My First Grow Ever! I'm Excited!

Your ph will swing, let it but keep it in the safe range. Doing so allows ample access to all vital nutes. It doesn't have to be nailed at any set point all the time. Relax just a bit. Keep the same in mind when you recognize a problem. Make an adjustment then let work. 3-4 days is a good time to sort things out in many cases. Early recognition is optimum.

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Why do my seedlings look so pathetic? Even the one that is doing well stretched like hell and now can barely support itself... I have had a fan on it for over 16 hrs now and it seems to be getting larger at the leafy portion, but the stem isn't getting any f'n stronger and in fact seems to be leaning over a bit... I put a toothpick in by it so it would have something to lean on and keep it somewhat straigh but not sure how well that will work in long run. all the others seem to have a decent root system on them and a little bit of foliage coming in, but right where the stem meets the rapid rooter it seems very weak and thin... What is that a result of, and is their anyway I can fix it???
 
There are no guarantees that all of them will be perfect. Prop it up and tend it. Keep the fan gentle, hopefully it will outgrow this phase. I have had it happen to me. Had one that was floppy till it got about 10" tall one time. Some are not worth the effort. It's your call.
 
Well if I had a choice I'd scrap about half of em, but I paid out the ass for these little buggers and don't have any bagseeds so I'm just gonna have to make due with what I have and hope the damage that has been done doesn't effect what it does throughout the rest of it's cycle... I've heard a lot of horror stories about plants that came from good genetics that were stressed too much when they were young and although seemed to have recovered, ended up either going hermaphrodite for no apparent reason or didn't take off like it should have and had a bad yield. I hope that isn't true in my case. I cut a third of an inch off the top of another rapid rooter I had laying around and then cut a small incision from the side to the little hole in the center, I then slipped it over the top of the existing rapid rooter and around the plant to hold it up better, I had to do this on all but two of them which are looking like they may not make it, but it does appear to be helping the others. the tallest plant which appears to have the most productive root growth appears be growing it's second set of true leaves but they are barely visible at this time, before I continue I would like to see them pop out a bit further and I'd like the roots to stem out a bit more... I can however see many smaller roots coming off of the long tap root but I am trying not to handle it too much.
 
Beena couple days since I have posted anything, I have been trying to let the last adjustments I made to my seedlings take effect and it appears it have worked for the most part. They appear much more stable and many of them have showed progressive growth as well. The one that is doing the best is about ready to be transplanted any minute now.
I have bleached the clay pellets i am going to use and have rinsed them thoughly. They have been drying for about 24 hrs now and I am about to put them in the new unit I have cleaned and poked extra holes in...
I intend on adding the pellets to the unit first and then pouring the ph'd water over them.
I will then let the system sit for a few hrs before I make the transplant to ensure the ph doesn't fluctuate too much.
After I add the plant to the system I will let it sit for a few hrs before moving it the necessary distance from the light where it will begin it's journey. I intend on just running it with ph'd water for the first couple days before I begin to add nutrients.
How does that sound Smokez? Do I finally have it right?
 
Sounds good to me, that's what the GH nutrients say more or less. I really wish I could figure out how to turn the GPS off on this damn phone of mine so I can post some pics, it's a HTC phone... One of the seedlings looks fantastic, the stem is a little long and I have it supported somewhat, but the first set of true leaves has taken off and will soon be a bout an inch long, while the second set has just begun to come in nicely I can see a slight definition in one of the leaves... I have four more that look like they are gonna end up alright and are at various stages of progressive growth, their is even second set of true leaves emerging from one of those and it looks rather promising although short in stature. But all in all, if i can keep them all alive throughout the rest of this process I will have successfully grown 5 of the 7 seeds I germinated so far. I still have 3 seeds left I haven't done anything with yet and intend on starting them soon if these transplants go well.... I am trying to level the ph in one of the systems now because the best of my seedlings is probably ready to go, but it still seems to fluctuate alot and is rather irratic...
 
teSmp said:
Download an exif stripper (google) it will remove any data related to the picture. I have been told numerous times 420mag strips the data for us anyways.
Click to expand...

Correct, 420 does strip the photo uploads...

But I recommend you do not rely on someone else to CYA...
You are thinking correctly to turn it off or strip it yourself.
 
