Noob from England

M

MaxHeadroom

New Member
Hi all,

I've just joined up after lurking for a couple of weeks following the Mars Hydro thread trying to learn about LED for my first ever grow. I felt I got to know a lot of friendly characters as I followed the thread and diverted to BID's unboxing and installation of a trial Mars II and confess I got a little choked when I saw he was no longer with us.

I'm still reading through the wealth of information as I learn to grow some high CDB strains for pain relief - I've been on codeine and morphine to deal with pain for nearly 40 years and had three benign tumours removed from my head. I'd really like some high CDB strains to help cut down on opiates (apologies if this is too much info, I'm trying to explain why I want to grow for the first time). I last had a joint over 5 years ago, but had to stop because street strains became ridiculously high in THC. I have a very demanding career and the smoke that initially helped reduce morphine to allow me to work became more debilitating than the morphine itself. Having been unable to find high CBD strains on the street I'm about to dabble with growing my own. Plans are for a small grow tent (2.5ft x 2.5ft x 6ft (or 0.8m x 0.8m x 1.8m as us English say)), with some LED lights. CBD Critical Care and CBD Kush seeds are on order :) Next step is to buy the tent and lights. I can't see me managing to ingest more than 1/2oz per week so maybe even a small tent is overkill, but I admit I'm loving the idea of setting everything up.

That's enough waffle... on with the show and hello one and all

Max
 
Actually Max, personally I enjoy when people actually take the time to let me know a little bit about themselves. Makes it more personal. I am pretty sure that my next grow is going to include a strain called Harlequin which is suppose to be a high CBD strain. There are so many now days to choose from it is crazy.

Welcome to the 420 community Max, I am sure you will fit right in with the rest of the family.:byebye:
 
Hi OlderGrower,

Thanks for the welcome. I've seen you pop up a few times in the LED thread and have been impressed with all the comments. Good luck with your first grow. I'd be interested in how that goes and even more interested in the Harlequin grow. It's been fun learning about set ups and I'll stalk you a little now as I take a peek at your journal ;-)

Best wishes

Max
 
G'morin' M,m,m,m,m Max ! And welcome to :420: I see you've met my friend OG. You gotta watch him, he's a sneaky one. Plays all humble then whips out the photos of his garden. :rofl: Check out our medical forums, might be something there that'll help you.

420 Magazine
 
Hi Rifleman,

Thanks for the pointer to the med section. It's on my to-do list but I've been sucked into OG's grow. Apart from the obvious highlights about progress, the best bit so far is the ladybird porn. Perhaps 'sucked in' and 'porn' should have been spaced further apart in my response, but what can I say? Money see, monkey do.

Max
 
Rifleman said:
G'morin' M,m,m,m,m Max ! And welcome to :420: I see you've met my friend OG. You gotta watch him, he's a sneaky one. Plays all humble then whips out the photos of his garden. :rofl: Check out our medical forums, might be something there that'll help you.

420 Magazine
Click to expand...
Hey now Mister. Do not be giving all my secrets away, besides I only learned how to grow by watching all you guys and gals:love:
MaxHeadroom said:
Hi Rifleman,

Thanks for the pointer to the med section. It's on my to-do list but I've been sucked into OG's grow. Apart from the obvious highlights about progress, the best bit so far is the ladybird porn. Perhaps 'sucked in' and 'porn' should have been spaced further apart in my response, but what can I say? Money see, monkey do.

Max
Click to expand...
Thank you for taking the time to check out my garden, as humble as it may be, I hope you were not terribly offended by the insect porn, just felt kind of natural when it happened.

And I remember maxheadroom quiet well but do you remember when he did the pepsi commercials?
 
Hi OG,

I don't recall the Pepsi adverts, only the shows. I was in no way offended by the insectophillia - it added a little something to your journal. If it's not against some rule I've yet to discover, I'm going to do a pre-journal journal here to help me remember dates and possibly move information elsewhere when the time is right.

Max
 
Soooo... not sure if this is the right place, but allow me to indulge in my happy moment and a pre-journal journal. Today my seeds arrived. I took a picture but damned if I can find it now I've stuck it on the gallery. Perhaps these things take time.

3 x CBD Diesel
3 x CBD Critical Care
3 x CBD Kush (are you seeing a tend here?)

Oh and 3 free Blueberry seeds. The local neighbourhood watch like blueberry pie... let's see how that goes eh?

And today I ordered a Mars Hydro tent and light bundle. A huge 2'4" tent with a Mars II 400. Now to think very carefully about the air system. As it's getting cold here and LED lights aren't as hot as HID, my real concern is keeping it warm enough at night. The back room gets cold, like 10 degrees C - that's 50f in old money. Thoughts are veering towards a thermostatically controlled oil filled rad for night time.

