Bubba Kush & Blueberry Journal - Hydro

[haarlemKnight]

This is a grow in a bedroom with a closet for medical purposes:

Plant Strains:
True Blueberry
Bubba Kush
AK47 (being phased out I think)

What I'm attempting/methods:

Overall:
Hydro grow with CFL's MH and HPS all in one room - Perpetual or SOG /SCROG. I am using soil for my mothers.

Rooms/Areas:
- Closet (mothers)
- Shelf(s) VEG and Clone
- Two Tents (Hydro Huts) one is 4ft x4ft one is 3.5ft x 5.5 ft

Lights:
-600 HPS/MH digital switchable - with vented hood/w glass
-400 HPS - with vented hood/w glass
-T8 - 4ft (2bulb)
-T5 - 2ft (4bulb)
-Hydrofarm - 125 Watt Daylight 6400K - simple reflector

Nutrients, Chemicals And Supplements:
-Superthrive
-Pure Blend Pro Grow -Botanicare
-Pure Blend Pro Bloom(hydro) -Botanicare
-Liquid Karma -Botanicare
-Basic PH UP & Down Solutions
-Liquid Kool Bloom - General Hydroponics
-Cal Mag Plus -Botanicare
-Hydroguard -Botanicare
-Clearex -Botanicare

Grow Medium:
- Fox Farm SOIL for mothers
- 1in Rockwool cubes for clones
- 3in Rockwool cubes for VEG (being phased in)
- 4in Rockwool cubes for VEG (being phased out)
- 6in Rockwool cubes for BLOOM (being phased in)
- Hydoton - Clay Pellets
- Coco Tek Coco Mat -(4ft. X 4ft. X 1in.)

Other Gear:
-6IN Inline fan 340CFM - T'd off to both of the lights and out the room
-Odor Sock (6in)
-Reverse Osmosis Water Filer/ 100 Gallons Per Day
-Water pumps
-Air Pumps
-Window A/C - 5500 BTU
-3 Fans (various Types)
-Lots pf power strips and timers
-Digital PH tester/meter & PPM tester/meter (waterproof)
-Various tubs, bins, trays and pots
-Various Metal/Wire racks and shelves
-Various Tubes and Hoses and stuff....

OK geez - I think that covers everything - I want this to be a very through journal with mostly all simple questions answered up front with the above lists etc.

I do need advice and I am novice at growing - however, thanks to this site - I have done tons of reading and advising at the hydro store and with other growers to get where I am. I will post pictures, explanations of what I'm doing and requests all here.

All advice and comments are welcomed, let's keep this clean kids!

the AK is is the left coner, the bubba kush plants are in the back (two of them in dirt) and the True Blueberry is in the front ina 6in rockwool cube- the small plats are just transplated clones of bubba and blueberry.

I have a gallery with descriptions to the photos posted, not sure how to link it yet... stay tuned

 

[haarlemKnight]

So right now my focus is to get as many plants as I can going and take the best and move them down the chain of life. The blubeberry is 45 bloom and the bubba kush is around 50-60 supposedly. Some people say the bubba will be 45 days, we'll see.

I am using hand watering now and may decide to use drain to waste instead of recirculation method for watering. If i do D2W i will keep separate tubs with different nute levels, ph's PPM and water for each phase of the plant life and fill a hand waterer for each set of plants i water. This is a lot of work but my result best for me. If it becomes too much work I'll switch to Ebb and Flow and scrog for both bloom rooms(tents). I have a 600 HPS and A 400HPS for flower. I may supplement these flower tents with some CFL's to help even out growth? I'm not sure yet

The reason for this is I plan to have different age/size plans in all areas of my grow spaces. So, basically I will harvest plants a row at a time or as they are ready come out of flower. I wont do an entire set of flower at once unless i decide to make one of tents scrog limiting me to do a complete harvest at once. I'd rather stagger the harvest of plant to reduce the amount of trimming and waiting on the next harvest. Eventually i will have plants ready to harvest nearly every week and will always have buds ready to be consumed for medication.

for now, I use 1in cubes and go into the 4 inch cubes.. then the 4 inch cubes will go into baskets with a small layer of hydroton and a piece of coco mat under the rockwool cube. This will change to the below method and get rid of the baskets and hydroton! I have found out that you have less options when you use 4in cubes after the roots show at the bottom. Unless you wanna use rockwool slabs - I dont. I want to move my plants around so i can level my light distribution in my perpetual grow et al.

I plan to go from the 1in rockwool for clones to the 3inch cubes fro VEG. Once roots come out of the 3 inchers in VEG i will take a 6in cube and carve out the hole to accommodate my 3inch cube instead of the 1in that is there. I will put the 3in cube about 75% deep - Then i will start flowering. I plan to flower my plans at 10-12 inches. I will either top or pinch my stems to promote bushiness as soon as possible. I may even tie my plants down if possible... Ive seen alot of dffrent methods of limiting verticle growth. I may try bending and tilts ect... We'll see here too

More to come soon......

