Redemption - Second Attempt Indoor Grow - Bagseed
- Thread starter Gree N
- Start date
Ok I did the math and compared my grow mix to yours.
It's handy to have an ec meter to measure ppm, though not essential.
My grow formula NPK is 3-2-4, so the bottle contains 9% total of nutrients- ignoring the micronutrients. I'll spare you the math because I mix mine differently- diluted to 4 litres of water instead of ten.
If I call 'full strength' the maximum reccomended dose on the schedule written on the bottle - for the height of veg growth (which is nearly always going to be too strong and burn your plants by the way)- and I then dilute this down to 1/4 strength for seedlings, which is what I do- I will be using roughly at the same total strength as you say you're using.
So if that's confusing- the 'half strength' of your mix is roughly the same as the '1/4 strength' of mine. This concentration is what I would use for rooted seedlings between about 4 and 8" tall. Brand new cuttings and very young seedlings would get about 1/2 this- so 1/8 strength total in my case, or '1/4 strength' in yours.
The other thing to factor in your water. I use rainwater so it's basically pure- zero ppm. If you're using tap water you have to factor in the ppm of that to the total strength of your mix.
If you're using tap water you may be able to get a public ware report that will tell you everything in it. Otherwise an ec meter can at least tell you the total concentration.
Aside from that there is the issue of ph- shouldn't be a huge concern for soil as long as your soil mix is decent and your water isn't something completely crazy.
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- #23
Sounds good thanks for the advice. I've got the four pots in a mix of about 50% perlite 30% coir and 20% soil. The CYCO says hydro use only so if not using it on the pots, I wonder if I can?
The DWC buckets I'm using water from my pretty new aircon unit which should have no minerals in it and taking the water from 7 down too 5.5.
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- #24
Bit of a update - things seem to look a tad better after 24 hours in the new room.
This one I have had outside, it's about 5 weeks old And I have been twisting the stem and training the crap out of it to keep it as small as possible until this room is underway. I just topped it a few hours ago.
These clones have small root balls already and were budding females so I trimmed the flowers off and I think too much leaf.
I forgot to mention the size of the room is 6.5ft x 3.5 ft. Because of height restriction I can probably have the lights at a height of 5 ft max and will be using 600-1000w cob led setup (mainly white with some blue, red and blurple.
So I'm thinking the light will have to be atleast 1ft from plants so max plant height can't only be about 4ft - going to need to scrog these sativa's.
This is what I have to work with until I finish my cob setup last parts are about 1-2 weeks away still.
I have a 40w ducted exhaust fan at the top of the room and a couple USB fans for the seedlings.
This one I have had outside, it's about 5 weeks old And I have been twisting the stem and training the crap out of it to keep it as small as possible until this room is underway. I just topped it a few hours ago.
These clones have small root balls already and were budding females so I trimmed the flowers off and I think too much leaf.
I forgot to mention the size of the room is 6.5ft x 3.5 ft. Because of height restriction I can probably have the lights at a height of 5 ft max and will be using 600-1000w cob led setup (mainly white with some blue, red and blurple.
So I'm thinking the light will have to be atleast 1ft from plants so max plant height can't only be about 4ft - going to need to scrog these sativa's.
This is what I have to work with until I finish my cob setup last parts are about 1-2 weeks away still.
I have a 40w ducted exhaust fan at the top of the room and a couple USB fans for the seedlings.
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- #25
I not sure, but I think you probably could. Perlite-only grows are a form of hydro. So is coco. They're both inert fluffy mediums -same as hydroton, which just serve to hold nutrients and provide some aeration to the roots. They use the hydro ph range and need constant ph monitoring, and also need to be supplemented with calmag. The fact that you have 20% soil is a bit of a curve ball- so I'm not sure how that equation works out.
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- #27
Ok I get it thanks for explaining that. I see they are selling a product called cAnna coco at my local hydro shop so what would you recommend to go with perlite only - coco only or a mixture??
I'm going to give those super drainage pots a go. So I'll be running 3 plants in the super drainage style pots and setup some kind of reservoir to catch the runoff. Aswell as run the 3 DWC so total of 6 plants in that size area, I will have to flip them early. I've got a bunch of beans I'm trying to germinate but they just won't pop
Coco only or else coco with a mix of perlite would be good. Perlite only worked well for me but it does take frequent waterings to keep it wet. For that matter so does coco, but perlite even more so.
There are different ways of growing in coco, and I'm no expert on it. Some people treat it more like organic soil, use bigger pots, water less often, and add organic supplements and stuff to it. The way I've done it is to treat it like hydro- use it as an inert medium, smaller pot, and water frequently.
I don't know much about the method of treating the coco like soil.
I have six smaller plants in coco right now. I'm using one gallon pots and watering twice a day. For this purpose I'm using a barrel of water (res) with an electric pump on a timer, which comes on twice a day briefly. It's pretty simple. All I have to do is keep filling the res once a week or so, and keep an eye on the ph. For this type of coco growing the coco should always remain wet- never dry out- at least once the plants get past the seedling stage. In the early days they need to be babied just like soil/whatever or can be overwatered. Calmag is a must.
