Starting My First Indoor Grow - Part 1 - Germinating Experiments

yes it is already turning green, its sort of half green today and its only the first day, im sure tomorrow once it gets some more sunlight it will be fine.

very exciting times for me

u ordered notes from overseas or here only?

here only mate, from a local gardening store over here, pm me and i will send you the names of the nutes if you want them

Don't smoke too many and forget to label the plants!!!

Go plugs!

Looks good man, I've ordered some plugs too, but I lost patience for them to arrive so today morning I've potted 4 seeds, all pots duly labled.

These have been potted in 1:1:1 Cocopeat/Perilite:Vermicompost:Soil.

I watered all the pots and drained them overnight. In the morning, put the following seeds in:

1. White Widow Feminised
1. Sweet Tai Feminised
1. The Church Feminised
1. AK48 Feminised

Its getting cold at night so I will move them indoors and place them near a room warmer.

Once they germinate, I will be moving them straight away to my grow room, under 400w MH Lights.

Its all coming together!!!

kingfisher021 said:

Looks good man, I've ordered some plugs too, but I lost patience for them to arrive so today morning I've potted 4 seeds, all pots duly labled.

These have been potted in 1:1:1 Cocopeat/Perilite:Vermicompost:Soil.

I watered all the pots and drained them overnight. In the morning, put the following seeds in:

1. White Widow Feminised
1. Sweet Tai Feminised
1. The Church Feminised
1. AK48 Feminised

Its getting cold at night so I will move them indoors and place them near a room warmer.

Once they germinate, I will be moving them straight away to my grow room, under 400w MH Lights.

Its all coming together!!!

Click to expand...

no posts man. How's it going?

mate i wanna give you a bit of advice...
first of all, there are numerous strains that will flower under 14-15 hours of sunlight. i've heard that strains like biddy early are difficult to keep from flowering at anything under 18 hours of lighting.
the outdoor summer heat wherever in india it is that you are can be easily dispelled using a simple thing like a shade net and a standing fan outdoors. having the time to mist the plants thoroughly with
water in the daytime will go a long way as well. where in india are you located? remember that sunlight provides around 50,000 lux (lumens per sq ft) at the equator and at the VERY least, 10000 lux on
an average day. in india, most places will receive more than that. no indoor spectrum can match the lights which plants have adapted to grow in over hundreds of thousands of generations. remember,
indoor grows are intended to imitate outdoor grows as much as possible while controlling negative factors like pests, stray pollen, humidity, etc. and maintaining security. any grower will tell you that
no light will be able to provide the kind of lights plants need like the sunlight.
also, it is my understanding that wherever you are, around september 21st, you will have 12/12. if you can set up a shade net outdoors, it is very very hard to see what you're growing inside there, and
by sowing seeds in the beginning of august, your plant WILL start flowering by the beginning of september (unless it's a south indian landrace) and will likely continue to flower through october and till
the end of november. by timing when you sow your seeds or transplant your clones, you can grow various strains outdoors. while your plants will not be as big as one which received 4 weeks of vegetative
growth, trust me when i say the outdoor sunlight will make up for it. even with a shade net, where i live, the lux under the shade net is above 10000 lux, in north india it will certainly be above 7000. your shade
net will also do a decent job of reducing the amount of rain your plants receive. try and do what you can to flower your plants outdoors except for during the winter. it is also my understanding that there
are several strains that can take cold down to 50 deg F. i can't grow them myself, as those strains generally respond poorly to heat, and we're still going 30, 31 deg C this winter, but
it drops to about 17-18 in the night though. certainly feels a fuckload colder on the bike when you cross 80kph...
also, you can substitute rooting plugs with a seedling tray and use pure coco peat as the medium. ensure that you rinse the coco peat with fucking hot water, as they tend to have salts in them, due to the environment
the coconuts grow in. make the coco peat as wet as a pre-horny pussy when you stick your finger inside it and it's ready to take the seed. when it gets it's second set of true leaves, stop watering it and when the
coco peat pulls away from the edges, it's really easy to pull it out. be careful when you're pulling, but if you practice with a few seeds you'll get the hang of it. landraces can be sprouted in the same way if
the seeds are of good quality. the tissues, soaking in water, etc has always been just an extra unnecessary step as far as i'm concerned, because everything actually germinated better with less tampering.
leave it for 4-5 days, i've never had anything take more than 4 and live out past the seedling stage personally...
also, at least where i live, the plants really really respond when they get a shitload of rainwater rather than my usual watering schedule, regardless of the strain. the next day, they're lush, they're greener than ever,
and look happy as a fucking kid with a happy meal...