Good to know I am working on it right now... Anyone have any idea how i can safely lower my ph? I went to a pet store and bought ph decrease, but it is for aquariums and hasn't been very stable yet as far as I can tell... Is there a difference in the stuff they sell for aquariums vs the ph down stuff you see at a hydroponic store??? I feel there is, but my gf thinks it's practically the same thing... The water I have been adding the ph decrease stuff to was distilled water I bought at the grocery store and I thought therefore it would be relatively stable and easy to lower, but this hasn't been the case. I cleaned and dried the hydroton thoughly before I poured the distilled water over them, and from what I have been lead to believe this should have removed any minreals from them that would effect my ph.... Is ph is a 2 gallon system really that hard to control and regulate or am I still doing something wrong? I really want to figure this out before I put my seedling into the dwc/drip unit and it is ready to go! Please help.
 
I suggest you fill the bucket and adjust ph in the bucket, not pouring it through the media. See if the ph still reacts the same. Be sure it is a clean bucket as well. I am not familiar with your waterfarm. Can you just pick the top portion up and place it on a new bucket that is prepped and ready?
 
Yes and no. It is designed to do that yes, but I would still be using the same medium. I clean and dry everything thoughly before introducing it. I have been experimenting with water in a 5 gallon bucket that has been left out for over 24 hrs, and it seems to have stabilized itself relatively well as far as I can tell, I have been slowly lowering it over the last 12 hrs so I can get it down to about 5.6. I will then begin using it as needed as long as I can keep it between 5.5 and 6.0 because in the graph you showed me a few days ago said for hydro systems best was to stay between 5.5 and 6.1. I am curious though, if I go a bit under or over that for a short period of time will it adversely affect the plant or plants that it inhabits? Guess my question is how important is it and to what extent can you vary from time to time? Water farms are simply a bucket with a smaller bucket inside of it with holes poked through the bottom... They run a air line down into the water that is connected to the drip line which the air forces the water through as it bubbles. The medium then sits in the smaller bucket with the holes with the drip system situated above it within the samller bucket. This is supposed to keep the pellets moist and provide a good stable condition for the roots.... I have not been able to stabilize after the clay pellets are added and am having a hell of a time keeping the water stable before that point as well. Can't figure out where I'm going wrong. I have gallon jugs filled with tap water that I have left out for over 24 hrs too and have been monitoring their progress as well so I have a good idea how long I need to leave them out before they reverse osmosify themselves... I will then degin trying to get them lower to around 5.6 05 5.7 as well. I have 4 gallons of distilled water i bought at grocery store left as well.
 
OK I think we need to know more about your base water being used. Tell me all you know about it. What you add and when you check it. Letting tap water sit does little more than allow chlorinated water escape. What matters is things like hardness, ph and alkalinity to stat with.

If you wish to wash the medium do so with DI or RO water. Rinse till it runs clean. One could measure the ppm to monitor. Get in habit of just lifting the top to work on the bucket. Will make change out easier as well. ph Fluctuation is fine just don't let it sit outside the boundaries for long.
 
