2135 replies to this topic

[Grow Thread]

Thanks guys,

I'll report back on runoff PH and PPM tomorrow.

On daily watering in coco: the school of thought I was following was to water daily just till runoff to avoid the coco drying out too much. The idea there is that evaporation of water from wet coco results in increased and excessive nutrient salt build-up as the water disappears. That matches up with the low nutrient concentrations I've been using also.

But on the other hand I just noticed the claw and the beginning of leaf tip burn this morning, which points to excessive nutes as you guys suggest. I suppose runoff measurements are really needed then -- I'll be back!

roots need air. and they arent getting that air until the soil/mix has reached a certain level of "dryness".

[Grow Thread]

Yes, indeed. What strain is it? I'd like to find some. lol Seriously though, let me know about the ozone thing if you find anything. Seems that O3 would be beneficial only if it breaks down going into the water in to lot's more oxygen. I'm sure the roots would love that environment! Just wondering if it would break down into something harmful. Need a chemist here, or someone more knowledgeable in that arena than me. lol O3 running through h20, shouldn't be anything bad, should it? lol Man, my head is not very clear at the moment, but my back sure don't hurt.


----Nemo

it can promote problems with the nutrients mixing together.

[bobandtorey]

roots need air. and they arent getting that air until the soil/mix has reached a certain level of "dryness".

you sure got that one right way to much water at the worst if you have to flush i would let them dry out i use the KISS system

[Grow Thread]

quick note. i have cleaned up the thread a little and revised the table of contents on page 1. i will continue to monitor and delete "coffee talk" posts. im not saying stop the chatter................ as a matter of fact keep it coming im just going to try to keep it cleaned up as we move forward.

also, i have made some revisions (well actually lucas made them) to the lucas formula for hydroponic nutrients. it is back on page 8 now.

thanks everyone. we are doing great

[Grow Thread]

[Grow Thread]

roots done right

[Grow Thread]

for those using the lucas formula.....

these are some of the mad ramblings from Lucas himself:


> is it ok to simply raise the tds of an 0-5-10 rezup to the target tds of 0-8-16 when flowering is initiated, rather than dumping the rez of 0-5-10

yes, if you are vegging in 0-5-10, you can certainly just add more nutes and keep going, by raising the TDS.

imvho, there is no need to dump the veg res

Im glad you asked about that, because Ive been meaning to talk a bit about vegetative nutes.
btw, before I blaze ahead, I dont recommend 0-5-10 as a veg formula actually, I only recommend it as a low light formula..

now lets talk about vegging

if newly rooted clones are transplanted into containers that are going to veg under fluoros, that is a sort of weak light situation, and using weak nutes makes sense, ~1000 ppm

but after the first week or two of fluoros, if the plants move to strong light, HPS light, or MH light, but with big lamps, you know, not fluoros, what is referred to as HID lighting.. then I want them to see full strength nutes.. 0-8-16.. ~13-1400ppm

now to the question of vegetative formulas
I find the use of FloraNovaGrow definitely kicks the vegging plants into greener, but also stretchier gear. In fact, vegging with FNGrow, the stalks turn into big hollow things that look like celery.. whereas when vegging with FNBloom, as I have always advocated in the past, vegging with bloom nutes, produces much more solid stems

sidenote, Clarke claims there is some belief that drug cultivars have hollow stems. I dont know if this is true, but I do know that higher doses of Nitrogen than the bloom recipe I know so well, produces hollow stems in plants that did not have them before..

anyway, back to the veg nute thang

I think vegging in FloraNovaGrow instead of FNBloom has some positive effects on kick starting the plants, so I devised an experiment..

a bubbler reservoir was mixed with FNGrow, and plants were vegged in it for a week, then, instead of dumping, when the light was flipped, all nute additions were FloraNovaBloom from then on.

so in this case the grow nutes stayed in the res, after veg ended, but only bloom nutes were added to the res when addbacks were made

this totally unreplicated experiment produced one of the highest yields that gardener has reported.. 1.75lbs per 1k... nothing outrageous, but, the cola size was huge!.. twice as fat as usually seen when veg is done with a low Nitrogen, bloom style nute

what Im driving at is the idea of feeding the stretch that Mr. Highway mentioned in the past.. the idea of nitrogen loading the initial days of 12/12.. I think he was on to something..

point of the story, even in this scenario, a res with Grow nutes during veg, not just weak bloom nutes, was not dumped, the Bloom nutes were simply added to the res as the bloom cycle went along consuming TDS..

so to your original, and insightful question, can one simply keep adding bloom nutes to a vegetative res, once the light is flipped, without dumping the veg res,,, my opinion is YES!

