Am I doing this right?

[HalfBaked98]

Hey Guys! I'm trying to get my first grow started. I hear that you guys always offer great support and feedback. Thank you in advance.

For the record, this is my first grow and I'm not looking to be a master grower by any means, the harvest will be for personal use. i just want to familiarize myself with the basics of growing, ill take it to the next level once I know more or less what to do.

I'm trying to grow 2 plants at a time. Here's my setup and plan, let me know if I'm doing this right.

I successfully germinated a bagweed seed using the paper water cup and paper towel method. I put it in soil and put it in my balcony. It sprouted today, barely. tell me if it looks normal

*Here is the delio: My balcony only recieves about 6 hours of direct sunlight. My balcony is on a building, facing the west, so the plant would only get sun for about 6 constant hours of direct sunlight.

My idea was to keep these plants short,and when they needed more sunlight I would bring them into my indoor setup. Here is what I had in mind.

* The setup has (for now, until the plants get a lil' bigger) two 23watt 6500k (daylight) and one 26w 2700k bulbs and a fan to keep air circulating and keep the heat low.

Give me your feedback on whether you think this could work, if not give me some advice.

 

[oldhippie64]

first I must warn you if there a streetight close by shining on your balcony don't grow them there.or shield the plants from the street light. Any light brighter then a full moon disrupts their sleep which stresses plants. too much Stress causes females to turn hermi and male( not a good thing). I think you should make your grow totally indoors or totally outdoors and not try to go back and forth. it makes it harder to keep your light schedule. The lights you are using are fine for now ti they get bigger

 

[Antics]

1 plant per pot.

Your seedling looks fine.

CFL bulbs should be 1-3" away, or 2.5-7.5cm away.

For Veg I suggest a minimim of 100 watts per plant, and a minimum of 150 watts in flower. These are true watts, not equivalent watts.

 

[HalfBaked98]

I have a question. The setup that I have there, its about 4000lumens and the two pots are in the same square foot. What would be your course of action? How long until the seedling grows leaves? As a first time grower, should I make the plant short and then change the light schedule to 12-12 with two 42w (2700k) and one 42w (6500k) to start flowering?

How does a plant look like 1month into its veg. Growth? How long should a plant be left in its flowering period? Thank you for the response.

 

[HalfBaked98]

one of these pots have the seedling, the other has the germinating seed.

 

[Antics]

With seedlings, 1 or 2 23 watt CFL bulbs works fine. As the plant gets bigger you will want to add bulbs.
I suggest placing 1 or 2 bulbs DIRECTLY over each seedling. There should be a gap no smaller than 1" or 2.5cm, between the plant and light, and no bigger than 3" or 7.5cm.

Adult leaves will start growing soon, and may be visible as early as later today.

Topping the plant, and using LST would work well when growing with CFLs, Keep in mind this applies mostly to photo period plants, not autos. I like to train my plants to grow short and wide to take advantage of as much light as possible.

I would strongly advise not to switch to 12/12 if you only have 3 bulbs. I suggest having at least 6-7 bulbs per plant in flower. If you use less bulbs, it will grow, but yield will be drastically reduced.

This is approximately 1 month old under CFLs. This plant later yielded a little over 2 ounces. I used 14 bulbs, and 361 watts.

A plant is left in flowering until the peak maturity is achieved. This time to peak maturity varies with each strain, so I can't give out a specific number for it. With bag seed you don't know the strain, so you don't know how long the flowering period is. I would suggest buying a 30x-60x microscope or loupe to examine trichomes. It's the easiest way to harvest. You want to look for as many cloudy trichomes as possible. Some people allow them to mature into amber trichomes.

This is what trichomes look like under magnification:

 

[HalfBaked98]

thanks for the response, some of you guys have it much easier than I do, my electricity costs $0.28kW/h. Pretty damn expensive. Especially if you plan to grow indoors. Is there an option to induce flowering to a small plant when it is still not mature by changing the lights and exposure?

Btw, here is a photo of my seedling on day 2 since its sprouting, let me know if it looks okay

 

[jummejum]

thanks for the response, some of you guys have it much easier than I do, my electricity costs $0.28kW/h. Pretty damn expensive. Especially if you plan to grow indoors. Is there an option to induce flowering to a small plant when it is still not mature by changing the lights and exposure?

