1. Help Us Improve the Grasscity Growing Journal!

    We're rebuilding the Growing Journal feature and want your input. What tools or features should we add? What other platforms do you use and love?

    Click here to share your feedback!
    Dismiss Notice

Wanna grow some autos for the first time. Some questions.

Discussion in 'Growing Marijuana Indoors' started by thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019.

Tags:
Page 1 of 2
  1. #1 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    Hi guys,

    I pulled off my first grow around a year ago and documented the entire process in my journal. Yielded 1.3lb I'm seeing more and more people advising me to grow autos on threads. Not only for yield, but time constraints.

    I grew in coco coir for my first run. A lot of people like soil and vouch for the medium on here. I have no experience with it, but people told me it requires less frequent feeding and maintenance in general as opposed to coco.

    Because I'm pretty unfamiliar with how autos grow(only know how my regular feminized went for my first run), I don't know how many I should even attempt to germ for my growing space. My space will be a tent that's 5ft by 5ft by 2m long. A lot of people have vouched for The Vault on here for their auto seedbank. I wanna buy from them from how many people are pleased with them.

    If anyone could answer even a few of these questions, or offer any advise, it would help me out greatly. Since autos are seemingly a different game from regular feminized, I'm trying to get an understanding of what medium is the best for them to grow in and what I need to keep in mind here.

    Thanks!
     
  2. #2 bkarnaze, Jun 11, 2019
    Autos are like photoperiods in all but 2 ways.
    (1) They flower automatically, and (2) it's a waste of time to clone them.
    But almost anything else can be done with them, including topping, training, mainlining, fimming, etc.
    They MIGHT need a bit less food.

    Strains can vary between 1 ft tall plants that yield an oz, up to 7 foot autos that can yield over a pound.
    If a breeder lists an auto's size at over 1 m, then it can get pretty big, especially in hydro.

    The consensus on the autoflower network is probably to grow in some combination of coco, perlite, vermiculite.
    A lot of people there use autopots and hempy buckets, which are similar to hydro in plant size and yield, and much more than soil.

    A good, direct breeder source is mephisto. Their website prices seem high, but every 1 seed pack really contains 2 seeds, and there are excellent mephisto freebies on top of that. The real price is about 1/3 the listed price. This is for direct orders only, and doesn't apply to ordering mephisto seeds from a different seed bank.

    Unless small varieties are grown, about 4 sq ft per plant works well. Vertical height can be a problem.
     
    • Like Like x 2
    • Agree Agree x 2
  3. #3 Vee, Jun 11, 2019
    I don't think you will need that much space in the tent to grow
    I have grown THC Auto Bomb simce it came out er ...5 years ago
    a great mild white widow type of auto
    no fuss nice blast
    in truth I don't see you liking autos at all
    but go ahead and post back
    I use 10 liter pots over the 15 liter for my photo-periodics
    good luck

    ps I too back Mephisto the humblesmellyscope the better ....lol
     
    • Like Like x 2
  4. #4 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    So, I should stick with same coco+perlite 70/30 ratio I did for photos for the autos is what you're stating then? What about transplants? Am I still going to need to do this for autos?

    I heard of Mephisto as well. A lot have vouched for them for their great genetics. You're saying 4 square feet per plant. That means 2 feet per plant. Well within my growing space.. Hmm, but you're saying vertical height can be an issue with my tents' 2m height?

    What if i don't have a watering system and need to manually water? What would the best course of action be here then in terms of what kind of pots I need to buy? I have regular 1G pots and 3G pots.
     
  5. #5 bkarnaze, Jun 11, 2019
    I recommend that you do with autos exactly what you do with photos, with the possible exception of transplanting, which I know nothing about.
     
    • Like Like x 1
    • Agree Agree x 1
  6. #6 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    Interesting. Okay then. I guess that's what I'm going to go with. Thanks bro.

    I did three transplants for my photos with coco in veg. Cups>1G>3G pots. So, pretty extensive overall. Veg'd em for 3 months and then flowered for the next 9 weeks following this. From my understanding, autos also require zero light shifting in hours(kept at 18/6 til harvest)?

    What does the timetable look like for autos from start of veg to finishing in flower in terms of months? People have stated around two months and I just wanna know if that's accurate or not.
     