Hey guys, time for an update, but firstly thanks elchupacabra for sharing your knowledge..ive seen your thread too and it acted as an excellent reference point for me!

I will definitely try growing outdoors when the time is right next year, i might even start as early as feb when the wether starts to warm up a little, and hopefully have something ready before end of may before it starts getting unbearably hot. i am in delhi, so the tempratures are extreme. its just the beginning of december, and we are already seeing 8 degrees at night, and this is just the beginning. since i just will not be able to grow anything outdoors for the next 2-3 months, i decided to start indoors. but outdoors is definitely on the cards, luckily i have no shortage of space to grow a couple of plants, and privacy isnt much of an issue either.....not from anybody outside the house atleast I am just waiting for the weather to be right for it.

now, about my germinating experiments, well my conclusion is.... nothing beats soil in a pot. next time i am not going to bother with small pots also,I will just plant them in their final pot right from the beginning. Most of the hermie seeds i was experimenting with germinated in the soil.

i just could not get them to germinate using paper towel or any sort of towel. maybe I was doing something wrong, who knows!! I even tried cocopeat in the seed tray, a few of them germinated, but the success rate for me wasnt as high as soil in a pot. I have decided that soil is what works best for me, and in future I wont bother with any other method.

about the seeds i bought from the internet, in total i potted 6 seeds, 2 initially and 4 later one. i have already destroyed the first two.

about the 4 I potted later on, all fem seeds:

The church has already broken surface of the soil, and in total i can see 4 leaves. 2 pointy leaves, and 2 roundish leaves. what exactly are the second set of true leaves?

The other three seeds have also germinated, i know this because i can see them almost make it to the top of the soil, they are still in the soil, stem bending downwards, hopefully when i wake up tomorrow i will see all 4 pots with leaves on them

I plan to leave them out in the sun for 2-3 days and then take them indoors under the lights for 18 hours.

I already have the lights and most other things i need, just need to find the time to put the room together. Now with all the babies about to show me their face, I have no choice but to get it all done very quickly.

I will post some pics tomorrow.

thanks for the interest guys, i'm gonna need all the help i can get along the way

good night for now!!

Also, can someone who is good with electrical stuff answer this for me please:

Will I be able run my 400w MH/HPS lights using a 1kva UPS during times of a power breakdown?

I calculated that the total amps of the lamps + ballast + housing will be just under 10 amps.

The UPS I am looking at is 1000va or 1kva, outpt about 600w. it has only 5 amp sockets though.

I need to find a way of having a power backup for the lights.

Ill be watching this one

Here is a picure update

This one is a bunch of seeds in one pot. im giving this away to someone who woll grow these in their backyard


This is my first hermie seeds that germinated, looks good i think, i can see some leaves developing on top, its been about two weeks for this one in the small pot, do you guys recon I should not put it in the bigger pot? Or can I wait a bit more?


Sweet tai..........3rd day


White Widow......third day



The church..........4th day


AK48........third day



Potting mix being prepared for the 4 plants for when they will have to be moved... this is 75% Cocopeat + Wormicompost and 25% soil for each pot



all the pots filled with the potting mix, watered till it starts draining, will let it sit like this for a few days until the plants are ready to be moved here. I might add some more soil+cocopeat+compost+bonemeal+neemcake to top up all the pots in a few days



more to come as things progress. an electrician is coming today to have a look at the lights, hopefully he will be able to put them together and then all I will have to do is hang them. pics of those as soon as its done

cheers guys thanks for looking!!! this is my first attempt at organised growing, so ill appreciate any constructive feedback i can get.

Dude, you put them in wet paper towel folded 4 times than folded over the seeds the last time. I ring out just a little bit of water just enough that they stop dripping. put them in a black Cd case or anything dark and more or less air tight, on top of the fridge where its the perfect warmth and in 4 days they pop. 100% success rate. Never ever germinate your seeds in a cloth towel the roots can get entangled and that sucks.

yeah i hear you man, but as far as my experience goes, i am now very confident about germinating straight in soil. works great

Hello Everybody, update with recent developments:

I have Finally set up the lights today, have moved one of my 4 plants indoors under the lights to see how it goes, if its all good till tomorrow then I will move the remaining three plants indoor too. At the moment the other three are outside under the sun.


One of the plants under 400W MH - its The Church strain.



