I need Help, first time grower Please!

[Sulfer]

hi, im a first time grower (outdoor). I planted some seeds a while back and more recently. so i have some about three weeks old and some only about 4 days in the soil to a week. i have to look at my calender for exact, but thats about right.
i went and got soil from scotts, sorta. i got it from a McDonalds parking lot. i saw them putting down grass seed so i took some of the soil. i took some other soil from another place as well. the McD's soil worked the best. THen on my second group, i bought scotts soil, and some fertalizer for roses. they are all growing but i looked at some videos on youtube and the older ones seem like they should be taller. also, i have the two very bottom leaves turning yellow on alot of my plants.
i know i need to check the Ph level, how do i do that. Its a little strip you buy, correct? i also read tho, that as long as it gets good sun and you water it, it should be fine. i started to use rain water instead of tap water later on. and have been using that for a while now and on all my newer plants. i planted them seperate times so i was about three weeks ahead so if the first ones die, i can figure out why so it doesnt happen on the next ones.
i bought pots, soil and fertalizer. i also have miracle grow, some nutrient sticks (those thngs you just put right into the ground). i planted only one with that when i first planted. it turned out great, but now the bottom leaves are yellow but i have noticed on some plants they are turning greener recently. only thing i have changed was using the rain water.
i have not used the MG yet.
okay... so i dont know what vegitation stage and flowering stages look like. can someone tell me? the veg stage is when its first planted, correct? Then when can i tell it gets into the flowering stage? is that when the buds start to show? that seems a bit late to me. so it has to be sooner, right?
how often should i water. at fisrt i started to water everyday but i stopped recently. i thought maybe i was getting root rot tho i replanted some and saw some roots and they looked very healthy.
now, i planted some in soil and some right into the fertalizer. the ones planted from to the fert came from the McD's scotts soil.. they are the oldest. the ones in just scotts premium soil are the younger ones. when do i start to feed these and is it okay that i used fertalizer and not a mix of soil and fert? i dont know much so bare with me please.
im having a lot of sucess with them growing. i have only had one die on me and i know why it died so it wont happen again, but lately like i said i have been having troubles. now, the weather has been messed up too tho.
if they dont get enuf sun, can they turn yellow? we have had really bad weather and not much sun to come. with that stunt the growth even tho it is hot out and watered?
i need some insight so i can ask more questions.
i need to know, the ones i planted in the fert, it says dont feed for nine months but the lady at the store said to feed after about a week. after the plants have poped out of the ground... when do i start to feed them and is fertalizer enuf or do i need to buy like MG or pellets?
i would prefer to get stuff from the store, not on line for many reasons. i did buy a small amount of Fox Farm.... what do i do with it. haha.
can someone help me so my babies dont die?
Thanks,
Lip.

 

[Sulfer]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

what i need to know right away is what is the best thing to plant these things in? and when to start feeding them and if i should feed them even tho i planted them in fert. please read above message for everything but i need to know those things first. cause my first plants are going on over three weeks in the soil (i grew them for a while in a wet paper towel. pretty long time, most of them the seed was already off, somecases it wasnt... but i had a lot of sucess doing this, waiting longer than ppl suggested. they seem to grow really well that way-so when i say three weeks, i mean three weeks from time i planted them, not the time i put them in towel. if you count that add another 5 to 6 days). thank you.

 

[Rodrigo]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

wow, I think that the first thing you need to do is research, there's plenty of material out there that you can read and learn from, even on this very forum.
Second, you need to gather your thoughts, you fail to provide any piece of information that would lead to a good advice. I don't mean to be a dick but you wrote everything clumped together, fast and without a plan, and this probably has discouraged anyone from reading it all the way.

