B
BigTex
Hey Hempcat thanks for putting it all in black and white for me. You have been most helpful
Wanna Ask The Old Farts A Question?
- Thread starter HempKat
- Start date
You don't really need humidity domes for seedlings. That's really meant for clones. Since clones start out with no roots their only way of getting moisture is to essentially "breath" it in from the air. The humidity domes help insure there is plenty of moisture to breath in. If they have already ajusted to the humidity when you first remove the plastic the may appear to wilt a bit after the first few minutes. If so don't panic, they adjust in an hour or so and will return to a normal appearence.
Now that they's broke ground don't expect much at first, it'll grow a little but the first few days it focuses more on developing the root system. That's why you want the soil to dry out, that encourages the roots to spread out looking for more water. Usually after the first watering you're talking 3 to 5 days depending on pot size. People get fooled because they just see and can feel the surface which being closest to air and heat it's what dries out first. Deeper in the soil moisture dries more slowly especially when there are not so many roots draining it. Now there are devices you can buy and stick in your soil to tell you if you need to water but there's an easier cheaper way called the lift method. Basically you prepare your plant in it's soil and pot and then before it's very first watering lift the pot and concentrate on how the weight of it feels and remember that. Then water the plant with enough water to thoroughly wet the surface and work thru the soil and create a little bit of drainage out of the bottom of the pot. Once it stops drainning lift the pot the same way you did before and you'll notice the weight difference, remember how that feels too. Now when you check your plants every day lift the pot, if it feels as light as it did before watering then water it. If you can still feel some added water wait then check again the next time.
After a few grows you'll get a feel for things and do it without really thinking. You'll also learn to pick up on other clues like changes in the room's humidity levels. You pick up on things like the length between waters getting shorter because there is more plant drinking that water.
Seedlings should be as close to the light as possible without getting burned, with the average cfl that means about 1 to 1.5 inches however, some of the stronger ones that are better for growing (more watts more lumens) they get warmer and so maybe you have to keep it 2 - 3 inches away. If you go further, the plant will still grow but it will grow tall and skinny. The closer you can keep it to the light without burning it the more it will grow short and fat which is really what you want for indoors. They say that a plant gets it's food from the sun so people may wonder why they need to feed it more then light and water? The reason is, just like we need certain balances of food to function so do plants. The food they get from the sun is like what we get from sugar and protein and starches. There is a running process in plants that uses the captured energy it gets from the light and turns it into the plant equivilent of sugars, proteins and starches. These things in dietary terms is the energy that fuels our lives. So just like we also need vitamins and mineral so do the plants and together with the enrgy food they combine to form new cells and new plant material. This same process that converts the light into plant energy food kicks into high gear at night when the plant isn't busy capturing energy and that relates to what they call a dark response. This means you tend to get alot of growth during the lights out period that requires you to check the light pretty much daily.
Hey Hempcat thanks for putting it all in black and white for me. You have been most helpful
No problem, I'm glad to be able to help. :smile:
Well if you're going to improvise I imagine you'll want to cover whatever side of the fan is facing the outside of your space, basically covering it without smothering it. The more you cover it though, the harder for fresh air to get in, if fresh air in is decreased, temps go up, so you got to be careful.
Not seeing a pic of where the fan currently allows light leaks it's hard for me to suggest something specific, I don't know how big and I don't know how important it is to blend in with the outer area for stealth. To try to illustrate one simple solution that shouldn't restrict air flow much, lets say the fan is mounted to a wall of your grow space and the hole to mount it there is 12" square. You would then find a rectangular shaped box that is say 18" wide and 24" long and say 12" deep. Since the box will be mounted over the fan openning you obviously want one 18" x 24" side to be open. Since the box is twice as long as the hole for the fan and a bit wider, you would position the box so that extra length is towards the ground. That would have the side closest to the ground being 12" x 18" if you've placed it the way I'm trying to describe
That side you would also remove and that's where the air would travel thru. You essentially just made a 2'x1.5'x1' tunnel with a 1'x1.5' openning on one end, plenty of room for air to flow freely. The key is, now for light to get in there it has to navigate two 90 degree turns. Unfortunately light on it's own can only travel in a straight line. To get around those turns the light would need to be reflected, that you can prevent by either painting the inside of the tunnel black or lining it with something black (except where the fan is of course) black absorbs light it doesn't reflect it. What this really is, is nothing new, photographers have used them for film develping rooms for years, it's called a light baffle.Another way would be to just put a thick curtain in front of it but that will decrease air flow.
