Perpetual Urban Organic Adventures with Steely

[ssteely71]

Hello Farmers.
Since This is my permanent home I thought I'd open up a little and invite you all into my adventures in urban high rise organic farming.
I live in an extremely high density urban area several stories off the ground which has presented some challenges to growing , to say the least.
My first obstacle is the simple fact that I can NOT EVER vent or exhaust in any way shape or form to the outside. I'm running 96w mother cab , 432w veg closet and a 600w Hps in my bloom bloom tent at any given time. This had forced me to think outside the box concerning heat management. As a matter of fact my spare bedroom grow area does not even have a window. Putting a needed portable AC into my bloom tent ,I had to run the ACs exhaust (245cfm)through a wall and into my laundry room where it's connected to a carbon filter.

It stays pretty warm in the laundry but not over 83*f. Now My 600w air cooled hood runs from a large carbon filter that sits outside the tent like this >>>filter>>>light>>>430cfm fan>>>>into laundry>>>. So I have two different different exhausts coming from my tent through the wall and into my laundry. To help ease negative pressure in my grow area I installed an 4'' intake with a 240cfm exhaust between my master bedroom closet and my veg area/closet. This keeps lots of fresh air coming in at all times. My veg area stays 72*-75*night/77*-82*f day at 40-60% humidity and my tent stays 69*f night /72-74*f day at 55-80% humidity consistently. My condo central AC keeps my condo between 77*-81*f . Lots of holes cut in walls, lots of airflow going on here lol this took me a few struggling grows to work out .I was herming good genetics from bloom temps at around 88*f . So a quick peek into my 4x8 tent for starters.....We always keep it legal....

We are working some BOG, ExoticGen and some TGA. First up some frosty Kimbo....she's a pretty gal at day 22.

Feel free to chime in , drop pics , critique , or ask questions.
More to come ...

 

[ninja69]

Very nice (: what kinda medium do you use?? And are you doing an ebb and flood system, just curious from tray.

Digging the set up though

 

[ssteely71]

Very nice :) what kinda medium do you use??

I'm glad you asked that. I'm currently using a soilless organic "super soil" mix from another forums recipe. I mix my soil every couple of months in batches of about 2-3 cubic feet. This means pushing all the furniture aside and mixing right in my living room.

I then put my soil mix into 15gallon bins and cook/store them on my small secluded outside balcony. I recycle my soil as needed.

I keep the soil moist with a little Liquid Karma and stir it weekly for the first few weeks. This soil recipe makes it so that all I have to do is add RO water and cal/mag and caps bennies as needed for each grow. Here is what things look like all put together in action....

Thanks for stopping by....

 

[Seamaiden]

You're mixing in your living room??? Now, *that* is some dedication to the art of cultivation!

 

[ssteely71]

You're mixing in your living room??? Now, *that* is some dedication to the art of cultivation!

It takes a few days to get all the dust cleaned up afterwards! And my dog will chew up any stray rocks that roll free lol.

 

[ssteely71]

So right now I have Bogs LifeSaver & Sour Bubble, ExGen's Kimbo Kush, and TGA's Jack Skellington in flower. I have some Kimbo and SourBubble females in veg also and its time to pick some more seeds to pop.
I have....
TGAs : Third Dimension, TheVoid, DrWho, and Jack Skellington.
BOGs: BlueMoonRocks, SourBubble
ExoticGenetics: Kimbo Kush
RareDankness: RugBurnOG
CaliConnetion: TahoeOG Fem, Buddha TahoeOG regs, mystery freebie seeds

Im leaning RugBurn/DrWho but not sure just yet.

I have finally eliminated fungus gnats in my growroom. I had to just create a physical barrier. I now only use smartpots toppped with DiamataceaousEarth and gnatgnix. This wiped them out in ten days. And it does not look like they will be returning , its good not to have seen a gnat in several weeks
. I still have a little leaf damage in my veg area I think is from thrips and Im using Caps foliar and SpinosaiD every 7 days, looks to be clearing up.
I'm set up now to run perpetual. So I can drop plants into flower as space opens up and keep me in a steady supply of fresh meds for arthritis and PTSD. I love training plants to many mains and have found that i really only like medicating with the flowers from the very tops of the plants. My 600w doesn't penetrate enough so I will clean out the bottoms of the plants better in future to concentrate on top buds. Here's a multi main lifesaver ready for flower.