First you need to understand the basics (which you don't) about veg and flower.
Vegetative state is when the plant grows but doesn't flower (bud) you can keep it in this state for as long as you want while indoors because outdoors you can't control the light cycles. So when planting outside you have to do it by seasons, depending on where you are in the world. In the southern hemisphere you plant in September and harvest in April (more or less) on the northern hemisphere I think you plant around March/April and harvest near October.
We indoor growers use 18/6 for veg and 12/12 for flower (lights on/lights off). Nowhere in the world (except for the poles maybe) you get 18 hours of light a day. So outside growing is much more challenging.

All this information is readily available in thousands of sites and forums and even in Wikipedia probably.

You need to do research on your own and learn everything you can. The forum is for advice and opinions on particular matters not so someone would hold your hand every step of the way and teach you everything. Go to the FAQ main screen and you'll see that the first 10 or so posts are called STICKY, those cover a lot of ground and have a ton of useful information, start from there. Then you could move on the FAQ and see if any topic interest you. There's also a search tool so you can search for outdoor growing advice/techniques or whatever comes to mind.

Good luck and Happy Growing!!

 

[ottothief]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

First off,WELCOME SULFER.Second like (THE EAGLES) said"TAKIT EASY"it will all come together.This forum is great for solid info.Check out on your (CONTROL PANEL) (GROW ROOM) then scroll down to a butt load of threads that will make your brain cramp with information.Have fun my friend.

 

[TanR]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi Sulfer,

As others have said, Welcome to the 420 community. I know you'll find the folks that visit this site to be more than generous with their time, knowledge and willingness to assist a fellow grower. I have to agree with the other poster though, that a rambling stream of consciousness post is not likely to be read nor result in sound, actionable advice/answers.

Also I have found that attention to detail can be most useful to those willing to assist. For instance, your statement that you "...planted some in soil, and some right into the fertilizer" surely can't be gramatically accurate. Please tell me you didn't plant seeds into a bag of fertilzer and actually expect anything good to happen.

Organize your thoughts, convey a thorough description of the environment (your outdoors but are the plants in pots or in the ground) and focus on specifically what your question or questions are.

Best of luck.

 

[Sulfer]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi Sulfer,

As others have said, Welcome to the 420 community. I know you'll find the folks that visit this site to be more than generous with their time, knowledge and willingness to assist a fellow grower. I have to agree with the other poster though, that a rambling stream of consciousness post is not likely to be read nor result in sound, actionable advice/answers.

Also I have found that attention to detail can be most useful to those willing to assist. For instance, your statement that you "...planted some in soil, and some right into the fertilizer" surely can't be gramatically accurate. Please tell me you didn't plant seeds into a bag of fertilzer and actually expect anything good to happen.

Organize your thoughts, convey a thorough description of the environment (your outdoors but are the plants in pots or in the ground) and focus on specifically what your question or questions are.

Best of luck.

okay addressing everyone that says i havent looked into this. i have. i have watched so much about this is rediculous tho as you all can probably understand, everyone says something diff. i get a lot of diff things out of the videos i watch but i am trying to get as much info as i can... i appreciate everyones time in talking with me tho you have to understand, i came to a forum last. i did the videos, read on line, read forums. so even if i asked a question that you think i can find the answers to easily, is not so. because i know several diff answers to most all the questions i asked. i just need to know the correct one.
i bought fox farm ocean forest soil and fox farm nutrients. i know that the yellow leaves at the bottom die (see i didnt know that till today. even all the research i did, notihing i saw said this except once. so is this true? you start feeding when the bottom leaves begin to die or when they do die? that was unclear. i got a PH tester since i have posted. i ordered it so its not here yet.
and again the post i am replying to was much nicer than some of the others... really if you read my post, i was asking questions but also giving the answers. just asking if those were the correct answers because there is so much wrong information out there i dont know what to believe. ppl swear by MG, some say dont use it... etc...
i just wanted to know what info i typed on my first post was all correct.
thank you for explaining to me about the veg and flowering. its what i thought it was, i just wannted to make sure. thats all... so im sorry if i wasted anyones time, that wasnt what i was trying to do. im trying to get the correct information. thank you.

