Grow Diary - 15xAlien Urkle, 1xSnowDog (FIRST GROW OP)

Hello all,
My name is Chris, I'm from Colorado, and this is my first grow op.

I thought I would post this Grow Diary for a couple of reasons. I like following grow diaries, and I imagine I'm not alone in that, so this is mostly for people who want to see my progress as my plants teach me. But I also wanted to have input from more experienced growers, I have a few friends I consult, but 100 minds is (almost) always better than 10.

So, here's pretty much what we've got going so far:

GROW ROOM/EQUIPMENT:
Our grow room is a 7' x 10' x 6.5' box we built in the basement.
For vegetative growth this cycle, we will be using 3x 4' 6-tube T5 lights.
For the flowering cycle, we will be using 3x 1000W HPS lights in aircooled hoods.
We live in Colorado, so low humidity is a problem, so we ordered a NewAir AF-351 swamp cooler and have a small backup humidifier to control temperature and humidity (currently monitored manually).
We have multiple oscillating fans for airflow, and a ~450CFM 6inch inline fan for exhaust, with a carbon filter.

MOTHERS:
We received 2 mothers from a friend, one Alien Urkle, and one Snow Dog.
We plan to clone new mothers and flower the current mothers toward the end of this cycle.

CLONING:
We cut 10 clones (9 Alien Urkle, 1 Snow Dog), then about a week later, cut 6 more clones of the Alien Urkle (not intentionally spaced out, we just decided to do 16 instead of 10 plants).

VEGGING:
We plan to veg for ~6 weeks (depending on when the plants are ready), using a combination of topping and LST to create bushy, even canopies.

04/24 we decided all clones were rooted enough for transplant, so we transplanted them into 5 gallon bags filled with about 3 gallons of a mix of FoxFarm soil mixed with peat moss and earthworm castings.

The Snow Dog is struggling to catch up, but all 15 of the Alien Urkle clones rooted well, transplanted well, and are growing quickly and beautifully so far.



We still haven't finished building the exhaust system for the aircooled hoods our HPS lights will use during flower, and our humidity is currently too low (early life 25-30%, lately 35-40%) as we haven't received the swamp cooler yet, but that comes tomorrow so hopefully we will be able to have perfect temps/humidity for the rest of their lives.

Some recent pics (5/11/2013 @ 2:30 AM local time, 16 days into VEG)

GROW ROOM:




EXAMPLE ALIEN URKLE 1:


EXAMPLE ALIEN URKLE 2:


EXAMPLE SNOW DOG 1:


EXAMPLE SNOW DOG 2 (belongs to a friend):


I forgot we had 17 plants in there right now. There's a 2nd Snow Dog that belongs to a friend.

Depending on how the quality of this batch turns out, might buy a batch of Northern Lights seeds online and pick the best female for a new mother for future batches.

MOTHERS:
Currently sitting in a bathtub under a 400W MH bulb.

Is that carpet on the floor of your veg area?

If so bad idea!

It can harbour all sorts of nasties!

I don't see you mention any more fans other than the 450CFM.

This is probably not going to keep 3x1000w air cooled hoods cool and scrub the room.

7x10x6.5= 455Cubic feet.

Then you need to add 5% CFM for each 1000w light.

Another 20% for the restriction of a carbon filter.

So +22.5CFM for each light and +90CFM for your filter.

This gives you a grand total of just over 600CFM to cool and scrub your air once per minute.

IMO.

You should run a direct intake to your 1000's and duct it straight out of the room with a 450CFM fan running the lights. This way no grow room air passes through your lighting rig.

Then use your current 450C fan and filter to exhaust and scrub.

This will give you better control of temps.

Other than this you seem to have a good plan.




J

jondamon said:

Is that carpet on the floor of your veg area?
If so bad idea!
It can harbour all sorts of nasties!
I don't see you mention any more fans other than the 450CFM.
This is probably not going to keep 3x1000w air cooled hoods cool and scrub the room.
7x10x6.5= 455Cubic feet.
Then you need to add 5% CFM for each 1000w light.
Another 20% for the restriction of a carbon filter.
So +22.5CFM for each light and +90CFM for your filter.
This gives you a grand total of just over 600CFM to cool and scrub your air once per minute.
IMO.
You should run a direct intake to your 1000's and duct it straight out of the room with a 450CFM fan running the lights. This way no grow room air passes through your lighting rig.
Then use your current 450C fan and filter to exhaust and scrub.
This will give you better control of temps.
Other than this you seem to have a good plan.

J

Click to expand...

It's not carpet per se, but it might as well be. It's a semi-absorbent material that shouldn't be in there. I'm not quite sure why it is in there, my roommates built the frame of the room, but I was thinking the same thing today when my humidifier malfunctioned and leaked water all over the damn thing, and I had to keep toweling underneath it and have fans blowing on the area to ensure it fully dried. I'm considering tearing it out tomorrow before the plants get too big to make it a hassle to remove.

The 3000W (3x 1000W HPS) lights are all going to be aircooled on a separate isolated exhaust system. We haven't put the system into the room yet, because it would all just get in the way as we raise the T5s during veg growth. The 450CFM fan will be exhausting the room air through the carbon filter, and there will be a seperate inline fan for the lights. We've been running the fan at 100% to replace the air approximately every minute but I thought it was only really necessary to replace it within every 5 minutes anyway?

We also have a NewAir AF-351 evaporative cooler coming tomorrow to increase humidity & lower temperatures for greater control over the environment, and might end up using a portable A/C unit during flowering if needed to keep temps down.

After this grow we are tearing down the box and expanding to the walls of the actual room it is in, with separate veg & flower rooms in a SOG setup, sealing the room and using a CO2 burner to reach 1500ppm CO2 and the A/C unit and swamp cooler together to control temperature & humidity.