 

[Doctor Dread]

Damn man, your doin it right... looks like you'll have some great producers in that setup. GL and keep it up.

 

[LaidBackinCali]

Looking good!! I will be watching this one!

 

[StonerGrower]

Looks great!

 

[CnstntGrdnr]

I've JUST subscribed to this thread - looks like you've been doing your homework. I plan on having a similar setup with an indoor grow tent, though not a hydro hut, and not a perpetual growth as I will only grow for recreational use.

Which light are you using in your 4' x 4' HydroHut? And, can you elaborate on the make/model of your r/o purifier?

 

[haarlemKnight]

Hey , thx for the post. I plan to use a 400w HPS in the 4x4 i have a 600w in the other hut.. I may supplement the 400hps with another light if heat isn't too much of an issue, perhaps CFL's?

I hear you get sunspots on the leaves if you have more than one light on a plant? Not sure if this is true but some have showed me examples of this... Ill try it and see what happens.

 

[DrKran]

good job. ill follow.

 

[haarlemKnight]

ok i'm basically at week 3 of my perpetual grow and have a lot of plants in the pipeline.... I'm gonna continue to try a little new stuff here and there along the way...

So, i have 15 plants under a 600MH and many more under t8's and taking the best of the breed and moving them to the other rooms(tents) for growing up

here is the image of one of the huts at week 3:

above image: 11 blueberry 10 in baskets and one in a 6in rock wool cube. 3 bubba kush plans in baskets, and one lonely AK plant in the far right corner. All the taller plants are blueberry the shorter darker ones toward the right are the Kush plants.
From the top down....

I have had some problems with Calcium deficiency supposedly and need to Increase my Cal Mag Plus from 2.5 ml per gallon to 5ml per gallon - Take a look at the next 2 photos below and let me know your opinion

Above are my mothers, Looking like a jungle in there.The 2 big bushy bubba kush plants are on the left in foxfarm dirt and 5 pronged bluberry mother in a 6in rockwool cube on the right - its on top of a piece of cocomat and under that is a basket of hydroton. I hand water all of these as needed.

The 4blulb 2ft t5 on the left and a 125w cfl on the right work very very wel for this set up. The plants grow fast and it's not too hot ever. I have a small rotating fan on the wall for circulation and adjust the lights accordingly. I can almost touch the lights witht he tops of the plats "almost is the key word. IF I DONT WATCH AND THEY DO TOUCH, I GET SOME BURNS. I rotate and plants to the lights daily and plan my cuttings for a more even growth. I'm trying to take 10 -15 cuttings twice a month from these - they recover very well after I clone.

Image above shows top of bybba kush mother, very alive and robust, I love this plant!


Image below shows my rooted clones in 4in and 3 in cubes. The bubba are toward the right front and the blueberry or toward the left back. All of my bubba clones are thick to begin with, then when i root them the talks get even thicker. They are huge compared to the blueberry plants. I have one plant like 3 weeks old with a 1/3 inch stem, the plant is only like 5 inches tall. big roots

I have a gallery posed here for other photos Gallery week 3

stay tuned for more on this grow , I plan switch the big tent shown above to flower within a week - Then I plan to make a Screen to go over my canopy - I may even top them to get more of a even spread - All I will do is change my light sched, leach the plants, switch to a 600w HPS bulb, and change my water to have whats needed for flowering. (more ppms, bloom agent, more calmag plus)

 

[haarlemKnight]

oh BTW in response to a earlier question: Iim using a Hydrologic Reverse Osmosis Water filter that I bought from the Hydro store. $185.00 - 100 Gallons per day. This is plenty for what I need or almost any small grow,I also make my drinking water for my water cooler out of this. It gives me 0 ppm water and it takes 42 minutes to fill a 5 gallon water bottle. I just use a kitchen timer and switch the line to the next bottle etc. I also have a 55 gallon water res (trash can) that has an automatic valve/floater shutoff when it is full, This attachments is like 10 bucks at the hydro store - I really don't use it that much because i just go directly to the bottles as mentioned. This water filter is a very very good item to have. It never leaves me wondering what might be in my water -I don't need any mysteries to risk my crop. Everyone needs one I think.

 

[StonerGrower]

The yellowing on those leaves looks like a Magnesium defficiency to me. It could even be a phosphurous defficiency.

 

[4twenty4all]

Great setup! You have me feeling jealous for sure! Great journal, lots of details... + Rep

 

[haarlemKnight]

Oh, BTW, i have added two more of the above lights mentioned(T8's - 4ft (2bulb)). they are shown in the very last photo of my post above. I have a large Metro wire shelf that's 2ftdeep by 5ft wide and 7ft tall, I can fit up to 3 dual bulb 4ft 8's on each of the 5 shelves. So there is much room for expansion

 

[StonerGrower]

Did you take care of the defficiency?

