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Perpetual grow with DWC/Hydro?

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Mrkline006

Member
im looking into a possible perpetual grow.. I was debating between hydro (DWC) and Soil... I really dont want a mess, or risk bugs which i know soil can do... I ran Pure coco on my first grow and loved it (aside from having to feed 1-2x per day, too much time with that) So I decided to read on Hydro, specifically DWC, or RDWC... I currently have 2x50 gallon barrels so i feel like I have the needed water amounts (could always trade those for a few smaller ones.

I guess my question is how realistic is it to run dwc for perpetual grow? I want to house my own mothers in which I could gather my own clones then obviously veg/flower. Im just not sure where to start with all this? Im in the process of building my room, im looking to ONLY flower up to 8 plants at a time. I know plants grow faster in hydro and thats where my issues I think come in, how long can i really veg for? doesnt solid rooting of clones take a few weeks? I have no more than 6ft in height to work with. Any questions feel free to ask, THANKS!!
 
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packerfan79

Active member
Veteran
Sounds like you are going to have issues with differing nute requirements due to different stages of growth.I wpuld suggest soil or coco. Perpetual is complicated, with a mom/veg area you could harvest every 8-10 weeks.
 
M

Mrkline006

Member
packerfan79 said:
Sounds like you are going to have issues with differing nute requirements due to different stages of growth.I wpuld suggest soil or coco. Perpetual is complicated, with a mom/veg area you could harvest every 8-10 weeks.
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Wouldn't I just use veg nutes, then once putting into flower, change out res and go with Flower nutes?
 
Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
You can do perpetual, with several reservoirs in rotation. Unless you engineer something with a lot of places for nasty stuff to hide and grow, your roots will become entangled as the grow progresses. So, start a res. In a few weeks, or whatever your rotation schedule is, start your next res.

Each res is separate, so the fade and flush are able to be done on schedule.
 
M

Mrkline006

Member
Douglas.Curtis said:
You can do perpetual, with several reservoirs in rotation. Unless you engineer something with a lot of places for nasty stuff to hide and grow, your roots will become entangled as the grow progresses. So, start a res. In a few weeks, or whatever your rotation schedule is, start your next res.

Each res is separate, so the fade and flush are able to be done on schedule.
Click to expand...

I'll be starting from seed so i have some time lol.. My thing is, should I keep the plants in the res I put them in for veg, or transfer after veg to the flower room? I feel like hiking plants AND buckets be a pain??
 
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packerfan79

Active member
Veteran
Mrkline006 said:
I'll be starting from seed so i have some time lol.. My thing is, should I keep the plants in the res I put them in for veg, or transfer after veg to the flower room? I feel like hiking plants AND buckets be a pain??
Click to expand...

If your going to be a grower get used to the pain. Lol nothing easy about it.
 
Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
Mrkline006 said:
I'll be starting from seed so i have some time lol.. My thing is, should I keep the plants in the res I put them in for veg, or transfer after veg to the flower room? I feel like hiking plants AND buckets be a pain??
Click to expand...
Learn bonsai mums and cloning. Seriously. You'll want to run clones from the same plant multiple times, so you can dial in the feed and harvest times properly. Main reason I'm not a fan of seed plants is their variations in nutritional and flowering needs.

Start your mums, take cuttings and grow roots on them for clones, veg them till you have a handful sized root ball (depending on the space in your flowering room), and then transfer them to the flowering room res. Bigger plants are going to tangle roots fairly quickly, so plan accordingly.

Awesome quality, when you get the feed correct and harvest timing down. Multiple seed plants in the same tub (even with today's 'Stable' strains. lol) are going to give you varying quality, due to varying fade/feed times/needs.
 
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Mrkline006

Member
thinking for now money wise since i have to build my whole room, along with equip it. I may wait on the DWC and just run coco...

anyone have a good solid link to build a homemade auto watering device? I have 2x 55 gallons drums, and from there im lost lol.. I know i'd need a pump and timer. and yeah.
 
Antrim

Antrim

Member
I have a perpetual RDWC setup. Basically, it's 3 different RDWC systems. I have one in my veg room and two in my flower room. The plants veg for 4-5 weeks before being moved to the flower room for 8-10 weeks. As the plants move out of veg another takes its place. Harvest about once a month. Fairly cheap to DIY. The only spendy part was the 3 water chillers, but after running DWC without them I've found it well worth the money.
 
E

Easy7

Active member
Veteran
Never got the idea of perpetual myself. Uneven light canopy does not get the best harvest.

Much better to focus on great harvests. Honestly with hydro, you can get a lot of harvests per year when SOG (minimal veg).

Sorta like a shotgun flowering chamber. Throw crooted clones in, veg forva day or three, then flower. Short flowering strains could get 6 harvests a year.

Hydro is by far a monocrop system. Bumping out plants as alike to eachother as possible. It's all about yield.
 
Douglas.Curtis

Douglas.Curtis

Autistic Diplomat in Training
Antrim said:
Uneven light canopy?
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Uneven canopy for the light footprint. Meaning you have different height plants but a level light pttern. Optimal quality is created by keeping all budsites within the optimal light density zone.

Just another reason I never do perpetual. ;)
 
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Easy7

Active member
Veteran
One way to stagger harvests is more than one tent. Just don't mess up the stages in each tent getting confused.

Shot gun flower (no veg) 70 day plants a month apart in two tents, and harvest about once a month. But then ya gotta remeber the curing time for each harvest separately.
 
OG_NoMan

OG_NoMan

Not Veteran
420giveaway
Easy7 said:
One way to stagger harvests is more than one tent. Just don't mess up the stages in each tent getting confused.

Shot gun flower (no veg) 70 day plants a month apart in two tents, and harvest about once a month. But then ya gotta remeber the curing time for each harvest separately.
Click to expand...

This is ultimately my goal indoor. I have 2 5'x12' flower rooms side by side giving me 4 5×5 areas. Once i get where i want to be i plan to add a flipper and start a side of the room every 2-3 weeks.
Good luck :biggrin:
 
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