Thanks for the input by the way... I really do need to get rid of that carpet before it causes any problems.

Went in this morning with intention of topping my plants, when I realized all my clones have alternating nodes, so I don't even know if I can top them?

They are growing in very bushy naturally, should I just let them do their thing?

When I use clones I still top them.

But I use a little LST to keep the remaining nodes at similar growing heights.


I personally work on exchanging air between 1-3x a minute.

If using 3x a minute exchsnge isn't cooling the area then this is where an AC would be needed.


When using a seperate fan for lighting rig and a single fan for scrubbing then this number can be reduced as much as you stated. Once every 5mins.

However IMO its always best to aim for 1x per minute. This way if its too much you can speed control it.




J

jondamon said:

When I use clones I still top them.
But I use a little LST to keep the remaining nodes at similar growing heights.

I personally work on exchanging air between 1-3x a minute.
If using 3x a minute exchsnge isn't cooling the area then this is where an AC would be needed.

When using a seperate fan for lighting rig and a single fan for scrubbing then this number can be reduced as much as you stated. Once every 5mins.
However IMO its always best to aim for 1x per minute. This way if its too much you can speed control it.


J

Click to expand...

How do I top with interchanging nodes? (can you show me a picture of where to cut?)

I've only ever topped plants by just pinching off the new growth between 2 opposite nodes?

I was thinking of just doing LST but if there's some way I can still top it too I wanted to try 4 different tests this grow:
Plants 1-4: LST
Plants 5-8: LST+TOP
Plants 9-12: TOP
Plants 12-16: None or Other

So I could learn a bit more and also compare how this strain reacts to each method.

Received the NewAir AF-351 today. Disappointed that I can't set it to a specific temperature or humidity, just on or off, cool or not, ionizer, etc. Overall, still a nice unit, and we were able to dial our exhaust fan down to 50% (exchanging the air in the room every ~3 minutes) and are now sitting at 75 degrees F with 50% humidity.

I also tore the carpet out of the room.

I started LST on one of the plants that showed significant growth over the others (during the first 2 weeks of veg, a small humidifier was placed very close to her, so she benefited most from it).

Updated pics: (taken @ 9:45 PM, 5/11/2013, 17 days into veg)

WayBaked said:

How do I top with interchanging nodes? (can you show me a picture of where to cut?)

I've only ever topped plants by just pinching off the new growth between 2 opposite nodes?

I was thinking of just doing LST but if there's some way I can still top it too I wanted to try 4 different tests this grow:
Plants 1-4: LST
Plants 5-8: LST+TOP
Plants 9-12: TOP
Plants 12-16: None or Other

So I could learn a bit more and also compare how this strain reacts to each method.

Click to expand...

You can top a clone ANYWHERE as long as you leave some nodes under your cut.

With alternating nodes you will undoubtedly have one node higher than the rest. LST this node so that it is below the rest. When the next leader takes the highest spot, LST it to the same height as the first LST. Keep doing this until all your tops are at the same height. This will then keep all those TOPS growing at the same level.



Make sense?



J

Seems like you're off to a solid start Chris. Looking forward to more!

Some updated pictures (taken some time ~18 days into veg)




I think this plant is going to become a new mother for the Alien Urkle, and we'll flower the current mother instead.


Overall, the NewAir AF-351 Evaporative Cooler isn't as nice as I thought (could be more effective, could be more programmable), but overall, it's fulfilling its job, the room is staying 72-75 F during the day and 68-72 F at night (real time, lights are on 24/0) and 45%-55% humidity.

Updated pictures (taken 5/20/2013 ~11PM, ~26 days into veg)












@3 weeks into veg: Fed plants, 1 gallon water + 1 tsp veg nutes
@~25 days into veg: Fed plants, 1 gallon water + tsp veg nutes + 1 tsp micronutes

This is mostly a picture update. Some plants showed minor nutrient problems which appear to be correcting now. I moved the plants closer to the lights, it was too much of a pain with our current setup to adjust the lights lower. Next grow we will have a pulley system to adjust the veg lights.

Tomorrow the plants will be transplanted into 5 gallon pots, with lime added to help stabilize our soil pH. Next grow we will be adding lime to our soil mix, as well as tranplanting from rockwool cubes to 1gallon pots to 5gallon pots. These bags are annoying. I also noticed recently we should have transplanted about a week ago, there's roots growing out of the bottoms of the bags.

Planning to switch to 2x 1000W HPS + 1x 1000W MH in ~1-2 weeks on a 12/12 schedule to begin flowering.



It's been a mostly smooth start with a few rocky days, how does it look like we're doing so far?

Planning on ordering from ATTITUDE SEED BANK for new mothers for future grow:

5 (feminized) Nirvana Blue Mystic seeds (sativa)
1 (feminized) Northern Lights x Skunk1 seed (indica)


Starting next cycle we will be building 2 rooms for perpetual grow/sea of green.

Woke up today to some very unsettling deficiencies on some of my leaves. Calibrated my digital pH meter and I discover that my other pH meter has been misleading me this whole time (WHICH EXPLAINS A LOT).

The pH meter I was using tested my water at 7.4-7.6 and my soil at 6.5-7.

After calibrating, recalibrating, testing and retesting my digital pH meter, it looks like my water is actually 6.2-6.3 and my soil is 5.5-5.6!

I flushed one plant, they don't look too bad though, if I just start pHing my water to 6.5 for a couple weeks will they be okay?
Should I stop adding nutes until the problem is fixed?
Should I delay switching to flower until the problem is fixed?

They've had a full spectrum of nutes recently and kept showing minor signs of nute deficiencies starting so I figured my pH was out of range, but I thought it was too high, not too low. Deeply regretting not having added dolomite lime to my soil mix on this run.