passive plant killer

[Slimm]

i'm having trouble understanding how you are going to light 4 rows of plants at different heights in an efficient manner with a flat led array. some of your plants could be as much as 3 feet and some will be as little as 8-10 inches unless i have missed something.

if you draw a 2 ft line for a base, a 3 ft line for one side, and 1 ft line on the other side, the resultant angle between the tops of the 3 and 1 foot sides would be at least 35 degrees.

you could hang the light at that angle but the length of the display would have to change from 2 ft to 2.75 ft to light all plants evenly.

it seems to me that, in a 2x2 space, you would be far more efficient doing a scrog with 1 plant.

maybe i'm missing something but it also seems that the larger plants on one side would shade out the smaller plants on the other side.

I have two 1x2 panels hanging independently. I have them slightly staggered and the lower angled slightly toward the center of the tent. The shorter plants in front go on stands. I have three rows going now - I agree it's going to be crowded in there soon. However, the plants get defoliated so the more mature plants don't shade much. Row two is the unruly row - I may have tie back a fan or two.

I agree on the scrog comment, however I want to play with 12/12 from the start. This is just an experiment.

 

[delta9nxs]

I have two 1x2 panels hanging independently. I have them slightly staggered and the lower angled slightly toward the center of the tent. The shorter plants in front go on stands. I have three rows going now - I agree it's going to be crowded in there soon. However, the plants get defoliated so the more mature plants don't shade much. Row two is the unruly row - I may have tie back a fan or two.

I agree on the scrog comment, however I want to play with 12/12 from the start. This is just an experiment.

so i was missing several somethings. you sound like you know what you are doing so good luck. the only thing i would add at this point is that i would try to keep the plants as short as possible.

i can't remember right now where but i saw a grow where they began flowering un-rooted clones. at the end of stretch they lollypopped them and grew the terminal bud only.

i mentioned one bed earlier but you need to harvest 2 weeks apart so maybe 4 beds made of rain gutter with tailpieces at either end that drop into a pvc pipe network.

this would give you much larger root systems than individual containers.

on lowes site check part #'s 12066 and 12067.

later

 

[Slimm]

so i was missing several somethings. you sound like you know what you are doing so good luck. the only thing i would add at this point is that i would try to keep the plants as short as possible.

i can't remember right now where but i saw a grow where they began flowering un-rooted clones. at the end of stretch they lollypopped them and grew the terminal bud only.

i mentioned one bed earlier but you need to harvest 2 weeks apart so maybe 4 beds made of rain gutter with tailpieces at either end that drop into a pvc pipe network.

this would give you much larger root systems than individual containers.

on lowes site check part #'s 12066 and 12067.

later

Though I had planned on 2-3 feet it looks like they are hitting 18-24 inches. I'll take your advise and shoot for 20 inches. Yep, I prune them to look like poles at the end of stretch except for any fans near the bottom.

I like the trough idea - I may go that route. Thanks!

 

[delta9nxs]

1. kish x juicy fruit seedling root ball at transplant on 7/3. this plant was approx 20"
2. same plant backside showing training and no more than 2" between nodes. i have taken several large cuts from bottom.
3. same plant front side. hard to tell from the photo but it's been trained flat in front. this causes interior growth to grow out rather than up. any growth that is small or weak is shoved out horizontally through the front at this time. this plant is 35" and will be topped and flowered tonight. so it recovered from the root ball trimming and put on 15" in 16 days. there are roots showing heavily at all air holes. also this plant is in a 50/50 rice hulls and turface mix. growing fine but a little drier than i like on top.
4. backside of a swt #4.
5. front of same plant. it is growing in a 1 part pine bark, 1 rice hulls, 2 turface mix. again, growing fine but a little too dry.
6. g13 cutting in 2 parts turface, 1 part rice hulls. this will be the first g13 clone to flower. the g13 in flower is a seedling and is finishing stretch now. six more weeks to test smoke.
7 and 8. assorted clones, all different strains.
9. rene x nuken in 3 parts turface, 1 part rice hulls. so far i'm liking this mix the best. stays wetter up top.
10. same plant

i don't know about the rest of you using coco but i have had continuous warfare with fungus gnats since i switched to coco. no matter what brand. the veg area here is now coco free and it is also gnat free. no treatments, i just rotated the coco plants out of the room.

