Update:

Long live the Coco! I just had enough of the insane diagnostics and having to play PI Fastforward just to get some smoke. There's enough to deal with as a nub without rampant pH changes so I've repotted everything that was in the flood and drain into 100% coco. Gave the roots a spritz of rhizo to help ease the passage and then a soak with nutes.

The roots did look brown and dodgy on a few of them but lots of healthy white growth too, so rather than cut it off I just left it...for better or worse. They'll either pull through as my first plants or not...but I'll do my best to get them into a flower-able state.

A few post-change shots. The coir pot is the Afghan germinating, but it seems to be growing mildew after only a couple of days...it looks like a very fine white powder, but I figured it could just be nute salts? (formulex solution) Difficult to see on the photo. If it gets worse I'll bin it pronto.

The first two photos are both WW, the one with the clay top is in soil and was removed about a week ago - for comparison with the other WW that has stayed in the pH rollercoaster. The hydro one looks more yellow and olivey, whereas the soil one looks more deep/foresty/proper green.

Also have got the lights about 2ft away (the tape measure in that photo is clipped to the reflector, so the bulb is about 10cm down...do it's about 60cm away from the tops). Is this about right?

Day 1 of not waking up panicking about pH or nute temps \o/

Quick germination update: The 5 MMGxG13 all have sprouted (100% germ rate!!) and a couple were poking taproots out the bottom of the cubes, so I potted them in coco. Of those 5 seeds I pre-soaked 2 in distilled water for 8 hours and then tissue paper...the other 3 I planted straight into rr cubes. Even easier was to plant the 2 Pure Afghan seeds in coco, Zoolander style. Both have come up. In future I'm going to do it coco style - easy, and no risk to the seed in transplanting a small taprooter into a hole with tweezers.

All the transplanted plants from the hydro system look to be healthy and happy, and survived having hydrotons ripped off their feet. Am going to water them later on this evening to give the coco a bit of a chance to dry out a bit, to encourage a bit of rooting.

In testing: I left out a 1ltr jug of my coco mix overnight (using 70/30 RO to tap), which included rhizo to see what the pH changes would be like outside of a recirculating system (i.e. to rule out airstone and hydroton effects). The pH this morning is 5.9 from 5.8 last night. I can only think that my not soaking the hydroton in pH balanced water was the cause, or my airstone is shite. Dunno. Will work that one out another time.

I think the height of your light will be just fine there FF. And welcome to the "coco club". Lots to love on this side of the fence.

FF's Coco Ditty (to the tune of Amy Winehouse's Rehab)

They tried to make me go to hydro
I said no, no, no.
Yes I been in soil, but its too much toil
You wont know, know, know.

I ain’t got the time
And if my girlies thinks im fine
They've tried to make me go to hydro
I wont go, go, go.

I’d rather be at home with ray
I ain’t got 70 days
Cos there’s nothing, nothing you can teach me
That I can't learn from four twenty

Didn’t get a lot in class
But hydro is a pain in the ass

They’re tryin to make me go to hydro
I said coco, coco, coco
Yes I tried black, but when I come back
You wont know, know, know.

I aint got the time,
And if my girlies thinks im fine,
They tried to make me go to hydro,
I now do coco, coco, coco.

The man said, why you think you here?
I said, I'm done with beer
Im gonna, im gonna loose my babies
So I always keep my coco near

:)

Nice work Fast Forward! hehehe I like it!

No news is good news :) Things seems to moving along nicely and now it's much more a waiting game than it is a detective/diagnostic game (the way I thought it would be).

I've started to LST a couple of the WW, after reading threads here and getting some great advice from PGW et al. I had some of these Bendz things that I got sent as a sampler, so I've put them on 3 of the WW at the bottom, to get more light at the side branches. Going to order some more and get crazy with this (on the WW...everything else gets left alone).

One question: what does curling leaves on baby seedlings mean? (are these rams horns?) I've moved the light away but it doesn't really have much effect. I'm using a low dose of nutes on them so I hope it's not burn. They seem happy enough, just looking a bit odd...

What are your temps and humidity running in there bro? Most margin curling is caused by heat and or humidity. And yes, each strain will have their own individual environmental preferences. That is likely why your other plants look fine.

