How to: Simple Hydroponics

[TheCapn]

>>> I will make sure to send you a link to the one I do once the journal is up and running. Sure would like to see B.I.D. dedicate one of his tents to a grow cube/top feed

s1ing, I'm totally stoked to see you get on with this. We have a couple others interested as well. If we had a few people gear up for this we could have a "Capn" challenge, and combine 3 or more journals (one plant each) into one. Should we shoot for cutting clones on July 1st, then flower Nov 1st?

 

[jlt1202]

>>> I will make sure to send you a link to the one I do once the journal is up and running. Sure would like to see B.I.D. dedicate one of his tents to a grow cube/top feed

s1ing, I'm totally stoked to see you get on with this. We have a couple others interested as well. If we had a few people gear up for this we could have a "Capn" challenge, and combine 3 or more journals (one plant each) into one. Should we shoot for cutting clones on July 1st, then flower Nov 1st?

damn i wish i had space inmy basment built like want i would jump on this!

 

[s1ingblade]

>>> I will make sure to send you a link to the one I do once the journal is up and running. Sure would like to see B.I.D. dedicate one of his tents to a grow cube/top feed

s1ing, I'm totally stoked to see you get on with this. We have a couple others interested as well. If we had a few people gear up for this we could have a "Capn" challenge, and combine 3 or more journals (one plant each) into one. Should we shoot for cutting clones on July 1st, then flower Nov 1st?

Yes Sir! I am down and will be taking cuts that day as per my new sched. I now must get 30 bucks up and get the 1 CU FT bag of croutons soon lol. I know it doesn't sound like much or hard to get ahold of but lately I am flat broke raising the new house down payment funds. I am sure like always with harvest time really close (start trimming tomorrow) I will come into a few extra bucks and get the cubes in time. So whats the plan time wise? Veg until 11/01/2013? I will PM you in a day or so when I get more time and get more details than. I am super stoked also, thanks to you and others here at 420mag

 

[TheCapn]

>>>So whats the plan time wise? Veg until 11/01/2013? I will PM you in a day or so when I get more time and get more details than. I am super stoked also

I don't keep mother plants, but I just went to flower a couple weeks ago with these two Agent Orange so I suppose I could still get a clone, it might be kind of slow taking off though.

But yes, a 9-10 week veg cycle from cut to flower. If anyone else wants to jump on board, we will keep everything in the same journal. Top prize is a week's stay at uncle sling's cabin!!! ha ha! If no one else wants to join us, we can just do our two plants. Sounds fun and looking forward to it.

 

[jlt1202]

>>>So whats the plan time wise? Veg until 11/01/2013? I will PM you in a day or so when I get more time and get more details than. I am super stoked also

I don't keep mother plants, but I just went to flower a couple weeks ago with these two Agent Orange so I suppose I could still get a clone, it might be kind of slow taking off though.

But yes, a 9-10 week veg cycle from cut to flower. If anyone else wants to jump on board, we will keep everything in the same journal. Top prize is a week's stay at uncle sling's cabin!!! ha ha! If no one else wants to join us, we can just do our two plants. Sounds fun and looking forward to it.

you should make a thread listing the contents needed for the contest so you have some base then have other things up to the grower like nutes lights and what nnot but standardize the bucket, rez size. that would be sick if you made a inventory list you could print off and go to homedepot or lowes, extra and stock up ; )

 

[TheCapn]

Good idea JT. I'll start a new thread now, and post a link. You in?

 

[jlt1202]

if i can move my product i should be in no prob, i will probly dedicate 1 of my 1000ws to it, are we going to take clones and put them in at what age? size? how do we know when we officaly start that the hard part lol

 

[TheCapn]

if i can move my product i should be in no prob, i will probly dedicate 1 of my 1000ws to it, are we going to take clones and put them in at what age? size? how do we know when we officaly start that the hard part lol

Hey JLT, I would really like to see you in on it! I just posted up the details on the contest here.

I just cut a clone so I'm the first entry, even though I've disqualified myself from my own contest. The clone I cut is from one of my two slower growing Agent Orange plants. I couldn't take it from the fast one, because it has been in flower for too long, and the clone would take off too slowly.

COKE420, what about you?

 

[TheCapn]

Ok back to Simple Hydroponics. I wanted to share a picture, from Method 2. I didn't anticipate this happening, but it seems that top feeding once every 4 hours, and an airstone in the reservoir, is enough to make the roots extend down into the res. Remember in Method 2, we are using the 27 gal strong box, 6" hole cut in the top of it, and putting the grow container on top of it? Here is what it looks like underneath!

And here are a few pics from a couple days ago. They are in rapid stretch right now. I have to stop using the foliar spray on them to contain the stretch.

