First grow dwc scrog LED 300w

First grow. Thought I'd document it here, more for my sake than anything. I have a barneys farm lemon amnesia(sativa dom) and a royal queen blue cheese(indica dom). Bought an apollo horticulture 300w led off amazon, admittingly the low electric cost is what convinced me. Hoping it does good for my small grow. I have two 5 gallon dwc buckets(bubbleponics, I believe)which started as top feed but the air pumps are used for small airstones now since roots have long since touched the water. I have 10" net pots filled with hydroton with a layer of loose rockwool at the bottom. I'm using fox farms trio grow big, big bloom, and tiger bloom. I had some trouble with root rot because my res temp was a bit on the high side, up to 78F during peak heat. I ordered some voodoo juice and while it was shipping I used peroxide on my roots daily. I have nice white roots now a week after treatment so I'm hoping that problem is over and done with, lesson learned.There was a good two weeks I thought I had lost both and contemplated pulling them and starting over. Thankful I bided my time. Due to the root issues along with some tragic nute burn I had early on my girls are a few weeks behind schedule. Should be at least a week or two into flower but I believe they are 3 maybe 4 weeks into veg comparatively. Next is to install my screen and hopefully I can make a good call of when to switch to 12/12. I'm using an old plastic baby gate, seems perfect once I snip off the extra length. I've ran my second round of topping and I've been lst'ing in preparation and things look great. Really excited for the switch and to watch them fill up the space. I'll update as I go and post a dry weight and smoke report for anyone who is interested

 

Lights were off when I originally posted do here are some pics.
Left is blue cheese right is lemon amnesia

 

Thanks goat, I've thought about the frozen bottles but yea once my screen goes in that's pretty much that for that possibility. I've yet to install my intake and exhaust, also planning on taking care of that this week. I'm hoping that will fix the res temp since the room stays pretty cold. As far as changing the res I use the indicator I installed as a drain and fill point. I usually pour a gallon of ph water into each bucket also to help get out what can't drain well. It's annoying but not too bad

 

Last few days before flower, starting to really bush on me. Had more root problems but got ventilation going in and out and there was immediate change and now I have bulging roots. I hand watered the hydroton with ph water with voodoo juice when I changed the res this and last time. Seems to be doing the trick

 

Switched to flower yesterday and got my diy carbon filter attached to the exhaust fan. Decided against the screen for this run, going to do a lot of lst instead. Didn't want to trust my roots being fine without being able to check and couldn't figure out a good way to attach the screens to my net pots and was getting pressed for time with my girls getting pretty bushy.

 

Thanks man. I was in veg for a total of 7 weeks, but a lot of that was spent in recovery. Height wasn't exactly the issue I've got 5ish feet to work with. It was lateral space especially since I gave up on the screen for this run. I moved them up a little for the pictures but they are starting to hit the sides.

 

Stretch has started and going quite well I think. The left (blue cheese) was a tri-leaf mutant, and on top of that about a week after planting the taproot tried to grow up out of the hydroton and I had to dig it out and flip it over. I've thought that I lost this plant 3 times now so needless to say I'm amazed it's doing this well. Truly is a weed

 

Not quite two weeks after the flip and the stretch is serious. I have this cab pretty packed I'd say, hoping I didn't mess up by postponing 12. Did a bit of trimming of the lowest bud shoots that weren't getting light anyways through this canopy. I don't think the roots could get bigger at this point. They went from rope looking strands to bulging tangled masses. Not sure if that was just from the stretch or if voodoo juice is just that good. Excited to see those buds start forming everywhere, the pistols started showing up a few days ago along with some nice earthy scents. Took these right after lights out tonight

 

Took a couple out of the box to get a good look. First two are the cheese and the second is the amnesia

 

Happy and healthy

 

Word of advice for anyone using fox farms in hydroponics. Big bloom and tiger bloom stain up the roots. The day after res change they look bad but as the week goes on it fades and the white roots start showing again. I ran into actual root rot at one point when the girls were young when they dipped their toes because I wasn't on it with the air stones. And even early on it looks much worse. Gunk coating the roots, foul smell and after the first time you instantly recognize it. I doused my roots on H202(peroxide) and got the voodoo juice going, not sure how much the voodoo juice did but I'll test that at some point down the road. Just words of comfort for anyone having the same fears that troubled me several times

 

Stretch is slowing and coming to an end which is good because I can't raise my lights anymore. My foot print is becoming an issue as well, trying to find a way to help with that. Turning my plants around everyday seems a bit too much to deal with especially if I end up having to tie up some colas.

 

A little bud porn. Just started week 4 of flower