The White Light Led Revolution

I grow organic with tea... So feeding will all be the same (in theory...)

But... THEYRE HERE THEYRE HERE THEYRE HERE!!!!

These things are nice! And the chrome is sexy as hell! I know chrome doesn't grow better bud... But it looks sexy! Hahahaha



http://forum.grasscity.com/indoor-grow-journals/1316222-4x4-led-wild-thai-seed-second-grow.html#entry20304616

 

Congrats on the arrival I felt like a kid on Christmas when I got mine xD The chrome is a very nice touch! At least it might reflect light rather then absorb it! What kind of teas do you use? I also grow with organic living soil and feed using teas and I've had to make some minor switches to a few aspects of my grow.

The reason i wanted to try the white lighting is that instead of targeting specific "peak absorption" bands of blues or reds. The whites are supposed to offer more of a complete spectrum not just the peaks. I used 600w systems before switching to LEDs and one run my bulb blew 2-3 weeks before finishing. I couldn't get a replacement mailed in time so I decided to take my 4ft 8 bulb t8 light that i would Veg with. It was using 6100k fluorescent white lighting, and stuck it above the girls to finish them off. The buds already had a nice size on them from the HPS, and after switching the trichome and resin production went the the roof and it was one of the frostiest and tastiest harvests I had. I only started looking at it after I had multiple patients saying "whatever you did this time it was a winner!" One had said he really enjoyed it because he didn't have to medicate as often and one bowl would be fine for hours. So I started looking more into it and decided to give it a shot, I can't wait to see how this next run goes!

Now as for the watering im still looking into this to find out the science behind it. So im not 100% on this but so far my hypothesis is that the plant and soil both transpire in order for certain elements to travel thru out the plant. The soil likes to have a certain moisture level in order for certain ionic bonds to take place to allow for the plant to uptake the proper nutrients. Which would explain why too wet and you lock out elements and too dry you lock out others. So maybe the plant can use the certain energy its producing from the light for these certain bonds rather then using the energy in the soil requiring less water usage? But again im not positive of that, once i find something ill post a link. But seeing as how nothing has changed in my grow just the light something's happening. I've had to go from watering every other day to every 2-3 sometimes even 5 days before I can water again. Now as funny as it is now that I know, I battled with this plant trying to fix it's Magnesium/Nitrogen deficiency. Before realizing it was just being locked out by over watered and everything I was doing made it worse. xD

Here is the Gods gift, I'm thinking OK it needs some magnesium a little nitrogen. No problem, make a brew with some Alfalfa and Epsom salt:



Few days later I'm like ohhhh my that backfired xD def over watering!



Doing the lift test thru me off as the plants were always light. So I've just started watching the leaves. As they perk down a bit it's time to water again and they perk back up to that 80 angle.



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I am in Bangkok and things we take for granite and can pickup from our local hardware and nursery stores are impossible to find here. I buy bales of alfalfa for rabbits and stick it in a blender. Not hard but very time consuming. Epsom salts comes from ONE pharmacy down town. They buy 25kilo bags and repackage I to small zip bags. I have one or two kilos of it. I've been reading lately a lot of led growers have to use it more than HPS... Interesting to say the least!

The ACT i made has worm castings, kelp meal, ground up alfalfa, and molasses. I plan to start using Epsom salt foliar feeds this time.

Last grow (first grow) I over watered but didn't know until I harvested (found mushrooms growing in bucket and soil was wet after 4 days of drying prior to harvest). I had a lot of yellowing and fan leaves dropping off. I read that was normal and I had nothing to compare it to but felt my die off was excessive. Now I water less frequently by watching leaves. I'm trying to keep track and make records of watering but I've been working and traveling a lot and depending on my girl or a friend to water while I'm gone.. As a base I'm going every 4 days instead of 3... But if I'm around and plants are perky I'll push it 5 or 6 days

When I first started reading about growing and leds, I understood there is a spike in light uptake at certain frequencies. Same as corals which I used to grow and did a lot of research on lighting. But it seemed odd to ONLY give plants those certain wave lengths. Then saw a vid of rosenthal saying plants need other spectrums that aren't available in led.
My FIRST thought was "then use white light, which is ALL colors combined(ala nature) and then supplement with EXTRA light in certain spectrums. To me it was a no brainer. I saw it as a human. Let's say vitamin C is healthy and your body needs it. Bell peppers are high in vitamin C... Are you going to ONLY eat bell peppers? NO! You eat a healthy balanced diet and maybe add some extra bell peppers...