This one, however, I flowered it for 10 days under Metal Halide, and didn't use foliar spray on it. This one is about 2 weeks ahead of the other two. I didn't get ENOUGH stretch on it! All the buds are huddled in with the fan leaves and I'm having a hard time getting light to the buds. Lesson learned.

Not much else to report. Tomorrow will be the start of the 2nd week of flower (4th week for the dark green ACE), and I'll change out nutrients. All three plants are drinking about a gallon a day. I'm only topping off with pure water, with 1ml/gal calmag.

 

[Hiker]

+rep CapN!

I liked method 3 the best, but I'd also figure out a way to feed several from the same res.

Great writeups

I'm a little wary of feeding rockwool that frequently, but your results certainly demonstrate it works well. I just always felt RW held too much water. Maybe the croutons would work better. Perhaps I can try one of my buckets with them next round.

 

[TheCapn]

+rep CapN!

I liked method 3 the best, but I'd also figure out a way to feed several from the same res.

Great writeups

I'm a little wary of feeding rockwool that frequently, but your results certainly demonstrate it works well. I just always felt RW held too much water. Maybe the croutons would work better. Perhaps I can try one of my buckets with them next round.

Thanks Hiker. I've been lurking on your journal as well and you got a jungle in there! I can't wait to see when they bud up. +rep to you too. I love your setup, and that silent fan is the sh_t.

I have a small space (4 x 12') so I try to flower only two at a time (each with a single 400 or 600w light), and usually stagger them a month apart. My veg area is only 4 x 3 so I can't veg two big ones at a time anyway. I wait unil they are 3' in diameter before flowering. For me, it isn't too much trouble to keep two separate reservoirs. But yeah if you have a lot of space it would be more efficient to combine a few per res.

I really like the croutons, as long as you don't "pack" them, they keep little spaces of oxygen in between. Normally, I go with method #1, and I'm getting a little worried about method #2. I really like the simplicity of it, but just in the last few days, the roots have almost doubled (since the root picture above), and now hanging down into the water in the reservoir. It has morphed into a combo top feed / dwc. It defeats my purpose of "simple hydroponics" but I'm going with it. I added an extra large air stone in there. It will be cool to see how it grows, and I know people like to see different methods. It is so easy to set up, maybe some readers will try it too. I have had to prune this one back big time, as the scrog is only 3 x 2'. With such a small scrog, I am really limiting the potential of this plant. After this run I will get back to just two plants at a time. The agent orange is putting out 9 bladed fan leaves all over.

 

[s1ingblade]

I'm stressing now that I am a few days behind on cuts! It's all in an effort to get a better dry/cure on and because for now the best hing would be to dry in the tent and keep it cool. Since thats what I am doing I cant reload yet. Another day or three and I will be able to do that and then I can take cuts, soon promise. By the end of the week

 

[TheCapn]

Simple hydroponics update-

For those of you following along, we now have 3 plants in flower, one Ace of spades, and two Agent Orange.

The ACE has been in flower for 4 weeks. I am running my general hydroponics recipe I explained a few posts back, around 900ppm, PH is 5.9. Scrog area: 4'x4'

The 2nd plant is Agent Orange, and it has been in flower for 2 weeks now. I am running Dutch Master nutrients at about 900ppm. Scrog area: 4'x3'. I am just about done pulling off any bud sites under the screen. I won't get into too much detail how to do this, but we want to cut off bud sites under the screen, that are not getting any light.

And the 3rd plant, Agent Orange, also dutch master, has been in just over a week at 800ppm. Scrog area: 2'x3' During the first two weeks, I cut off a couple bud shoots per day, that are under the screen and not getting light. Don't do too many at a time, or else your plant goes into "heal" mode, instead of "grow" mode. I have had to cut a lot off this third plant because I am so short on space for it.

I am irrigating for 15 minutes, every 4 hours, during lights on. Then only once during the 12 hour dark period.

I am amazed at the ACE, where I had hardly any stretch. As I said before, the first week or two in flower was under metal halide, and I didn't use foliar spray on it. Look at the stretch on the middle Agent Orange. Crazy! But I'm not going to top it. I'm letting it go. I hope it is not too close to the light.

All three "simple hydroponics" systems are working beautifully. I like the simplicity of method 1 (see above) the best. In two months, this will easily be two pounds. And I'm only tending to three plants. As Hiker pointed out, it would be even easier if I ran all three plants from one reservoir.

It's gettin hard to move around up in here:

The agent orange is popping out 9 bladed fan leaves, and big ones! In case you're wondering, I only pull off a few fan leaves here and there, now and then; no more than a few per day. I NEVER to a "defoliating" session. The same goes for pulling out bud sites under the screen as I said above.