Those are the cheapest ways I can think of. :smile:
D
drdee
Hi HK,
This seems like a familiar thread. Am I back at pg? lol
I just joined here and am Getting my feet wet posting.
Hey, on that afghan that was going bonkers with vegetative growth... I pruned it and changed the nutes which were way high. I think it was just a vigorous plant combined with a very aggressive nute regimen and was in a hydrofarm which, because of the oxygen availability, encourages explosive growth...so, just a combination of things. Live and learn. Looking great now and has a month to go.
My question relates to timers. I was wondering if you've experimented with various digital timers. I bought several inexpensive digital timer locally and they have random mode, astronomical mode and an incredible array of options that I don't need. I've tried and can't get the damn things to work. Mind you, I'm an old fart with bad eyes and am somewhat technologically challenged. I need to be able to contol pumps with 1 minute increments. I'm setting up a DIY large pot E&F and I need two times to control the supply and return pumps. Any experience you can pass along? At this point, ease of use is more important then cost.
Take care,
Dee
This seems like a familiar thread. Am I back at pg? lol
I just joined here and am Getting my feet wet posting.
Hey, on that afghan that was going bonkers with vegetative growth... I pruned it and changed the nutes which were way high. I think it was just a vigorous plant combined with a very aggressive nute regimen and was in a hydrofarm which, because of the oxygen availability, encourages explosive growth...so, just a combination of things. Live and learn. Looking great now and has a month to go.
My question relates to timers. I was wondering if you've experimented with various digital timers. I bought several inexpensive digital timer locally and they have random mode, astronomical mode and an incredible array of options that I don't need. I've tried and can't get the damn things to work. Mind you, I'm an old fart with bad eyes and am somewhat technologically challenged. I need to be able to contol pumps with 1 minute increments. I'm setting up a DIY large pot E&F and I need two times to control the supply and return pumps. Any experience you can pass along? At this point, ease of use is more important then cost.
Take care,
Dee
You want this:
http://www.bghydro.com/BGH/itemdesc.asp?ic=TICCARTDNE&eq=&Tp=
SD (hope I can post in this thread, I'm an old fart,too!)
D
drdee
Hey Sunnydog...that's a great timer you linked to. Thanks so much. You can time to as little as 1 second? I can't imagine...
Hempcat...sheesh, you must type faster then Mavis Beacon! Sorry to jack your thread but I got the answer I needed.
Peace guys,
Dee
Hempcat...sheesh, you must type faster then Mavis Beacon! Sorry to jack your thread but I got the answer I needed.
Peace guys,
Dee
I thought it is 1 minute.....
Well first, no you're not back at PG although rumor has it PG is just temporarily down due to technical problems that just happened to occur at a point in time when the technical guy (Gad) was unreachable. Supposedly it should be back up Monday or Tuesday. What this is, is essentially the same as over at PG, me trying to help people with the basics.
Now onto the question of timers, alas all I've ever needed timers for were hours not minutes. So for me the traditional analog kind have been fine. I just make sure to get the heavy duty ones. Mainly due to the fact that in the event of a loss of power digital timers, like most digital things have a tendency to reset to a default value which could be devastating to one's grow if not caught in time depending on what it controlled,
I'd say if you need control down to the minute then you probably have to go digital but surely there have to be ones without all those other settings that many might never need?
Sure I've been wanting some help for a long time. :smile: Although I'll warn you there can be some long slow stretches manning this ship.
