Arteekay's 1st Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x 4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Strains

arteekay

arteekay

Well-Known Member
Member of the Month
February 2016
[Oct 31 - Nov 1]

After a particularly long delay hearing back from my usual guy, I finally decided to set up a basement grow tent two weeks ago.

On halloween day we picked up "all we'd need" from a local hydroponics store. Nice enough guy, but too busy to really provide good info. Insisted we should start autoflowers in solo cups and wait for them to get a little root bound. So we bought what we thought we'd need and got out.

The same night, at 5:30pm central, the following seeds were placed into water for germination, following the crop king germination instructions to the letter.

2 x Candy Cane feminized autoflower
2 x Northern Lights feminized autoflower

We spent a good amount of time trying to pick the first strain, and the particular seeds we'd germinate out of the 5 available.

WP_20151031_20_16_34_Pro.jpg


Sunday was spend cleaning the basement and setting up the grow space with what little we picked up at the local shop, which included:

1 Secret Jardin DS120 (v2.0, dammit) grow tent.
1 cheap white gull wing reflector with a socket for the 125 Watt SunBlaster CFL 6400K we picked up to get us going on.
GH pH Test Kit 1oz
PH Down
Dutch Nutrient Formula Grow A and B set
6" muffin fan
6" clip on fan.
 
Re: Arteekay's First grow - sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering mix str

Good luck!!
:yummy:
 
Re: Arteekay's First grow - sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering mix str

Thanks growchick, hoping for great luck and if needed, a little help here and there. From what I've seen in a week or near constant lurking and reading, I'm in the right place.

I actually had a lot more for my first post, accidentally hit post instead of preview. My initial post therefore continues below.

Other stuff from the local grow shop

container for the bail of sunshine #4 we'd bought
5 x 3 gallon (11 liter) round hard plastic pots with fairly tight trays.

[Nov 2 -3]

Sunday, a little over 18 hours after we'd put the seeds into water glasses, we transferred them to paper towels. None had noticeably cracked open yet.

Monday night they'd all cracked, but the tap root was still pretty small so we decided to leave them for another night.



Meanwhile, I'd ordered two more strains from Crop King Seeds online that were not available in the local shop, both still autoflowers as we had decided to go with them first to get something on the go before we started playing.

That package showed up on the Tuesday, and we put two more seeds in to germinate that night, still following the crop king seeds germination directions.

1 x Revolver feminized autoflower
1 x Early Miss feminized autoflower

Then we checked the first 4 seeds we germinated, and decided we'd plant all four



Since we had one of each strain that had a longer tap root, we decided to try two shorter tap rooted ones in peat moss starter pods (not sure of the brand or I guess, the correct name. Rapid rooter but generic? anyway) and the other two directly in soil in the 3 gallon pots.

It's about this time when we made what i think was our first mistake. We soaked all four pots, nearly completely, pouring probably 20 liters of PH tested tap water until we got run off. We were careful not to pour directly over the sprout, but otherwise poured until it came out the bottom.

We then set the cfl up over them, probably two feet away, and turned on one of the small 6" fans to move some air around and zipped the tent up tight for the night.



(Continued...)
 
Re: Arteekay's First grow - sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering mix str

[Nov 3 - 6]

Of course we had to peak in every two or three hours and see if we were ready to harvest yet, and to keep the top of the soil moist with a light sprayer. That's when we started to see the problem with adding around 6 gallons of water to a 4x4 tent and not giving it anywhere to exhaust. Our temps were fine (I believe at least, correct me if I'm wrong) around 73 for a high and 68 for a low, but our humidity was around 90%. Time to mount the noisy little muffin fan in the top exhaust sock and see what it'll do. Sucked the tent in tight and we quickly opened the passive vent to relieve the tension.

Easily took three or four days before the humidity came down to around 50%, and the pots themselves are still very heavy. We decided when the Revolver and Early Miss were ready to go into the pot, we'd be a lot more careful about how much water we were actually putting in. I'll be looking for advise on what exactly do to with this situation in the near future, for now I'm adding a very small amount (100-200ml) of ph tested tap water slowly around the plants every second day. I'm assuming i have to not let the top roots completely dry out while waiting for the bottom half to dry out.

At this time we were leaving the CFL on 24 hours a day, and had lowered it to around 8 inches from the tops of the pot rims. Every 3 or 4 hours we'd check to see if we could start hanging, drying, and curing it yet, and to keep the soil over the seeds moist.