IrieItes
LucasI

[Grow Thread]

was just hacking out the basics of a 72 plant perpetual grow. assuming of course a nice and easy 12 week complete cycle.






sine we are not easily afforded room for mother plants, i would take clones from the week 4 plants just before they go into the flower room.

[Grow Thread]

about $175-200/month in lighting cost. the cfl's for the clone chamber dont cost anything. the 1000w MH in the veg room would be on 18 hours/day and of course 4000 watts on 12 hours/day in the flower room.

[Grow Thread]

i am working on another DIY on a 2 plant bubble set-up. this time i will have pics check back in a couple hours.

[Jipo]

Wow looks like a pretty crazy setup, I've been trying to figure out exactly how I want to run mine since I'm limited to 12 little plants. I can do a mother/clone room in one and then a flowering room, I don't know if I want to deal with perpetual on such a small scale or not, I'm thinking 1 patient would be a nice move to make as well. What would you do if these were your limitations

(1)10x10 room
(1) 52"x48"x30" Mother tent
(1)1000w hps
(1)600w mh
(12)Independent bubble buckets
(2-3) mothers
(12) plant limit.

GO!

[Done Here]

Wow looks like a pretty crazy setup, I've been trying to figure out exactly how I want to run mine since I'm limited to 12 little plants. I can do a mother/clone room in one and then a flowering room, I don't know if I want to deal with perpetual on such a small scale or not, I'm thinking 1 patient would be a nice move to make as well. What would you do if these were your limitations

(1)10x10 room
(1) 52"x48"x30" Mother tent
(1)1000w hps
(1)600w mh
(12)Independent bubble buckets
(2-3) mothers
(12) plant limit.

GO!

Ok I was wondering about this, do your mother and clones count in your 12 plants???

[Jipo]

Ok I was wondering about this, do your mother and clones count in your 12 plants???

Yeah unfortunately. Now if I had a 24 plant limit all would be easy.
4 mothers in tent
1 clone of each every other week.
4 weeks veg from cutting
4 plants every other week.

It would be a much more simple world if I had 1 patient, but I don't want any patients I don't know.(long story, bad outcome, lesson learned)

[Grow Thread]

BUBBLEGROWERS 2 PLANT "ON A BUDGET?" BUBBLETOTE FOR UNDER $30 COMPLETE

ok follks, here we go. simple to build, simple to operate, and VERY cheap to set-up. let's start with the parts. everything is from either meijer or wal-mart. if you click on each part, there will be a link to the EXACT same item i am using in this application. the only things not avaliable at meijer/wal-mart are a couple 5" net pots and some hydroton clay pebbles. you can pick those up at your local hydro store or online.

PARTS:
10-gallon Sterilte storage tote. the link is for a bulk purchase, but they are $3.49/each in the store. wal-mart.
20-60 gallon aquarium air pump. $8.99 in store. wal-mart.
meijer seems to have a janky online spread, and i can't find these items online, but they have these 2 items in the pet/fish dept. the air stones are $2.29 and 25ft of air line was $2.89 i believe.




and then as was stated, you will need to pick up two 5" net pots ($2.00) and a small bag of hydroton clay pebbles ($5) at the local hydro store.


so here is what our mess is looking like so far:





let's start with the hardest part first. the holes in the lid of the tote. and folks, it aint hard at all. ok, when using a 5" net pot, you want your hole to be about 4 3/4". we don't need the net pot falling through into the water/nutes below. i would recommend practicing real quick on a piece of cardboard before you actually cut the lid. just to be sure everything fits before you mess up a brand new tote. ok, 4 3/4" hole. you know what you have laying around the house that is perfectly 4 3/4" in diamater?



yup, a compact disc. ready-made template for your holes. now this isnt rocket science, just eyeball out a couple holes on the lid and trace the cd with a marker.



