Okay, I'm going to lay this out before anyone says anything. I am growing with ONE random seed in a very rushed manner. I know what I'm doing isn't ideal or the best conditions but this is more of like a test run for me. So with that said here's what's going on. So a couple of days ago I found a random seed in where I keep all of my pipes. It was a nice dark brown color with a bunch of spots. My buddy just started growing a couple of things in his closet so I figured that I would just germinate it and give it to him when it was ready. Well it took about 12 hours for the seed to crack open and expose the tap root. So I told my buddy it was all ready for him to take and I have yet to hear anything from him about it, so I decided to try and grow the little baby myself So I then transplanted it into a party cup with some soil from outside >.< So I then put it outside with a plastic bag over the top of the cup to keep the moisture inside while I was waiting for it to sprout, like I learned here on GC So me and my roommate rigged together a little grow box for my closet and we placed the cup under there for the night with a couple of CFLs. We checked it the next day and to our surprise we had a small white sprout sticking through, with no seed casing. We waited another couple of hours and now we have a nice little sprout with two leaves coming from it So with how well this thing is growing we're excited to see how everything goes, but we're not putting all of our hopes and dreams into this one seed We plan on using 4-5 26 watt 6500k CFLs. If you guys have any specifics on what/how many CFLs, we should use or if what we are using should be fine, it would be great to hear some feedback. I might post a journal soon, still waiting to see how things go still, but any info from you guys would greatly appreciated Outside (have to get more light proofing done >.<) Inside .. Lights up close..
Yee city of trees! Damn i miss sac . But go out and grab some soil once that shit gets it's first true set of leaves, i wouldn't want to transplant this early in it's life. FFOF is pretty much the best/most used soil for beginners, you can get it at any hydro store. Get 100 watts for that plant, that's kind of the recommended ACTUAL wattage, but you can use less if you choose. Otherwise, good luck bruhh...
I don't miss sac in the slightest. The PacWest is too nice. Anyway, the soil from outside thing you definitely didn't learn here, pretty bad idea... bugs and funk and drainage and what not. Transplant now before it's too late. Get organic soil, and some perlite, mix the two together 2:1 and water when your planter is light (not daily, maybe every 3 days). Don't stress about the plastic wrap. I've never worried about it and my seedlings always do fine. Get 20 to 30 watt day light cfl bulbs. The more the better. I like one bulb for every 3 inches of plant, up to about 150w max. If you're smart about it you can get some clamp light reflectors from Home De Pot and direct that energy right at the plant. Keep your CFL bulbs within 2 inches, 2cm away is about as close as you want them. Leave your water out for 24 hours before giving it to your plant. Actually, with one plant, your water needs will be minimal. Get yourself a 5 gallon jug and fill it up with Reverse Osmosis filtered water (the water machine in front of the grocery store for .25 a gallon). This should last a while, and your plant will do MUCH better not on treated human waste that has been recycled. Sac tap water is among the worst I've ever had. Even Fresno has Sac beat. Ditch the foil, get yourself some Mylar. Foil isn't that much more reflective than flat white paint and it can create hot spots where it creases. Poke holes in your cup so water can drain out. When you water, water to saturation slowly with run off coming out the bottom. Go from saturated to almost dry, watering as infrequently as you can stomach. New growers are notorious for watering too often and drowning their plants. Young plants have small root systems, little leaves, and don't need more than 1 ounce of water a day.
Okay, so today was a little worrisome and I'm still a little weary. So we knew we had to change the soil that our plant was in but we couldn't get anywhere yesterday to buy some >.< So early this morning I checked my plant, it was drooping quite a bit and just not looking very strong. So I instantly got ready and headed out to grab so new soil. I placed covered the cup and placed the cup outside while I was gone in hopes it would perk up. So I went out and I picked up some Miracle Gro Potting Mix, can't remember which kind, I'll post pictures. I also picked up some other lights and sockets for the grow box while I was shopping around and (b)Lowes so when I got home I checked to see if the plant had gotten any better and to my surprise it was standing straight again and looking quite healthy again. I realized that when we we're testing the light sockets the other day we put the wrong bulbs in so we switched those out hoping that was the cause of the drooping earlier this morning. So after that I carefully sifted through the soil that the plant was in and carefully pulled out the plant. I removed almost all of the shitty soil from the plant and placed it into a new party cup of the Miracle Gro soil. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to flush the new cup of soil or not, so I didn't "/ Should I have flushed it before placing the plant into it? I'm afraid to water it right now because I'm afraid of drowning it. What should I have done, flushed it or not? Or can I just wait until its first watering?
I tried... I tried... Water as needed, you don't want to stress the plant too much right now. She needs a good 10 days to recover. Then if you got moisture control miracle grow you're going to have new problems to deal with. Shoot first and ask later, huh?
Get a small fan to blow on the plant and another to exhaust the hot air out of that box. Do you know your temps???
