7 days old how do they look

Discussion in 'First Time Marijuana Growers' started by prohet, Jan 17, 2013.

  1. Hey guys,

    I am new to growing, and I would appreciate your opinion...!

    My seedlings are 7 days old, under 7x 23w 6500k (600w equivalent) and 1 40w 2700k (150w equivalent) CFL. The lamps are about 4 inch above the plants. I am using distilled water, and have a fan running for air flow. The temperature is a constant 73F.

    How do you think each of the seedlings are looking (I watered them a few hours ago)? The growing is slow, but that is probably due to the root system being developed. Since I have not come across live cannabis plants before, I am not sure what to think as they look somewhat sad to me.

    Thanks a bunch!
     

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  2. Update: this morning, the two that looked droopy yesterday, and less droopy today!
     
  3. the droopiness comes from overwatering, otherwise theyre fine. worry less.
     
  4. Fantastic! Less watering it will be.. I might try out every other day...
     
  5. You really only need to water once every three or four days depending on how fast your growing medium dries.

    Try sticking your finger in the soil an inch or two deep. If its dry then water, if you feel moisture wait.

    Another option is to lift the cups. If they're heavy wait, if they feel light go. Pour out a cup of dry soil to compare at first.

    You really need to let the soil dry completely out. Letting the soil dry promotes root development and ensures that you won't get root rot.

    Biggest mistake that new growers commit (I know I did) is over-watering.

    Other than that, plants look really solid and your soil mixture looks pretty close to spot on. 200W for five plants is pretty low but you can add more as you go. Basic rule of thumb is a minimum of 100W for your first plant and 50W for each additional.

    Do you know anything about the genetics of your plant?
     
  6. Thanks for your reply.

    Concerning the lights: I thought that 1 23w CFL is equivalent to 100w, so by having 7 CFL bulbs (6500k) I thought I was okay lol. I can add another 2 6500k of 23w. Is that better?

    I do not know anything about the genetics, although the seeds came from a good seed bank.

    The soil mix is Cactus soil, with added red earth clay and perlite. It has earth worm castings, sphagnum, and peatmos.

    I will follow your watering instructions, I am very pleased you responded to my message, azgrassman!
     
  7. a 23w CFL is a 23w CFL and equal to 23w of CFL, which is a lot less than 23w of an HPS or MH. the equivalent is the visible brightness compared to incandescent lights, doesnt need to concern you when growing plants with it.
    still youre more than good for now, one 23w CFL per seedling would be ok for another 2 weeks at least. for a full grow the rule of thumb with CFLs is 100w for one plant and 50 more for each additional plant, so for flowering you should get some more of the 2700k CFLs.
     
  8. Thanks, I have two more 2700k 40w CFL with 2720 lumens each. I will buy a few more as they are on sale.

    So in order to get to 100w CFL for 1 plant, I would need 5 23w CFLs, and then 2 23w CFL per additional plant. I cannot locate stronger 6500k CFL bulbs, but might have access to some 5500K stronger ones. I do not live close to a large center so I need to do with the resources in my small town.
     
  9. just use the 2700k ones, both 6500k and 2700k and everything in between do work for both veg and flowering, theyre just not necessarily optimal. its more important that the spectrum fits flowering than that it fits veg. think about growers using HID lamps, lots of them do both veg and flower with HPS, which is a more reddish light still than 2700k CFLs.
    just exchange some of the 6500k bulbs for 2700k ones and add a few 2700k when you go into flowering. Id probably keep something like 10-20% of the total wattage as 6500k in flowering for diversity. as long as you got more than 50% 6500k in veg and enough overall wattage, you dont need to get more 6500k bulbs.
    the 100w rule also is meant for flowering I believe, in veg its gonna be fine to have 30% less light since the plants will still be smaller and slow growth can be compensated by vegging for an extra week or two rather than directly reducing the harvest.
     
  10. Thanks for the great reply.

    I will go and add the two 2700K I have to the mix, which will leave more than 50% as 6500K.

