The Super Micro Grow Project Featuring: Dr. Herb, and Spottythedog Hey guys. I have just been reading some posts and got inspired to do more with my grow than to keep it to myself hidden away when I can share it and get new ideas and help others get new ideas. I have a strong passion for the cannabis plant, not only is it awesome stuff to consume. It also to me is most beautiful in the most unique ways. Anyway, I have gotten a few seeds from some bunk bud that a buddy brought over and I said "hey u know this stuff is bunk weed right? There's seeds in the grinder!" So I was able to save 3 of 5 seeds that didn't get grinned up, and germinated them in a dime bag with water. I found a cardboard box and constructed a mini portable grow box to fit on the bottom shelf of my cabinet. (TOTALLY STEALTH). I'm using a 23=100 watt florescent single bulb for vegetation, and a 40 Watt clear bulb for Flowering. I have no fan yet but am looking for a small battery powered hand held fan from dollar stores or super market to blow air around. The heat escapes the top, cool air comes in a hole in the bottom side. Located in the basement, where it's pretty cold. Now I have a family in the house that cant be smelling this plant or finding it, so it's pretty well hidden doing it's job. To contain the smell I had gotten strong scented candles and put them around the room. Even without the candles being lit, the fragrance is admirably smelly. So it should conceal some of the smell that way. I also had seen that people use some sort of GEL that I forgot the name of and have no idea how it works, but somehow eliminates the dank. Another possible smell spoof is a carbon filter, you can learn more about all this stuff with googles resources. My plant is 14 days old now and looking good, one seed is still in the soil though, one didn't germinate and the first one most likely feels like a male to me intuition speaking. I have already begun the LST process, I used a small colored paper clip that I bent into a hook and use it to hold the main stem down, The bottom leaves should if as planned remain a couple mm from the soil. Also some random seedling popped up but I'm pretty sure it's not cannabis, looks like a tomato plant. Not sure, if anyone knows I'm up for a tip. Thought I'd keep it anyway. Also I throw a lady bug in there every once in a while to take care of baby Marilyn, and eat the mites or w.e he does lol. Interesting to watch the lil guy go about his day on his endless mission to find food. Actually he ran away this morning so I need to find a new lady bug now. Oh and if you have any ideas, constructive criticism, tips/tricks, suggestions, feedback all welcome. Thanks for reading! asstheshit: Current Progress Week 1: March 10, 2016 Week 2: Week 3: Week 4: Nutrition Facts: Homemade formula: Water, Urine, Cocoa Powder, 20-27-5 Lawn Fertilizer.
That "clear bulb" you have is incandescent, at the very least halogen. Not only is this not going to sustain growth, but im pretty certain if you put it in an enclosed cardboard box with no ventilation yer gonna burn down your fucking house. Pleeeease get some fans goin asap Sent from my LG-D852 using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Yeah I actually started with that bulb and with three days in the heat was 80 deg F. I went out and got the new CFL which is a couple degrees cooler and I'm looking for a fan right now, no stores have mini hand held battery power fans so Im making a slightly bigger box as we speak. I have air flow just no fans.
Get out of that cardboard before you start a fire. Don't over water. You really should've started the seeds in a solo cup so you could confine the amount of space the plant has to get rooted into...which is the very first thing they do before they grow much in the foliage department. Confining the root space, gets the foliage to growing faster than having them in a huge container and waiting on that tiny seedling to form a root system. Start them small and repot them as they need it. Don't over water. This is the biggest mistake new growers make. You do not water your plant until it has used up the water you gave it last time. Very simple. You over water these things and leave their roots sitting in moisture all the time, and you won't raise a plant. Got to have defined wet dry cycles to keep them healthy. Also, you will have to have a way to check and adjust the pH of your water (using tap water is fine) to a range of 6.3 to 6.7 for soil. Not doing this and watering out of range will lock up the roots of your plants. It's a biggie when it comes to growing so make sure you've got a way to get it in the right range. These plants need very light and arid soil to grow best. If you can't manage to use formulated grow soil, you will have to add a bunch of perlite to the soil you are using. A ratio of around 60/40 soil/perlite works pretty good. Again, they do not like having their roots sitting in moisture and the perlite provides good drainage. If you're using good soil and potting them as they need it, you shouldn't even need much in the way of nutes until it's much closer to time for flower. Nutes should be given when the plant has used up what came in the soil. Giving them before that or just too early in general will only fry your plants. If this is your first grow, you could really help yourself out and de-stress this grow to a great extent by going to the new grower threads here on the forum. There are posts specifically dedicated to new growers