Max Reefer's First Grow After a 20 Year Hiatus

[BunkerMonkey]

OK...this is my first DWC grow and my plants have only been in the buckets a little over a month but they are beautiful and thriving. You may not like my nutes since I'm not "organic", but I've been following a grower who calls himself Hygro Hybrid on You tube for the last 6 months or so and I'm basically doing what he does since what he does brings in an average of gram per watt and since I'm not a shareholder in Consumers Power I want to grow the most and best weed possible (who doesn't) for my electricity dollar. Hygros recipies have been changing lately but when I started putting my plan together he was using RO water and -

H2O2 (industrial strength 29%) to kill unwanted bacteria and so forth, also is an oxidizer, but is probably used up quickly in that role.
Silica Blast or its equivalent. Plants love silicates. It's also supposed to make them more pliable for LST. I bend the hell out of branches.
CalMag or its equivalent (calcium and magnesium and some iron) because plants love CalMag. Also found naturally in most non-RO water.
General Hydroponics FloraGrow/FloraMicro/FloraBloom for N-P-K and micro nutrients.
General Hydroponics Rapid Start until the roots are well developed.
Adjust pH back to 6.0
All nutrients are ONE HALF of what the bottle says and you should end up with about 600-700ppm in RO water. I don't know how to mix nutes using well water or city water, but I would assume you could drop the CalMag and have a higher final ppm if those elements are present in that water, which they should be.

I'm all for "organic" weed, but I didn't want to start fooling around with beneficial bacteria in something so new to me. Maybe with time I might add some so-called "organic" nutrients, but I also didn't want to stink up the basement with bat shit, if you know what I mean.

I stumbled upon HygroHybrid last fall when I got my MMJ card and decided to get serious about growing and supplying the dispensaries with my "overages". Hygro rambles a lot and mispronounces a few words but he seems to know his shit so I started following his grow videos and making notes. Unfortunately his videos were getting reported to YouTube and they were pulling the videos down so Hygro had to a Subscription Channel, but it's only $0.99/month. Damn cheap in my opinion! He's doing a LED/HPS grow off experiment right now to settle that matter once and for all. He's using Black Dog LEDs. Is that what you are running?

 

[grown2smoke]

nice setup, sucks your having problems but i know what thats like all too well. i dont know a whole whole lot, but i do know that one plant with the dragon claw looking leaves up top, thats usually a sign of over feeding, so id just bump the nutes down a little.

 

[BunkerMonkey]

I wish I had a good camera (I will after harvesting) so you could see how the DWC plants GLOW compared to the plants in the B'Cuzz Mixx (peat/perlite/dolomite lime). My first four dirty girls (chuckles) were started in soil so I put them in 10 gallon Dirt Bags(TM) and B'Cuzz (because that's what the kid at the hydro store recommended and all the bales of media were all the same price). I guess it's not considered a "soil grow" because I'm not using "organics". I say plants don't care where they get their N-P-K and Micros from as long as they are the right kind of nutrients. Now when it comes to flavor and THC/CBD production and stuff I don't claim to know shit, except that the old growers swear by soil for taste.

I've been giving the same nutrients listed in the post above to both the DWC and the B'Cuzz plants.

 

[BunkerMonkey]

I agree, grown2smoke. Too much N most likely. Never use as much as the instructions call for.

 

[Max Reefer]

nice setup, sucks your having problems but i know what thats like all too well. i dont know a whole whole lot, but i do know that one plant with the dragon claw looking leaves up top, thats usually a sign of over feeding, so id just bump the nutes down a little.

well all they have been getting is water. they are growing in sunshine mix soil. the funny thing is that it is only the three nysd plants. the chernobyl is in the same soil and isn't doing the claw thing. I have never grown in soil before and the only nutes I have given them is some molasses and oregonisms.

