Patro's First Grow: Hydro, Velvet Bud, Jack Herer, Goldmine

[Patro46]

First off, I never thought I'd live to see the day Oklahoma would pass medical marijuana laws, but when it happened, two things took place.

1. My bucket list visit to Amsterdam was removed
2. I decided to take advantage of what I voted for, obtained my card and began construction on a 12x12 "He-Shed".

In the 70's and 80's I ran an indoor hydroponics setup using 4" PVC pipe looping through a room. Today I think it's called "Nutrient Film Technique". What I knew then was I could grow stalks big enough to play baseball with...and did it out of 16 oz Dixie cups.
For my first grow in a very, very long time, I opted for an Ebb and Flow design, but wanted to be able to grow 6 large plants in flower and another 6 plants in veg at all times, so I divided the room in half, dedicating 6x12 for flowering and 6x8 for veg and clone. This gave me a small entrance with two separate areas for growing.


For the flower room, I went with a set of six 6.6 gallon buckets and a homemade Ebb and Flow controller (nifty kit you assemble yourself) and a 55 gallon Brute tote.

 

[Patro46]

This hopefully will allow me to grow 6 nice size ladies. I also needed to be able to move things around with ease. This is my solution

I still have to address lighting, ventilation, cooling and a host of other factors that need to be met before I can kick this project up and running. I'm a cheap guy when I can be, so I tend to use what I can find. This is the controller I'll use to control the fan for heat removal from the 1000 watt hood in the veg room and the two 600 watt hoods in the flower room. It's ducted to draw air from outside and duct the hot air outside. The thermostat serves two purposes. First, it insures the fan only runs when the lights are on. Second. It's a wifi thermostat and allows me to monitor temps. It's powered by a 24 volt 40 va transformer, and incorporates a speed control. Best part it didn't cost me anything.

The flower room consists of two 600 watt HPS lights set to operate off 220 volts. All my light controllers are 110 volts. Here's my solution. The box is a simple 60 amp disconnect that I gutted. I installed a heavy duty 30 amp contactor with a 110 volt coil. My simple light controller controls a contactor that carries the load for the lights.


I learned a long time ago if you start with clean water you eliminate stuff like wandering ph, ect. I opted for a HydroLogic reverse osmosis system. With 300 gallon a day capability, it should provide all the near zero ppm water I need. I plumbed this into a 55 gallon reservoir on a float switch. This provides all I need for reservoir changes.


Moving on, I shifted attention to the veg room. I need to maintain 6 plants in veg, always ready to go into flower, so timing is designed in. I opted for a 2x4 flood table with a 27 gallon reservoir. A single 1000 watt light (adjustable from 500, 750 and 100 watts) in veg.

 

[Patro46]

Right across from the veg table is another small flood table. This can keep a mother or provide a place for clones once they leave the cloner. A single 2 foot, 4 bulb T-5 provides lighting here.

And so it begins... I started with three clones, two Velvet Bud and one Blueberry. (Blueberry is in the middle)
I then picked up a Goldmine, Jack Herer and a cute little Lemon Cush Headband. I transplanted them from soil to hydrotron.

It didn't take long to move them into bigger pots in the flower room. This is getting FUN!

 

[Patro46]

My grow is a sealed grow. I have an co2 generator in the flower room. This fan controller run the quietest variable speed ICM inline fan I've ever heard. It's mounted in the attic and has two 5 inch supplies and two 5 inch returns. The flower room has one 5 inch supply register and one 5 inch return. The same for the veg room. One supply-one return. This allows me to exchange air between both rooms, effectively keeping the co2 levels elevated in both rooms using only one generator.

Here's a view of the small mother/cloning station

That tiny entrance where you walk in houses a wet/dry vac and storage cabinet for nutes, ect.

I tried to build a cloner, but like those before me, I gave up. Reservoir temps and tiny leaks. I need dependability.

I'm a big believer in healthy roots. White roots are healthy roots.

 

[Souptaco]

Wow awesome grow space!

Northern Lights #5 Mid Grow

Started first time grow first day of veg 12/31 I’ve been debating on if I should journal but decided to. Viparpectra 600w 3x3x6 tent Planted in topsoil mix Transplanted into 5gal ffof mix 1/11 1/15 first topping 1/20 first day training 1/29 1st neem oil treatment 2/5 second 2/3 started...

www.420magazine.com

 

[Patro46]

The flower room has kicked into overdrive and now I need a method of plant support that allows it to be moved with the plants, and several plants have outgrown their buckets so
time to move those girls into flower room in 6.6 gallon buckets


Well into flower now, about four weeks. I'm having to train the canopy. The Velvet Bud has exploded far greater than I thought she would as did the Goldmine Feminized. Both the Jack Herer and the Blueberry are much shorter, fuller plants. The Blueberry stalk is just about big enough to use as a baseball bat. This plant could support pineapples for fruit as the stems are thick and solid, unlike several strains in the grow

 

[Patro46]

Now that I've pretty much made it through my build and have some healthy girls going, this old timer needs your help. I need your opinions. First off, I can walk into my local hydro store and show a man a lot of ways to spend money. Further, if the man listens to a counter man he's gonna help in that dept as well, and there seems to be no end in what you can buy and add to your regamine. Go to another store and you get a whole new spin on spending.
So.... 'Ol School here keeps coming back to NPK. Or am I missing something?
Since I began, I purchased General Hydroponics Flora series, mainly because of how well it actually broke down in the water and hasn't given me any wild swings in ph or ppms.

