AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal - Ebb&Flow - Bubblelicious 2013

AfricanGrower

Well-Known Member
:welcome:and hello all fellow growers, some of you might of seen me around the forums browsing through and obtaining more information. All for this grow right here. This will be my first attempt at a hydro setup, but given that I have grown in soil before I feel I have a good amount of experience to finally get things moving. Below you will find all the info needed about this grow and hopefully some of you stick around to see and aid my successes and failures!

STRAIN:Nirvana's Bubblelicious.

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"Bubblelicious was developed in the Midwest, U.S.A., then brought to the Netherlands in the 1990s to be further refined. Its cannabis plants grow vigorously and finish flowering in about 8 weeks. It is highly resinous and extra sweet. Certain phenotypes will actually display a distinct pink bubblegum scent and flavor. This strain of cannabis is also very suitable for medical marijuana users."

INDICA/SATIVA: 70% Indica and 30% Sativa
THC CONTENT:16%-20%
YIELD TIME 8-10 weeks
AVERAGE YEILD 400-500g/m2

GROW STYLE: Topping/Scrog or LST (depending on space available with 2 girls:hmmmm:

GROW MEDIUM:Grodan Grow cubes and a 3.5 gallon nursing pot
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HYDRO SETUP:Ebb&Flow system based on one similarly made by TheCapn. You can find a DIY on how I made mine in my sig or by clicking RIGHT HERE

GROW ROOM:
I have just relocated my home to a more friendly part of the country and am currently waiting on my grow tent to arrive in the mail. I have a 6' x 4' x 3' (h x l x w) space in my closet that I initially planned on lining with 'PandaFilm' and just use the space to my advantage, but I decided to go with a grow tent for the pure convenience of a 'pack-and-go' setup.

Here is the grow space in the closet, now temporarily covered by a black sheet keep my equipment hidden.
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But it is whats behind the sheet that counts:thumb: The top 25gal tote will be used as a res tank and the bigger tote will be used as a stand for now. As you notice the black plastic bags to the left, those are currently keeping my ebb&flow system from contaminants ;)
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As you can see the rack that the cooltube is hooked up onto would have been a perfect harness, which was one of the main reasons why I had wanted to go with just the PandaFilm.
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LIGHTING: A couple of 18-23watt mixed spectrum CFL's/ A 400watt MH/ A 400watt HPS (dimmable electronic ballast)
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VENTILATION: A 6in 240CFM duct fan with 10ft of aluminum tubing. This will act as an exhaust fan, placed before the cooltube, pulling air out of the grow room through the cooltube and out of the tent. This will eventually allow me to add a carbon filter in the future if I think smell is too noticeable:yummy:
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NUTRIENTS: Although not the most highly recommended hydroponics nute linup, I have gone with FoxFarm Liquid Nutrient Trio-Pack and FF Trio-Solubles. Also I have the Bushdoctor line of products. I got 2oz and 1oz bottles as you can see, since I plan on investing in higher quality 'organic' nutrients.
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WATER:Although the area is nice, the water is saying otherwise. I had never really had a problem with total displaced solids (TDS) in my water where I moved from, averaging at around 20-30ppms. Here, however, ppm ranges between 175-190ppm:yikes:, slightly higher than my tastes. I am still going to in an all around ph/ppm meter but for now I am using a low quality one.

This is water I currently am using to feed my seedlings, after letting it sit for 36-48 hours.
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24/8/2013


Now time to tell you all about the magic beans:hippy:I had germinated two Bubblelicious seeds on the 23rd and 1 bagseed on the 22nd. I was going to use the bagseed as a test for my nutrient solutions in the future, but unfortunately it just didn't make the cut. I used distilled bottle water mixed in with a single drop of Kangroots to give some positive reinforcement to the ladies.

The two bubblelicious seeds showing taproots
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The bagseed showed taproot, but remained unchanged since being put in grow cubes.
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25/8/2013


I first pre-soaked the grow cubes in the minute Kangaroots Nutirent solution. I then planted the two 'Bubbs' using sterile tweezers in the grow cubes (unfortunately I couldn't get my hands on rockwool cubes, so I improvised with the grow cubes which all seemed to work out fine) giving enough surface contact with the taproots.



