So with higher growth rates and bigger yields did you notice much of a negative compared to the soil ones? Quality aka top shelf meds?? Hope not cause if its just as good or close to it, I might really get into it. I have been wanting to do a 5x4 light matrix 5 400 watt HPS with 4 plants, each plant will get blasted by three hid.'s ought to be no problem getting over the 1GPW
So did you grow your 20 ounce plant under a 600 watt high pressure sodium?
Have a great 4th Capin
Hi s1ing, you bring up some great questions. I might get off track here, but let's talk about these subjects:
The 1.25 pounder was grown under 600W HPS, yes. I was using 3, 600W HPS bulbs in the room, on a light mover, on 3 plants. The 3rd plant you never saw in the pictures. It was a smaller 4 ouncer in a 7 gal container of super soil. I crammed it in there anywhere I could, where it would get some light. From those three plants (2 capn style and 1 dirt) I got a total of 34 ounces, still a long way off from 1gpw, but 1gpw is not my primary goal.
Is Grams Per Watt our goal?
It is a great goal to strive for to save electricity (and great bragging rights), but it's not our limiting factor. In order to calculate your cost of electricity, take the cost of electricity, times watts, times hours. So for example, in flower, if your cost is .07 cents per kilowatt hour:
1800watts x .07/1000w x 12hours = 1.51 per day x 30 days in a month = 45.36 per month.
So I flowered 3 plants under 1800watts for two months, and it cost me $91. $91 to flower 34 ounces. Not too shabby. The cost of electricity is small, compared to the yield.
Is light and space a limiting factor?
No. If you could reproduce the same above scenario 4 times in your grow room, you would go buy the lighting and fill up your basement today. $91 to flower 34 ounces? Sign me up!
I realize there is more to it than just space. It all adds up... keeping the room cool, de-humidification, nutrients, and so fourth.
Plant Count
When we look at the big picture, plant count is your only
true limiting factor. Go outside your limit, get caught, bye bye.
Your goal
Since plant count is our only HARD limit, the final goal should be weight per plant. Let's be conservative and say... we know we can consistently get 12oz per plant, each plant with a 600W light. That's $30 to run a 600W light for two months, to produce 12oz. I would take that ROI any day. This doesn't include vegetative growth, which costs about 1/4 that (we use 1/4 the light since plants are smaller).
If you're not getting 12oz per plant, how are you making up for it? You're growing a greater quantity of plants. I agree, in a 16sqft area, I could grow more weight from 4 plants, than 1 plant, but not a SIGNIFICANT amount more. In a 4' x 4' SCROG, you're still only going to efficiently grow one nice cola per 4"x4" hole in the screen, whether you have 4 pots underneath or one.
Quality, dirt VS hydro
The super soil organic, and the hydro plant where the same strain, from same mother. If you smoked them one after the other, yeah, the dirt plant was a little more smooth and smelled a little better. I think most people will agree, if given the choice, they would rather smoke organically grown bud. Would your patients? Maybe. I find growers are more anal about their strains and quality than patients. The average patient would rather just pay less per ounce. We take it too personally, when we think we've produced the finest top shelf medication. We expect our patient to be blown away, and all they say is, "It's pretty good."
Summary:
Think about it: if you flower 8 plants and get 4oz per plant, or 8 plants and 12oz per plant, it's a no brainer! Be safe. Stay within your plant counts. Grow the most per plant you can. It takes 2 months to flower, so why not veg for two months? Start with small plant counts and grow em big, Capn style!
Maybe the croutons would work better. Perhaps I can try one of my buckets with them next round.
