Surfbuddy's 1st DWC BigBud, Northern Lights, BubbleGum Grow Journal 2012

[SurfBuddy]

FIM Mania

FIM Mania strikes. After seeing Goshawk's handiwork of topping at 2nd node and every node thereafter, I decided to fim mine at the 4th node. There were signs of node growth on all plants that I Fimmed, something I felt important to have. Plants that befell fimming, BB1, BB3, NL1, and BG3. BG1 and 4 were spared, as they have been struggling and do not show node growth.

here is BB3, first to fall victim this morning just before lights out. Photo was taken after lights came back on for the evening, and the little side nodes have already grown. All other plants were fimmed after lights on this evening.

Also did a water res change out today, although the res smelled nice and was finally sitting at 6.5. Hopefully now that the drip system is no longer in place and killing my plants, things will take off AND be more easy to manage. I think it is what was causing my pH issues.

Water put into the res was 5.3 at 448, with a boost of nutes for the 4th nodes. Also boosted the ST to 1ml per 7 gallons to aid with the stress of the fimmination.

Even though the plants are still tiny, I just got a whiff of them and they are starting to smell a little bit. NL seems to be stinkier than the others so far.
I'm going to have to make an ona bucket soon.

 

[SurfBuddy]

HELP! Do I need to cut these roots?

My pH spiked again overnight after changing the res-- it was 5.3 at res change and was 7.3 just before lights out.

I pH downed the res, and peeked in at the roots again, and saw this:

I was hoping that the res change and flush would help, but it seems to not have helped. I did a pour through with h202, then actually did a soak in another cup with h202, and then another soak with hygrozyme, then set it back into the res. Will be checking in a few mins to see if the pH has stabilized, but my question is,

Should I cut the roots? the other roots nearby are not yet hitting the res, so I'm worried about trimming off the only roots in the res for this cup. I'm not sure if the bad roots can be fixed some other way than cutting them off?

Please, any advice is welcome.

Thanks in advance.

 

[teSmp]

Eee not sure about the roots! I had one root that was a little off in color and I trimmed it back, not sure if that was right or not. For the fan I had to put an 80mm computer fan outside of my intake hole pushing in. I also have mine set up like this fan > hood > outside my tent > carbon filter. I had my carbon filter first in line to begin with but it's working better this way. Seems my fan wasn't strong enough to suck through the whole set up.

 

[Bassman59]

What are your res temps? might want to get the water level up to just touching the roots. Once you get a spurt of root growth lower it a little so the rockwool isnt totally soaked. But getting to the roots now could get a nice spurt of root growth.

 

[SurfBuddy]

HELP! pH and root problem!

Eee not sure about the roots! I had one root that was a little off in color and I trimmed it back, not sure if that was right or not. For the fan I had to put an 80mm computer fan outside of my intake hole pushing in. I also have mine set up like this fan > hood > outside my tent > carbon filter. I had my carbon filter first in line to begin with but it's working better this way. Seems my fan wasn't strong enough to suck through the whole set up.

Yeah, kinda scary... although that plant seems to be doing OK...
I have wide rectangular passive intake vents, so not sure how a fan would work there, but those sides of the tent are also close to flush to the wall...

What are your res temps? might want to get the water level up to just touching the roots. Once you get a spurt of root growth lower it a little so the rockwool isnt totally soaked. But getting to the roots now could get a nice spurt of root growth.

Res temps are 68 or less, I constantly change the ice water bottles in the 2nd res.. but I just peeked in and now my nute solution looks kinda cloudy !? Uh oh>>>

 

[SurfBuddy]

Twelve12 -bat signal activated@! any ideas?

 

[SurfBuddy]

Woops forgot the question: Twelve12, any Ideas about what to do about these roots? Cut, I like bassman's raise the water idea, but now my res water looks cloudy

 

[H-factor]

Does the res water smell?

 

[Bassman59]

cloudy can be from nutes, or even hydroton dust if not really really well cleaned prior to use.

Off hand I tend to think you're probably over worrying. They should barely have any nutes yet and if res temps are good, then I would just get the water to the roots. I think it's a little normal to not be perfect white when they are not in the water too. Most often, roots that are discolored at all in my grows are above the water line. Later on you may see some discoloration that comes from the nutrient. More like staining them more towards the color of the nutrient mix.

 

[Twelve12]

Does it smell? Does it feel slimy? If not, then it might be stained from the premix in the reservoir. It could also be a sign of Pythium growth and soon to rot the root. Could also be pH problem that caused it, now you got the pH stabilized keep an eye on it.

Is it happening to all the plants or just this one?

 

[SurfBuddy]

Does it smell? Does it feel slimy? If not, then it might be stained from the premix in the reservoir. It could also be a sign of Pythium growth and soon to rot the root. Could also be pH problem that caused it, now you got the pH stabilized keep an eye on it.

Is it happening to all the plants or just this one?

Actually, the res is smell-less.
The res does not feel slimy, like the hose I used for the distributor did that one time.
Stained? Hmmmm.
Pythium? uh oh.

