1st Grow - Cheap Setup - Northern Lights

[Space Wabbit]

PH level can definitely be a source of problems. I'm on my first grow and I initially didn't think much of it. I've been watering house plants with regular tap for years. While I was waiting for my supplies to arrive in the mail I popped a bag seed for a test run. Within the first 10 days I had yellowing leaves and super slow growth. Turns out my tap water is about 8.3, wayyyy to high. Bought a cheap PH meter and some ph up (just citric acid) and ph down and started ph-ing my water to 6.8-6.5 and my new sprouts are doing great. I will mention that I also switched to FFOF vs. Miracle Grow (luckily found a hydro shop) and I think that made a big difference too, but I'd say it was mostly the PH level.

 

[Eyetim9]

Thanks for the input Space Wabbit. If I can't keep my PH down with apple cider vinegar I'll be getting some organic PH down for sure, but what is weird is that I'm reading is that organic soil usually has acidic (low) PH levels so again I'm wondering why mine is so high, must be my tap that I need to test too sooner or later. At least i think I read that last night, man I haven't smoked in a few weeks...

 

[Eyetim9]

One other question that is on my mind is it too late to start treating my plants for PH problems, I mean should I keep an eye on the PH levels well into the flowering stage and up until the harvest?

I'm sure the answer is yes I should keep an eye on the PH levels throughout the whole grow, but just wondering if they can get through the nutrient lockout sooner or later and then just flourish even with high PH.

 

[Space Wabbit]

Fixing the PH doesn't cost much at all and is one of the ways you can easily improve your grow. Once you start PH'ing the water before each watering it becomes easy (I keep empty gallon jugs for easy measuring). I'd check the run-off as well to see what your soil is currently at. Plants can recover from high PH, flushing with PH'd water is recommended.

I wouldn't count on a plant recovering from high PH on their own with continued high PH.

 

[Eyetim9]

Big Gal (just realized i was calling her a guy, it better not be a guy!) doing good with his LST but has some yellowing spots forming on one of his biggest fan leaves, I am not too worried though

Big Gal just watered them almost max dose of fish emu, max dose of kelp and 1tbsp of molasses in a gallon. Fed them both about a quart each.

Runt is looking good, clipped her 2 biggest fan leaves 2 days ago to let some light hit the slow forming colas at the bottom. I still don't know about this girl, but she going into flower mode the same day Big Gal does since I don't have separate rooms for them.

 

[Eyetim9]

So even though I just nutrient watered them I couldn't take it anymore seeing a bunch of other people's grows, organic or not, being younger than my plants by 3 times bigger than mine. So I just watered with apple cider vinegar and half a lime and it brought the PH down a good amount to 7.0 or 6.9, in about 3 days I will water with the left over mixture of that. Hopefully it will open up the roots some to get some more nutrients in there. Either way gonna start going into flower mode on the 8th or 15th of June.

 

[Eyetim9]

OK weird the rotation of my photos all depend on how my camera phone is when i take them. Will post updated correct standing pics in a few moments.

 

[Eyetim9]

Big Gal again

Runt is flourishing

Day 2 of flower

Still high ph levels.....boo

 

[Stinky Snid]

OK weird the rotation of my photos all depend on how my camera phone is when i take them. Will post updated correct standing pics in a few moments.

It's probably tougher on some device than others but... I always use landscape pictures and it doesn't require rotating pre upload.

Either way we'll turn our phone around to see your pics, keep them coming, they look great

KiG cheers

 

[Eyetim9]

More pics incoming soon...

 

[Eyetim9]

Almost 2 weeks into flowering and they are looking good if I don't say so myself. Switching up feeding some, molasses and water for a feeding session then next feeding session is fish emulsion and kelp extract, and alternating from there about every 3 days.

Big Gal's pot seems to be much lighter than Runt's even though I feed them the same amount...I'm assuming with her having more and bigger nodes that they are drawing more water faster....

Big Gal

A pic of the almost spiral LST technique I tried.

Popcorn nugs

Runt isn't so runty anymore, I really did have faith in her, she just did not like LSTing. No problem with me.

