First CFL Grow Using 30 Watt CFLs

cfls work well but i was using around 400watts with the cfls so it made sense to switch to hps for the extra lumins, it dont cost me more in electric as im using about the same watts but i got 55,000 lumins now from the 400watt dual spectrum hps, i got to admit the plants grow a lot quicker, heat is an issue and i cant keep my grow room door closed for more than about an hour so heat is a major issue, i had not heat issues with cfls, in fact temps where to cold with the cfls, so as long as you can keep the grow are cool with using hps then you should be ok, i still use cfls for my clones and seedlings, the clones i have now got in veg under hps have only just gone under the hps i had them vegging under only 2x 30watt 6500 k cfls, and they seemed to grow quicker even though they was only under 2 cfls and not over 10cfls, so not sure what happened their,

ill still use cfls for my clones and seedlings, and when i switch the hps to 12-12 ill use the cfls to veg the seedlings and clones for the next time round, im chuffed with the results from the hps, my 1 clone is bigger than the plants i vegd for 7 weeks under the cfls, but i cnat pin point it to the cfls as i was not using bpn during veg the first time round and also the temps where low, so now im using bpn from day 1 and my temps are fine, a little high if i have the door closed for to long, it dont take long to get over 100deg f, so keeping the temps down is a lot harder with hps, i had no heat issues with cfl even when i was using 15x 23 and 30watt cfls, the temps where ok, but this hps pushes out a load of heat and keeps the room nice and toasty for the plants,

i dont have any extraction fans though so that would help, i just have 12v fans blowing on the plants to keep the tops of the plant cool, because the temp change from the top of the plant to the bottom is a lot, i need to keep the air moving above the top of the plants to stop them over heating at the very top, its either that or raise the light and let the plants stretch which i dont want to do.

i am getting loads more stretch with the hps, cfls kept the plants short and very bushy, but the hps seems to make the stretch more than the cfls do, possibly because the light is further away from the top of the plants, the cfls could be withing an inch of the tops of the plants so possibly the plants didnt need to stretch as they was all ready at the light, but this hps makes the plants not so much stretch but get a lot taller with more node growth,

so this time round im using the hps for veg and for flower, my hps has a digital ballast so i could us a mh bulb if i wanted, but the bulb im using is a dual spectrum one so it has an extra element that puts out the blue light needed for the veg stage, i think this is also a bonus for when the plants flower as it means their getting both the blue and red light for both stages of growth, so this should make the plants healthy, only time will tell how this 2nd grow goes, but im pleased with the hps, i would still be using cfls if i was only growing 1 or 2 plants, but when i was using that many watts on cfls it made sense to switch and get more lumins for the power i was using
 
that bud is the main bud off my 2ltr dwc hempie, its dry now and in jars to cure, it weighs in now dry at just over 20g so a lot less than the oz i thought, im amazed how much that bud has shrunk, dont get me wrong its still huge but was massive when i harvested it, ill be doing another 2 x 2ltr dwc hempie this time round, im just deciding what to do, what seeds to soak,
 
Hi donpaul.p
I think this is what you are looking for.
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thanks for the chart mate, makes a lot of sense, i may try lowering my light about an inch a day and try and get it slightly lower, i had my grow room door shut today for 3 hours as i had visitors and when i opened it temps where at 110f, but the plants looked really healthy and wasnt showing signs of heat stress, in fact id say they really grew well at the higher temps, im not saying it is good for everyday, but the plants seemed to cope well with it, i like to keep it around the 80 to 85 mark as my plants seem to respond really well at that temp, i just run a bigger fan with the door open if temps go to high,
 
i got 20grams of my 2ltr dwc hempie, this was 12-12 from seeds, so if i did just 10 of these hempie and did 12-12 from seed i should be able to get 200g every 8 weeks, i just realised this when another grower told me about the 200g per 8 weeks, i then realised what he was saying made sense, even though the yield is low, its makes sense, the space i can use with a hempie is tiny, their is no veg time just strait to flower, so i could do just 10 plants every 8 weeks and get around 200g per 8 weeks, this isnt bad, i could fit about 100 hempies in my grow space, watering would be a problem and plant numbers would be a bit risky, but i could easily do 10 2ltr dwc hempie in my grow space and could even fit some 3 gallon pots in their if i wanted to veg regular plants,

