Hello Everyone, I am a relatively new grower , I did a couple of grows before but I was forced to break for a few years . So I had the ideea of starting a cabinet grow about a month ago and thus my journey began. However I was facing a few problems : 1. Stealth - have to use a cabinet that is sitting on a balcony 2. Heat - It's a very hot summer and temp are soaring 3. Care - I sometimes have to be away for 2 weeks at a time ( if not more ) These are problems that are new to me ( except maybe the stealth part a bit ) and it turned out to be quite a challenge so far. This is why I decided to make a modest grow journal , so that I may benefit from the experience of the friendly people around here . First of all , I will describe my setup : 1. Space The cabinet is relatively small : 60cmx40cmx85cm ( 23.6x15.7x33.5 inch) The most troublesome is the height , 85 cm total so if you take out : the height of the pot + reflective hood / light support it adds up to an absolute maximum of 40 cm (15 inch) of height for the plant. I dressed the whole inside of the cabinet with mylar for light reflection. 2. Light I started up with only a 45W CFL 6400K but then purchased a cooltube and a 250W HPS with dual spectrum to use throughout the plant life cycle. 3. Pot I bought my seeds from Nirvana , 5xfeminized Urban Poison sativa dominant hybrid and for a bit of diversity 5xfeminized Indoor mix ( no ideea what strains ) I put them in 3l AirPots and used soil as the medium. 4. Air Intake : I installed 2 x 120mm PC fans (75cfm each ) Outtake : I installed 1x120mm PC fan 75 cfm + 1x92mm PC fan as outtake for the cooltube 5. Watering As I said I sometimes have to be away and leave the plants for weeks at a time so I bought a device called Tropf Blumat which is a ceramic sensor that theoretically detects when the moist level of the soil is low and sucks up water from a reservoir to bring the moisture level up. Final details Due to high heat which is a new concept to me ( my previous grows were done during winter and spring) I faced a lot of difficulties . The average temperature around here is 31 C with the temperature on the balcony where the cabinet is of 36 C , and these are only the averages! I planted 2 seeds ( 1 Urban Poison + 1 Mysterious Lady (from the Mix ) and got them up to 3 weeks but then I messed up and forgot to leave the window opened for a weekend and they kind of got cooked ( temp of 51 C recorded by thermometer ) So one of the plants died at that point and the other one lasted for another 2 weeks but gave up in the end . This brings us to 1.5 weeks ago when I germinated another seed , I noticed that the Urban Poison took the heat a lot better than the other plant (Mysterious Lady was an indica as indicated by it's wide leafs and low resilience to heat). In the place of the late Mystery Lady I put another Urban Poison seed yesterday . For the time being I moved the cabinet inside where I have AC and I will attempt to use the AC to get the plants through the last month of summer at least. Allrighty then , I think this is enough info to begin with but I will post a picture , just in case you haven't read a single word so far . I will post a few pics of the first plant in the next post , I just want to say thank you for reading so far and I hope you enjoy the rest. Also any help or advice is more than welcome , my mind is wide open. Thanks!
Here are a few pics of the 9 day old Urban Poison . I was amazed at how fast the seed opened up and of it's growth in general in the first couple of days. Within 2 days of placing it in the soil (also one day of germinating in a paper towel) the seed opened up and the first set of leaves grew almost simultaneously with the cotyledons. Despite all of this she had almost 0 growth in height ... I am thinking it's because of the powerful light it is getting ?! Should I try to lift the light up higher ? It's ok in a sense that it did not grow in height as I have very limited space but I was thinking of doing some LST so I don't really like the way it's progressing. Also another pic of the whole setup up close.
Howdy , I have a couple of new pics today , I was away for the weekend and I left her with a 45W CFL instead of the HPS just to avoid having to leave the AC on . As it turns out the weather was rainy and temp were quite low 20-25 degrees celsius. It seemed to me like it was a breath of fresh air for the plant , It grew very nicely as you can see. Also , I have a few questions for you guys 1. Is the plant better off with the 45W CFL or will it grow faster with the 250W HPS ( it is key to know that when using the HPS the temp goes up by 5 degrees celsius) 2. What is the cause of the plant growing so short ( notice the distance between the nodes ) ? 3. I used BioBizz All-mix which is supposed to be an organic soil mix with nutes to last for 4 weeks . Would It be too soon to start feeding it next week ( when she'll be 3 weeks old ) with organic nutrients ? I had in mind the Iguana grow juice or MOTHER EARTH Organic super tea grow , both from Advanced nutrients. Cheers !
Thanks dude , appreciate the interest ! I have to say the Urban Poison is really taking off , the heat seems to have a positive effect on the growth , because it is growing fast and shows no sign of stress . The temperatures these last few days have been in the proximity of 30 celsius. 28ish at night and up to 32 in day time . Humidity is a bit low in the high 20 percentile (27-29 RH ). I leave a couple of bowls filled with water right under the intake fan so they can evaporate faster but this is the best I can do . I agree , but she is growing too short , there is too little space between the nodes , so I have to wait a bit and see how she develops. Today I got a really sweet scent of her too , I have to say it intrigued me! It is sweeter smelling then the Pure Power Plant , it's like smelling a very ripe berry .
