150w HPS Club and Resource Guide......

[grumblez]

Hey PD thanks! She is still going! About 25-30 percent amber now. I took a sample and she worked fine...so I am not worried at all...whoo hooo....daddy is gonna be happy from her yield, for sure...all the fan leaves are going yellowish so it cannot be too long...maybe another two weeks or so...

 

[Substrate]

Hello guys!

Just another „new face” around

I've just finished my first successful grow and would like to share some pictures of the curing buds. More can be found there –› click.

 

[AcroPhobic]

^^ Nice colors you got outta that bro ^^ and congrats on your harvest

 

[piosh]

I've just finished my first successful grow

gratz man - its always beautiful to see selfgrown buds instead of buying some...

 

[AcroPhobic]

gratz man - its always beautiful to see selfgrown buds instead of buying some...

No no .. its better to SMOKE selfgrown buds instead of buying it. I take great pleasure and pride in the fact that I grow my own smoke and its BETTER than any shit these scumbags sell on the streets because I know how it was grown and what the Tric ratio is for what I like in a high depending on strain.

I havent bought a bag in 9 years! You know how much money Ive saved? Thousands upon thousands.
I have a lady friend grower in Las Vegas and we exchange seedbank beans and homegrown bud all the time shipped overnight through USPS.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

I have a lady friend grower in Las Vegas and we exchange seedbank beans and homegrown bud all the time shipped overnight through USPS.

Speaking of sharing through the mail, you can pick up one of these cloners at the hardware, Lowes or Home Dope for ~$3. It's has a dozen pucks. Use a hot poker to poke holes just above the puck line and use coffee stirs to secure pucks to the bottom. A little scotch tape to secure the dome and it's ready for packing. Crushed newspaper works good, as long as the cloner doesn't jostle inside the box.

 

[AcroPhobic]

Speaking of sharing through the mail, you can pick up one of these cloners at the hardware, Lowes or Home Dope for ~$3. It's has a dozen pucks. Use a hot poker to poke holes just above the puck line and use coffee stirs to secure pucks to the bottom. A little scotch tape to secure the dome and it's ready for packing. Crushed newspaper works good, as long as the cloner doesn't jostle inside the box.

Good post DB! I used something similar years ago when I had that unknown bagseed motherplant alive for 9 years. I shipped my friend in Vegas 12 clones off that plant and used newspaper, styrofoam from store bought aplliances and bubble wrap to secure the cloner itself. I wrapped the medium in plastic with twist ties to keep moisture in medium just in case of any shipping delays. I may have let the mother flower out and produce seeds for a cross, thus ending its life but my friend still has a mother plant from those clones I sent her alive n well! I can always get it back but Im done with that era, on to the next keeper to find. I'm real excited to find a keeper in the stawberry diesel x strawberry cheesil seeds she sent me that she crossed herself using the best of the best out of 25 plants she had to work with. Outdoor 2010 is gonna be good to me this year.

 

[catman]

Turns out my ballast is fine, but my bulb was dead. A few minutes after running the new one it became clear to me the old one was not nearly as bright, produced more heat, and the color spectrum was considerably more blue. The size of my buds aren't as big as they should be, but I have a lot of bud sites that will hopefully make up for it.

Week 6

PDxAK47

Bubblegum

And some Merlin's Magic.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

Those are looking great, catman. Check it out. At day 35 I'm finally getting a bud, lol. Just kidding. These might even have to be staked. I'm wondering what those C-99 expressions smell like? They sure look good.

These smelled like tomato plants for the first few weeks in flower. They're sour stanky atm. Hope the filter holds out.

There's 3 more like that in the same box. I wasn't expecting anything more than a mess. But they're turning out to be manageable since all the tops are at the top. The node stacks are twice as long as past grows. I got more than 4 zips with a 15 plant sog and hoping this does better.

 

[AcroPhobic]

Catman ... same thing happened to me when I changed bulbs for the start of my current flowering clones. It was the bulb that was bad and as soon as I put new one in, bam , it was like night n day. Lookin good on the update!

DB .. day 35? dang .. But in the end you should have some fine ass smoke!

Heres my update .. day 29 of 12/12 ... 4 clones .. filled entire space .. its a jungle in there! Im not the best photographer so bear with me, but there are budsites everywhere going all the way down.

The frosty goodness came in by day 20 and now they smell diggity dank, and I owe that to molasses, everytime I use it, next day plants always look twice as nice and smell insane. Also heres what my RH and temps usually stay at during flowering, but temp is a tad high today. Also I took the pic the few seconds the light turned on when its just firing up, so thats why it looks dark and shadowy. The temp/humidity meter was photo'd after 30 minutes in.