 

[Eyetim9]

I also started misting with molasses instead of kelp.

 

[Eyetim9]

Molasses watered on 6/25 was thinking of having to wait 3 days to water again but today the pots really felt light. So I went ahead and with nutrients with a good amount of run off making sure all the soil was soaked. This may be the last time I water with nutrients other than molasses.

Or should I keep watering with fish emulsion and kelp extract for the entire flowering period up until I flush with water (and probably molasses) the last week or so?

 

[Eyetim9]

Good morning to these lovely ladies. Did a good amount of demolition yesterday, mainly on Runt. And mainly because of spotted leaves. I don't know if I did too much nutrients on a feeding or two a few weeks ago or the girls don't like the molasses foliar feeding over the kelp I was doing but a bunch of fan leaves have started getting spots on them so I'm going back to 1/2 - 3/4 strength nutrients and also going to stop foliar feeding them.

.

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[Eyetim9]

Runt is getting too close to the light, gonna lay off the nutrients now. Hopefully she stops growing vertically.

Big Gal looking good, a lot of her colas are about the same size, for now...6+ weeks till harvest!

I'll try not to post pics for a week or so, to hopefully show some major change.

Peace

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[Eyetim9]

One more pic just cause the position of the phone matters for the pics....

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[MetalPoet]

Hi, eyetim. I have a similar grow about a month behind yours. Don't mind me while I check out your grow. Looking good so far!!!

 

[Yojitoke]

Hey fella good going there )

Not an expect by anyways I'm doing my first grow also but can I ask how warm is it in your grow room?

 

[Eyetim9]

No prob Metalpoet welcome both of you.

My setup is under basement stairs on concrete, they used to be on 2 towels but I took the towels out from under them because nowadays the water, when it's feeding time, runs right through kinda fast. I am assuming because of how many roots there must be. Any who the Temps average 83°F, but now since I actually enclosed it Temps are getting to about 90° if the door is shut, which I haven't shut much yet but I am going to have to be shutting them for the next 3 weeks...So we'll see how they react to higher Temps. My PH levels are still high about 7.8 or higher according to a 2 prong 3 in 1 meter.

I have 1 tall cylinder fan blowing on them 24/7 sometimes I turn it off at night if I remember.

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[Mr. Krip]

Nice work for you first grow!

Just a couple of comments that may help:

There is a big difference between soil & hydro. With hydro, the nutrients are supplied in a form that is directly ingestible/accessible to the plants. With soil, the plant relies on the nutrients in the soil which must first be broken down by microbes before they are accessible to the plants. This makes the microbial activity key to successful soil grows in terms of making the nutrients available.

So, to start, don't use H202 with organics/soil. It will kill the microbes.

Based on my understanding, I don't believe there is any benefit to a foliar feed with molasses alone. I'm primarily a hydro grower, but do grow veggies, etc. in soil and am somewhat familiar with the use of molasses.

Molasses is basically used to feed the microbes in the soil. Alone, it will have little-to-no nutritional value to the plants. Molasses is used when making compost teas to help feed the microbes so they're happy and multiply. It's also added to compost teas and other organic fertilizers, including when foliar feeding, for the same reasons.

Next, the plants will require different amounts of nutrients in different ratios at different stages of development (i.e. more P & K in flower and more N in Veg). When I grow in soil, I tend to worry less about these ratios and more about making sure anything and everything the plant could want or need is present in the soil.

In hydro, I feed the plants and in soil, I feed the soil!

When growing in containers, this is even more important since, eventually, the plant will use up all of the nutrients available in the soil in the container. Those nutrients need to be replaced, which is why we fertilize. The fertilizer provides the nutrients and the compost teas provide the microbial activity to make the nutrients available to the plant. The molasses just feeds the microbes.

You can look into different lines of organic fertilizers, but some basic components are things like blood meal for Nitrogen, Bone Meal for Phosphorous, potash for Potassium, and rock dust for trace minerals (although, there are many more ways to organically add NPK, etc. to soil!).

That all being said, I would continue to fertilize and would use more than just the fish emulsion; and use fert's in your foliar feeds.

I hope this info helps!