I don't even know exactly where to start as it has been a great while since I last posted. I'm fairly new to Indoor growing, I guess you could say I'm a "budget grower." I am in my second grow as my last 3 plants, from bagseed ended up dying probably due to using tap wateer when I ran out of purified water. My setup was pretty basic, after germinating the seeds, I started with a motor oil case as a starter box, lined with alluminum foil and used those energy saving bulbs, coil shaped lamb bulb (CFL?) After about 2-3 weeks they outgrew that box and I moved up to a trash compactor box, but lined it with this mirror like wrapping paper that resembles Mylar, from the Dollar tree store (couldn't find where to locate some Mylar). Where do you find Mylar? I also, at this point added another one of those enegy saving bulbs. I've been feeding the plants every other day with Miracle Grow Tomatoe Plant Food and flushing with bottled water the other days as water is needed. I use a mister type spray bottle to Foliar feed along with pouring the water/fertilizer solution. I use a combination of the foliar feeding and pouring the solution into the soil. Last week I stepped the light up to a Halogen type bulb, (I believe) It's like one of those bulbs you see used as a flood light or motion sensor light. I started the plants out for the first 2 weeks on 24 hour light, 2 weeks after that I started them on 18/6, and now recently I've started them on 12/12 light cycle in hopes of triggering flowering. My plants get a real light green almost dryed out look to the leaves, what could cause this? The plants constanly have a computer power source style, 12 volt fan runniong on them constantly. Imist the plants during there light cycle like every 1/2 hour to keep the humidity up. At this point I am so lost. Have I totally fucked up the vegitative to flowering stages? I recently came across another type of light I've been thinking of using in place of the Halogen. I'm not sure what kind of light it is considered to be but it is the same type of light used as a jobsite work light, like the rectangular ones that usually come on e tripod. The NPK ratio on the fert I use is 18-18-21, is this sufficient? Too much? I have 9 plants all together in this box and space is getting pretty crowded. I have been topping the plants trying to make them spread out instead of getting too tall. I've also recently found a closet style cabinet that is approximately 4-4.5 feet wide by 6 feet tall and about 3 feet deep. I've been contemplating building and switching over to this new box/ shed. Is there any kind of paint that resembles Mylar, that has the same reflective qualities or would i be better off just painting it a gloss white? Will the plants still flower even if I switched the light cycle too many times or too soon? I know I have a lot of questions and different points to cover but hope someone out there can help me salvage if not make these plants grow as good as they can. These plants have been in my closet since they were first started due to the fact that I have roomates that can't know about them. I've been waiting for these plants to flower to determine their sex so I can weed out the males. Have I totally fucked up or am i just overly anxiuos? Is there anyway to tell their sex other than by the flowers? I lost tack and thought I was in like my 3rd month, when I'm only 12 days past a month. As I said before I know this is alot of questions and different topics, but I'm new to the grower's world and any feedback, suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Please Someone Help! Thanks, Your fellow grower
Stop using the halogen bulbs they will not work for our little hobby, the heat from the bulb probably bleached out the leaves, cant be sure without pics. you really should feed every other watering instead of every watering with the occasional flush, i did this on my first grow and i ended up with a buildup. how old are they? as for the reflectives dont use aluminum all it does is keeps heat in the box and reflect hotspots which will cause burning of the leaves. pick up some flat white paint from like home depot (its really cheap) personally id go with some diamond cut mylar, its so much better than regular mylar imo heres one place that i think is fairly cheap http://www.basementlighting.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?page=1/PROD/RS4 Light changing constantly will just cause it alot of stress and it can hermi on you, try not to go back and forth
WHat a mess , for starters put some spaces in your post, it's very hard to read when it's that small and all running together. (infact i didn't read the whole thing). I would suggest you do some research into some successful grows in the "grow journals" area. You can find a grow that is similar to yours and then copy everything. As the other person said, halogen lights are all wrong for growing. The biggest problem with 1st time growers is they can't leave the plants alone, Instead of misting the plants every 1/2 hour why not leave a cup of water in the room (same effect). And plan your lighting cycle, if you start with 24 hours lights, then leave it like that until your ready to switch to 12/12. Stuffing around with the lighting will confuse your plant and most cause it to be a crossdressing freak !!! (which is no good for smoking) Haver a look in the grandpa grow guide in the 'stickys' section of this area, this will give you the most basic needs and set-up for pot. If you want a step-by step video of how to grow, i suggest watching the 'how to grow pot" series by Marijuana Man at www.pot-tv.com (only for broadband users) If you stick pot in the soil and just water it it will grow. All the other aspects of growing are just to improve the final yield, by making the plant bigger stronger and healthier.