Got home from work on Wednesday, and was happy to see three of the four had showed up to say hi, and by Thursday they were all in attendance. We did our first little happy dance.



A little damage to this guy, it was on the first set of real leaves as well. Hoping the next set are clear.


 
Re: Arteekay's First grow - sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering mix str

[Nov 7 - 10]

By the time they little girls were an inch or so tall, it was becoming painfully apparent just how poor the light we'd picked up was going to perform. Each plant was bent over trying to get in line for the single cfl, and I couldn't imagine another 3 or 4 weeks of that going on.


I'd rotate the pot a couple times a day to try and keep them somewhat upright, but this couldn't continue.


So I got medicated, read for hours and ended up reading @KingJohnC's entire spider grow journal, along with all the others linked to in @Twilight LED's signature.

I placed the order for a Spider 4x MCOB LED Grow Light on Nov 3, and then method 7 led glasses on the following weekend.

Nov 10 the Spider showed up!
 
Re: Arteekay's First grow - sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering mix str

[Nov 10-15]

We got the spider hung and the Early Miss feminized Autoflower went into an air-pot (exact size unknown) i'd picked up quickly at the local guy again.

The Revolver feminized Autoflower took an extra day and was put into the same sized air-pot. Buddy had run out of the same pot we'd bought for the original 4 and I figured we'd give them a go.

And here's the rest of the pics I've taken of them up until today, not the greatest shots I know.



And that brings me up to date. I hope I haven't bored or annoyed anyone. Comments and suggestions are welcome and appreciated. How do they look to someone who's seen them at this age before?
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

I'm a bit confused on when I should start adding my DNF grow nutes to my girls. I want to give them a chance since I already bought them, but I want to try Remo's full nute kit for the next grow. Decided on the less is more principal for now and will just pick up calmag and ph up from the local guy. Assuming calmag is calmag pretty much? Keep reading that autos and/or LED lights cause the plants to use up more calcium and magnesium that photo and/or HID, and want to be ready if need be. Might do a 1/8 to 1/4 dose anyway.

First four, 2 x Candy Cane and 2 x Northern lights are 12 days old and I think doing pretty well. They got a misting, causing the droop, and about 50ml around the top of the pot. Pot is still heavy. Scale on the way tomorrow to actually find out how heavy.



The Early Miss and Revolver got around 75ml via sprayer.

Tent is currently 71.4F and 61% RH, running 19/5 (couldn't decide between 18/6 and 20/4, so....) and they sleep from 10pm to 3am.

Max temps daily are around 77F in the top corner, 75F in the middle of the pots ground level and 73.5 outside the tent. Max RH is 61% throughout the tent, and 63% outside it. An existing humidifier was put into service three days ago when the outside temps finally started dropping and RH throughout the basement went to 25%.

Min temps daily are around 70F on the floor and 71 in the top corner, 69 outside the tent.

I'm told I look like I'm getting a tan. I really don't stare at them for hours, swear!
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

They look pretty healthy and happy to me :thumb:
If the soil you have already has nutrients in it, you may want to wait a few weeks before starting to feed them. Then for the 1st 2 weeks feed at 1/4 recommended and 1/2 recommended the following week. After that you should be ok to go full recommended feeding.
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

Thanks all, I thought they looked reasonably healthy but I lack the experience to know for sure.

This is my worst looking one, a little thirsty maybe?



Barring any opinions before I sign off for the night, I'm going to leave them all for another day without water. Pots are lighter then they've been since the first day, but still heavy in my opinion. No scale yet to confirm.

Thinking tomorrow will be their first 1/4 strength feeding.

 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

The 2 Candy Canes and the 2 Northern Lights hadn't had a good soaking since they were planted in their 3 gallon containers 2 weeks ago, so tonight was their first water to run off with PH tested water first, followed up by 500ml of 1/4 strength Calmag plus and DNF Grow A and B.

Run off was around 5.8 I'd guess, still on the drops and trying to divine the color, PH and TDS meter on their way but at least a week away.

Early Miss got it's first soaking, I'd only given her 50 to 100ml slowly from a sprayer at this point, and the Revolver got 250ml, I'll now wait to see how the first 4 do with the nutes at the stage they're at and try to gauge off that.

Put too much sunshine #4 in the two air pots, so they're a real PITA to water and now ready that i should have put the bottom piece one level higher than I did. Hoping the top will compact down a bit during the grow, and the bottom I can't figure out why it'd matter what height I put the bottom in at. It still has a good inch of airspace and shouldn't be any stronger than any other level. Oh well, too late now anyway.

