Hi! First time grower needs help please!

[Greenethumb42]

Hello first time grower.I am a first time grower as well..we'll really this is my second but my first indoors..and let me tell you it doesn't matter what you use or give them as long as you take care of them they will grow..my setup is not far from yours..I made a grow box out of cardboard and made a wing for my lights out of a dryer vent tube..if you don't have much height you can always lst means low stress training..take a bread tie or some kind of tie and tie the top of the plant down..it will make all the lower stuff grow up..also do you know anything about topping or FIM.means duck I missed..there is so much you can do..utube is my best friend..lol..are you using any nutrients and how old are they now..keep up the good work..and when it comes to growing being patient is the key.

 

[Hobopr0]

cool, thx for the encouragement...yeah, been all over youtube and been fiming here and there as well. just bending here and there and it keeps bouncing back. it's gonna be a mess when i switch to flower mode!

your girls look great! what the deal with those?

 

[Greenethumb42]

They are 6 weeks old and there on day 7 of flower...try to tie down the branches..keep up the good work and it will pay off..and remember if something doesn't look right don't be afraid to ask..try to catch it before it gets to bad or just flush your plants it will take everything back to normal..it's good to flush every once and awhile anyway

 

[TheNarrator]

Hey Hobopr0,

Plants look real nice, well done with all the training etc in your small space!

Good decision to get a tent. With 5 plants in the tent I think you would be wanting them to go vertical as they will grow so much more in flower that if you keep training them horizontally I imagine things could end up pretty tangled. With your CFL setups it should be fairly easy to control this by gradually moving the lights up as you don't want them to get too stretchy and lose the awesome bushiness you have trained in. I guess another option would be using a screen of some sort to ensure the tops that you have created stay even as they start to bud up. Not knowledgable enough to comment on yield but with a 2 month veg I don't think you will be disappointed.

 

[Weaselcracker]

Its not really possible to give yes or no answers to the questions, Basically though, with the training I see you doing, you're aiming to fill the growing space horizontally with a flat canopy of growth. In a general sense, vertical growth doesn't really do anything for you. Say you have a 4x4 foot space, filled wall to wall with a jungle of plants. The light shines from above, down on the plant's canopy. Depending on what your lighting is, good buds are produced in the top ten inches or so of the jungle. The depth of light coverage and prime bud production varies between led, cfl, hid, etc. But generally the lower, shaded, part of the jungle doesn't produce much worthwhile.
So- in a sense it doesn't matter whether the plant jungle is one foot high or 6 feet high, it's still a 4'x4' space.
I'm definitely generalizing...
Another factor is that you're most likely going to have some males show up, which will make a hole in the canopy. Usually though, you can train the remaining plants horizontally to fill the space.

As for yield, that's always a hard question to answer. Your goal, well- every growers goal, is to keep those plants 100% healthy and given lots of light till they are finished flowering. Then the plants will produce to their potential. There are sooo many obstacles in the way of that happening. As a first time grower you are going to make some mistakes that will affect yield. In fact, as a reasonably experienced grower I'm still making plenty of mistakes that affect yield.

Probably the best way to measure yield is in terms of grams per watt. That is- grams of bud produced at harvest, divided by the total wattage of the lighting you are using.
The gold standard is 1 gram per watt. If you get .5 grams per watt on your first run you can definitely pat yourself on the back. For that matter-hey, pat yourself on the back whatever you yield.

As an example- I flower under a couple 600 watt lights, using individual scrog screens for each plant. I grow four screens/plants per light. Each screen is 24" x 19". I squeeze four together under each light to make a 48" X 38" screened plant area.

This last month I harvested a few plants. My average yield per screen was 116 grams. This amounts to a little over one pound per light, and .775 grams per watt ( 465 grams produced divided by 600 watts light)
This last run was my most successful ever and I managed to keep the plants healthy throughout. They aren't high yield strains. I'm using old bulbs which are the cheapest ones available and should have been changed long ago. I'm away a lot. There are many areas I could make improvements, but I'm very happy to have done this well. I actually don't worry much about yield. I'm more about quality over quantity. Keep the plants healthy and the rest will follow. It ain't easy!

This is probably the best answer I can come up with. I'll leave you to do the math.

