1st Grow - CFL Lighting

My 1st post here and my first grow. I've been around a few larger grows using halides, but never had my own garden. Limited space here. It's a closet thats 24" x 18" and 7 feet tall. I'm planning to veg 4-6 weeks and then flower.

I am trying to sprout seeds. Seeds have been in the paper towels for about 36hrs at time of these pics. If they sprout - and thats a big IF - I'll transplant into pots and progress with the grow.

Current lighting is 23w CFL curly-Q bulbs. 6500k for the veg stage. I have 2700k bulbs on hand for flowering. Right now, I have 1 light positioned about 4" from each pot. If they sprout and I get them transplanted, I'll turn on the other 2 lights.

Total lights in this closet will be (4) 23w CFL 6500k - 1600 lumens each. The space is roughly 3sq ft, so I estimate just a snerch over 2000 lumens per sq.ft. Hope thats enough.

On the right is Afgooey. On the left is Kreep. There's 5 seeds of each strain. I'm banking on some males and I have a friend who has volunteered to take any females off my hands that begin to crowd. I'm planning on only keeping 2 females in this little closet.

why do you want males?

Germination:

Seeds tend to sprout fastest in a slightly warm, moist, dark location.

I moisten a paper towel (as you have), place the seed in the middle, then seal it in a zip-lock baggie with a breath of air from my own lungs to make it slightly puffy.

Then I leave it in a dresser by a radiator which keeps it slightly warm. Others put it in a paper bag behind the refrigerator (not too close, just enough to slightly warm it). It's up to you.

In about 24 hours I have a good quarter inch tap-root showing, and plant it in the starter pot, root down.

Lighting:

CFLs emit more light from the sides than the top, so having them slightly tilted toward the plants will be better for the growth stage.

Personally, I don't think 23w is powerful enough for the whole grow. If you are able, I'd return them in favour of 42watts, which produce 67 lumens per watt (so about 2800 per). I'd suggest the inexpensive brand "bright effects" (Low's brand), they sell for about $8 each or less in a 4 pack. But whatever you are able to find in your budget should work. (I used Phillips brand and can verify that they work well. I used the same bulbs through 2 grows, but they are a little more expensive.)

If asked why you need to return them, say that your new home is on dimmers. (CFLs can't be used with dimmers.)

For just 1 auto I used 4 42watts and had great results. You may want to hold on to a couple of the 23s for supplemental since you are doing 2 plants. I would also recommend you line the walls with some type of reflector. Ideally Mylar would be your best bet, but in a pinch/budget you can use the shiny-side of tin-foil. Tin-foil is a poor reflector, but better than nothing. That's what I used, and again, good results.

I hope this helps.

I think your lighting should be good to get them started and even veg for awhile if ya want, but you will want to step up the lighting for the later stages like GaiaGuy said.

Thanks for the tips gents.

I have a 175w MH that can be used to supplement the lighting. I'm concerned with heat though. I'm having trouble finding bulbs in the correct colors - perhaps you know where to get the proper bulbs? It's a standard Mogul (screw in) base - NOT the double ended type found in shop lights. This is a big bulb - looks like a giant cigar - 2.5" diameter x 10" long.

Can't find anything larger than 23w at Lowes or Home Depot - might be a local thing. Looked and looked - no joy.

Will go lights out on the seeds and find a warm spot for them. Thanks for that tip as well.

Found 85w CFL 6500k at Amazon. About $28 each.

6500k
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002ZPHXU8?tag=tomosgard-20&camp=0&creative=0&linkCode=as1&creativeASIN=B002ZPHXU8&adid=1XCBFNRN545EE0E37GM2

2700k
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003YO0VRQ?tag=tomosgard-20&camp=0&creative=0&linkCode=as1&creativeASIN=B003YO0VRQ&adid=1V1RDJ3HHMRE7YXWAW7R

green gurilla said:

why do you want males?

Click to expand...

I DON'T want males. But I'm sprouting seeds. Chances are pretty good that I'll get some males.

Unless you know of a way to look at a fuking seed and tell if it's a male or female?

I'll toss the males in the garbage after I sex the plants.

UPDATE:
Still no sprouts yet. They've been soaking in the paper towels for just over 2 days. I put them in a ziploc bag and blew a little air inside. Then I stuffed the whole thing inside a capt. crunch cereal box and put a little thermometer inside and closed it up. That should keep them dark enough. Stuck the box under the lights. I opened the box today and the temp inside was 80F.

Several seeds have cracked open and one has the beginnings of a root. This pic is an Afgooey seed. No action on the Kreep yet. I'm a bit of a camera geek. Here's a macro shot.

