1000w vert multi-strain coco

This is my garden. It is a 5x5x7 mylar tent that I bought off ebay for $160. I also have a 1000w ballast and a 1000w Hortilux bulb that is set up vertical style. There is a circular fan under the bulb to help keep it cool and a six inch 400cfm inline fan on a speed controller set to low for ventilation. There are also two circulation fans and the plants are elevated on 2' tall tables. The plants are a variety of genetics I got from Attitude seed bank and some that I found as bag seeds. The bag seeds are actually good stuff cole train x lemon skunk, and the Attitude seeds are Paradise Seeds Wappa, and Sensi Star, and Magus Genetics Warlock. There's one plant that I don't know about... it was a clone from another batch that got mixed in without a name tag. It is probably one of the plants I listed above but it could also be Chronic. I am using Cutting Edge Solutions for flowering. Micro, Bloom, Plant Amp, Mag Amped, and Uncle John's Blend. I also add an extra 25ppm or so of Epsom Salt to the reservoir too. For a few weeks in flowering I will be using Advanced Nutrients Big Bud as I have in the past. The plants will also get foliar sprayed with BioCanna BioBoost Accelerator to enhance resin production up until it is too dangerous to spray. Temperatures inside the tent are held around 73 to 76 derees lights on and 70 to 72 degrees lights off. The plants are in #3 SmartPots. They were started in botanicare coco in one gallon rootmakers from clone and bonzai trained for several months. The coco mixture in the larger planters is Roots Organics Coco mix with the addition of about 10% GrowStones. The nutrients are used as suggested except the EC of the system is controlled by myself. During the stretch the EC is between 1.2 and 1.3. During the flower onset the EC increases to 1.4 to 1.6. Then during peak flowering for 10 days or so it's almost up to 2.0ec, maybe 1.8 on some plants is better. Once swelling is subsiding the ec is gradually decreased to around 0.8 to 1.0. 7 to 10 days before harvest is when I'll begin rinsing the planters with several gallons of runoff twice a day every day. Here are some pictures. I hope that everyone has lots of questions because I know a thing or two about nutrition, lighting, environment, training, and flower building. Plants are about 19 days into 12/12 in the latest picture. Sorry about the inconsistent white balance.

 

Thanks man. I'll try to get some of the early resin shots up soon.

 

Thanks dude.

I thought about using a parabolic for a little bit but decided against it because I was afraid it would limit the vertical height of the tent. The 1000w bulb mounted where it is is very efficient at providing light 360 degrees around without the need for reflection. To be honest, the comparative amount of energy that is present in the upper corners of the tent is really low. Not that I'd call the upper corners dark, just not well lit, because the majority of the light is already being focused at the plants. No branch is more than 30 inches from the bulb, most are within 2'. The shape of the plants helps maximize this efficiency.

If I were to use a parabolic it would be too far removed from the bulb to have a noticeable impact due to the size and shape of the plants.

I had been using a horizontal reflector for a while but have found vertical bulbs to produce much larger yields.

 

The screens are called grow through plant supports. I found mine at home depot. They have a couple different sizes so I got a few to experiment with. The 12" rounds have posts that hold them 18" above the bottom of the planter, or about 10" above the soil. The 16" rounds have 24" which holds those screens about 6" higher. By using some of the shorter 18" posts with some of the taller 24" posts I was able to angle the screens.

Then it was just a matter of training the taller branches up the screen as the plants grew into them. The tallest branches were super cropped when they started getting too tall. The Cole Train x Lemon Skunks are practically impossible to wrangle and stretched despite my every attempt to control them.

This grow was thrown together at the last minute. I had planned on using a stadium style setup with tiers of clones in 1 gallon planters. Instead of that, these plants I'm actually flowering out now were originally taken as re-vegged clones from a grow last summer and kept in a small "side-tent" for several months to be used as mother plants for the cloning requirements. I didn't have the wattage necessary to really fill these out in time to get all the cloning done that I would need to fill the tent up. Instead of doing a vert stadium SOG I decided to take a few good clones from each to fill out and used these 6 "mother" plants. They only needed a few days of veg to fill in the screens and I was good to go which is probably going to save me at least 1 month versus trying to do this as I had planned originally.

I pulled down about 550g in total from my last grow, had some problems with herms and had to pull several plants a few weeks early. This time around I plan on no herms and should get a better weight. Here's a pic from my last grow at about day 40 of flowering in coco using Canna A+B, Liquid Karma, Big Bud, CNS 17 Ripe, Bud Candy, Snow Storm Ultra, Cal-Mag Plus, and Hydroplex.