I'll be harvesting those plants in the next few days.
There are different ways of growing in coco, and I'm no expert on it. Some people treat it more like organic soil, use bigger pots, water less often, and add organic supplements and stuff to it. The way I've done it is to treat it like hydro- use it as an inert medium, smaller pot, and water frequently.
I don't know much about the method of treating the coco like soil.
I have six smaller plants in coco right now. I'm using one gallon pots and watering twice a day. For this purpose I'm using a barrel of water (res) with an electric pump on a timer, which comes on twice a day briefly. It's pretty simple. All I have to do is keep filling the res once a week or so, and keep an eye on the ph. For this type of coco growing the coco should always remain wet- never dry out- at least once the plants get past the seedling stage. In the early days they need to be babied just like soil/whatever or can be overwatered. Calmag is a must.
I'll be harvesting those plants in the next few days.
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- #29
I have some big coir blocks here, it says one block makes about 90 litres of soil when soaked in water for 20mins.
I picked them up for free from a neighbour that has moved out and they have no packaging or labelling on them so I can't tell if it is coco but it does look to be a fairly light colour? He also gave me a big bail of quality sugar cane mulch, so I'm hoping the coir of high quality as well. His gardens always looked top notch.
Any idea if a coir block could be similar to coco?
I picked them up for free from a neighbour that has moved out and they have no packaging or labelling on them so I can't tell if it is coco but it does look to be a fairly light colour? He also gave me a big bail of quality sugar cane mulch, so I'm hoping the coir of high quality as well. His gardens always looked top notch.
Any idea if a coir block could be similar to coco?
Yeah that's coco. They compress it into blocks. It will look darker when it's wet. Hard to tell at the moment what the quality is. And I'm not a coco expert but apparently it does make a big difference what the quality is like. There used to be issues with salt in the coco blocks (coconut palms grow next to the ocean) and people would often soak and drain it a few times before using it. But I think that's more of a thing of the past- I'm not sure. If you had a ppm meter you could soak it then test the water to see if it shows any dissolved salts- or you could just rinse it well to be safe.
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- #31
Thanks Weasel,
After reading this and soaking half a block in hot water to break some off (it was super compressed) I've broken about 1/4 of the block away and fluffing it out with hot water, it even smells like coconut shells haha so I'm going to assume it is coco coir.
I'm going to rinse it with hot water thoroughly then soak it in ph'd water.
Should I soak it in 5-5.5 ph water? Should I let it dry out a bit in the sun after it is soak, before I transplant what plants I have left?
I'd rinse it just for the hell of it - but not worry about trying to adjust the ph of it. At least I read before that it's really hard to shift the ph of the coco itself. But yes- 5.6- 5.8 is the correct range and while it certainly wouldn't hurt to soak it at that ph- just may be unnecessary (you may want to google up on that because I'm stoned and not 100% sure what I'm talking about.
As for drying it out a bit - yes because it is possible to overwater young seedlings in it- so you don't want it soaked when you start. Water the seedlings as if they were in soil till they get bigger and build a root system- then you probably want to water and feed it ever day.
Also like other forms of hydro it contains no nutrients in it so you have to supply that from the start - though obviously in very small amounts at first.
As for drying it out a bit - yes because it is possible to overwater young seedlings in it- so you don't want it soaked when you start. Water the seedlings as if they were in soil till they get bigger and build a root system- then you probably want to water and feed it ever day.
Also like other forms of hydro it contains no nutrients in it so you have to supply that from the start - though obviously in very small amounts at first.
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- #33
Got the girls all transplanted into coco. Been busy today and adjusted my cob setup so I can atleast get it going in the room to replace the crappy cfl's. So now I'm running 150w 3500k spread over 6 cobs 50w of blue light.
Nice, starting to look all pro!
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- #35
I've started at 24 inch from plants now I'm down too 12 inch and might even drop the lights a bit closer? What should I look for as first signs for the . too close to the light? I havnt experienced this problem with cfl's lol
Yellowing leaves, it can look just like nitrogen deficiency. Check out light burn on grow weed easy dot com.
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- #37
I unsubed your other journal. It was done right?
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- #39
Its not over till the fat lady sings
The bigger girl from that journal is still alive and the hedgehog is kind of half alive, there both outdoors now. The bigger one is finally starting to shed fan leaves and getting her first big fat calyx after about 3-4 months of flower already 
They are just in pretty hard-to-get-too secluded area so it's not easy getting photos of them.I'm just letting her go but I will finish the journal off when I harvest her. The hedgehog is looking like it might even be re-vegging so it probably won't be ready for harvest till 2018 .
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- #40
Looks like the lights might have been a bit close,
Here's a shot 5 days since I topped it. I used a razor blade and dissected the top bit of new growth
Wonder if I should do the same thing too these two new bits of growth?
Here's a shot 5 days since I topped it. I used a razor blade and dissected the top bit of new growth
Wonder if I should do the same thing too these two new bits of growth?