Hope it's a girl!!!

I put 3 Afgooey seeds and 2 Kreep seeds into dirt this morning. All had the beginnings of a tiny root.

For your viewing pleasure......... here's some pics of DIRT.

I'm running all 4 lights now. 23w CFL 6500k - 24/7. Still germinating more seeds in the capt crunch box. They are in a ziploc bag and wrapped gently in wet paper towel. Temp stays between 75-80 inside the box.

I've read somewhere that it may be helpful to have a little bit of 2700k light in there during veg and a little bit of 6500k during flowering, like 20% or something. Have you thought of throwing in an extra light with one of those? almost all the bulbs in my house are 2700 by coincidence so of course I did

Subbed!

Yeah, the plan is to get a few more of these reflectors from Home Depot - they are like $6 or $8 apiece. I have a few 2700k bulbs here, so no harm in running a few of those as well. I have a 175w MH setup on my salt water fish tank but I really don't need that much light. There's other power compact lights on that tank and the MH just burns corals and makes them recede. I'll probably take that light and ballast and throw it into my grow closet. Just need the right bulb. The fish tank bulb is 14,000k - REALLY REALY blue and not good for plants.

I want to get bigger bulbs. I found some big ass CFL's on Amazon. Just short on cash right now. I'm hoping these seeds will pop up and actually turn into plants. As soon as I see green leaves, they are going to get placed on old paver stones to get them right up next to the lights. I would really like to get them around 3-4 inches from the lights. Right now, the lights are just there to add a little heat to the capt crunch box and help germinate the remaining seeds.

Found this article on germinating seeds... Dumb luck - I did it right. GaiaGuy gets credit for telling me to keep them in a dark spot. +rep man. Thanks
Link> http://www.amsterdammarijuanaseeds.info/how-to-germinate-marijuana-seeds.html

I am not sure if my seeds would be considered bag seeds or not? I did get them from bags. The Afgooey seeds came from a bit that I purchased at a local dispensary. The Kreep came from a friends grow that got pollinated by a male that was overlooked for too long. So is that bag seed? I thought bag seed was when you had no idea what it is. The seeds came from bags - but I do know what they are. ???

I don't know how the Afgooey will grow out. I do know the Kreep is long and spindly.. My friend vegged his Kreep plants under 1000w MH bulbs for about 2 months. They were touching the ceiling and we had already topped them twice. Long branches and very stinky. If I get lucky here and they actually grow, I'm planning to LST the Kreep like crazy, just to keep the height under control. If my Kreep turns out anything like my friends - we'll have some couch lock sheeit here!! It's 1 or 2 hits and quit - or you'll be in bed sleeping it off for the next 6hrs LOL Good weed for sleeping if you have insomnia. Great weed for dinking around the house on the weekend.... as long as you don't get greedy. Really need to stop after 1 or 2 hits. Gets ya fuked up!!

Fingers crossed

I'd like bigger bulbs too, I found a 42watt 6500k fluorescent at walmart for 10, it still screwed into the socket but it was a little smaller than the socket, it didn't light up and I returned it, gotta learn about sockets haha.

Woke up this morning to find 2 little sprouts.

I know this is boring for those of you that have already done it. For a 1st time grower it's exciting. Even though I've been around grows in the past, these babies are MINE!! I guess thats what's so cool about it. They're mine.

So, there's (4) 6500k bulbs and (1) 2700k bulb in there right now. 23w each. Right now the lights are about 4 inches from the pots. I think they need to be closer to avoid stretching, but I also don't want to fry my seedlings. Any tips on when to move the lights closer and exactly how close?

Congrats! I love that our setups are essentially identical, down to the number of 6500k bulbs and the number of 2700k

Dunno if you've kept an eye on mine, I've been drinking too much in the past couple days and keep forgetting to take pics, I promise she's doing well though! Glad to see that this thread's gonna go on!

I check your grow daily.

It's a waiting game now.

EDIT:
I just checked the closet........ I see a third one popping up now!! It's still bent over - leaves have not busted out of the soil. But I can see about 1/4" of the stalk!!

Happy Dance!!

Moved on to a different site

Nice man!

I'm no expert, but I would trust that 150 watt bulb more

Moved on to a different site.

good work, also with my CFLs I've had some of them less than an inch away, and some farther. As you can see there's not really stretching, but there's not a whole lot of vertical growth that I would expect either, I'm transplanting in an hour and I've already set it up so the lights will be farther away. Many of the higher leaves have almost totally covered lower leaves, and I think they're like to photosynthesize a little bit so hopefully I get only an appropriate amount of "stretching"

Moved on to a different site.