I've been using the 3 part series plus a calcium and silica supplement. I use RO water, so swing issues haven't shown up.
I maintain a 69 deg root zone and use a 10th hp chiller to maintain reservoir temps. Air is introduced in 55 gallon reservoir and in each of the 6 gallon buckets. They flood every 2 hrs for about 15 minutes, and the buckets keep about 1/2 to a gallon of nutrient h20 after pumpdown, and it is always oxygenated. Airflow is good everywhere, from above to under canopy and during lights on I maintain between 900 and 1500 ppm Co2. Flower room temps are maintained at 80 deg during lights on and run 70 to 72 during lights off. Humidity spiked at around 4 weeks into flower, so much so I had to invest in a dehumidifier. Humidity is dialed in at 50% and bounces between 40 and 50 rh now.
So I'm hoping I'm meeting requirements.
And if so, and the plants are happy...(happy roots, happy plants, right?) do I really need to add bloom boosters, ect. to grow a true top shelf product? Will the plants genetics bring out those traits or do I need to truly add to my nutes?

 

[Patro46]

Last night was a long one. Changed out the nutes in the 44 gallon reservoir last night and went with the General Hydroponics mid flower recipe (sort of), here is why. For whatever reason, if I go according to the GH feeding schedule, it tosses me around 1500 ppm. I learned this during veg. I've been running their exact recommended formula.....at 50% strength. My water always tests below 10 ppm, but if I go by their recommendations, it's always too hot. Anyway, the mid bloom steps up a formula change, but instead of running at 50%, I ran it to 70%. This tossed me in the high 1200's. I had to add some PH Down after a mix and stabilization, which is pretty much par for course with my setup, just never ran this hot on nutes

I'm using the Flora series and only add three other components.
*GH Armor Si
*Calimagic
*Mammoth Beneficial Bacteria

I certainly welcome your input!

Onto yet another question. I've been tossing my leaf trimming, but my wife bagged up the last batch and I stuck it in the freezer. The only reason I did was after looking at the leaf under a magnifying glass, they we chocked full of little bubbles of yum-yums. So I have a few of these frozen in the freezer. Any opinions on what to do with them?


Dealing with stink. Up until about a week ago, smell really hadn't been an issue, as I kinda like that dankage smell. However, they are getting real dank so I kicked up the carbon filter to about 50%. I put a 90 on the fan supply outlet and installed a 4x12 four way register. This is otherwise wasted air is now directed helps to keeps the canopy moving around. Most important. Absolutely killed the smell.


The main nutrient reservoir in the flower room is a 44 gallon Brute. Temps are kept at between 68 and 69 degrees using a 1/10 hp aquarium chiller. Yes, I pump the nutes through the heat exchanger of the chiller I just consider this a maintenance issue and clean the heat exchanger on it. It has plugged before, but only when I shut the pump off for nutrient changeouts/cleaning. The 2nd time it happened, cleaning became a part of it, and after a grow, it gets cleaned out. I have a handy tool that involves a small co2 cartridge and is great for clearing small restrictions in all kinds of things. I ended up investing in one of those rather noisy air pumps, however it provides 8 equal air supplies to the entire flowering room, so the 6 grow buckets each have an air stone, the 44 gallon Brute reservoir gets one and the 55 gallon R.O. reservoir gets one as well. I installed a float switch on this one, so it automatically keeps itself topped off at all times, and NO R.O. filter I ever used was "fast". This eliminates waiting and waiting. I have a pump in the bottom that provides R.O. water to both the flower room, and through the wall into the veg room.

 

[Patro46]

I knew I'd end up having to come up with something to hold the branches and buds, and knew whatever I did had to work with my roll around plant carts, moving with the plants. This is what I came up with, and topped it with a trellis net.

 

[Patro46]

Tending plants last week, a branch near the bottom of my Lemon Kush Headband snapped. I'm well into flowering and hate to waste, so I stuck it in my cloner. Low and behold she grew some legs. I just transferred her into Hydroton. Looks health, but not sure what to expect

 

[Patro46]

Two days ago, I began my 2 week flush. The trics are cloudy and maybe 5 to 10 percent of them are looking amber. The bud hairs are now showing a golden hue.
The two plants I held the least hope in have both proven to be a good looking yield, the Goldmine Fem and the Velvet Bud both have fat, sticky buds. The Blueberry was a shorter plant as is the Jack Herer, but both are gooey and dank.

 

[Patro46]

I'm 5 days into flush. I'm planning on 11-14 days, then harvest. Wish me luck!