first hydro dwc grow NL x BB and Star 47 fems

[catainahab]

ok so here i go. started a number of grows ago with dirt with tasty buds then moved to coco with bigger yeilds now is the hydro.

hydro set up is
5x 25 litre buckets
1x 600w duel spec bulb
1x 250w cfl blue spec
GH nutes g. m. b.
Rhizotonic
Hygrozyme
MJ 500 water pump
30w air Pump
8x 4" air plates
Plumbing pipes and fittings
silver tape to light proof buckets
Nutradip tri meter
crap camera

i started the seeds 3rd july in rockwool and switched the light on on the 5th. Roots popped out of the cubes on the 7th and they were put in the nursery bucket on the 9th. i have to say watching the growth on the seedlings from this perspective and seeing the roots develop is addictive. As soon as they were put into the bucket the rhizo was added at half strength for the first couple of days and as of now they are on full strength.
Just using the tri meter for ph and temp for the next week as i'm moving house to pastures new and havent built the full system yet and i think the bubbles form the plates are completely fucking with the ppm readings. hopefully it will give me a true reading when its sitting in its control bucket.

as stated in the inventory a crap camera.
i'm gonna keep the ph between 5.6-5.8 which is the same as a regular coco grow and hopefully they wont need any nutes for the next couple of days, the ppm part is bouncing between 2500-4900 as soon as i turn the bubbles of i get a reading of 520, hard water from hell. hopefully the new house is a bit softer.
As for the seeds northern lights cross with big bud on the left and sensi star crossed with ak47 on the right both are indicas with the star having a touch of sativa. they all will be topped and scrogged.

any input or help for a newly converted hyro-naut will be welcomed.

 

[catainahab]

so its been a couple of days since the last entry. the roots have exploded with growth, rhizotonic is the muts nuts. i think i have a light leek in the nursery bucket and i have aquired a tiny bit of algea. because the lid is for the system i havent built yet i think the light is getting in around the edge . not 100% on that though.
I changed the water on saturday i was hoping not to have to add nutes other than the rhizo but they are showing the 3rd set of leafs other than the cotyledons and they will get hungry now. started off with less than a quarter strength nutes. if i turn the bubbles off or move the cfl further away from the ppm probe then i can get a reading. base with out nutes is 520ppm with nutes 920ppm.
I will hopefully post pics tonight after work.

 

[catainahab]

so pics as promised

nl x bb on the left star 47 on the right




now never having to see the root system before im not sure if this is normal looking micro bacterias or the rhizotonic it looks brownish. its only on this 1 plant at the moment and this is the best picture i can take of it. if anyone can advise on this then shoot away. it doesnt seem to be effecting anything yet .


massive difference over the space of 2 days

 

[catainahab]

so its been 2 days since my last post and the possible algea problem is still there plus a minor fuck up with ph. i have added some hygrozyme to try and sort out the algea and changed the bucket for a bigger 1 which has sorted the light leak. i'm using gh micro hard water and it brings the ph down gradually so when i correct the ph 5.8 about 24 hours later its taken it down to 5.4. one of the stars has now got an MAG problem because of this, i know that the mag is in the soup so i added some plain water to bring it back up to 5.8. seems to be working.
This hydro shit is fast acting and definitely less forgiving than coco


pics of the mag problem to start purple underside of leaf and crispy looking leaves on top


now the algea. if its still there in a couple of days then i'm gonna try h2o2.



all in all looking good. this is going to be my last post for a couple of weeks need to wait for an engineer to sort the internet in the new place and they take an age to get their arses in gear. i'll still be taking photos and keeping notes and will update when i get back online

 

[catainahab]

ok so summer seems to have arrived with a fucking heat wave from hell. how long will my plants last in this heat i have no idea. current temps are room 35 c to 38 c and the water temps reached 30 c last night. the thing is the plants dont seem to mind it at the moment and are growing nicely. topped them the other day and they look happy and roots look fine. i lack a freezer so ice bottles are out and i'm a bit skint at the moment so a nute chiller is definitely out. the forecast for the weekend is cooler so i'm hoping they will last till then. having to use the works cpu and net so no pics at the mo. i have a very decent air pump supplying to 8 air plates in 4 buckets so hopefully thats what is countering the high water temp. the thing is the noise. i have the actual pump on about 5 inch of rubber and about an inch of card to get rid of the vibration noise but its still there. wood flooring is no good for dwc i'm not sure if the air plates are contributing to the prob but it sounds like a hornets nets in my attic room, bedroom and bathroom but hopefully not in the neighbours. if anyone has had this prob and knows how to sort it out please advise

 

[cannavienna]

i'm gonna sub fuckin' scribe!!!!! two sickkk strains man keep us updated please!

