lenhug said:

That's v cool, I only hope I can get anywhere close to your amazing grows. And thanks for words of encouragement.

I'm just in process of setting up my first indoor tent grow (after 2 initial outdoor grows this season). The one thing that's causing me most thought/ire is the soil/growing medium setup. So many different options and opinions out there so can be hard to filter and pin down. I think I have a plan (one easy, other not so much), just need to choose and try it though I suppose.

Annoyingly I'm travelling at Xmas (can't leave them on their own for 2.5 weeks) so don't think I have enough days left to start/finish so will have to be as soon as we get back at New Year. Can't wait!

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Greenjourneyman said:

you definitely will not get a full grow in before Xmas. However if you are able to hook up a reliable fish tank pump on a timer you could solve your h2o problems while away, even for that long.

Any way you had an actually question about soil and substrate. You are right there are an overwhelming amount of options. What I have deduced is it’s a matter of preference of the farmer. If someone really like compost, you better believe they will find a way to use and succeed with compose in their grow. It comes down to what is easiest and cheapest for you personally.

Ive gone through many attempts to find “the best” substrate including the following: coast of Maine dense soil, coco only with liquid fertilizer, half and half coco soil topical and liquid fertilize, all dirt from the back yard, dirt plus compost, reused living soil, and only coco with topical fertilizer. Some had better results than others, but for time and expense and total energy I’ve settle for what it use now.
Ratio 3:1 store bought soil (happy frog / coast of Maine / whatever on sale) then adding fox farm topical fertilizer as needed.

reasoning for this path is cost and ease. The coco soil mix provides good drainage and initial nutrients in the substrate for needing to add ferts. I only have to mix up soil in a big Tupperwar. Liquid nutrients are really cool but it’s so much time in measurement and exact pH balancing.

good luck with the operational set up. What did you have in mind for lighting?

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Greenjourneyman said:

Hey Lenhug,
That light will be a great starter light. As time goes on you may want to put more power your tent. Speaking of the tent, if you have the room for a larger than 3x3 footprint you may want to go with something like the picture below as it has more compartments. As your growing skill improves you will want to clone and have more than one life cycle happening at once, you will need more chambers to accomplish that (of course more lights too).
As to your soil question. Coco and peat moss are very different mediums. Coco is high drainage whereas peat moss is the opposite; but they both have very little / no nutrients to speak of so you will have to either add fertilizer treated soil for food. I have seen people use peat moss, I prefer the coco. (Also from an eco perspective the peat moss is ruining the planet slightly faster). Worm casting never hurt add away. However, if you plan on using a fertilizer product (liquid or topical) the fertilizer would be doing the work of the worm castings so a redundancy there.
Good luck man. you should set it all up to be fully ready to plant.

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Greenjourneyman said:

Day 16. (Not sure where I got 22 days last time, beans went in the ground Oct 15th).

most all have produced 3-4 leaf nodes, waiting for them to get a little taller then I can start the low stress training. Turn them all into sea monsters.

Close ups of the Ms Jillz x Golden Nugget and the Chem Haze. second grow on the haze it was pretty awesome the first time. I’m expecting big things again.

be well and grow on,

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Greenjourneyman said:

Hey Lenhug,
no problems, I’ve been growing and posting on this thread for a couple years now with little or no interest from the larger world / community. It’s nice to have someone to chat with and give advice. Thanks for coming by and asking questions. Also I’ve been doing this a while now and kind of take things for granted, you’re right I do have some amazing grows thanks for that validation. I see the big commercial guys and I think I have a long way to go.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, once you get a dialed In methodology it’s all just repeatable with different genetics. It sounds like you are on the way to getting it right the first time with your indoor set up. if you are thinking you’d want the extra chambers cop the bigger tent to start man. Trust me you’ll thank yourself later. (And yes I fully appreciate and understand the misses issue [the Bonnie Situation if you prefer] and negotiations to keep my hobby alive).
Ive only been out to Northern Cali but I hear your area is a beautiful one. I’m virtually a diagonal line all the across the county from you up in MA.
Im going to spend some time LSTing my plants tomorrow I’ll throw up some pictures then. See how all the little ones are doing.
be well and grow on,

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Greenjourneyman said:

Did the first round of Low Stress training on these plants. The main goal here is to get the lower branches to jump ahead in growth. We’ll see in about a week the results of this action. I like doing this with the unknown gender seeds as it will grow many long branches than can later be cloned. These are all photo period plants and will have to be culled for gender at some point. I generally try to get a few clones per plant then immediately bloom the parents.

Pro Tip: the smallest sized clothes pins from a craft store are the best for pinning down leaves and stocks. My preferred LST method.

happy to see the peppers are also growing just fine a little behind the cannabis since they took much longer to germinate. It’s the first time I’ve done food in my grow lab, I think I will continue to experiment with it, seems super simple. Maybe some grocery store squash seeds next?

be well and grow on,

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Greenjourneyman said:

Hey Lenhug,
no problems, I’ve been growing and posting on this thread for a couple years now with little or no interest from the larger world / community. It’s nice to have someone to chat with and give advice. Thanks for coming by and asking questions. Also I’ve been doing this a while now and kind of take things for granted, you’re right I do have some amazing grows thanks for that validation. I see the big commercial guys and I think I have a long way to go.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, once you get a dialed In methodology it’s all just repeatable with different genetics. It sounds like you are on the way to getting it right the first time with your indoor set up. if you are thinking you’d want the extra chambers cop the bigger tent to start man. Trust me you’ll thank yourself later. (And yes I fully appreciate and understand the misses issue [the Bonnie Situation if you prefer] and negotiations to keep my hobby alive).
Ive only been out to Northern Cali but I hear your area is a beautiful one. I’m virtually a diagonal line all the across the county from you up in MA.
Im going to spend some time LSTing my plants tomorrow I’ll throw up some pictures then. See how all the little ones are doing.
be well and grow on,

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Greenjourneyman said:

It’s an ongoing process with the LST. little bits on continuous adjustment, the goal here is to expose those under branches and have them get a jump on life. In that way I’ll have the main cola then then 3-6 large arms reaching upward as well.


@lenhug so for the winter time I have a space heater in my grow room. It sucks down The electrons but keeps the room itself at 60ish and the lights in the tents pump the plant temp closer the 72ish. I will say that it’s not ideal and I would like the plants at 80-85 but it is what it is. I manage.
the peppers are Habannadas which are a specialized cross breed of habanero pepper a cornell professor worked on for a decade or so. All the capsaicin has been bred out so they make your mouth tingle, just no heat. Super delicious.

@Otto Bonn hey man. Thanks for coming by. Im in the foothills towns just north of Westfield. Truly western mass, you ask a Bostonian they thin the state ends at Framingham mall. I do a winter indoor to set me up for an outdoor summer season. If you go back a page or two you’ll see the summer grow. NC is a great state I have a buddy in Asheville, also outer banks are amazing.

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