Colorado Griz's - Ebb & Flow - Coco - LEC 630 - Grow Journal - 2016

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Damn CG,
Tight internodes and deep green leaf color.
I'm amazed at what those LEC's can do.

 

[ColoradoGriz]

Damn CG,
Tight internodes and deep green leaf color.
I'm amazed at what those LEC's can do.

The lights thank you, I can't take the credit. Like I was saying, so far the only negatives of this grow have been my own actions. I know growers swing both ways when it comes to defoliating in flower. Had these plants been showing deficiencies, they probably wouldn't need defoliating. In this run the plants have seemed so healthy that my pulling leaves has had little negative effect. It's almost if they have more vigor after. I mostly bend down big fans and if they snap off, they snap off. Next day, all healed up. I snapped a main top, 8 inches down by accident putting on the third trellis yesterday. I leaned it up against another branch and bent a fan leafs stem around it. Checked it an hour ago and it's standing on its own, hardly even forming a knot.

As you can see here, running out of height. The light at this height is not causing any heat stress but is minimizing the light footprint. A factor I completely brainfarted.

I did this cleanup weeks ago for better airflow. I should have done more, like remove more stems I knew wouldn't reach the canopy. Spacing here shows how the light fluctuation caused a lot of stretching. I let things get so bushy, I didn't notice till after.

Some of the girls.

This was the plant whose top snapped off. after 1 day, standing on it's own. All healed up.

Thanks for stopping by!

 

[qaza]

Nice grow mate, how high is your tent? I'm in a struggle with mine at 5'6" reckon I will make though thanks to LED. Will def get higher tent after this my first grow with single White Widow.

 

[VladimirPutin]

I gave up on ceramic metal halide for horticulture seeing all the price gouging going on for relatively low intensity equipment.

But I DO want to see how your buds turn out. Of course node height is tight, you are dumping a fair level of blue on them during flower. Just too bad that LEC has tons of useless yellow and green light dumping out of there as well.

I hope you reach 1 gram per watt at least. Good luck I'll be watchin'


A drain and flood for coco has been called a stupid idea (google search) but actually I see some method behind the madness . Later !

 

[ColoradoGriz]

Nice grow mate, how high is your tent? I'm in a struggle with mine at 5'6" reckon I will make though thanks to LED. Will def get higher tent after this my first grow with single White Widow.

Thanks Qaza! It’s a standard 80” tent but I have ceiling clearance for under 8 feet, so I've thought about a tall Gorilla tent. The White Widow x Big Budz strain grew into the lights. They were the reason for the 3rd trellis. The Blue Dream is at the expected height, Delicious Candy is the shortest, the Pakistani Valley and Blue Cheese are tied at second tallest.

Over the last year I have been less about clones and more about just trying different strains to see which ones grow better in my environment indoors and those for outdoors. The White Widow cross will definitely be on my list for next years outdoor grow but unless I reduce my count in the 4x4 and do some LST, I will probably not grow it indoors. It would be a great LST plant but I'm currently trying to find a balance between minimal effort and maximum yield.

 

[Coloradokid19]

Wow my oh my those girls have gotten HUGE!!

It's crazy how much a few weeks can change these babies into strong females with beautiful flowers.

Great work you have done so far. Don't for get to keep it up and happy growing!!




Sent from my iPhone using 420 Magazine Mobile App

 

[Stage]

 

[Slowpuffer]

Colorado Griz's - Ebb and Flow - Coco - LEC 630 Grow Journal -2016​

Thanks for stopping by, I've been away a long while but I'm back to check things out. I've only been growing for a few years now so this is all still a learning process for me. I'll spare you boring personal background stuff and get to the meat and potatoes. I'm not really good at writing journals but in my own research I haven't found anyone running the exact setup I am, so, let's experiment.

SETUP:​

INDOOR GROW: 4x4 Apollo Horticulture Tent
MEDIUM: Royal Gold Tupur Coco Coir and Growstones
WATERING METHOD: Hydro Farm Ebb and Flow w/55 Gallon Rez and 7 Gallon Controller
NUTRIENTS: Advanced Nutrients Sensi Coco Grow (Hobbyist level Nute Schedule); Great White; Advanced Nutrients PH-Down.
WATER: Tap at 7.2 PH, PPM 53 (Rocky Mountain Snow Melt) Not using rain water this run.
POTS: 2 Gallon Pots (bottom inch Growstones, filled 3" from top w/ Coco Coir) decided against smart pots this run.
LIGHTING: Sun System 630w LEC; T5's for seedlings
AIR FLOW: 6" 440 cfm Exhaust fan on low, 6" booster fan intake, 1 3 foot tower oscillating fan, 2 6" clip fans, Phat Filter.
CONTROLS: Blue Lab Guardian for EC, PH and Res Temps. Titan Controller for Heat, Humidity and Lights. Not using CO2 this run. Humidity is really low in Colorado. Wifi Camera to check my crops 24/7.