 

[go4snypr]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I know how you feel about all the information, it is hard to process. I am not sure where to start answering questions in this thread. If your seedlings have sprouted and you put them in soil and they are poking thru, you are on a good start. As for nutes, if you are using soil that already has fertilizer in it, then I would wait. Soil like Miracle Grow has time release ferts in it, and if you start adding more, you will burn your plants. I use what they call Sunshine Mix #4, it is a mixture of things, but it is not soil and it has no nutrients in it, so we control that by adding what we want to it for fertilizers. Stealing dirt that you have no idea what is in it for pests/chemical/disease, is only going to cause you problems in your garden.

I saw a question in the top post about watering, ONLY WATER WHEN IT IS DRY, heft the pot, stick your finger in the dirt, get a feel for a dry pot. When it is dry, then water, over watering is one of the biggest noob mistakes. (that along with over fertilizing)

Ph is important, (sounds more important if doing hydro setup), test the ph of the water going into the plant, and if you water to get enough out the bottom, test the ph of the water comming out the bottom of your plant. PH should be around 6.0, too high or too low and you will start getting nutirent lock out, (the plant will stop taking up nutirents). Also, the ph of the soil will effect the ph of the water,that is why you should check it out of the bottom, especially if you are using unkown soil.

Lighting: You plants are going to be in the Vegatative State, or Veg, for at least 4-6 weeks, that means your lights are on at least 16 hours a day, this is when the plant does most of the growing, and you will never see buds form during this state of growth

Once you decide the plant is big enough (depending on how big your grow area is), then the lighting changes to a 12 hour of day 12 hour of dark, this is what makes the plant start producing buds. Also known as the Flowering stage.

To get things going right for your self, and so others can help, you need to decide:

what kind of dirt you are going to grow in (i see you have fox farms now, I have never used anything other than Sunshine #4, so I dont have any info for you on the FF soil, maybe someone else will chime in )
let us know if it is in doors or out doors
let us know what temps you are running during day and night
the ph of your water
if and what nutrients you are adding
what kind of lighting you have (if it is indoors)

Once you get a few things set in stone, then we can help with plant deficiencies and other grow problems, but like everyone else said, when you post problems in an unorganized order with no "real" question, it is hard to give proper answers. Good luck

 

[CA215]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Welcome to the forums brotha! I'm reading through your posts and would like to leave a couple pointers that i think will help you on throughout your grow. Fox farm ocean forest soil will work prefect for your grow! Do not add any nutrients until at least (the rule of thumb is 30 days) 30 days, I, instead, watch my plant until I start seeing some yellowing or deficiency, that's when you need to start adding in nutrients to your mix to keep your girls green and lush Remember start at about 1/4 or 1/3 strength nutes and work your way up until then. Picking up a pH tester is your best bet I think.. Check your water ASAP, you want to shoot for 6.0-6.5 range, and when you pick a number to roll with, try to pH your water to that number every time. Big jumps in pH will cause stress to your plants and can cause problems to arise further down the road. Hope some of this answers a couple questions, if you have some more feel free to contact me , I will try my hardest to help your world run smoother CA215, Welcome to 420magazine Sulfer!!

 

[Sulfer]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Welcome to the forums brotha! I'm reading through your posts and would like to leave a couple pointers that i think will help you on throughout your grow. Fox farm ocean forest soil will work prefect for your grow! Do not add any nutrients until at least (the rule of thumb is 30 days) 30 days, I, instead, watch my plant until I start seeing some yellowing or deficiency, that's when you need to start adding in nutrients to your mix to keep your girls green and lush Remember start at about 1/4 or 1/3 strength nutes and work your way up until then. Picking up a pH tester is your best bet I think.. Check your water ASAP, you want to shoot for 6.0-6.5 range, and when you pick a number to roll with, try to pH your water to that number every time. Big jumps in pH will cause stress to your plants and can cause problems to arise further down the road. Hope some of this answers a couple questions, if you have some more feel free to contact me , I will try my hardest to help your world run smoother CA215, Welcome to 420magazine Sulfer!!