don't have a 4 3/4" hole saw? neither do i, a razor knife works fine. take your time, "score" the plastic a few times around..... you probably won't get it to just cut right out. but remember, this is by far the hardest part of the whole process, so concentrate on not slicing your fingers off, and when you get done, you have this:




hard part is over. i swear. ok, next step. we do need 2 more holes in our bubbletote, but they are kinda already there for us. in the model of sterilite brand tote i used here, there are pre-drilled drain holes in the handles:



but these holes aren't quite big enough to slip our aquarium air line through so we need to make them just a touch larger. sneak into the kitchen (hopefully the wife is on the couch and mesmorized by the new episode of Gray's Anatomy) and snag a steak knife. just kinda stick the tip in the hole and twist it around a few times.



ok, do both sides:




awesome. now we are getting somewhere. next cut off a section of air line..... 5 feet or so is good. i like to have enough excess air line that i can move my air pump well out of the way. run the air line through the hole you just widened:



and then attach one of your 6" air stones from meijer. i like these particular stones because they are fairly heavy and will stay on the bottom without help.




and then connect the other end of the air line to your new air pump.



and repeat the same process using the other hole/air stone and plug it into the other outlet on your air pump.




holy smokes folks........ i think we are on to something now let's fill this bad boy machine with some water now.



ok, this is kind of critical for down the road. i fill one gallon containers and dump them in. measuring how much water i add to get to "my point". that point is about 1/8 to 1/4 inch below the net pot. if you keep the water level about 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch below the bottom of the net pot, you have reached the sweet spot. the air stone in the bottom of the bubbletote will shoot air bubbles upwards through the water. when these bubbles reach the surface they pop. the goal is to find the perfect level to where the net pot is not sitting in the water, but actually the bubbles are popping on the surface and just getting the bottom of the net pot wet. once the bottom of the net pot gets wet, it will transfer that moisture to the bottom layer of hydroton pebbles. the pebbles then transfer the perfect amount of water/air between themselves and eventually to the rockwool cube. the cube will stay damp, but not "soaked".

once the roots form and grow through the rockwool cube, they will continue growing through the clay pebbles, and then through the sides of the net pot, and ultimately down to thrive in the nute/air filled goodness of the solution.

this is a good time to take one of your net pots out of the lid so you can peek inside and get the water level just right.



once you hit your spot, i draw a line on the side of the tote. on the inside. with a magic marker. you could also use a piece of tape or something. since i kept track of how much i added, i know it took me EXACTLY 6 gallons of water to hit the spot. that will help down the road after doing flushes. after flushing you can just re-fill to your line and add nutes accordingly for 6 gallons of water. here's our line:



well hell....... let's plug this puppy in and see some bubbles.



bubblegrower likes:


ok. let's grow something. got your clones rooted? me either, so let's pretend for a minute:



ok, i start with a thin layer of clay pebbles on the bottom of the net pot:



then set the clone/rockwool in the net pot and cover the rest of the way with the hydroton pebbles:



and then repeat of course, and folks, you have a built yourself a bubbletote:



and soon, you will have this:






congrats!!

this system will maintain 2 plants all the way to harvest. occasionally, depending on strain/veg time, a plant may "outgrow" the tote. well, not really outgrow it, but with larger strains, after sometime you may want to move them to one plant/ tote. it is very simple to move plants if you have to. just pull out the net pot and all the roots, and put into another tote. if you grow mostly indica strains, you will have no problem with 2 plants in one tote all the way to the end. some sativas that get long and lanky may want the whole space to themselves...........

peace, love, and BIG happy grows:

[Grow Thread]

time to smoke......... that was a job

[Grow Thread]

Wow looks like a pretty crazy setup, I've been trying to figure out exactly how I want to run mine since I'm limited to 12 little plants. I can do a mother/clone room in one and then a flowering room, I don't know if I want to deal with perpetual on such a small scale or not, I'm thinking 1 patient would be a nice move to make as well. What would you do if these were your limitations

(1)10x10 room
(1) 52"x48"x30" Mother tent
(1)1000w hps
(1)600w mh
(12)Independent bubble buckets
(2-3) mothers
(12) plant limit.

GO!

12 PLANT PERPETUAL BEDROOM GROW

so you wanna turn an extra bedroom into a grow room. 12 plant limit..... perpetual....... harvesting 1-2 ounces about every 9 days i figure. with our limitations, a mother or 2 is possible, but i would pick good strains, cause you gonna be smoking a lot of it depends on your preference. too bad we can't have more mothers

ok....... you gonna have to build a cab or something for the mom and clones. nothing extravagant.... just something with a few cfl's in it to get clones rooted and to keep mom kinda small. if you dont want to build a cab, i guess you could just use the 600w MH for moms, clones, and veg....... just make sure moms and clones are pretty far away from the light. whatever you want, but i would use the tent for flowering and the rest of the open space for veg/clones/mothers

so we have 2 moms.... 2 plants down, 10 to go. im seeing 6 in flower at all times.

lets cut it into 9 day segments. if 12 weeks is 84 days, lets make ten 9-day segments......... equals 90 days. good cycle time.


