First Grow, 2nd Try - Green Crack in Homemade Box

**PLEASE FEEL FREE TO COMMENT, I NEED ALL THE HELP I CAN GET**

Ok well this is my first grow but my 2nd attempt. Here is what happened on my first attempt:

I got a Purple Kush clone a couple of weeks ago and it was dead in about 2 days. I think it was getting too hot, even though my temperature monitor wasn't getting above about 85 (I know, still a bit warm, but it shouldn't do THIS should it?)

I added another PC fan to blow air around the lights as I think the stagnant air was to blame. It was too late for this one though.

Here were my two new plants on Tuesday, April 14 (day I purchased them). The one in the terra cotta pot is Super Silver Haze and the one in the black Botanical Brothers pot is Green Crack.

Both are filled with FoxFarm soil and I used plant success tabs in each. Both were watered thoroughly the first day.

Lights are 8x42W 6400k CFLs.

Day 2 and the Super Silver Haze plant is looking bad. Looking like the Purple Kush plant...signs of burning. I think the PC fan I added (see pic, the fan on the light fixture) was actually reverse of what I needed. This light was blowing air down (at the lights) but I think I needed to turn it around to suck air up and away from the lights.

The other pic is the Green Crack, which is looking ok. There is one end of a leaf there that looks a little burned, but nothing too bad I don't think.

It was too late for the SSH....she shriveled and has died since this pic.

Day 4 for the Green Crack and she looks to be thriving.

I use thriving loosely though considering the other two plants I've had have died very quickly.

Pics from days 5-9. Stems seemed to be a bit red/purple on 7 (see 4th pic). I'm going to get a Ph/Nute test kit today to test my soil and water. I know I should have done this to begin with, but I'm doing it now.

Also going to start using FoxFarm Nutes, but will wait until next week so that she has had two full weeks to get settled.

Any thoughts? I have no idea how fast she is growing since this is my first try!

Ok here we are on Day 21. I switched her from a 1G to a 3G pot today. Should have done this about 5-7 days ago but never had the time.

Probably going to switch to 12/12 in a few more days and get my screen for the ScrOG.

Put her on 12/12 starting today and switched to 8 - 2700k 42W CFLs. I am going to let her grow up just a bit taller before screening and training under. The screen is in place and ready, just needs the other side to be stapled up.

Really taking off now, looking great. Haven't even fed her - going with just great soil and water and seeing how that does first time around!

Here we are another week later....looking VERY good!!!

johnnybt said:

Here we are another week later....looking VERY good!!!

Click to expand...

Nice!!! Wow it has went through some rough times hasn't it? but looked pretty tasty now Woot!!

How many cfl's do you have in that initial pic? 8? (I know its way to late since the initial plant has passed away but.. lol) man that many lights above 1 lil plant is like liquid lumens, she prolly drowned lol jk Sounded good though

Anyways. I have to take my hat off to ya, by looking at the previous pics I have nothing but respect for you man, you didn't give up on em when they were down and now there showing you how thankful they are

+rep +sub. Def a great comeback man!!! Keep it up


(I noticed im the only comment. @ top you said its ok to comment, if that has changed let me know and ill remove post (if edit/delete is still avail) .

Thanks for the comments! I am just glad that someone is following along hahaha.

Here are some pics from this morning. I have removed quite a few of the big fan leaves. They were starting to yellow and also blocking some bud sites. I read conflicting opinions about the removal of fan leaves and just decided to get rid of them.

You can really see the top cola starting to fill in and it looks like I'm going to get 1 GREAT cola, 1 really good one, and then several other small branches of nugs. The close-up is the top bud on the main cola. Starting to REALLY stink and get sticky.

She's taking about 1.25L of water (1 blender pitcher full) everyday. Still haven't added anything to the water as far as nutes go. I'm amazed it looks this good really and can't wait to see the final results!

yah i hate to seem late...but..

from what i see those were clones??

clones HATE load and loads of light when they first root thats whyt he haze didnt make it through im sure

the crack is looking great, great fuckin CFL fixture

how bad is the smell outside of the grow room?any filter?