 

[catainahab]

good to have you along mate. photo updates are gonna be difficult to do for a couple of weeks but im still snapping away and will do a full update once my home internet is back up

 

[2easy]

ok so summer seems to have arrived with a fucking heat wave from hell. how long will my plants last in this heat i have no idea. current temps are room 35 c to 38 c and the water temps reached 30 c last night. the thing is the plants dont seem to mind it at the moment and are growing nicely. topped them the other day and they look happy and roots look fine. i lack a freezer so ice bottles are out and i'm a bit skint at the moment so a nute chiller is definitely out. the forecast for the weekend is cooler so i'm hoping they will last till then. having to use the works cpu and net so no pics at the mo. i have a very decent air pump supplying to 8 air plates in 4 buckets so hopefully thats what is countering the high water temp. the thing is the noise. i have the actual pump on about 5 inch of rubber and about an inch of card to get rid of the vibration noise but its still there. wood flooring is no good for dwc i'm not sure if the air plates are contributing to the prob but it sounds like a hornets nets in my attic room, bedroom and bathroom but hopefully not in the neighbours. if anyone has had this prob and knows how to sort it out please advise

hey mate.

do those plates vibrate against the buckets. i used to have that problem. my pump was quite but i could still hear my grow from upstairs. eventually had to glue my airstones to the bottom of my bucket to stop them vibrating inside.

also that root slime doesnt look good IMO. i can highly recomend the heisenberg tea.

https://www.rollitup.org/dwc-bubbleponics/361430-dwc-root-slime-cure-aka.html

i will not grow DWC without it ever again. also using the tea you can throw away your rhizo and hygro as the tea leaves both of them in its dust

 

[catainahab]

nice info thanks. the root slime seems to have gone for now with the aid of the hygro and getting rid of the light leak . once i use the bottles up i'll give the tea a go. next time i clean the nutes out and fill with fresh i'll glue the plates down, they dont touch the sides but with the wooden floors i think its turned the room into a base box. i'm also get some carpet squares to put under the buckets. i'm pretty much up for anything that can get me a good nights sleep.

 

[2easy]

good luck and keep em green

 

[catainahab]

the internet is back thank fuck. time for an update



so these were taken on the 23/07 i have constantly had heat issues so pumped up the air supply and it countered the problem. they were topped 2 days before one of each took it and the others turned into fims. retopped and happy days.

25/07


2 days later the heat gets a real problem completely changed the system to the full unit. the ambient temps before the lights came on was 27c as soon as the lights came on it bumped it up to 35c-38c. the next few days i thought they were shot for sure. the water temps were at 33c. ph moves between 5.9 down to 5.7 i'm using gh's standard veg formula at half strength with the topp of being 10 ltr per week( i let the water level drop by 10 ltr then top of with full strength gh veg formula) water ppm in the new place is 530ppm and the veg formula comes to 600ppm.

28/07


2 days later and they are still alive. i have noticed that the roots are pure white again the hygrozyme works wonders. stil have heat problems but it doesn't seem to be affecting the plants so much. star 47 still on the right an nl x bb on the left the topping and retopping have taken well. the star is starting to spread out and seems to have more growth than the northern lights


30/07

star 47


nl x bb
more of the same the summer seems to have fucked off for a little while so the ambient temps have dropped with the lights on 30c , water at 24c ppm dropped to 1030 over the last couple of days so topped up with 10 ltr of nute mix back up to 1100.


31/07


so these were taken 1 day later just to show the growth rate

02/08


topped again for the last time the star had more of a topping mainly because its spread out more. the northern lights have stayed compact. 2 days till a water change then i'll trimm leaves and get light in the nooks.

