Vertical T8 Growcage: Utopia Haze, Super Lemon Haze, Tangerine Dream, Bubble

[growzilla]

Alright, this is the second grow diary and my 4th grow in total.

Last time, one Utopia Haze and one Super Lemon Haze gave me a little less than 60 grams out of 150 watts of CFL power. After doing some reading, I found a method that uses 4 36W T8 tubes in a vertical setup, growing 12 or even 15 plants in a vertical SOG. So I tried to copy it, this is my new box.

It uses 1 central tube for which I've modified the socket rail. I sawed off the connecting middle part and glued the ends to wooden struts which are fixed to the floor and ceiling. That gives me about 1m of T8 tube which can shine in all directions around it because there's no more socket in the way.

Around the central tube, three sockets are placed at around 120 degrees of each other. If you look at it from the top, it sort of looks like a mercedes star, if that makes any sense. The four tubes make for a total of 144 watts of power comsumed, so I cut down my power usage a little, which is always nice. The box is made of wood, all the insides, cables and sockets have been painted flat white. I drew the line at painting the pots, but I might actually do that next time.

Right now, my box holds 12 plants, that is 3 per floor and 4 floors in total. Each plant has 3 tubes right next to it, the central one being shared by all plants. I lose a lot of tube length to the pots, but later if the plants get bigger I can move the pots farther away from the central tube and train the lower plants to grow up the middle next to the pots. The good thing with T8 tubes is that the plants can touch the lamp without getting hurt too much, which is what unlocks the full potential of fluorescent lights by offsetting their main disadvantage, which is poor light penetration. So most of my plant matter is really close to the light.

You'll notice that I'm not using 3K lights, the tubes I'm using are Osram Fluora tubes, their spectrum being mostly blue and deep red. I figure these will be more efficient than regular tubes, but internet research gave me nothing conclusive, so I'll try for myself. So far, this light gives my plants tight internode spacing, which is a good start. Check out the spectrum:

So, the plants are around 5 weeks from being beans, growing 12/12 from seed to encourage early flowering. If all goes well, they should show gender in around 2 weeks. Then, I might go down to 11/13 since I'm growing mostly Utopia Haze. What do you think?

 

[Krasi]

Wow very interesting, i`ll be watching this one:)

 

[growzilla]

Update time is here!

The ladies have been growing nicely, although I overfed my Utopia Hazes (damn, they do like their nutes *light*). I had to flush them to avoid further N toxicity, let's see if they rebound in the next days.

Don't compare the individual plants to the picture before, almost all plants have been moved to different slots according to their sizes. Also, many plants have been "potted up", so I took them out of the pot and filled in more soil in order to really use the whole pot for rootspace.

Number 11 on the top left is a Tangerine Dream, and it is one of the weakest in my crop. Hasn't even started flowering yet, went all purple although it has the same soil, feeding schedule and surroundings as the other ones. Should I give her some more P? Don't want to overfeed her, she's already curling the leaves inward.

On 4/20, around half of my plants showed their sex, one of them being a male. Too bad since he's the biggest, healthiest plant this run. Anyways, I told him he'll live for a while longer, but to avoid him jizzing all over the ladies, he's getting an extra compartment:

11 Watts ain't gonna get him much bigger, but hopefully it'll be enough for him to fully develop his balls. I will use him to knock up one or 2 of the other girls. Never messed around with that sort of stuf before. The strain of this male is probably something called "Bubble", it was a packet of freebie seeds I received along with my last purchase.

Probably gonna try to cross this with my Utopia Haze to get a faster bloom and maybe keep some of Utopia's extraordinary yield. If the children smell like bubble gum like the name implies, I'll be very happy.

Right, on with the cage: Check out some of the lady action!

If you have a really good eye, you might have noticed that I have replaced the central T8 for a 2700K one. I did some more research about light colors and their energy distribution, but I haven't made up my conclusion yet. 2700K has a peak at 610nm, which is not really the ideal color, but it's way higher than the more continuous spectrum of the Fluora. The spectrum I posted in my first post is bullshit, by the way, not sure if they changed it, but nowadays it's different, less red. Look it up. The main reason why the 2700K is in there is that I wasn't sure if they'd start to flower in the purple light. Next time I'll have made up my mind before I start the grow. Or not.

What else? Oh, of course. I cut up some willow tree branches and made a tea. Willow trees have a hormone in them that works like cloning gel for root boosting. Or it might all be bullshit, that's what I'll find out. So I cut four cutlings from the strongest 3 plants and the tangerine dream, which I might keep around if the taste is really nice, despite the bad yield.

So here are the four happy mini-cutlings who also received their own piece of real estate. The cutlings have been blurred to protect their identity:

It's the first time I'm making cutlings, if half of them survive I'll be real happy. If all of them survive, I'll probably tell you that I knew from the start that that was gonna happen.

