First grow, Northern Lights

Ha ha another person to try the flourish excel i've been using it on my current grow and must say, it definitely wont hurt thats for sure! Give it a go dude

Oh yeah and only spray when lights are on as plants respire co2 during darkness and take in oxygen. I use about 1/4 of a capful to a 500mL bottle too

eastcoastmo said:

Oh yeah and only spray when lights are on as plants respire co2 during darkness and take in oxygen. I use about 1/4 of a capful to a 500mL bottle too

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thanks, until I actually have a few nodes and fan leaves I will not spray with flourish excel.

Here is a picture of my plants


Day 12
And here is the heights of my plants that I measured today, I must have mis-measured plant 2 yesterday as I measured it twice earlier to make sure I had the correct measurement and I do:

1. 95
2. 78
3. 100
4. 73
5. 88

You can spray them from as soon as they have leaves man. I was spraying mine from as soon as it went in the system. Flourish excel is an organic carbon source in liquid form so it wont hurt your plants..would probably help them actually just give them a light spray

eastcoastmo said:

You can spray them from as soon as they have leaves man. I was spraying mine from as soon as it went in the system. Flourish excel is an organic carbon source in liquid form so it wont hurt your plants..would probably help them actually just give them a light spray

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ok I am doing a 24/0 light cycle until they reach about 20 inches before flipping to 12/12, and you said only spray them when the light is off so should I wait until I start flowering them? Also what do you use as a spray bottle?

Nah mate, spray them only when the lights are on, so any time at the moment

Plants need CO2 when lights are on as they need it to photosynthesize, once lights go off they respire CO2 and take in oxygen

alright thanks @eastcoastmo, the flourish excel should be here weds

also its about 60 degrees outside, so I opened my sliding door and turned the light back up to 400w, and just measured here is the heights:

1. 97
2. 83
3. 102
4. 82
5. 90

Ok so I got this thermometer and my light at 400w quickly heated my grow space up to 93 degrees, so I turned off the light and am back to using my CFL bulbs until I can figure out how to cool this down. An air cooled hood + inline fan will probably cost more than just buying an LED grow light off eBay so I am not sure what I will do, but at least I caught this early on.

just get your self an in-line fan a cooltube and some flex ducting.. your going to need to get that heat down and that will do the trick. You'll also need to circulate the air around the plants.. also if you need to be stealth pick up a carbon filter.

sup man..now that you have a hid you shouldnt have the lights so close. 12"+

also, they are big enough to soak the soil, and then let it dry out. water until you see a drip or two. you dont want water to gush out, becuase itll wash out the good things in your soil that you want to stay there.

i am very interested in northern lights because of its low odor.

good luck

I have seen many a good cfl grow, I like hid's + CFL's on extensions to hit lower buds..... but I'm a newbie here so I want the pro's to help you out. Good luck Smigula, I'm sure you're gonna do fine!

thanks everyone. I talked with my friend in Michigan who grows medical marijuana and he told me I will get significantly lower yields with LED lighting, and I decided since I already have this 400w HID I am going to use it, I am buying this cool tube with reflector, an inline fan and I already have some ducting. Can anyone suggest an inline fan that I should get (the cheaper the better for this grow)?

Also my plan is to use my HID light and CFL lamp with the CFL lights giving light to the lower buds of my plant which should help especially during flowering.

I grew NL for my first grow 10+ years ago man!! Came out pretty good all things considering so Im sure youll do fine, plus having easty subbed will help too Just wanted to throw my .02 in here though and say unless your planning on growing vertically cool tubes really suck in my opinion. If you do decide to go the cool tube route its only too easy to make one your self using hurricane Glass for candles from Michaels or the like (If you do a search for DIY cool tube Im sure you'll find it). Im not sure whether or not the hurricane glass is tempered (someone chime in here) as Ive never made one, but I see others using it on RIU frequently without issue. Also, you are not gonna get better results than can be achieved with HID lighting, many will argue..they are WRONG. Led lights are suitable for VEG but cannot compete for the bloom stage. Inline fans, reflectors and good genetics are the investments we all spend money on in this hobby that stay in our grow rooms for years to come, its cash well spent. Goodluck, your in the right place to learn. Ill be lurkin...-S0uP

thanks SOuP, I looked into a DIY cool tube, but I think I am just going to get this cool tube, it comes with a reflector and I dont like the one I currently have. I already have 25ft of 6" ducting, so I need to get an inline fan, I am thinking of getting this one since I like buying things off Amazon and have Amazon prime so I will get it in 2 days. Also for nutrients my friend says he has experimented with a lot of nutrients and prefers using these 3 so I am also probably going to get these in the next couple of days (also Prime eligible).