 

[Hobopr0]

thanks man...just got the tent and untied the plants so lets see what they do. gotta do something soon though about the ventilation/air scrubbing now as i plan on switching to 12/12 soon. just added some pics to the gallery

 

[Hobopr0]

Its not really possible to give yes or no answers to the questions, Basically though, with the training I see you doing, you're aiming to fill the growing space horizontally with a flat canopy of growth. In a general sense, vertical growth doesn't really do anything for you. Say you have a 4x4 foot space, filled wall to wall with a jungle of plants. The light shines from above, down on the plant's canopy. Depending on what your lighting is, good buds are produced in the top ten inches or so of the jungle. The depth of light coverage and prime bud production varies between led, cfl, hid, etc. But generally the lower, shaded, part of the jungle doesn't produce much worthwhile.
So- in a sense it doesn't matter whether the plant jungle is one foot high or 6 feet high, it's still a 4'x4' space.
I'm definitely generalizing...
Another factor is that you're most likely going to have some males show up, which will make a hole in the canopy. Usually though, you can train the remaining plants horizontally to fill the space.

As for yield, that's always a hard question to answer. Your goal, well- every growers goal, is to keep those plants 100% healthy and given lots of light till they are finished flowering. Then the plants will produce to their potential. There are sooo many obstacles in the way of that happening. As a first time grower you are going to make some mistakes that will affect yield. In fact, as a reasonably experienced grower I'm still making plenty of mistakes that affect yield.

Probably the best way to measure yield is in terms of grams per watt. That is- grams of bud produced at harvest, divided by the total wattage of the lighting you are using.
The gold standard is 1 gram per watt. If you get .5 grams per watt on your first run you can definitely pat yourself on the back. For that matter-hey, pat yourself on the back whatever you yield.

As an example- I flower under a couple 600 watt lights, using individual scrog screens for each plant. I grow four screens/plants per light. Each screen is 24" x 19". I squeeze four together under each light to make a 48" X 38" screened plant area.

This last month I harvested a few plants. My average yield per screen was 116 grams. This amounts to a little over one pound per light, and .775 grams per watt ( 465 grams produced divided by 600 watts light)
This last run was my most successful ever and I managed to keep the plants healthy throughout. They aren't high yield strains. I'm using old bulbs which are the cheapest ones available and should have been changed long ago. I'm away a lot. There are many areas I could make improvements, but I'm very happy to have done this well. I actually don't worry much about yield. I'm more about quality over quantity. Keep the plants healthy and the rest will follow. It ain't easy!

This is probably the best answer I can come up with. I'll leave you to do the math.

after the ventilation/air scrubbing, i plan on adding more/upgrade the lighting. was thinking of just hanging some more cfl's but in between and below the canopy. also look in using the screens to help separate some of the tangled mess i created since i had to train/supercrop. this is scrog correct? need to read up on this. if u remember from my other thread, i had to bend due to space, but now that i untied them...there's a bushy mess on one side...should i keep them tied down??

another question now is that since they're now in tents, do i need to be concerned w/getting enough co2 now?? or is my daily conversations work well enough?


just hope to be able to harvest something from these.

 

[Weaselcracker]

Yes - scrog is a screen that is used to separate/ support the plants to spread them out more uniformly. It's not complicated- just a sort of support to tie the limbs to in order to arrange them better.

Hmmmm... Again -it's hard for me to answer the next question. Now that I see the big picture- you have just a few cfls over quite a lot of plants. I thought you had more light above them all. They work best within a few inches of the foliage so you'd need lots more to cover that area...
I would probably bend the tallest ones down to even them all out to the same height. And/or put a larger light in, or more cfls around everything.

I'm a little worn out and my typing finger is sore, lol. I'll try to get back to this- but really, just think in terms of giving the plants the maximum amount of light coverage possible, based on what I was blathering about before. You can only do so much with the light you have. If possible try to get an hid or led light that will cover the entire area. You can add more cfls but after a while you'll have spent just as much money on cfls as you would have on a better lighting system.

The last question is easy. Don't worry about adding CO2. Yes they'll be fine with regular air.
Yes - having daily conversations with them will help add co2


You're aware of this great resource, right? How to Grow Marijuana Everything You Need to Know

 

[Hobopr0]

what size fan would u recommend, 4" inline w/scrubber? based on size of room plus 30% due to scrubber, figure cfm over 100 would be fine. need to remove the odor but noticed that when i opened the tent today, got a musty smell. i have an oscillating fan running in there so figured i need to keep the fresh air coming in. id like to go passive and suck the air through the scrubber, then either vented out of the tent into my bedroom or out of the house. this seems to be the best way no?

i know i wanted to add more lighting but now this seems to have become a priority now..

