Round 2 - Its about time. A [Soil - CFL - Closet] Grow

Brokenhope420 said:

Well, I just watered Beta and Chi, Ch is not looking well at all... soon it will be the second of a long line of dead plants. I think I have a pH problem, MG soil starts off low, and I have done absolutely nothing to adjust it. I read the root stunting and slow growth is caused by a low pH, and nutes can get locked out. I can't really test the pH, but it couldn't really hurt to try to raise it very slightly, right now I am looking at 0% success, can't do much worse eh.

Haha damn im so pissed. It will be my 5th grow before I can even have something make it 2 months again, and then I get to try flowering for the second time so that can get screwed up again.

I really am pissed off at greenweed420 though, this entire time he made me believe MG was the problem and I was wasting my time my plants deaths were inevitable, so this entire time I have been sitting here thinking my plants are doing bad because of miracle grow and theres nothing I really could do, not because I am screwing something up, so this whole time I have been wasting my time, I could have been trying to fix the problem, but instead I was just thinking as soon as I get new soil I will be perfectly fine, and I wont.

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maybe a long line of dead plants,,but think of what you have learned Broken,,don't give up man,,change whatever it takes and do what ya gotta do,,were all here waiting,,and we ain't goin nowhere

Keep on Growin

HoLE

Haha yeah I guess I have come a long way, I think I would be a bit less frustrated if this grow wasn't turning out a hundred times worse than my last, and a hundred times slower.

and I cant imagine what I would have done without the help here haha, take a look at my attachments, this was my first ever attempt, I think about the time I joined here, and yeah thats backyard soil haha. I quickly learned that I was doing everything wrong haha. Even worse was before that CFL you see there, I was using a 100w incandescent, I couldn't even figure out what an incandescent was and what a CFL was, I had never heard of CFL haha.

andddd Thanks for all the encouragement . Soon I should be getting the floros, new soil, and Petersons Plant Food (I found out I was supposed to be feeding them, I have never fed a plant in any of my grows... could be contributing to the problem), but I am planning on doing some experimenting under the floros and see what happens, I am planning on experimenting with up to 10 sprouts, not sure how much room there will be yet, but after they get too big for the light, I will start removing the least healthy ones, not sure how many I will end up keeping.

I started germinating quite a few kind bud bag seeds yesterday night, so by monday or tuesday I should have around 10 sprouts poking out of the soil.

Just be careful if you are planning on feeding your seedlings nutes.. I would wait a good two or three weeks at least before you start a feeding schedule...

Yeah the food is for the plants I already have, 5 are 3 weeks old, and 2 of them are a month old, I am planning on starting 1/4 strength of whatever the package says.

I transplanted the 3 sprouts that were in one cup, its now in a pot about the same size as the others, I used miracle grow just because thats what its been in and there hasn't been a problem with those so far. This was one of the better transplants, I used a razor and cut the bottom of the cup of and pushed the bottom up and it came right out easy... normally it takes me 5 minutes of knocking it quite roughly and pulling until I can finally get most of it to come out... in the end its always fucked up and theres always a huge mess...

another thing that is bugging the hell out of me, the lighting just doesn't fuckn work at all... this vanity light strip I have been using because it has so many sockets is complete shit, impossible to use a Y socket because your forced to angle the lights in a way that doesn't get the light where you really want it...

the only way I can make the light strip work is to completely destroy the hood thing, it was a shit load of work to put together but it really just isn't working... and a repair on that thing takes nearly 2 hours because of the hour and a half spent disassembling the whole setup and moving all the shit that will fall over when I try to move that out of the closet... its ridiculous... I just repair it and hte plants had minimal light for an hour atleast and yellow spots started appearing in the middle of the leafs on the 3 week old plants.

Beta is doing remarkably well, and I am going to try to put all the lights on it. My first topping did go successfuly, there is 2 heads clearly growing now . The leafs are starting to point more upward...

I have decided Chi is not worth salvaging, I took it out from under the lights... quite a disappointment, Chi was doing the best at one point and then in 2 days it just completely went bleh. 2 out of 3 of the first set of plants are now gone.