so this time round here is what im doing,
in veg now under glr i have the following,
1 x special kush clone, 1ft tall, monster cropped with crazy branches
1 x special kush clone, 5 inches tall, monster cropped with crazy branches
1 x northern lights cross big bud clone, monster cropped and has grown to stems, so im lst these so i can have them growing upwards from the edge of the pot so it will look like its 2 plants coming out the same pot, but its only 1 plant.
1 x delicious fruity chronic juice femenised seedling, 3 inches tall and growing well.

1 x greenhouse seeds auto bomb, this is also in the grow room under glr and it seems to be coping well with the glr method, it has not gone hermie and continues to flower.

im feeding the auto the agressive bloom bpn schedule, the clones and seedling was given bpn at slightly stronger than veg 1, i did this as some clones are bigger than others so didnt want to use veg 2 and run into problems, so i went in between the 2 and gave that feed and everything is ok.

about 7 days before i flip the lights to 12-12 ill soak some seeds and get them growing, these will then go into 3 x 2ltr dwc hempie and go 12-12 from seed, i want to see what results i get this time round with different strains, if i can get around 20g per plant then ill hit the target of 200g every 8 weeks, so depending on the results will depend where i go with my next grow, also the results from the plants that have been vegged,

this is the 3 seeds ill be using for the hempie grow, i may soak these 10 days before so they can have a few days veg,
1 x delicious fruity chronic juice femenised
1 x reserva privade sour kush, also known as headband and its femenised.
1 x afgan skunk femenised
so them 3 will go into the hempie grow, i will take clones from all of them in case i decide to stick with the hempie or if the bud is nice to smoke, i wont be taking any clones from the special kush or the nl x bb fem, i want to try different strains so ill not take clones from them, they will be vegged and flowered as is, no topping, no lst as such, so i can see what results i get if the plant is left to do what it should with no training.
 
I used CFLs in my 1st inside grow and found out the same thing you did about cost of watts...now i don't use them any more...good for veg?...maybe so but plants gets larger faster under MH and buds are larger denser under HPS..if you enclose your light reflector with glass and a ex. fan you can put your plants closer..also rm temp won't be so high...
 
i was thinking about an air cooled hood, it would certainly help with the temps, 1st time round i used 400watts of cfls and my plants struggle to get taller, but this time round all my clones where rooted and vegd for a couple of weeks under only 2 x 30watt cfls 6400k and they seem to be growing better than the mothers did under all them lights, all ready my 1 clone is bigger than the mother plant it came from and the mothers where vegged for 7 weeks, these are not that old and growing like crazy, they are under 400watt dual spectrum hps now with the glr method and they really are growing like crazy, ive never seen nothing like it, it really does make the last grow look very slow, these are going to be bigger than the mothers a lot sooner, the plants seem healthier and really growing fast.

im not sure what has made this happen, is it the nutes, is it the higher temps, my temps are always above 78, im around 85+ and the plants seem to be growing like crazy under it, they show no signs of heat stress at all, so thats about the only difference this time, i know im using the hps but these clones and seedling was all grown under cfls to start off with, it was only when my hempie finished flower that i put everthing in the grow room, i think these plants are going to get pretty big really quick, so this should give me a better yield, but if i ever wanted to mother a plant then id take a clone well into flower stage so it ended up monster cropping, i could take roughly 20 clones now from the 1 kush plant, if i took that many from the mothers i would of had no plant left
 
it is looking like that mate, it would make mothering a plant worth it if the clones are going to do better than the mother, i always thought they would be the same plants, but my clones are far out growing the mothers in less than half the time, its could possibly be due to the age of the clones, no need to start with the seedling growth so that cuts out over a week, plus the clones are old enough to be in agresive growth mode, so im wondering if that has got anything to do with it, and possibly why glr is working better with my clones than it is with the seedling, maybe the seedling needs to to mature before it starts to grow well under glr, im using glr till i switch to flower, and im pretty chuffed with the results on the clones, i never got these results when i tried glr with the cfls so i wonder if the glr under cfls was just a lot slower due to the lower lumins, so under hps im probably noticing the difference more.
the seedling is not growing as quick as the clones under glr and its not growing any quicker than the seeds i grew under 12-12 or under 20-4, id say the growth rate is roughly the same, im hoping it picks up and grows as quick as the clones, its got some catching up to do
 
