Newbie hydroponics grow, need help getting started/selecting equipment!

[Don Cotyle]

Hi SoEx, your ladies are looking great!!! I can see trichs starting to form on some of the bud leaves...allways a good sign!!!

Your running GH florilicous nutes arn't you? If so you can easily go the entire grow without a rez cange, that's another reason I suggested that you go with those nutes and the Lucas Formula!!! If you use a bloom addative and you have room, after the grow transfer your rez o a storage tub with areation and save to on your secound grow! When your plants get to useing full strength stage you can addback the nutes in the container as is per a gallon at a time! I've done it on a few occasions when funds were low and it worked fine!!!

 

[SoEx]

Hi SoEx, your ladies are looking great!!! I can see trichs starting to form on some of the bud leaves...allways a good sign!!!

Your running GH florilicous nutes arn't you? If so you can easily go the entire grow without a rez cange, that's another reason I suggested that you go with those nutes and the Lucas Formula!!! If you use a bloom addative and you have room, after the grow transfer your rez o a storage tub with areation and save to on your secound grow! When your plants get to useing full strength stage you can addback the nutes in the container as is per a gallon at a time! I've done it on a few occasions when funds were low and it worked fine!!!

Nah, I am using Dutchmaster Advance flower nutrients. As for NPK (I guess?) Flower A 2.4-0-2 & Flower B 0.6-1-4 So I guess that means 3-1-6 and it's about 1700 ppm last I checked (I'll check again hopefully too).

 

[felix2]

those are really nice bud shots! good job.

 

[SoEx]

Thanks for the comments/compliments.

Took clones of my vegging plants and I'll throw the vegging plants into flower if the clones continue to look like they'll survive two more days.

 

[SoEx]

Well to avoid actually having to do anything I just kept the two remianing rooted clones vegging in the bubble cloner. Pics of the plants after having stayed in there too long:

Lemon Stinky clone:


Master Kush clone:


And I took clones of the vegging plants (Dirty harry/grapefruit and the dirty harry/twisted fruit). I'm going to put the vegging plants into flower for 2 weeks to sex them, then dispose of the males.

Then, hopefully, I'll grow out the clones for 3-4 weeks, training them. Then hopefully the flower chamber will be free.

3 weeks 4 days today. Another 3 days hopefully and I'll be almost halfway there!

 

[Guest]

Man I just read right through your whole thread, well started last night and just finished the last 2 pages. A great read

I bet when you lost little stinky and the other little seedling you were doubting you'd be seeing the incredible forest you now see in that cupboard.

Well done and keep us posted

 

[SoEx]

Man I just read right through your whole thread, well started last night and just finished the last 2 pages. A great read

I bet when you lost little stinky and the other little seedling you were doubting you'd be seeing the incredible forest you now see in that cupboard.

Well done and keep us posted

Ha, well that was quite a read, thanks. Yeah, I was worried things wouldn't go well at first, but the flower chamber is really off to a great start. Almsot halfway there! I really hope these buds fill out

Got some more pictures. I put in a 105W 5500K CFL in there too while it's still nice outside.


And the canopy goes down another 3-5"

Lemon Stinky:






Master Kush:

 

[SoEx]

Some more pics. bit crappy still, sorry.

Things are still bulking up and the bud leaves and some of the fans are accumulating lovely trichs.

Pics!

Lemon Stinky:











Master Kush:







I'll try to get a few nice overall shots o fthe entire thing too.


I have a question. On branches like this:



Will those smaller buds down there expand upward and will more calyxes show up? I just hope these things bulk up some more, hopefully.

4 WEEKS IN! 4 to go, hopefully. Halfway there?

 

[Don Cotyle]

A little hard to tell from the pic where they on the plant. Take an overall plant shot and use something to point that area out! 4 weeks to go alot can happen. The last 2 weeks will tel that's when they swell! They will at least double, if that helps any. Can tell more with better pic.

Do you have one of the little micro scopes? Available at Radio Shack for around $12 , 60-100 power. You'll be able to see the trichs, go for 50/50 cloudy amber for a good and it's time to harvest!

 

[SoEx]

A little hard to tell from the pic where they on the plant. Take an overall plant shot and use something to point that area out! 4 weeks to go alot can happen. The last 2 weeks will tel that's when they swell! They will at least double, if that helps any. Can tell more with better pic.

Do you have one of the little micro scopes? Available at Radio Shack for around $12 , 60-100 power. You'll be able to see the trichs, go for 50/50 cloudy amber for a good and it's time to harvest!

Yeah, I'll take some decent overall shots tonight hopefully and make things look nicer. All I have now is a bunch of branches/growing tips from each of the two plants going through holes in the screen and extending upward from 6-12", so far. A lot of them have one flowery calyx top that has the decreasing number of fan leaves (5, 3, 1, as is characteristic). Then along the long branch there are like 4-6+ little buds that formed out of internodes that are putting out calyxes. These would've been other, big branches I imagine if I had let them veg longer after the screen before flipping to flower, but I suppose these might just stay as tiny popcorny buds? My yield might not be too great, even with the scrog this time around, due to my inexperience but I suppose that's what the learning experience is all about anyway.

I don't have a radioshack microscope but I can reverse the lens on my camera and get some extreme macros at much higher quality than I've been posting up so far. I just haven't seen anything too amazing that justifies the effort of reversing the lens and getting super close in.

