My Ebb And Flow (Pics)

R

reefcouple

Well-Known Member
Easy420forme said:
What about allowing all my extra hydroton float in that water and open flood tank?
Click to expand...

Honestly the best advice I can give you is really try to cover your tray so the light doesn't hit the water, even if you cut some cardboard for the time being.. I promise you the light and water will create issues.. The hydroton will grow algae on it as well because they will be wet...
 
R

reefcouple

Well-Known Member
Easy420forme said:
What about allowing all my extra hydroton float in that water and open flood tank?
Click to expand...
Tell ya what, I will try to post some pics of my ebb and flow tray and cover tomorrow to try and give ya an idea.. Be patient tho, i never posted pics on here before so I will need to figure it out ;)
 
R

reefcouple

Well-Known Member
Easy420forme said:
i guess a cut out of Styrofoam would work until I can think of something better
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Styrofoam works well, a friend of mine uses it, then he glued some of that black plastic to it so no light seapage... I will still try and post a pic of what i did for you to get an idea...
 
dark farmer

dark farmer

Member
Hey everybody, for some reason i stopped getting updates on the thread(?). Anyway, I was going to post some updates and mention that algae is a problem but it looks like its already being discussed hah.

I had algae by the end of the first week. It wasn't a huge amount, but enough to see it in the flood tray and forming on the hydroton. Rather than use an algaecide or anything, I've just cut some cardboard to fit around the base of the plants. Nothing fancy, just something to block a larger portion of light and easily removable. Using cardboard instead of algaecide was more of a financial/laziness decision than anything. I'm not planning on smoking my tomatoes, so the less I have to do the better :)

Today is the end"ish" of week 2. So, the tomatoes have been in the system for 14 to 16 days. From what I can tell the algae hasn't hurt my tomatoes, they seem fine. I haven't changed my flood cycles or light cycles at all because I want to keep as many variables from changing as I can. I'm doing this as sort of a controlled experiment to gather data.

IMG_20101023_123601.jpgIMG_20101023_123606.jpg
 
R

reefcouple

Well-Known Member
dark farmer said:
Hey everybody, for some reason i stopped getting updates on the thread(?). Anyway, I was going to post some updates and mention that algae is a problem but it looks like its already being discussed hah.

I had algae by the end of the first week. It wasn't a huge amount, but enough to see it in the flood tray and forming on the hydroton. Rather than use an algaecide or anything, I've just cut some cardboard to fit around the base of the plants. Nothing fancy, just something to block a larger portion of light and easily removable. Using cardboard instead of algaecide was more of a financial/laziness decision than anything. I'm not planning on smoking my tomatoes, so the less I have to do the better :)

Today is the end"ish" of week 2. So, the tomatoes have been in the system for 14 to 16 days. From what I can tell the algae hasn't hurt my tomatoes, they seem fine. I haven't changed my flood cycles or light cycles at all because I want to keep as many variables from changing as I can. I'm doing this as sort of a controlled experiment to gather data.

View attachment 1228494View attachment 1228495
Click to expand...
Excellent my friend!! you will be very very happy you covered that table... I was cleaning the entire system every week because of algae until i started covering the tray, now i clean after harvest only..

kudo's and happy farming ;)
 
dark farmer

dark farmer

Member
Cannamark said:
the girls will break their necks reaching. lower the lights/....
Click to expand...
I'm keeping the lights at the same height throughout the grow mainly because this is a controlled grow. I admit the light is a little higher than I would like. I did consider lowering and adjusting as they grew, but keeping the my changing variables to a minimum is one of my goals.

In future grows, I would like to see the effects of more frequent, shorter floods(with a better timer), keeping the light at a certain distance, and also do a series of grows with 14,15,17, and 18 hour light cycles.

Tomatoes aren't photoperiodic like marijuana, so I don't need to induce flowering by changing the light cycle.
 
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