MR

 

[Max Reefer]

I didn't include this blue hawaiian in my journal at the beginning because I thought it was a goner. she is one of the ready to flower trees I converted to dwc from soil. in the beginning she was outperforming her sisters but one day she was looking rather limp. after frantically google searching the issue, I changed the nutes and the next day she looked to be her old self. well two days later she was back to looking limp. so I repotted her and removed some rotten roots gave her new nutes and the next days she was back to her old self again. but then she did it again. at that point I tried repotting her in soil after another root cleaning. this seemed to have no effect, so after a couple days I figured she was dead, but she refused to turn brown. so instead of pulling her up, I decided to put her outside and start a foliar feeding twice a day. after ony a day, I could see some signs of improvement. by yesterday she was definitely showing signs of life again so she got to go back inside yesterday.

this pick is if her when she went outside...

here she is 3 days later ready to go back inside...

MR

I have decided to try re-vegging this girl since she isn't showing any signs of new growth, but she is no longer droopy. so that's a good sign. she is now outside for a few (maybe 3 or 4) weeks.

MR

 

[BunkerMonkey]

Never give up until at least a week after you are sure a plant is dead. Last week I was about 3 seconds away from tossing 4 Colombian Gold landrace seedlings, but they pulled through and I have no doubt they will make it. Just my luck they're all males.

 

[Max Reefer]

now for some bud porn.

the chernobyl is one of my dirty girls and she is looking fantastic!

the nysd is doing very well also. this is just one of the three.

the blue dream appears to be completely spider mite free. it is amazing what a good hosing off will do. but all of her leaves have brown tips. not sure how to deal with that.

all of the dwc girls are suffering but a couple have some pretty good oil production. they still won't produce much in the way of buds, but I can't wait to try them and see how they taste.

here is the chem dawg.

MR

 

[Max Reefer]

Never give up until at least a week after you are sure a plant is dead. Last week I was about 3 seconds away from tossing 4 Colombian Gold landrace seedlings, but they pulled through and I have no doubt they will make it. Just my luck they're all males.

that is the only reason that this blue hawaiian is still alive. I noticed she wasn't turning brown so I didn't cut her and throw her in the yard waste bin. she might produce some buds in the future, but it won't be soon. it's all I can do to wait out the next 2 weeks to finish my dwc girls. when they come out, I am going to make a top drip reservoir system and ditch the dwc.

MR

 

[Stumped]

Hey max did you figure out what caused your air stones to get all gunked up?

I tried dwc briefly and had tried some molasses in my dwc.and it did exactly this.

 

[Max Reefer]

Hey max did you figure out what caused your air stones to get all gunked up?

I tried dwc briefly and had tried some molasses in my dwc.and it did exactly this.

I believe that is exactly what did it. now the dreaded slime is proving difficult to get rid of. I want to get some physan 20. that seems to be the silver bullet where the dreaded slime is concerned. I am planning to ditch the dwc and go back to what worked for me in the past. a top drip reservoir system, dwc is too finicky and too sensitive to environment variables.

MR

 

[Stumped]

I bought some expensive as hell stuff from the hydroshop 50$ for a pint, was called piranha. Beneficial bacteria cleared it right up in a week. I then shortly after got sick of dwc as u said too finakey and now I'm back to soil lol. Thinking on doing a simple flood table filled with hydroton. 3x3 feet. With a 15-20 gal rez.

Good friend of mine does it and the main selling feature for me was rez temps don't matter, basically if your under 80 your good. Dwc was driving me nuts having to add frozen bottles of water in the rez to keep temps below 70. And now I upgraded to a 1kw. So I had to abandon dwc as the temps in my room are much higher now.

Cheers

 

[BunkerMonkey]

Go with what works for you. So far I'm in love with DWC but I'm growing in a basement in Michigan so my nutrients are staying around 71° F. As the temperature rises down here over the course of summer I may find that I need to have a chiller though. I was growing in "soil" and still have the girls up off the concrete floor even though they are in DWC buckets but I'm soon to be building a larger vegging area and then the girl's buckets will be down on that 65° slab and should be fine. As soon as this soil grow is over and I can work in the flowering room again I will be making a couple of changes in my ventilation system and putting in a RDWC with the res outside the room so it doesn't pick up all that waste heat from the lights.

 

[Greensmurf420]

I love DWC!

No soil to mix & dispose of
No worries about over/under watering
Easy ph testing
Oh yeah and can't forget about
Faster & bigger growth!

