First Grow - Soil & Leds Indoor Tent

[jinxjj]

Hi All,

Figured i would start a journal as I'm bound to make mistakes and could use any advice along the way to ensure i am successful. I will try to post pics as much as possible to keep it interesting.

Goals:
- To successfully grow 8 plants and harvest them
- Learn as much as possible
- Start an SOG perpetual grow

The Setup:

- 10'x3'x7' PVC Tent with Panda-Poly Walls
- 4'x3'x7' Veg room
- 4'x3'x7' Bloom room
- 2'x3'x7' Clone/Seedling room
- 550CFM 6"x24" Phresh Filter
- 6" Hyper Fan
- 450Watt G8 LED BLOOM Light (280W actual draw) -
- 450Watt G8 LED GROW Light (280W actual draw) -
- Small heat mat for my seed tray/solo cups (with temp controller)
- Large 48"x20" heat mat for when i pot up to 5gal pots.
- Small heater


The Grow:
- Starting with indica bag seed (might have a sativa seed or two in there as well)
- Will be using Humboldt Nutrients soil
- Have various nutrients on hand which i will use when the time is appropriate (GH, Soul Synthetics, and Roots Organics)

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

congratulations on your journey....the only diff between our grows is I use 600 watt kooltubes rather than led's and t-5 lights. Ill stick around and watchya progress. Good luck if I can help you I will.

 

[jinxjj]

11/21/2014:

Planted 24 seeds of Indica (Jiffy peat moss pucks) and possibly had some purple sativa seeds in there as well. Heat set to 80* and temp prob is between 2 pucks at level seeds are at. Small pool of water in bottom of tray, enough to fill depressions.

11/24/2014:

4 seeds have broken the soil and I checked on 2 which are still growing the root beneath the surface, my guess is the rest will break surface within the next day or 2. The dome has been removed from the tray and room temp is being kept around 75* and soil is being kept around 80* on temp controller.

Room is between 50-60% humidity.

Placed 2 - 6500K 23watt CFL bulbs above the tray about 8 inches from the pucks. Each bulb is 1450 lumens, giving me a total of about 3000 lumens.

Planted 9 more seeds in solo cups with saran wrap over the top since i was worried about all the bad things i have been reading with those damn Jiffy trays. Hopefully i don't loose all the seeds i planted in the Jiffy tray, most of them seem to be doing fine (see attach pics).

11/25/2014:

Most of the seeds are starting to pop out the soil and grow!!! Woo hoo!!!

 

[jinxjj]

I also forgot to mention in my first post but i plan on being rather scientific and growing several different test groups of plants to see how these nutrients work out. I don't plan on adding any nutrients until they are at least a couple weeks old, i don't want to kill them when they are just babies!

So far my current plan is:

1x Control Plant - This will only get water (unless it starts dieing and i have to save it with something)
1x Plant using GH flora series at 1/3 strength of their recommended schedule for entire grow
1x Plant using GH flora series at 1/2 strength of their recommended schedule for entire grow
2x Plant using GH flora series starting at 1/4 strength, then slowly ramping up to full strength for the rest of the grow (any advice here?)
1x Plant using Soul Synthetics and Roots Organics stuff at 1/2 strength for entire grow.
2x Plant using Soul Synthetics and Roots Organics stuff at 1/4 strength then ramp up to full strength slowly.


Here is what i have for nutrients:


Contains:
- 16oz FloraMicro
- 16oz FloraGro
- 16oz FloraBloom
- 8oz FloraBlend
- 8oz Liquid KoolBloom
- 4oz FloraKleen
- 1oz RapidStart
- 1oz Floralicious Plus

Also have the following:
- 16oz Aurora Soul Synthetics BLOOM
- 16oz Aurora Soul Synthetics Infinity
- 16oz Roots Organics Budda Grow
- 16oz Roots Organics Trinity Big Catalyst
- 160z Roots Organics HPK
- 16oz Roots Organics Budda Bloom
- 1x packet Roots Organics Uprising Bloom
- 2.2lbs Peruvian Seabird Guano 12-11-2 (not sure i am even going to use this, it was free so i took it but no idea what the hell it is for just yet...)

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

if you haven't looked into og biowar products I suggest you investigate what they bring to your grow mediums/plants. great info here and you may be able to get all you need from those packs instead of using a plethora of diff products. just a thought. very solid set-up tho.

 

[jinxjj]

Thanks man! My friend who has grown successfully in the past with some large setups told me to go with the GH starter pack i got, and all the other stuff was given to me for free so figured I'd do a test run and see how they perform. Any suggestions on good threads/articles to learn about nutrient usage? Seems like all i have been doing is read read read lately :)

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

oh geez yeah here let me see what I can find/help ya with. if your into organics you may find this thread fun.....https://www.thcfarmer.com/community...atics-even-veganics.55033/page-6#post-1365440

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

if you ever deciede you wanna use a compost tea once there bigger I have acouple recipes I could share with ya guy. heres one.........
Part 3 the tea recipe you requested