    I am thrilled by the help I am getting!
     
  11. no problem, its nice to help people who show gratitude and arent too lazy to do some research on their own. :)

    I gotta say though, the information Im giving may not be entirely correct.
    Im kind of a newb myself, Ive only done one outdoor grow last year and got a few plants with just two 23w CFLs in my closet for experimental purposes at the moment (checkin growth rate, Ill be growing a lot of foot-tall cuttings for guerilla growing in there this year).
    Im a very enthusiastic amateur though, so most of what Im writing doesnt come from personal experience, Ive just been spending a lot of time over the past three years and especially the last ~10 months doing research on the subject, Ive watched all the good vids on youtube, read all the stickies and a couple of grow journals here and been observing and participating in this beginners section mostly.

    in this case Im not certain how much of a difference exactly the light spectrum would make for veg, Im just pretty convinced that it isnt a lot.
    growth might be 20% faster with 100% 6500k compared to 50/50 6500k/2700l, but thats the most I would imagine.
    I have also read once that 2700k in veg leads to a little more stretch, but Im not sure of the source (it was in this forum, not sure if a newb or a pro), so the guy who wrote it may have confused something when reading about flowering. Im pretty sure that the object of discussion was 2700k only for veg and that with >50% 6500k the extra stretch, if there is any, is negligable.
     
  12. Thanks for your reply again. I have done of reading, too. My challenge is using the resources that are available here in town. My humidity is a bit low, so I just added a humidifier and will check my hygrometer twice a day.

    Your reasoning does make sense to me, I think I will make sure the 6500K CFLs are in majority watt-wise. I might add two more, to get to 9x 23w 6500K, and then with the 2x 40w 2700K should be fine for now.

    I am also thinking of making a "light tree": a skinny piece (4" wide) of plywood of 4 feet standing up, with sockets every feet. In each socket goes a splitter for two lamps. I am thinking of making two of those and place them around my plants when they get larger, to provide side and top light at once.

    I have not seen something like that being build, though,but I can manage myself as it is easy to make.
     
  13. #13 baumeister, Jan 17, 2013
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 17, 2013
    sounds smart, its definitly a good idea to get CFLs as close to the plants as possible and in between the plants, since theyre only effective at very close range. Ive read a lot of stuff about how CFL light has less "penetration" than HPS light, but I dont see how that would work, I think thats just the CFLs being a lot weaker. dont forget ventilation though, a CFL in stagnant air gets hot enough to burn a plant at an inch distance while a CFL in a steady airstream can touch the plant without harming it. Ive put a thermometer to a 23w CFL, it was 70C (158F) without cooling and 25C (77F) (pretty much the same as the surrounding air) with a fan blowing right at it. Im not sure how cooling a running CFl affects its light output, energy efficiency and lifespan though, there are some waves of brighter plasma visible slowly moving through the tube when its cooled, they speed up until no longer visible when the cooling stops. couldnt identify a difference in total light output without measuring equipment.
    Ive seen a couple of extremely impressive grows where people got inventive with CFLs, positioning them all around their plants and achieving harvests that were at least two thirds the amount you would expect the same plants to yield with HPS light and the size, density and resin content of the buds were equally decent.
     
  14. #14 prohet, Jan 17, 2013
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 17, 2013
    Great! I start building the light tree, but I have to order in more wired sockets, see the picture attached. There is one socket wired on it now, planning to put 3 more on it, and then each socket will get a y-splitter.

    Two or three of these should provide light all around...(I hope)
     
  15. I increased the light number to the following:

    9x 23w CFL = 13140 lumens
    2x 40w CFL = 5440 lumens
    ---> totaling 18580 lumens

    All of this in a space of 40x50 cm. I think I will keep it this way during veg, and will upgrade lights in the flowering stage to 8x 40w 2700K and two 23w 6500K, using 5 rubber sockets on the light tree in the picture with Y splitters to get two bulbs each. This would be per plant.

    I am guesstimating that 2 out of the 5 plants will be female. If more, I need to alter my setup.
     

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