 

[daggerinmyback]

coco = gnats ... I was thinking of some baby chameleons to toss in lol then in flower wrangle em up or just keep em in the veg tent lol

 

[*mistress*]

do the rice hulls maintain their physical structure after use?

 

[SRGB]

Hi, delta9nxs.

This is a very good thread. We hope that it is alright to post here. If not, please let us know.

We would like to donate some of our products to you, for use and review. We beleive that our products would be well suited to your style of gardening. We also believe that you would provide honest and accurate feedback to us and the community at large.

In particular, our 1 liter or 1 gallon size Square Root(TM) Garden Bag may (will) eliminate the transplanting of your cuttings out of the sterlyte food containers, altogether. This will prevent any pause in the plants growth, or shock from extraction-type transplanting. The roots will grow through the SRBGB, into the media surrounding it, canceling the process of removing the primary root mass and total root volume from the starting container.

Here are some pictures of roots growing through some 1 liter Square Root(TM) Bags, progressing from initial root growth through the SRBGB's, to after being pulled from a 20 gallon SRBGB:

In the last four pictures, much of the root mass from the media is not shown, becasue it was in the perlite and could not fit in the picture. There is a 1 liter Square Root(TM) Bag underneath that root mass. The same 1 liter SRBGB that the initial cutting started in. The plant was never taken out of the initial 1 liter SRBGB that it rooted in. The entire 1 liter was placed into a 5 gallon SRBGB. After the roots grew through the 5 gallon SRBGB, the 5 gallon was placed into a 20 gallon SRBGB, for the remainder of the season. Alternatively, the 1 liter can be placed directly into a 10 or 20 gallon SRBGB to further vegetate, then bloom.

The above pictures can also be found at this thread:

https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=207882

This is a rose grown in a 3 gallon Square Root(TM) Bag.

Rose
3 gallon Square Root(TM) Garden Bag
Perlite
Outdoor
Bloom 60-75 days from sowed graft stock
Watered once or twice a week
Water soluble nutrients

If you want this removed, please just post. It would be fun to
combine passive techniques into a few, or several re-combinations.

The 1 liter and 1 gallon sizes, in particular, should help make the transition from cutting to tree seamless. Just place the entire SRBGB into the 5 gallon bucket, or, even try a 5 gallon SRBGB.

Again, this is an offer of donation to the delta9nxs. A unit or few for free, for this thread and the community.

If the mods/admin will permit free donations to the community from a vendor. And, if delta9nxs is potentially interested in trying out a different passive method, or incorporating a technique into the PPK model.

/SRGB/

 

[delta9nxs]

coco = gnats ... I was thinking of some baby chameleons to toss in lol then in flower wrangle em up or just keep em in the veg tent lol

it wouldn't take many of those big tropical geckos to clean up the gnats. down in the islands they got some that eat their own body weight in insects daily. the locals let them live loose in the house. they hide behind picture frames and stuff in the daytime and come out and crawl around on the ceilings and walls all night. you do have to clean up a little lizard shit.

i've mentioned this before and got no response but you can spray the outsides of your containers with a regular raid type flying insect killer. if they land on it even months later they die. i think when i mentioned this earlier people thought i was talking about spraying with the plants in them in the growing area but that is not what i do. i spray them before loading the medium and let them air dry. outside only. when you change out a plant there will be hundreds of dead gnats in a ring around the container.

also, bombs that contain pyrethrum are very effective if used in sets of three 4 days apart. do one, wait 4 days, do one, wait 4 days, do one. this interrupts their life cycle. with bad infestations you may have to repeat.

look in pet supply areas for flea bombs. make sure they are pyrethrum or pyrethrins. the flea bombs are safe for pets and humans, and plants. same shit that is in doktor dooms.

the bombs are very effective against spider mites when combined with a neem treatment.

later

 

[delta9nxs]

do the rice hulls maintain their physical structure after use?

