A Sad Sad Grow Journal

[muraydog]

Dec. 17, 2016

I used the paper towel method to 'crack' the Haze Xtreme seeds (from Crop King seeds) and had 5/5 sprout. (One seed took 2 days longer to sprout).

I am using a small grow tent that I made of PVC pipe and black and white poly. It has a footprint of 17" (3.7 ft2), and 45" tall.

I started using 2 GE Reveal Full full spectrum lights, (each 72 Watts and 1120 Lumens)., and 2 x 13 Watt CFLs (2700K ("soft white") , and 900 Lumens each). This givves a total of 172 W and 4040 Lumens, or only 1090 L/ ft2, which is waaaay too low. I also know I need more daylight colour lights but they will have to do for a few days.

I am using a "soil-less" soil as a grow medium. Schultz Seed Starter (made of sphagnum peat moss and vermiculite with no added nutrients) in solo cups. In the pictures are 6 solo cups with growing medium but only 5 have seedlings. The other cup is kept dry and I can compare the weight of the others to see how dry they are.

DAY 1: Dec 18

First day of vegetative stage. - first set of true leaves

DAY 2: Dec. 19

First watering. Used tap water

Day 4: Dec 21

I added 2 13W CFL lights (I didn't record what colour). This adds 1800L, but I am still at only 5840L, or 1580 L/ft2. Still well below the minimum recommended of 2000l/ft2. I want at least 5000L/ft2

DAY 5: Dec 22

DAY 7: Dec 24
Second watering. I again used tap water without checking pH. Turns out it was too high at 7.0. I didn't add any nutrients. I am waiting for 4 nodes before fertilizing.

DAY 8: Dec 25
Crap. I burnt a small hole in black and white poly of my grow tent. It touched one of the light bulbs and melted. I've covered the hole with duct tape, but the wall is no longer flat and therefore less reflective.

DAY 9: Dec 26
Third node is appearing but the leaves are yellow

DAY 11: Dec. 28
water with tap water

DAY 12: Dec 29
Dammit. Burnt a leaf. I moved lights further away.

Put in a bathroom ceiling fan to extract air from the tent.

DAY 13: Dec 30

DAY 14: Dec 31
Ugh. Burnt a leaf on another plant. I moved the lights up even further.

Water with tap water.


DAY 15: Jan 1
Replaced one of the 13W CFLs with a 100 W full spectrum light bulb. I'm limited on the number of sockets and their wattage limits. I have some splitters coming in the mail. This will incease by far the number of bulbs I can use but decrease outlet needs.

DAY 16: Jan 2

DAY 17: Jan 3
They look pretty sick.

I added a Aqueon LED aquarium plant light. I wasn't able to find the specifications on the light but figured it can't hurt.

I also added a Coralife 50/50 bulb and am lowball estimating the lumens at 500.

In addition to the two above lights, I have 2 x Reveal 100's (each: 1260L, 100W); I x Reveal 100 (1120L, 72W)

I still only have an estimated 1821 L/ft2

DAY 18: Jan 4

As you can see from the pictures, the fourth node leaves are coming in but are sickly looking. The third node leaves never did recover.

I'm getting brown spots on the leaves. Not sure what caused it nor what I should do.

DAY 19: Jan 5

They are starting to look a little healthier and are showing some growth.

I topped one of the healthier looking seedlings. I just pinched the top leaves like with basil.

 

[muraydog]

Re: A sad, sad growing journal

DAY 20: Jan 6

Topped the other 4 plants. I really should tidy up that dirt in there.

Pictures show the set-up. The extraction fan is at the top. Intake is passive through edges of tent.

DAY 21: Jan 7

I finally got my 7-way splitters in the mail! I got two, and use them in 150W sockets. Therefore, I am able to use 6 x 23W CFL bulbs plus one 9W CFL bulb in each reflector/splitter set-up without going over the recommended wattage. Each set-up has gives off over 10,000L, giving me a total of 5627 L/ft2

Watered with bottled water. pH unknown.

DAY 22: Jan 8

Plants looked wilted. Reason unknown but I don't suspect heat since it seems pretty cool in there. I moved the lights up another rung just in case, I'm still waiting for my thermometer/hydrometer to come in the mail so I'm really just guessing.

DAY 23: Jan 9

I wanted to add a small fan but the plants look too fragile. They are even more wilted and yellowing. Some lower leaves have extensive brown spots. Those lower leaves that still exist anyway.

I watered again. It might be a day or two too early but it's hard not to when they look so dry.

DAY 24: Jan 10
Oh the plants look so sad. Very dry and pale. The leaves are curling downward.