Give us your temps and humidity, and we can go from there.

That is one funny song , Nice FF and eveything lookin nice and gotta agree with PGW about the heat . Thats a simple fix most of the time .:)

It's a small budbox, 75x75x100cm, and until this morning the only ventilation was a desk fan rotating in the corner. I think humidity might have been right up there @ 80-90% but I didn't think it would be a problem for the kids (and saves the under soil seeds not yet germed wet/damp and from drying out too quickly).

I put a cheapo but amazing mini circulating fan (really mini, like 3" or so) that fits in the roof vent perfectly, so that's now expelling the hot air. Temps now at 80f/26c and 55% humidity.

The only ones that have gone curly are those lowryders - hasn't happened with anything else I've germed. Genefreaks that they are :O

I really think adding the extraction will help with the curling. Apparently the Lowriders are more heat sensitive than your other plants. Keep us posted on it's progress.

Disaster struck last night - my pH meter got wet and is fried, and I'm literally broke - so I can't feed my babies until I know...especially with my shitty water. This is officially not good.
Fortunately I had about 4 litres of nutes that I had mixed up last night, pH 5.7, so I gave them all a drink. I figure they might be able to go a day or two (maybe 3 at the outset) without drink before they start to suffer, so I've got that time to beg/borrow/steal cash for a new pH meter. NOTE FOR NUBS: Cheap pH meters are bad. Spend the money, it'll save you the money in the long run. Ignore the bullshit about replacing the bulb. Quality is quality and it's a 100% essential piece of kit.

As I was checking them out during their daily feed, the oldest Violators and WW are pushing out the bottom of their pots already. I didn't have enough nutes to repot many, so I put one of the Violator girls into a 18cm pot (6.5l I think) and fed her the rest of the pH'd nutes.

My mud dwellers are also in need of new pots, but I'm treating them much more harshly, so they don't get pH'd water. They get runoff and whatever I've got handy. They're test subjects to see how far I can abuse stuff. I repotted them into a soil mix I made (and I've still got it under my fingernails - NOTE TO NUBS: use a stick, unlike stoney fuckhead me :)). It was roughly:

- 50% light mix
- 24% coco
- 24% perlite
- 2% rockdust

just because that's what I had and it just felt good :) No science, no reading...just a mud cocktail a la FastForward. As for feeding, and you're gonna love this bit, I just couldn't be arsed with doing anything properly, so I splashed in a litre jug some bits and bobs....cocktail stylee. All the stuff I don't really use much of - like some VitaLink nutes. Fed them and we'll see how badly they burn up :)

I'm 99% sure my plants have been cal and/or mag deficient, and that's why they're yellowy and not properly dark green (the Violators should be way darker, more indica-ey)...not because of nitrogen lack, but because of lack of nitrogen availablity from ca or mag deficiency...caused by my RO water cut with tap. So, that 5l of feed I made up last night was from a bottle of Somerfield's Scottish Spring Water (79p/5l), which has Calcium and Magnesium in it...is pH 7.6 and EC0.2 to start with. I think they look better already, but we'll see.

Photo updates...things starting to look proper....just need to get them to green up properly and we're getting close to rock and roll :) Need to start sexing them if possible, but the violator girls are looking joy. #3 if female will be a mother...she's strong and lovely.

The two wilty looking ones are the mud ones. They've been transplanted so should perk up again in a day or two. They're greener than the others because they've had tap water and proper sun/outsideness... :)

Well there's an in-depth update! lol

Sorry about your meter. Might try one of these just to get you by...? http://www.discount-hydro.com/productdisp.php?pid=533&navid=55

I used a kit like this for months before I finally broke down and bought my Milwaukee. The only caveat is if your nute mix is really dark, it's more difficult to match the colors. But if I were in your crunch, I'd use the liquid for sure. Much better than hoping, or not feeding at all.

Your LST work is looking nice too. Good job on that. It won't be long and you'll start to see why LST rocks!

Cheers PGW....I've taken a shot of one of them to show the LST progress....those bendz things rule....a pack of 50 should arrive tomorrow and then I'll really get to work.