Water coming out of my tap is around 8.5 approx.
I called the hydro store I bought most of my equipment from and told them I was having issues with it and asked them what to do and this is what they told me. The guy said he uses the water out of the tap where he lives and it comes out around 9.0 he said as long as I let it sit out all night I shouldn't have a problem... Said as long as I can keep it below 8.0 the plant shouldn't struggle, but that lower would help.
He also told me a more likely problem is my water temp was too high which essencially prevented the water from holding oxygen that the plant needs to live and thrive. This made sense after he told me the water should stay in the upper 60's/ lower 70's in a hydroponic unit such as mine. When he told me that it all made sense, I don't have anything cooling the air in my tent other than the fan I have blowing through the hood to cool the light, and the oscilating one I have goin back n forth throughout the room, which means with my light in the tent the temp fluctuated between bout 82-90 depending on the temp of the air in the room the tent is in and the fresh air outside.... And since I don't have anything to control the temp of the water other than the air inside the tent at this time, I had to rig up a way to run the A/C vent in the room with the tent to the tent itself, after I rigged the A/C unit to the tent and closed the vents throughout the apt to force more air through that vent the temp in the tent went down to between 67-73, which reason would lead me to believe would make the water temp about the same.
When I researched the optimal temp for a pot plant I only looked at the air temperature which was very naive of me... The air temp can be considerably warmer than the water as long as you have a way of cooling the water separately. I assumed since a bud plant can grow in 85-90 degree temps that the water could be that temperature as well. But I was way wrong...
Last night I put 1/4 nutes in the system hooked up the A/C and after letting the temp settle around 70 and the water circulate for a couple hrs I transplanted my first seedling into the Water farm hydro unit... Unfortunitely I also taped the largest vent in the house shut and the A/C unit froze up and stopped running at some point last night and when I woke up the temp in the tent was about 85! Once I figured out what happened and took the cover off of the large vent I let the A/C thaw itself thoroughly and started it up again a few hours later. Since the large vent wasn't covered it took a lot longer for the air inside the tent to cool back down this time and I can't quite get it down to the upper 60's like it was last night. Right now it is between 72-77 depending on whether it is day or night... Atleast I think that is what is creating the difference, but either way the plant seems to be doing fine so at this point I'm not too worried. As summer gets going and the temps outside get up and over 100 degrees I do wonder if the A/C unit will be able to keep the temp inside the tent cool enough? At that point I may be able to tape that large vent shut again without having to worry about it freezing because it's so hot outside. I have also considered possibly some sort of window/portable air conditioning unit as well. But the important thing is I think I got my problem figured out and undercontrol for the time being and I don't expect summer to really get kicking for atleast another month or two so I have time to make adjustments accordingly.
I plan on leaving the plant I just transplanted on a 24/7 light cycle for the next week with 1/4 strength nutes the first three days, then half strength the last four days. I will then change to a 18/6 light cycle with reg strength nutes until I begin to see the first plant or two flower, I will not have to change the light cycle to get them to flower because they are an autoflowering strain. Thus I can add other plants to the tent that are not auto flower and can veg them while i finish flowering my auto girls.
I did this on purpose so I could have more flexiblity and somewhat of a perpetual harvest reguardless of the fact I only have one grow tent. Also did it because the way I see it since this is not only my first hydro grow, but also my first grow period,that I would be focusing not only on the plant but the equipment and system themselves since I am not familiar with them and that the autoflowering feminized seeds should make it easier not only to sex because they should come out feminine, but to cycle as well becuase they flower reguardless of light cycles. This will hopefully allow me to become more familiar with the equipment/system and once that happens I can worry more about the plants and manipulating them properly. Hopefully this was a wise choice, time will tell. I will be losing some yield potential due to the autoflowering genetics, but I should be able to harvest more often as long as I go this route. May just have to add more plants throughout this first crop n have a few finish every other week or so... I can do this as long as I continue to run each unit seperately so i can manipulate nutrients as needed.
I just started to see the first couple roots show on two of the other seedlings and they should be ready to transplant in two to three days... One of the other seedlings doesn't look too far behind and the last one took a turn for the worse a few hours ago and appears to be hanging on by a thread and don't expect it to turn around. That would leave me at 4/7, which isn't bad considering I came into this knowing far less than I thought. Now that I have learned from my first set of mistakes I feel comfortable trying to germinate the remaining 3 seeds I bought as well as the bagseed I happily stumbbled across this evening!
Got it from a buddy that just made a trip out to denver, the strain is called DIA... I hadn't heard anything about it so I googled it and came up with 3 different possiblities. The first thing I found was on Marijuana Strain Library, Reviews & Guide | joinTogether and is a new strain named DIA after the Denver International Airport. The picture of the buds online look very similar to those I purchased. The other possiblity is that it is either named DIA in short for a strain called Diablo or Diamond OG Kush... The first option is the most probable given the fact he had just come back from denver, but on the other hand denver has such a wide variety of dispenseries I wouldn't put either of the other past it either. But it is very good bud reguardless and I plan on attempting to grow it very soon.
What a great surprise to find, I needed that kind of karma after the week I have had.
 
The temp in the room as of this minute is 72 degrees and as long as my A/C is working properly stays within a degree or two of that temp... I have an inline fan blowing air through the inclosed 600w HPS hood, it is taking air from inside the room (not tent) and pushing it directly through the hood and out the other side of the tent, that air doesn't make it into the plants atmosphere because it never leaves the hood or the duct work. I then have my A/C blowing cold air coming in from the top of the tent pushing the air down from the far upper right hand corner of the tent... Inside the tent I have a pivoting fan blowing toward the seedling which is about 14in from the light. I also have a small 6 inch walmart drum fan blowing air out of the tent from one of the 8 inch duct holes in the tent but I'm not sure that helps much. I have heard it would be better if I had the inline fan sucking air through hood rather than pushing it through and that it would be better if I could somehow create negative air pressure as opposed to positive air pressure within the tent, but not sure if that is correct or not.
 