 

[Wickedgroer]

New Guy Alert! New Guy Alert! Wickedgroer has entered the conversation

New Guy Alert! New Guy Alert! Wickedgroer has entered the conversation

Helloooo,

I am a first time legal oregon grower. I recently have set up a small grow system much like yours Pipedream. Mine is 5ft tall, 18" deep and 30" wide. Im using a hydrofarm 150W hps for veg and flower. I have two white widow plants (at least I hope they are white widow, that's what I ordered)

Here is my journal, and if anyone has any tips, I am always open, afterall, its these types of sites that have helped me to put my system together.

the cabinet is a wooden shelf unit i bought at freddies for $20. I made two sections, the top section is a shelf with a small fishtank fluorescent bulb assembly wiretied to the top. the lower section has a hydrofarm 150W hps light. I bought a window blind for $3, cut away the blinds, and tied the leftover strings to the hangers for the hydrofarm, this allows me to raise and lower the light as needed. the strings were a little thin, so I bought thicker string for another $2 and it works well. I have to lift the light by hand, then pull the string with the other until its where I want it.

I bought a white shower curtain for $7 and a blackout curtain for $15, with some curtain rods and holders for $3 each. Then, I wrapped the bookshelf with the white shower curtain. the front of cabinet is covered by the black out curtain, which has white inside and dark blue on the outside. I then took cardboard and put it on the outside of the cabinet to keep the light from getting out, or in. The grow cabinet is in a closet. With the curtain closed, and the closet door closed, its nearly pitch black in the cabinet. Even during the day. I bought three small fans, one I put up in the top shelf positioned to pull the warmth up out of the lower cabinet, another I have focused on the hps light to cool it off, the third I have focused on the tops of the plants.

Once the cabinet was done i took three seeds and put them in a warm, dark cabinet between two plates and warm wet paper towels, each day i put a little bit of luke warm water on the paper towels, morning and night, and put back in warm, dark cabinet. After two days, one began to sprout, this is Juanita (is it corny to name them?), the next day I had another seed sprout, Carmelita. The third seed sprouted the next day, Maria. After a couple of days, Juanita had reached close to an inch, Juanita about half an inch and Maria only a quarter of an inch. I was impatient, so I took all three and put them into small coco pots, two thirds was filled with hydroton, the other third was filled with cocosoil. The top part of my cabinet has a single fluorescent bulb (from a small fish tank). I put the three cocopots inside a small greenhouse container and put them in the dark for two days, making sure the soil was damp with a sprayer. the second day, Juanita shot up quickly. the fourth day, Carmelita sprung up, and after six days Maria was a no show. I turned on the fluorescents and they both grew quickly to the top of the greenhouse.
on the sixth day, I took Juanita and carmelita and put them into the hydro system I have made.
I took a ten gallon rubbermaid tub, filled it with 5 gallons of spring water, I was using a small fish tank air pump into a medium sized air stone, I also used a water pump, hooked up some 5'8" hoses, drilled a small hole in the top of the tub next to the net pots and positioned the hoses to flow over the root system of the newly added cocopots w/plants. the cocopots are positioned in the middle of a 6" pot filled with hydroton.

the first two or three days, new leaves sprouted and grew, but then all growth seemed to stop for a couple days. I added some nutrients, half strenghth, a little growth, but not much after a couple of days. then I replaced airpump with a stronger dual output, bought another air stone and put each directly under the 6" pots. the growing resumed, sprouting a third set of leaves with three leaves each. however, the lower leaves began to curl up at the edges and droop, their color was green, but splotchy. I lowered the light to about 1 foot above the top leaves, but in the next few days the curling and drooping seemed to get worse.

I was worried about the heat and humidity, the temp was high 80's with a humidity of mid 20's, I thought this could be the problem, so I bought a cool mist humidifier for $20, cut a hole in the side of the cabinet at the bottom and directed the air blowing from the humidifier into the cabinet. It worked great it has lowered the temp to low 80s while increasing the humidity to low 40's. The new sprouts began to grow, but the curling and drooping was still a problem.

The other night, I thought that maybe the cocopots were restricting the oxygen from getting to the rootsystem, even though a few roots had grown through and began to grow in the water below. So, I decided to remove the plants from the cocopots all together in a possibly invasive transplant maneuver. I took them, a few root systems were broken in the process, and put them directly in the hydroton, building up the clay pebbles to give the stems support. Since then, Juanita and Carmelita seem to be much happier, there has been significant growth and the leaves have a spring in their step.

