2nd Grow: PC & Cabinet combo

Strain: Mazar X Great White Shark - Feminized (World of Seeds freebie)
Medium: Coco/Perlite (70/30 mix) in a 2 gallon Smart Pot
Nutrients: House & Garden Cocos A/B + their line of additives* (I received a free sample kit from H & G that contained smaller bottles of almost all their additives!!)
Vegging Chamber: PC grow box (see this post for details)
2-3x 23w 5000K CFLs
Flowering Chamber: Wardrobe cabinet (to be built yet...I figure I have a month or two to get this built and prepped)
6x 105w 2700K CFLs


So I'm working on my 2nd grow now. I'm sticking with CFL bulbs because I'm working with small areas and want to keep the electric bill low. I'm keeping my PC grow box from my first time around, and going to use it as a vegging chamber. I figure that buys me some time to get the new flowering chamber ready. My first baby would've loved more space to grow, so that's why I'm opting to build a new flowering chamber out of a 6'x 2.5'x 1.75' cabinet. I'll have to learn to grow vertically this time, as opposed to a nice horizontal LST.


I prepped my coco with bottled RO water that naturally comes out at 5.6-5.7 pH, so I left it be. I also prepped 1/2 gallon of water with 1/2 tsp of CALiMAGic and charged the coco with that. I tried the shot glass method for germination this time around. Soaked it for about a day, before it sank. Then I just made a 1/4" hole in my Smart Pot and poured the glass into that and covered her up and gave her a bottle of water.


I should see her by the end of the week I'm thinking... After she pops up and gets comfortable I might start giving her a tiny bit of Roots Excelurator to give her a boost I'll post pics as things progress, but you know nothing really exciting is going to happen for the first few months

She has shown herself

Since she sprouted on Valentine's Day I shall name her Valerie.
In a couple of days I'll start giving her a weak mix of Roots Excelurator and it will be game on!

we like picture lol ! congrads on the sprout

It's just a sprout though...I figure I'd wait till something interesting happens rather than post mundane pics of a sprout or an update every time a new leaf grows in

i wouldnt mind seening your cab if you have some pics that would be great of what she going in !

If you want to see the veg chamber, click on this link. I used that for veg and flower my first time. I haven't built the new flower chamber yet. I will be doing that very soon. I'm going to use THIS as the base before I modify it. Slight setback at the moment. I just got my order from 1000bulbs.com and 5 out of the 6 bulbs came fucking broken! They're closed on the weekend so I have to wait till Monday to find out what they're going to do about it. Just a bit aggrevating...oh well. Hopefully they make it right.

Welp, I talked with Customer Service at 1000bulbs.com and they were quick to rectify the problem. I just had to send them a picture of the broken bulbs and they are sending out replacements today. Hopefully none of these get smashed either. I plugged in the 1 that's not broken and verified it worked. Holy shit, is this gonna be nice to flower with 6x 105w CFLs! The things are monstrous for sure, lol. I'll get the cabinet probably in a couple weeks, then figure out how I'm going to arrange it all.

Boo.

She died. I think the medium is too hot with the Cal/Mag I charged it with. It's a shame too. When I realized what it was, I tried to flush the medium with 4 gallons of water, but it was too late. She's yellow and wilted won't stand on her own anymore

Waiting on an order...should be here any day now. I ordered some Super Lemon Haze and some Chemdawg. I forget what freebies... I'll prolly want to try out the SLH first

Live, learn, and grow!

dam eh sorry dragon311 better luck next time !

Next time around try some FFLW soil mix to start off with and then transplant. At least then you know you wont need to do anything but water it for the first few weeks.

Nah, I'm just gonna do what I did the first time, plain coco/perlite. Not charged with anything. That worked perfectly fine. I tried to be too slick and do the whole thing in the final pot. I can just leave the medium plain, and feed cal/mag later if I need to. Sucks that im just weeks behind schedule now, but oh well. Mail can't come fast enough

I went to the store today to pick up a new coco coir brick. They didn't have any. All they had was the big 40lb bags, and I'm only doing 1 plant. Guy at the store hooked it up with a gallon of something called Coco Not. I think my order might arrive today too, I'd like to get started ASAP as I'm already way behind schedule.

What do y'all think? Should I keep the < 2 gallon mixture I already have that was charged with 1/2 teaspoon of cal/mag in 1/2 gallon water, and subsequently flushed with 4 gallons of water since now?

Obviously I will only plant a seed in the new stuff that's not been charged, but do you think the old mix will be safe to transplant too? Or will it still be too hot when I transplant?