 

Hi dude, can I ask you where did you buy the lights, I can't find anything on the web

 

DDP,
 
I am in Bangkok and things we take for granite and can pickup from our local hardware and nursery stores are impossible to find here. I buy bales of alfalfa for rabbits and stick it in a blender. Not hard but very time consuming. Epsom salts comes from ONE pharmacy down town. They buy 25kilo bags and repackage I to small zip bags. I have one or two kilos of it. I've been reading lately a lot of led growers have to use it more than HPS... Interesting to say the least!

The ACT i made has worm castings, kelp meal, ground up alfalfa, and molasses. I plan to start using Epsom salt foliar feeds this time.
 
Since you're relying on alfalfa and other organic matter for nutes, try dumping a handful of earthworms into your soil.  They will help break down the organic matter in your soil and turn them to readily absorbable form of nutes, the way nature intended.  To facilitate the break-down process, they secrete enzymes that helps break the matters down.  Their nutrition comes from things in soil, such as decaying roots and leaves. Animal manures are an important food source for earthworms. They eat living organisms such as nematodes, protozoans, rotifers, bacteria, fungi in soil. Worms will also feed on the decomposing remains of other animals.  They are also very effective in keeping the root-zone healthy from their burrows, which creates air channels thus increasing the flow of oxygen to the roots and also helps in reducing root diseases from lack of oxygen. 
 
The problem starts when over-watering occurs, which will cause soil stagnation from the lack of air flow thru the root-zone, resulting in root diseases and other wonderful problems.  They also keep the root-zone healthy, and aid in nute absorption by the many types of enzymes they secrete as they make their way around in the soil.  In all, worms is nature's soil recyclers and conditioners, without them, plants and ultimately us wouldn't do too well since we need plants to be healthy so we can consume them in different ways.
 
Using worm casting/compost teas are great as they are readily absorbable and best of all, they make the meds taste better to me.  If u notice, almost all giant squash/pumpkin competitors use some kind of organic castings/compost tea and heavy usage of enzymes and bacteria to help with nute absorption and reduced root-zone issues.  Xtreme product is a good example, coming from that sector and now making the above mentioned avail. for canna-specific applications.  Guess what, why not have the guys responsible for those enzymes and other goodies in your root-zone doing there thing, producing fresh organic nutes, along with all the beneficial enzymes that can only be had by them being nature's soil recyclers/conditioners.
 
Last grow (first grow) I over watered but didn't know until I harvested (found mushrooms growing in bucket and soil was wet after 4 days of drying prior to harvest). I had a lot of yellowing and fan leaves dropping off. I read that was normal and I had nothing to compare it to but felt my die off was excessive. Now I water less frequently by watching leaves. I'm trying to keep track and make records of watering but I've been working and traveling a lot and depending on my girl or a friend to water while I'm gone.. As a base I'm going every 4 days instead of 3... But if I'm around and plants are perky I'll push it 5 or 6 days
 
Over-watering is one of the most common mistakes, and first thing to master as a budding new greenthumber.  The yellowing of leaves could be caused by oxygen starvation from the root-zone airflow being affected by the accessive amount of uncirculating water in the soil literally suffocating the roots.

When I first started reading about growing and leds, I understood there is a spike in light uptake at certain frequencies. Same as corals which I used to grow and did a lot of research on lighting. But it seemed odd to ONLY give plants those certain wave lengths. Then saw a vid of rosenthal saying plants need other spectrums that aren't available in led.
 