that contain the information you're going to need to know to make this happen. You have to have a grow setup and lighting and all that. You have to have seeds. But you can have the greatest setup and strains to grow that exist and still screw it up royally if you don't take the time to learn how to do it. It's not rocket science, but I don't recommend the "fly by the seat of your pants" method when starting out. Read up on how to do it and get a better situation for a grow box and take off. One more thing, you were talking about smell above. You don't even get any real smell out of these plants until you get way on into the flower cycle. It's at that point you're going to have to be concerned about others smelling your plant. If you get yours to that point, you'll definitely have to have a plan to control it or a carbon filter to deal with it, because you can believe that it will stink up the entire house without it. Good luck. Hope all goes well! TWW
Thanks Widow, your point about about my watering schedule. So far I have had it soaking but only to help the other seedling grow which that one will be removed for 're potting etc. As for nutrients I'm just making the formulas I havn't applied any nutes yet. And I will be keeping the project in a cardboard box until I see reason other wise. Only because the temps are staying very low in my basement and I have set it up pretty safe from fire hazard. It is in my room so I check on the plant every hour or so just to give it some mist on the leaves and make sure my lady bug is still living off the sugar I fed it. Lil guy has lived for 4 days with the plant I have a video I can possibly share so u can see the grow in action. I have just finished painting my larger box, and adjusted my cabinet to a larger shelf size. ( good thing all the shelves can be adjusted hehe.) I will be posting an update within the next 24 though with all up to date info. Sent from my SGH-I747M using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Update 2.0Ok, so I will be doing updates fairly often, I will try to keep everything as organized as possible in this post as well. Cannabis Plant(s): The second seedling finally popped up but the seed was only half opened. So I carefully used my nails to crack it open more, and slide it off as gentle as possible. There is no physical damage to the new seedling and I have named her Eve. The first plant Marilyn is the star of the grow and will continued to be for a while, looks good and healthy. I have re-potted the second seedling into a piece of an egg carton. I'm going to try and stump it's growth early by keeping it in the small egg carton piece for a while, I don't know how long though, we'll see. I have already began making a nutrient formula, still got some residue in it so gotta work out some measurements still. Grow Box: 1. I have found a larger Cardboard box and used wall paint for the interior. I put 3 coatings of paint for most efficient light glow. The box can now fit a much larger plant or even possibly 2. 2. I went to Dollarama and found a battery powered mini fan. It's supposed to hang around your neck and keep you cool; I have it hanging in the box blowing the air around. 3. The new box now has 3 air intake holes in he bottom, and I'm just using the one big hole in the top for the exhaust, and heat ventilation. However this box doesn't get quite as hot as the smaller one with tinfoil. 4. I'm still looking for a splitter so I can have 2 CFL's running. Dollarstore doesn't have em so I will be making a trip to Wal-Mart or Home Depot. New Media Before and After Interior Setup Seedling 'Eve' before she was re potted. Thanks for keeping up with my second grow experiment, I appreciate all the feedback you guys are awesome! Keep those new ideas flowing guys. If anyone has something to suggest don't be shy. You might see your suggestion in the next update in a couple days.
Ok I got a little surprise an hour ago when I opened the box to check on the plants a mosquito flew outright in my face! So let's hope he doesn't get back in there and bother the girls. I also put my lady bug back in there to protect them as well.. I fucked up though! I was digging in the soil to put the new sapling in as you can see in the pic, and i cut some roots off. In the magnifying glass I saw fresh white baby roots in the spoon. I hope she gets well soon. New light that I took off my old cabinet, looks beaut for a little extra something. And here are my baby girls, and Ben the lady bug. Marilyn and Eve are looking healthy. After digging in the soil it looks moist enough to leave alone, so I will probably feed them next week. Let's see what happens, hope the roots find there way around the sapling.
I honestly wouldn't recommend using HPS or MH in a cardboard box. A single CFL may have been harmless, but you'd definitely be playing with fire this time. I once left a plant hidden inside my grow cupboard with a single CFL plugged into a timer while I went on a trip to Australia for 4 days.. and believe me when I say that I was WORRIED about my little girl when I was away. lol It was still alive and kicking when I came back, I was revegging it.. but boy, was I worried. You just can't trust electrical components, especially if there's going to be humidity inside your grow box.. you've always got to think safety first. My hair dryer exploded a couple of days ago, for no reason whatsoever. My entire palm was covered in black, but thank god I didn't hurt myself in any way.
