The Official Hempy Bucket Thread

[Japanfreakier]

Here's how I do it.
You'll need plastic buckets
A wire mesh screen
Plastic sheet ( for the floor)
Big mo-fo pasta strainer

Take your perlite and dump it into a mesh like this one and shake the bucket. I like to spray my net with water because it picks up the roots better that way. Just shake a bucket full and then repeat it once or twice more. You'll be able to get almost all the roots out this way, much easier than you'd think.

Now it's time to wash away nutes and salts by putting it in the pasta strainer in batches and spray with your garden hose or something, Run a bunch of water till you feel it's running clean.

Next you have to boil it in the biggest pot you can find. I can do 3.5 liters at a time. Just boil it in water for at least 5 minutes to kill anything.

I can process 40 liters of perlite in 3 hours this way. I like it because it's done with stuff around the house. It does waste water, and the some people are concerned about nute run-off and such but it works well for me. I've been using the same perlite for 2 years now with no problems.

There is also a product that people just dump in that is supposed to sterilize it and is sold in hydro stores.

 

[palaa]

Mod suggest

Mod suggest

Hello

Does anybody have tried yet HempyBucket with airpruning holes? I think that would make it even better. 2 inch solid bucket in bottom and rest of that is full of holes. Landscapefabric or something similar is must in inside to prevent medium flowoff.



....just of my thoughts....

 

[badbudz]

hey thanks for goin to the trouble of taking a pic Japan,i will try everything you mentioned apart from the hydro product..

 

[dubwise]

I reuse my perlite/vermiculite mix often. While flushing the plant, it cleans up the perlite. After the plant has been harvested, I remove as much of the root mass as possible. Then the "old" medium gets tossed into a 15g container and gets flushed again. I use the 15g container because I'm usually harvesting 2-4 plants and need the space to hold all of the old medium. This medium gets cleaned and then reused a couple of grows later. This is part of my perpetual setup and I've not had any issues of nutrient left over in the medium causing any kind of mishap with the new plants in the reused medium.

 

[RoachClip]

If you use 5 gallon buckets can you successfully just use & grow with straight perlite and if so with 5 gallon buckets I'm sure you would need a few 50 pound bags to fill up 5 gallon buckets. Also how much of a 5 gallon bucket do you need to fill it up to?

 

[Japanfreakier]

Straight perlite works fine but offers almost no support to the plant so plan on supporting them another way.

It's really light, a 5 gallon bag of the stuff is under 2 kilos.

 

[RoachClip]

so make it like 70 % pearlite & 30 % peatmoss.

What's going to suck is if I need to hold them up and want to use a bamboo stick I'm hoping the 2 pearlite & peatmoss will be enough to hold the bamboo stick straight up.

 

[stonethecrow]

Hey all, noob chimin in and have a few ?s
a friend turned me onto icmag actually this forum itself cause he had great results following this method so suggested it to me because of the simplicity of it all. Im only 30 pages in so far but wanted to ask for some opinions before i finish reading the whole thing.
I got my hands on 20 PK seeds and I plan to follow this method the way it was originally layed out but it will be a few months before i move and will have the space to build my room so i have been reading other forums as well because im excited to get started now.
i have a cabinet im gonna use for a micro with 6 of the seeds which i soaked in distilled water for 20 hrs per another forum on germinating and then put them in 2 inch rockwool cubes. I also read another forum on growing in 20 oz soda bottles and another that is an ongoing scrog grow in a micro cab. Those 2 gave me the idea i came up with using the space and funds i currently have available.

what i plan to do is a micro scrog in 16 oz party cups using a 150 hps complete light system and 2 to 4 100 watt cfls. any comments or suggestions on that would be appreciated and i have a couple ?s regarding the media
are the 2 inch rw cubes too big for the cups im gonna use or could i use them in 100% perlite or would it be better to just put the seeds in the 75/25 mix and let them go from there. like i said i soaked the seeds for 20 hrs in distilled water and they have now been in the rw cubes for about 36 hrs so im thinkin that i should just leave em alone but if its not too late id be willing to drop em strait into the 75/25 mix if that would be a better way to go about it.

 

[guanito]

just leave them alone. if you need to you could trim the outside of the cubes.

trouble w/scrog is no one does it right. you're supposed to veg a good long time before the flip - not just grow through a screen. might be hard in a micro cab. also be careful cfl's. they generate heat. glass partition is a good idea.

you can grow in any media that drains well. i tried 100% perlite a couple of times and found it to be not supportive enough. now i use a mixture of fox farm ocean forest, worm castings,perlite, coco. still perlite/vermiculite in the bottom though.

dr. bud 20 oz bottles are flowered from seed and nourished w/piss. lol

 

[stonethecrow]

ok well too late now. ive read thru 50 pages now and read about rw bein over saturated and it freaked me out cuz i kinda thought i did that from the start even though the package said to dip the cubes in water and gently squeeze out the excess which i did before inserting the seeds. they still felt wet to me after more than 24 hrs and were cold to the touch so i mixed my p/v at 5/1 cuz im using 6 cups and soaked them down and let them drain out then carefully pulled the rw cubes apart 1 at a time and dropped the seeds in the cups and covered em. I am happy to say that 4 of the 6 had 1/4 to 1/2 inch taproots that had the curl to them that i read was good for them. i only have 1 of the 100 watt cfls on them right now and will be getting the rest of the lights on friday. should i just go with the 150w hps for these or would the cfls be beneficial for me. i really dont wanna veg for a long time so i guess the scrog is out because as i said ill be movin in the next few months so i was hoping for a short veg and then the 50 to 60 day flower that the PK seeds call for. today is my 3rd day since droppin the seeds in the cup of water so how long should i wait before starting the flower cycle. im not really lookin for max yield or anything i am just anxious to try this out and i have more seeds to do it right once im moved and have a room built. i read these plants grow 2 to 3 feet and i have 27 inches of height before hangin my light so im guessing at least 20 inches for them to grow in total and plenty of space to tie them down and let em become short bushes. yes it was dr. buds forum i got the 20 oz bottle idea from but i wont be pissin on my plants but id like to use some bat guano after reading about what it does for the buds i have seen the dry stuff at my local hydro shop but didnt look for the liquid since im not at that step yet. Ill be getting my 150w hps and nutes on friday so should i or not grab some liquid bg to go with the gh 3 part for the way im doing this or is there a better route all together as far as nutes go for the small scale op im doing. id really like as many opinions on this as i can get at this point before i go and spend the money on anything. ill continue to read the rest of the posts here and then ask more ?s as they come up and look forward to any and all info anyone would like to offer