From the guru himself, but yet, these so-called led experts in the red-spec. camp think their par peaks only targeting is better, and the rest of the bands are not needed.
 
My FIRST thought was "then use white light, which is ALL colors combined(ala nature) and then supplement with EXTRA light in certain spectrums. To me it was a no brainer. I saw it as a human. Let's say vitamin C is healthy and your body needs it. Bell peppers are high in vitamin C... Are you going to ONLY eat bell peppers? NO! You eat a healthy balanced diet and maybe add some extra bell peppers...
 
You hit it right on the head.  Common-sense tells u that plants have evolved since the beginning of creation around the sun, and it's sunlight, which is the source of all life on earth.  Then came along "man", who now thinks he's smarter and more efficient than mother-nature and our sun in growing plants.
 
Truth is, probably every par band has some kind of use/role in photosynthesis; otherwise, plants will not absorb it as the McCree curve illustrates.  This curve is much more thorough and accurate to the actual par spectrum absorption than the standard par peaks chart, which usually only shows the chlorophyll a/b/carotenoid absorption.  The red led camp tends to use this chart to sell the idea of targeting only par peaks since it doesn't show the absorption for the whole par spectrum.
 
The thing is that led grow light vendors want to use the peaks/efficiency in targeting only par peaks probably is to differentiate themselves and give them an assumed edge over other conventional grow light tech., mainly HID.  Plants will not absorb other bands, unless they need them.  Plants are very efficient in every of it's function, and will not do anything if it's not needed nor waste any of it's energy that's prioritized for flowering/fruiting/seed production.
 
I always thought efficiency is getting as much as possible for the same amount of effort or resources applied.  Guess this doesn't apply in regards to overall yield and quality when we talk about grow light spectrum.
 
There are studies that verifies that white light will produce more plant-mass than any other spectrum.  You can verify this yourself.  Like anything, u just can't expect it to perform at it's best if it's forced to compromise on it's needs.
 
You can't expect an athlete to perform at his/her peak on competition day if they were on a vegetarian diet with no protein for a few days before competing.  Maybe if we feed just apples, bannanas, and oranges only they will perform better than a complete diet with lots of protein.
 
So why are plants any different?  Because we say so?  We now think we understand something as complex as nature, and can dictate what nature needs.  Another one of man's ignorance, and/or arrogance.
 
In all of my experiences with leds, and used both reds and whites, everytime if plants are put into position between two spectrum with light bleed from both, being red and white, the plants will always turn towards the white spectrum indicating their preference. 
 
To me, what is more clear than the plant themselves, tell u which spectrum they prefer.  Hard one to chose.  Let's go with the reds since they look sexy, or because we also think it's better for them, regardless of what they prefer. lol.

 

Good info! Yeah I've been looking for worms here... No luck yet...

Btw, you share good wisdom, I'd hate people not to read it just because he green text is very hard to read

 

Good info! Yeah I've been looking for worms here... No luck yet...

Btw, you share good wisdom, I'd hate people not to read it just because he green text is very hard to read
 
They have to have fishing tackle shops, since Thailand's a big fishing spot in S.E. Asia.  Good luck!
 
I was trying to make it easier with the color contrast, and picked green for our color. 

 

Great read bsless! We had a compost pile with organic matter made up of table scraps, coffee grounds (no meat or bones because it will attract rats) and grass clippings and leaves. One of our jobs as a kid was to hunt for night crawlers after a heavy rain and collect them for the compost pile. We also had "worm boxes" for fishing bait....
 
Yeah, without worms, our earth will be a wasteland, especially with us running around polluting everything.
 
Yes, I had the same experience with the reds vs the white. The plant actually turned and toward the white spectrum light. There are some camps out there that state "white LED's" is going backwards. Well I can only go by personal experience and my last grow was the best grows I have had.
 
Mr. Ed Rosenthal, mother-nature, and plants are all clueless about the proper spectrum for photosynthesis. lol.
 
