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250w HPS users....

O

otherwhitemeat

Limey and bat. Thanks again for the kinds words...Yeah, i have a long flowering Sativa (aka NY Haze) that takes about 3 months...I can let it go beyond then and get some frosty nugs, but the buds start a late stretch that winds up turning into HUGE colas. I have good experience now with this strain. I trim all the buds and keep the frostiest beauties for smoking, the fan leavs, popcorn buds and assorted trim get turned into cannabutter. Next up I am trying some Top44 and Papaya as I want to shorten my time to harvest...I am sure I'll get quite a bit less than the oz/sq ft I have been getting, but will gladly sacrifice that for more frequent harvests...I'll post some pics when I am lucky enough to find some females...lady luck has not been nice to me the past few weeks.
 

limey

Member
otherwhitemeat said:
Limey and bat. Thanks again for the kinds words......I'll post some pics when I am lucky enough to find some females...lady luck has not been nice to me the past few weeks.

No worries, man

I have read some interesting stuff on how germinating conditions affect the gender of plants grown from seeds. I must admit, I find it a bit confusing as I thought gender was determined purely by genetics and so was set at the point of fertilisation. Nonetheless, I understand, for instance, that relatively high 'N' levels for seeds and seedlings do predispose plants towards being female. This is borne out by recent personal experience, as I tried controlling the height of some KC33 that I was growing by keeping N levels very low at seed and seedling stage. I got high germination rates but a VERY low count of females: only 1 in 7. This may have been bad luck but that's statistically unlikely.

Otherwise the germinating conditions encouraging female plants are, I understand:
consistently damp but not soaking substrate
generous space for the tap root to develop
shorter day lengths (i.e. germinating at 14-16 hours and raising the daylength for veg to 18-24 hours as the seedlings develop)
closer to pH6 than pH7

I haven't as yet tested this shorter day lengths for germination method and would be interested to hear what others have to say about it.

Otherwise you can find my preferred germinating method detailed in the UK growers thread on IC - though I happily admit I closely copied it from 'Big book of buds 2', it works well for me.

Peace :joint:
 
C

cdd

limey said:
Nice young 'uns, man.

You growing these under a CFL?

Have you FIMed them or is the short, squat cabbage shape natural?

:joint:

Hey limey, These are under 250w MH right now... one of them is lst'd the other one is topped so it has 4 branches spread flat out like a X.
I think thats even better cuz u have 4 stems to lst instead of 1
:rasta:
 
O

otherwhitemeat

limey said:
Otherwise the germinating conditions encouraging female plants are, I understand:
consistently damp but not soaking substrate
generous space for the tap root to develop
shorter day lengths (i.e. germinating at 14-16 hours and raising the daylength for veg to 18-24 hours as the seedlings develop)
closer to pH6 than pH7

Wow! This is helpful! ALL of my conditions are no optimal... abuddy recommended using clone nutes after the seedlings clear the Grodan plugs, never though of it...He also showed me that the package for the rockwool advise adjusting ph before dropping the seeds in...I may have to rethink things a bit.
 

limey

Member
otherwhitemeat said:
Wow! This is helpful! abuddy recommended using clone nutes after the seedlings clear the Grodan plugs, never though of it...He also showed me that the package for the rockwool advise adjusting ph before dropping the seeds in...

No worries, my friend.

Your buddy gave you good advice there. Particularly pH adjusting the rockwool cubes, which are naturally alkaline. I pre-soak mine as previously described.

Best wishes for your gro :joint:
 

limey

Member
cdd said:
Hey limey, These are under 250w MH right now... one of them is lst'd the other one is topped so it has 4 branches spread flat out like a X.
I think thats even better cuz u have 4 stems to lst instead of 1
:rasta:

OK, cool. I used to use a 250w MH (and was very happy with it) but have recently swapped to using a 125w CFL for the veg stage (then upping to 250w HPS for flowering). Though the 125w CFL is half the wattage, it runs much much cooler so you can take advantage of the inverse square law and bring the lamp much closer to the plants (with mine, 2 inches/6cm) so you end up getting pretty much the same intensity of light for half the wattage/expense. And of course, less security risks - heat detection wise - with cool CFL lamps, for the veg period at least.

Anyway, as I said, I like the look of your plants and wish you well with them. Will be interested to hear how they develop.

Best wishes for your gro :joint:
 

K.J

Kief Junkie's inhaling the knowledge!
Veteran
limey said:
OK, cool. I used to use a 250w MH (and was very happy with it) but have recently swapped to using a 125w CFL for the veg stage (then upping to 250w HPS for flowering). Though the 125w CFL is half the wattage, it runs much much cooler so you can take advantage of the inverse square law and bring the lamp much closer to the plants (with mine, 2 inches/6cm) so you end up getting pretty much the same intensity of light for half the wattage/expense.

This is exactly what I'll be doing in my soon to be built NGB-style cab; 125w CFL for veg/mom/clone room and a 250w HPS for the flower room.
 
J

janedope

hey guys just found this thread... definately one ill be checkin back on... i'm growin with a 250HPS, right now i got Mendo Purps, Apollo 11, EC Sour Diesel and the White...
 
I

Iron_Lion

Here's a few pics of my JW Apollo 11 grown with a 250W HPS.

right before the chop



day 30




 
I

Iron_Lion

cdd said:
nice iron lion.. looks a bit like mines

hp day 16 12/12








Nice LST cdd, were those topped too? I topped then LST'd the mothers and LST'd the rooted tops.


 
M

mrred

I have a questions
59260mycab-thumb.JPG

What size fan to use?
It has to run thru the carbon scrubber then thru the cool tube and out the back. OR what cfm rating for just straight exhaust out the back with no cooltube or carbon scrubber? All with ballast in grow area.

Cab size is Height 36 W 27 and Depth of 25, SIngle 250hps of course

I was thinking the S&P TD-150 293/218 cfm (high/low) or S&P TD-125 197/149 cfm (high/low)., cant be more than 6 inchs round
 
C

cdd

Iron_Lion said:
Nice LST cdd, were those topped too? I topped then LST'd the mothers and LST'd the rooted tops.

Yes, they where both topped once to make the "lower" branches grow bigger, and keep up with the "top" even though topping is not actually lst, i felt like i needed to do it and it turned out fine:joint:
 

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