>.< I took your advice just forgot some of it >.< (the perlite) I knew enough to not get the moisture control. There isn't really a specific type to this Miracle Gro, it just says "Potting Mix" The NPK is 0.21-0.07-0.14 I saw somewhere on here that I should have it in soil that should have higher N levels than P and K, so I figured this should work. I am currently setting up a small fan but temperatures have been staying pretty steady around 86.5* Here is the Potting Mix I picked up
Nah bruh, you want to do feedings with higher nitrogen levels during veg, and then phosphorus during flower. Those MG soils can be too "hot" for seedlings and cause nute burn from the beginning, but some people have used it with success so we will see.
Ugh, now at this point I've heard and read both different sides about higher/lower nitrogen levels >.< Hopefully this little lady will survive but if she doesn't I'll finish my setup and just grab a clone from one of the clubs and see if I can do any better with that.
UPDATE!!!! Okay, so the seedling died unfortunately >.< so the other night I went to one of my local dispensaries and picked myself up a nice sized Pineapple Thai clone for 10$. So the plant was pretty tall for the little pot it was in so I instantly transplanted, following some great instructions from some video, (wasn't really that hard though) Okay, so I got my little girl on Friday night and put her under my 4, 26 watt CFLs. I fixed my grow room up A LOT better from when I had the seedling in there. I have the fan hanging from the light as to have constant movement of the leaves. I had put in a sizable exhaust hole at the top of my grow box but right now temps have been very nice staying roughly around 79-81* The clone had quite a bit of yellowing spots on her when I got her, but looking at pictures from yesterday to today, they look as if they're getting better. So without further wait, here she is This was taken the morning after I got her 10/16/10 These were taken today 10/17/10 Here's the setup I'm also curious about what CHEAP nutes I could get. I am on a very limited income so I'm curious to know, if I was to get some cheap nutes from home depot or something what exactly should I be looking for? I'm really new to this so that part I'm a little confused about. I have a couple of hydro stores near me that I could go to to get some nutes as well. I just don't have a clue what to get when it comes to that stuff. Any help from you guys would be greatly appreciated like always. Stay lit guys, I'm gonna smoke a bowl of some blue dream
Also, I was wondering if you guys can tell me about how far along this clone is? She officialy starts the 18/6 tonight. I just rhought I would give her a day of full light in her new pot and soil. I'm just curious how much longer I should veg before flipping the switch to 12/12
yo yo yo GC! It's been awhile since I've updated so I figured I would snap a couple of pictures of my baby before switching her to 12/12 starting tomorrow (possibly) Things were going smoothly until the other night >.< So a couple of nights ago I got pretty lit and fell asleep, which is normally fine because I have an alarm set on my phone to shut my lights off everyday at 1:00am (no timer ) and turn them back on at 7:00am. So later that night I wake up at 3:00am to see that my alarm never even went off So I was like whatever, it won't be that bad if I'm off by two hours. So I walked over the "cabinet" (I say that very loosely, lol.) and opened the door to find to my surprise, half of the lighting fixture had fallen at some point in the night and one of the bulbs had direct contact with the lower part of one the stems and the group of leaves down there as well. As you can imagine I quickly fixed the light an inspected her carefully. The part of the stem that the light fell on as got very, very weak and the top half then became too heavy for it and it sort of just fell over. So at that point I decided to tie her up to something to try and bring her back. One of the guys at my dispensary was talking to me today about it and said that I did the right thing and it should heal back up. He also instructed me to pull off any dead leaves. So at the moment I have one the the sides tied up to a support and the other slightly pinned down to the side of the pot. I was interested in experimenting a little with this plant due to the unique way it was sort of pre-topped when I got her. So basically since there is two stems coming off of a main stem I sort of see it as two plants. Since I have the one side tied up to the support (we'll call her, Dani ) I can't really do much with her. So I was thinking about taking the other side (we'll call her Amanda ) and tying her top completely down the side of the pot, from what I understand this will cause it to grow in more of a bush than a tree, let's say. Basically I'm wondering if it is possible for me to leave Dani to grow straight and normal, while taking Amanda and giving her a little LST. What do you guys think, has this been done? Can it be done? Will it be worth it? Or would I get two kolas if I left it the way it is?!? Any input would be appreciated, especially because if I'm going to LST Amanda, then I want to keep the whole thing in veg for like another week, otherwise I'm going to switch to flowering sooner. The NEW setup (much better) minus another, stronger fan on the left hand side Dani Dani's new growth (small bit of purple stems >.<) Where Dani got burned Amanda Also my baby has yet to receive any nutrients. I am wondering what my options are for cheap(er) nutrients that I can get. I have seen a bunch of nutrients in Home Depot and stores like that, but many of them have completely different NPK, so I have no idea what I should be looking for. I know a lot of people get FF nutes, but I don't really have the money for that, so any cheaper alternative would be great