hi, mistress! the rice hulls are almost 20% crystalline silicon and have a high ratio of lignin to cellulose. they will maintain their structure throughout a cannabis grow no problem.

they are extremely porous all the way through with no trapped voids. so is turface.

when i used turface alone i would screen it for fines to increase air porosity. used with rice hulls i do not have to do this. i can take straight turface right out of the bag, rinse it thoroughly, and use it.

rice hulls have a media ph of around 6-6.2 like turface and a cation exchange capacity of 20-30 meq/100g. also like turface.

in these 3 gal containers i'm using a 3 turface 1 rice hulls mix now that i really like. the plants like it too as you can tell from the photos. i take 9 quarts rinsed, wet turface and 3 quarts dry rice hulls and throw them into one of those cement mixing tubs from home depot, mix by hand and load, not pour, the mix into the container. this wetting and loading avoids separation or stratifying.

once in place i rinse the whole thing well, let drain, pour approx 4 gals of a 600 ppm nutrient solution through it just for charging and displacing the tap water more than cation exchange reasons.

i can do these steps faster than rehydrating and rinsing coco. i can do the whole process in less than 30 minutes.

i think a good mix could be built with turface, diatomaceous earth, pumice stone, zeolite, isolite, small lava rock and so on for a base of 2-4 parts and coco, rice hulls, wheat straw, pine bark, nut shells or perlite for one part and get similar performance. pick one substance from each group depending on what you have available locally.

you would have to check air porosity of each proposed mix before trying it with a plant and adjust accordingly.

the ppk, being a tunable device, allows you to adjust for slight differences in performance.

the ideal mix would be available locally and cheap. the mechanical properties of the mix are more important than the substances themselves.

d9

 

[delta9nxs]

hello, Square Root Garden Bag people! thank you for the compliments and the generous offer!

at this time i do not see how i could use them in this device.

the root ball you see in figure one of post #2244 is not something i usually have to deal with. normally i am transplanting an eight inch clone with an intact root ball. in this device there is no transplant shock when done this way.

your bags look nice and effective. maybe in the future i will be in a position to try them.

thank you again, delta9nxs

 

[dgr]

gnats:
I treat all my coco with Bayer before I pot up. I think I saw a couple of gnats, maybe.

Rice hulls drain REAL fast. After reading delta's use of them, I bought a bag that will last about forever. I used 2-3:1 coco/hulls and am definitely watering moms more often than I want to. But I AM lazy. I'll get them switched to F&D or drip (or an apparatus that allows them to be top watered and wick watered all at once) and they'll be perfect.

 

[delta9nxs]

gnats:
I treat all my coco with Bayer before I pot up. I think I saw a couple of gnats, maybe.

Rice hulls drain REAL fast. After reading delta's use of them, I bought a bag that will last about forever. I used 2-3:1 coco/hulls and am definitely watering moms more often than I want to. But I AM lazy. I'll get them switched to F&D or drip (or an apparatus that allows them to be top watered and wick watered all at once) and they'll be perfect.

hey, dgr, sorry i didn't explain further that this mix is intended for automated top watering. i hope i haven't caused you any inconvenience.

the change to this mix is part of an attempt to speed up the flow through rate so that the system comes to equilibrium faster after each pulse event.

i first increased the size of the bottom lines from the control bucket. Then the change from coco as coco is a very “slow” medium. I have all plants in veg and one plant in flower with this mix or versions of this mix, 8 more to go. next i will speed up the top delivery rate.

i am already playing with volume and duration. i'm running 8 oz's per hour through the top in veg right now with no overflows.

i intend to increase the flow rate to the top while shortening the time frame it takes to equalize the system.

jjfoo made an observation earlier that he thought more flow would increase solution stability. he was right. thank you, jj.

this small change brought the reading numbers closer together, reducing the spread between extremes of ph and ec. They were already stable and now they are just a little bit more stable.

imaginary friends' vision of how the pulse should hit and behave, while technically unachievable, is still very approachable by increasing flow rate to a point where where you are putting the desired amount out onto the medium top in a shorter time frame. Thank you, IF.

