Pirate Grows Pot

[Pirate]

Pirate Grows Pot​

Hello Everybody. I have been messin around on this site for about a month and found it while searching for info on growing. At first I was paranoid about signing up. But I finally bit the bullet and....well.....Here I am. I ahve taken a wealth of info from many of you and Inspiration is what I got the most of. So with that, I want to welcome you to my grow room......Pirate Grows Pot !

I am new to growing in general. I did grow few plants many years ago but nothing like what I see here. Technology has changed in 15 years. One plant I did bring to flower was an outdoors plant. Just before Harvest...........Someone decided they needed it more than me. My Bro and I were growing it in his back yard. Well he went to jail for 4 months and His girfriend kept seeing this thing getting taller than the fence so she kept cutting it and tying it down........all the time cussing us about it. Well by the time he got out this thing was a monster. Huge ass buds and 12 feet long in a horizontal growing direction. Like I said...........Someone burned it right before we got to harvest it. We had a few going in the gargage but never did anything serious about them.

Anyway, Here we are today: 15 years later. Now I am serious, older and alot wiser.

I have already started my seeds and they are in the 2 or 3 inch range right now. They are on their 3rd set of leaves. Not counting the little round ones (name of those??) I am going to start at the beginning even though I am 2 weeks into the grow as of last night so this thread has a true beginning and "hopefully" an good ending.

All advice and suggestions are welcome. Hope you like this as much as I like doing it. God I love the Internet !! Don't you?? (funny thing, Last time I tried to grow......the internet didn't exist) At least not to the general public.

HERE WE GO....... LETS GROW SOME POT​

My grow room is a closet that I have emptied in my home office. It measures 8 feet long x 30 inches wide/deep x 8 feet high. I will seperate this into 2 - 30 inch x 4 foot sections. One for Vegging and one for Flowering.

Here is the grow room as I see it from my desk

I am going to grow 5 White Widow and 5 Northern Lights. All Nirvana seeds from Discount Seeds. Discount cannabis seeds - marijuana (weed) seeds
4 days later.......I was GERMING !!

Here is the info from the site about my seed selections:
NORTHERN LIGHTS
Pure Indica and winner of the Indica strain 88, 89 and 1990; an absolute must for the indoor grower! Northern Lights dominated harvest festivals and many wonderful stains share its heritage. Through selective breeding we have succeeded in developing one of the most powerful plants in the world. Northern lights is highly adapted to indoor growing, compact, powerful, good yield and has exceptional resin production. Northern Lights is a most lucrative plant for the indoor grower. When it’s covered in snowy crystals of resin lights, it’s ready to harvest.
Flowering: 45-51 days
Height: 100-130cm indoor / 160cm or more outdoor
Yield: ~128-180g indoor / 400+g outdoor in good conditions
Indica/Sativa: 95/5
Harvest: Primarily indoor, late Oct. if outdoor
Sow: Sow when soil warms to 15C/59F or transplant after last frost

WHITE WIDOW
White Widow is one of a kind and winner of the Cannabis Cup in 1995! This plant is the strongest among the weed species. Has the highest percentage of THC !!! Also known as Snow White, A relatively short plant with high flower to leaf ratio it can do well indoor and outdoor. White Widow has a delicious aroma and sweet smooth fresh taste, as well as a serious high. Watch the flower maturing stage and harvest at the peak of white crystal formation which will cover the flowers. Avoid excessively cool damp conditions in the maturing phase.

Flowering: ~56-60 days
Height: ~80cm indoor / outdoor150-200cm
Yield: ~240g indoor / ~395g or more outdoor
Indica/Sativa: 60/40
Harvest: If outdoor end of Oct.
Sow: After last frost ~ April/May or when soil warms to 15C/59F​

As soon as I ordered the seeds I started to build my germination box. I will use this later for more seeds but I intend On cloning my fems when I select good ones. The box will be to small for that. It will just be for seed germination. That way I can keep lighting schedules on tract in the different rooms / boxes.

Here is before and after shots of my Germ box:

Before:

After: I used 2 cans of High Heat Flat White Paint. Its so bright in there I can harldy look inside when the lights are on.