 

[Weaselcracker]

Definitely need to be well over 100 Cfm- 100 or less is only good for small spaces like grow boxes IMO. I scrolled back but couldn't find the size of your tent.
General rule is that the fan should be able to exchange all the air in the room in three minutes. So by that, a 300 cubic foot space 'should' be fine with a 100 Cfm fan. However- filters impede the fans power, vents and ducting slows air flow further, and if you have a hot climate you'll need more Cfm to keep things cool. So it's wise to go well over the minimum.

 

[Hobopr0]

sry tent size is 4x3x6. was thinking of going with a 4" fan with scrubber now after seeing some videos on youtube.

 

[TheNarrator]

Calculating Fan Requirementsl

That site has some pretty good detail of how to calculate the CFM although you would still want to allow a safety buffer for ducting.

Sorry for the metric but in my space (1.024m^3) I used a 96 CFM fan (2.718m^3/min) so <3min to change the air, however I also have a carbon filter as well as several meters of ducting on the passive intake and have not had any issues at all even in very high temps.

 

[Hobopr0]

thanks...due to budget am going to go with a 4" set up. from what ive been reading, this should be able to handle the size of my room without issue im hoping! . tent is work in progress...still need ventilation and mo lights! here's some pics from today. so far...they've been vegging just over 2 months now from seed. im wondering if i could send into 12/12 now. the plan was to start it sometime in the next few days.

btw, i just transplanted 3 of the 5 ladies the other day but seems to be having some issues on 2 of them. one seems to be getting the Claw but unsure the reason. i dont think it's nutes as i havent given any for about a week. perhaps the stress of the move? overwatering?

another plant has an issue with the leaves....not drooping but they arent fully opening up if that makes sense. not enough light? this one was transplanted as well.

humidity issue? should i flush them all? thoughts???

 

[Hashassinz]

Hobopr0 your name suits you with those ghetto tins. You get mad credit from me with that ghetto fab rig reflectors. Work with what you got like a boss I love it. Hope it works for you.

 

[Hobopr0]

Hobopr0 your name suits you with those ghetto tins. You get mad credit from me with that ghetto fab rig reflectors. Work with what you got like a boss I love it. Hope it works for you.

haha real ghetto but thanks man for the encouragement and love.....i really didnt think it would get this far so wasnt prepared at all. just using what i have laying around the house u knowwww! i still need to get the air scrubber/ventilation going...especially since i just switched them to 12/12 a couple days ago after vegging these since Thanksgiving. here some pics i just took prior to shutting down the lights for the day...

2nd day 12/12 and now hoping that these are all females. i do see pistils on all of them (i think). but will take better pics tmrw so u guys can lemme know what u think.

 

[Hobopr0]

update day 5 12/12 cfls

 

[Sejd2131]

Truly an amazing grow.. Never seen anything quite like this and the results are outstanding... Keep up the great work...

 

[Hobopr0]

2/14 Valentines Day UPDATE:
So per a separate thread, i ended up wacking 2 males (in pieces and gonna try to make some butter/oil) so now have 3 beauties that have been doing it's thing. repotted 2 of them into larger pots that the males were occupying.. hope to see significant growth as the root growth was a crazy mess and actually ripped apart because they were sicking to the bottom of the pot.

i also added some more cfl's but because i waited to long to do this, as u can see, i have some plant stretch...how should i go about curbing this? should i just leave it alone at this point or lst these or even possibly...dare i say, clip the off the top cola or is this only done during veg to slow down growth? i havent yet added any nutes to these but do plan on doing so although i only have the MG to use. im just excited to finally see some budding going on! let me know what u guys think/suggest!

 

[Greenethumb42]

That's was a bad idea to transplant the while in flower..your probably not gonadotropin see much growth in the next week or so while she recovers from the stress of the transplant

 

[Hobopr0]

yeah i know but it needed to be done since it was badly root bound. i lifted the pot and it had roots coming out of all the vent holes. this was about 2 days ago but looks like it's pulling through although it was pretty wilted when i transplanted initially. been on regular water and was thinking of giving some nutes today.