quick update, i decided to end the aerogarden, the light just wasnt strong enough to grow it, it was stretching like crazy then the branches where stretched that much it just kept falling down, so i took a load of clones from it, im still not sure if its male or female yet, got about 5 clones, im hoping its fem cuz i really like this strain, if not i got 2 more seeds of this strain to try, but ill leave them for round 3,

so thats the aero garden, i have also decided to soak 2 fem seeds for my 2tr dwc hempie, here is what i soaked,
1 x reserva privada sour kush, also known as head band,
1 x afgan skunk.
both of these are femenised seeds so should be female, although i do know its not ever 100% else they would call them female seeds,
with these i plan very little veg, possibly a week or 2 so i can try and get more than i did off my last hempie, so they will veg under glr for a couple of weeks, or i may even veg them under 24-0 with the cfls, im thinking this as the clones are growing super quick under glr but the seedling is not growing any quicker than a normal seedling, so maybe the cfls are the best option and do 24-0 for the 1st 2 weeks,

right i just soaked the seeds, when they pop open they will go into the 2ltr dwc hempie x 2, im hoping to beat the weight of the last hempie, thats why im giving them some veg time, depending on how quick they grow depends on the veg time, im thinking possibly 2 weeks at the most then they will be under 12-12, ill just take them out the grow room when the light goes off so i can still use glr on my other plants that i plan to veg for a while, so all been well my hempies will bu up and running in a few days time, these will grow along side what i got,
so this is hempie round 2 starting today,
 
thanks james, here is some info ive been talking about with james, its about tanning lamps, i have got one and james mentiond he has got uv light also, here is the info i found, it seems it increases potency, its got to be worth a try, mine is a small floor standing lamp, has 5 x 1ft tubes in and slightly taller than knee height, so ill probably give this a try when i enter flower
Ultra-violet B light is a spectrum of light that is invisible to us but is visible to insects and some other organisms. In humans it causes suntan and sunburn and is implicated in the formation of eye cataracts. It is the light emitted by tanning bulbs.

UVB light also affects marijuana potency. The potency of high quality marijuana increases in direct ratio to the amount of UVB light it receives. This is very significant. In California, where the medical dispensaries operate in an unrestricted market; many dispensaries reject fall harvested outdoor material as inferior. They have found it lacks the potency of indoor crops and is a harsh smoke. However, when they were presented with marijuana grown outdoors but forced to ripen August 10, they accepted it as if it were indoor because of its high potency and lack of harshness. I think the harshness results from cool nights.

Indoors, under fluorescent and HPS lamps, gardens receive little UV-B light. Metal halides emit a bit more. However, there are ways of supplying your garden with UV-B light. Tanning lamps work, that is, lamps that tan people, because of the UV-B light they emit. Using tanning lamps will increase the THC content of the crop. Reptiles and lizards require the spectrum to stay healthy. So the spectrum usually comprises about 10 percent of their output. If you want to try tanning lamps they are available on the Internet. Use between 5-10 percent of your total wattage to these lamps. For a 1000-watt garden use 100 watts of special lighting.

Adding UV-B light to your garden will enhance your marijuana naturally, without “special formulas” and chemicals.
 
here is some more great info, curtesy of jorge cervantes, it recons it makes the buds grow better, its just some basic info i thought you may like to read
GREEN AND BLUE LIGHT AT NIGHT

As plants evolved for hundreds of millions of years they never actually had to deal with separation of light spectrums or unusual lighting regimes. When they received light it came from the sun in a mixture of spectrums and they could pick and choose which to use. It was only with the advent first of gas and then electric lighting that plants encountered unusual regimens and splintered spectrums.

Plants measure day length using the red light spectrum. While they use other spectrums for other purposes, they are not sensitive to them as far as flowering is concerned. They are almost totally insensitive to green light and for this reason reflect it back to us while absorbing most other spectrums.

