ive started my first grow about 6 weeks ago. for the most part everything has gone quite smoothly. im a little new to grasscity.com so i dont know if im supposed to describe everything in detail or what but if so let me know and i can give ya'll the rundown. super excited about joining. looking to cram some knowledge!
i started with 7 seedlings. all 7 germinated. had them all growing and had to kill 4 of them cuz i felt that that was to many (i did cry myself to sleep that night) and its been about 6 weeks and they are looking mighty pretty ( atleast to me anyways) i started out with a basic miracle gro soil mix. i dont think its been giving me any trouble. i accidently misread this website about watering so i was watering every other day with a miracle gro mix in water that sat out at room temp. im assuming thats why my plants are so dry ??? anyway so i said 6 weeks lol. one of the plants is 12" and the other is well on its way to 10". and they both have 10 leaves going on 12. im confused about what you guys talk about when it comes to lighting. its all jibberish to me so ill lay it out plain and simple. ive built my own grow lamp with a sheet of steel from a tube that is about 2 ft x 1 ft curled to a U shape. i drilled a hole in the center to mount a duel lightbulb outlet and wired it through the top. ive got 2 flourescent light bulbs (i believe 60watt) running for 17 hrs on 7 hrs off. and i also dropped the grow lamp down to about 3 - 4 inches above the plants tops. let me know what im about to run into. so far so good. (im also a little worried because the lower leaves are very small and dry.)
probably should have mentioned what i was using to grow in. lol. still new i actually got a box from where i work its about 3 1/2 ft tall and 2 ft wide and atleast 2 1/2 ft deep. ive got the entire inside white and surrounded with car window covers. the ones that look like tin foil haha. they seem to be working quite well. ive got the grow lamp mounted on a pulley system at the top of the box. ive got a constant fan that is circulating air in and out of the box and i also keep a big bowl of water in the box at all times for humidity. the temp. in the box is 75 - 83 degrees with lights on. and no lower than 67 degrees at night time.
yes i am using regular light bulbs.... Thanks mat369 hopefully will be getting pics on here extremely soon.
Regular light bulbs are really tough to grow with in my experience. They will work, but you will need a shit ton and the wattage/heat/lumen output just isn't worth the trade-off. If you're staying small, compact fluorescents will work, although I'd STRONGLY recommend an HID light- either high pressure sodium or metal halide. Both have their pro's and con's, although I'm partial to HPS. Any more than two plants and you'll run into problems with starving your plants of light with too weak a light fixture. Too little light, and your plants will wither and wilt- too much, and you'll burn tops and superheat your grow room and lead to humidity problems down the road.
You may want to start thinking about switching your lighting timer to 12 hours of light and 12 of dark pretty soon. your plants will almost certainly triple in size. I dont know how big ur space is but thats one of the mistakes I made when I did my first grow. my girls got too big for my grow area.
i was planning on switching the time to 12 and 12 at 7 weeks. ive finally got some pics for you guys. they show the set up and progress so far (remember only 6 weeks)
Woah stretch. You really should replace those incandescent with some CFL's. CFL's deliver considerably more PAR than incandescent bulbs. As of now, your plants are starved for lumens. Good luck on everything. Welcome to GC
Hey buddy here you go I will keep it cheap and simple! Change your lights to compact flourescents they are like 6-7 bucks at wal mart. get a total of 120 watts REAL watts not what it says its equivalent to. Your plants are stretching meaning they arent getting enough light. And the regular bulbs are to hot to put closer. The cfl's you can basically put it right against it. Get the soft white kind and switch to 12/12 immediately or your light wont be able to cover it all during flowering. You will thank us later! cheap fix to get a better result. good job keeping them alive tho +rep for that! your almost there! Edit: and when you go to flowering 12/12 you need to light proof your box or you will get no results!
oh haha i dont have normal shitty lightbulbs in there lol. ive got cfl energy savers. theres 2 of them at the equiv. 60watt each. sorry about the confusion. i think i may need to get a boost though. edit: there is usually absolutely no light getting in when the front is closed i have a 3 inch wide strip of duct tap that flaps over the side by the fan to keep any and all light from escaping as well as entering.
That's a relief. Although, the stretch is still very evident. Grab yourself some 42w'ers ---> 42 Watt Compact Fluorescents and some 2-bulb adapters ---> I'd cram as many as will fit, as many as you can afford, or as many as will fit on your fixture/s circuit..... whichever comes first More light = More/Better bud
this be my setup on the inside. where did you get one of them bad boys??? been lookin for those for a month! Edit:i bet you i could put another one of those duels i have in there and wire them together so that i would have double what i have now! shit son xD that will be my weekend project haha. Ps! are my plants still stretching even if i got cfl's in there?
decided to do what i had suggested earlier. i went out and got myself a second duel outlet and mounted it next to the other in the fixture and got 4 new 60watt cfls as well. Hopefully this will help out (fingers crossed) i took that advice about starting flowering and set the lamps to 12 and 12 so big changes coming . I wont be taking pics til this next coming weekend. wanna see how my babies take to the new lighting and shorter hours. im still worried about the sex. even after 6 weeks i still dont know what is what. hopefully things start showing here in the next 1 to 2 weeks. Edit:is 3600 lumens going to be enough for the 2 plants???
light is more measured by Sq.ft then by number of plants. Your definately in better shape with 3600, you could maybe add 1 or 2 more bulbs. If you did just start flowering your going to want to make sure the CFL's you are using are 2700k bulbs (soft white), those have moe red spectrum better for flowering.
i just checked and they are 2700k soft white. i almost dont even wanna walk away from them lol. i wanna watch them 24/7. how close can the light be to the plants? does it matter if its touching them or not? i feel like im asking to many questions haha