First Grow: Organic, CFLs, in 2.4 Sq Ft Box

[gangalicious]

Hello 420 peeps. Okay, so I finally decided to try to grow my own medicine, the sweet, sweet cannabis plant.

This whole project began as a PC case grow-op type experiment, but I quickly realized the space limitations were just too oppressive. After a lot of internet research, I really just wanted to experiment to answer a few questions for myself. One, can good, effective, powerful, cannabis be grown under CFLs? Two, can it be grown in a restricted space/box?

Vital Stats:

Strain: 2 clones of "Grape Ice" maybe, probably, is what the guy finally settled on after listing several different names. So who knows fo sho.

Cab: 2.4 square feet (13" deep x 26" wide x 34" high); (0.225 sq meters) 6.8 cubic ft. Various fans and DIY carbon filtration.

Lights: 256Watts of various CFLs: 115W @ 2700K, the rest at 5300-6500K

Temps/Humidity: 78-83F at root level. 88-94F at canopy level. Dry lately, so humidity in the box runs ~30-45%.

Soil: Aunt Edna's Best Organic. Yeah! Contains lotsa goodies, like bat guano, kelp, mycorrhiza, castings, feather meal, gypsum, lime (dolomite and oyster shell). I added extra perlite to achieve a 5:1 of Aunt Edna's Best to perlite ratio.

Water: when top 2 inches feel dry, about every third day or every other day, usually. Filtered tap.

Added nutes: Veg: I added high nitrogen bat guano and organic kelp extract. Flower: General Organics BioThrive Bloom formulation, plus a bit of high phosphorus guano.

Right now the plants are finishing week 8 of 12/12 and I think they look pretty good, but I also think I probably made quite a few mistakes along the way. I'll post pics to show the progress, starting with . . .

Day 2

 

[gangalicious]

Also, in such a small grow space, I had to use some training techniques and cropping, I think it may be called supercropping or something. . .

 

[DroJo]

Hey gang..

have ya had a look @ this:
Photo Gallery Guide - How to Resize, Upload & Post Photos

Sounds a bit warm in there, how are you exhausting your grow cab?

 

[gangalicious]

Day 18

Day 21

Day 30: Here you can start to see what happened when the plants grew too close to the lights: several leaves are burnt and there is an overall yellowing/bleaching. I had been sick for a few days and forgot to lower the plants one day. They were growing so fast that I was adjusting their height just about every day. Some tops grew to within about 1-1.5 inches from the light, too close and too hot with these CFLs.

 

[Linkorien]

looks good if you have an extra $25 and an outlet you could run to lowes or a improvement store to get yourself a bathroom vent fan and hook it up in tat box very easy, it would bring the temp down a bit and provide great circulation
i have two running in my box

 

[gangalicious]

Hey gang..

have ya had a look @ this:
Photo Gallery Guide - How to Resize, Upload & Post Photos

Sounds a bit warm in there, how are you exhausting your grow cab?

Hey DroJo, thanks for checking in. Figured out the image problem, so thanks. (cut and pasted the wrong string of text). Yeah, I agree, sounds a bit hot, but since the weather has been cooling down some, its been easier to keep the cab cooler. The last couple of days the cab at root level is running more like 78-80F. At about three inches below the lights (about where the tips of the buds are), the temps are still about 88-92F. At this point, I've got a total of four fans (3 x 120mm computer fans and one 4" inline) for exhaust but they're also sucking air through DIY carbon filters, something they were not designed to do. I've got no cash right now to buy real fans that can move air with much force (higher static pressure). I tried lowering the plants about an inch further from the lights which lowered the canopy temp to about 86F, but my impression was that the plants actually grew slower, so I moved them up to about 3" from the lights and have kept them there since. They've been looking healthy and green as long as I keep the tops at ~3" away and as long as they stay below 96F. Thanks for lookin' out, Dro. More pics to follow tonight, including current pics.

 

[gangalicious]

looks good if you have an extra $25 and an outlet you could run to lowes or a improvement store to get yourself a bathroom vent fan and hook it up in tat box very easy, it would bring the temp down a bit and provide great circulation
i have two running in my box

Hey, Linkorien, thanks for the reply. I never thought of a bathroom fan. Are there any that run reasonably quiet? My bathroom fan at home is really loud. It doesn't have to be stealth, but the cab is in a bedroom.

 

[DroJo]

looks good if you have an extra $25 and an outlet you could run to lowes or a improvement store to get yourself a bathroom vent fan and hook it up in tat box very easy, it would bring the temp down a bit and provide great circulation
i have two running in my box

Bathroom fans tend not to be quiet tho..

