Multiple watts of light in veg?

[Green Giant]

Hey farmers, I use one 1k MH for my veg room, but I need more light, I am an old salt water reef keeper so I have plenty of smaller watt lights that I do not use anymore...

Let me run this idea by you guys... I will remove my 1K light and install many other smaller lights in its place, so as the plants will move around the room and be under progressively more watts each step until into flower.

Start off under two 8 bulb T5 fixtures, then under two 250W MH then the last stop is under two 400W MH and into flower the go....

What do you think? Will I have any problems with this?

 

[El Cerebro]

sounds like a decent plan so long as the bulbs aren't old ones. still though, they're not going to grow and 'harden' like under the 1k. guess it depends how tall/long you want to veg..

 

[Cat Jockey]

How long is your veg time? If it is a month, you will notice a difference. I used to run an E&F veg room that had T-5's for the first week, a 400W for the second week and a thowie for the last two. It is all about intensity with the different HID wattages. A 400W will simply not produce the growth that a thowie can.

I don't see any problems, but I guarantee you that if you take one plant and keep it under a thowie for the entire veg time and you take another on your different bulb journey, the thowie plant will be bigger. No criticism about your plan, just what I have experienced using different bulbs during the veg stage.

 

[LexLuthor]

It depends on the # of plants, if you have so many that they don't fit under your 1k, then it might be better to use your plan because you can seperate your plants so 1/3 would be under the T5's, another 1/3 under the 250's and so on. That way you can get them alot closer to the bulbs and they will grow just fine. Of course, if you have 1 plant under a 1k and 1 plant going through your plan, then the 1 plant under the 1k will grow better, but thats not the case. There is a point of diminishing returns, a plant can only absorb so much light, so having too much is useless. I see this sometimes with seedlings, so your plan might be better, but I can't say for sure because I can't see your growroom and the development of your plants under the 1k. Your gonna have to try and see if it works, good luck.

 

[Green Giant]

sounds like a decent plan so long as the bulbs aren't old ones. still though, they're not going to grow and 'harden' like under the 1k. guess it depends how tall/long you want to veg..

What do you mean by "harden"? Are you saying they will stretch more?

It depends on the # of plants, if you have so many that they don't fit under your 1k, then it might be better to use your plan because you can seperate your plants so 1/3 would be under the T5's, another 1/3 under the 250's and so on. That way you can get them alot closer to the bulbs and they will grow just fine. Of course, if you have 1 plant under a 1k and 1 plant going through your plan, then the 1 plant under the 1k will grow better, but thats not the case. There is a point of diminishing returns, a plant can only absorb so much light, so having too much is useless. I see this sometimes with seedlings, so your plan might be better, but I can't say for sure because I can't see your growroom and the development of your plants under the 1k. Your gonna have to try and see if it works, good luck.

That is what I have going on, the Veg plants will not fit under one 1K MH, so I will use one T5 fixture over my EZ Cloner, then the other T5 fixture over the rooted clones, then under the two 250W MH as adolescents, then under the 2 400wMH before going into the flower room. I usually veg for about a month, but since I switched up to chow mix they are growing at a much faster rate.

 

[Bannacis]

I like that set up, its a good progression up to flowering, what you using foe flowering? the 1k watter?
also allows you to give your girls a more controllable set up.

 

[Green Giant]

I like that set up, its a good progression up to flowering, what you using foe flowering? the 1k watter?
also allows you to give your girls a more controllable set up.

I flower under 3-4 k HPS depending on how many ladies I have in the room. I may upgrade my electrical so I can run 5-6k soon.

 

[Bannacis]

sounds good...