A way to start autos

[vicious bee]

Here's my not yet proven way to start autos. PVC pipes. The ones in the pics are 1"-8" high filled with NAPA (the auto parts store) sweeping compound made of fired diamotacious earth. Similar to turface used in ball fields. The bottoms are covered with silt fence held on by rubber bands. This was my first try. My next is 3/4 inch 12" high. If you rap the side of the tube the sweeping compound falls out and you slip the plant out. Put in a zip lock to carry to keep from drying out.

My first set I put holes in the side like hempy buckets. That didn't work so well. My next set I just used tubes with holes in the bottom. Worked much better. what they are in is a 1 dollar plastic shoe box you can get from dollar stores. The red string is #14 gauge stranded electrical wire. Small holes are drilled through the sides of the box. The wire is threaded through , a washer is put on the end and a knot tied in the wire to keep it from pulling through. You then have a carrying handle so you can carry outside to get the plants used to the Sunlight. Poly string would probably work better.

 

[TopShelf]

looks like a mixed bag? which strains

 

[vicious bee]

All blue Streak. This is the first set and I screwed them up. My next sets are starting to look better. This set I sprouted the seeds then something came up and I couldn't get the tubes ready in time so the sprouts spent two weeks in the fridge. Most still came up though. I then over ferted with concentrated seaweed. Arrrgh. Too big a hurry. It's ok though gives me some plants to experiment on. Don't expect any yield from these.

 

[dargo]

Nice one, I been doing the same thing

How will you transplant to a bigger pot/pipe? Im going to keep mine in the drainpipe untill I can see the taproot poking out the bottom, dig a deep but not very wide hole, fill it will my mix and then plug the pipe into the top of the hole, Il use something to keep it from falling over untill the roots attach to the ground. I thought as its going to be much higher off the ground it might help protect against rabbits aswell.

 

[vicious bee]

If you tap it on the side the dirt, not sure about your mix, will fall out. You pull the plant root and all out of the tube then you directly plant in soil.
Here's the unproven idea: Autos stop growing when their tap root hits obstruction. If the pipe is tall enough the plant can be sexed before it's put outside. The truth of this remains to be seen. I've been growing in 32oz. cups that are tall and getting maybe 7 to 14 gr. per plant. I see others that have one gallon pots with much less yield. I wish I had femed seeds but I don't. Have to work with what you have. I may ditch the idea of sexing indoors. I may try it both ways and see what happens. Some small amount I will try sexed and unsexed.

 

[thaiboxer]

very interested in these methods.

i have recently acquired a bunch of auto seeds & am in the process of building a cab.

i understand that the last thing you want to do is get autos off to a bad start.

My method so far was to germinate in towel, place in a rockwool cube, then into a small hempy (tennis ball tube 7-8") with the idea being that a shorter hempy will get a taproot going quicker & i can transfer into a taller hempy (1 gallon 10" high)

i've made a very light nutrient mix from rainwater that i soaked the rockwool cube & gave an initial dose into the tube hempy & have been topping off to the hole as needed with plain rainwater. Perlite/vermiculite hempy.

My question is about the starting & watering. do you water daily or are you looking for tap root stretch?? or is the container filled with water & it soaks up through the bottom? Did you place the sprouts right in the media? Water plain or tap?

I have enough seeds that i can mess around with variables & get some nice starting autos. I was thinking jiffy's for my next run.

 

[I'm Dykster]

Very cool thread VB! That is something I have wondered about and I am growing in different size containers trying to figure the automatic plant out!

 

[SmokeyTheBear]

seems like a lot of work for nothing. why not just put them in the pots their going to finish in to begin with? i was under the impression that it was not good to transplant auto's.

 

[vicious bee]

I'm not going to use pots. I going to transplant directly into the ground. What I grow indoors I'm not concerned with yield. I'm only making seeds for outdoors. I would rather have 40 plants to choose from than 8. I have limited space indoors and can't put outdoors close. What I'm doing is a little odd but it fits my circumstances. Probably not the best way.
thaiboxer- I water every day but the bottom is open. There's a tub below that catches the run off. I don't let the run off get too high in the tub. Makes it too wet. Remember my media lets water through fairly well like perlite but not quite as much as perlite. Also I put holes in the sides of the tubes in my first two generations of this idea.Just like a hempy. It didn't work all that well. I think they are too narrow and get too much air. The third I built I just have the bottom covered with silt fence. Major difference. I'll take a pic today. It's much better. Silt fence is cheap and holds soil in but lets water through. Same as air pots. Not sure why people just don't buy silt fence and make their own air pots. I think that a long taproot is critical but I don't know this for a fact. It's speculation. Others have the same notion. My thinking is that an unrestricted tap root will not slow growth in height and volume or horizontal root growth is more important to the plant filling out later. The water I use is ph'ed tap water that has been sitting out in a five gallon bucket for a few days. Rain water should be better but there's no telling what's in rain water. Probably going to grow faster with rainwater but you could get some kind of mold or whatever.

 

[darwinsbulldog]

nice stuff man, thanks for the info i'm interested in trying out some sour 60s auto flowering.