Trying to see if I need to rinse/soak this Coco Not too?...nvm I checked out their website. Looks like its a coco substitute. But first line clearly states: completely satuarate CocoNot before planting. I will do this with some RO'd water that comes out 5.6-5.7

So here's the new plan.

I'm going to germinate 2 since I'm way behind schedule. A fast and a slow plant so I can space them about about a month or more apart. I should be thankful for the planning down the road I hope.

I've rinsed the CocoNot and will mix with with approximately 30% perlite. I'll use solo cups or something, since I'm going to do two different plants this time. The fast flowering one I'm doing will be Green House Seed's Auto Sweet Mango. It's supposed to take 9 weeks total from start to finish. The longer flowering strain I'm doing is also from Green House Seeds, Super Lemon Haze. I plan to run the Auto Sweet Mango in the PC case the whole time. While the Super Lemon Haze I will veg in the PC and finish her off in the new cabinet I will be building in a couple of weeks.

I still wanna know what people think I should do with the old "hot" mix of coco/perlite that I pre-charged with cal/mag and subsequently flushed with 4 gallons of water? Think it will be fine for transplanting when the new girls are ready?

Update 02/27/13

The Super Lemon Haze has shed her shell. She's still straightening out. I think I will name her Kara. +Rep to anyone who can guess what the name is referencing.

On the other hand the Auto Sweet Mango has yet to even produce a tap root. I'm wondering if she's not a dud. She was planted Sunday morning after soaking for 10-12hrs. Since that one hasn't even broke the shell yet, I went ahead and started soaking another one of my freebies. I wanted the second one to be an auto so it will finish long before the SLH. So now I have one of DinaFem's Auto White Widow soaking in my Dali shot glass...

Looks like I might've spoken too soon...the Auto Sweet Mango is just a slow starter. I poked around tonight and noticed she finally cracked her shell. Hopefully she's just a late sleeper

Altho this begs a different question now. I had soaked my Auto White Widow for about 8-10hrs now. Can I just dry it off and put it back in the bag for storage? Or has it been "activated" and there's no turning back now?

After a bumpy start to my second grow, I think it's finally safe to say I'm on the path again. I'm surprised that lightly charging my medium with cal/mag gave me the problems it did. I corrected that problem and now I have 2 seedlings going. 1x Super Lemon Haze (fem) and 1x Auto Sweet Mango (fem). The SLH sprouted on 2/27 and the ASM sprouted on 3/1. I've started the seedlings on a very very weak amount of Roots Excelurator to help give them a boost.

I'm using a PC grow box to veg both plants. The ASM will stay in the PC case for flowering and the SLH will go into a new flowering cabinet I will begin building next weekend. I'm going to LST the ASM, and the SLH I will top or FIM and let it grow vertical in the new cabinet. Or I might want to try to scrog the cabinet I haven't decided yet.

Here's the girls first pics

Kara...hmmm Heavy Rain? Looks like things are starting to move along for you now. I think the "old" mix will be ok when you are ready to transplant. Seedlings are prone to nute burn for awhile. I use FFOF and watered very lightly and that worked for me though I am going to be using the Cocoa Coir I use for my Gecko on the next round. Do you have a picture of the tower? What kind of lights are you going to be using?

The first post should have a link to my PC case.

Nope Kara isn't from a video game.

For vegging I'm using 23w 5000K CFLs. 2 at the moment...will use more as the seedlings get bigger. For flowering in the PC case I will be using 2x 55w 2700K CFLs. In the cabinet I plan on using 5x 105w 2700k CFLs and any supplemental lighting I might need.

Holy hell Roots Excelurator is the shit At least I'm thinking that's what's responsible for this...I went to check on my little girls tonight and the SLH main root is already poking out the bottom of the 9oz solo cup! It's too early for a transplant....and I don't want to try and force it back in the cup and injure her...so I took another cup put 2-3" of coco/perlite in it, and then cut the bottom off the cup the SLH is in now, and nested a cup within a cup. I wonder how long that will hold her over...

Time for a weekly update. Kara (SLH) and Gwen (ASM) seem to be doing just dandy! They really like the tiny amount of Roots Excelurator I've been giving them so far. I had been keeping Gwen's cup nested in a half water bottle to keep her the same height as her sister, since Kara is in double cups since her root already grew out one of the holes. Well Gwen's roots are growing into the water that's collected from runoff lol. I figure this will be ok until it's time to transplant them. If I'm mistaken please let me know.