lovingthegreen
Member
Just ordered some Master Kush, 10 seeds, from Attitude. Also getting 8 bonus seeds for free, great deal! I ordered it with "guaranteed" shipping, which I assume means they'll reship if it gets seized.
I'm almost certainly going to use some sort of cheap grow box like a big Rubbermaid tub or similar. I've already got a few, though they may be a little small. Still, I might use one anyway, just to save money. Also just found that I have 5 spare 23W CFLs, cool white.
Here's my rough plan, cut and pasted from my intro thread:
Lights: CFLs, they are cheap and available. This is going to be a cheap sort of grow. Gotta learn and start somewhere.
Grow medium: Soil. Probably some regular stuff from Canadian Tire etc. I've also got some basic liquid and solid houseplant fertilizer, should be fine for the herb as well.
Current equipment: Some plant pots, lots of power strips, some extension cords, an old PC that doesn't work but has a working CPU fan etc, fertilizer as noted above, brita water filter pitcher for making nice clean water.
Plan: Ideally I'd like a continous permanent grow. Small-scale, as it's for personal consumption, cheap, as I don't have a lot of money, and stealth, for the obvious reasons. I've read a fair bit from the various threads and have basic understanding of lights, the plants biology etc. Since the flower period is about twice as long as the vegging period, I'm thinking of maybe 3 boxes, call them Veg, Flower A and Flower B. Gonna start with seeds in Veg, then clone, move the clones to Veg, the mature plants to Flower A, and so on. Should allow a harvest every 5 weeks once the cycle is fully running.
Not going to obsess over details on this first grow. Going to water the plants with Brita filtered (carbon filtered) ordinary water, as needed, adding a small amount of liquid fertilizer every so often. I'll see how the plants respond and up or down the amount of water and fert accordingly. Going to let them veg for as long as they want under 20/4, hopefully get them nice and strong, then put them in the flower box for some 12/12 until hopefully I get some nice fat buds.
Issues: Main issue is just the handyman stuff with lights, cutting holes in the boxes etc. I'm not particularly good at that stuff. I'm fine with plants and planning etc though, so it should work out. I'm not too worried about smell, as this is going to be small scale, with a non-super-smelly breed, in a closed room in my apartment, possibly in a closet if the boxes fit. With some odor killer chems it should be fine.
That's about all I can think of right now. Once I've made a bit of progress I'll post my grow journal thread. I figure the next step is strolling around a few stores and seeing what I can buy for cheap. I'm thinking I need CFLs, probably a cutting knife of some sort suitable for the type of box I buy, some sockets or whatever to connect the CFLs to the power strips, some sort of glue to glue the strips to the top of the box, potting soil, probably some fans, 1 intake and 1 outtake per box, 1 timer per box, maybe a PH sensor, moisture sensor etc, if they are cheap.
Currently: add 5 CFLs to the above list of available equipment. Also, probably only one flowering box, as desertrat made me realize that two are unnecessary.
Some other thoughts and questions I've had were:
- instead of gluing the powerstrips to the inside of the lid, I had the thought that it would be more flexible to make holes in the lid through which cords could be run for the lights. That way I could use the cords to vary the height of the lights. The powerstrips would rest on top of the lid, with the cords plugged into it, leading to the sockets for the CFLs. Make sense?
- what kind of cutter do I need, to cut a tough plastic box? I guess I need to make a square hole or two for the fans, right?
- I suppose I need a baffle attached to each fan, to keep the outside light out, right? Where do I get that? Same place as the rest of the stuff, Canadian Tire, Home Depot, etc?
- any thoughts on my lights? Are 23W CFLs of any use? They seem plenty bright to me, though I know that HPS and such are better for the plant. Too expensive for me right now, maybe later though. I'd like to fill my boxes with maybe 3 to 6 plants at a time, depending on how I rotate them. Perhaps 6 CFLs per box, 1 per plant?
Please forgive my simple-minded questions. One of the few things I'm not good at is handyman type stuff, measuring and cutting etc. I tend to make simple, dumb mistakes.