i have plannted two diff times, i am going to leave a post to someone else after this will answer some questions about what i got set up... but i wanted to thank you for your info as well as ask you something. my younger plants are doing great. my older ones have been fed, but they are yellow but only the very bottom leaves. the ones that first show up when they grow. someone told me they are meant to fall off. is this true? and if not, what could be the cause of this? i have heard lack of sun... nothing else on any of the plants are messed up. only bottom leaves. the rest of all of them look great so far. check my other post im about to leave, it might answer questions you need to know. thank you again for your time, i appreciate it. so many of you are all so nice.

 

[Sulfer]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

thank you for all that info. it was very helpful. heres what i got going on.
I did get soil i didnt know about but these were test plants, tho i knew the one soil i stole was from scotts and for grass (what they were using it for). i knew what scotts used for soil when they plant, so i knew it had nutrients in it. the other was just to see if it would work because it was right out side my apartment. my second batch i got scotts soil from the store... after that... i order fox farm ocean forest and was gonna replant my newbies in better pots (was gonna do that anyway they are getting to tall very fast) and plant them in this soil, the fox farm.
its an out door grow on a pourch. i live around pittsburgh, pa. our weather hear sucks but it gets light from about 6 am to 9 pm. weather so far has been about 60s at night and mid 70s to 80s in day time, tho its going to start getting much warmer out now.
i also used rose wood fert for my older plants when i replanted them. they all actually seem to be doing good except some have a very thin stem. i have had some bent. tho, i put more soil around them and they seem find. in fact, it happened to one that is about 3 to 4 weeks old and its stronger now, but its not very big... it seems to have stunted growth, but i could be wrong about this. i have to keep an eye on it. they are in either those all natural paper pots that you buy real cheap at the store, i use those to start them, then i put them in clay pots. right now, the ones in the pots are in about 5 to 6 inch tall pots. like i said, other than the yellow on the bottom leaves (i heard this is normal and they are supossed to fall off, is this true? ive asked someone else about this as well)... they seem to be doing good... i planted them two seperate times because my first ones i wanted to test things out. diff soils and foods to see what works but it seems like it all worked just fine. like i said too, som eof them have a very week stem. i add soil to it, is this normal to do? in some of the videos i have seen i saw that they dont put a lot of soil around the plant at first. then when it gets pretty tall i assume they add more but none of the videos i saw told me if they do or dont. if i dont, they get bent. is there a way to make the stems stronger right away or is ther something i can do to make sure they are safe from the elements. they are small, so tying them to a post im not sure is doable yet, they are so tiny really. tall, but thin, tiny. but really really tall.
again i thank you for all you wrote. it is a lot to take in. this was a last min thing i did this. i didnt expect them to get this far to be honest with you. but i hoped it would. i just thought some would die and i only had one die and i know why it died. so i have tons of plants... i can spare a few, if they die no big deal, but id ont want that of course... im just trying to do the best i can now... now i see i can grow them, i ordered that soil and i also got some nutrients i forget what they are called... something bloom. big bloom maybe. it says to use with fox farm and it says you can use it from seedling till harvest. i didnt want to spend the money when i started, but now i see that these will grow here, where i have them, i am more willing to spend the money.
i think i answered all your questions and then some.... thanks again and any thing else you think you can tell me, or think o f telling me, or whatever would be great. thank you so much i do appreciate your time very much, as well as everyones!

 

[CA215]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i have plannted two diff times, i am going to leave a post to someone else after this will answer some questions about what i got set up... but i wanted to thank you for your info as well as ask you something. my younger plants are doing great. my older ones have been fed, but they are yellow but only the very bottom leaves. the ones that first show up when they grow. someone told me they are meant to fall off. is this true? and if not, what could be the cause of this? i have heard lack of sun... nothing else on any of the plants are messed up. only bottom leaves. the rest of all of them look great so far. check my other post im about to leave, it might answer questions you need to know. thank you again for your time, i appreciate it. so many of you are all so nice.