Next is the air movement. I'm thinking over sizing the fan and getting variable speed, either built in or a variable plug socket. Another reason to oversize is to accommodate a large carbon filter. Odour control is very important. Has anyone ever put cooker fan carbon filter sheets over the air intake flaps to prevent odours leaking from the intakes? As for heating...I've had this crazy idea to start off with the carbon filter very low down to draw the heat from the top. I'll experiment with this (remember - cold room).

Next up is picking good soil. Do I splash out on market leaders on the first grow or get mid-range and learn with that to minimise cost on an experimental first grow?

Am I likely to need pest control given it's winter here and all the insects have gone south?

Monitoring - temps, humidity and soil pH... anything else?

Draining run off water - a tray at an angle and either towels with a bucket or a wet vac.

Nutes (see I'm learning the lingo) - Completely confuzzled at the range of stuff out there. I understand CalMag is required with LED's in particular. More research required

I'll flesh this out as more springs to mind and people comment (please do!)

Max
 
MaxHeadroom said:
Soooo... not sure if this is the right place, but allow me to indulge in my happy moment and a pre-journal journal. Today my seeds arrived. I took a picture but damned if I can find it now I've stuck it on the gallery. Perhaps these things take time.

3 x CBD Diesel
3 x CBD Critical Care
3 x CBD Kush (are you seeing a tend here?)

Oh and 3 free Blueberry seeds. The local neighbourhood watch like blueberry pie... let's see how that goes eh?

And today I ordered a Mars Hydro tent and light bundle. A huge 2'4" tent with a Mars II 400. Now to think very carefully about the air system. As it's getting cold here and LED lights aren't as hot as HID, my real concern is keeping it warm enough at night. The back room gets cold, like 10 degrees C - that's 50f in old money. Thoughts are veering towards a thermostatically controlled oil filled rad for night time.

Next is the air movement. I'm thinking over sizing the fan and getting variable speed, either built in or a variable plug socket. Another reason to oversize is to accommodate a large carbon filter. Odour control is very important. Has anyone ever put cooker fan carbon filter sheets over the air intake flaps to prevent odours leaking from the intakes? As for heating...I've had this crazy idea to start off with the carbon filter very low down to draw the heat from the top. I'll experiment with this (remember - cold room).

Next up is picking good soil. Do I splash out on market leaders on the first grow or get mid-range and learn with that to minimise cost on an experimental first grow?

Am I likely to need pest control given it's winter here and all the insects have gone south?

Monitoring - temps, humidity and soil pH... anything else?

Draining run off water - a tray at an angle and either towels with a bucket or a wet vac.

Nutes (see I'm learning the lingo) - Completely confuzzled at the range of stuff out there. I understand CalMag is required with LED's in particular. More research required

I'll flesh this out as more springs to mind and people comment (please do!)

Max
Click to expand...

One thing to consider is the carbon filter should not be needed when you start your grow so I would recommend picking one up but do not put it into your system until you start to notice a light odor. It will last longer that way. On your 1st grow I would not be looking for top of the line mediums, and I would avoid low end at all costs unless you have no other option. Go mid range, plenty to choose from. You should be fine for a while and not need any nutes for a while which gives you time to learn a few of the real basics.

I will need to get back to you, I promise I will finish my thoughts but I just received a phone call from my brother and his wife has taken a turn for the worse and I need to go. I am sure you will understand
 
Good morning all,

There's been a hiccup with the plans :-/ Mars Hydro are out of the 2'4" tents and they aren't back in stock until next month. They have great customer service and have offered 3 options.. a refund, a bigger tent for a little more, wait for the small one to come back in stock.

I don't want to go for a bigger tent as the 2'4" will serve my needs... I'm not going to be selling my crop, 2 plants will be plenty and I have limited space where it will go. Plus I don't want to invest in more LED's to cover a bigger tent. Not that the electricity will cost much - I have solar panels that produce 3.6Kwh on a good day. Dull winter days still average 900w during daylight. But I digress... I think my real choices are now 1. Take the refund and buy elsewhere 2. Wait for the tent to come back in stock.

I'm veering towards 2 because I've not seen many (if any) reviews of the Mars LED & tent combo. Plus it gives me more time to learn and prepare for my first ever grow. I've still got soil and nutes to consider.

I was hoping to plant the first two seeds on Christmas Day but such is life.

Max
 
MaxHeadroom said:
Good morning OG,

Wonderful advice as ever, thank you. I hope things turned out ok? It feels like we're all family on here; I'm sending cyber wishes to you and yours.