It's just this one root on this one plant--but was the only plant with roots in the res too.

I'll just monitor it then.

cloudy can be from nutes, or even hydroton dust if not really really well cleaned prior to use.

Off hand I tend to think you're probably over worrying. They should barely have any nutes yet and if res temps are good, then I would just get the water to the roots. I think it's a little normal to not be perfect white when they are not in the water too. Most often, roots that are discolored at all in my grows are above the water line. Later on you may see some discoloration that comes from the nutrient. More like staining them more towards the color of the nutrient mix.

I guess it could be the nutes, this time i used more hygrozyme, which kinda looks cloudy in the bottle. I don't think it's hydroton, I've seen that dust before They ate some last night, about a 1/2 gallon of 6 and ppm dropped from 450-400

You know, you're probably right about over worrying. I just checked on em again, and they look happy. Those roots have not seen the water, at least in a long time. That makes me feel better, thanks. I've added a riser in the bulkhead in the res to bring the water up.

Does the res water smell?

Nope, fragrance free Thanks for the quick response!

Everyone!

Now, there's something else. I am trying not to worry, and I think this could be from mom's hands' lotion (she wanted to practice helping and fished out the water bottles last night. I know she washed her hands...) There is a foamy stuff in the bottom res, so much that it came out on the unfrozen water bottle when I pulled it to replace it.. it actually kind of felt like lotion more than foam:

Thoughts? If it is hand lotion I should scoop it out, yes?

 

[Bassman59]

Just a fyi, once roots reach the water, having ice jugs in the tubs will kill and break off any roots that touch the bottles. Highly suggest getting an outer tub to set your dwc tubs into. Add water to the outer tub to make a "double boiler" so to speak and put the ice jugs in the outer tub. This works very well in cooling the nutrient water.

 

[SurfBuddy]

Just a fyi, once roots reach the water, having ice jugs in the tubs will kill and break off any roots that touch the bottles. Highly suggest getting an outer tub to set your dwc tubs into. Add water to the outer tub to make a "double boiler" so to speak and put the ice jugs in the outer tub. This works very well in cooling the nutrient water.

Thanks B-man,
I like the way you have your 5 gal buckets in the tubs, but i don't think i can fit a bigger tub around my existing tub, and I'm worried it will break my plastic shelf. I'm putting the ice jugs in the larger res, so none of the ice bottles ever get near the roots.

 

[SurfBuddy]

OK, there's some F*cked up sh*t going on here. Today I found a plastic thing in the res-- it looks like the thing that has the sugar topping for a toaster strudel. What's weird is I have not eaten or had a toaster strudel in the house for months. WTF? Time to get paranoid? Two things:
1. If there is toaster strudel sugar in the res, does it matter? Should I do a flush? The res was at pH7.5 with ppm staying constant 450 with about 1/2 gallon missing.
2. How did that get there in the first place? WTF? Disconcerting to say the least.

 

[Bassman59]

What flavor?

 

[SurfBuddy]

What flavor?

Sugar and high fructose corn syrup flavor

 

[SurfBuddy]

Photo update: They are looking over-watered, which I am not sure is possible in a R-DWC? I've got 3 air stones in the top res and 3 in the bottom res, so I think there's plenty of o2 (although I could try moving the stones around a bit...
Ironically, BB3 with the most growth and development has NO roots in the res, only eating off bubbles.
The slow bunch: The two on the back right were not fimmed as they didn't seem ready.

NL1, happy, but maybe a tad droopy, and recovering from fim (pics were from just before lights out, so could just be tired)

BB3 was the one that got fimmed first, and probably should have been the only one lol but she's recovering nicely:

BB1, also recovering from FIM:

The growth of all of these seems stunted and droopy compared to the 2L-DWC-H next to it, which is reaching for the light and has broader leaves all around. These were all regular seed, so there will be variance, but I think I can see where this is going...

 

[SurfBuddy]

Well, after fighting pH battles and seemingly loosing, and a water change saturday, the plants are not drinking anymore. There is some funk going on, and I just cannot let it go on anymore. After pulling the pump to show mom what it looks like and how to drain the res, I saw that the intakes were covered in brown, gummy slimy booger like substance. I started to drain the tank, then decided F*ck it. I'm just going to switch over to 2L's for everything. I've got to go out of town and mom will have to deal with all this herself, and it's just too much to ask. Shit, it's almost too much to ask of myself right now, lol. Maybe I'll try it again when I get back, but for simplicity's sake, and mom's...

This journal will come to a close, and all the plants will be documented in the other journal as I insert them. I'll still post pics here of the nastiness etc as I do the move over.

So let that be a reminder for you DWC'ers out there, to check the pump for junk.

 

[SurfBuddy]

The dirty tub that pushed me off the fence to shut down the DWC. I'll try again when i get back

 

[Bassman59]

I've seen worse.

Airlines should be black btw. I do suggest if you havent already, read Tulip's tutorial on dwc. It's a good basic guide. You'll also never have a perfectly clean tub in dwc. Yours doesnt look horrible.