I'm going to look for some kind of bloom booster with 0-50-30 or something similar in NPK at the hardware store in a bit. If I can't find anything suitable I suppose I'll have to order from a hydro shop, but I'm not such a big fan of that since it takes some time.

 

[Stalldaworld]

WOW! i just read through this entire thread, amazing stuff!
great job SoEX! very inspiring!

 

[Don Cotyle]

That's cool that you have a nice camera you can do that with!! You should find something that will work as a bloom enhancer, the way fuel prices are going you'll be better off, shipping is getting crazy! Hey it's all good, the popcorn buds will frost up nicely and smoke just as well as the big buds

 

[SoEx]

WOW! i just read through this entire thread, amazing stuff!
great job SoEX! very inspiring!

Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it, hopefully I'll have some more pictures to come too

That's cool that you have a nice camera you can do that with!! You should find something that will work as a bloom enhancer, the way fuel prices are going you'll be better off, shipping is getting crazy! Hey it's all good, the popcorn buds will frost up nicely and smoke just as well as the big buds

Argh, I checked the gardening section of a store locally and unfortuantely all the supplements -- even the bloom boosts -- had way too much N in it, something like 15-30-15s and others. I suppose I'll just order something and get it in after a week or so.

Yeah, I'm not concerned about the quality of the popcorn buds, just hoping that I can get a few decent/bigger buds and some good yield.

It is my first grow, but I'm hoping for something around 100 grams from this. I'd love to get more, but even that may be unrealistic given my inexperience.

Whatever happens, I sure have learned a hell of a lot! Thank you to you and everyone else who helped answer my questions by the way.

 

[SoEx]

"Uploading temporarily disabled."

Boo, damn it. Going to see if I can find something else to use, got some quick snaps I got from the ladies in flower.

Okay. Here's a shot from underneath. Lemon Stinky to the left, Master Kush on the right. The master kush got quite a few branches up, the lemon stinky got pushed to the side a bit:


edit: images snipped off

 

[SoEx]

News from the veg room:

I combed through and identified 2 clear males. One of the plants was overtaken early by its neighbors and really didn't get much development in (I also had to trim its roots at an inopportune time).

Anyhow, I'm down to 4 suspected female plants and 1 unknown.

I am keeping all the cuttings so far (labeled) and am waiting for some roots to appear. I won't kill off the original females until I have a rooted clone that I can start vegging.

So hopefully I can veg ou the 4 suspected female clones, the 1 unknown, and either master kush or lemon stinky for the next go around. Only 3.5W to go until harvest, hopefully

 

[Don Cotyle]

They look great SoEx,the trichs are forming nicley, even if you don't get the best yeild you'r gonna get treated to some excellent smoke!!!, and next go round you'll do even better yeild wise!!! Make sure you cut off everything under the screen so all the goodness goes to the top!

Don't go by date to harvest, check them trichs! 50/50 cloudy/amber then you'll get the most from your plants!!!

 

[FreezerBoy]

If I didn't know better, I'd think you've been doing this for years! Gold star on the forehead for you.

 

[ogatec]

lmao, u still worried about them not growing? lololol

 

[ogatec]

man is that the MK with all the crystals?, looks like it should turn out DANK....


how do they smell?

 

[SoEx]

They look great SoEx,the trichs are forming nicley, even if you don't get the best yeild you'r gonna get treated to some excellent smoke!!!, and next go round you'll do even better yeild wise!!! Make sure you cut off everything under the screen so all the goodness goes to the top!

Don't go by date to harvest, check them trichs! 50/50 cloudy/amber then you'll get the most from your plants!!!

Yeah, they're looking tastier by the day. I'm hoping to get something respectable for yield, but if I don't it's okay.

As for growth underneath... I did trim off most of the stuff under the screen but small branches re-emerged and look healthy nearer to the top. They're putting out many calyxes and are flowering, so I might just wait a bit and see if they get some trichomes on them? I don't mind some smaller buds, as long as they're smokable

And yeah, I'm not going by 8weeks for harvest, that's just my rough estimation. I did veg the plants for longer than most do (and I heard the longer you veg the less time you spend in flower) so I'm hoping to finish at somewhere NEAR 8 weeks.

Get this, I started flowering exactly 8 weeks before 4/20. That puts harvest at 4/20 if it would take exactly 8 weeks. total accident, heh.

If I didn't know better, I'd think you've been doing this for years! Gold star on the forehead for you.

Ha, thanks. I had a lot of great help from you guys. This is honestly my first grow and I'm glad it's going so well so far.

I'm not one to toot my own horn but I do feel quite accomplished for this having gone so well up to this point.

man is that the MK with all the crystals?, looks like it should turn out DANK....


how do they smell?

The close ups are of the Lemon Stinky. But they're both getting very trichome-covered.


Flower chamber ph is 5.6, PPM is actually up to... 2600. I didn't intend for it to go that high, but I might've made a slight error at last feeding I guess. Anyway, they haven't burned or seemed to mind yet. I'm not using any boosters/additives yet, either. I'm going to purchase some molasses soon, and look for a bloom booster, though.

I suppose it's okay to have my PPM that high since I don't use anything else other than nutrients in the water to feed my plants? The nutrient calculator on dutchmaser's site maxes out at like 1800 ppm but they also "recommend" you use their entire line of junk (silica, some boosters, foliar feed + penetrator) so maybe I have a bit more headroom.

Thanks for all the help people, I'll rep you all once harvest comes about, hopefully!