My First Grow Ever!

[Rifleman]

4x8' tent
1000w hps @ 60%, 18/6
Raptor hood 6"
1 oscillating fan
4 five gal bucket DWC
clay pellet medium
Humboldt nutes; micro, grow, bloom
2 RQS Bubble Kush Auto
2 bag seeds

Grow is 1 wk old. Nutrient was 4ml of ea per bucket, 1/4 suggested dose. PH was 5.8 when grow started.
All four have stretched due to my light being too far away. I've been lowering it every few days.
17" yesterday, 7hrs @ 10" today, 6" now.
With fan blowing it is 84*F at base of plant. I'm checking them every 30 min for any damage. None so far.
Water change is due in two days.

Other than the stretch and some ugly distortion at the base of the first 2 true leaves of the bag seed, everything seems to be going good. All 4 are showing 2nd node growth, from full blown leaves to just sprouting them.

Suggestions, warnings, or criticisims ?

 

[mrrobert420]

pictures? and welcome!! You will find everything you need here - Just ask, someone is pretty much always here to help

 

[Kola320]

Your gonna wanna watch for some root rot with those temps my floor temp is 75 f and I have problems with rot. the light is a bit overkill at this young of a stage don't get me wrong I love my 1000 but don't really use it till I hit 3 weeks. If you have troubles with rot, we use the same line of nutes, I use there micro an Bloom in veg like a lucas formula. till flower then go to master A an B... But what I have found is a product called Mykos extreme gardening works really well to keep rot away you use like a tbls per gallon of water you might wanna look into it if you start to see root problems. Other than that I think your off to a good start happy growing

 

[Rifleman]

The light is only running at 60%, so 600w. It's probably a little extreme at this point, but it's all I have. By week three I plan to bump it to 750w, and again to 1000w around week 7. Sound alright? I'll keep an eye on the root rot. I've done a lot of research and made a fairly big investment, so I'm keeping a very close eye on everything. Thanks for the advice.

 

[mastertek2000]

going to get hot in there

 

[mrrobert420]

Agreed on those temps - unless its sealed with c02 gonna need to bring that baby down

 

[Rifleman]

Since stealth isn't a huge concern I leave one of the tent step thru doors unzipped but closed, and the other one fully open, rolled up and placed on top of the tent. Heat is definitely a problem. A fan and ducting is going to have to wait a few weeks though. I just checked my bucket temps and my water is at 82*F. I have the air pump cranked way up to keep O2 levels elevated. Will more freq water changes help me avoid root rot and algae until they are tall enough that the light will be far enough away to keep from heating my nute solution? How about a lower budget way of keeping everything cool?

 

[Khraevyn]

Hey Rifleman!!

I am new myself, but this site is really nice. A lot of people actually take the time to respond and help others out. In regards to ur heat issue, i would imagine if you could keep a good supply of clean cool water available, you could try to control your temps that way. I see that having a lot of issues though. A lot of wasted nutes and making sure your water is perfect every time. If u can get a fan and place it up higher to act as an exhaust, that would help. Keep it as high as you can as that's where the hot air is. Even just a little desk fan or something to at least create a flow or draft. Just getting the air moving will help cool it down some. You can also try something like this to blow cool air in:

This seems like a pretty simple setup as long as you're not blowing the air directly on the plants. They may not like the cold air.

Good luck and I'll be watching with excitement!!

~K~

 

[Rifleman]

Had to go out today and leave the babies unattended. Returned home to find one of the bubble kush leaning waaaay over. Too much heat. She has begun to stand back up and recover since lights out. The light has already been raised and another oscillating fan added to help vent the heat. 17" away and I felt like they were stretching, 6" away and I almost lost a known girl. I'm going to try and settle on around 11" away & see how that works. Other than the heat created my the mini sun in my tent everything is looking good to me. But wtf do I know, I'm a noob. Lesson learned today?....patience dummy. I may be in a hurry to see rapid growth, but it'll never happen if I kill them first.

Tomorrow morning is my first water change. I'll be looking at it closely, and smelling the water also. I have a pic of each plant for everyday of it's growth so far, & with the light raised out of the way tomorrow I thought I'd take a few more. If I can figure out how to embed them in a post I will. I prefer to embed rather than link just cause I feel it's easier to maintain reading momentum. HA, how's that for OCD. lol

Results so far are as follows;
Plant 1, day 9, 3" 2nd set of leaves 1/4" long....bag seed
Plant 2, day 9, 2.5" 2nd set of leaves 1" long....bag seed
Plant 3, day 5, 3" 2nd set of leaves 3/8" long....bubba kush auto
Plant 4, day 4, 2.5" 2nd set of leaves microscopic....bubba kush auto

 

[Rifleman]

If I did this correctly you should be able to see my babies now.

plant #1

plant #2

plant #3

plant #4

 

[Rifleman]

First water change today. Everything looked and smelled ok. I'm hoping it is early enough in the grow that everyone will recover from the excessive heat. The light is now at 11" and still only 600w. What do you think? Plants 1 & 3 look rough to me. Here's to a full recovery & maybe an inline fan sooner than later. Enjoy, and comments are welcome and appreciated as this is my first grow in my life.

