First Grow - Coco & Hempy experimentation

Hey guys, its around Day 28 of my grow, ive taken pictures daily, and have only just gotten around to start a journal.

My first grow space was just a ali shelve.

I believe i started with a couple of CFL's(Daylight spec - 6500k - 24 ACTUAL Watts) and a small fluro i got cheap. I purchased 2x 18watt Grolux lights, that emit a purplish light - so i gather its a good mix of Blue / Red / Yellow (The same as you would see in fish shops etc.)
Panda Film (got a shit ton of this stuff given to me.)

As this is my first grow, im trying to have a full growth cycle in order to get my head around the practical parts - therefore ive kept this as low cost as i can.

Using tape and cardboard to hold it all together. I wired up all the lights by myself - using 3 core 240v wire (1 meter each) and just brought the light sockets as you would see in the roof of you room. I was unable to find these y splitters/adapters that i see commonly around the internet, nor did the hardware stores know about them. Im gathering is the country im located in.

My PH tester is a cheap drop+tube solution with a color chart on the side of the bottle. Its amazing how you start to notice yellow with a red tinge or a greener tinge in order to try and hit the 5.8 mark. Im sure its not exactly 5.8 but its not 6.3 so its between 5.5 - 6.0 which is as good as im going to get without a digital meter and its calibration solutions. I do not have PPM reader, nor do i know how 'hard' my water is. I generally sit my water for a good 48 hours, i end up giving it a mix & stir during the sitting period - this is something i read to do in order to get rid of most of the chlorine in the water.

It starts off with 2x Hempy's which have done rather poorly but i believe i figure out its reasoning today - either an iron def, or im only checking the run off every 2-3 waterings, and im letting it get too high(not counter acting by dropping PH of water to say 5.0 in order to get a 5.5-6.0 reading on the run off. I will be correcting this as of today, every time i look at the pictures on the dates ive fed the next 2-3 days show's good growth(*slaps his head*)
The Hempy style medium's consists of 3/4 Perlite and 1/4 Vermiculite. I also failed to find any solid hempy guides before taking on the challenge, and did not keep the res's topped up daily until the roots hit the res.

Then there is the two Coco attempts. Consisting of 3/4 Coco (This is pre flushed and all watering has had its PH adjusted accordingly from germination to pre-readying the coco.)
These two are cranking, thus far ive found(this is where i got the bad habbit from) that coco does an amazing job at holding a good PH level. what ever i put in, generally comes out and stay's like that - and ive only really needed to check its run off every 2-3 waterings.

Around the 16 day mark i fed them all, as there was some signs of nute def's. I have used the first Coco plant (Coco02's - 4 days older than Coco01) to show me the signs of things going wrong in advance. Has proven great, as you can see Coco01's result is looking a bit better than 02's.
The feeding started at 1/4 the dossage. for 2 feedings, then i flushed them all and fed them at the same time with 1/2 strength, ive lost track of my feeding schedule i just tend to feed 1/2 every feeding (today i did full strength) and just pre flushing every 3 feed's.
(FEED: I know its not perfect- but the cheapest from the store. I will use both of these - one veg / one bloom http://www.flairform.com/Products/greendream.htm )
The temp's and such of the above setup would range from 23 degress(c) to 29 degree's depending on the temp inside the house. Using two PC fans and a desk fan to push the are through. This was by all means NOT Light proof'd. I had a fan on the left side pushing air inside and just inside was another fan which would take the air and blow it over the lights and the tops of the plants - this was to cool the area and to simulate wind, in order to strengthen the stems.
Humidity ranges from 50-60% on average sometimes a little hotter, im not too fussed about this aspect. However this is not to say i dont understand the role this plays on the enviroment - .

Sometime earlier this week(You can see via the pictures) I cleaned out a wardrobe/closet and started constructing a grow room. Much bigger spacing using a old desk table i had to raise it up while vegging. Screw hooks at the top and using chains to hang the lights has made it extremely easy to adjust the lighting.

I do have a heating issue, as ive got 6 CFL's and a fluro - generating so much heat im not able to circulate the air very well, im currently trying new things to solve this.

With all the CPU/Case/PowerSupply fans ive collected over the past few years in use its still and issue. These fans suck they have bugger all power or push.
Its sitting around 29degree's at night, and roughly 31-32degree's during the day. (Bad i know) Have a trip in 7 days, and not much cash to spend so they may just have to suffer for a couple of weeks.

So it would take me quite sometime, to crop all these pictures(Day01-Day28 - 5 Pic's each day) down to size so im going to give you a link to my abandoned attempt at a wordpress blog but is currently where im hosting my pictures. All future pictures will be cropped and displayed here, as well on the hosting.

Index of /grow (Lame domain name i know - was free though.)

The pictures are large - high quality ranging from 300KB - 1MB on average, and a few uncropped image along the way(2.5MB) so im sorry if you have a slower connection, ill write up some PHP when i have time, make it so you can see thumbnails and such before viewing the large file. Ill also add some tiny features of being able to look at one plant every X days rather than every day.

I'll re-read over this a little later and fix up anything gibberish up, and add anything that needs to be mentioned.

 

Hey guys, as mentioned all future photo's would be uploaded here as well as my hosting

If in the next couple of days the Hempy's do not take off, ill be transplanting these into a Coco / Perlite mix.

 

So its been pretty hot here last couple of days, normally i would feed the plants tomorrow, but ive had to fill the res's in the Hempy's.


Size shots.

 

So today i decided since im taking off on Mon/Tue's over seas id better transplant these into something a bit more decent, all containers had shown roots to the bottom, was just trying to get a nice root ball before hand(waited an extra week)

I've dropped the hempy attempts and am happy to say im a Coco supporter
(3/4 Coco | 1/4 Perlite)

Upon transplanting i saw some light browny roots on the bottom where the res was. Perhaps i had root rot or its just discoloration from the nute's not sure. Sounds like this was the main cause for my unsuccessful hempy attempt, if someone could perhaps let me know why this occured - thanks.

(All pictures will be lower quality for aproxx 2.5 weeks while im over seas.)

Also since all the pots were the same size (6l containers) i had to change my lighting and fans up a bit, so ive included these pictures as well.(6 Hours after transplant)

 

Today is recovery day from yesterdays stressful transplant. They have all lifted up a bit, Will give them a feed in two days hopefully they take off

New Camera - Not as great as the last.

 

Currently over seas but have someone still doing the daily photo's so just check the remote hosting for updates until i return home. Thanks and sorry.

 

Still over seas there seems to be some issues here and there -without being at home to deal with it myself wouldnt mind if someone could check out and advise on how they are doing(via link in first post as im overseas) Thanks in advance. (Keep in mind im explaining this to my missus, so detailed information broken down would be great)

 

Hey man lol- gave up on this journal, i should have removed it. How ever- since you took the time to drop a line, i'll send you a pm tomorrow with a few links to my video's. Choose to keep it semi private