I think this will increase gas exchange and possibly grow higher yielding plants.

I think that while increasing the flow rate I can still cause the capillary reverse flow to function at least 25% of the time.

Right now in veg with the 8 oz's per hour the system equalizes fast enough to cause the reverse flow to kick in between pulse events.

d9

 

[mrcreosote]

delta9nxs,

Greetings and kudos for one of the best threads on IC.
I blush to think of how many times I've passed this thread by, Passive Plant Killer...

You might have to 're-brand' to VUPPK. Very Unsucessful PPK. Not a deader in sight. As a plant-killer, you have failed mightily.
The most fun and enlightening was watching the evolution of an idea and the clear and concise methodology backed with science and botany that lead to your conclusions of what works and why.
This is a boon to the community and many people who would ordinarily not grow for lack of knowledge or physical limitations would be helped by a 'set it and forget it' type system that is scalable to fit their needs.

I have been holding off growing for a long while because I've got (it seems sometimes) a million teenagers running through my house, and, while I trust my 18 yr. old son, he has a few friends on the edge of his circle who seem a bit shady. I'm in a very unfriendly state and all it takes is for my son to make one tiny slip up and 'grow-room' will be the small-town talk that moves like lightning in this place. I may be overly cautious, but Rule #1 already has a hole in it and that ain't good. I'm not sure if his potential for coming in for a windfall of herb can overcome that insidious tendency of teens to 'forget' they know something that needs to be forgotten.
(Being the 'cool Dad' who lets kids hang out here has a few drawbacks. I average 1 Dorito per bag that comes in the house.)

It's a tough call because your method would be virtually silent with no bubblers chugging away and running 5 gallon buckets of water into my den closet constantly.
I've got the basic 2'x4' closet with shelf to work with and using 7" roughneck 3 gal. tubs as res and pot would leave me about 3' to 3'-4" max height with 2 x 400w horizontal cool tubes or 4'-5" doing a 3 plant vertical. Since I want to do a perpetual 3 week(-ish) flower cycle, my veg shelf should be very easy to work. I'm thinking that a 3 plant modular horizontal scrog might put out a better harvest because a vert will only have a 3 week period with 2 sides lit. ( XOXOX ). Training stretchy skinny plants is okay but for 3 weeks I'll be lighting a plant back full of stem.
I'm just thinking out loud because the only way to know will be to try both ways and see.

I really like the valve stem bulkhead fittings and surgical tubing/ clothespin shut-offs. Stick a splice fitting after a 2-3" piece of surg. tube and 2 clothespins and shutting off the water to slide a bucket/tray out is a breeze. Cheaper than dirt and would work fine.
Very McGuyver.
The only trouble is that it gives me no reason to buy these,

http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=37291&catid=743

Knowing you are more than familiar with surgical leg cuffs, (as am I. Monday I go to have a bile duct stent taken out AGAIN, after leaving it in too long AGAIN. I spend my extra thousands for Dr.s Mercedes payments.)

Hell, I may buy em just for the sexy-ness of it all.

Anyway, just a long-winded 'atta-boy' for taking us on a fun ride that's going to help a lot of people grow some meds without stress and failure.
Carl's thread about the Jack's Pro got me before I finally went through your PPK experiment thread.
Very glad I did. This needs to be a sticky for sure. You're gonna be famous.

"Yes Senator, first it started with a 'Killer' marijuana strain called AK-47 and now there are these high tech growing machines called 'The PPK' springing up everywhere. This proves how violent these people are when they name their gear after guns. They must be stopped now!"

Sheesh.

 

[zeke99]

Delta9:

You use the black buckets. Was the color chosen for a specific purpose? I was thinking about using the white buckets, but painting the "in" side of them black. Would that not both reflect the light and insulate at the same time? I have a hard time heating the grow space during the USA winter months and worry about the roots when it's very cold/dry. This was a problem last winter with plants in perlite (Hempy, not PPK). Going forward I'm going to attempt a perlite/turface mix per your post above... Hate those damn fungas gnats!

