Holy shnikey's! I had no idea the PH-200 costs that much! I just looked it up.
Gonna have to get the OMM a good x-mas gift
Absolutely! As I mentioned to you once before, getting a PH-200 as a gift was pretty special, not just because of the cost involved, but because of the accuracy and quality of the meter! The person who bought that for you KNEW a thing or two about PH meters! Hope you are taking good care of it and are storing it properly? The sensor needs to remain wet at all times surrounded by storage solution inside the reservoir cap.
And I should add that $80.00 for a PH meter with this kind of accuracy is DIRT CHEAP! Nothing can touch the PH-200 in its own price range. You have to go up into the multi-hundreds and even thousands of dollars before you will find one that is more accurate, and few can compare when it comes to the ease of calibration!
I was wondering... are the growth rates different between clones and from seed? I know it takes a while for the roots to come in on a clone, but once they are established are they pretty much the same as the mother interm of growth speed?
In my experience, seedlings grow faster than clones do. At least for a few weeks after the clones have roots. I can't speak for all clones though, just the ones I made that didn't die outright! lol! When I get some from the Turbo Klone and plant them it will be interesting to see what kind of growth rate I get from those. As I mentioned in another post, that growing tip I cut from one of the two original Blueberry plants has not grown a bit since I took it, and even though it is looking really healthy and green, it appears to just be in a state of suspended animation. More on that whole situation another time.
Also! When you clean out your pots, after use ,are the plants root bound?
After flowering and harvest, the roots usually extend all the way down to the bottom of the 5 gallon pots, but I wouldn't really consider them "root bound". Nothing like you see when transplanting a healthy young plant from say a 1 gallon pot into a 5 gallon. When a plant goes into flower, the root growth slows to practically zero. That is why it is so much harder to clone a flowering Cannabis plant, since root production is cut way, way back by the plant's own hormones.
There was a thread somewhere about pots and their size/shape.. Someone said clones do better with wide pots and from seed do better with taller pots... They said this was due to the seed one having a tap root. Does this sound accurate to you? I ask cause I know you have done both...
Sorry...Couldn't help myself!
That is getting a bit carried away with stuff that really doesn't matter or is even true if you ask me! Pots are pots as far as I am conerned and I try to get them as cheaply as I can. As I mentioned, I purchase my pots in bulk from some of the large online greenhouse outlet stores. You can pick up two dozen 5 gallon pots like the kind I use for under $20.00, and many of these online stores offer free shipping on orders over $50.00. I bought four dozen of these 5 gallon pots for $40.00, along with FIFTY 6" peat pots for $20.00 and some other assorted gardening tools.
In my opinion, anyone out there paying more than a buck for a 5 gallon pot is paying too much! Sure these cheap ones are thin vaccuformed vinyl and rather flimsy when empty, but you don't use them empty now do you? lol! When filled with soil, they are every bit as solid feeling and useable as a $15.00 ornamental pot or bucket. Those cheap 5 gallon pots I bought are now on their fourth season, and I haven't lost a one! As you said yourself... Put your hard earned cash into things that matter, and don't get sucked in to those minutia discussions about things that don't.
How do you like your T5's? Is hydrofarm a good brand? I intend to use the same lighting system (but prolly the 8 bulb one)... I'm unsure if I want to get the VHO, is that what yours are? or the regular HO?
Sorry I'm all questions! But thanks again GG7, your so helpful!
No problemo! Glad to help! That is what this forum is all about right? Sharing knowledge and information so all of us can grow better stuff!
As far as fixtures go... I'm very satisfied with the Hydrofarm fixtures! Mine are the "Very High Output" variety that Hydrofarm calls the "Designer Series". If you buy the larger tube configurations they provide multiple switches on the fixture that allow you to operate sections of the fixture independently. On my 6 tube fixture for example, you can just run the two outside tubes on each end, or the two center tubes in the middle, or all of them. Not sure what the 8 tube options are, but obviously it will be something similar.
It is easy to get totally caried away with the gear and lose sight of the whole point of buying it in the first place! As with any hobby, there are those who spend more time debating and arguing about the virtues of one brand of device from another or other minutia than they spend actually participating in the hobby itself! They lose sight of the actual goal! In our case, that is growing a quality crop, and in that regard my Hydrofarm stuff has never let me down.
I really can't justify spending any more for a T5 fixture than you need to to get quality. I have seen some T5 fixtures that are way more expensive than the Hydrofarm Designer and I just can't figure out why. There is also a cheaper Hydrofarm line of T5 fixtures, but it wasn't that much cheaper, and I liked the low profile design of the Designer Series enclosure and the dual switches on the 6 and 8 tube models.
Good call on shooting for the 8 tube model! You can always turn some of the tubes off or remove them, but you can't add more tubes to a fixture that only holds say 4 to begin with! I made that mistake when I bought my first fixture. Four tubes seemed like plenty at the time, but I quickly learned that when growing with T5s or CFLs there is no such thing as too much light!
The 6 tube was only a little more $$ and I eventually bought one of those too.
Since I took those grow room photos posted at the beginning of this journal, I have swapped my two T5 fixtures around and put the 6 tube into the Bloom Room and the 4 tube in the veg room. The more lights you can have on a flowering plant the better, so it made complete sense to make the swap!
Besides, this time of year, I don't even run my veg room since I have all my plants out on the back deck taking advantage of the FREE sunlight!
Did I get all of them?
Let me know if you have any more questions on this stuff!
Cheers.
