Maine 4-Season Greenhouse Grow

-4F, feels like -15F. Cold. Windy. 12" of snow from the blizzard two days ago. Polar Vortex for the weekend, so the girls are inside 1) just in case we lose power and 2) too damn cold to carry them the 100' to the GH without them and me freezing to death!

Will post a photo of them @ 3 weeks once I can figure out this new website format!
 
-7F, feels like -22F.

Damn cold, but plants looking good.

Week 4:

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Climate change...yay!? Currently 50F here and I had to readjust some things in the GH to keep the plants from getting too warm. As everything was set, the box temp went from 73F to 87F since the GH temp never went below 50F. They are all definitely interconnected! However, the girls are looking very healthy and happy after a light pruning and some basic LST to give the emerging buds some added exposure.

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Close up of buds
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Also did a little reconfiguring on the GH (I think this is 5.0 or 6.0?!) to add more growing room in the spring. I will still have some aquaponic towers above the 300 gallon tank to give me access to some N-rich water in the early veg stages. But all that comes later...
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Day shy of Week 6 but it is such a beautiful, sunny day I couldn't help myself. Too sunny possibly, since the GH was 103F and the inside of the box hit 101F...but no issues and (as you can see) the plants look fine. The temp swing was my error since I moved the 4 hour (lights off) rest to earlier in the morning...I had some single digit temp days with no sun and I had to gamble which were the warmest times of the day (and shoot for that as a 4 hour rest window). Anyway....now that is adjusted back to previous times which worked well and we shouldn't have temps that high for a while.

I defoliated all three two (2) days ago as they had grown in fairly thick after topping and adjusted some of the LST.

Each plant looking healthy with lots of bud sites....

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Swinging by to see what you have going on over here! Give me a weekend to read through and condense any questions or comments for you brother.
 
Just some eye candy today. I was inspired by this 420mag photography thread to shoot some decent photos of the ladies. In the cold and snow it got too easy to use the cellphone, but the photos stink. I like to be able to look back a year or more from now and admire them rather than just note their progress (which is still helpful, but I also love seeing all the pistils and trichs!)

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Looking good BH. Read and caught up on your entire journal last night. Quick question.....what hours do you have your light off in your box? My thought, is if you are having any lower temps in the coldest hours of the night, you could run your lights during that period. Perhaps a run from Midnight until 9pm. Of course you could already be doing it!
 
imtoasted said:
Looking good blew.. bet your happy you started a winter grow haha. Youd be goin nuts by now lol!! ...
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True. On a snowy, cold day there is something magical about looking into a space where three little plants are so happy, green, and aromatic!
 
Van Stank said:
Looking good BH. Read and caught up on your entire journal last night. Quick question.....what hours do you have your light off in your box? My thought, is if you are having any lower temps in the coldest hours of the night, you could run your lights during that period. Perhaps a run from Midnight until 9pm. Of course you could already be doing it!
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Lights run from 2pm-10am. Fan (on sunny days only) runs from 9am-3pm. Box temps with lights on (meaning not hottest time of a sunny day) average 75-80F based on outside temps of 0-20F and GH interior temps of 25-35F. Since that is 20 hours of the day, I designed accordingly.

The only wildcard is sunshine:

1)Yes? then great. GH will heat anywhere from 75-100F and the fan will ventilate and blow cooling air into Box and keep temps around 55-85F (even with GH temps being 25-30 degrees higher...the magic of thermal mass heat sink). If I don't have the fan running on a sunny day and the GH heats up then I see Box temps bump up to 95+...suboptimal.

2) No? Well, by the end of the 4 hours rest, the Box will bleed off about 30 degrees in heat assuming the GH temps are around 30-40F (with exterior temps being 0-20F). I have found this to be less of an issue since the plants are fine with 55-60F which is about where they get on these days.

So basically the insulating GH aspects works well for me while using this insulated box...it's the sunshine that keeps me jumping!

But, it is only for maximum 3 months a year and growing in a GH covered in snow keeps a smile on my face!
 
imtoasted said:
Definitely man.. i love staring in my big tent and feeling the warmth and smelling their smells... oh it really invigorates you on those depressing winter days!! Love it! ...
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We have hooks in our GH for a hammock for those times of the year when we want to get into shorts and short sleeves and maybe have a man-tai and a midday nap when it's 10F outside!
 
Blew Hiller said:
Climate change...yay!? Currently 50F here and I had to readjust some things in the GH to keep the plants from getting too warm. As everything was set, the box temp went from 73F to 87F since the GH temp never went below 50F. They are all definitely interconnected! However, the girls are looking very healthy and happy after a light pruning and some basic LST to give the emerging buds some added exposure.

20180112_082932-1_resized.jpg
20180112_082758_resized.jpg
20180112_082802_resized.jpg
20180112_082806_resized.jpg
20180112_082811_resized.jpg


Close up of buds
20180112_082802-1.jpg
20180112_082811-1-1.jpg


Also did a little reconfiguring on the GH (I think this is 5.0 or 6.0?!) to add more growing room in the spring. I will still have some aquaponic towers above the 300 gallon tank to give me access to some N-rich water in the early veg stages. But all that comes later...
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Click to expand...

Aquaponics looks like an amazing way to grow anything but especially medicinal crops.

Can't wait to see your developments
...
 
ginganinja30 said:
Aquaponics looks like an amazing way to grow anything but especially medicinal crops.

Can’t wait to see your developments
...
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Well, not actually growing with aquaponics in the winter as the min temp for the water to support bioactivity is 55F and current water temps is 40F. In about 2-3 months I will have the tank circulating through media which will convert the fish waste to nitrogen rich water and then we'll see the effect that has on the summer crop...

Stay tuned!
 
Blew Hiller said:
Well, not actually growing with aquaponics in the winter as the min temp for the water to support bioactivity is 55F and current water temps is 40F. In about 2-3 months I will have the tank circulating through media which will convert the fish waste to nitrogen rich water and then we'll see the effect that has on the summer crop...

Stay tuned!
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It's been great seeing your greenhouse develop BH, I'm going to try to build one this year out in my back garden.

I've got a pile of reclaimed timber to play with so hopefully I can pull something together ...
 
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