04/08
just changed the water gone to full gh veg formula. topping off with full formula as well. will update with photos later. had a bit of a fuck up with being heavy handed i took the mesh off to look at the roots and check the pipes. i put it back on and split a stars stem should be ok

 

[catainahab]

first water change manage to check the roots properly

perfectly white i think they are a bit stunted


now for the split star


the split has gone down about 10mm hopefully its not too bad only time will tell






i slightly over filled the water in the buckets by about 5 litres by the time the plants have drunk it up the ph will be at 5.8. i'm not used to using ppms so this grow i'm just watching and guessing. i'm leaving 2 weeks between water changes and following the gh veg guide 7ml of each per 10ltr. when the ladies have drunk 10 ltr the ppm has dropped 120ppm so i put 10ltr of nute mix in if there is no change in the ppm but the ph drops to 5.7 i put 10ltr of normal water in. they are looking really healthy.
due to timing issues i'm going to start flowering next week giving about 2 weeks of veg left. the next water change i'll be following the lucas formula

 

[cannavienna]

good luck with the split one :/

 

[catainahab]

so its been about 36 hours from when i split the stem. it doesn't look like its slowed the growth and the tips are still green and good. they have six days till 12/12 switch

 

[catainahab]

hi first off the split. 2.5 days have past and it still doesn't seem to have effected the branches. i'm expecting bud loss i have put a dose of rhizotonic in the mix and its pure fingers crossed


now for the growth rate of dwc these are over the last 2 weeks. sorry about the last one i cant figure out how to flip it


i upped the grow part of the gh nute formula thats now running at 10ml with the micro at 7 and the bloom at 7 this looks like the last time i'll adjust for the veg stage. gonna be switching the lights on saturday and the following saturday will be the water change with the 8-16 bloom formula.

 

[cannavienna]

hi first off the split. 2.5 days have past and it still doesn't seem to have effected the branches. i'm expecting bud loss i have put a dose of rhizotonic in the mix and its pure fingers crossed


now for the growth rate of dwc these are over the last 2 weeks. sorry about the last one i cant figure out how to flip it

i upped the grow part of the gh nute formula thats now running at 10ml with the micro at 7 and the bloom at 7 this looks like the last time i'll adjust for the veg stage. gonna be switching the lights on saturday and the following saturday will be the water change with the 8-16 bloom formula.

lookin' good bro!

 

[catainahab]

the heat has risen and i decided to switch a day early. LET THE STRETCH BEGIN. my lights do most the work at night but the over lap into the day would have stressed the plant to fuck. i also ordered a new reflector should help with the heat . they have nearly filled their space and with the stretch over the next week it should fill the rest.



one of the northern lights is a bit stunted but seems healthy the 2 stars have bushed right out. they drunk 20l of water over the past 2 days so i topped off with nute mix 15ml g- 10ml m- 5ml b per 10 ltr. over the next week i'll up the b and lower the g.


the split has had little effect on the grow so far. the branches are developing good healthy shoots

i got to say dwc is a piss easy way of growing, its more watching than work. hopefully the bloom is just as easy

 

[cannavienna]

you are right, dwc is easy but VERY unforgiving if you don't look after the plants every single day. i'm talkin' algae, pH fluctuations and stuff like that can fuck up everything in a few days.
but yours seem healthy as fuck dude!

 

[catainahab]

cheers mate. my grow space is in my smoking room and i spend alot of time in there as most tokers would. the first sign of anything happening and i'm on it. its been a week with out changing the water just topping off and i have noticed the ph changing a little bit faster than normal, i was going to give it another week then a change out but i reckon the hard water will force me to change out in a few days less. these ladies are thirstie 12 hrs gone and they have drunk another 10 ltr. next grow i'm gonna get a topp off res set up

 

[catainahab]

three days in and here is the update.

new reflector turned up and has lowered the temps by 3c which means i don't have to get up at 6:55am to shut the tent up




i think i have moved the bud sites into their final positions. still room for tinkering though



this is the split one, the stem has become more rigid and there is no sign of major discoloration


i added a dose of hygrozyme at 4 ml per gallon to clean of any shit on the roots before the water change which will be in 3-6 days time


09/08.........................11/08
amazing growth rate