 

[dargo]

seems like a lot of work for nothing. why not just put them in the pots their going to finish in to begin with? i was under the impression that it was not good to transplant auto's.

If there in a drainpipe with no bottom and you plug the pipe into a hole when the taproot just shows itself there should be no transplanting shock. its easy to start plants indoors/greenhouse this way to get them as big as possible before they go out. the only shock they will get is from the change in enviromental setting. want bigger plants? use longer pipes so the tap root takes longer to grow out

 

[Muddy]

When I pulled my plants from my first auto grow 3 years ago one of the first things I noticed was the long tap root that autos have. Since then I've used taller pots to give the tap root more room to grow and that's seemed to work out very well. I start my seeds in Rapid Rooters, then plant those into 4" square by 5" deep pots. These a just big enough to use until I can sex them. Then the females have been going into 3 gallon pots. I just got some 2 gallon bags that I'm going to try for my next batch. So far this method has worked very well. I just finished drying 4 Diesel Ryders yesterday and they weighed in at 25, 32, 32, and 33 grams, the highest yields I've yet gotten from any autos except Mi5.

I also only use rain water and have never had a problem with any type of mold. I check the pH from time to time and it's consistent at 7. I know from years of vegetable gardening that tap water will maintain a plant but growth spurts only occur after rain falls. I'd recommend to anyone who can capture and use rain water to do so.

 

[vicious bee]

When I pulled my plants from my first auto grow 3 years ago one of the first things I noticed was the long tap root that autos have. Since then I've used taller pots to give the tap root more room to grow and that's seemed to work out very well. I start my seeds in Rapid Rooters, then plant those into 4" square by 5" deep pots. These a just big enough to use until I can sex them. Then the females have been going into 3 gallon pots. I just got some 2 gallon bags that I'm going to try for my next batch. So far this method has worked very well. I just finished drying 4 Diesel Ryders yesterday and they weighed in at 25, 32, 32, and 33 grams, the highest yields I've yet gotten from any autos except Mi5.

I also only use rain water and have never had a problem with any type of mold. I check the pH from time to time and it's consistent at 7. I know from years of vegetable gardening that tap water will maintain a plant but growth spurts only occur after rain falls. I'd recommend to anyone who can capture and use rain water to do so.

Good info.

 

[thaiboxer]

anyone know how detrimental is it to start an auto in a full size vs mini hempy??

 

[vicious bee]

I started some in a 3oz. cup hempy with the hole about 1/2 way up the cup. They were a little too wet but worked ok. Might have worked better if the hole was lower.

 

[I'm Dykster]

I want to fool around with just strapping a bunch of long tubs together and letting the plant go the entire grow in a 4 foot tube...I over did my seaweed spray...forgot my own advise...less is more....

 

[thaiboxer]

i will be conducting auto start experiments over the next few months, really interested to see how the start effect yield & time. I am hoping the hempy will even things out in the long run.

 

[vicious bee]

I want to fool around with just strapping a bunch of long tubs together and letting the plant go the entire grow in a 4 foot tube...I over did my seaweed spray...forgot my own advise...less is more....

I do some weird stuff but growing in four foot long tubes? Are you making fun of me? I really screwed up my plants with seaweed. Someone else said seaweed acts like an amplifier. I believe it. I used the same amount of nutes normally just added a little seaweed. Burnt them big time. Here's new pics of tubes. This is a comparison. The ones on the left had no holes in the side. The ones on the right had holes in the side like a hempy. BIG difference. The ones on the right never looked good but I may have sunburned them a little.

Below is root porn from the tubes with no holes. I'm transplanting them. The root is longer than the tube. It's wrapped kind of like a spring.

Close up

Maybe you can see how it's kind of like a spring.

They are about a month old and only a few have started to show sex. Light levels are not extremely high. There not very big for a month but you can fit more in a smaller space with the tubes. It remains to be seen what they will do when put outside. I'm hoping that with a long root the roots will expand horizontally quickly and therefore bulk up the plant. Will know in 5 or so weeks. Don't you love autos. Real quick feedback.

 

[Dog5tar]

Oh, 'bis mortars! Top invention, finding this talk about tap roots a really interesting read.

I started messing with AFs last year, using small 2" pots to germ - directly in compost, no batmix, nothing special and then moving to bigger 4" pots after they sex, final transplant to 10" pots after 6 weeks. Feeding with Biobizz (veg + flower mix) commences after going to 10" pots, every two days until the last week when I flushed with water. This is very similar to the grow method I've used with standard 'bis over the years.

My conclusion so far is that there are quite a few different phenos about in AF world, and the big ones grow big, the small ones grow small. If bis mortars help the smaller phenos grow larger, then this is a great contribution to the AF bible.

How exciting to be at the leading edge of research on a new genus of herb!

 

[vicious bee]

I'm not claiming that this will make auto flowers grow big. If you want the best way to get big auto flowers use Mdanzigs method or another grower uses large pots with Miracle Grow moisture control mix and gets good results. I'm trying to get the best yield out of a bad situation. I wish to start them in a small as possible space then when sexed put outdoors. This is not the best way to get the highest yield per plant but might be good per plant per space. I bet a two gallon hempy would put out a killer sized plant. Maybe use a small trash can.