Hey guys , I am back with some more pics . The growth is going steady now , unfortunately also the temperatures are going crazy around here , I am using the AC to keep it at a decent 30-31 degrees celsius. It is still pretty much bushy looking , my best guess is that it's due to the high amount of light and heat. Also the seedling is starting to grow. There was a bit of an offset with the second plant , I had to keep both plants on the 45W CFL for a couple of days and the seedling stretched for the light. I did a mild LST on it to control it's height. On a side note I decided to name the first plant Lucy ( as in Lucy in the sky with diamonds ) , not sure what to call the second one yet , I will be referring to it as mystery woman for now, since I don't know what strain it is. Since Lucy was doing so well I decided it was time to move it in a larger pot so I transplanted it in a 6 liter pot from it's former 3 liter one. The roots were looking really good , they had reached down to the bottom of the pot and generally stretched over the whole surface of the previous pot. I am impressed with the performance of the Airpot it seems that it's legit.
I forgot to say that I also bought some nutes today , I went with Advanced Nutrients - for the vegetative stage : Mother Earth organic super tea Grow - for the flowering stage : Iguana juice Bloom Lucy has starting showing clear signs of N deficiency so I will start feeding her with a half strength solution of Mother Earth grow on the next watering. I am starting to think how much time to keep her in veg , considering that Urban Poison flowering time is 2 and a half month and I only have so much space in the closet, if you know what I mean. I am thinking to keep it for another week and then switch the lights. I attached a pic of the leaves , you can see the decoloration that I identified as N deficiency. The earth was supposed to pack nuts for 4 weeks but at the fast growing rate she probably consumed most of it.
Hey there, Tonight I fed Lucy for the first time. I used the Mother Earth Super Tea Grow with a concentration of 4 ml per liter. The lower leaves were looking really bad , all yellow and stuff so I rushed it a bit . I would have normally waited a bit longer for the pot to get lighter so that the roots grow nice and uniform. This past few days it's been really hard to shield Lucy from the heat, even with the AC on , she gets temps up to 32 celsius. My biggest fear is that the heat will affect the roots. I also put the cooltube a bit higher up , to minimize any possible light burns but I noticed that the temperature got higher after I had moved it. Probably the air beeing pulled inside the tube is hotter and it's not cooling the HPS as efficiently ... The biggest downside to the size of my cabinet is that I don't have any room to insert a tube on the cooltube's intake , to vent cold air from outside ...
I forgot to mention , Lucy's younger sister started to grow a bit. She came from a seed included in Nirvana's Indoor mix , so I am still clueless about what strain it is. I have a hunch that she is an indica , judging by the bulkier leaves , and the fact that she seems to be hating the heat unlike Lucy. I will post a few pics tommorow. Stay high guys !
hello city dwellers ! today I have quite a few pics for you : Lucy has developed quite a bit of branches but kept short as hell. Which serves me right ... I mean just take a look , isn't she just the most adorable tiny bush you have ever seen ? I am starting to be concerned that she'll run out of space really fast in the cabinet , considering that she'll get a lot bigger in flowering ... I'm getting a strong vibe that I should put her to flower asap, but I will hold back for just a few more days. As you can see I did a bit of LST on her , and it's working out great so far. I will probably start tying up the smaller branches as well in a couple of days , just so that they can get more light. There is a big struggle for light between the leaves because of her low height combined with strong branching. The Mysterious Lady grew a bit , I decided to put the cold light CFL on top of her to reduce the stress coming from the HPS . I put on a few pics with her as well as promised. I will take any advice on how to optimize / improve my LST training or any suggestions on what you think would benefit Lucy the most in her environment. Laters
Hey guys , It's been a while since I wrote something so I want to give you an update. Lucy is absolutely thriving , she is a gorgeous looking bush and has , from what I counted tonight, 12 main colas . Misterious Lady is picking up the pace but still quite a bit behind. I did some intensive LST on Lucy to get her in the current bushy shape and I am thinking of switching the lights early next week , cuz she is really starting to fill up the place and I want to have plenty of room for her buds. The plan is to keep ML separatly and continue to veg her a couple more weeks until she is a bit more sturdy and then put her back in with Lucy. You will notice ML has a bit of a N deficiency ( it is N right ? ) , I fed her tonight and gave her 5ml of Mother Earth Super Tea Grow , I hope this will make her allright ! I also have a ScrOG in the works , and I plan to mount it up at the same time that I am putting Lucy in flowering. She is getting a bit hard to handle and I think the ScrOG will be a great help to fight off the growth that is to come . That's all folks, let me know what you think and again , I would love to hear your suggestions ! There seems to be a problem with attachments so I had to put the pics on ImageShack ... enjoy Peace out !