Hey DroJo, thanks for checking in. Figured out the image problem, so thanks. (cut and pasted the wrong string of text). Yeah, I agree, sounds a bit hot, but since the weather has been cooling down some, its been easier to keep the cab cooler. The last couple of days the cab at root level is running more like 78-80F. At about three inches below the lights (about where the tips of the buds are), the temps are still about 88-92F. At this point, I've got a total of four fans (3 x 120mm computer fans and one 4" inline) for exhaust but they're also sucking air through DIY carbon filters, something they were not designed to do. I've got no cash right now to buy real fans that can move air with much force (higher static pressure). I tried lowering the plants about an inch further from the lights which lowered the canopy temp to about 86F, but my impression was that the plants actually grew slower, so I moved them up to about 3" from the lights and have kept them there since. They've been looking healthy and green as long as I keep the tops at ~3" away and as long as they stay below 96F. Thanks for lookin' out, Dro. More pics to follow tonight, including current pics.

How are the fans set up? Do you have an intake bro? The plants do look pretty healthy tho.

 

[Linkorien]

not true if you spen a little more you can get one rated at like 1.0sones
go to lowes i just got mine there its a 4.0sones in sound level but i still think its quite.
when i was there they had a set up over at the fan selection so you could push a button and listen to the sound level f 4.0 vs 3.0 vs 2.0 vs 1.0 the 1.0sones i cant hear not at all its also $60 but it moves 75cfm i got the 75cfm 4.0 and have no problems

check this out
hxxp://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=204318-14-QTR070&lpage=none

 

[gangalicious]

Hey DroJo, yeah, I've got a couple of intakes at the bottom and middle of the box. Exhaust out the top. I don't have many good pics of the cab, but lemme see if I can get some of those put up soon so that you can kinda see what the deal is.

 

[gangalicious]

not true if you spen a little more you can get one rated at like 1.0sones
go to lowes i just got mine there its a 4.0sones in sound level but i still think its quite.
when i was there they had a set up over at the fan selection so you could push a button and listen to the sound level f 4.0 vs 3.0 vs 2.0 vs 1.0 the 1.0sones i cant hear not at all its also $60 but it moves 75cfm i got the 75cfm 4.0 and have no problems

check this out
hxxp://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=204318-14-QTR070&lpage=none

Awesome. Rest assured, I'll be at Lowes tomorrow checking those babies out, pushing the buttons and switches and everything. Don't have the dough right now, but soon maybe. For those who don't know, because I didn't know, a "sone" is "a unit of perceived loudness equal to the loudness of a 1000-hertz tone at 40 dB above threshold." Whatever that means. Thanks, Linkorien.

 

[Sonzor]

Congrats on the start of your new grow. The plants look wonderful. And goodness Grape Ice that sounds awesome. Great job and + rep and good luck on the rest of your grow..

 

[Linkorien]

a "sone" is "a unit of perceived loudness equal to the loudness of a 1000-hertz tone at 40 dB above threshold." Whatever that means. Thanks, Linkorien.

LMAO thank you! i wasn't very sure what it meant ether!!

 

[gangalicious]

Last Day of 24hr lights (day30):

Day 21 of 12/12:

Day 35 of 12/12:

Day 42 of 12/12:

Day 49 of 12/12:

Current pics (day55 of 12s) coming up, tonight . . .

 

[gangalicious]

and so here we are today . . .

Day 55 of 12s:

 

[gangalicious]

Congrats on the start of your new grow. The plants look wonderful. And goodness Grape Ice that sounds awesome. Great job and + rep and good luck on the rest of your grow..

Thanks, sonzor, for the kind words and rep.

 

[k1net1k]

nice work !!

 

[OldSkoool]

Very impressive! I'm amazed you were able to grow two plants in such a confined space. Making me re think if I can stuff two plants within my own confined (20"X20") space. Although judging by the photo's, it looks as if those are 10" pots. Excellent job with the LST as well!

Loved the bud porn of those trich covered buds. How do the trich's look? Close to harvest?

+reps for over coming issues, and producing a beautiful crop!

 

[OldMedMan]

Hi gangalicious

I don't think you could have made your grow any better than it is, everything looks well thought out and the small space grow set up is top notch.
Your plants look like bud machines.

Had to laugh at myself when I saw that you raised the plants to the light. I did just the opposite. It was hell raisin all my CFLs everyday.

 

[DroJo]

and so here we are today . . .

Day 55 of 12s:

Whoa bro! clearly i should be taking tips from you and not the other way around.. holy cow gang, grape ice or whateva it is loooks pretty. Fantabulous job..

P.S. i think the reason your temps are a lil high is because it looks like your using IR Shield. Ir Shield is really great for reflectivity but temps do tend to be a lil higher.. but ummm dude, doesnt seem like thats botherin your girls at all...

wowz...

+rep for sure