Thanks for input. However I am still kinda lost, what should I do as for the lighting? Take the Halogen out and use the Job site type light (Incadescent?). Or should I go back to the Energy saving bulbs (Cfl's?)? What are the chances of them going to Hermi and how will I know. The plants are 6 weeks tommorow. I am attaching some pic of my plants. I hop ethey will help you, help me lol. I appoligize for the picture quality, it's the best I could get. I couldn't get them in the row box, cause the light would add too much white to the pic (glare) Well hope to hear back soon.
Personaly i would get rid of the Halogen because they give of far to much heat and will end up frying your plants. Just change back to cfl's or even better hps and keep them under the same light cycle.
So these lights, the Halogens, seem to be doing good as you can see by the pictures. I don't have a HPS, at least I don't think I do. What are these jobsite lights called? Should I keep them at the 12/12 I have them on now? How will I trigger them to flower if I leave them on that cycle? I'm sure it is much to early (6 weeks) to have changed them to the 12/12? Please, please help my plants are sceduled to come on at 5am and scheduled to go off at 5 pm. Will send pics of the light if needed, it looks like one of those rectangular spot lights that are on a tripod looking stand.
Im confused on what light you have are you talking about a site light and if you are they are halogen like you said before and they come in 150w,200w,300w and 500w This lamp wouldent be good for the plant. And all a hps light is is basically a street lamp from of the road that runs of a balast. You would be better getting a 250w 400w or even a 1000w depending on how many plants you intend growing. Is this your first grow if so why did you start the light cycle on 12/12 ?
The light is a jobsite light, but it looks as though it has some type of a ballast on the back. I've included pics of both: #1- front of the (jobsite) light #2- back of the (jobsite) light #3- front of the bulb I'm using now #4- side view of the bulb #5- best pic I can get of the interior of my growbox I can't really afford to go out and buy a HPS at the moment, so which of these would do best for the time being? The bulb has a marking on it that says 130 watts. The "jobsite" light puts off an enourmous amount of light and has a "bulb not too exceed 500 watts," warning on it, but I can't figure out how many watts it is or what type of light is exactly. The bulb that I am using now is accompanied by one of "corkscrew" energy saving lights, whatever they are called. I didn't start the plants on 12/12 light cycle I just recently, within the last week did. I started them at 24 hours, then about 2 weeks later starteds them on 18/6 and now last week started them on 12/12 in hopes of triggering them to go into the flower stage. Should I stay at 12/12? Go back to 18/6? Losing track and thinking that they had been growing longer had led me to believe it was adequete time to change their lightcycle. Please help the best you can as I hope to salvage these plants as much as I can. As you can see they look pretty healthy, just need to sex them. But how, now?
I have no idea what type of light this "job site" light is, like he said probably Halogen. Imo id stay away from using any type of lights youre unsure of but thats just me if you got some Cfls i would just use those and get some more, they are very cheap.check out inside sun.com they have some good prices for a Hps(flowering) or MH lamp(veg) save u its well worth it. try to stick with one type of lighting schedule dont keep switching back and forth or else youll stress it and it possible can hermi. How old are they? plants wont start flowering until its mature, usually about 6-8 (it really varies, plants mature when you see alternating nodes)weeks. Longer if its a Sativa Dom. Got some pics? Side of that when youre flowering make sure when lights off it is completly dark if there are light leaks it will hermi on you,and you dont want that.. heres a great thread by spanish fly about sexing http://forum.grasscity.com/absolute-beginners/101130-sexing.html#post1072068 Best thing is keep doing some research
What is this MH? Metal Halide? And where so I find one. I know it sounds stupid but I really don't have the money to go out and buy any lighting systems right now, as I am not working at the moment. Right now, I'm just trying to find a "quick" fix for the moment. I would be better off using the CFL's? Just to clear any confusion, are these CFL's a corkscrew shaped, energy saving bulb, like 13 watts? You asked for pics, but there should all ready be some posted, that I posted the other day. As you can see by the pictures that the plants are looking prettty good except for a litlle light browning of the tips of some of the leaves, deadening. Is it normal for the lower leaves to start dying off? Should I stay with the 12/12 light cycle? If so how will the plants know to flower?
Oh how so true spanishfly. Get the right light or just scrap the whole thing cause all you are going to get from what you are using is a higher electric bill!!!
yeah I didn't read that small text either but some ppl want to know the cheapest cause THEY DONT HAVE THE MONEY understand there are people alot poorer then you are
Just use CFL's...the more watts/bulbs the better. Search for journals by Polski and Volkal as they did some grows sing all fluro lights which are pretty cheap.
