Hello all! I am embarking on my first grow journey and decided to do everything the DIY way. I want to share it all with you and I am hoping to learn more so don't be afraid to offer tips and criticisms. Ok so for the basics here is what my setup consists of: 5 plants from amazing bagseed. Sprouted in Sta-Green potting mix. Currently under 100w Fluorex CFL. Housed in approx 3x3x5 stealth box in closet. Box details: 3x3x5 6" intake fan on lower left side 6" exhaust fan on upper right side Future strategy: (all goods already already purchased) - Repotting tomorrow morning into Fox Farm Ocean Forest soil - 7 days adding 250w CFL 6400K Blue bringing total to 350w CFL - SCROG unit installed roughly two weeks from now - Plants will be repotted all from red cups, to 1Gal to 3Gal - Odor control using ona for now however considering Carbon Filter - FOR BLOOM 250w CFL 2700K Red added 100W Fluorex removed. bringing total to 250w Blue 250W Red CFL. Basically 500w CFL. Nutrients - Fox Farm Grow Big - Fox Farm Tiger Bloom - DynaGro ProTekt - Bcuzz BIO-Nrg Flavor - TakeDown bug repel Now for the fun part PICTURES!!
Looks good. Be carefull of FFOF Soil. It can burn seedlings. However since yours look to be almost at the end of seedling stage it may not be a problem for them.
Good to know. Keep an eye on me! I think they are strong enough for FFOF but then again I know very little from experience.
Welcome to GC Hollewood! I hope you have as much fun growing as I do. Take it easy with the nutes, you seem to have bought more then you need which may be inviting to overnute and overnuting is bad. Really bad! I'll come around to your grow from time to time. Good luck! (and if you're short on knowledge just post the questions right here, there are many people with lotsa experience on this forum)
Thanks guys I'm glad you are all along for the ride! I was told to water once a week with nutes and once a week without to flush out pathogens and keep things fresh. Should i cut the recommend dosages on my nutes in half? Or what would you recommend?
It's kind of difficult to generalize a feeding schedule. This is because you can never exactly get the right amount of nutes in the soil. It depends on a lot of things ; the soil, nutes already present in what ratio, humidity level of the soil, speed of growth, temps, strain of MJ and so on and so on. If you have nutes that are supposed to be used for normal houseplants then you can use twice the recommended dosage that is printed on the label. If it's ganja nutes better stick to the label. Always use 1/4 dosage on the first nuting 1/2 after that and then full nuting. It's always better to wait for signs of nute deficiency then adding (too much) nutes in an attempt to prevent undernuting. Once the soil is messed up due to overnuting you'll never be able to totally correct it. Want to see how bad overnuting & overwatering can mess up your grow? Check my 2nd and 3rd grow journals, soil problems deluxe there....
Good to know I will definitely stagger the first few feedings as for now I am letting them get used to the new pots and new soil. I repotted this morning and will take pictures tomorrow morning. Class took the joy outta me but seeing my babies has brough it back! I don't know if I am overly optimistic but I think they are beginning to blow up.
That Fox Farm fert is good stuff; I just started using it myself. Since it is organic it will be a bit more difficult to over fert them. Just give them the FF Grow big and tiger bloom now at about half the recommended dosage at first; the Dyna Grow looks to be more for flowering so I don't think you need it now. Then, I believe you can fertilize every watering at full strength but be careful with this because I have yet to try this out and each strain is different and fear is right with better under than over ferting. If you water say every four days they should be fine with the ferts in there every time. If you start to see burned leaves at the bottom just switch to ferting every other watering.
Thanks for assurance, I was a little scared on the soil burning them. However why should I give them TigerBloom? Wouldn't I want to wait until I flower?
Sinus, sorry I don't. I kind of built the box off the top of my head. It turned out amazing but I somewhat have always had a knack for woodworking. Here is price breakdown on cost of box. Wood + general util. = $40 100w Fluorex CLF w/ hood = $60 250w Red/Bloom CFL w/hood = $90 250w Blue/Veg CFL w/hood =$90 (2x) 6in. inline can fan = $80 Nutrients/ONA = $75 CarbonFilter = $65 Reflector Height Adjustors = $20 Fox Farm Ocean Forest Soil = $20 GRAND TOTAL = $540 Not bad considering I almost pulled trigger on $1600 stealth cab from 4eversun.com And here are the new pics! I think they are loving the new soil. You tell me!! pic 1 is side view pic 2 overview of em all pic 3 my favorite one. think "she" *crosses fingers* is on roids.
The light in the pictures is from Home Depot. You can find it in the security/motion detector section. Its called Flourex 100w something or other and only trick is you gotta put tape over motion sensor thing to keep it on. My other lights I found on ebay from a guy called growrite. CFL's are much more attractive for me because I hate having to deal with heat.
Alright so they are finally getting fed full strength. The ladies demand water roughly every 3.5 days... They are being fed ProTekt and Fox Farm Big Grow. Having never done this I am really unsure of when to bloom... I imagine atleast two more weeks at the least considering I have on more repotting to do and want to have my SCROG installed for a few days before I flip to bloom. ANY THOUGHTS?
Technically, they are not really ready for flower unless sexual maturity is reached i.e. alternating nodes. This usually occurs at about one month of normal growth and 12 inches tall.
I just bought the 250W bloom cfl from growrite, based totally off of your post - lemme know what you think of it, I'm anxiously awaiting the bulb and hanger from the UPS man *was having serious heat problems myself*
well havent reached bloom yet so dont know how she really works in action. but ive fired her up and she is a beast. slight hum assuming its normal. its defintely a lot cooler compared to HPS but its not your 26w anymore so dont let your tips get anywhere closer then 2 inches.