Always question the status-quo, if one intends to progress, because to do the same thing, and expecting different results, is the definition of insanity.
 
Sometimes going backwards is actually going forward, and going forward(perceived anyways), is actually going backwards.  
 
Here is a pic of the last grow:
 
Those looks like HID buds.  Pretty impressive for going backwards there.

 

We live in an area where we have seasons and the plant life is adapted to having that. Yet Cannabis has grown throughout the world. Wouldn't they be more disposed to what they need by their place of origin?
 
Sunlight spectrum varies by seasons, period of day, clouds, pollution, and other factors can also influence the spectrum throughout the day.
 
I've actually seen claims by a well known and respected brand that it's not wise to change the spectrum on plants, because it might take them as much as three weeks to recover from spectrum shocked.  Guess everytime LED, and HID switch from veg. to bloom spectrum, or MH to HPS, plants would take an additional 3 weeks + 60days(excl. haze, sativas, and other long bloomers), so it would now take almost 90 days for a 60day strain.  Yeah, right, sure, sure!  lol. 
 
The nice thing about the white spectrum is it is similar to natural sunlight, since it covers the entire light spectrum, though not as complete, but still much better than only targeted peaks like the red spectrum.  Even though sunlight spectrum varies throughout the day, plants still receive the complete spectrum.
 
Yes they can, and will adapt, but will not to be able to reach their full-genetic potential if forced to compromise with only targeted par peaks.   The idea is to give them as complete full-spectrum as possible, and let them figure which and how much of it to use.   We do; however, know that red is essential to the flowering/fruiting process, with LED it's easy to bump the reds up, accordingly.
 
The reds argue that only a small amount of white spectrum is needed, and the emphasis should be on the reds.  That's interesting, because outdoor crops seems to do just fine, if not better than HID, LED, and all other artificial grow lighting for that matter, but yet doesn't contain so much red that it glows red. 
 
Like the old saying, "Don't fix something that's not broken."  The sun has never let us down since the beginning of time so why are we trying to re-invent the wheel and replace it, instead of emulating it.  It doesn't look like the plants agree with the red camp on which spectrum is best for them by turning to the white everytime.  Truth is the sun will outperform, and outproduce any kind of artificial light, period.   So much for targeting peaks and being more efficient. 
 
This might explains why the plants often turn to the white spectrum in preference due to the fact that the white spectrum is more complete like sunlight, especially the cool-whites(6000-6500k), since natural noon sunlight, under a clear sky spectrum is approximately 5800-6000k.
 
Another argument is that the sunlight spectrum is unefficient, because much of it's spectrum is outside the par region.  This is where LED shines over other artificial lighting is it's ability to fine tune the spectrum down to the exact color band; therefore, allowing spectrum fine-tuning. 
 
I'm not here to bash the red spectrum, rather separate the hype and facts, along with my personal experience of using both pretty much ever since LED were introduced into the grow light market.  There's a lot of red spectrum that are excellent in their own right, but I tend to believe more in the spectrum that my plants turns to, actual results, and the sun more than so-called experts. 
 