The 3 sprouts that were in one cup have been moved to the spot Chi used to be under the lights.

sooo... the current lighting is like this:
There is now 4 or 5 CFLs all around Beta about 2 inches away. 3 over the 3 sprouts about 2 inches away, plus a few on the side slightly farther away, and I have 1 light over both of the other plants in cups.

this is what I am considering:
destroying my entire current setup, not using Y sockets in the vanity strip, and turn that vertical, so all the CFLs are sideways, so I can put can reflectors over each light and all the light from each bulb is facing straight down where I need it. There will be quite a few less CFLs used, but if I do it like this all of the light will get where I need it to be no problem... but then thats only 5 sockets available on that... instead of the 8 or so I normally use.... eh, but the new setup I would use a box and line the inside with mylar. The can reflectors do work extremely well though, I grew the best 3 sprouts so far [til the 3 week point], under 1 single CFL with a can reflector.

Chi has died. That makes 2 out of 3 of the first set of plants gone.

Beta looks like its doing well.

I transplanted the sprouts that were in 1 cup.

Day 32 - 1/20/8 - Beta
Day 20 - 1/20/8 - Unnamed smaller plants

Wow Beta actually made progress in the last ehh 7 hours since I checked on it... its definitely doing well, the leafs growing between the nodes near the bottom where old leafs died is great, it will make Beta look a lot better, and thankfully those leafs are growing healthy. Its top leafs are looking great, and so are its 2 heads which I noticed growth over 7 hours. 4 CFLs all 2 inches away surrounding it did the trick haha.

Its only about 6-8 inches tall though, topped at the 5th node, and the heads havent produced a real node yet... so its really not as big as it should be on the start of day 33... I am hoping it starts picking up with the better lighting.

I didn't get the soil yesterday, and I didnt get the seeds planted... theyre probably all too germinated now and I will have to throw them out.

Alright just got back from Lowes, finally found the full gardening center haha...

*I got a pH meter, non battery powered - I think I remember saying not to get the ones that don't use batterys but eh its the first pH meter I have EVER seen, I had to get it. I will measure the pH of all the plants later when the lights go on.

*I now have peat pots, it will make things much easier - how long do I keep the thing in the peat pot before I transplant? I'm kinda pissed I just bought 2 bags of plastic cups too haha

*I bought Shultz plant food plus (concentrate is said on the top). It is 10-15-10 which is good for vegging right? It says 7 drops per qt, so I think I will start at 2 drops per qt (in the water I use for the older plants I already have).

* and I got new soil... I was very close to getting miracle grow again, I just wanted to try something different though... Its Sta-Green all purpose potting mix with fertilizer. The analysis on the back is .13-.04-.09.

I am gonna start the planting all the seeds soon. Any comments on the crap I got... I am curious if that stuff will work...

looks like its gettin better how many cfls u got on that thing

Inside under the hood about 11... maybe 12, one of the CFLs is a 40w, the others are 26watters. I have made an effort to keep all the light under the hood, so a lot more light is staying inside now, instead of having the back and front both open, but I still do want to redesign it.

I really need some new sockets that I can like clip on to stuff and has a small gooseneck or something, thatd be perfect.

I am going to get the floro thing asap, the next few days, I am going to use it on all the new plants until they get bigger.

Day 33 - 1/21/8 - Beta
Day 21 - 1/21/8 - Unnamed smaller plants

I watered Beta, and one of the sprouts with slightly nuted water [10-15-10], and the pot with 3 plants in it didnt get fully watered I ran outta water -_-.

The first picture is of the 8 new seeds I planted today, 4 in sta green soil, 2 in mg, and 2 in dg, I am not sure if the sta green is moist enough, the water bubbles on the top of the soil, and then drains straight through everywhere... the soil didn't feel moist at all, and was draining all over the place... whereas the mg and dg soil didn't actually drain water but it got the peat pots real wet on the sides all the way down.

My pH meter measured about 7.0 on all of them - not sure if that thing even works... my water measured 7.0 too, and so did the dry soil... weird.

it does look alil better..at least the tops anyway

if the water isnt soaking into the soil add a few drops of biodegradable dishwashing liquid to you water it will make the water "wetter".

The new plants still haven't sprouted, its been about 36 hours, so they should be sprouted tomm, and I still haven't got the floro yet -_-, I will figure something out though.

Beta is starting to grow faster, starting the 2nd nodes on both heads. I nuted 1 L of water with 1 drop [box says 7 drops per qt], and watered the pot with 3 sprouts in it again since last time it really didnt get watered much... I hope I am not overwatering it, but its not looking quite as good as it was.

Day 34 - on 1/22/8 - Beta
Day 22 - on 1/22/8 - Unnamed smaller plants

one question though, should I flower Beta in 3 weeks or so? I really don't want to transplant again, and its pot [bucket] isn't that big, maybe a gallon, think it will be necessary for me to transplant it later? When I flower I plan to plant a few sprouts prior and flower a few very small plants with it as well, just to see what happens, but all the lights will be focused on Beta.

and I really hope Beta doesn't end up dieing before day 60 or so, I have never had a plant actually go into flowering before -_-.