 

[growzilla]

Lurkers, please leave some feedback, ask questions, discuss opinions, it'll make my day. ;) I know this forum is more focused on commercial and big grows, but there's gotta be some love for the private microgrow?

No pics today, but the cage is filling out nicely and I might soon change the setup a little to allow for larger plants. Already have the mod in my head, but it's hard to explain. You'll see in a week or 2.

Meanwhile, almost all plants have started flowering, the male is still looking handsome but starting to stretch (no wonder, only gets 11W of light).

The clones are wilting, they might all die. Not sure yet. Tune in next week!

 

[MrBlazeAlot]

Worry not bro! There are people like me watching tho im usually 2 stoned and can't be bother with writings, however your grow is quite innovative (i've never seen so kinky method) and seems interesting, imma be watching over your ladies from this thread so keep on posting and more pics plix :D

 

[growzilla]

Alright, this is flower week 3.

They're stretching quite a bit, had to move the biggest three to the ground. The amazing thing is that there are still 2 plants that are the same size as the others but show absolutely no signs of flower yet. If they haven't started in 2 weeks, I'll throw them out.

The cage has filled out very nicely now. Most plants are growing next to the pot above them, flowers right next to the T8 tubes with no heat problems. The flush definitely helped, they went back to growing and looking healthy.

The male is still hanging on, not looking happy but I'm only after his pollen anyway, so that's fine.

The clones are officially all dead, none of them developed any semblance of root. Better luck next time I guess. I'm also considering growing some auto strains next run, but it's way more expensive for my system, running 12 plants at the same time with no way of cloning. We'll see. First, I gotta finish this one.

 

[growzilla]

Let's begin flower week 5!

They're coming along nicely, but the differences between strains are starting to show. First, let's check on the plant that was featured in last post's first image:

As you can see, she's still far from maturity but starting to develop trichomes on the leaves. She might take another 4-6 weeks to finish, but I expect another boost in flower production soon.

Next is her neighbor, starting to make her way into the bright, cozy space between the next pot up and the lights. All plants that have made it there have produced notably bigger buds than the others. With CFL and fluoro lighting, it's really all about minimizing the distance between bud and light.

Next, check out on of the nicer buds, this is plant 7:

And my favorite plant so far, plant 4:

This one already smells really fruity, I suspect 4 and 7 to be the "bubble" bonus seeds I got with my last order. If they are, they should be finished a little sooner than the bulk of my crop, which is Utopia Haze, a 8-10 week strain.

EXPERT ADVICE NEEDED:

This plant curls its leaves inward despite not having been fertilized in a while. However, some of the lowest leaves, despite getting plenty of light, wilt and die. Is it N toxicity again or is that something else? I water them every 3-5 days, whenever the top soil starts looking dry.

I'm already very pleased with my growroom concept. I mean, the plants won't win any beauty contests, but they're going strong. 11 out of 13 are still alive, and just imagine running all plants like number 4 and 7, it would easily yield 100g - a year's worth of weed for me.

 

[smartcalyx]

the claw. give her a slight flush then straight water. next feeding back off the n a bit

 

[growzilla]

Flushed 4 plants, lets see how they react. All 4 hadnt been fed in 3-4 weeks, only water. Maybe its still built up salts from way back when I last fed them.

The plants that had been flushed weeks ago look pretty decent, so itll be good to see the other 4 bounce back. Thanks for the tip, smartcalyx!

 

[Chobble]

How are your yields? Do you find them to be any lower or "Fluffier" with those fluros?

Chobble

 

[growzilla]

Hey, thanks for asking that. Finally some dialogue. :)

Not sure about the final yields yet, but definitely pleased with the results so far. Week 5 is rolling and some pistils turn brown already. I will harvest in stages, with the Indica-heavy Bubble plants first and the Hazes last. On all plants, there are many budsites almost touching one of the tubes, no significant burning occurs. The sativas have grown past the pots overhead and continue to stretch while keeping a tight internode spacing of around 2 inches. Due to the very equal light density around the plants, lower buds are almost as thick as the headbud. Buds are definitely looking (I don't squeeze unfinished buds, that's a sin) at least as dense as I ever got them. I never grew using HPS or LED lights, so I can only compare to a 6x 23W CFL Setup that has yielded me 60 grams out of 2 plants, including triched leaves and many rookie mistakes.

With CFLs, in order to get good results you constantly have to reposition the bulbs in order to be 1-2 inches away from the biggest budsites. Get too close, game over, too far away and the yields suffer. A distance of 2 inches means only 25% the light of a one inch distance. The nice thing about this fluoro setup is that I only have to worry about watering, watering and not overfertilizing again, for god's sake. :)

In terms of pure efficiency, imagine running three of these 144W cabinets against one 400W HPS light and an AC unit. I wouldn't advise going for a larger scale, that's a lot of plants...