Now on the other hand if something goes wrong with your res it can quickly affect the plant. But if you have separate buckets it can be an easy fix.

I was no good growing in soil but I thrive in dwc!

 

[Stumped]

Damnit I'm sorry lol didn't mean to get people all ruffled. Let me rephrase

Dwc has failed for me. So I do not like it right now lol

 

[Max Reefer]

I bought some expensive as hell stuff from the hydroshop 50$ for a pint, was called piranha. Beneficial bacteria cleared it right up in a week. I then shortly after got sick of dwc as u said too finakey and now I'm back to soil lol. Thinking on doing a simple flood table filled with hydroton. 3x3 feet. With a 15-20 gal rez.

Good friend of mine does it and the main selling feature for me was rez temps don't matter, basically if your under 80 your good. Dwc was driving me nuts having to add frozen bottles of water in the rez to keep temps below 70. And now I upgraded to a 1kw. So I had to abandon dwc as the temps in my room are much higher now.

Cheers

dwc is definitely temperature intolerant. I am partial to a top feed reservoir system. much the same as a flood and drain table, but different. yes the res systems are much more temperature tolerant. especially if you can remove them from the grow room.

Go with what works for you. So far I'm in love with DWC but I'm growing in a basement in Michigan so my nutrients are staying around 71° F. As the temperature rises down here over the course of summer I may find that I need to have a chiller though. I was growing in "soil" and still have the girls up off the concrete floor even though they are in DWC buckets but I'm soon to be building a larger vegging area and then the girl's buckets will be down on that 65° slab and should be fine. As soon as this soil grow is over and I can work in the flowering room again I will be making a couple of changes in my ventilation system and putting in a RDWC with the res outside the room so it doesn't pick up all that waste heat from the lights.

my first grow 20 years ago was in a basement. I never had any temperature issues there. I think things would have been different this time around if I had a res chiller. but then I would have to also have the dwc system set up as a reservoir system for that to work anyway.

I love DWC!

No soil to mix & dispose of
No worries about over/under watering
Easy ph testing
Oh yeah and can't forget about
Faster & bigger growth!

Now on the other hand if something goes wrong with your res it can quickly affect the plant. But if you have separate buckets it can be an easy fix.

I was no good growing in soil but I thrive in dwc!

I am glad it is working for you. unfortunately it doesn't work in my situation. luckily I have options.

Damnit I'm sorry lol didn't mean to get people all ruffled. Let me rephrase

Dwc has failed for me. So I do not like it right now lol

I am right there with you brother.

MR

 

[BunkerMonkey]

I love DWC!

Oh yeah and can't forget about
Faster & bigger growth!

No doubt about that, Greensmurf! Two months ago I had four rooted clones. I put two of them in soil and two of them in DWC. The two in soil were intended to be mothers and I don't plan on taking a lot of cutting from them so they are fine like that. I kept those plants in good lighting and they grew quite nicely. The two plants in DWC were kept in a low light area for the first month because I still had plants that needed to veg another month and I hadn't finished building the budding room. The soil plants in good light grew about 18 inches while the light starved DWC plants only grew an inch or two. When I finally put the DWC plants under the same lights as the soil plants the difference in the two methods quickly became obvious. DWC plants grow at about twice the rate as plants in soil. My runt DWC plants have overtaken the soil plants that had all the advantages at first and they are also much more vigorous and healthy looking. If I hadn't light starved those two DWC clones I would be looking at the same results as this grower had -

And I haven't fooled around with organic stuff and bacteria, just General Hydroponics Grow/Micro/Bloom and I don't have any slime of globs or gobs. I just hope the final product tastes OK.

 

[BunkerMonkey]

Max, I'll be following your top feed flood & drain system. It sounded like a great way to grow when I heard of it.

 

[Max Reefer]

because we all like videos...


MR

 

[Max Reefer]

I snapped a couple pics after lights out last night.

the blue dream has been getting tied down to make her more spread out. from the top she looks like fireworks going off in the sky...

my queen of the grow room is the chernobyl. she is so beautiful!

MR