Haha yeah, I've got an electrical burn on my hand before from an outlet plugging in a glue gun back in school. My new bulb there best defined as an HPS I suppose, isn't all that powerful actually it was for lighting a wood cabinet for long periods of time, plus it has a heat shield. The humidity needs to go up in this new box, because with the extra space now the temps have been keeping it pretty low. If anything I can just open more holes in the bottom for intake, or more in the top for exhaust. I won't be taking any long trips and If I do they will need to be sent to a friends to be looked at which I don't plan on ever doing. So I'm home with them everyday all day. I took the precaution of anything going sideways on me in there though. I have everything re enforced with duck tape. I just started running the bulb not to long ago so I'll leave it on for a day an see if anything needs adjustments. Thanks for the input, If I do make a fire... well just let's say I like playing with fire
Hey I get we do what we got to do! People are just concerned but I'm sure you're concerned and taking the most/best precautions with what you! So wish you the best of luck! Looks good so far! Sent from obamascookies iPhone
lol I agree hps in a cardboard box is bugged out. I got four cfls in a similar box and ran it all night with no fan closet door closed and no issues. Bet there won't be a fire but it's tru my man be careful. Keep us updated 114 Watts Micro CFL Cardboard
The HPS was left overnight with the CFL and she perked up so much! Plus the leaves on top almost doubled in size over a few hours. I HAVN'T SEEN HER SO HAPPY! The temps went over 30c/80f. So I just turned the fan on. The leaves growth may also be because I cut some roots off, so maybe it focused some of that root energy into the leaves. Yeah so even a low watt HPS does get hot after a while but DEFINITELY does the job well. Sent from my SGH-I747M using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Apparently, you can use coffee granules to filter the smell.I read it on here somewhere, they absorb the smell somehow. Sent from my E2303 using Grasscity Forum mobile app
@Jane_Bellamont is a micro grower here who uses that method I believe. I will be doing that for sure though. Plus some Udon gel for plan B. Sent from my SGH-I747M using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Grow box update and sneak peak of the progress. I cut up an old vacuum from my great grand mother. We were going to sell it in a garage sale; eh what the heck. So now we have air flow coming from outside the cabinet, which is much cooler coming just off the basement floor. I I have a lot of space to control the odor because it's a little a box in a big cubby. I will be using ground coffee beans, scented candles and incents. I wont be lighting anything, just simply Throwing in a bunch of strong scented items around the top and outside of the box. I will also cover the walls in bounty sheets on the outside of the box aswell. Im only allowing fresh air in the box from the outside of the cabinet to avoid unusual tasting/smelling buds lol. Marylin is pretty healthy. Just gave her a little misting. Looks like the soil needs to dry up a bit. I just fed her coco water with some grass fertilizer (2cups water, 1/2tsp grass fertilizer, 1/2tsp coco baking power). I don't recommend using this formula because it's just a test I came up with to see if it works. The leaves are getting bright, so something worked probably mostly from the grass food because the baking power isn't pure cocoa beans. I use regular city tap water. I have modified the head lamp aswell. I duck taped the two together. I am using a hard cover plastic notepad for the reflector ($1.50 at Dollarama). I cut the spine of the cover and took out all of the inside parts to it. Used duck tape to hold it all in place. Intake ventilation pipe from the vacuum installed on the button of the box for cool air to come from the room. I actually installed 2 more pipes on the top for the exhaust. It is pretty effective with no fan it keeps the temps at 30. That's because the room is so cold in the basement abd with the weather that only cold are is going to come in and the cabinet is warming up my rooms which is pretty cool. I got that white plastic basket on the bottom from dollarama aswell. So you don't have to worry about spending $$$ to make a setup like this. I think I spent a total of like 20$ including a timer from dollarama, and they sell light bulbs to. And that's all so far Sent from my SGH-I747M using Grasscity Forum mobile app
That reflector is ace. Idk if id trust it with more than a couple bulbs tho. In all honesty its probably a little early for nutrients, your nutrients are certainly unique at that. Interested to see how this goes. Sent from my LG-D852 using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Also whats up with the third plant? That is not greens my friend Sent from my LG-D852 using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Yeah definitely not herb. In all honesty I don't know where it came from. It's a random plant thought I'd just leave it there anyway. Looks like a tomato sapling, or maybe crab grass lol idk. It is early for nutes, but I barely put nutes. Sent from my SGH-I747M using Grasscity Forum mobile app