ClosetPharmer
New Member
Hi all and welcome to my first grow journal. 
I’ve been lurking and learning for many months and now am ready to share my experience and hopefully help others while learning more myself.
I’m an empty nester living in a state where cannabis isn’t legal (yet) and don’t want to buy weed on the black market. I used to be a serious toker in the 70’s and 80’s but once kids came along I stopped smoking.
I’m a bit of a tinkerer so I decided to build my own stealth cabinet. The cabinet is going into a large closet in the basement, so it didn’t need to be camouflaged. I framed it with 2x2s and covered it with ¼ inch plywood. It measures 3 ft x 3ft x 6ft. I mounted wheels on the bottom to make relocating the cabinet easier. I painted the inside with white roofing paint.
For air intake and light baffle I simply left a 2 inch wide slot in the bottom in the back wall and then added a 4 inch cover on the outside and inside so the air has to make 3 - 45 degree turns to get in. The air intake is 2 inches by almost 3 ft. Below is a diagram and detail shots of the outside and inside of the light baffle.
For airflow I picked up a Ventech 4 inch fan and a oscillating fan. I will be adding a carbon filter later.
In looking at the different technologies for growing, I decided that organic living soil was best for me. I like the fact that once you have your soil mixed and “cooked” it is pretty low maintenance; just add water. I figure the plants and the soil can figure out what they need and it would be better to get out of the way and let them do their thing. I used the recipe for organic soil from Subcool (google it if you’re interested) basically 1/3rd peat moss, 1/3rd worm casings, 1/3rd perlite plus amendments. I mixed the soil and let it “cook” in a 50 gallon container while I built the cabinet.
For light I decided to go with LED for heat and energy consumption. I found a Mars ll 900 watt light on ebay at a decent price.
I put it all together hung the lights and then ran it for a few days to see what the temp and humidity did. Since this sits in the basement and I’m in a cold northern state, I was worried about temp being too low but it seems to stay at around 75 degrees, the humidity was lower than I anticipated but I figure as long as the roots get all of the water they need they should be ok.
For seeds I went with Herbies and they arrived safely via the stealth method. This part was the most nerve wrecking part for me. After being overwhelmed by all of the choices I settled on King Kong and Critical Super Silver Haze for my first grow. Here’s some info on the strains:
Strain: King Kong
Breeder: Dr. Underground
Location: indoor, outdoor, greenhouse
Type: indica/sativa
Flowering: ~53 days
Only female seeds.
Delicious Critical Super Silver Haze Feminised Seeds Specs
Genotype: 30% indica, 70% sativa.
THC: 20%
Production indoor: 450 gr/m²
Production outdoor: 500gr/plant
Harvest indoors: 70-75 days ,
Harvest outdoors: end of October .
In keeping with my lazy approach to gardening, I was intrigued with the auto wicking method using cloth “Smart Pots”. “Noobwannb's Self Wicking Smartpot ghetto setup” thread on --------- was very helpful. So I selected two different cloth 5 gallon pots (one was half the price of the other so I thought I’d see if the expensive version is worth it). I took a large Rubbermaid container and filled it with hydroton, filled the smart pots with my soil that had been cooking for about 2 months. The container was then filled with water to about an inch below the top of the hydroton.
When it was time to plant the seeds, I decided to just drop them into the soil so I don’t have to bother with transplanting them and traumatizing the roots. The soil was nice and moist after sitting on the watered hydroton for several days so I cut off the top of some water bottles to keep the area where the seed was planted at an higher humidity.
This worked well for the Critical Super Silver Haze and it popped after 2 days and has taken right off. However, the King Kong seed didn’t germinate, so I took another seed and used the soak and paper towel method to plant the seed with the tap root already showing.
So my plants are 2 weeks apart in their development. The King Kong is supposed to be a quicker flowering strain so maybe they’ll finish around the same time.
Here's Haze after about 2 weeks after planting on 2/10/15
Here she is right after being topped on 2/15/15
And this was taken 4 days later
The plant is responding incredibly well. I’m really happy with how healthy the plants look so far. I plan to SCROG both plants as soon as they get a little bigger (around 8 inches). Given how fast the Haze is growing I’ll need to build my SCROG frame this weekend ;-)
Here's King Kong when she popped on 2/10/15
And here she is on 2/19/15
That's it for now, I'll post more pics when I've got the SCROG built
I’ve been lurking and learning for many months and now am ready to share my experience and hopefully help others while learning more myself.