(yeah, I know... CRAZY! You should have seen the mixing guide...)

 

It went something like 4ml A, 4ml B, 6-8ml Liquid Karma, 2ml Cal-Mag Plus, 2.5ml Hydroplex, about 0.2ec of Big Bud, 8ml Bud Candy, 4-5ml Snow Storm Ultra, and another 25ppm or so of Epsom Salt. Around day 45 I phased out the Big Bud and the A+B and ran maybe 10-12ml of CNS 17 Ripe in their place. The key is using low levels, understanding the ppm and ratio changes, and working inside of a safe EC for the plants.

Here's some pictures of the current grow on CES.

 

Using a Hanna GroCheck HI991404.

I would begin by mixing in my A+B, the Cal-Mag Plus, and the Liquid Karma. Then I'd mix in the Big Bud dry. I watch the uS/cm increase as I add the Big Bud and I try to get as close to a 0.2ec increase as possible.

I cut back from full strength and run a lower amount of the stuff because I was also using Hydroplex. By adding a little at a time and mixing it in I was able to use the meter to determine how much of an increase in EC the Big Bud had added. Full suggested strength on the Big Bud dry will register at around 0.6ec (1tsp, or 7g, per 5 gallons).

At 1-17-38 more than 56% of the stuff is guaranteed plant fertilizers. There is also a good deal of unlisted ingredients. At $25 for 130g there is no comparison to the $45 for 1L of liquid Big Bud. I found myself using a little around 1tsp in a 10 gallon reservoir most of the time, less in the beginning.

For this grow I will be basically repeating this process except without the Hydroplex. By reducing the amount of nutrition derived from the CES Bloom I will achieve the same EC as I would have without Big Bud dry. I'll probably push between 0.2ec and 0.3ec of the Big Bud dry.

I still have a little remaining Hydroplex and I may decide to use some of that on days 44, 45, and 46 for a good Phosphorus boost once I cut the Big Bud. Maybe not though...

 

Figured I'd drop in a quick update.

Temperatures have been a bitch but the AC unit is now in place and controlling everything very well.

Big Bud just went into use yesterday. I used an ~1350uS/cm solution on those two waterings. Today I am using ~800uS/cm, which is leftovers diluted with water. The runoff has been a touch high, nothing crazy, but more than the solution that is in use. The offset 1/2 strength feedings help keep buildup from being an issue when running maxed out EC levels for the stage of growth.

All in all they are about average. Hopefully I'll be seeing something good in the next 10 days or so.

 

Go deep, get high.

I'll try to snap a few pictures just before lights on tonight. Since introducing the Big Bud I've hit a little of a mag issue despite the EC measurements being ~1.25 in and 1.4 out.

Also, I turned the AC down a little last night and cranked up the window intake fan (because it was cool outside) but I woke up at about 6 am and in around 3 hours the room crept up about 8 degrees and into the Mid-80's in the hottest spots closest to the bulbs. I turned the AC back up and things cooled back into range quickly, but there was probably an hour or two there over 80 (...yet again...) which never helps. Stupid summer time and your wonderful weather and sunshine ruining my indoor temps.

I'm pretty sure that some of the larger fan leaves that are about 10"-12" from that naked 1000w monster aren't going to hold out for too much longer if I keep pushing the enhancers, regardless of buildup. Only 1/2 of the plants are showing these symptoms which indicates at least something of a nutritional issue since they are all the same distance from the bulb and all subject to the same temperatures.

I'll be running a little more Mag to compete with the sudden K increase from the Big Bud dry as well as cutting back on the Calcium (to aid in the uptake of the other cations) and using a Mag dominant foliar spray directed at the underside of the affected leaves to try and preserve the remaining chlorophyll. If this get's uncontrollable I'll probably start training these branches towards cooler parts... Might do that anyway and save myself some trouble down the line.

Here's an idea of what is going on in picture form. You can see there's no real burn on the tips, though they are curled a little despite the high K numbers (indicating that they're a little warmer then the parts of the plant a little further from the bulb.

 

At this point I prefer fewer plants. My issue is with dealing with all the clones. If I had more space and a little extra cash I would consider my options. With the legality of things right now I am just trying to stay within my limits.

SOG is especially attractive at first until I think about all the work it is.