My First Grow... Outdoor on tight budget

I've decided to try and grow some bud. I have collected over 500 seeds in my 10 years of smoking and picked out a few that look good. Here is my documentation of my attempt to grow. Please feel free to make any comments or input to help me in this adventure.

these are the seeds Ive collected over the years.

I germinated 10 seeds a few months back. I put the seeds in water and waited till the root popped out. Then I planted them Miracle Grow soil in 3 liter soda bottles with holes cut in the bottom for drainage.

You can see a few sexed really early like in the first week and stopped growing up. But the ones that took longer to sex got bigger. The tall skinny one I think is a herm, so Ive been tweezing off the male parts and keeping the female parts. Those pictures are about 2 months into the grow.

I keep collecting lady bugs and their larva and putting them on the plants to keep the spider mites in check.

Okay... Now I'm going to start germinating 10 more seeds and start again, but hopefully its close enough to summer so they dont sex right away.

GL WITH YOUR OUTDOOR OP... Take 30 of them seeds and find a gorilla op spot. them plants look decent... the one thats showing sex can be re-vegged I think..

Hiya smkone2dadome420,

Thanks for the input. I was hoping they would naturally re-veg outside, but im starting to think they dont have long enough light time outside right now. Needs to be atleast 13 hours daylight for them to re-veg and I think they only get 11 to 12 now.

I think I could bring them inside and put a light on them, but i dont have the right lighting. Im thinking that the drop in Lumes might do more damage even if they are getting light 24 hours a day.

I went to home depot today to look at lighting fixtures and CFLs and other lighting. Surprisingly, 100W CFLs put out 2000 lumes. So 5 of them would be 10k lumes roughly. Home depot surprisingly, also has HPS and MH bulbs. Some Mogul base and some Medium base.

So now im doing some research to figure out what types of lights are best to re-veg/ veg with before I spend the money.

Today I watered that plants and collected lady bugs in the yard and put them on the plants. Most of the lady bugs are finishing up their cocoon stage and turning into adults. They like to molt out of their cocoon and sit on the outer shell of the cocoon for a few hours after they molt. They look bright yellow when they first molt then the red color and black spots start to develop.


ladybug larva attached to fence starting to molt

The first 2 small ones sexed really early and the smaller one already had its flowers open (all 4 of them), the middle pic is the bigger ladies that took longer to sex so they got bigger. The pic on the right is my old lady from 8 months ago and a herm that ive been saving and plucking off the male parts. I didnt want to kill my first lady from 8 months ago so I left the top on and cut the bottom buds off. It looks very brown and dead but where I cut the buds from on the bottom small leaves are starting to grow back.

those above pics are with my old cell phone... g/f took the digital 8 Megapixel to go hiking with her friends... so photo resolution should get better

So I decided to get a 50W HPS Lights of America fixture from home depot. Cost me 40$, and I had to cut an extension cord so I could wire it for a 120V outlet. It puts out around 4000 lumes and doesnt get very hot. Im going to use this to try and re-veg the ladies that sexed too early outside.

this is how i set up the 50W HPS over the tiny lady to re-veg her. Im going with 16hours on and 8 dark

Im trying this one lady re-veg before I put the other small lady under the light just in case I fry this one.

Im starting to question my choice of time on for re-vegging. First I was thinking 16/8 since they've been outside in 11/13, but now im thinking I just want to keep the light on 24 till my baby lady starts to re-veg. Anyone got any input as to what my light cycle should be inside to re-veg a plant thats been outside in 11 light/13 dark???

K I'm going to stick with 16/8. I plug in the light at 8am each day and unplug at midnight and have a small fan to move the hot air coming from the light away.

this is the tiny lady im trying to re-veg