Hey guys, Nothing much going on just yet. I’m about to get going here shortly when seeds arrive. Just a simple T5 grow with some replacement LED bulbs. Here’s the space I’ll be working with. Looks like I need to grab a roller and get those walls painted white. Not too far from the house I have access to some Daddy Pete’s brand bagged mixes. Mostly want to try it out because it’s local, some of it has the organic label and honestly I find the name hilarious. Most likely I’ll just be growing autos but I may pop a couple photo seeds too just in case. RD https://www.daddypetes.com/daddy-petes-sea-n-farm This one looks closest to a Coots mix. Hoping they have the Pete-lite mix as that looks the best for a seed starter.
Whoops I was gonna share the two bags I bought later. I got the one in the above post about a week ago. Thinking it might be a good idea now to add a gallon or two of coir to it as a starter mix for autos. The other bag I bought lists cow manure first, then bark, omits vermiculite altogether and lists sand last. I’m thinking I’ll use this as the main soil for an auto. I’ll try another in a 50/50 mix with the sea and farm and another in straight sea and farm. Then I’ll sea what happens. RD
Day 1 has begun! Stuck two of em in a black 27g tote. In the two bagged soils I mentioned, plus a couple handfuls of an all purpose organic fertilizer. Found a bag of Organic Jiffy Mix seed starter, mixed a few handfuls in around where I planted and used a solo cup of it straight up where I put the seeds.No drainage holes. Gonna have to be careful watering. Apparently I’m back to winging it. Hopefully tomorrow I get it setup better. Right now the T5 is leaning against the wall. Both are Sour Stomper - big thanks for the help! RD
I suppose this was a productive way to spend another rainy Sunday. Gotta get a small fan and a thermometer/ humidistat would be nice too. Heck maybe even a timer for the light. Probably should bug @Organic sinse over in the auto thread. I think I’m gonna refrain from planting anymore till I know the mix will work. RD
Day 8 (I think) Been a lil too cautious and kept the light too high. Was seeing a bit of stretching. Seedling in the background actually had flopped over but the top was still growing upwards. I’ve only had a fan for 3 or 4 days. Brought some leaves in this morning and I’m afraid I brought pill bugs in with it. I found a ton of pill bugs under a board that was in contact with the ground a couple weeks ago when I started cutting boards for a worm bin. So I should have known better. Think I’ll order some nematodes from Arbico Organics that @TimJ mentioned to me awhile back. I’ll release some with the plants and also into the worm bin filled with leaves to see if it works. Bummed me out seeing them around as I was really hoping to make use of all these leaves. Also found a bunch of termite damage in the shed something I’ve never had to deal with. Jiffy mix and the soil mix seems to be doing Ok so I got that going for me. May start some new seeds soon but I don’t have any containers or soil right now. Trying my best to pay attention to these lil seedlings and enjoy the experiment and getting things dialed in. Biggest surprise is how close I can get the light. @Organic sinse is there a big difference between day 1 and day 8 as far as how close I can get the light? RD
I've never had any issues with pill bugs like some folks have. I've had them in my pots and in my worm bins without issue. What I do seem to be breeding is millipedes in my worm bins. They came in with the leafmold/comfrey compost I use for my worm bins.
Pill bugs only seem to go after my little sprouts. They seem to leave the established plants alone. Could be an issue for you at this stage.
That seems to be the case with others. Maybe the pill bugs just like my growing medium better than my seedlings or I've just been extremely lucky.
Day 1 I always go really far away, like 3’ with a cob. I watch for legginess and close the distance daily. By day 8 I am often closed in to about 2’. I kind of maintain that 18-24” throughout the rest of the grow. Ive found out thst too much light day 1 and 2, really slows em down. Start high and drop about 6” on day 3 or so is kind of my go to move. Watching em is the key. Cheers Os
Right on. Day 1 I didn’t even have a light set up yet! I only turned on all 8 bulbs a couple days ago too and one is burned out. Be honest with me here are they looking a bit behind schedule for day 8? I’m thinking so. I always saw my photo plants grow faster than autos for the first 2 weeks but that could easily be due to operator error! RD
Ya know there was a certain point where I thought all this talk of pill bug damage was nonsense. I always had a few around and it was never an issue in smaller grows I had. When I ran a dispensary I had (16) 500 gallon beds and I brought in about a dozen garbage bags full of leaves and a couple bales of straw for mulch. I saw an explosion of pill bugs and they managed to kill a couple weaker full sized plants and did quite a bit of damage overall. If I kept the place I was about to bring in a half dozen chickens I had and not feed for a week! RD
They could be a touch behind its hard to tell really. I will say this as a grower that always runs 6 different strains at the same time, there is a huge range of variablility the first 2-3 weeks, The ones that start slow, usually come back and pass the others at about 21 days. I think some just like to get their roots established more in the beginning, and some take off above ground and then kind of slow while their roots catch up. This could even have to do with having air and soil temps that are perfect for one at a certain stage. I think ya just have to let her ride and see what happens. Cheers Os
Well it appears like ElBurnoDeluxe has occurred. First symptoms of slight leaf tip burn about a week ago. Back to the drawing board! I did see that Lowe’s has peat moss, lava rock and ag lime. $22 for a 3 cf bale of peat and I’m used to paying $13. Ouch! Tiny 1cf bags of lava rock for $6-7. Not seeing much for perlite around. Still very much trying to get used to the area. RD
In my area Lowes only sells Miracle grow perlite and it has nutrients in it. Home depot sells Vigoro perlite. I use the Vigoro brand. Lava rock is very expensive here too, that's why most of us on the east coast use perlite. The CSPM has almost doubled in price on the east coast in the past few years. Not sure why.