So ive been growing in spacebuckets for about 2 years and have now bought a 4x4 grow tent 1000w led lamp and carbon filter etc... I was using bottled fox farm nutes and just basic dr earth soil from home depot. Im wanting to go full organic and only supply nutes with super soil and compost tea's. I can use compost tea to supplement my super soil correct? I was also wondering about roots organics as my base medium but i heard that can burn seedlings and seeing that i only grow from seed (just a personal preference mine) what would be the best soil for my seedlings until i transplant for full veg and flower. Also i found some supersoil pre-made online called "kind" it comes from Michigan and was wondering if anyone has used it? I live in a big city on the east coast with no real yard so i dont really have anywhere to mix my own super soil. Thanks in advance, Averagejoe
Make your own mix, i use FFOF and Happy Frog 50/50 amended with wormcastings, kelp meal tomato tone and hi cal dolomite lime, I just finished a 60 day veg and in 4th day of flower have given these plants nothing but water and a few top dressings of bat guano. Only way to go.
Roots and fox farm are both fine for seedlings, they are hotter soils but I haven't found it to cause a problem at all (I use FF)
Lots of us around here build are own soils. Buying bagged soil like fox farms is not making your own as mentioned above. Check out the organic section and look into actually building your own organic soil.
I was going to and still might use subcool's super soil recipe. I'll definitely look into making my own normal soil as well. Thanks for the tip and where to look.
Just a heads up most 1000w led's aren't actual 1000 watt hps replacements. That number simply represents the number of leds in the array like 200 5 watt leds. The manufacturer doesn't typically run them more then 40% full power though. Most 1000w cheaper led's I've seen run something ridiculously low like 300 actual watts. I have a sneaky suspicion you'll be under powered in a 4x4. It took me over 700 actual watts of led to fill one up and mine run hot not 40% full power. This is after trying 2 runs with just a 515 actual watt light. It wasn't quite enough for the 4x4 so I added another 255. Look at the actual watt pull of your light at 120volts in the specs. If it's not at least 550-600 watts it's not really capable of filling a 4x4. Mars current series of lights that fill 4x4 spaces are 740 watts for the epistar and like 680 watts for the cree 256.
Im also an electrician watt conversion on my light is equal to roughly 640 watts. I'll check lumens and foot candles once the light comes in
Warrior mix from fox farm is great stuff and feeds for 3 weeks to a month which should get you to a 5 gal bucket. Also look into organic root boosters like Dutch pros take root. Or you could check into using pro mix some sort of ocean compost like lobster or crab or something. Just watch for the fackin fungis gnats. Also bird guano with some dolomite lime and you should only have to water. Mind you you don't have to let the soil brew or bake or what ever any one wants to call it. I use the same thing from veg to bloom. But at about 5 weeks in a 10 gallon pot your going to run out of bird shit and your plant will start to yellow. So plan it that by the time your plant is running out of grub you should be flushing anyway. Good luck hope all goes well.
But thank you for the concern. I ordered a mars hydro light. If need be I'll supplement with another light but my conversion said it would roughly put out 640 watts.
Yeah i thought it was 1000w its actually 1200w the specs actually say it puts out 552 true watts so i guess my calculations were wrong. Thanks for making me double check.
It may be ok but in the HPS world most people if they're using a vented hood run a 600 watt in a 3x3 and a 1000 watt in a 4x4. Older burple style LED's like you and I have are only a little more efficient then hps. Maybe 25-30%. That means you should still need approx 750 watts to fill a 4x4. Even if you look at the high tech cob led fixtures available with the best leds around the fixtures designed and built for 4x4's are in the 600+ watt range. Those led's are much more efficient then the older 3 and 5 watt single diodes. Timber Grow Lights 600 Watt Vero29 V7 4x4 Framework Here's my dated setup. 2 CLW 110 vegmasters and a platinum p450 & p900. I spent way too much. 180 watts veg, 770 watts bloom. The harvest I'm chopping down should be in the 20-24 oz range if I counted everything. Not an awesome figure on yield but I'm working my way up to respectable range. Near 1g/watt.