I am growing the following feminized strains:

Blue Cheese x 2: an indica cross created by crossing a Blueberry male with an original U.K. Cheese (a Skunk #1 phenotype) female.

Humboldt Blue Dream x3: A sativa dominant cross of Blueberry and Haze
coloradoGriz,
Pakistani Valley Kush x 2: 100% Indica

White Widow X Big Buds x 3: Hybrid, name speaks for itself

Delicious Candy x2: Indica dominant Caramelo x Cheese​

Many of you are already familiar with several strains so I will spare all the details of each. If you have any questions about a particular one, I'd be happy to answer to the best of my abilities. I hope my comments throughout this journal will fill in the blanks about their performance in my grow.
Now I had already germinated these seeds prior to starting this journal. It wasn't until I finalized my setup that I decided to start a journal.

I germinated 14 seeds in Rooter Plugs in which 14 hatched and 13 broke the surface. I've seen all kinds of methods of germination and personally I just stick with a simple method that has worked for me about a good 99% of the time. I use rooter plugs soaked in regular tap water until I feel they are nice and soaked but not dripping. I place the plugs in tray with a heat pad underneath. My heating pad has a thermostat and I try to keep the pad in the high 70's, below 80. I put the seeds into the holes of the plugs and push them down about a knuckle deep, 1". I then rip off a piece of the plug and use it to plug the hole.

I use a single bulb T5 running for 24 hours until they sprout.

I usually get results in 2-3 days. These seeds sprouted within 48 hours and had fibbbrst set of true leaves on day 3.

After 4 days I transferred them to red solo cups filled with Royal Gold Tupur Coco and put them under the four bulb T5s until they started their 5th set of leaves. I topped the 5th set gave them about 4 days and transplanted them to the 2 gallon pots.

bbb

Day 5

Day 7: Decided why water, when I can dunk. Same process as Ebb and Flow, I felt it helped get any air pockets out of the medium and fully saturated the medium. Looking back, it was easier than watering and didn't have any negative effects. Bottom line, time saver, thorough but not necessary. I'll be doing it from now on though. This is just RO water and Great White.

Watered and Healthy. Through this stage watering every 3-4 days was fine. More often wouldn't have hurt but I wouldn't have gone less.

Snapshot from my wifi camera giving me live video feeds.

These were my all-stars at Day 15. I had topped their 5th set of leaves. Showing signs of water not being enough anymore.

These were the runts of the bunch.

Don't worry, that's just the tap PH

Dinner time, ¼ serving.

Ph is better, brought that water temp down to 74. Ph was auto adjusted by the Nutes.

Pakistani Valley stretched a bit into the T5s. Giving them a little more time to adjust from the topping before I transplant to the 2 gallon pots.



Now I have grown in Fox Farms soil until a friend turned me onto coco. I had been using Botanicare but once I found out they had ties with Monsanto, I dropped their product line along with G & H. This is my first time using Royal Gold so it's too soon to tell.
I've heard varying reports about coco coir in an ebb and flow system. I'm hoping to find out for myself if this is a good medium or not. I want to use coco because I can throw it my yard instead of a landfill. This is also why I decided against smart pots. So no ebb and flow using clay pellets and smart pots on this grow. I used to grow a few plants in large pots but I wanted to downscale the pot size as moving those big pots around after a long day of work was getting old.
This is also the first time I have used an LEC lighting system, lots of firsts. Nothing against LEDs, I just think they are not there yet and I got tired of pink photos and special glasses. Well, let's add some photos.

Here you can see a little light burn. These girls want more light and they are going to have it.

This is a good testament. The plant in the red solo cup was one of the all stars that didn't make the cut of the 12 going into the Flower tent. We transplanted the plants just one day before this was taken. You can see the growth that basically happened overnight.

Here we are now Day 5 of Week 1, Veg Cycle.