This brings me to where I am today. Check out my pics and let me know what you think. I haven't done anything with ph levels. Im using Soul Grow and Infinity and plan to use the bloom and boost formulas for flowering.

 

[AcroPhobic]

Welcome aboard Wickedgroer

Temps during veg in low-mid 80's isn't that bad contrary to what know it alls will tell you. Sure 70-78 is ideal growing conditions but in reality low 80's isnt a bad thing.

Now when you get high 80's - 90's is a problem 4 sure. With proper ventilation <intake+exhaust> you can eliminate temp problems easy and fast and keep temps steady like me and others here.

Hope you grow some fine smoke my friend, were always here if ya need us for advice.
http://www.icmag.com/ic/member.php?u=143762

 

[Wickedgroer]

Thanks Acrophobic! Its nice to actually be an active participant, rather than just a dreamer. The only questions I have right now are what is the proper height for the hydrofarm 150W light above the tops of the leaves? I don't have much room for stretching and Im hoping the girls (Im hoping they are girls) will be more bushy. The other is how often I should completely replace the water in the tank? I changed the water after two weeks, filling it with distilled water and nutes. My plan was to replace the water (from now on I will use spring water) every two weeks and nute them once a week. What do you think? And lastly, Juanita's first set of leaves have a hard yellow tip and recently a small yellow spot on one of her leaves. This is a result from the earlier problem with the lack of air and the cocopots. Since, the new growth looks healthy and green. I am wondering if I should clip off the older leaves that show signs of yellow? Again, thanks for the help.

 

[hoosierdaddy]

How close you get the light to the plants will be determined by how well the air ventilation is in your box. What type/size fan are you using for the exhaust, and what size are the intake hole(s)?

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

Speaking of intake, a filter helps keep dust out of your bud and carbon filter. This is just a used dryer sheet but works better than nothing. Hepa filter material would catch more particles but might need changing more frequently.

 

[AcroPhobic]

I grow in soil and soil only .. so someone else is gonna have to help ya on that one.

DB .. Mcguyver growing is the way to go ... I use crap laying round the house and Mcguyver it to suit my needs! Paint strainer/filters work also but you need the fine mesh ones to catch the crap. Why buy it, when you already have the stuff at home I say. That dryer sheet brings back memories of smoking weed in parents house as a young lad and blowing smoke into a toilet paper roll with dryer sheet attached at end! HAHAHAHAHAH good times ... it did work though .. room may have been smokey, but at least the room smelled dryer fresh. LMAO!

 

[Wickedgroer]

I dont really have an intake fan, per se, I am using a cool mist humidifier that blows cool, moist air into the bottom side of the cabinet, then, there is a small 8" fan that blows that cool air up towards the light. On the other side of the cabinet I have another 8" fan that blows on the top of the plants. When I place the backside of my hand at the same height as the leaves, it feels breezy and cool with just a very slight hint of warmth if I leave it there for a minute or so. See the pics I posted.

 

[AcroPhobic]

Hmmm ... airflow is key bro ... what are the ambient temps in your room like?

With proper ventilation/airflow I'm able to get my 150 as close as 3 inches from tops without any cooltube or heatsheild. You saw pic of my flowering temps so that tells all.

My room temp where intake comes from is between 68-72. I have a 6inch fan on lowest setting blowing on canopy and bulb for good measure but I dont think I need it somtimes with the 8 inch exhaust and good intake.

 

[hoosierdaddy]

I dont really have an intake fan, per se, I am using a cool mist humidifier that blows cool, moist air into the bottom side of the cabinet, then, there is a small 8" fan that blows that cool air up towards the light. On the other side of the cabinet I have another 8" fan that blows on the top of the plants. When I place the backside of my hand at the same height as the leaves, it feels breezy and cool with just a very slight hint of warmth if I leave it there for a minute or so. See the pics I posted.

You may be able to get plants to grow in there, and they may well finish. But they will not be up to par in such an environment. You need an intake and an exhaust. It just has to be. No successful grow you see here has zero ventilation, like yours.
The plants need to refreshed with Co2 and the heat needs to be expelled. No other way to do that without a good working ventilation system or a system that cools and provides Co2.

A $27 duct booster fan from HD is all I use in my 150 box. And I have about double the intake area as I have exhaust area. I keep a 4" fan blowing across the top of the canopy and directed at the exhaust fan towards the top of the box.

 

[AcroPhobic]

Listen to the wise one above. He speaks truth. Check out his link "understanding airflow" in his sig. It will greatly help you out and you'll learn a great deal of info.