& Heres a shot of my starfigher? leaning kimbo.

Have a good day !

 

[Mr.7thson]

Congrads on the battle!
I've ran both LS and SB,that taste of SB is real flipping good.

 

[Burned Haze]

Looking good :) , I Can't wait to see how ur Third dimension turns out!

 

[ssteely71]

Looking good :) , I Can't wait to see how ur Third dimension turns out!

I've already ran it once and it was so lemony my jar still reeks of it. Here's a shot of it at 10 weeks. But only two seeds left of it so going to hold on to those a few years.

 

[BeenBurned]

Nice work man...keep it up!! So, I saw somewhere u had some of BOGs sweet n sour Cindy seeds...havnt seen u run em yet, did I miss em??
All of BOGs gear seems to be the shit so far...loving the look of the BMR too.
Healthy iz happy!!! BB

 

[ssteely71]

Nice work man...keep it up!! So, I saw somewhere u had some of BOGs sweet n sour Cindy seeds...havnt seen u run em yet, did I miss em??
All of BOGs gear seems to be the shit so far...loving the look of the BMR too.
Healthy iz happy!!! BB

No sweet n sour Cindy! But I'm loving my LifeSaver I've been smoking on. Thanks for stopping in !

 

[ssteely71]

Got everything packed into my 4x4 flower area pretty tight. I went in and trimmed out all the undergrowth and larf branches. I hate trimming on plants just being flowered but I hate restricted airflow and plant energy being wasted so I went with it. I'll keep an eye out for balls real close , especially on the TGA gear. I've got 2 Kimbo's at week 4 ,and 4 lifesavers ,1 SourBubble , 2 TGA jack skellingtons in "pre-flower"( 7 days from flip but not flowering yet. I count day one from day first flowers forming) I bet this looks like a sea of buds in 2 weeks.

Also pulled both Kimbo's out of tent and gave them each a full flush followed by a mild feeding. They both were suffering slightly from N overload aka "nitrogen claw". I'm looking at reevaluating the N components in my soil mix and replacing with a fast access N vs the slow release feather meal or reducing the amount.

On a side note:My Lifesaver #7 has cured and it's pure fire ! I either have a low smell pheno or I missed the mark with my drying/curing but it smokes awesome. Very very smooth. My wife says it's her new favorite and is requesting my joint rolling skills more often than before. Most of the tent is the Lifesaver. Lol.
Thanks for dropping in.

 

[burn4me]

:couchpotato:got my seat. glad to see you opened the doors to your grow. 4x4 looks epic with it stuffed so full. make it do what it do;)

 

[ssteely71]

:couchpotato:got my seat. glad to see you opened the doors to your grow. 4x4 looks epic with it stuffed so full. make it do what it do;)

Good to see you here!

 

[ssteely71]

Holding out on popping seeds untill after SF Cup. Don't want my garden/house sitter to have to deal with seedlings.
But this Kimbo I got going at about day 30 is already pushing the limits on my filters. Two totally different phenos, both have a sweet scent if touched but smell like something rotten just sniffing them, almost a bit nauseating. The flush changed the smell imo. Check it out. Here's a few shots One almost looks done.

 

[Prime C]

Killer setup in the condo! Looks great.:D

 

[BeenBurned]

^^^ agreed, nice n healthy,
And that Kimbo...like a snow capped peak!
Props man...

 

[freespirit]

Lookin good in here steely!

 

[burn4me]

wowza....dumpin frost everywhere

 

[ssteely71]

Just dropping a few pics. My blackberry kimbo is a beaut. Investing in a real camera soon.

Did not feed the blackberry Kimbo enough this round, and had N toxicity to boot. Hit her with a little nutes to finish her off Have her cloned and clones ready to go into flower to replace this one. Will try dialing her in next run. I'm hoping she's a hard hitter. My starfighter Kimbo is glassy w resin and very sticky. (The last pic)Didn't clone her ,but I'm going to clone a bud at harvest. She might be a keeper. Pretty sure the N overload hurt my yield greatly. Thanks for dropping by my grow in the sky.