Being new to this set up, vegging for 3-4 weeks will be dependent on growth. I've been able to keep them short and bushy up to this point. I started the rez with 90 liters of water and nutes on Friday. About Tuesday the EC went up a little so I just topped off with 15 liters of water bringing the EC down. Since this brought the PH up a little by Wednesday, I added some PH down. I also should mention I have two airstones in the rez to keep things from getting stagnant and put oxygen in the water. They are on an 18/6 light schedule with 3 waterings a day during the light cycle. Once when they wake up, one mid cycle and once more 2 hours before lights out. I may or may not drop this down to two feedings but it's working good so far.
I have good feelings about the LEC lamp. Temps get to 80-88 and I know that is kind of high, but Colorado has very low humidity so 85 with a Humidity of 50 in my grow tent is a trade off and the plants are showing no signs of heat stress. In about a month temps will drop and heat will become more manageable. I could run cool air from outside or hook my portable AC but currently I'm not too concerned about a high of 88. Just a tip, sometimes turning up your exhaust fan is counterproductive. If you suck air out too fast, it doesn't give the incoming air time t nnnnime

 

[Slowpuffer]

ColoradoGriz,
1st. off the subject a bit, just to say thanks for your service ! I think we're on same page, except you're growing in coco and i'm still playing in dirt. I got the Nanalux, you got the sun. i'm running one 3100 & one 4200 bulb. This is my 2nd. grow with it & I got it to close to my last grow and it made crop mature to fast, so yield was not that great. I'm giving you fair warning, don't get this light closer than 3 feet from canopy. It will fry your buds !! I was running an air conditioner then, now I'm pulling fresh air from a window in the next room & exhausting the hot air in same room. I don't have a intake fan, and I need to go back to home depot & get some 8 inch ducting. But 6 inch is working fine. My clones are 7 weeks old, but were stunted by treatment s for mites. They're just now starting to get healthy enough to clone & get into 12/12. Will probably start 12/12 in couple days. I'm really glad I ran into you journal, because as you said, not a lot of lec going on.
I'm using 1/4 perlite, 1/4 ffof, 1/4 coco coir, & 1/4 this organic high nutrient potting soil called vermifire. I wish I had never put that shit in my mix, but it's to late now. I wish I was using the same thing you're using and will be in next grow. Anyhow Griz, if there's anything i can do to help you, just let me know & I definately will be following your show. Here's some photos from today. 5 pineapple chunks, 2 blue dreams, 1 called kpippy, and one bubbas gift. All clones .

 

[Slowpuffer]

I think we're on same page, except you're growing in coco and i'm still playing in dirt. I got the Nanalux, you got the sun. i'm running one 3100 & one 4200 bulb. This is my 2nd. grow with it & I got it to close to my last grow and it made crop mature to fast, so yield was not that great. I'm giving you fair warning, don't get this light closer than 3 feet from canopy. It will fry your buds !! I was running an air conditioner then, now I'm pulling fresh air from a window in the next room & exhausting the hot air in same room. I don't have a intake fan, and I need to go back to home depot & get some 8 inch ducting. But 6 inch is working

. My clones are 7 weeks old, but were stunted by treatment s for mites. They're just now starting to get healthy enough to clone & get into 12/12. Will probably start 12/12 in couple days. I'm really glad I ran into you journal, because as you said, not a lot of lec going on.
I'm using 1/4 perlite, 1/4 ffof, 1/4 coco coir, & 1/4 this organic high nutrient potting soil called vermifire. I wish I had never put that shit in my mix, but it's to late now. I wish I was using the same thing you're using and will be in next grow. Anyhow Griz, if there's anything i can do to help you , just let me know & I definately will be following your

grow. Here's some photos from today.

 

[Slowpuffer]

I think we're on same page, except you're growing in coco and i'm still playing in dirt. I got the Nanalux, you got the sun. i'm running one 3100 & one 4200 bulb. This is my 2nd. grow with it & I got it to close to my last grow and it made crop mature to fast, so yield was not that great. I'm giving you fair warning, don't get this light closer than 3 feet from canopy. It will fry your buds !! I was running an air conditioner then, now I'm pulling fresh air from a window in the next room & exhausting the hot air in same room. I don't have a intake fan, and I need to go back to home depot & get some 8 inch ducting. But 6 inch is working

. My clones are 7 weeks old, but were stunted by treatment s for mites. They're just now starting to get healthy enough to clone & get into 12/12. Will probably start 12/12 in couple days. I'm really glad I ran into you journal, because as you said, not a lot of lec going on.
I'm using 1/4 perlite, 1/4 ffof, 1/4 coco coir, & 1/4 this organic high nutrient potting soil called vermifire. I wish I had never put that shit in my mix, but it's to late now. I wish I was using the same thing you're using and will be in next grow. Anyhow Griz, if there's anything i can do to help you , just let me know & I definately will be following your

grow. Here's some photos from today.