I didn't know that clones hate a ton of light...thanks for that. Next time I'll start them out with just a few of the lights and screw more in as she grows.

The box is in my garage and the smell is getting pretty bad in the garage. It vents out the side of our garage into a neighbor's yard, but that guy doesn't even live there and comes by MAYBE once a month. From my research I didn't think that a single plant would smell this bad so I never did anything about filtering the smell.

Also, when does the plant smell the worst? I read one place that an hour before the lights go on is the worst but for us it seems to be when the lights have been on and are about to go out that it smells worst. However, the lights go off at 10am, meaning they are on all night while the garage stays closed, so the garage staying closed for all those hours is probably what gets that smell up there too.

I'm a MMJ patient in CA so I'm not worried about the cops, but I would really prefer my neighbors not know! haha.

She has slowed a bit on the water and I'm taking more fan leaves off everyday. Will take more pics tonight or tomorrow morning.

Thanks for the comments, really appreciate it!

i honestly dont know about the smell, im on my first grow with 6 plants in my closet and was wondering how bad is my house gonna reek ahah

i do know the smell of marijuana plants is worse in heat then in the cool weather so , that being said i would say DEFINATLY smells worse when the lights have been on heating your tent up and the smell should go down when the lights are out

Had a few different things happen yesterday:

1. The smell had gotten too bad. It was REALLY stinking up the garage, even with two PC fans venting out a small grated window via ducting. I'm guessing a lot of the air just didn't make it all the way out the window, even with the ducting pushed to within a couple inches.

SO, to fix that I built some carbon filters, attached to 3" PVC Elbows, and used those on the exhaust fans. They don't vent out the garage, but the air is very much cleaner smelling. There's still a hint of MJ, but that's likely due to small leaks elsewhere.

Had to hold them up with twine in addition to duct tape, which looks pretty low-rent but it works. Next time I can build something more sturdy.

2. Timer was not working, and I don't know how long/often it's done this. Went in the garage around 1pm and the lights were ON! They are on from 10pm-10am and off all day. I hope it hasn't done this very often as I know the DARKNESS is key in flowering.

SO, got a new timer, nothing really exciting.

For the pics we have:

1. The filters from the outside

2. Plant from the side. You can see the two really good colas growing up, and a lot of smaller branches.

3. Top cola really filling in! Looks so so fine.

4. Close-up of a bud on a lower branch. I was not expecting to see hairs change color this early. Normal or maybe a sign of my light fiasco? Will hit the book to see if I can find something.

5. Lower branch - Is this typical spacing on the lower branches? Or is this sign of stretching due to these branches being so far from the lights? Looking at the plant now and my top-only lighting setup, I really wish I had kept with the scrog...it would have been amazing.

6. Top-down view. Can't wait to harvest those babies!!!

Pics of some buds from today. Quite a few pistils changing colors.

From my math I was expecting to harvest sometime around June 25-26. Problem is I'll be out of town with my friend/neighbor watching over them from June 18-25.

I don't want him to have to harvest and possibly fuck something up. Is it better to harvest EARLY or LATE?

I am thinking maybe if a lot of the pistils are brown by next Thursday when we're leaving I can just cut and hang it then and then trim it when we get back and start the curing.

Or should I just let it suck up all the water while we're gone and harvest ASAP when we get back?

Well I'm out of town right when she is getting ready to harvest. There were probably 30% of the pistils changed to brown/red a couple days before we left, but then I came out one day and BOOM there were new clusters of pistils shooting out the top of nearly every bud. We will be back by Thursday night and I'm guessing harvest will need to happen within a couple days after that. At least I have a buddy looking after her and watering her, but it's tough leaving my baby!!! hahah.

Will have new pics when I get back. The buds REALLY started to fatten up since the last pics. I can't wait.