2 mothers (numbered #1 and #2 in diagram below) and then:

1-8 new clone cutting being rooted #3
9-17 one plant in veg #4
18-27 one plant in veg #5
28-36 one plant in veg #6
37-45 one plant freshly moved to the flower room #7
46-54 one plant in the 2 week stretch #8
55-63 one plant just over 2 week stretch and blooming #9
64-72 one plant packing on weight #10
73-81 one plant finishing weight packing #11
82-90 one plant in flush #12


i think thats 12 every 9 days you would be harvesting one plant, and cutting a new clone off the mothers. switching mothers every other 9 days. yup, so every 9th day a plant moves up in the order until finish. this is once again, assuming about a 12.5 week cycle.


so under your 600w MH you would have the 2 mothers, one freshly rooted clone, and 3 plants at various stages of veg state. thats 6 plants.
and then in the flower tent, there are another 6 plants 9 days apart. plant one is just entering the tent, and plant 6 is on its way to the chopping block.


the veg/clone area could either be a grow tent or a wood/panda film room.

[Grow Thread]

on 2nd thought. use the tent for veg and the open room for flower. you will have plants flowering at DRASTICALLY different heights. you will need a lot of space to move those milk crates around

even if you have to make a make-shift wall in your tent.... a small cornered off part with cfl's for the mothers and one clone.

[Grow Thread]

p.s. i would say thats gonna cost you a $5 donation to the site, but i know you already donated for the chat room so you off the hook


j/k bro......... i hope this puts some ideas in your head though. a 12 plant perpetual CAN be done........ so see there all you patients....... unless you are blowing through more than 1-2 ounces every 9 days, there is no reason your caregiver should ever have you without meds.

[Jipo]

Yeah I was def planning on mothering in the tent, its short in height won't be good for flower, plus its small. Last night I decided first run for mother selection will be
DNA Sour Cream
The Church
White Rhino
Arjans Strawberry Haze
Lemon Skunk
And Hawaiian Snow

The Haze, Snow and Cream are sativas, I've read the cream stays shorter (5') or so, but the Haze and Snow have a tendency to be very tall, especially since I'm going 10gal res buckets. Unless I get the strawberry pheno on the haze its not going to be a mother, and from what I hear the GHS strawberry pheno is rare. The snow has a very high CBD pheno so I'm hoping to get that and mother it since it will be a good day time medicine for my pain. Then I'm very torn on the Lemon, Rhino and Church. I've had Lemon and Rhino, both are two of my favs and the Church I've never had but I've read a lot about it and if its really as good as I hear both production and potency wise I see myself taking that one. I have extra Lemon Skunk and Church seeds though so I may just end up keeping the rhino around for a little bit since its my only seed.

The reason I chose 6 potential mothers is I have 3 autoflower seeds, so my plan is let the mothers veg a good 7-9 weeks while the autoflowers grow out, giving me enough to last while I wait for the potential mommies to flower. Just prior to putting the 6 in flower I'm going to take a cutting of each, make sure it roots and then move the 6 huge plants to flower. The 6 rooted clones will be labeled and veg while the others flower. Then at that point I'll pick the 2 mothers, take 3 clippings of each and put the 6 large plants in the flower again, veg out the 2 sets of 3 mother clones, after 3-4 weeks I'll add one and every 9 days after that add one of them to flower until I have only 2 of the mothers room. Should be a nice way to go into the perpetual.

[Jipo]

p.s. i would say thats gonna cost you a $5 donation to the site, but i know you already donated for the chat room so you off the hook


j/k bro......... i hope this puts some ideas in your head though. a 12 plant perpetual CAN be done........ so see there all you patients....... unless you are blowing through more than 1-2 ounces every 9 days, there is no reason your caregiver should ever have you without meds.

I go through like a 1/2oz every 7-10 days so I'd be fine, I'm also trying to see if any of my friends who could get a card will make me their caregiver and I'll double up on plants and give them free meds.