 

[stonethecrow]

i am using distilled water from the grocery store at the moment and was planning to continue with it or should i switch to the spring water which would be better

 

[guanito]

'round here tap water is good
i just leave it out for 24 hrs for the chlorine to gas out

you got plenty of room.
just top your plants after the fourth node.
that means vegging for 4 weeks. or flower after first week, no topping.
i've only had problems w/untopped plants overgrowing the box

make guano tea.
just take a gallon plastic water bottle and dump about 1/4 cup guano in there.
shake it up , let it stew, and keep diluting it after every use
get the jamaican (flower) and the mexican or polynesion (veg)
add 1 drop super thrive or kharma, some other amendment if you wish
you can foliar feed by adding a few drops of kelp extract to the mister.
if you use any fish products (besides kelp in the mister) be sure to use them all up at once.
that shit attracts animals
be sure to flush good.

I use earthjuice now with an organic soilless mix, but i still have the guano around
have heard reports that guano farming harms bats so i'm not as keen on it as i once was.

 

[dubwise]

Hey stone. First off, good luck with your new grow. Second, if you've got a limited amount of experience with gardening in general, don't get too carried away. Keep it simple and you will grow great bud. Hempy buckets are easy and inexpensive to run. Personally I wont use the rockwool, it seems as if they stay too wet for my likes. If you use the 75/25 blend of perlite & vermiculite you can water/feed every couple of days and it's very easy. On the topic of veg time, it appears to me, that there comes a time in the plants life that the length of time v/ the amount of harvested grass will not matter. I think its called the law of diminishing return. We were vegging plants for four and sometimes six months and getting a lot of weed, but the cost to run the op and the amount of nutrients used just didn't add up. We've come to the conclusion that it is better to veg out for a few weeks and keep the perpetual rolling along. Again, good luck with your grow and read read read all the things you can. This site and the folks are excellent!

 

[Harvest Time]

hey all.. new to the method.. threw 5 critical + in str8 perlite under cfls...2 withered away and 1 came up and just stopped growing...2 still ok so im gonna transfer tomorow and add some peat moss..jus a lil bit..goin under leds also. hopin for the best..gotta get it down b4 i pop my blue kush seeds!

 

[stonethecrow]

thanx dub and yea ive read thru this whole thread now and parts of a few others and agree the people here are great when it comes to helpin out a noob. I ditched the rw cubes and dropped the seeds right into my party cups. this morning i got up and checked on em and the four that had popped are about 1/4 inch above the surface already and 2 have their first leaves starting to form. I really didnt expect this so quick.

when should i start feeding the nutes to them. I wont be able to get them til friday when i get my light and other things i still need.

ive decided to go ahead and let em veg a few weeks and top em to trade a buddy for some diesel clones which brings me to my next ?. I probably read the answer already and just dont remember as ive taken in alot of info in the last few days but when exactly do i start counting my veg time. right now theyre seedlings and not actually veging right or is it the same. my friend suggested i let em get a foot then top so i guess the length of time dont really matter if im just going for a height. what i wanna do is have them bush out and fill the area i have as much as possible.

again thanx to you and also guanito for your feedback and ill be back with more ?s as they present themselves

 

[guanito]

don't really feed them for a couple of weeks.
the rapid rooter plugs have something in them already.
you can mix up half strength grow to use every third watering.
you have to see how often they need watering.
most common mistake is over-nuting for sure.
all the girls are different
get to know them!

takes a long time - a lifetime!

 

[Japanfreakier]

You'll know when if you wait.

 

[dubwise]

Hey stone, I usually don't feed for about a week to two weeks, it depends on how well they're doing and whether or not they need it....They'll tell you. Also, I subscribe to the theory of less is more, and so I start out a quarter strength nutes and build up until flip, and by then I'm usually a little stronger then bottle recs. I use GH w/ Liquid Karma, and at the strongest, I'm mixing a 4-2-1 tsp/gal of the 3 part, and 2 tsp/gal of LK all the way through. Guanito is dead on about getting to know your plants. When we started our little deal, we had too many strains and nothing worked well....we dropped down to one and have it perfect, since we've added a few more strains and are learning them now too.

 

[stonethecrow]

ok cool i didnt think i needed to right away ill just stick to the plain distilled water for now.
guanito i didnt use the rapid rooter plugs i had em in 2 inch rw cubes but took em out cuz i felt the cubes were too wet after 24 hrs so i mixed my 5to1 p/v and filled the cups and let em drain then put the seeds in. i havent watered since cuz the top is still damp feeling.

as of right now which has been 4 days since i dropped em in the cup of water to soak id say theyre pretty happy. they have light and water and are poppin their first leaves so ill just leave em alone for now and watch em do what they do.

thanx again guys

 

[dubwise]

I recently took some cuttings of a big mama I've got, and directly put them into mini hempys. Which factors more in new root development? A) temperature B) humidity