I’m an empty nester living in a state where cannabis isn’t legal (yet) and don’t want to buy weed on the black market. I used to be a serious toker in the 70’s and 80’s but once kids came along I stopped smoking.
I’m a bit of a tinkerer so I decided to build my own stealth cabinet. The cabinet is going into a large closet in the basement, so it didn’t need to be camouflaged. I framed it with 2x2s and covered it with ¼ inch plywood. It measures 3 ft x 3ft x 6ft. I mounted wheels on the bottom to make relocating the cabinet easier. I painted the inside with white roofing paint.
For air intake and light baffle I simply left a 2 inch wide slot in the bottom in the back wall and then added a 4 inch cover on the outside and inside so the air has to make 3 - 45 degree turns to get in. The air intake is 2 inches by almost 3 ft. Below is a diagram and detail shots of the outside and inside of the light baffle.
For airflow I picked up a Ventech 4 inch fan and a oscillating fan. I will be adding a carbon filter later.
In looking at the different technologies for growing, I decided that organic living soil was best for me. I like the fact that once you have your soil mixed and “cooked” it is pretty low maintenance; just add water. I figure the plants and the soil can figure out what they need and it would be better to get out of the way and let them do their thing. I used the recipe for organic soil from Subcool (google it if you’re interested) basically 1/3rd peat moss, 1/3rd worm casings, 1/3rd perlite plus amendments. I mixed the soil and let it “cook” in a 50 gallon container while I built the cabinet.
For light I decided to go with LED for heat and energy consumption. I found a Mars ll 900 watt light on ebay at a decent price.
I put it all together hung the lights and then ran it for a few days to see what the temp and humidity did. Since this sits in the basement and I’m in a cold northern state, I was worried about temp being too low but it seems to stay at around 75 degrees, the humidity was lower than I anticipated but I figure as long as the roots get all of the water they need they should be ok.
For seeds I went with Herbies and they arrived safely via the stealth method. This part was the most nerve wrecking part for me. After being overwhelmed by all of the choices I settled on King Kong and Critical Super Silver Haze for my first grow. Here’s some info on the strains:
Strain: King Kong
Breeder: Dr. Underground
Location: indoor, outdoor, greenhouse
Type: indica/sativa
Flowering: ~53 days
Only female seeds.
Delicious Critical Super Silver Haze Feminised Seeds Specs
Genotype: 30% indica, 70% sativa.
THC: 20%
Production indoor: 450 gr/m²
Production outdoor: 500gr/plant
Harvest indoors: 70-75 days ,
Harvest outdoors: end of October .
In keeping with my lazy approach to gardening, I was intrigued with the auto wicking method using cloth “Smart Pots”. “Noobwannb's Self Wicking Smartpot ghetto setup” thread on --------- was very helpful. So I selected two different cloth 5 gallon pots (one was half the price of the other so I thought I’d see if the expensive version is worth it). I took a large Rubbermaid container and filled it with hydroton, filled the smart pots with my soil that had been cooking for about 2 months. The container was then filled with water to about an inch below the top of the hydroton.
When it was time to plant the seeds, I decided to just drop them into the soil so I don’t have to bother with transplanting them and traumatizing the roots. The soil was nice and moist after sitting on the watered hydroton for several days so I cut off the top of some water bottles to keep the area where the seed was planted at an higher humidity.
This worked well for the Critical Super Silver Haze and it popped after 2 days and has taken right off. However, the King Kong seed didn’t germinate, so I took another seed and used the soak and paper towel method to plant the seed with the tap root already showing.
So my plants are 2 weeks apart in their development. The King Kong is supposed to be a quicker flowering strain so maybe they’ll finish around the same time.
Here's Haze after about 2 weeks after planting on 2/10/15
Here she is right after being topped on 2/15/15
And this was taken 4 days later
The plant is responding incredibly well. I’m really happy with how healthy the plants look so far. I plan to SCROG both plants as soon as they get a little bigger (around 8 inches). Given how fast the Haze is growing I’ll need to build my SCROG frame this weekend ;-)
Here's King Kong when she popped on 2/10/15
And here she is on 2/19/15
That's it for now, I'll post more pics when I've got the SCROG built
subbed up for this one