DAY 25: Jan 11
started daily water spraying to increase humidity. I spray the plants and the sides of the tent.

DAY 26: Jan 12

I'm concerned that the temperature is too low. I added one of the Reveal light bulbs to add some heat. It also increase the lumens to 6000L/ft2.

DAY 28: Jan 14

They are brown, dry, wilting, crying.

I believe this is a do or die moment. I have some Miracle Grow, which I read is okay during the growing stage. I gave 1/4 dilution as their first feeding. I should have done it before now, despite what I read.

DAY 29: Jan 15

 

[muraydog]

Re: A sad, sad growing journal

DAY 30: Jan 16

I removed the dead leaves. I'm not sure the plants are going to live through this. It looks like it's hugging itself in pain.

Still spraying daily.

DAY 31: Jan 17

I removed the remaining dead leaves from the plants. There aren't many leaves left.

DAY 32: Jan 18

Wow. That's fucking sad. Unless I'm growing sticks. But I'm not giving up on my babies!

DAY 33: Jan 19
watered 2 of the 5 plants with distilled water of pH 6.4

DAY 34: Jan 20
watered the other plants. 2 of the plants are basically dead.

I lowered the heat bulb to increase heat to 24-25C. (My thermometer measures in only in metric)

DAY 35: Jan 21
The greenery gives me some hope, but not much.

DAY 36: Jan 22
Removed 2 dead plants. That leaves me with only 3 and hopes that at least one is female. The humidity is 32%. Right now my only method to add water to the air is a bowl of water in front of the fan.

DAY 37: Jan 23
Added a bubble stone to the bowl of water to increase humidity.

DAY 39: Jan 25
I got my General Organics Go Box and fed the plants according to the box, plus a smidge of epsom salts In retrospect, I should have diluted it the whole thing before feeding.

 

[muraydog]

Re: A sad, sad growing journal

DAY 41: Jan 27

Brown spots on leaves and yellowing. Leaves look crispy. Too much nutrients? Partially flushed plants.

DAY 46: Feb 1

Added a small humidifier and removed other humidity sources.

DAY 48: Feb 3

watered with distilled water

DAY 50: Feb 5
The plants are looking pretty healthy.

I topped them again. Perhaps too soon but I only removed tiny leaves.

DAY 51: Feb 6

watered with distilled water.

Now the leaves look dirty. Could this be stress from topping? I'm so confused.

DAY 52: Feb 7

Although the roots had been very underdeveloped, some new roots have grown quickly and they were slightly root bound. My bad. I moved the plants into 3 gallon cloth containers but I didn't put in full amount of soil because I can barely fit 3 of them in my grow tent. (I do have a larger flower tent that I will move them to when the plants get larger or when I'm ready to flower.

 

[DeanB]

Classic over watering. Also, distilled water is unstable and will cause pH problems. Need a fan on them to thicken the stems and help dry them out.

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[DeanB]

The lights you are using emit most of the light out the sides of the bulbs, not the bottom. You may want to rethink the set up.

 

[Skullman420]

You have been drowning your plants. Let them dry completely out between every watering.

Also. Is the soil fertilized? Think I noticed some nutrition burns as well but not sure.

Plesse stop drowning your plants. Its so sad

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[JimmyJames905]

You need to rethink your whole Grow. You're creating problems from the ground up.
-Use pro soil. Like FFOF or ProMix Herb n Vegetable. You just add water to these soils. No nutes.
-Philips LED light bulbs will give you twice the light for half the watts. Use those. CFL is dead.
-transplant way sooner.
-stop drowning your plants. Water every 3 days.
See this plant....

It's one month old from the day I planted the seed. It's a foot tall and bushy as hell. Wanna know the secret?
Good soil, cheap led bulbs and water.
That's it.


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[Skullman420]

I see now you're not using soil at all. You should check the pH of the water you feed them. For your medium the pH should be around 5.8-6.0



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[KingstonRabbi]

Glad to see you're turning this one around. Roots growing into new soil is like a reset button.

Do look at adding another reflector around CFLs to direct more light downward.

 

[muraydog]

Several people have commented that I am watering too soon. When they were in the solo cups I kept one dry and full of just soil so I could compare the weight (and hence dryness) of the plants. I did think the plants were bone dry when I watered them - should I let them go another day? I was only watering every 3-4 days as it was.

 

[muraydog]

As far as the CFLs, they'll have to do for now. I'll upgrade them to proper grow lights when I can afford them, but that probably won't happen this grow. We are considering building an LED setup if we can find appropriate parts. I'd prefer LED lights but they are just too expensive to buy. We need to do more research.