If you were referring to chimeras and spanishfly's post they are right...so dont start yelling in all caps..if you have crappy lights,soil nutes,ventilation, shit PH tester ( this is not something you wanna go so called "cheap")you really are wasting youre time...if you want "the cheapest" than shop around or dont grow till you have the proper equipment, its just the way it is listen to lucian and just use CFLs its cheap, and ive seen some amazing grows with just CFL's..stay safe
OK, i know the 'job site' lights you are refering to..(basically like the light used to light up road works and stuff at night. I wouldn't recommend them to use (but that doesn't mean they won't work)... If you are tight for money stay away from MH lights and go directly for a HPS light. MH lights work best for growth, and HPS work best for flowering. But a HPS can be used for both growth and flowering - so go for a HPS when you can afford one ! When you switched the light cycle to 12 on 12 off , you have already triggered the flowering stage, it might take a little while before you see the white hairs. The dark period is just as important as the light period, so try to aviod letting any light into your grow room during the dark pariod of your lights..... You can use CFL's for growing, but a HPS will cover more plants and give alot more light.... You could achieve the same watts with cfl's but you would need a hell of alot. Hope this Helps !!!
To you assholes who wanna sit there n talk shit about how I'm trying to "find a quick fix" for the moment, that is outright bullshit and fucked up. Look maybe not all of us can run out and by custom grow setups that cost 1000's of dollars at the drop of a dime. I have other things that have to be paid for first and as I said I'm having a hard time finding empoyment at the time. I posted on here to get y'all's opinion, not to be talked down upoin and ridiculed. I'm on here trying to grow something the best I can and you are ridiculing me for it. You don't have to help me, but please don't sit there and ridicule me for doing the best I know how. Go somewhere else you upity assholes! Another thing is that I wasn't trying to yell at anyone. I accidently made the words bigger than they looked when I typed it. I thank all you out there that are taking the time to answer my questions and not down talk me cause I can't afford a costly grow operation....You forget I'm just beggining. As for my plants they are doing alot better than I previously thought. It seems as though all the plants are females. They are showing the little pistils where the branches meet the main stock. They are also already showing sighns of budding at the very top and the buds are already lookin beautiful. I believe that this "halogen light" is working pretty good, as long as I occasionally mist the plants with regular bottled water. It keeps the humidity up and keeps the plants from drying up as I understand that that is a problem that they present (halogens). I fear that some of them did hermie on me though, I will have to form my final theory on the situation, after the lights come on after 5 p.m What do they look like when they hermie? Is it the pistils and little male ball sacks that appear? I will have to attempt to take some pictures if I can get a close enough zoom with my digital camera. Again I appreciate the time and knowledge that some of you have instilled in me and I will have to repay you by using it to produce the best bud I can and passing it on as well as keeping you all informed. As for the others who choose to condemn me for trying the best with what I have, you can just go fuck off with your stuck-up ass, snide asses. It's not like I have the money to spend and refuse to. It is so wrong for someone to sit there and say "you might as well scrap it and start over," after all the work and sweat I have put into this. As I said before not all of us can go out and spend 1000's of dollars on proffesional grow operations. Gotta start somewhere.
I figured out what the name of this jobsite light is, it's called an "Incadescent Luminaire" Do they put off too much heat? Who is to say who can grow and who can't. I find it totally repulsive to listen to someone sit there and believe that they can dictate who can grow and who can't. To all you stuck up, hypocritical assholes......Go fuck yourselves! I get on hear for knowledge and input not to be ridiculed and talked down upon. You are badly representing Grasscity.com Not all of us has mommy and daddy's money to go play around with. Thanks to thoise of you who aren't hypocritical bastards!
First off, you will get nowhere being abusive. No one is trying to say who may or may not grow, you came asking for advice and got given it - you just don´t like what you have been told. You try to grow under halogen lights and all you will get is a big electric bill. Get the right light or don´t bother.
I have never used a halogen light for growing so it's hard to comment. The misting has me a little concerned, only becasue if you wet the leaves of the plant and also have a light on them, you can get burn spots. Much like you don't water your plants in the middle of the day - you wait until the sun has gone down and is less intense. But if the misting idea is working, then just keep doing it. If you want to raise the humidity in the area, you could try some cups of water next to the plant, These will eventually evaporate giving you the humidity....... Take a chill pill as well dude, or have another cone....No need to get all worked up over a grow. Growing Pot it like getting a fish tank. Your going to kill some fish but with some trial and error it will all work out !!!