How about an update Griz ? Let's see what that 630 lec is doing . I just went 12/12 yesterday. Hope all is well ?

 

[ColoradoGriz]

Sorry for the lack of updates, nothing exciting was happening lol. Well, I'm harvesting this weekend. Most of the plants are ready now, but there are a couple that I would like just a few ambers on.

Coco has been great, nutrients have been great. I'm just now getting deficiencies but the plants are in dying mode so I'm not shocked. The light is a beast. My plants grew up almost to the bulbs and it fried the tops of two main colas. They've held up strong and didn't hermi thank the pot gods. One started growing branches with nugs on it from the main cola. It's kind of weird. I will take some pics in a bit and post them tonight. This grow could have gone a lot better had I managed the plant height better. Honostly I didn't think 2 gallon pots would produce such healthy 4 foot plus plants. I've also learned a few strains to not grow indoors lol.

 

[ColoradoGriz]

Thanks for the advice Slowpuffer and your plants are looking good!

Here is a group shot. There is one in the back that got a really bad top burn. I left it alone at that point. I figured no need to stress it out more, I've seen this happen outdoors and they endure. I will clean it up on the trim of course.

Some pretty good size colas

This is the head of the snake. It's a Blue Dream that would have hit over 6 feet. I had to bend it under the trellis and this is where it popped up. It started growing new stems from the cola.....

Here is the body of the snake. About two feet of golf ball size buds all down the stem.

More buds.

Ignore the deficiencies in the leaves for a sec. One thing about the LECs is that plants under the light appear to have no frost and it freaks you out but they are all pretty frosty.

I will take some better picks when I chop em down this weekend.

Peace

 

[ColoradoGriz]

Maybe someone has some insight on this. The deficiencies exhibited in these photos just happened over the last 2 days. I usually flush with water but this time I used a product by Advanced Nutrients called Flawless Finish. It's supposed to have ingredients that basically remove the salts from the coco. I'm thinking maybe in a drip system it would be more effective than an Ebb and Flow that fills from the bottom. I attribute these deficiencies to the excess salts. 2 more days.

 

[qaza]

Very nice Griz, wish my first attempt was looking 1/4 like yours lol! at least I now know where I want wrong so next attempt should look better.

 

[Slowpuffer]

So how many plants will you harvest, from the original 12 ? Looks like the light did it's job ? Did you take any pics. during mid bloom? Anyhow I'm using the same light, only a different brand, so check out my journal, Don't forget to give us a smoke report and a final weight !! Very nice !!

 

[ColoradoGriz]

So how many plants will you harvest, from the original 12 ? Looks like the light did it's job ? Did you take any pics. during mid bloom? Anyhow I'm using the same light, only a different brand, so check out my journal, Don't forget to give us a smoke report and a final weight !! Very nice !!

I grew out all 12. I feel I could have gotten the same results with just six though. If I had the room I could have spread them out more and got more branches above canopy. The penetration of the light was good, better than any previous lights I’ve used. I grow outdoors also, so I’m impressed knowing what the sun does and what this light does. I think once I start pulling these plants of the tent, I will have a better idea on each plants performance.

Next grow I will stick to 6 plants, one strain for better management. I was filling my reservoir with about 40 gallons of water and changing it weekly. I’m sure I could have used less water (30 gallons) and saved some money on nutrients or extend my change times to every 2 weeks. I had just wanted to give all the elements a fair assessment. Environmental conditions were awesome all the way through so no changes to fans and lights for next grow. Another mistake is that growing in Coco, I could have reduced the flushing time to one week instead of two like soil. I think that might be another reason for the deficiencies that have been showing up. I probably could have added some cal mag last week but at this point it would make little difference.

 

[Slowpuffer]

I know you are right about getting same with less plant count, but then we'd be talking more veg. time, and more training time. I just want to grow as much as I can without too much hassle. I'm thinking about doing what you're doing with the auto watering, but I'm thinking 20 gal.. I will build my own, if time or energy permits. At 74, you never know how much of either you gonna have that day !! Ha !! hope i don't sound like i'm complaining ? Ha !!
In my opinion, the reason you have deficiencies is because of the flood and drain system. Or this is the problem I had with it. The fertilizers stay in the root system. Top water your plant and catch the 1st few ozs. & check it for ppm, I'd bet you'll find it real high. At least that was my experience with flood and drain. I'm gonna set mine up to top feed and drain to waste. I'm so happy that you are happy with the cmh light, I'm 11 days into 12/12 today, with the same light. I have 9 plants total, and I'm going to have a defoil party tonight, I gotta get rid of some leaves !! I'm still manhandling pots, in and out of tent and I really need to get a system in place for feeding. it's just that I've gotten used to bringing them out one by one and sitting them on a stand and groom, and look them over with a fine tooth comb, and water (feed) to drain and then put that heavy pot back. It also let's me change the positions of the plants in respect to the light. Did you clone these plants, before starting 12/12 ?? Hope things are good in your world !!

