield better if they start under 6500k light or can they immediately go to the 2700k since they essentially go right into flower? And if they do need a blue spectrum to veg, will blacklight CFLs work? I would mix them in with the 6 2700k cfls I have going right now.
Just a quick update. The 2 faster germinating plants are growing at a pretty steady rate. The 3rd is catching up fast. The cotyledon that looked weird at first are looking fine now. I'm not sure how big these are supposed to be at this stage, since it's supposed to finish in 60 days or so, but they seem to be growing pretty fast.
Only been 2 days since the last update, but I guess I'll start updating on the week marks unless something goes wrong and I need a question answered. The late bloomer seems to be 2 days behind the other 2 based on size comparisons in pictures, which should be right since it sprouted 2 days after the others, so it doesn't seem like it will be shorter than the others.
the light spectrum is up to you. I have three auto going also im using MH until i see preflowers the im switching but alot of people use either one all the way. i personally dont know about the black light though but like i said i would just switch first site of preflowers and leave maby one or two 65k's. Im subbed check out my grow in my sig we are about in the same time frame.
Well, I didn't make it too far without having a question, but I guess that's expected being the first grow. I noticed over the course of 1 day the leaves on my plants went from having a fuzzy-ish look to a glossy look. Is this supposed to happen? Or is it a sign that they need something? I'm guessing it's natural, just because almost every other plant's leaf I've seen is glossy and not fuzzy, but I'm just making sure. Here's some pictures to show what I mean. First one is Day 15, second is today, Day 16, of the same plant. Oh yeah, and it sorta looks like the plant is already showing it's sex (looks female), though I could be, and most likely am, wrong. That's not shown in the pictures though. Also, I got a pH testing kit the other day, so now I can make sure my water is the right pH. I found out the water I was using (the first 2 waterings) was at a pH of almost 8.5, way off target, so after this next watering (probably Saturday) I'll see if there's any increased growth. I don't have a temp/humidity gauge for the box yet either, but the box is warmer than my room, and that's supposedly set at 70F, so it's at least warmer than that, and I doubt it's hotter than 90, or even close for that matter. I have no idea about the humidity though, so I'll be getting something to keep track of that in the next few days.
Today I found algae growing on top of the soil of one of my plants. How should I go about fixing this? Should I cover it the soil with aluminum? (I don't have mylar since I'm using a white painted growbox) Also, how could this have been avoided without covering the soil, or was it just a matter of time?
90's a little high but not bad. once you get that temp gauge and get the temps lowered you will see better growth rate. But even with the High ph your girls look great.
Yeah, I know 90 is a little too high, but I'm just saying it's probably within that range of 70-90. My room is at 70 degrees, and the box doesn't seem like it could be more than 20 degrees hotter. I would guess it's around 80-85. Also, I only watered with the high pH water twice, so maybe early in seedling phase the pH doesn't really matter that much...
I know what your sayin my room temp was high and it effected my plants real bad but yours look fine. like yours on day 14 look real green and healthy but mine where curled and yellowing because of the high heat/low humidity combo.but now since i have everthing situated it should be a smoother ride from here on.
Today is the 3 week mark. Lots of growth since last week. The plants are starting to grow at much different rates though. The 1st plant is looking like it will be the biggest. It's almost the diameter of the pot now. The 2nd plant, while it sprouted the same time as plant 1 and was keeping up with it until a few days ago, is looking like it will be a little smaller. The 3rd plant, the last one to sprout, looks like it will be the smallest (in width). It's not growing out as much as the others. It might end up being the tallest though. It's growing vertically much faster than the other 2. Also, the 2 larger plants showed their sex today. Both are female, which was expected since they are feminized seeds. Just nice to know it's true. The only thing I still don't have in my box is a thermometer. I'm getting that today though, so that won't be a problem for long. The day after I installed the carbon filter, these plants started to stink up the box. Not that it mattered too much letting the smell out considering I'm the only one in the house this week. Don't pay attention to the white dots on plant 1, it's dust from perlite I had originally added to the top of the soil trying to get rid of the algae problem. I figured the tin foil was easier though. How long does it take from when pre-flowers are shown to actual bud production? Maybe next week I'll have some baby buds to show.