Another view....



A close up of The Church - I think a bird must have chewed off one of the leaves, was also showing some deficiency, dont exactly know what, but I gave it its first feed yesterday - micronutrients and a NPK feed too, its almost 3 weeks old now, I hope its not too early to start feeding them? I also fed the other three plants, but I only gave them the micro nutrients feed. very little to begin with too.




Humidity 67%, temprature around 17 degrees under lights as I type this



To give you some idea of the space, do you guys recon that 400w is too less for this space? the plan is to have 4 plants ...maybe 5 if its not too much



More updates very soon, now that I actually start my attempt at growing...until now it was just trying to get things organised!!

Thanks for reading!

Merry christmas folks!! I had a day off today, woke up early and put my day to good use

I finally removed my 4 main plants from the small pots, and moved them to their final destination. I am using 16 inch pots, don't know how many gallons etc but it looks quite big.

I noticed that the roots had reached the bottom of the pots, and had no more space to go. I feel it must have been like this for some time, which is probably why the plants were showing that there was some sort of problem. Here they are in their final pots:



===============================================================

This is the White Widow. Part of one of the leaves was found missing this morning. look at the second pic for a closeup....what could this be? I suspect a bird might have tried to chew it off? Because when I looked at it fresh, it hadn't develope the yellow edges, and when it was fresh it looked like someone had cut it or tried to chew a part of it..then later in the day the edges became yellow/brown


Overall pic: The chewed off bit: Another:

===============================================================

This one below is the Sweet tai, by far the healthiest plants of them all so far. looks very green, nice and happy, no defects or defeciences or evidence of abuse by birds yet.

Healthy vs Healthy

===============================================================

These pics below are of the AK48. Looks good mostly except for one of the older leaves, that started showing some problem a couple of days ago. I fed all the plants a some micro nutrients, and I haven't seen the problem in any of the other leaves. It could also be because they must have been rootbound for some days now in the small pots...so hopefully moving them to bigger pots will make them happier. But still looking at the closeup pictore of the leaf with the problem, what do you guys think it could be? Also, one of the leaves had a hole in them, some kind of worm I think? I have sprayed all the plants with an organic pest control solution..

brown patch the hole: Overall picture

===============================================================

This plant ini the pictures below is my most unlucky plant, the church. One of the leaves shows a similar problem to the AK48, and one of the leaves was chewed off by a bird I suspect, because again when I looked at it fresh, it seemed like someone had tore a part of the leaf...


chewed off: Overall pic brown spot:

===============================================================

I also cleaned the Grow room, sparyed some bug spray, finalised all the lose wiring, hooked up the power backup, looking all set now. The only thing left now is the timer switch, which has also been ordered.

Today will be the first proper day for all the plants to be indoors. At the end of the day today, I will move them in around sunset time, and keep the lights on for about 3 hours. That will be around 11 hours of sunlight, and 3 hours of indoor light. from tomorrow I will keep increasing the lights on duration by one hour each day, stopping at 18 hours. I guess the vegging period officially starts today..

View attachment 2454723View attachment 2454722View attachment 2454720

Glad to hear you're set on germinating in soil with great success. The reason your first seeds took so long to germinate is because you buried them too deep. The Grow Bible by Jorge Cervantes advises to plant the seed twice as deep as the width of the seed. This comes to about 1/4 inch (about 6mm) for most seeds. There is great information on germination and more at the highy respected Mandala Seeds website. They are purists and oppose paper towels, soaking, etc. but offer valid botanical/biological reasons why.

Your pictures look great! I couldn't tell by the overhead shots if the stems are leggy (stretched, reaching towards the light). If so, check out the newbie forum sticky by Goten. I think it's called something like, "Replant those long stretchy stems. It's easy."

MH bulb died on me today!!!! good that i had the HPS bulb, vegging under HPS at the moment until I Can get the MH replaced.

Other than that plants looking happy, definitely perking up after putting them in bigger pots.

Is there any way I can change the title of this thread? Since this is no longer just a germinating experiment and I am documenting my grow here, would be good if the title can be changed to reflect that

kingfisher021 said:

MH bulb died on me today!!!! good that i had the HPS bulb, vegging under HPS at the moment until I Can get the MH replaced.

Other than that plants looking happy, definitely perking up after putting them in bigger pots.

Is there any way I can change the title of this thread? Since this is no longer just a germinating experiment and I am documenting my grow here, would be good if the title can be changed to reflect that

Click to expand...

PM a mod .