26/8/2013


Since I am still waiting on my tent to come in, I am currently using a homemade PC grow box with a staggering height of 1 and 1/4 foot I used for previous 'personal' grows, mainly with AF's :blunt: Though not as stealthy as it used to be (as you can see all the light leakage coming from all over haha) it is fulfilling the purpose for now as a seedling incubator.
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Incubator PC box Specs:
-17in x 17in x 7and1/2in (h x l x w)
-Temperatures range anywhere between 77-84 degrees Fahrenheit and humidity between 48%-63%
-Lined with the material found in car window reflectors
- 2x 12volt 80mm pc fans working at half the intended output
- As of now, 1 19watt and 1 23watt (total of 42watts) CFL bulbs at 5000k

Today I watered the beans again around 9am with 1/4cup of plain water at a ppm of 175. When I came back from work I found these little girls shooting straight up out of the cubes:)
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Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

That's it for now, I will be updating this journal with pics either every 4 days or every 7 days depending on my schedule and how baked I might be at the time :bong:

All comments and criticisms are welcomed here, AG ;)
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

Welcome to :420:
Your off to a great start, once that tent comes in your gonna be set. Looking forward to more updates soon.
Good luck with the grow AG. ;)

:rollit:
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

No worries, I love updating my journal as much as you all love looking at 'new' pics and progress :Namaste:

Once again, thanks for the encouragement stealthgrow!
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

>>>I never seen anything like this for a medium before SUBBED! I like your set up

Thanks for stopping by and checking out the journal, I'm aiming for at least 16oz for this grow, highly achievable, but this being my first hydro setup I'm going to hope for anything in the 'double digits' range!

And WildRose, the grow cubes are comparable to the slightly 'bigger' rockwool cubes growers use to start clones and seedlings but much, much smaller. In my setup the cubes will get completely saturated, giving the root system a healthy wet and dry cycle. This provides sufficient nutrients and oxygen, promoting roots to take full advantage of the space ;)
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

Hello 420, I'm back with an update of the two Bubb ladies. They have shown significant growth now that I just scrolled through the pictures I took from 5 days ago. It is always amazing and intriguing to see new growth on your cannabis plant no matter how many times you have grown :blunt:

Anyway here is the update:

31/8/13

I have categorized the Bubblelicious plants into 'Bubb' A and 'Bubb' B for now, and that is how I will be addressing each plant. While I further tried to light-proof the 'pre-veg' PC box Bubb A fell over and showed some of its roots through the grow cubes. (I know mistakes happen, but this was quite unacceptable IMO being way to stoned during important work:smokin:)

This happened 2 days ago on the 29th and she seems to have bounced back fine, but with noticeably slower growth than Bubb B. However, Bubb B is showing phenomenal growth and almost showing its second pair of leaves.

Bubb A:
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Bubb B:
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Bubb A & B: (Here you can see the rate of growth between each plant. The significantly slower Bubb A is on the right if the picture ended up flipped upside down
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Temperature has been very steady given the little amount of ventilation in the PC box with only two 80mm fans running at half their voltage.:grinjoint:
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On another note I have been slowly reducing the light schedule from a 24/0 to an inevitable 18/6, so when I start to run my MH I won't be running over the electric bill. But for now, since I am using a mere 42watts of CFL, I am taking off 1 hour of daylight a day and currently on a schedule of 21/3 ;)
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Grow Tent Update

I just found the perfect dimensional tent to best utilize my grow space on the Flea! At a good 7ft x 4ft x 2ft (h x l x w), this tent will basically 'slide' back into place leaving just enough room 'width-wise' for my exhaust tubing to fit through.

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I had also just realized that an electrical outlet is non existent in my closet and the closest one was either 10ft away in the bathroom and 19ft away in my bedroom, so I got to thinking :passitleft: I decided to buy a 50ft extension cord (overkill, I know ;)) and run it from my bedroom. The reason why, you might ask, is because I am able to make the wire flush against the wall, leaving it much less noticeable than if I ran it from the shorter distance in my bathroom. But regardless there will still be a heavy duty extension cord running into my closet which when I eventually have friends over, will become very noticeable.

I do have a light switch in my closet. I'm going to research to see if I can run my electricity off of that, I'm just not sure if a light switch can handle the amount of wattage I want to throw at it! Any suggestions on this topic would be appreciated, I am no skilled electrician by an means:scratchinghead:
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

That is it for now, and like I said before I will be updating my journal every4-7 days based on my schedule. I want it to lean more towards 7 days just to show a consistent weekly growth rate. However if I do run into any unforgiving problems I will be sure to post here as soon I can/can't diagnose the problem!

All comments and criticisms are welcomed here, AG ;)
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

>>>NIceee africangrower i like it!! Subbed for sure hopefully i can pick up a lot of tips from you!

I'm sure it will be a learning experience for both of us, this being more first hydro-setup ;)
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

MINI-UPDATE

I currently changed a a sufficient amount of things in my grow to inform everyone with a miniature update. In case recommendations want to be given and/or questions need be asked!

31/8/13; 9:30pm

I recently just changed the nutrient solution that I have been feeding them from seedlings (based on 1/4 strength of the one given on the FF website), which consisted of 1.25ml/.375gal of 'BigBloom' (.01-.3-.7). I have now added .5ml of 'Kangaroots' (.8-.1-.03) and .25ml of 'Microbrew' (1-.2-.7). This gives me a total by comparison of (1.81-.6-.76) NPK value, which I believe will balance out my Nitrogen intake. This gives me a total ppm of 220 from my TDS pen, and I had calculated a 205.115 ppm through written formula! Pretty close I guess, though I'm 15 ppm off!