Cool, that bodes well for the new guy. Seems like he has hydro experience to which I desperately need someone to help with that since I'm strictly a soil guy so far
I'd leave 2 of the three 1K MH out of the equation maybe use them for veg but that's alot of wattage for veg or get more HPS. Assuming one isn't able to get more then I'd use one 1K MH in the middle and the two HPS 600W's on each end angled in slightly so the HPS and MH really overlap.
Mixing the two spectrums is fine and some even think it's more like outdoors and therefore better. You still want the red spectrum to be dominent though since flowering plants respond slightly better to red spectrum light.
Ideally I'd have all 1000W and start with all 3 MH thru the stretch phase(first 2-3 weeks of flower usually). Blue Spectrum light tends to promote more compact growth in flower so hopefully it would keep stretching to a minimum. Then after the stretch phase I'd switch it to 2 MH and 1 HPS for the next couple of weeks. Then 2 HPS and 1 MH for the next couple of weeks and then finish off the last few weeks with all HPS. This would be done in hopes of somewhat mimicing fow the way the sun refracts thru the atmosphere changes from more blue in the late spring early summer to more red in the late summer early fall.
Of course it all depends on how big a space you're trying to cover as to how many lights you need. I say 3 because that's the most I could ever see myself working with. As it is right now one or 2 1000W lights is all I need.
Okay well knowing that if you want to, you can do what I was saying with the two HPS and one MH and then set up a seperate spot in the same area but away from the footprint of the 3 lights and just use the 2 MH for that spot.
In flowering it's prefered to use more red spectrum but it's not a requirement, the difference between MH and HPS is not so significant that you absolutely have to flower with HPS. Either HPS of MH can be used from the start of veg thru harvest. MH flowered plants will be slightly smaller but the buds will be more dense and heavier. So if you wanted to use all your lights you could but if you're shooting for a good spectrum mix then do the 2 HPS to one MH that I suggested.
Lets begin... i have box 40x60x70cm (dont know how to write x length x height cm) and 4x120mm fans for blowing air out and 2x92mm for blowing it in. One of outblowers is attached to cool tube, in the other end of cool tube is another 120mm fan whitch is pushing air through cool tube and out. In the front end of the box i have big 22cm fan for air mixing in the box. I have 3x2+1 pots in the box.
The problem is following: The two backer flowers dont get enough light (because of cool tube) and i saw stretching signs. So do you think its good idea to remove cool tube and put in just ordinary hood and 22cm big fan directed into the light so the fan will move hot air towards the back of the box and the exhaust fans will suck it out? The two backer plants dont get almost nothing light and i must do something about that. Please help me ASAP.
IndianHay
The problem is following: The two backer flowers dont get enough light (because of cool tube) and i saw stretching signs. So do you think its good idea to remove cool tube and put in just ordinary hood and 22cm big fan directed into the light so the fan will move hot air towards the back of the box and the exhaust fans will suck it out? The two backer plants dont get almost nothing light and i must do something about that. Please help me ASAP.
IndianHay
I have a question for you. Don't really know where I can ask this so I thought who better then you. OK so I have been smoking around 12 years now (only weed) sometimes a lot and some times only a little. When winter comes it gets really cold and also dry here and it gets harder for me to breath (also have a cat and cat allergies). If I smoke before I go to bed (one or two hours before) I wake up and hack for like 10 minutes, Flem Flem Flem. I am wondering if you ever have problems breathing in the morning or just really congested. also I am wondering if you have any advice to help my problem. I am worried I might have lung problems or something. Do you think if I start running or biking my lungs would get stronger and help elevate the problem? I am 28 years old.
Richard Gozinya
Member
OK, everything is going good but here is my problem. I am in day 50 of flower, thought I had the mite prob solved prior to start of flower. Well, i didn't and they are rallying the fucking troops.
Should I cut early and chalk it up to a learning experience, cut early and make loads of edibles of BHO.
2nd part of this, when making BHO or edibles do I need to cure it the same?
Thank you
Should I cut early and chalk it up to a learning experience, cut early and make loads of edibles of BHO.
2nd part of this, when making BHO or edibles do I need to cure it the same?
Thank you