Actually I did some searching and I might get this air cooled hood instead as it is also Prime eligible.

EDIT: actually doing a bit more searching and reading through the reviews I think I am going to get this air cooled reflector

The fan in your link is actually a booster for long lengths of ducting meant to be used in conjunction with an inline fan, you are going to need an inline fan rated for a much higher CFM than that one... You want to be able to exchange all the air in your environment every 1-5 min depending on temperature needs, I ALWAYS upsize to be safe, plus the inline fans can easily be speed controlled for even better environment control if they are large enough. The reflector you have in the link is comparable in price to a Sunsystem yield master supreme which is 95% reflective, backed by warranty, and is from a reputable manufacturer. They also have other options for a reflector that size at just a slightly higher price tier. General Hydroponics makes a very user friendly 3 part from what I have heard with a relatively small learning curve and there certainly are in numerable successful growers that use it...AN recently ripped off GH recipe and is selling the exact same 3 part but calling it jungle juice, it is sold for less$ in an attempt to steal customers from them, You may want to take advantage. In my opinion, you may want to look into Dyna-Gro as an option. Equally, if not more simplistic than the GH line, it delivers a more "Complete" ration to your plants and you would be adding silica to their plates with Pro-teK. Dyna Gro will set you back about 40$ for the line and last for quite some time. Personally I got tired of paying for shipping on H2O (96% of bottled Nutrients) and will only order soluble salts online such as Jacks professional plant food line. These Nutrients are by FAR the most cost effective option. With a TDS meter they are very straight forward to use and a 5# container could last you years. Just some thoughts, I still have very expensive bottles of shit laying around that I dont and prolly wont EVER use from when I started this up, so if I can try and save a couple new guys some cash by imparting my mistakes its worth it. -S0uP

thanks again SOuP, after looking around I am probably going to get this inline fan, would you also recommend getting a speed controller like this one?

Also for this grow I think I am just going to stick with the nutrients I already have, but for future grows I would like to get something else, is this the Jacks pro plant food you are talking about?

thats a handy little thing to have init m8

m8 i no it ur 1st grow,a m8 of mine also has his 1st grow on the go an at 12days old there twice the size of yours an he only useing floresents,saying that he has me to help him an i know whats what within reason,i can growa grade-A quality smoke put it that way,im gonna keep an eye on this journal to compare with my m8s crop,he also has 5 plants'there BARNYS FARM BLUE CHEESE an there growing really well at the moment,i will have to get some pics of them an put em up to show you m8

Soup's on the money here dude, from experience, cool tubes aren't as efficient as I'd like. Others may disagree but thats personal experience. I'd go for something more like what Soup suggests with the Sunmaster, they are great and come with a warranty

As for a fan, also agree with Soup, the bigger you can get, the better, you want lots of air moving through that light constantly. The 400 cfm in your last link will do sweet. I think the one I have is a 300cfm and it keeps the air moving over my 600w pretty well. I am growing in the cooler months here though where temps get down into the minuses at night though which helps keep it cool.

If you're set on keeping the cfl in there, that's cool, just keep it close and i'd look at a 5000k or higher and keep the light spreading as evenly across the canopy as possible as it will help with trich production towards the end. It may help thicken the side buds for the moment but i'd be using it for trich production towards the end

All those products are great, Hydrofarm is by far the most economical inline fan on the market BUT, if noise is a concern for you they are also the loudest. I wrap my fans in cheap heavy sleeping bags and it really does help the sound of my vortex fans running 24/7 (Wife would kill me otherwise). The speed controller can be added at any time so if budget is a concern I would say it was the least priority. If the nutrients you already have are the GH line you mentioned earlier you will be fine, better than fine. I can think of many worse options for your first grow....many. The Jacks you found is the soil answer to their Professional Hydroponic Fertilizer/Cal Nitrate that I have used in the past (Currently out and throwing together a custom mix of all those expensive bottles I was telling you about) and I highly recommend you do some research as to what some growers can do with the stuff. I really do encourage you to explore other options in regards to your reflector, there are some better deals on amazon for aircooled hoods far superior to the one you were looking at, and as I mentioned its an investment thats gonna last you quite some time. -S0uP