I also found this distributor on Craigslist for a grow light -
Kijiji - Buy, Sell & Save with Canada's #1 Local Classifieds
Anyone have any input on this light set-up?

 

[KingstonRabbi]

Several people have commented that I am watering too soon. When they were in the solo cups I kept one dry and full of just soil so I could compare the weight (and hence dryness) of the plants. I did think the plants were bone dry when I watered them - should I let them go another day? I was only watering every 3-4 days as it was.

Now that you're in larger pots with new soil it should be easier to tell by weight when to water. also good idea to use a moisture to test different depths. You want the top and middle layers to have no water and the very bottom to be drying out before watering. Decent one a grow center should be $15 or less. Using it daily gives good idea of how fast plant is using water and how fast it's growing.

As far as the CFLs, they'll have to do for now. I'll upgrade them to proper grow lights when I can afford them, but that probably won't happen this grow. We are considering building an LED setup if we can find appropriate parts. I'd prefer LED lights but they are just too expensive to buy. We need to do more research.

I also found this distributor on Craigslist for a grow light -
Kijiji - Buy, Sell & Save with Canada's #1 Local Classifieds
Anyone have any input on this light set-up?

That's a HID unit if link is correct. If you want affordable entry level LED unit try Amazon. Mars Hydro units are reliable.
Or you can build your own using LED bulbs and mounted sockets. JimmyJames has good design/instructions.

 

[muraydog]

Thanks JimmyJames.

I have more questions regarding lights - If I switched to LED light bulbs, could I just use the set-up I have (with the splitters)? I'm sure the set-up you have is better for getting the light to the plants, but if I have a better reflector, would that be okay?

Also, with the CFLs I know to count light with lumens. From what I have seen, LED power is more determined in watts. For my 10.7 ft2 flower tent, I believe a 400 watt light would be appropriate. Would a 600W light be a better investment for the same space if I buy one outright? And when determining the wattage using light bulbs, do you count the power usage or equivalent? Do you have separate lights for grow and flower or is an LED 'grow light' sufficient?

My husband is toying with the idea of buying the LED chips and building from scratch but we haven't found an appropriate tutorial and we aren't sure how to determine quality among brands of LED chips.

Oh ya - as far as water, do you use RO water? I don't have a ppm measuring thing - should I avoid tap water because of the salts?

Thanks again.

 

[muraydog]

Oh, as far as the link I provided, I am considering it only because I can't afford an LED light yet. It has both a MH and HID bulb and dimmable ballast. I know they use too much power but the cost is more aligned to my budget. Maybe I can get good LED light next year, but in the meantime, does this light seem ok?

 

[KingstonRabbi]

That is way more light that will fit in your grow tent. Even dimmed down the heat would be hard to control. Even if it fit you would need to invest in fans with AC so the cost of set up is more than just the cost of the light and ballast.

You are better off sticking with CFLs or better yet LED bulbs that run cooler and brighter. You can expand lighting in small increments to stay in budget and not fry your plants. And if/when you do invest in LED fixture you can still use the CFL/LED bulbs as side lights to boost yield so no money wasted, it will all return in form of bigger buds.

 

[JimmyJames905]

A HID Grow light will do just fine. They use a little too much power for my bill but they work fantastic.


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[Ladicannabis]

My husband is toying with the idea of buying the LED chips and building from scratch but we haven't found an appropriate tutorial and we aren't sure how to determine quality among brands of LED chips.


Ok @muraydog. The forum I belong to has a section on building LED's. Give me a bit and I will get it. I jumped from our extensive email conversation to here. I paid for the forum I am in so I can piggy back some of your questions there with the Lords of Amsterdam if required.

CFL's work you just might need higher reflective material. Since I haven't seen your set up I am not sure YET.

Ladi

 

[Lost In Nugs]

Distilled water without nutes in a soilless medium sounds a bad idea to me.

For LED. I would only buy from Cree, Bridgelux or Citizen. CREE CXB3070, CXB3590. BRIDGLELUX Vero 29 gen 7, Citizen Clu1212, 1818, 1825 are good chips. There are some more, but these are rock solid for shure

Current Grow SeymoreNuggets Flowering Journal - Nebula & Atomical Haze - Soil - 2x3 - 420W DIY COB

My journey seeking the light. Found some
SeymoreNuggets DIY For Noobs - Build Lights - CO2 Supplements - Auto-Watering - More

 

[Skullman420]

Follow fanleaf's numerous tutorials here on this forum. He's amazing and will guide you through it if you ask nicely

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