No problem Sulfer, this is a great helpful community, everyone has the same love for this awesome megical herb The two small leaves that first appear when your plants start to grow will start yellowing and will usually just fall off. This is completely normal and you shouldn't have anything to worry about. If it is your bigger fan leaves you may have some deficiency issues that could possibly need some tending too.

In responce to the second post, couple questions. Do you have any small stakes you can use to help your girl grow straight up. I think you are saying that the main stem and branches are just very skinny right now and are almost toppling over? If that is the fact, I use anything I can find around my house, bamboo stakes, even a small shish kabob can work, with a twisty tie to keep it held close the the stake. And for adding soil, I usually add another layer of top soil about 2 weeks after my plants have been growing, by this time I have watered a few times and the soil has compacted abit, you will have a bit of room on the top of the container. I don't like my roots being right on the top soil & getting hit by the sun so I tend to try and put as much soil as I can to keep them situated. Another question. Are you moving your plants from spot to spot or do they stay in one location. If you are moving your plants around you have to keep in mind that their light time could be getting affected every time they get moved, if this happens a couple times they should be fine. But constant stress if no good for our ganj. Hope this helps ya a bit Sulfer Happy fathers day sir CA

 

[toasted]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Sulfer

If your experience is anything like mine has been so far with the forums, you will find sooo many helpful and extremely knowledgeable people who make themselves available to help. On top of 'interactive help' possible here, there is just so much great information stored within the site & older posts that it would take multiple lifetimes to absorb everything

That said, as a recently new solo grower myself the primary recommendation I would make to you is to pick up a good "grow bible". I have found it to be very helpful as a quick "go to" reference. While in almost every case the forums here can provide the same (or even better & more update to date) information I have found there are certain fundamental subjects (ex: pest / disease identification) that the grow bibles distil fairly well. I have run into situations where it's also been nice to have something at my finger tips which I can 'flip through' to find a bit of information quickly and am not in front of a computer.

I think the biggest name I'm aware of in this category is Jorge Cervantes (hit up the googles or youtube to get the low down) but there are def. others.

Aside from that I saw you were asking about stem strength... I would suggest to you that there is no real "magic bullet" for this or any other aspect BUT there are definitely a few that can be done to help the plant out. IF you were doing indoor in a fully controlled environment, the main thing people do is use an oscillating fan which over time (days & weeks) causes the plant to become stronger. I think outdoor grows rely on mother nature to do the work of the fans. Stronger roots also mean better nute uptake, which means a stronger healthier plant. This is also where pH comes into play since if the pH is too high or too low there are certain primary/secondary/micro nutrients the plant will -not- be able to uptake:

PH and Nutrient Uptake charts!

I will say for me, it took so much reading/research/time to figure out how much I *didn't* know

From experience I can say you will not think of everything or get it all right the first time around!!! Try and learn from each mistake and keep in mind the plants are very resilient. Personally I think there's a reason it's called "weed"

I hope this helps and wish you the best of luck!

 

[Jimmycricket]

Re: I need HELP, first time grower PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

For instance, your statement that you "...planted some in soil, and some right into the fertilizer" surely can't be gramatically accurate. Please tell me you didn't plant seeds into a bag of fertilzer and actually expect anything good to happen.

.

Oh its possible lol. When I first started trying to grow I remember i poured like 3 tablespoons of the blue MG crystals into some water and fed it to a 3 day old sprout. I figured if a little bit of nutrients help them, then feeding it a lot will make it grow even faster rofl.

Obviously that didnt work and those plants died in a few hours .

But Sulfer my best advice to you is read some basic horticulture books and how to grow weed guides. Also for me videos are a nice way to learn too, so youtube is loaded with great grow videos (and some shitty ones too). I think jeorge cervantez "grow" video is quite nice and was one of the first videos i ever saw about growing dope. Its a good starting place.