Update for today:

Repotted the other 2 Violators into 18cm pots (6.5l) and gave everyone a well needed drink with pH'd feed. New pH cheapo truncheon rules (20 quid, ebay, next day delivery). Shuffled the room around a bit and brought some of the lowryders in from the prop room.

I need to repot a number of the WW - they're rooting out of the bottom of their pots now. When I repotted the Violators they have great roots - white and much thicker roots than I expected. Not as dense but really chunky - 3-4mm all wrapped around the outside. Didn't take any photos because it's a scary thing repotting first time, with a handful of crumbling coco and plant in your hand. Roots are nice though - just not very hairy at all (in fact, no hairs...spaghetti-like root action). Gave them all a spritz with rhizo and pirhana whilst doing it.

I've been holding off on repotting the WW because (a) I don't care too much about them (they're lowest priority in my rooms) and (b) I only want to repot the girls and save space. I can't really tell their gender from looking, so have taken photos. Any ideas? I think #4 is a bloke just because of the stretchy internodal gaps but I know nowt...

e2a: The Violators and WW are mostly ready for flowering by now - 4 weeks from seed for the Vios. Going to keep 1 for a mother and flower the other two, but it's going to be a few weeks before I can build a flower room. Long veg methinks and selective flowering...much cullage and death or donations...

Hmmm...the plants I have in soil look lush and dark green....everything else in coco looks a more yellowy/olivey green. As I test I'm going to mix up some Lucas formula nutes and feed a couple of them with this separate feed, to see if it's an cal or mag thing.

e2a: Plan B....epsom salts on a couple of the WW and maybe 1 Vio as a test...

First off FF, what is the pH of the nute solution that you are feeding your coco plants? If your running the same pH with the coco plants as you are the soil plants, that is part of the issue you are seeing with the light color. Nutes for plants in coco should be between 5.8 and 6.2. For what it's worth, I run mine as near as I can to 6.0.

Regardless your veg plant's are beautiful , awesome work FF:)

ProGroWannabe said:

First off FF, what is the pH of the nute solution that you are feeding your coco plants? If your running the same pH with the coco plants as you are the soil plants, that is part of the issue you are seeing with the light color. Nutes for plants in coco should be between 5.8 and 6.2. For what it's worth, I run mine as near as I can to 6.0.

Click to expand...

I've been doing everything at 5.8 (or 5.7 if I overdo it with the pH down) pretty much religiously since day 1. Those soil plants have been getting random mixes of anything I fancy...2nd hand coco nute flush....a mad cocktail of vitalink products another time....watering every 3-4 days when the top looks like the moon....that kind of thing. I thought it was something to do with one of the more trace elements more abundant in soil than in coco...because people seem to report calmag deficiencies with coco. I also read somewhere that Canna used to put more mg in? Now they don't? I dunno..but i'm all confused :)

Sooooo....tonight I've mixed up a 5l bucket of water (EC0.3, tap+distilled), stirred a levelish tablespoon of epsom salts (from the chemist, not the garden centre) and then pH down'd it to 5.8. Soaked 3 of the WW with it and chose 3 that looked similar in size and age to the ones in soil...and marked them up 'EPSOM'. We'll see what happens in the next day or so...either they'll green up or get sick :)

e2a: I'm starting to discover little bugs....nothing terrible, but they can smell my weed (yeah, they're starting to smell of growing herb...I love that smell) and are coming in for it. Found 1 little spidermite, a moth, what looks like a small flying thingy, and a dead mozzie. Gonna keep a sharp watch for more and will prolly get some kind of anti-bug preventative thing on Friday just in case. NO ONE EATS MY PLANTS BUT ME :)

"NO ONE EATS MY PLANTS BUT ME "

That's great! Lmao. Get on those pests ASAP though. They can get ugly with a quickness.

BTW....your doing a damn fine job!

Looking good Fast forward . I'll be watching this one if you don't mind. Looking forward to getting my hands on some of theis.

LST FF Style: Kung Fu LST aka HST :)

The bendz arrived today, so I've handed out some punishment to the WW. Seeing as the first set of 3 were so easily and well accepted by the plants I've put these ones on a bit more hardcore...to see how quickly and well they adapt. Should be interesting :)