  7. #7 bryan oconner, Jun 11, 2019
    only think i want to add is keep in mind the added light time you run auto 24 hours instead of 12 double your bill.
    one thing i really like auto for . lets say your doing a bedroom grow you cant make it totally dark for 12 hours a day or have a shit load of light leaks . but the auto feed them at least 18 hours of light harvest . no need to worry about light leaks ever . . another thing about auto some of them will be ready in little as 6 weeks ! 6 fucking weeks no need to wait 4 to 8 weeks for veg then flower7 to 16 average 10 weeks for flower.
    yes i know some photo we veg for 6 months i have done a few longer about 8 months before flowering just to fuck around throw 4 hps 1000 on top of 1 plant see what you can get . its all fun
     
    • Like Like x 1
  8. #8 bkarnaze, Jun 11, 2019
    Grow style affects time to harvest a bit, and I can only report on autos in hydro while following the VPD chart.
    The 10 week mephisto strains do finish in 10 weeks.
    Some other breeders shade the truth a bit.
    My experience is that the average auto starts flowering in the 4th-6th week, the finishes after 12-14 weeks total.
     
    • Like Like x 1
    • Agree Agree x 1
  9. #9 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    That's insane compared to what I worked for with the photos. Six weeks to be completely done with any amount of plants is just crazy to me. 18/6 light hours are good from start til finish with the autos then is what you're stating, right?

    I have 1x 1000w light. That's all I'll be using in my space. I got an MH+HPS.
     
  10. #10 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    Ok, so I'm pretty sure I'll order from Mephisto. How many plants should I go for in this case for my space? I think 3 would be fine, but 4 might be pushing it?

    I just don't really know how these autos grow. Thanks for giving me the timetable. I'm gonna try to LST them as well. Top if that's possible, or even advised with these autos. How much yield do you think I should expect to garner if I grow in hydro(coco) and I have 3-4 plants?
     
  11. #11 bkarnaze, Jun 11, 2019
    Some people grow autos using 24-0 lights, the plurality uses 20-4 lights, and some use 18-6 lights.
    The same light schedule can be used from seed to harvest.
    Your 25 sq ft tent should be able to hold 4 large plants, 6 average plants, or 8 small plants.

    Right now I have an Autoseeds SuckerPunch that's 6 ft tall after topping and LST, but it wants about 9 sq ft.
    A Mephisto StrawberryNuggets is 2 ft tall, and wants about 4 sq ft.
    If you order from mephisto, they will give good height info.
     
  12. #12 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    Awesome. Why are you saying large, average, and small though? You can't control the veg time with autos I thought?
     
  13. #13 bryan oconner, Jun 11, 2019
    no you can not buttttttttttttttttttttttt just top the plant before it starts to flower. cut the main top stem to get it shorter problem solved not to large but it will be fat
     
  14. #14 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    "just top the plant before it starts to flower. cut the main top stem to get it shorter" All you're referring to here is topping right? I did this for my first run on all my photos. As well as LST.

    As @bkarnaze stated, I can train them with LST with zero issues. Is that correct?
     
  15. #15 bryan oconner, Jun 11, 2019
    correct
     
    • Like Like x 1
  16. #16 thebombhaha, Jun 11, 2019
    I'm excited to try them out. Do you think I should start them in larger pots as opposed to small cups like I did for photos? I assume roots grow fast as hell because they have such fast start->harvest times.
     
  17. #17 jtruog, Jun 11, 2019
    I've never grown autos so take this with a grain of salt. I personally would start them in the final pot. I haven't figured out why people would want to transplant autos OR photos. It seems like extra work that carries an unnecessary risk.

    I'm sure someone more knowledgeable can prove me wrong but that's just my thoughts.

    Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk
     
  18. #18 pat at the beach, Jun 11, 2019
    Do your research. Ive got about 15 grows done , however this is my first auto grow ever I went with tangerine dream that they claim is a 8-9 week flower cycle , im on week 11 and it probably has 3 more weeks to finish. The one thing I would suggest is to do what im doing right now , and that is I started some additional fem photo period seed once the autos were 4 weeks old. At least with the extended light cycle of auto's I can take advantage of the lights being on 20 hours a day to veg the photo period plants. Once these autos are finally done the fem photo period plants will be large enough to immediately flip to flower
     
  19. #19 bkarnaze, Jun 11, 2019
    Some breeders give FLOWERING time for autos instead of seed to harvest times.
    Other breeders give seed to harvest times.
    Your plants will probably need 8-9 weeks after flowering automatically begins in the 4th-6th week.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  20. #20 thebombhaha, Jun 12, 2019
    It’s about how many I can fit in my growing space. My goal is to be able to do 4 autos, but I need to find a seedbank that ships to me. I could use cropKing again, but I was told their phenotypes aren’t that great after my first run.

    I veg’d 5 photo plants for around 3 months and then switched to flower for another 9-10 weeks following this in my first run. All documented in my journal. Hopefully, I can get an idea of what to really do because it’s not like I never grew in my tent prior.
     
Page 1 of 2

Share This Page