 

[delta9nxs]

hey, mrcreosote! funny post, thanks for the comic relief.

i got to go now but i'll be back! d9

 

[dgr]

hey, dgr, sorry i didn't explain further that this mix is intended for automated top watering. i hope i haven't caused you any inconvenience.
...
d9

d9,
No worries. I was not in any way complaining. I apologize it came across that way. I wanted others to be aware that they drain fast. Honestly, if I stick with E&F, I will still play around with the hulls. I think I could flood more often with them in the mix. I've followed along and intentionally used the hulls to lower my PWT in my plants. It was my fault for putting too much hulls in my mix.

Let's think of it as self-encouragement to move towards the PPK.

 

[delta9nxs]

Delta9:

You use the black buckets. Was the color chosen for a specific purpose? I was thinking about using the white buckets, but painting the "in" side of them black. Would that not both reflect the light and insulate at the same time? I have a hard time heating the grow space during the USA winter months and worry about the roots when it's very cold/dry. This was a problem last winter with plants in perlite (Hempy, not PPK). Going forward I'm going to attempt a perlite/turface mix per your post above... Hate those damn fungas gnats!

hi, zeke. i use black to block light to stop algae. once the plants are in flower they are shaded all the time so heat build up is not a factor for me. also in a ppk solution temperature is not as much of an issue as it is in conventional hydro where the roots are in full direct contact with the solution all the time.

heat could be a factor for some depending on their set up.

if you want to use white because of availability or heat control paint the outside of the buckets black, then repaint them white over that. you get light proof and reflectivity.

later

 

[875]

i don't know about the rest of you using coco but i have had continuous warfare with fungus gnats since i switched to coco. no matter what brand. the veg area here is now coco free and it is also gnat free. no treatments, i just rotated the coco plants out of the room.

i think i heard someone say you can eliminate that with the purchase of "brick" coco and rehydrate it yourself

 

[SRGB]

"delta9nxs:
hello, Square Root Garden Bag people! thank you for the compliments and the generous offer!

at this time i do not see how i could use them in this device.

the root ball you see in figure one of post #2244 is not something i usually have to deal with. normally i am transplanting an eight inch clone with an intact root ball. in this device there is no transplant shock when done this way.

your bags look nice and effective. maybe in the future i will be in a position to try them.

thank you again, delta9nxs"

Hi, delta9nxs.

Thank you for your consideration and gratious reply.

Our product eliminates transplanting altogether.

Once the root tips pierce the SRBag, you could simply place the entire 1 liter or 1 gallon SRBGB into the 5 gallon PPK bucket, cover with your choice of media, and pulse-feed as usual. The roots grow through the SRBags, so you would not have to pull the rooted cutting out of the sterlite containers, reducing a step in the rooting and growing process, for greater efficiency.

Afterwards, the SRBags can be washed in a machine, folded and stored in a drawer, also eliminating container cleaning and storage.

The Sterlite(R) rooting containers and Turface(R) do work well for you, as your pictures illustrate. The SRBags provide greater overall aeration for plants, and the composition of the SRBags promote vigorous root growth through the container itself, canceling the need to do any extraction of the root mass or plant, during the entire growing cycle.

These efficiency increasing factors are what led us to offer you free samples for trial in the system you use. Your approach, in our view, attempts to steamline the gardeneing process to increase overall efficiency. We beleive that we have made a product that deletes the transplanting portion of the gardening process altogether; increasing efficiency by canceling the step of extraction-transplanting.

We have maintained heirloom roses for lengthy periods in 1 liter Square Root(TM) Bags. And, alternatively, vegetated roses from one to three feet in them, before placing the entire SRBag into a 3 or 5 gallon SRBGB. In particular, the 10 or 20 gallon size works well for large plants and small to large trees; including bamboos and alders. They are quite versatile.

However, we respect your choice to not try our product at this time.

Feel free to visit our sub-forum and contribute with your experiences, technical methods, and evolving ideas in soilless gardening.

Best,

/SRGB/

 

[mrcreosote]

i think i heard someone say you can eliminate that with the purchase of "brick" coco and rehydrate it yourself

Nah,
You still end up with gnats...

They're just flatter gnats.