I hope everyone is enjoying the pictures, and maybe try this method yourself. This is the exciting part of the grow. The ace is budding up, and the Agent Orange is starting to show stars. I wish I had a time lapse camera because I can literally see new growth every day. If I had to point out one thing WRONG with this grow, is I am having trouble keeping the humidity down. This is always the case for me during this stage of the grow, when the plants are taking in SO much water. I don't have a dehumidifier in the room, so the humidity is around 75%. The plants love the humidity right now, but when buds start packing on size, we need to be careful of bud mold.

PS, in another thread, someone claimed this growing method was a "downgrade" from DWC. It is true that DWC is a great way to grow, and growth rates are crazy fast, but it is hard to not give this "simple hydro" system another look. Less chance for root rot, not affected by power outages, PH and ppm swings are less, able to leave your grow for a week, and... look at the pictures. It is easy to get 12oz per plant using this method, a 4 x 4 space, and one 400-600W bulb.

Happy growing, I'll check back in about 10 days.

 

[Hiker]

I am irrigating for 15 minutes, every 4 hours, during lights on. Then only once during the 12 hour dark period

I use the exact same schedule. Mine is biased towards lights on, ie the last daylight feed is an hour or so before lights out so the plants have some time to 'use' up those fresh nutes.

A lot of growers frown on flooding at night, but I always did it in the 90s. My goal with it is to replenish the O2 around the roots. It has nothing to do with feeding or water for me. It's all about getting fresh air to the roots. I'm in rock though, so I could probably flood every hour and be fine. In fact I did that in the 90s as an experiment. I did one set of trays and flooded on a 2 hour cycle, so 12 flood & drain cycles a day! They did fine. The reason I switched back was I thought it added too much RH into my grow space. This was right after my first experience with bud rot, so I was paranoid about rh.

Anyway, I like watching your journal. We do a lot the same, but we also have some different opinions, such as our views on defoliation.
Keep 'em green

 

[s1ingblade]

Wow 2 P's from just 3 plants! I am loving your threads CAP.
I will be taking cuts before the week is over, by the 7th if not the 5th
I have this funny feeling that one room is going to become a hydroponics room and the tent will continue to be for soil as I am wanting to also try my hand at a super soil type high brix run.
Take it easy Cap'n

 

[TheCapn]

Wow 2 P's from just 3 plants! I am loving your threads CAP.
I will be taking cuts before the week is over, by the 7th if not the 5th
I have this funny feeling that one room is going to become a hydroponics room and the tent will continue to be for soil as I am wanting to also try my hand at a super soil type high brix run.
Take it easy Cap'n

Hey sling, 10-12oz per plant is no problem for this method, as long as you veg for enough time. The way I look at it, we flower for 2 months, so we may as well veg for 2 months.

Be careful, once you try this method you won't go back. It's simple, like dirt, but the growth rates will amaze you.

That said, I have made sub's organic super soil in the past, and let it sit for two months. Talk about simple! All I did was water every 3-4 days; added absolutely no nutrients. I didn't get anywhere near the growth rates I do with top feed rockwool, but it was super easy and buds smelled and tasted great. You could literally give a patient a light and a couple plants and they could flower them with no worries. If I ever went back to soil, I would do sub's super soil.

 

[TheCapn]

Hey Hiker, thanks for the info. I could probably get away with not irrigating at night as well. It is true plants take up much less amounts of water at night, but I have also read that plants "rehydrate" during the night, and if no water is available, plants can actually go into conservation mode, closing stomata and so fourth, which slows growth. I like your idea of running your E&F buckets with Rock. It gives the roots more to hold on to, gives beneficial bacteria a home, and the rock holds water. When I did it E&F buckets, I didn't use media, and the roots just dangled. I've also done E&F buckets full of rockwool cubes too. I am fascinated how plants take up water, and sometimes you can actually see water droplets here and there on leaves. This is a good read: Physiology of Water Absorption and Transpiration

Yeah I've had a few colas go to mold too. I don't care for E&F trays in flower either. Just not enough room for roots and like you said, it it an evaporating machine!

As far as defoliating, I do some as I said in the previous post, but not too much at at time. I am open to ideas on this, but I believe the large fan leaves do most of the photosynthesis, which provide energy to the flowers. That said, I am probably too conservative. Im watching your journal. I can't wait to see them bud out.

 

[s1ingblade]

Hey sling, 10-12oz per plant is no problem for this method, as long as you veg for enough time. The way I look at it, we flower for 2 months, so we may as well veg for 2 months.

Be careful, once you try this method you won't go back. It's simple, like dirt, but the growth rates will amaze you.