 

[haarlemKnight]

Well it seems to be on the taller plants out of the bunch. I had about 10 leave showing the browning above, and removed them. I have doubled my Calmag plus to 5ml per gallon and the larger leafs are starting to do the same thing.... about one per plant... the ends remain soft however they look brown and look brittle, but when touched still soft. I was just in the looking at the plants a few minutes ago, most of the bigger leafs tips are starting to curl down slightly like they want to start looking like the other bad leaf.

The smaller/younger (bubba) plants i have in there don't show this at all - they look really good. My PPM is around 1200 - I use 70% Pure Blend Pro Grow 10ml per gal -... Cal mag plus 5ml per gal, some hydrogaurd 5-7ml per gal(which im told to start phasing out due to RO filter) a small about of superthrive 2.0ml per gallon.

This is frustrating because i think im doing things right - I do 2 full feeds a day. Sometimes i run the water just to cover the roots coming out of my baskets so they don't get too dry. but i do fill the ebb flow tray twice a day for 15 minutes. the rockwool says moist.

So is using the hydrogaurd basiclly doing nothing for me since i have 0 ppm water out the ro filter. All my water is clean and I'm using like 5-7ml per gallon of hydrogard in my res. Is this causing the deficiency by making 200-250 of my ppms hydrogaurd? Someone today told me this and said i should eliminate the hydrogaurd all together and still even raise the ppm to 1500 and never exceed it. HE also said i shoudl increase the feedings and then drop down the ppms when i flower to induce flowering. what do you guys think?

My problem is I want to redo my water soon and start flowering and don't want this to be a bigger problem in bloom...What do you guys think? How should I proceed? I want these plant to grow as perfect as possible. I plan to use the set of nutes i have listed at the top of the post. Advice anyone?

 

[4twenty4all]

what is your PH? That may be off. You do test PH after adding your nutes, right?

 

[haarlemKnight]

Oh yes, PH is at 5.7- 6 usually... i check and get it perfect when I make a new res water(18gal). I adjust occasionally if needed- but it usually is pretty good... someone told me i need a lid for my res, it currently sits under the tray with the plants. So lights don't shine directly into it. He said with no lid the nitrogen leaves the water... Is this true? Is the table covering the res enuf? Is a Nitrogen deficiency look like what I have? I want to redo the water for the 1st week of Bloom ASAP.

What are your thoughts on PPM and % of base vs calmag plus or other supplements/nuts for my new water mix... Again, im using R/O water...? How much superthrive does everyone else use? Sometimes I'm afraid to add the full 2.5ml per gal to my res, Very scary to add so much superthrive right?

I get so many conflicting sources of advice...What's the sure way to go for a simple res/nute mix that covers all my bases?

 

[haarlemKnight]

no one have any thoughts?

 

[haarlemKnight]

Hi everyone, Just an update on my grow.

I started flowering 4 days ago under one 600hps and one 400hps. I have the the two tents(huts) going. My tents are pack to the gills. I am deciding when/if i should top my plants. Its a jungle already! I will post some photos soon of my progress....

It seems my leaves are doing much better and I think it was a calcium def. I up'd the Calmag Plus to 5ml per gal and it seems to be working fine for now. My res stays stable and the PH stays at or under 6.2 almost always. My ppm is around 1250-1300 for this first ten days of flower. I will change the water at 10 days and up the ppm to 1400-1500 for the next ten days.

Following that, I will continue with the same feeding convention for two more res changes eventually raising the PPMs to 1800 on the 4th res change out (at day 30). The last res change at roughly day 40, will be my flush. I plan to harvest most of the plants(blueberry)on day 45-50. The Bubba Kush plants might need to stay a little longer supposedly.

I am using the following Nutes in my 18 gal res for flower cycle in the hydro setup
(I have one bubba plant in dirt under the 400hps):

Nutes for flower cycle:
-Pure Blend Pro Bloom(hydro) -Botanicare - 10ml per Gal
-Cal Mag Plus -Botanicare - 5ml per Gal
-Superthrive - 0.5ml per Gal
-Liquid Kool Bloom - General Hydroponics - 2.5ml per Gal

I will use this same formula in the weeks ahead until full/ final bloom and I will phase in 2.5 ml per gal of Liquid Karma by Botanicare in the below schedule:

Day 1-10
New water, 1250-1300 PPMs
Day 11-20
New water, 1450-1500 PPMs
Day 21-30
New water, 1650-1700 PPMs
Day 31-40
New water, 1750-1800 PPMs
Day 41-45 plus...
Flush water with 10ml per gal of Clearex -Botanicare

Cut and Dry

I plan to get around 500 grams when I harvest at the end of November. If I'm lucky I might get up to 1000g - Another we'll see situation

Any thoughts or advice would be welcomed.

gwon to be a Far I

 

[WeedSmokerNYC]

Does Hydro grow MJ Plants better?

Mine are gonna be at week 3 Sunday and arent that tall, Although it could also be the strain.