 

[marski420]

If you are saying the lower leaves are wilting / yellowing and you also say you havent fed your plants nutrients in over 3 weeks that would explain a lot.. your plants are hungry is what it sounds like to me. Great job using minimal resources bro!

 

[growzilla]

One sign of overfeeding can be leaf curl on the top leaves and yellowing of lower leaves. If there is too much salt in the soil, especially if it accumulates at the bottom which is easy to do with these small pots, the roots can't draw water very well. I have to be careful not to leave drain water in the saucers to avoid this. Since flushing, no new yellow leaves have appeared. The plants are growing quickly and new shoots look healthy, so fingers are crossed.

 

[growzilla]

Okay, after 40 days of flowering (counting from the first day I saw pistils on the highest internode), plants 4 and 7 (the Bubble strain) are ripe and have been harvested. Trichs are milky all over, with around 5% of trichs amber. I took down one sidebud yesterday and quickdried it using the microwave-steamdrying method, which produces smokable buds in minutes, but also nukes most of the aroma. It still had a hint of bubblegum, so I'm excited to see what happens after proper curing. The effect was strong, uplifting, not too narcotic, but very body-heavy still. I like a headrush, hence the relatively early harvest. Little to no drymouth, which is nice.

Here are the two after removing all fan leaves:

I left the lowest 2 internodes intact and put the remaining plants back into the cage, the lower branches had been pollinated and I want to make sure the seeds are fully developed because I want children from this strain. Also, I will see how the effect changes when most trichs are amber.

The hazes have some more time to go, although some of the plants are already fully frosted and milky. Maybe I'll take down one of the early bloomers next week and keep going in that rhythm so that I end up with cured bud from all stages of the harvest window. I'm a fan of the energy high though, I want to do stuff when I'm high. That's why I'll probably stick with earlier harvests, even if the yield suffers a little.

 

[growzilla]

Final update. Too bad there was very little response to this diary, I lost interest in sharing the progress with an empty room. So here's the final post 1 day after harvest. I learned a lot this run and have definite action items for next time. I don't have final numbers yet, but I expect the total dry yield to be 70-80g from 144W. That's a step up from last run, but far from 1g/W. Still have lots to learn, lots to tweak and lots to try. I'll try to find a community with more focus on small grows and post my future projects there. Thanks to everybody here who contributed, it's a nice forum but I realize I'm way out of scale with my setup.

The lower branches of 4 and 7 (Bubble) were harvested on day 57 of flower. I can't tell too much difference between the early and the late batch, both of them have a very nice, distinct smell of multivitamin juice and a smooth smoke. I'm tempted to say that the late batch is a little heavier in effect, but that might be confirmation bias and/or more weed that I put into the joint.. the point is, both batches get me high enough to enjoy life thoroughly. :)

On to the hazes:

Out of the nine haze plants, 4 were harvested on day 62, the remaining 5, including the Tangerine Dream, were chopped on day 68. Here's a day 62 pre-harvest, post-trim pic of all 9 hazes:

View attachment 229921

I'm having trouble telling the Super Lemon Hazes from the Utopia Hazes. Last run, the Utopia Haze yielded a lot heavier than the SLH, but this run they're all more similar - probably because the small pot size affected them all almost equally. I guess the difference will become more clear once they're dried and cured.

The one plant that definitely stands out is the Tangerine Dream - it was a weak plant, didn't grow too well and was FIM'ed which made it produce 4 small "head buds". But the smell! It's so intense, so clearly tangerine without any other influences, I'm really looking forward to having this cured. It'll be a treat to smoke this one, even though the yield was rather poor. I still have 2 or 3 seeds left, so I'll definitely run another plant or two next time. If the smell carries over into the cured buds, it's the most awesome smelling strain I've ever encountered. To those who have a little spare room for an experiment, I'll recommend it - just don't expect high yield.

Clearly, I need to get my nutes worked out next run, and most likely use bigger pots. I might reduce the overall number of plants to 9, the highest compartment of 3 plants was to low in height to house fully-grown plants. The early harvest of plants 4 and 7 allowed me to put all remaining plants in the low 9 slots where they got more light and space. Also, I'll space out the T8 lamps more to accomodate the larger plants.

Finally, a word on lighting. It was hard but I stuck with the fluoras throughout the whole flowering period - just to see how they'd do. Next time, I'll only use them for veg, for flower I'll be using either 2500K warm comfort whites or the meaty-colored Natura food lights with a lot of red.

All in all, the growcage concept is a lot of fun to explore. The small pots present a challenge as does fertilizing. On the upside, there's no necessary light distance adjustments, good bud quality on the lower branches and potentially outstanding energy efficiency and virtually no fire hazard. Plus, growing several strains at once with this little energy consumption allows me to try different things on different plants and compare the results. I'll keep refining this method to increase the possible yield.