Plants' insensitivity to green light can be used to a gardener's advantage. You know that turning the light on in the middle of the dark cycle disturbs the plants' flowering paradigm. The light, HPS, fluorescent and MH lamps all emit red light. Green fluorescent and LED lights contain no red light and will not disturb the dark period. You can go in the garden under adequate light to work, as long as it is green.

Plants use blue light for certain regulatory processes and also for photosynthesis. Chlorophyll absorbs both blue and red light and uses the light's energy to power the complex process in which water and atmospheric carbon dioxide are converted to sugar and oxygen gas. Blue light does not affect the regulation of flowering.

When blue light is turned on during the dark period, plants photosynthesize but their flowering isn't affected. This results in more growth as the plants produce more sugars. Before LED lights it was difficult to create a pure blue light. Instead, most of the time other spectrums were filtered out, which can be an inconvenient process. Try using between 20 and 40 watts of mixed blue light per 1000 watts of regular light. I have done only initial experimentation with this so test this in a limited way first. I suspect that the additional light is an efficient way of increasing total yield

Aside from red and blue light, plants also use orange light for photosynthesis. I haven't experimented with them yet, but orange LEDs might also help increase yield and probably can be lit continuously, just like the blues. More on this as the news breaks–or at least, as it fractures.
 
i would veg the hempie plants under 24/0...CFLs...i think i will save growing in water for the winter..ice in the reservoir is not working...my res temp hit 90 in less than 5 min...so i emptied my 5 gal buckets...i still got the 5 gal cooler going and the cloner...i got them on a timer to keep the pump less heated..i may hook up a separate reservoir for the 5 gal ..see how that works...
 
thanks miwa, they will be veged under cfls for the first week or so then they will go under the hps for the next week, im planning on 2 weeks veg at the most, the reserva privada sour kush, ill check the name, but that seed has popped so ill put it in pot tomorrow, i prefer to put them in pot as soon as i know the seed has popped, i dont take the risk of touching the tap root, if i know the seed has popped then it gets planted, i have had 100% success rate so far, so the hempies are on the way, 1 will be planted tomorrow in small pot for now, as the hempie wont fit in the small veg room, but as soon as its big enough it will go in the hempie in another room with a few cfls under 24-0, then it will go under hps under glr for another week then it will be flowered, it will give me something while i veg the clones and other plant under glr, i can get the hempies going and flower them off before the others, im hoping both seeds pop by tomorrow, the afgan skunk fem seed is smaller than the other, a lot smaller, so not sure if its even viable, looks ok and the colour looks good so all been well that will have popped by tomorrow.

i gota agree with the temps mate, its not good for hydro grow, my hempie seemed ok with the higher temps, today i have been at my moms so the grow room door was wedged open with a big box so the dog couldnt get in, when i got back the temp was 90f, but all of my plants even the seedling have grown well over an inch in less than 12 hours, the plant i am doing the lst on i tied it back down before i left this morning, then when i get back it has started growing towards the light and its reached the edge of the pot so it can grow up now as a normal plant, none of my plants are showing signs of heat stress, no leaves have got turned up ends, im not sure why my plants grow under these temps, 90 is meant to be way to hot, but my plants seem to grow a lot more and i do mean a lot more when the temps are higher, i try to keep them around the 80 to 85 tops, but it gets higher if im out and wedged the door, so on these days the plants seem to grow loads, not really sure why, could it be the strain, or strains
 
can any of you top growers help me and james out with some info, theirs loads around the net but none have tested the idea, does anyone know anything about uv lighting or using tanning lights for these plants, it says using these lamps in flower will produce bigger and denser buds, but im sure i read somewhere that using them for to long will damage the plant just like it damages a human, but this is going back a few months when i first thought of the idea, james mentioned it and we been discussing it, but im hoping that one of you top growers can give me and james some advice on this matter, i dont plan on buying the tanning light i have all ready got one, it has 5 x 1ft uv tubes in it like them long shop lights but these are 1ft long, the tanning unit stands upright like a halogen fire or normal fire, so the bulbs run from the floor to above the knee in height when standing in front of it, its not meant to be used like a normal light this is standing upright so not sure what it tans, unless its just for tanning your legs when your sitting down, you could also hold it on your lap if you wanted a nice tan up the top, not sure why it was made this small, possibly medical reasons, i can have 3 lights on or all 5,

anyone got any info on these and how they affect the plants
 
another quick update, their will be pics tomorrow of my plants so their will be a big update tomorrow with many pics, i promise.