I have added another 18watt 6500k CFL in the PC box giving a total output of 60watts, and a tmpreature of 84F and humidity at a steady 60%.
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Close up of Bubb B
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Close up of Bubb A
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Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

In light of my recent credit spending, I have been running low on many self nurturing funds! I have since decided to go out and buy a half oz of 'mids' from the local dealer. Not my ideal smoke, but it should last me to the end of the month when I go back to my home town for the weekend. Yup, that's right. I will have my system up and running solo for at least 3 days by the end of the month ;)
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Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

Every 4-7 days??? AG, you gotta be more like me and update every 35-45 minutes.:high-five:

Until you find a solution about grabbing power from that light switch, maybe prying off the floor molding and running the extension cord behind it? If you have access to a wood router, you can cut a channel the entire length of the molding and tape the ext cord into that channel, then nail it back to the wall.

Apologies for taking so long to get into your journal, these last few days at work damn near killed me from exhaustion.

Are they really middies? A lot of people like to decompress Mexi brick and pass it off as middies. My best experience with middies is a nice manicured bud that had a mishap and was lightly pollinated or for whatever reason had to be harvested early. I know that when it's dry, it's usually dry as hell so whatever you can get your hands on to get you through, you gotta settle with. Just don't let a slick talker try to gas up the price with very inferior quality. Mexi brick be the worst @ $60 an Oz. and broken up into $40 eighths as "middies". We may have been born on Tuesday, but it wasn't last Tuesday.

Anyways, I absolutely loved the very first pic in this Journal. It looks so fruity and just delicious. When I walk my dog near a baseball field, there is some kind of large weed bush or tree that has tiny fluffy budlike colas that smell exactly like fruit pebbles. Definitely not of the canna family, but if it was possible to graft in that scent to a canna plant, I'd buy that shit in a heart beat, especially if the buds turn out the way it appears in that first photo. Damn, can't wait to see you take those ladies to pound town, pun intended!
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

No apologies accepted here mate, I completely understand the stressors of the reality we call our daily lives! I don't even think I have enough time to update my journal everyday with the amount of other threads I go through in one sitting on this wonderful forum. Literally, I am sitting in the bus in the mornings on my phone going through sub's and other random thread haha ;)

As for the floor molding, I don't think I quite understand what you mean. I could pull the flooring in my closet (where the grow tent is located) and in my bedroom(where the socket is locate), but what lays in between these two rooms is my bathroom which has grout-layered tiling. Nor did they intend to install drywall on the walls like a regular apartment, but insisted on a 'unfinished' stone look made from splattered plaster! I decided just to run it through, just won't step on it when I get out of the shower!

Thanks for the invaluable information on these 'kind' of suppliers; you don't even want to know what I went through to get this! Yes these middies I got for around the same price you mentioned there for an oz. Doesn't smell like anything potent but after a few hits, (or fifteen ;)) it gets the job done!

And the purpose of the picture of that juicy Bubblelicious bud is to attract all of you to my boring grow journal. Ask for updates and thy shall receive:Namaste:
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

I thought I asked for one every 35-45 minutes? Or should I ask every 35-45 minutes? I like to pay closer attention to growers like you who are very involved with their entire setup, so more frequent updates is what I want as I will sponge everything I can from your experiences. Thanks again for the linkback to the ducksfoot strain. That was enlightening and I will be digging through Herbie's stock to find something that has that included. Ideally I'd love to find a high yielding strain (like everyone) that is short like Indica/Ruderalis, grows well indoors in scrog, with a stone mostly sativa dominant with only indica overtones. Might be some time before I find that one, but that's gonna be my great white buffalo!
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

I will start with more frequent updates on these ladies this evening Sky! I'm sad to say I'm experiencing a bit of PH flucuation, but my meter should be arriving shortly. Thanks again for the interest in my grow ;)

That duck's foot really is something eh? It makes me want to take my growing to the outdoors sometimes!
 
Re: AfricanGrower's 1st Hydro Journal-Ebb&Flow/Bubblelicious 2013

I emailed Herbies last night to see if they had those duck's foot genetics. they replied that they didn't, so if you come across any breeders of those genetics, try to plug them in with Herbies. I will be getting my pH meter this weekend too, but the guy at the hydro shop told me to be careful with them, especially the low end ones b/c they lie to you and require frequent calibrations. He offered to calibrate the one I get off him weekly for me. So it might be good idea to also get (or replenish) the dye in the water kind as well. they're a bit tricky as well if you are trying to pH water that has been colored by nutes. Until I can afford something high end, I will be using both
 
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