Btw, here is a photo of my seedling on day 2 since its sprouting, let me know if it looks okay

I too live a place where electricity is quite pricey. I would suggest you to buy a led panel. If you plan to only stick to cfl you will need a lot of them to get proper light growing conditions, and that will both cost electricity and bulbs.

 

[HalfBaked98]

do the LEDs take up less electricity? If so, which one is best bang for buck if I'm trying to grow 2 plants at a time?

*does that look like a normally growing seedling to you?

 

[Antics]

do the LEDs take up less electricity? If so, which one is best bang for buck if I'm trying to grow 2 plants at a time?

*does that look like a normally growing seedling to you?

Well my CFLs uses 361 watts of electricity and produced a total of 3.15 ounces on two plants. Veg time was 5 weeks for one plant, 6 weeks for another.

With my LED it uses 150-170w (Less than half the power), I will use it to Veg ONE plant for approximately 8 weeks, and my goal is to yield over 3.15 ounces with one plant. Using the same soil, same nutes, same everything. Only thing I changed was the light. Keep in mind I don't KNOW FOR A FACT, if I can hit 3.15 ounces, but that is my goal for this grow.

And yes, the seedling looks fine.

 

[jummejum]

There are a lot of great led panels out there, and many of them are already here on the forum. I can't tell you which one to go for. It's all about your grow setup, budget and so on.

Have a look at the threads in my sig. Yes your seedling is just fine so far, no need to worry. Just remember when using CFL or tubes you will have to keep the bulb very close to the plant. Just like Antics mentioned before.

 

[HalfBaked98]

Thanks for the advice, one more thing. How much water should I give my plants and how often? I often find myself in the precarious state of not knowing whether or not to water

 

[jummejum]

Thanks for the advice, one more thing. How much water should I give my plants and how often? I often find myself in the precarious state of not knowing whether or not to water

Only water when needed. But that is sometimes difficult. Btw you should get a dome for that seedling just until it gets the first 2-3 set of leaves. It also makes it easier for you not to worry about watering all the time.

if the first 3-4 cm feels dry then water.

 

[gonegoodbye]

Thanks for the advice, one more thing. How much water should I give my plants and how often? I often find myself in the precarious state of not knowing whether or not to water

The first thing I did after planting my first seeds was to read as much as I could from this thread: How to Grow Marijuana Everything You Need to Know. Answers to most of your questions are right there. Overwatering is one of the most common problems for new growers, so if I were to read only one article from that thread I would read one about watering.

 

[HalfBaked98]

Thank, I know more or less what the guidelines are but I'm looking into finding out more about people's personal experience with this stuff. My past experiences in many other fields have shown me that a lot of these guidelines have more than one right way, typically people with more experience can tell the story. Let me know , I'm trying to collect as much personal experience data as possible to make my first grow a successful one.

 

[HalfBaked98]

Hey guys, I just wanted to show you day 2-3 of my grow. Let me know if you think the plants are healthy. Weird thing, I woke up today and saw Plant 2 barely poking out of the soil, when I got back from work it was already giving little tiny leaves. Sweet! here it is, for how much longer should I put them under my light setup? when should I up the wattage?

^^^^This Sprouted today^^^^

^^^^This Sprouted today^^^^

^^^^This one Sprouted 3 days ago^^^^

 

[Antics]

You can keep the seedlings under 1 bulb each for about a week, after that I'd add 3 more bulbs.

And just to verify.. you are keeping the bulbs within 1"-3" of the seedling?

 

[HalfBaked98]

yes. about 3 inches from the seedling. You would add 3 more bulbs, PER plant? or in total? Would you suggest investing in an LED?

Could a decent LED let me grow 3 plants at a time? is an LED growlight more efficient in electricity too?

 

[Antics]

Add 3 more bulbs total, making it 2 bulbs per plant.

LEDs are definitely worth the investment. I would suggest that you avoid buying into the LED "grow lights" that screw into standard light sockets. I've never seen actual grow proof that they work, and the manufacturers suggest using them to replace incandescent bulbs, incandescent bulbs can't grow plants, so they may not have their research done properly.

The sponsors here sell wicked good LED lights. High quality, and there's probably a grow journal for every model light out there. That way you can actually see what the light is capable of.

Efficiency depends on your usage really...

For example, on my last grow, I used 14 bulbs, 361 watts, for 2 plants. I yielded 3.15 ounces.

My new LED has 100 total diodes, 3 watts each (Approximately 300 watts of LED output). It only draws 150-170 watts. So I'm using less than half the power, and should produce about the same yield on one plant.