Under-watering seems to have slowed the daily change rate, so I'm not bothering with pictures even for myself from tonight.

They're up for 5 hours before I crawl my lazy ass out of bed, so hoping to see them all praying to the spider before I leave for work.


Question for anyone reading, do you count days from when you start to germinate, when you notice they have germinated, when you transplant, or when they actually sprout? Is there any kind of consensus either here or generally?
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

Some pics after last night's watering and first feeding on the 2 CC and 2 NL:



And some pics from tonight:



Some close ups of a few spots/discolorations I've seen for the last couple of days. Looking back through the previous pics, they've been there since the leaves emerged it looks like.

 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

A couple things of note. Instead of watering a little bit every couple days soak the whole pot with water. It should be very heavy. If there are no nutes in there I would go with a very weak solution to start, like 1/4th the normal amount. Feel the weight of the pot before and after. Then let the pot sit until it gets as light as it was to start. This will cause the roots to go out searching for water and nutrients. The way you are watering now the roots have no need to spread beyond the small wet area in the middle. In veg, roots like a good wet/dry cycle. For your first soaking it may take a week or longer before you need to water again. Then they will be bigger and you can increase nutrient levels for the next soak.
They do look good so far!
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

arteekay said:
Question for anyone reading, do you count days from when you start to germinate, when you notice they have germinated, when you transplant, or when they actually sprout? Is there any kind of consensus either here or generally?
Click to expand...

For what it's worth, I count days from when I can just see the leaves above the rooting medium - usually about 2-3 days after the seeds get wet (planted).
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

arteekay said:
Some close ups of a few spots/discolorations I've seen for the last couple of days. Looking back through the previous pics, they've been there since the leaves emerged it looks like.
Click to expand...

I don't know if your light is strong enough to do this, but when I get a droplet of water on a leaf under my light (either from watering or natural plant transpiration), the drop of water turns into a magnifying glass and burns the leaf.
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

ShiggityFlip said:
A couple things of note. Instead of watering a little bit every couple days soak the whole pot with water. It should be very heavy. If there are no nutes in there I would go with a very weak solution to start, like 1/4th the normal amount. Feel the weight of the pot before and after. Then let the pot sit until it gets as light as it was to start. This will cause the roots to go out searching for water and nutrients. The way you are watering now the roots have no need to spread beyond the small wet area in the middle. In veg, roots like a good wet/dry cycle. For your first soaking it may take a week or longer before you need to water again. Then they will be bigger and you can increase nutrient levels for the next soak.
They do look good so far!
Click to expand...

I tried to follow A-Train's recommendations, at least for the first two weeks when they were very small. On Wednesday night they got the first full soaking in two weeks, and I'll be following the lift method from now forward. I'm not sure what Sunshine #4 has for nutes exactly, hoping someone more familiar can help me out there. Regardless, since they'd been soaked through to run off twice, I gave them a 1/4 strength feeding with the DNF grow a+b and calmag+. They seem to have taken it fine, and I can see no evidence of nute burn in the fresh growth after two days.

I'm assuming nute burn would show up within a couple of days, is that correct?


growchick said:
For what it's worth, I count days from when I can just see the leaves above the rooting medium - usually about 2-3 days after the seeds get wet (planted).
Click to expand...

That does seem to be the consensus. In that case my 4 oldest girls are 16 days old tonight.


growchick said:
I don't know if your light is strong enough to do this, but when I get a droplet of water on a leaf under my light (either from watering or natural plant transpiration), the drop of water turns into a magnifying glass and burns the leaf.
Click to expand...

I think it was from when they were just starting to form those leaves, and before I got the fans up and running but still while on the cfl. I've been very careful to only water right before their bedtime now and they have almost too much airflow. I'm keeping them dancing pretty good most of the time, specifically to make sure they don't have any lenses on 'em.

They seem to be incredibly tight, the shortest Northern Lights is nearly 10 inches across but still only 2 inches tall.
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

Tonight's pictures, frakkin' camera battery was dead so these are from after they'd been tucked in for the night for three hours already.

 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str



I put this seed in to sprout late on 11/14. It was showing above the root cube on 11/17, so I say it's 4 days old today (the 21st).

*shrug*
 
Re: Arteekay's First Grow - Sunshine #4 - Spider x4 - Crop King Autoflowering Mix Str

Tonight's pics from just before their bedtime:



They seemed to have enjoyed their last watering and first feeding three nights ago. Still don't see any signs of nute burn or deficiencies (that I can see, from my limited experience of course).
 
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