Maccars 1st Journal - Hericules Fem 250W HPS - Hydro - Closet - Smartpot - SCROG

[Maccar]

Hi all well ive decided that this, my third ever grow will be my first journal.


First of all, the details.

Strain ; Sannie's Hericules Feminized
Clone or Seed ; Seed
Space ; 2' x 3' x 6' closet
Soil or Hydro ; Hydro Smartpot
Number of plants ; 1
Medium ; 50% Vermiculite 50% Perlite
Light ; 250w of combined led and cfl for veg and 250w of HPS for flower
Training or elnatural ; LST & SCROG
Nutes ; Local hydro shops own mix
Screen Height ; 10" Above medium

Ill get pictures up soon with the setup and so on, but basicly its a closet with exhaust fan up top that runs via a sock type carbon filter. I dont have a inlet fan as yet but i think thats where i will do variations on this grow because keeping temps down with the hps is a struggle. At the moment there is just a hole in the bottom of the cabinet for inlet air. The smartpot is something im in love with....... Basically the whole setup was 100 bucks and all it is is a resivior (holds 40 litres i think) and this cool pot holding tray that has a "smartvalve" in it that floods the bottom of the pot to about 1.5". Then it shuts the valve from the gravity fed resivior, and slowly the nutrients are absorbed by the plant and then once the pot is nearly dry it will flood again. So its pretty much a supply on demand setup. I used it for my last grow and just loved it, never tested ph or all those other things once, and just refilled the resivior every week or so and it just grew and grew and grew. It made my first attempt at hydro very very easy and amazed me with how quick the grow rate was. Heres hoping i get the same results this time. Last grow i got 3.5oz with little training so this time im going for a scrog with lst before it hits the screen to get better cover. Hoping to get at least 5oz this time and any input from you much more experienced growers would be appreciated. Anyway seed went in tonight and pics up soon. Thanks for reading.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Ok got some pics sorted, crappy quality sorry bout that only using iphone camera at the moment. Should be getting my camera back in a couple of weeks.

Fairly basic cabinet setup, i just put the screen in there today. I havent been too stressed about shades for the cfls because that light config there is only for veg and it did a good job last time.

Full interiour of the cabinet, up the top left is the exhaust fan with ducting that goes to ceiling via a carbon filter.

Here you can see the green reservior on the outside left of the cabinet that just gravity feeds to the smartpot.

On the left hand side there is a inlet vent with louvers that open and close acording to the suction from the exhaust fan. Im thinking about putting a inlet fan there instead to try and prevent the high temperatures i get when the HID is on during flowering. Space is a bit of an issue for a fan there though. Also you can see there is the feed tube coming through the vent currently for the smartpot.

Disregard the light heights at the mo... they will be adjusted when seedling is planted.

No movement from the seed yet, bit early anyway i think.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

TADAAAAA............... finally

Ok so its in. Basicly with this setup i just plant the seedling with the medium only about 3-4 inches from the bottom of the bucket. The Medium is dry untill the nutes mix slowly sucks up which is about 2 hours from initial hookup. With the medium around the seedling i just put plain water to make it a bit damp. The idea being that the seedling is intially planted close to the bottom, so the taproot doesn't have far to travel to hit the new nutes, and over the next week i will put more and more medium in as the seedling stretches untill its about 1" below the top of the pot.

The lights are nice and high and for the first two or three cycles ill only have the cfl's on as the seedling only popped out today. The nutes mix for the first 10 litres (2.64gal) is only half strength.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Update day 11 from seed.

Things are progressing nicely here. Over the next week as the little lady grows taller, i will keep adding medium until it is only about an inch from the top of the pot. Things will start to get interesting in about a weeks time when it will be on full strength nutes. Meanwhile looking ahead to flowering, im going to have to do something about temps when the HPS is running. I was thinking of getting a cooltube and upgrading the fan thats exhausting atm with a higher powered fan. When i get this fan i want to get one thats capable of doing the job with a 400w hps in the cabinet because i think ill end up upgrading from the 250w hps eventually as well. I dont know what fan im going to get but i would like to stick with the 6" models and i was thinking of going to something like a 400cfm blower of some sort. Dont know if this is overkill, but any oppions would be great.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Update day 18 from seed.

As you can see, things progressing nicely here. Just after i took these pictures i took off the lower set of leaves (first set) and put another inch of medium in. Time to start some LST soon i think.

 

[Tmac12]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Looking good!

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Thanks for dropping by Tmac, i was starting to get a bit lonely on here lol.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Update day 23 from seed.

Little lady is doing very well. So far nice and healthy with good growth. As you can see tonight i gave her her first bit of lst. Just a gentle bend tonight, tomorrow ill take her further over. Im not sure how long ill veg for. I might take it right out to 31 days from seed (8 days from now). Just because im a little OCD.

Ive never done a scrog grow before so im not sure if i should be doing a longer veg and trying to get her to fill out more........
Any tips welcome.
Thanks for reading.

 

[j4s2u0]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Looking good there Maccar,perfect green...looks very healthy and growing fast!

