connecting growers from south africa....

this thread is for growers who stay in south africa and want to share experiences and knowledge about indoor and outdoor growing...

i have two questions for growers in sa... first off, cheapest nutrients both (organic) and (chem) ? ................the second being, seed banks and companies that ship to sa and are reliable ?

here are a few sites that i use in sa, http://www.hortishop.co.za/products/ this site is called hortishop worth a look at, http://www.proponics.co.za/ this site have awesome prices on grow systems (airponics) (hydro) (bubble) (NFT) (DWC).....
and the cheapest site that i recommend is http://hydroponic.co.za/ doesnt look like the best set up web site but it's easy to use and has really good prices.....

Howzit Bru, Still alive?

I have used this company, http://www.gthydro.co.za, pretty good pricing and the guy that runs it is really helpful. My order was late so he sent me extra nutes for free. I found that the grow shop in Cape Town to be a little disappointing, expensive and not very helpful. I checked out the proponics link, got some good stuff and well priced too.

Now we need to find seed distributors, if I come across any I will post what I find. I know some growers that buy seed from somewhere, I will have a chat to them and see what they say.

And yes, I am going to keep this thread alive if I can.

Right, so this is how I started out, I pulled a weed bush out of the gardens where I live, I am going to call it a rescue because I am insecure and need to make myself feel better. lol

Here is a pic, look at her, ag shame man poor thing I felt sorry for her....



I did a whole lot of googling and this is how I found RIU, boy was my daughter pissed off about that. You will see why as the story unfolds. So where was I, oh right, I found RIU because I wanted to keep the plant small. I found out about a technique called topping ( I think that's the term), It essentially gives you two nodes (not sure this is the right term either), in layman it becomes two plants kinda. So I chopped off her head with much flourish and fanfare and decided to put her under a lamp to see what would happen. This was about 5 days (if I am reading my time stamp on the photo correctly) after I topped her;


Another week or so later and a globe change she looked like this, the bottom leaves were telling me to fack off, they preferred it in the garden, the rest of the plant was quite happy too be pampered;



When I saw what was happening, to her, all the growth all over the place just from being under a light, a lot of the worlds mysteries clicked in to place, unfortunately the most important one didn't, why does nobody like me, especially woman. hehehe. So that was it, I decide to give this a go, I decide to save up for a tent, some lights. This is why my daughter is not too impressed with RIU, she gave me the lecture about the way the world works but she finally let me save some of MY money for it, I thought that was generous of her.

I germinated a few seeds, I see the Americans call them beans, I like that, I am going to use it, hope it's not copyrighted or something. So I kept some beans from a really good batches of weed I bought....

To be continued because I cant find my germinations pic's, dammit!!! See you soon.

Just a heads up for those that might come on here, politics here is not like ours, it's very very juvenile, I was surprised considering our politicians are not the best either. Not all of it the commentators are like this but quite a few.

Anyway, still can't find my pics of germination's I did, so if I haven't found them by tomorrow, I will pick up where I can.

OK so I went out and go a timer for my lights, man the crap they sell at builders warehouse, avoid them if you can, I know some growers from places like Knysna and surrounds don't have much choice where to buy from, so I suggest order online if you can,

The timer I got is a waco, R 90 builders warehouse, its an analogue timer, works like a swimming pool pump timer, don't bother with the directions, they are as much help as condom with a hole in it.




Here is a link to help setup the timer if you dumb doos like me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0C-GHBiJY6k

I see nute's is a big worry for most new growers, well it was and still is a worry for me, but I got these products from www.gthydro.co.za/.

View attachment 2936326View attachment 2936327View attachment 2936328

I am growing under CFL's, I managed to get 2 85w CFL's from a small comapny that supply's lights, he had to order them in but it was the only place I could find them. They cost me about R 260 ea, they push out 5,100 lumens each and they seem to be working fine.


It's sleep-time for the girls so I don't want to open the tent to take out a globe, but the box illustrates my point nicely I think. I got such a fright when these were delivered. I thought eskom would come and hunt me down for sucking all the electricity in the neighbourhood, lol.

I am going to carry on with my little journal I started earlier in this thread as soon as I get my pic's sorted.

Right so I am back for awhile, so I thought I wou ld post my first buds, I wish I had time to finish up where I left off but I just couldn't, I will try as work will ease for awhile now.

Ahoy nev. Welcome to rui. Looks like you getting the hang of it. The colour on the lady looks good. What strain is she? Looks sativa to me. Bag seed in our banana Republic would prop be a malawi or some swaz gold if it was a decent outdoor strain. Keep puffin.

haasdas

You should really look for the digital timers at builder's. The waco ones are R160 but very reliable and it stores the time incase of load shedding.

haasdas

Yeah the power cuts the other day caused my bushes to flower, and then the facking heat killed 3 of them. I have been trying to find a digital timer for months now, I bought one but it didn't work, go figure.

You growing indoor or our bru?

Just harvested outdoors and a sog indoors. You?

haasdas

Sog?

Indoor only, I stay in a flat, I use a tent and cfl's, check the above posts from me from December. Finding stuff is really difficult in the new and impoverished SA, and expensive. holy shit it's expensive, I am poor you see, no handouts for me lol.

A sog is sea of green. Its a perpetual grow where I harvest every 3 weeks. Smaller qty but constant harvest. Ive also been trying to keep costs down. I have been adjusting my cab for over 18months. If you need info or advice just ask. Ive been doing it a while.

For winter I start alot of ladies by cloning and let the veg inside for a while then I move them outside to to flower. This is apart from my normal cycle in my flowering cab.

haasdas

What kelvin are your cfl? You have loads of new bud sites. Do you have side lights for them?

I have 2 85watt shining on top and about 4 or five 22/24 watts around the sides, not sure excatly the wattage of the smaller ones. Kelvins, let me check......... nope I have no idea, but the spectrum is 5600-6400 or somewhere close to that.

I had a sog once and then the facking heat came to the western cape and it was game over for them.

I appreciate the offer for advice so I will defiantly take you up on that right now actually, my bottom leaves are starting to yellow and fall off, will this be a problem in future? I can take a pic if you need one.

Its usually not a problem. Cfl dont penetrate the canopy well so it is probably just the new leaves that dont get enough light. I trim them off.
The spectrum you using is more on the blue side which is perfect for veg. Have you tried a lower kelvin like 2700k for flowering?