That said, I have made sub's organic super soil in the past, and let it sit for two months. Talk about simple! All I did was water every 3-4 days; added absolutely no nutrients. I didn't get anywhere near the growth rates I do with top feed rockwool, but it was super easy and buds smelled and tasted great. You could literally give a patient a light and a couple plants and they could flower them with no worries. If I ever went back to soil, I would do sub's super soil.

So with higher growth rates and bigger yields did you notice much of a negative compared to the soil ones? Quality aka top shelf meds?? Hope not cause if its just as good or close to it, I might really get into it. I have been wanting to do a 5x4 light matrix 5 400 watt HPS with 4 plants, each plant will get blasted by three hid.'s ought to be no problem getting over the 1GPW
So did you grow your 20 ounce plant under a 600 watt high pressure sodium?
Have a great 4th Capin

 

[TheCapn]

So with higher growth rates and bigger yields did you notice much of a negative compared to the soil ones? Quality aka top shelf meds?? Hope not cause if its just as good or close to it, I might really get into it. I have been wanting to do a 5x4 light matrix 5 400 watt HPS with 4 plants, each plant will get blasted by three hid.'s ought to be no problem getting over the 1GPW
So did you grow your 20 ounce plant under a 600 watt high pressure sodium?
Have a great 4th Capin

Hi s1ing, you bring up some great questions. I might get off track here, but let's talk about these subjects:

The 1.25 pounder was grown under 600W HPS, yes. I was using 3, 600W HPS bulbs in the room, on a light mover, on 3 plants. The 3rd plant you never saw in the pictures. It was a smaller 4 ouncer in a 7 gal container of super soil. I crammed it in there anywhere I could, where it would get some light. From those three plants (2 capn style and 1 dirt) I got a total of 34 ounces, still a long way off from 1gpw, but 1gpw is not my primary goal.

Is Grams Per Watt our goal?
It is a great goal to strive for to save electricity (and great bragging rights), but it's not our limiting factor. In order to calculate your cost of electricity, take the cost of electricity, times watts, times hours. So for example, in flower, if your cost is .07 cents per kilowatt hour:

1800watts x .07/1000w x 12hours = 1.51 per day x 30 days in a month = 45.36 per month.
So I flowered 3 plants under 1800watts for two months, and it cost me $91. $91 to flower 34 ounces. Not too shabby. The cost of electricity is small, compared to the yield.

Is light and space a limiting factor?
No. If you could reproduce the same above scenario 4 times in your grow room, you would go buy the lighting and fill up your basement today. $91 to flower 34 ounces? Sign me up!

I realize there is more to it than just space. It all adds up... keeping the room cool, de-humidification, nutrients, and so fourth.

Plant Count
When we look at the big picture, plant count is your only true limiting factor. Go outside your limit, get caught, bye bye.

Your goal
Since plant count is our only HARD limit, the final goal should be weight per plant. Let's be conservative and say... we know we can consistently get 12oz per plant, each plant with a 600W light. That's $30 to run a 600W light for two months, to produce 12oz. I would take that ROI any day. This doesn't include vegetative growth, which costs about 1/4 that (we use 1/4 the light since plants are smaller).

If you're not getting 12oz per plant, how are you making up for it? You're growing a greater quantity of plants. I agree, in a 16sqft area, I could grow more weight from 4 plants, than 1 plant, but not a SIGNIFICANT amount more. In a 4' x 4' SCROG, you're still only going to efficiently grow one nice cola per 4"x4" hole in the screen, whether you have 4 pots underneath or one.

Quality, dirt VS hydro
The super soil organic, and the hydro plant where the same strain, from same mother. If you smoked them one after the other, yeah, the dirt plant was a little more smooth and smelled a little better. I think most people will agree, if given the choice, they would rather smoke organically grown bud. Would your patients? Maybe. I find growers are more anal about their strains and quality than patients. The average patient would rather just pay less per ounce. We take it too personally, when we think we've produced the finest top shelf medication. We expect our patient to be blown away, and all they say is, "It's pretty good."

Summary:
Think about it: if you flower 8 plants and get 4oz per plant, or 8 plants and 12oz per plant, it's a no brainer! Be safe. Stay within your plant counts. Grow the most per plant you can. It takes 2 months to flower, so why not veg for two months? Start with small plant counts and grow em big, Capn style!

 

[s1ingblade]

Makes good sense, Thanks and +Reps for the time you put into your threads. I am loading up for a long solo work trip. If I can get the tent reloaded by tomorrow than I will take cuts before I come back tom. night. I am thinking of taking a cut off of a critical + I have been growing in a small airpot and seeing how well that bad girl blows up in my "Cap'n Style" grow. You think I still have time if I get rooted cuts by the 17th.?
If so I am in for sure
Thanks again and I'll be back soon