Max
Click to expand...
Thank you Max, We will not know the results till next week, they did give her a prescription to stop the swelling of her brain but only time will tell f it works or not. My wife and I will be spending most of the weekend out spending time with them both. For now I just want to get my mind off it for a few minutes. I did not sleep well last night, I am sure you can figure out why. So the advice I give you today, I am going to keep very basic and generic because I do not want to risk giving you bad advice because my mind is elsewhere.
As for your issue with the tent not being available what I would recommend is this, get he light from Mars-hydro, you will not find a better light for the money. Granted there are better lights out there but you will pay dearly for them. Dollar for dollar I do not believe you can go wrong buying the Mars-hydro. Now as for the tent, I am not personally knowledgeable with the quality or costs of their tents but I do know that there are many tents available on the market which are just fine, some better then others but for the most part if you spend a 1/2 hour or so researching them online and look at their reviews, you should be able to find something comparable. If you do not mind waiting a few weeks, I would just wait though. You could order it now, then get it by the time your plant will need it. To begin with the 1st few weeks your plant will be so small that you can get by without a tent. In fact you can even get by without the light. Just use a CFL or two until your light shows up.
One investment you will want to buy is a good PH meter. You can get them for as cheap as 35 to 40 USD. If you are growing in soil you will want to PH your water to 6.5 for the best results. This will be critical as the plant gets older and you eventually start using Nutes. At the beginning though you will not need notes, because the soil will have everything the plant needs right in the soil. All you have to do is add water at the proper PH and make sure not to over water it.
One other thing that you will have to have right away, that is a fan. Your plant will need to have air circulation. Not hurricane winds, but just a very light breeze. What this will do is make sure there is always plenty of CO2 available for the plant to beat, and it will help the plant develop strong stems which will be needed to hold and support the heavy buds you intend to grow.
Now for the importance of up potting. Some people will start their plant out in say a solo cup then when ready to be up potted they will move it straight into the final pot they intend to grow, either a 3,5,7, or 10 gallon pot. I do not recommend doing it this way. Many may disagree with me on this point but here is my logic behind up potting. When the plant 1st starts developing roots it send a tap root deep in search of water. When it hits the bottom of your pot, it will start sending out side shoots and developing a thick root system to pick up not only water but nutrients from the soil. If you up pot you are doing a couple of things theater beneficial not only to the plant but to you as well. When you up pot, you are adding fresh soil which contains nutrients the plant can use. So each time you up pot you are basically adding nutrients to the plant which means you can wait longer before you are required to add your own nutrients to compensate. That is the benefit to you, now for the benefit to the plant. Each time you allow the plant to stay in that smaller pot, it can fill that area easier with its root system and have a thicker more vibrant root system. Better the roots, the better it will grow. A win win situation. It is true if you planted your seed in a 10 gallon pot eventually if you water it properly it would fill the pot with roots but you will be watering soil which has no roots and will not have them for some time. It will be harder to judge when you need to water and when not to water. Sure you could water part of the soil but what happens when the tap root goes deeper then what you think it will be. If you do not water it enough, the tap root will stay dry and be stunted or even possibly die back.

Sorry for rambling on,
but this is just my 2 cents

Thank you for the well wishes :hug:
 
Hi OG,

Completely understandable about churning mind preventing sleep. More excellent advice, thank you. I should at this juncture let you know that I'm not learning just from you... it's true, I've been unfaithful! YouTube and 420 Mag have been great sources - the personal touch from you goes above and beyond.

I think you are right on the tent. A full month is a touch excessive and having shelled out on LED I'm a little reluctant to buy CFL lights for a mini veg box to fulfil my Christmas Day planting hopes. I can't find anywhere local with small tents and I do have concerns about buying from Amazon on three counts; 1. Privacy - I don't want an easy record of my grow box purchase being stored and accessible to all the wrong people. 2. Quality - I have high hopes Mars have got it right. It's hard finding another supplier at the right quality and price point... which leads me to number 3. Price - I got a very good deal from Mars on the tent.

I'll look into CFL's and make something to house it if the price is right. I guess I should stop being tight and have a separate veg room. I'm thinking a maximum of two plants in flowering at any one time, but I want to be sure I take to this before becoming one of those "all the gear, no idea" chaps.

As for soil; here in the UK Forest Fox isn't widely available, but Canna is everywhere. Ordering something called 'Canna' is a bit off putting considering the storm troopers' over reaction to anyone growing a plant. Obviously a very dangerous plant that wanders off to deflower virgins, mug old ladies and generally destroy the fabric of society... all during the dark period. Hmmm, could the dark period be so named for sinister reasons? Answers on an electron. The winner gets a knowing nod.

Forgive the rambling... cutting down on opiates is making me twitchy and all neurons are firing in a random fashion. Things may get tangenital soon (going off at a tangent to speak bollocks). Moments like these make me wish I could get some high CBD strains quite easily.

I'd better go and gather my thoughts... and design a scree. Possibly a Rasberry Pi based environmental control system. I have most of the electronic components to hand.

Adious amigos

Mad Max
 
At last.. a picture of the seeds in question.

Why does it look like they are under grow lights you ask... because I have computer controlled LED lights all over the house. Geek much.
IMG_38879.JPG
 

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