You can use queen size knee high nylon stockings for tea bags. 3 pair for a dollar at the dollar store. Tell 'em you use them for paint strainers. Put the recommended tea in the stocking, tie a loop knot in it and hang it in your tea bucket. The tea should look like a mud puddle. Agitate the bag in the water vigorously. An aquarium pump and air stone will dissolve oxygen into the solution and keep the good bacteria (microherd) alive and thriving. Let it bubble a day or two before you use it. If you find you are making too much tea and having tRECIPE #3 (My favorite)
If you want to use guano tea and kelp...
2/3 cup High P Guano (Indonesian or Jamaican)
5 tsp. Maxicrop 1-0-4 powdered kelp extract
(That mak
Guano Tea and Kelp:

Seedlings less than 1 month old nute tea mix-
Mix 1 cup earthworm castings into 5 gallons of water to make the tea.
Add 5 tbs. Black Strap Molasses.
Use it to water your seedlings with every 3rd watering.

Veg mix-
1/3 cup Peruvian Seabird Guano (PSG)
1/3 cup High N Bat Guano (Mexican)
1/3 cup Earth Worm Castings (EWC)
5 tsp. Maxicrop 1-0-4 powdered kelp extract
(That makes the "dry mix". You can make all you want and save it to use later.)
Mix with water @ 1 cup of dry mix into 5 gallons of water to make the tea.
To that 5 gallons of tea add:
5 tbs. Liquid Karma
5 tbs. Black Strap Molasses
Use it to water with every 3rd watering.

Flowering nute tea mix:
2/3 cup Peruvian Seabird Guano
2/3 cup Earth Worm Castings
es the "dry mix". You can make all you want and save it to use later.)
Mix with water @ 2 cups of dry mix into 5 gallons of water to make the tea.
To that 5 gallons of tea add:
5 tbs. Liquid Karma
5 tbs. Black Strap Molasses
Use it to water with EVERY watering.
o throw it out, use 2 1/2 gallons of water and cut the nute amount by half.

 

[jinxjj]

Thanks for the info! Maybe i can put that guano to use....

I do have a pH question, i was told my soil should already be the perfect pH and i tested my water and these are the results:

Total Iron: 0 ppm
pH: between 6.5 to 7.5 hard to tell because the colors are so close
Total Chlorine: 0 ppm
Total Hardness: 50 ppm

Do i need to bother checking regularly or should i be fine using soil? I bought some pH up and down just in case i need it.

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

that's an pretty pricey recipe...im in the process of trying to find a k.i.s.s simple recipe for us to follow, that lil mofo right there nearly bankrupted meh! lol!

 

[jinxjj]

I have never really hard of the teas before but sounds interesting. I am really open to any growing method right now, i heard hydro has a higher learner curve and it would have been much more expensive.

 

[jinxjj]

11/26/2014:

Day 5 and seedlings are moving a little slow, my friend seems to think the soil is too nutrient rich and I've read these stupid Jiffy pucks are not good for cannabis. Seems the outer shell of the seed is getting stuck on the leaves of most of them, friend seems to think they will be fine just need to give them time.

Hopefully the other seeds i have in the solo cups break ground in the next couple days and were viable seeds. Should also have some Nepalese Watermelon clones coming my way soon (100% real from a breeder).

 

[jinxjj]

Was able to get that seed crap off a majority of the ones that were starting to sprout. Put some spit on them and then gently peeled off the crud that was keeping the leaves sealed together.

 

[jinxjj]

11/27/2014:

Had to save a few more seedlings by picking that seed coating crap off the leaves. Almost all have popped and are doing well pics to follow.

The seeds I planted in the beer cups are also starting to pop up. Running out of space with my current rigged up light setting so will have to move all these under the LED soon in my tent.

How far should I keep the LED from the seedlings so I don't fry them? 450watt LED with 280watt actual draw, link in first post.

Also, how soon can I transplant those jiffy pucks into some better soil in beer cups? I'm thinking about doing it now for the bigger seedlings that already have leaves.

 

[jinxjj]

Bigger seedlings at the end of the tray are 2" tall.

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

Um im not sure bud cause ive never used leds, hmmm hopefully someone with led experianc ewill chime in!

 

[jinxjj]

No worries man, thanks for trying to help. How do the seedlings look like they are doing so far? I just gave them some water last night as the pucks were starting to get dry. I recently took a mylar emergency blanket and wrapped it around the tray to contain the light from my CFLs better and that seems to have given them a little boost but hopefully i can get them under my LED grow light soon and watch them really take off.

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

good.....I would say try to keep the light at least a foot away from the ytops of the babies maybe farther..you can experiment with varying heights until someone chimes in. ya never know you may find a sweet spot yourself without anyone needing to help. Like I said before if I can help you I will.

 

[VERMONTSKUNKS]

lol your gonna have a lot of mouths to feed soon!

 

[jinxjj]

Tell me about it.... Luckily i have a water pipe i can tap into if needed right near my grow tent. Ideally i would like to setup a drip irrigation system if i end up sticking with soil or just some type of automated watering. Seeing as this is my first time i think its best to do it all by hand and get a feel for whats right before i try to automate things. I'll probably wait till Friday/Sat to move them under the LED just so the stragglers can catch up and open their leaves.