2nd grow: Dinafem Critical - Soil vs Hydro Waterfarm. The race is on!

Greetings JeromeT! It will be good to have a similar grow to follow, loads more waterfarm threads are popping up, GH must be making a fortune, lol.
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Things are looking good, nearly all the undergrowth is gone, budsites are filling up nicely, and trichs are beginning to appear, awesome!
Humidity is worrying me though, its between 61% and 55% But I'm going to have to risk it, I cant afford a dehumidifier, and i dont think theres any other way of getting humidity down.

Just another quick update,
I found a puddle of water on the floor of the grow room this morning, I cleaned it up, looked around for leaks and cant see any, but im keeping an eye on this, I have no idea how it made its way out of the waterfarm, but Im not impressed! It certainly hasnt helped with the humidity, now it is sitting at 67%. I really cant afford a dehumidifier, maybe Ill try and blag one from a hardware shop by printing a barcode from a cheap one, then go back to the shop and stick it on a decent one....BEEP!.. "That'll be £19.99 please sir!"
Other than the water thing, the plant is happy...

PPM 1100
PH 6
Temps 28'C

badgerbadger said:

Just another quick update,
I found a puddle of water on the floor of the grow room this morning, I cleaned it up, looked around for leaks and cant see any, but im keeping an eye on this, I have no idea how it made its way out of the waterfarm, but Im not impressed! It certainly hasnt helped with the humidity, now it is sitting at 67%. I really cant afford a dehumidifier, maybe Ill try and blag one from a hardware shop by printing a barcode from a cheap one, then go back to the shop and stick it on a decent one....BEEP!.. "That'll be £19.99 please sir!"
Other than the water thing, the plant is happy...

PPM 1100
PH 6
Temps 28'C

View attachment 1424392View attachment 1424393View attachment 1424394View attachment 1424395

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Hope you find out what the problem is, but oh my god that 3rd picture looks BEAUTIFUL!

I just topped it off with water, and I noticed that as when I pour the water in too fast there's a 'wave' of water that brings the level right up, and then it bobs up and down and settles where it is, I think this wave maybe overflowed yesterday and thats where the water came from, so from now on: pour the water in SLOWLY! lol, lesson learned..!

Maybe a little too medicated to notice?

lol, I reckon so!

I bought a dehumidifier Overnight it has emptied several litres from the house, and now the humidity in the grow room has dropped to 55%, a few more days of that thing running and I should be on target!
Its all looking good now, that dank weed smell is pretty strong and the buds are forming nicely, I brushed my hand one a bud and its soo sticky already, and has a lovely fruity smell
Today I have flushed it through, and added fresh water, nothing more to report...!

That shit looks awesome! Can't wait to see thr final results. Sub'd to see this one.

Cheers man, welcome along for the ride...
I thought I would take a pic of the one remaining soil plant, along with the Kandy Kush seedling in a waterfarm in room B.
The critical in soil went through some serious stress, the soil its in is shite, it got burnt, deficiencies, and a fungus gnat infestation, so now its on the mend, Im going to hang onto it and veg it for ages til I decide what to do with it! The other soil cirtical I gave to a mate, whos having fun with it...
The KK has just grown out of the seedling stage and is going to be vegging until the beast is harvested.
Im still emptying several litres of water out of the dehumidifier every day, but my windows are no longer running with condensation, so its doing its job!

Dude u have me sold on this Critical+, I read where u started her straight 12/12 and pulled an o off. I would love to hear ur technique of exactly how u scrogged this lady. Jus by lookin ur r gonna pull some major bud off that one plant. Nd I def wanna c that one in soil flower.

bigbo420 said:

Dude u have me sold on this Critical+, I read where u started her straight 12/12 and pulled an o off. I would love to hear ur technique of exactly how u scrogged this lady. Jus by lookin ur r gonna pull some major bud off that one plant. Nd I def wanna c that one in soil flower.

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The screen is about 12 inches above the waterfarm, I let it veg until it hit the screen (4-5 weeks.) Then I flicked the lights over to 12/12, and I started to weave. I let the tops grow through about 4 inches, and then pull them down into the next hole and back out of the hole next to that, so the plant comes through the hole, then the next hole has the nodes in it, then the next one has the top in it. I did this with as many tops as i could. For any others that I couldnt fit in I kept pulling them to the side until they were clear of the middle of the screen and pushed them through at the edges of the screen, this spread everything out a lot more, I was really worried that it was all too dense, I'm still wondering if it is too dense, but fuck it, its happening!
My air intake is at the bottom of the cupboard, and my extractor is at the top, next to the chains for the lights to hang is a fan pointing down straight onto the left hand side of the screen, I think this gives it a pretty good air circulation, I did try it with the fan at the bottom of the cupboard pointing up, but the temps went through the roof, so i swapped it back, there is a nice breeze running throughout the cupboard, so hopefully this will stave off any mould. Another thing I've started using is Liquid Silicon, it gives the plant stronger cell structures, and allegedly prevents mould. Silica is found naturally in soil, but due to the behaviour of silicon its not added to nute bottles, so hydro grows lack this silica unless you use LS. I cant say whether it has made a difference or not cos I dont have a comparison, but it hasn't done any harm!
As for the one in soil, I'm quite tempted to leave it veg til april, then plant it outside, but I'll see how big it gets first! If it gets too big, I will probably flower it, or use it for cuttings.
I'm really impressed with Critical+ so far, its a fun plant to grow, and I'm gonna get loadsa smoke off it (hopefully) The smell isnt as bad as I was expecting, but its early days still, maybe it will start to stink in the coming weeks...

Badger threw u some rep. Thank u so much. Im planning on taking this info and try to use it outdoord this year.

nice one man! good luck with your project, I'd like to see how it turns out

I will def keep u posted on this summers grow. Im hopin to pull rome ridiculous yields so I don't have to grow all winter.

Sounds like a good plan, winter is hard work, and its always good to have plenty of smoke!

3 weeks to go.....!
Today Im flushing, and adding pk 13/14 @ 1ml per litre = 8ml. Then adding nutes to make it up to 1200ppm.
Its really starting to fill out nicely, plenty of cola action, and its covered in trichs, sooooo fuckin sticky, and sweeet smelling!
I have managed to get humidity down to 43%, so im well happy about that...

Congrats man that shitttt looks dank

Im soooo excited now, it looks like proper buds...
Halfway through the flushing i got interupted by a cockatiel that just walked into my house out of the rain, so I got delayed trying to catch it, its now been rescued! bit random really...! But anyway, pk 13/14 added and nutes made up to 1000ppm, Ill make it up to 1200 in a few days, let the plant get used to the high pk levels.

Just a few more shots, flushing tomorrow and returning to 10ml micro, 20ml bloom, buds filling out nicely...roughly two weeks to go!!
Also a couple of pics of the Kandy Kush and the old soil critical in veg room.

that canopy is sexy. scottyballs would be proud. what did you use to make your screen???

threw some rep. whatever thats worth.

Cheers dude, most appreciated! I used 2" square plastic fence stuff from the garden centre, and pinned it to a wooden frame. Its done a pretty good job