Yesss I smell pot in my closet now, the entire first grow with 2 plants over 2 months old, no smell whatsoever, this one, I dont know which ones smelling probably Beta, but everytime I move my nose over a hole in the setup and sniff I can barely smell a strong pot scent.

Temps have been a bit high the last few days has been staying around 92, Beta hasn't been showing heat stress but everything else has, I could lower the temp big time by opening the back of the hood, but a huge amount of light would be lost -_-.

Wow, just checked up on them but the lights are off so I just hopped in the closet real fast and shut the door, the pot stench is so much stronger inside the closet when its cooler wow, I love the smell, all my plants in the past I had to literally stick my nose on the leafs and sniff as hard as I can. Smell is not gonna get me in trouble, so the way I see it, the smellier the better hahaha.

I just went to walmart and bought the 4ft t12 thing, and 2 40w daylight (6500k) bulbs for it... but wow that thing is huge 0_0. I will definitely have to make room for it. I am still waiting to bring it inside though because I am super paranoid about the neighbors seeing me bring soil and then this into the house, so I will wait until it gets a lil darker outside.

The sockets and hood was only $8, there was one slightly more expensive but I didn't have enough money with me, the bulbs was $10, they had cheaper ones though, a 2 pack of 3200k, for $4.

Damn I am going to have to run a THIRD extention cord under my door, and run it from a entirely different set of outlets in my room -_-. And all because this thing has 3 prongs not 2. This also means that it cant utilize the timer... so this is going to be on in the same room while the mean setup under the hood is off... is that bad? if so I wont do that... another option is to split the 1 outlet coming out of the timer into 2, that would mean its supporting around 300w at most, is that too much?

I do have to make major room for this thing though, but damn so many freakn plants could fit under that thing, i really wish the 6000 lumens it outputs in total wasnt spread over a 4 ft distance, its a bit much.

Does the floros get nearly as hot as CFLs?

I am also having trouble finding a place to attach the hooks, theres right now nothing to hold it up with so I cant use it today, I am going to try to go to Lowes asap and get some loop screw in things, I have a shelf in there that would be perfect to put the hooks in. I did finish making room for the light too, damn that place is so freakn cramped, it took me an hour to clear shit out and half of the shit ended up cluttering my room up instead haha.

yesterday when I took the pics i fucked with the setup and temp went up a few degrees, I couldn't get it back down each time it got hotter and it reached 99 degrees in the box.

I ended up taking the back off, so all the lights being let out but the temperature is at 90. WTFFFFFFFFFFFFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They have all been heat stressing.

Fucking piece of shit setup won't fucking cool at all. Actually I blame the piece of shit fan that hardly blows any air but is loud as fuck.

Sorry but I am really blazed off of some old shwag cuz I spent all my money on equipment and shiz haha, so I am hella tired and the last thing I feel like doing is taking pictures and uploading them, so once again no pictures today, definitely some tomorrow though [posted in approximately 24hours from this post]. Temperatures are down to 83-85 now, lower when lights are off, the entire back of the setup is open now -_-. Humidity goes from Lo% to 20%.


Beta is growing very well and very fast, the hood will have to be raised again tomorrow.

I got the things to hook the chains on the floros up, the little screw in metal hole things, I have gotten 1 into the shelf so far, its so freakn hard to get the thing to go through the shelf, the woods so dense, but it holds well.

Only 1 out of 8 seeds have sprouted in 3 freakn days, this is crazy its never taken this long, and the sta green soil isn't absorbing the water at all, so I am pretty sure none of those are gonna make it, the dollar generals aren't looking good, and I don't know why the 2 in the miracle grow haven't sprouted, 3 days is the absolute longest it's ever taken seeds to sprout for me -_-.

I am probably going to plant a few more, the 4ft long light is huge and I can easily fit a few more under it.

I plugged in the 4ft t12 today, it has 40w 6500k bulbs... the CFLs I was using I was unsure of all the spectrums, but I know the floro is 6500k, the lights lit up very blue, all of the CFLs have a more redish look, none of them look anywhere near what the 6500k floro looked like, so I think all the CFLs I am using are in the wrong spectrum.

I guess we will find out as soon as I start growing under the floro, should be finished and setup tomorrow.

I may go out and buy some new CFLs marked 6500k on the package.