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Looking good there Maccar,perfect green...looks very healthy and growing fast!

j4s2u0
Yeah i dont have any other hydro grows under my belt to compare with but the speed and ease of use with this smartpot system is easy to fall in love with.

 

[Setting Sun]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

very cool Maccar!

I've been eyeballing those Smartpots and Auto-pots for a long time. Always wondered how well they did because the medium never really gets flushed at all.

Do you know what strength nutes you're running in ppm?

Instead of planting the seedling down deep and building the medium up around it as it grows, you could just fill the pot with medium, plant the seedling on top, and hand-water the pot until the seedlings roots hit the bottom. It usually takes about a week or so before the roots get down there, so you just would need to hand water for that one week, then the gravity feed takes over.

your plant is looking great!

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

very cool Maccar!

I've been eyeballing those Smartpots and Auto-pots for a long time. Always wondered how well they did because the medium never really gets flushed at all.

Do you know what strength nutes you're running in ppm?

Instead of planting the seedling down deep and building the medium up around it as it grows, you could just fill the pot with medium, plant the seedling on top, and hand-water the pot until the seedlings roots hit the bottom. It usually takes about a week or so before the roots get down there, so you just would need to hand water for that one week, then the gravity feed takes over.

your plant is looking great!

Yeah i was curious about the possibility of nute burn before i bought it but the guy in the shop was adamant i wouldn't have an issue....(as all salesmen are ) But yeah my first grow with this pot was so simple and the plant was so healthy and full right to the end, the only thing that held me back yeild wise was that i did minimal training and space became an issue. So im hoping this grow will go the same way and the pot will deliver again, but with better yeild results!!! As for the ppm of the nutes i dont know the answer but i can tell u the info of the bottle. Its a nutrient mix with part a and part b and the shop guy told me to run the same strength most of the grow with just a little less at the start and a little more in the middle of flowering. Anyway the bottle says:
K/N Ratio 1.2
Ca/K + Mg + N 0.6
NPK Ratio 4.5 : 1 : 5.6

Wtf any of this means im not sure, theres heaps more info on the bottle like Nitrate, Iron and all that as well. The guy at the shop did also imply that i would probably get similar results with canna vega and flores but would have to fiddle with levels as his mix is sort of dialed to the pot.......
Not sure how true any of this is as its all from a salesman, i might actually do a comparison grow next and do the exact same setup, strain ect but canna nutes mixes instead.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Update day 29 from seed.

Things progressing nicely here. I noticed the plant stalled for a day or two after a bit of rigourous LST action the other night. But she seems to be back into the swing now.

 

[Setting Sun]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Plant's looking great and bushing out nicely!

Whatever's in those nutes from the shop seems to be working fine.

I'm thinking of ordering one of the "smart valves" from that system to set up a tray or tub with a few 5" pots.

I've tried some landscape fabric in the bottom of pots to see if it would keep the roots from growing out of the drainage holes, but it just slows them down, doesn't prevent it completely, but I think two layers would do the job pretty well. Doesn't affect drainage at all, but I need to keep the roots in the pot so they don't grow into and foul the valve.

nice job Maccar!

 

[Tmac12]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Your plant is looking very nice and healthy!!

 

[karagrows]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Your plant is looking very nice and healthy!!

I agree Tmac, plant looks happy as hell... Nice job.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Plant's looking great and bushing out nicely!

Whatever's in those nutes from the shop seems to be working fine.

I'm thinking of ordering one of the "smart valves" from that system to set up a tray or tub with a few 5" pots.

I've tried some landscape fabric in the bottom of pots to see if it would keep the roots from growing out of the drainage holes, but it just slows them down, doesn't prevent it completely, but I think two layers would do the job pretty well. Doesn't affect drainage at all, but I need to keep the roots in the pot so they don't grow into and foul the valve.

nice job Maccar!

The smartpot comes with fabric disks just like your talking about. I dont know what sort of fabric it is but i reckon two layers of the landscape fabric would do a similar job. As you said if it drains well i dont think you would have an issue.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

I agree Tmac, plant looks happy as hell... Nice job.

Thanks guys and karagrows.

 

[Maccar]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

Plant is doing great and filling out well. I am going to do the switch to HPS & 12/12 this Thursday. I was wondering what people do when they are LST'ing like this, do thy continue to tie them up and train them after the 12/12 switch has been made? I am planning to keep training them through the stretch, to fill out the screen. Obviously i wont be doing any more hardcore bending, i was just planning on giving them a nudge in the right direction. Thoughts and opinions welcomed.

 

[Setting Sun]

Re: Maccars 1st Journal. Hericules Fem, 250w HPS, Hydro, Closet, Smartpot, SCROG

In early bloom, the stems are still pretty flexible and I can still bend them over, but they start getting too woody and stiff after a week or two of bloom.

Also, once the plants start blooming, I don't want to stress them or make them spend them energy on things other than forming flowers, so I do my best to have all my LST'ing done before I flip them.

I wouldn't hesitate to apply more LST in early bloom if I had to, but I prefer not to.