anyway i woke up today and my other seed had popped, so i dont like waiting till the root has grown loads before putting in pots, if the seed has popped and the root is growing then thats good enough for me,

both my seeds are now in pot
1 x reserva privada sour kush
1 x afgan skunk.
both these are femenised, i was a bit concerned about the afgan skunk as it was such a small seed, but over night the seed popped and the tap root has grown more than the headband or sourkush as it is also called, so both now have gone into small pots, now i only filled the pots a small way with soil, less than half the pot, the reason i have done this is because these are going into the 2ltr hempies so i dont want them having to grow their roots loads before they start coming out the bottle in the hempie, so as soon as its growing its first set of real leaves they will go into their new hempie homes, i must add a new improved 2ltr dwc hempie home, both 2ltr hempies will have air stones this time round, before i never used air stones and got great results, but towards the end of flower i was starting to get some slime and bad sell in the res, so i think the lack of air was an issue, not all people have this issue, but both my res on my hempies are pretty much a full 2ltr pop bottle so it holds a lot of liquid, my last hempie was drinking a whole res every 24 to 36 hours so it never got to bad, so this time i will be having a fan blowing on the bottles that are used as the res to keep temps down and they will have air stones keeping the roots in oxygen rich magic bpn goodness.

ill do a big update tomorrow so you can see my crazy monster cropped plants, and also my lst plant that is no growing up and no more lst, it is basically 2 plants in one pot growing from 1 clone, im not sure how it split into 2 at soil level but it has, it was never topped as it was a topping when i used it as a clone, if i move the soil out the way of the stem i can see where the stems join it looks like a perfect T joint, so not sure what happened, possibly monster crop side affect, not to sure, but it looks great and they are all growing like crazy, ill take plenty of pics in the morning and put them up while im at my moms, i know ive not took many pictures this time but its uploading thats the problem, so ill take the pics and take the mem card to my moms and upload some pics while im their,

greenhouse seeds auto bomb is doing ok, i thought the GLR would cause problems with it and might make it hermie, but it hasnt so not sure if autos can hermie, i would of thought giving a normal plant light during the 12 hour dark period would stress it enough to make it hermie.

the other thing im a bit confused about is that my plants seem to prefer higher temps, when the temps are below 80 the growth slows down but when the temps is about 85 they seem to grow like crazy, when i was out yesterday i came back and the temps where at 90f, i checked my plants and all had grown over an inch including the chronic juice seedling, today the temps has been in check around 80, and growth has slowed again, not sure what to make of it, do some strains prefer hotter temps, do they grow naturally at these higher temps, i dont like having the temps above 85 so im not aiming to keep the temps their, im happy when the temps around 80, but i noticed the extra growth when the temps where higher and my plants showed no signs of heat stress like curled leaves or the edges pointing towards the light, the plants looked the same they always do.

could it be that the higher temps are heating the soil up and the roots prefer it so take in more nutes and water, or is it the plants taking in more water to cool down and in doing this take in more nutes, i dont know enough to explain it so just throwing ideas out their, im not going to grow at them high temps, when im here the temps stay below 85, its just when i go out i have to wedge the door open with a xmas tree box so the dog cant get in, if i leave the door shut it goes over 100f as i have got no extraction fan in their, so the door stays open.

so tomorrow their will be a full picture update, you will really see the difference since the last pics
 
remember to get your entries in for the contests, enter your plant for plant of the month, enter your own buds or buds you have purchased or been given in the nug of the month, or nominate someone for member of the month, the prizes are great, so get your entries in, the link to the contest is in my signature below
 
Don p I went back a few pages to where you were talking about light time 20/4 & so on seems like some interesting experiments to be tried out. I'm thinking about bumping up my time to 20/4 after I get these BPN & see what happens.
 
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