INTRODUCTION TO SOLAR RADIATION
The Changing Terrestrial Solar Spectrum
Absorption and scattering levels change as the
constituents of the atmosphere change. Clouds are the most
familiar example of change; clouds can block most of the
direct radiation. Seasonal variations and trends in ozone layer
thickness have an important effect on terrestrial ultraviolet
level.
The ground level spectrum also depends on how far the
sun's radiation must pass through the atmosphere. Elevation
is one factor. Denver has a mile (1.6 km) less atmosphere
above it than does Washington, and the impact of time of
year on solar angle is important, but the most significant
changes are due to the earth's rotation (Fig. 4). At any
location, the length of the path the radiation must take to
reach ground level changes as the day progresses. So not only
are there the obvious intensity changes in ground solar
radiation level during the day, going to zero at night, but the
spectrum of the radiation changes through each day because
of the changing absorption and scattering path length.
With the sun overhead, direct radiation that reaches the
ground passes straight through all of the atmosphere, all of the
air mass, overhead. We call this radiation "Air Mass 1 Direct"
(AM 1D) radiation and for standardization purposes use a sea
level reference site. The global radiation with the sun
overhead is similarly called "Air Mass 1 Global" (AM 1G)
radiation. Because it passes through no air mass, the
extraterrestrial spectrum is called the "Air Mass 0" spectrum.
The atmospheric path for any zenith angle is simply
described relative to the overhead air mass (Fig. 4). The actual
path length can correspond to air masses of less than 1 (high
altitude sites) to very high air mass values just before sunset.
Our Oriel Solar Simulators use filters to duplicate spectra
corresponding to air masses of 0, 1, 1.5 and 2, the values on
which most comparative test work is based.
Standard Spectra
Solar radiation reaching the earth's surface varies
significantly with location, atmospheric conditions (including
cloud cover, aerosol content, and ozone layer condition),
time of day, earth/sun distance, and solar rotation and
activity. Since the solar spectra depend on so many variables,
standard spectra have been developed to provide a basis for
theoretical evaluation of the effects of solar radiation and as a
basis for simulator design. These standard spectra start from a
simplified (i.e. lower resolution) version of the measured
extraterrestrial spectra, and use sophisticated models for the
effects of the atmosphere to calculate terrestrial spectra.
The most widely used standard spectra are those
published by The Committee Internationale d'Eclaraige (CIE),
the world authority on radiometeric and photometric
nomenclature and standards. The American Society for
Testing and Materials (ASTM) publish three spectra, AM 0 AM
1.5 Direct and AM 1.5 Global for a 37 tilted surface. The
conditions for the AM 1.5 spectra were chosen by ASTM
"because they are representative of average conditions in the
48 contiguous states of the United States."
Fig. 5 shows typical differences in standard direct and
global spectra. These curves are from the data in ASTM
Standards, E 891 and E 892 for AM 1.5, a turbidity of 0.27
and a tilt of 37 facing the sun and a ground albedo of 0.2

 

I was a little over-medicated yesterday.
 
The reds works fine, I just feel the whites are better from the last 3yrs. of testing them since I bought my first white spectrum light that converted me.
 
In my experience, spectrum can sometimes be compromised if there's enough intensity behind it, but not vice versa.
 
A good example of this is the HPS, which has a bad, lop-sided spectrum that peaks in the green, and yellow bands, but still manage to get excellent results.
 
In reality, the only reason the HPS outproduces the MH is it puts out more light for the same wattage, and not because it has a better spectrum.  The MH is actually a better spectrum for photosynthesis, since it's similar to morning sunlight with more blues that's better for growth.
 
Another example of the other way around is floro's, the spectrum is fine, if not good, but just lack intensity; therefore, yield and density suffers.
 
A good rule of thumb is go with the industry standard recommendation of 40w+/sqft.  Anything less will result in serious buyer's remorse later.  You might be able to stretch it down to 30w/sqft. if it has secondary lens, but I wouldn't go under this figure if u expect HID quality and yield.
 
Another is find a light that offers a 90-day money-back guarantee if you're going to take their recommendation of less than 40w+/sqft. for flowering.  Recourse's always nice.

 

Since switching to white lights, did you notice a change in how the plants grow or flower?

I'm on day 17 from 12/12 flip, but it seems the clones from last harvest are growing really different. Part is from LST I'm sure, but I rally don't remeber so many bud sites so early. Especially but stacking seems way more intense on this grow. Not sure if it's light, LST, clones instead of seeds, imagination or what. The plants are much smaller this grow, but seem really dense.

 

Hope you don't mind me posting this here, just comparing notes with you. I just went back and looked at photos from my last grow, and this grow is beyond a week ahead of my last grow! I can't hard lye believe it's ALL due to the lights... Maybe because my ladies are more petite this run? The plant is not supporting so much mass so it puts it's juice I to bud sites?