I believe I may be seeing the first signs of rapid growth in the plant I transplanted two days ago, the second set of true leaves seems to be growing faster and faster and I expect to see an exponetial change very soon. I think i've got the A/C thing under control for now and I added a gallon of nute mixed water to the reservior about an hour ago... Got a couple square feet of tent space I may lend to a friend sometime in the next week, but he's doing an outdoor grow and just needs a little more time to prep his garden and let his seedlings get a little bigger before moving them outdoors, so his plants shouldn't get in my way. He is also the only other person aware of what I am doing because he has grown hydrponically before and I need atleast one person i can call if I need help or have a question. Figure i could return the favor by letting him keep his seedlings in the tent and under the light for awhile.
 
Just wanna pipe in and say how very interesting I'm finding your Journal first-tymer; you got me tagging along after I read the contents of your fine equipment though I can not offer a helping hand because I'm a soil and coco coir grower and no nada about hydro systems but I can already tell I'll learn mucho here. Only thing I can offer is that when I had the inline fan it was connected to the top of the light hood and the ducts ran outta the attic to an outside vent and that any regular fans should be above the lights cause thats where the heat is and as long as the temps are no higher than 90F plants should be ok. Once I learned how to read the leaves, it became easy to see how happy the plants are, like the leaves droop when its to hot in there for em; Anyways, thanks for starting this journey for us to follow along. :cheer:
 
No problem Vamp, I can honestly say that although i have already struggled a few times along the way I am finding I enjoy it more and more everyday! Like I said in the begining it has been a passion for awhile I just haven't had the chance to exercise my abilities and dedication for it until now.
With so many different methods to growing, different strains, different equipment that is constantly evolving! I can't see myself ever getting tired of doing this. I want to make some additions to my setup along the way, but they will be either improvements to the system I already have, or be assisting me in creating a more natural perpetual harvest (ex: Clone box, Separate Veg room, Metal Hylide lamp, Carbon filter, Another inline fan, Supplemental co2, etc). I don't necessarily want to yield any more each harvest, but rather harvest more often perhaps. I also want to experiment with soil soon as well as start a couple mother plants, maybe an Ebb & Flow, definitely want to do a Sea of green, aeroponics. The sky is the limit when it comes to that it seems.
And don't get me started on strains! I started a list today of Strains I would like to attempt growing and it got a little bigger than I was expecting. Here it goes and the first two I have seedlings started. Auto-Pounder, DIA, Big Bang Auto, Sour Diesel, Northern Lights #7, OG Kush, Grand Daddy Purp, Trainwreck, Durbin Poison, Sweet Island Skunk, Headband, Cotton Candy, Bubblicious, Shipwreck, Isis, Blue Dream, Chem Dawg, Blueberry, Lambs Bread, Strawberry Cough, Purp Urkel, Skunk #1, Church OG, White Widow, Purple Kush, White Rhino, Lavendar, Thai, Hash Plant, G-13, Purple Haze, Cheese, Lemon Haze. Thats what I got so far, lol it's gonna take me a lifetime and I'm excited for every minute of it.
I am using your advise about keeping my fans higher vamp, and I appreciate the help, hope you stay tuned and can kinda cheer me on along the way. Helps to know I'm not just talking to myself sometimes... Is there anyone else listening I wonder? Let me hear it people! What does everyone think? Am I batshit crazy or am I heading in the right direction? Is there anything else you would like me try? I'm open for suggestions and I will take everyones ideas into consideration.
 
first-tymer - You will see explosive growth when the roots are ready. As long as you keep everything in line the growth rate will continue.

Your efforts have been great and you continue to cross every hurdle you have encountered. There will be many more along the way. But each time you will find it easier to see and understand. Keep the attitude...

Helping each other is what makes this place so great guys, glad to see you spreading it around.

The big point I would like to make is, opinions are easy to get, advice will abound, in the end it is your garden and your decision. You alone get the gift or the failure. Listen and learn but in the end its up to you. Make educated decisions and seek advice to verify or steer your efforts.

Great selection of strains, but I would suggest you invest in NON autos. Leaves you in control of when and how big. Plus you can clone it. Cloning an auto is not a viable option. With perpetual cloning you can go on forever figuratively.

Perpetual is what you are after. Pick a strain and schedule your grows to harvest every 2-4 weeks if you wish. You can keep a a clone in low light and alive till you are ready to push it into production. So yes the sky is the limit. A clone from a clone, from a clone ....etc

Deege420 - Thanks for helping where you can. He said it well when he spoke of sharing the experience and not feeling alone. You have a great grow going on as well.

:thanks:
 

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