Thanks in advance for any advice. Once I start growing, I'll be sure to post pics etc and let you know how it goes. Hope my seeds arrive soon!
I'm almost certainly going to use some sort of cheap grow box like a big Rubbermaid tub or similar. I've already got a few, though they may be a little small. Still, I might use one anyway, just to save money. Also just found that I have 5 spare 23W CFLs, cool white.
Here's my rough plan, cut and pasted from my intro thread:
Lights: CFLs, they are cheap and available. This is going to be a cheap sort of grow. Gotta learn and start somewhere.
Grow medium: Soil. Probably some regular stuff from Canadian Tire etc. I've also got some basic liquid and solid houseplant fertilizer, should be fine for the herb as well.
Current equipment: Some plant pots, lots of power strips, some extension cords, an old PC that doesn't work but has a working CPU fan etc, fertilizer as noted above, brita water filter pitcher for making nice clean water.
Plan: Ideally I'd like a continous permanent grow. Small-scale, as it's for personal consumption, cheap, as I don't have a lot of money, and stealth, for the obvious reasons. I've read a fair bit from the various threads and have basic understanding of lights, the plants biology etc. Since the flower period is about twice as long as the vegging period, I'm thinking of maybe 3 boxes, call them Veg, Flower A and Flower B. Gonna start with seeds in Veg, then clone, move the clones to Veg, the mature plants to Flower A, and so on. Should allow a harvest every 5 weeks once the cycle is fully running.
Not going to obsess over details on this first grow. Going to water the plants with Brita filtered (carbon filtered) ordinary water, as needed, adding a small amount of liquid fertilizer every so often. I'll see how the plants respond and up or down the amount of water and fert accordingly. Going to let them veg for as long as they want under 20/4, hopefully get them nice and strong, then put them in the flower box for some 12/12 until hopefully I get some nice fat buds.
Issues: Main issue is just the handyman stuff with lights, cutting holes in the boxes etc. I'm not particularly good at that stuff. I'm fine with plants and planning etc though, so it should work out. I'm not too worried about smell, as this is going to be small scale, with a non-super-smelly breed, in a closed room in my apartment, possibly in a closet if the boxes fit. With some odor killer chems it should be fine.
That's about all I can think of right now. Once I've made a bit of progress I'll post my grow journal thread. I figure the next step is strolling around a few stores and seeing what I can buy for cheap. I'm thinking I need CFLs, probably a cutting knife of some sort suitable for the type of box I buy, some sockets or whatever to connect the CFLs to the power strips, some sort of glue to glue the strips to the top of the box, potting soil, probably some fans, 1 intake and 1 outtake per box, 1 timer per box, maybe a PH sensor, moisture sensor etc, if they are cheap.
Currently: add 5 CFLs to the above list of available equipment. Also, probably only one flowering box, as desertrat made me realize that two are unnecessary.
Some other thoughts and questions I've had were:
- instead of gluing the powerstrips to the inside of the lid, I had the thought that it would be more flexible to make holes in the lid through which cords could be run for the lights. That way I could use the cords to vary the height of the lights. The powerstrips would rest on top of the lid, with the cords plugged into it, leading to the sockets for the CFLs. Make sense?
- what kind of cutter do I need, to cut a tough plastic box? I guess I need to make a square hole or two for the fans, right?
- I suppose I need a baffle attached to each fan, to keep the outside light out, right? Where do I get that? Same place as the rest of the stuff, Canadian Tire, Home Depot, etc?
- any thoughts on my lights? Are 23W CFLs of any use? They seem plenty bright to me, though I know that HPS and such are better for the plant. Too expensive for me right now, maybe later though. I'd like to fill my boxes with maybe 3 to 6 plants at a time, depending on how I rotate them. Perhaps 6 CFLs per box, 1 per plant?
Please forgive my simple-minded questions. One of the few things I'm not good at is handyman type stuff, measuring and cutting etc. I tend to make simple, dumb mistakes.
Thanks in advance for any advice. Once I start growing, I'll be sure to post pics etc and let you know how it goes. Hope my seeds arrive soon!