 

[ColoradoGriz]

I know you are right about getting same with less plant count, but then we'd be talking more veg. time, and more training time. I just want to grow as much as I can without too much hassle. I'm thinking about doing what you're doing with the auto watering, but I'm thinking 20 gal.. I will build my own, if time or energy permits. At 74, you never know how much of either you gonna have that day !! Ha !! hope i don't sound like i'm complaining ? Ha !!
In my opinion, the reason you have deficiencies is because of the flood and drain system. Or this is the problem I had with it. The fertilizers stay in the root system. Top water your plant and catch the 1st few ozs. & check it for ppm, I'd bet you'll find it real high. At least that was my experience with flood and drain. I'm gonna set mine up to top feed and drain to waste. I'm so happy that you are happy with the cmh light, I'm 11 days into 12/12 today, with the same light. I have 9 plants total, and I'm going to have a defoil party tonight, I gotta get rid of some leaves !! I'm still manhandling pots, in and out of tent and I really need to get a system in place for feeding. it's just that I've gotten used to bringing them out one by one and sitting them on a stand and groom, and look them over with a fine tooth comb, and water (feed) to drain and then put that heavy pot back. It also let's me change the positions of the plants in respect to the light. Did you clone these plants, before starting 12/12 ?? Hope things are good in your world !!

The link to your journal isn't working, I want to check it out. I was monitoring the buckets early on for what you said about the root system. These pots are decent in that the inner pot sits an inch above the drain which is recessed. It prevents the pots sitting in water. One problem is the salts that get pushed upward and settle on the top of the medium. I like to have more room to get in there and get my hands dirty but this was so automated I mostly just checked readings. I had an outdoor growing and my wife wanted some other strains so this was kind of a side project at the time. I didn't take any clones as my other tents were busy with other crops and didn't have room to facilitate clones. I just planted some Heavyweight Strawberry Cheesecake though. I will mother that for the next grow.My body is the same age as you, life has given me a beating. That's why I was trying out this system, I wanted something for when my joints aren't cooperating in the winter. We are getting snow right now. Wife is getting me some lemon juice for the bud wash in case I decide to take them down tonight.

(reading that back I sound automated. I'm really high right now.)

 

[Slowpuffer]

I've never grown in a double bucket set up, but if it's ebb & flo, then at some point the plant is forced to feed by taking in nukes from bottom. The nukes get sucked in and then the water receeds, and the nukes stay in the pot. But when it's flooded next time, the nukes don't get to run out the bottom, because the medium is dry and will only absorb more nukes. Until they get flushed from the top, that crap just keeps building up.I added a couple new nukes yesterday. bat poop works, but I just don't think it breaks down fast enough, for the plants to fully get the full benefits. So now I'm using Earth juice (bloom) along with the bat poop. Growing with chemical ferts. is so much easier, and do a better job, and sometimes I wonder why I bother with organics. Some folks swear that organics is healthier, but i wonder sometimes !! I've grew both ways, and although i think organic weed tastes better, It's a fact, that taste is same, in blind taste tests.
Don't know why my link to my grow Isn't working, but keep trying !! Terry, why isn't my link working ?
I took them all out last night, gave them another dose of azamax, watered till runoff with bat poop, earth juice, big bloom, and silica blast. Lollipoped them and removed a few leaves that were blocking light. Was gonna take off more, but i'll wait till they're done stretching !! I don't see any evidence of my branches being stiffer or tougher, as they advertise . do you use silica, I never had till I read up on it, and it's supposed to do all sorts of good stuff for your plants. We'll see !!
Strawberry cheesecake sounds so dam good !! I smoked strawberry cough about a yr. ago, and that was some good tasting weed, and got me high as all hell !! I don't grow the strains that I'd like as the skunk smell is so hard to cover up !! I'm legal, but I have landlord problems !! Anyhow Griz, keep trying to get to my grow & we'll check ya later !! Hey, how do you wash your crop ?? I want to wash mine, this time around, as i'm using the azamax mite control. I don't usually foliar feed, so I've never washed, but I'm hearing good things about it ? What do i need ?