The entire garden.

Plant 1

Plant 2
Plant 3
Plant 4

Hopefully I've linked each photo to a larger version.

 

[Kola320]

Do you have a fan blowing on them gently ? it will help strengthen the stems and move some of that hot air around

 

[Rifleman]

Water change took about 90 min start to fin, including clean up. I took each bucket out of the tent to make sure any remaining residue from the growing media was washed out of the bucket bottoms. There was quite a lot even though I had rinsed the media before using. That will be the last time I do it this way. Next weeks water is already in the tent in 5 gal buckets allowing it to evap any chlorine & gain room temp. Next time I will mix my nutes and ph three of my replacement water buckets *before* starting the rest of the process to streamline it some. Then use my pump to empty and refill each bucket in turn.

On initial set up my solution PH was around 8.1
I adjusted each bucket to between 5.7 and 6.1
Before removal today they were between 7.2 and 7.4
The new solutions all are between 5.9 and 6.1

It has only been two hours since completing the water change but I swear they look better to me. I think I'm on the right track with the light ~ 11" for now and an upper and lower fan to keep the air moving. Now that I have the photo thing figured out, I'll at least post a weekly update on water change days. Looking forward to learning as much as I can from you guys. I hope you enjoy watching my babies grow as much I am.

 

[Rifleman]

Do you have a fan blowing on them gently ? it will help strengthen the stems and move some of that hot air around

I now have a 12" oscillating fan on low, on the floor of one end of the tent, and an 18" oscillating pedestal fan on the other end above light level running on med.

Plant #3 is still suffering two mistakes. The heat, but I'm also thinking when I placed the sprout in the rapid rooter the tap root caught and it didn't fall in as far as the others, and I didn't want to force or damage it. Next grow germination will take place in the rapid rooters.

 

[Khraevyn]

Sounds like you are having some fun, huh? One of the reasons I didn't want to start with all that heat to deal with. As long as you can keep the air moving, it sounds like you got it under some control. I would suggest instead of having ur second fan above the lights, have it actually blowing across the bulb or hood where it is hottest. Most likely right across the bulb bottom. Angle it to swirl around and and kind of see what works best. I hope you got a handle on it. I can just imagine what your gonna have to deal with when you crank it that thing to full 1000W. Good luck brother!!

~K~

 

[Rifleman]

Heat is going to be a problem.

 

[Rifleman]

Agreed on those temps - unless its sealed with c02 gonna need to bring that baby down

I've been reading some about cO2 Mr R. Doing the math it appears I would need and additional 1/3 cu ft of cO2 to reach the desired 1500. That doesn't sound like a large amount especially since I have 25 or 30 old cO2 fire extinguishers. lol. Question for you, I know this isn't optimal but once I reach flowering stage would a 1 or 2 sec burst into the tent at lights out be beneficial? I've got a ways to go before I need to worry about that, but I'm trying to be in front of the educational ball for once in my life.

 

[Rifleman]

Sounds like you are having some fun, huh? One of the reasons I didn't want to start with all that heat to deal with. As long as you can keep the air moving, it sounds like you got it under some control. I would suggest instead of having ur second fan above the lights, have it actually blowing across the bulb or hood where it is hottest. Most likely right across the bulb bottom. Angle it to swirl around and and kind of see what works best. I hope you got a handle on it. I can just imagine what your gonna have to deal with when you crank it that thing to full 1000W. Good luck brother!!

~K~

I am having a blast. I just looked at the pics from two days ago and I'm sure I've got the heat handled for now. I swear they have doubled in two days. I'm not sure I'll take the light past 600w now. I think for my size grow that it would reach the point of diminishing returns when I factor in the cost & PITA heat in the small room. Of course when the time comes who knows...I'm just feeling a little cheap after buying a fan and ducting this weekend. <snerk> It's only money, right?

 

[Rifleman]

Plant 1, the one that was most heat damaged.


Plant 2 4th node growth, under 3 inches.


Plant 3 Bubble Kush Auto


Plant 4 Bubble Kush Auto


Just a mid week update. They are taking off nicely. What do you think? Click on the image for a larger view.

 

[Sir Budlovski]

Just checked out your journal mate, I think they really have picked up very well now compared to the last few updates the auto looks quiet happy.
Havnt had any issues with the pellets you are using in the hydroton?