The Light:
Since the cabinet is so small: 15 x 22 x 30, I had to use small lights. I bought 2 Circiline light fixtures and made one fixture by stripping and building them into one Frankenstien like creature. The total watts ended up being 94 in cool white and Daylight combined. The lamps are round as you see and get progressivly smaller. (22 inch, 16, inch, 12 inch lamps). The idea came to me in a vision. (Well..........actually.............. while shopping at HD)

Here is the Light:

A few days later I upgraded with more lights and I will get to that soon.

GERMINATION
I used the cup of water method to pop the seeds:
1 half cup of distilled water at room temp, 2 cups labeled for 1 strain each
5 seeds per strain into the water at 6pm on January 20th. (Saturday Night)
Covered with a paper towel in the water to keep seeds below water line
(they wanted to float)
Placed cups in Germiantion Cabinet so they would stay warm and covered to keep light out

All 10 seeds cracked by 9 am the following morning.

I placed all seeds into 4 inch rockwool cubes with root facing down. Watered with plain Distilled water at room temp and placed in Germ cabinet with dome on tray

I don't have a photo of that but here is what it would look like with the dome and lights inside the cabinet. You can see the pully system I installed for raising and lowering the lights on the left side of the cabinet. I installed a max drop cord so the fixture could never drop thus cruching my babies.

All but one seed sprouted within 1 day. (24 hours), I cracked the dome open for ventalation at this point but did not remove it totally for a few days. The next set of photos are 2 or 3 days into the seedling stage:

Day 4 or 5:

Getting thier sunlight: (so to speak)

The box has 2 computere fans bought from an electronics store for 8 bucks each. One for intake and one for exhaust. Intake is lower front, You can see it in the photo. Exhaust is upper left back for cross ventalation. Tempature in the cabinet stays around 75 to 80 and the humidity around 35%.


OPPS ! Looks like I am trying to post to many photos at one time. I will have to start a new post.

I'll be Back !!

 

[Pirate]

Shall we continue??

One week since they were seeds in a wrapper: Notice there are only 9. I ended up with 4 NLs and 5 WWs. I probably could have waited a little longer for the 10th but I kept fucking with it and trying to see if it was coming up and I think I screwed it up. Anyway; It never looked like it was sprouting so I ditched it. All the others were over an inch tall by now. I really only want to end up with 2 nice females for cloning anyway. I figure my odds are good with 9 plants to get 2 Mammas. One of each.

This is around day 9 or 10. Notice the lighting upgrade. There is a total of 394watts of light in that tiny little box.

Here is week #1 photo:

I must take a break. Been typing and uploading for a couple hours now. Plus, I wanna go look at my cuties !!

Be back soon.

 

[CannabisClown]

nice

 

[delicato420]

Yarr! nice setup.

 

[Pirate]

Thanks Guys. I have more to post to bring it up to date but..............My mouth is full of Lasagna right now. Home made. I made it. Fresh frozen. All I needed to do was take it out of the box and plastic wrapper and microwave it. Viola, Homemade Lasagna

YUMMY !!

 

[Pirate]

Ok,
On day #10 I transplanted into my hydroponic system which I built from scratch. All the info to build one is on the net and every part can be bought for cheap at any home improvment store. Very little is needed from the Hydro store.

Here is a photo of the 4 inch Rockwool soaking overnight.

I used room temperate distilled water and rockwool stablizing solution. Ph was adjusted to 6.0 ( so I thought) I had not yet recieved my PH meter and was using the little bottle a dropper method to test. After I got my tester I realized...........the dropper method sucks. I wouldn't suggest it. GET A DIGITAL METER.

Anyway, Here are the seedlings transplanted into the rockwool cubes. #rd and Labled. I used #s as to the order in which they sprouted. Of course, They really sprouted almost at the same time.

Here is the Flood and Drain tray before I had enough caly pellets to fill it. I have more but I need to claen them.What a bitch that is. You have to wash them many times before the residue goes away.

Here is a far away shot of the grow closet with Ebb and Flow tray set up. I used a car windsheild sun blocker for a frontal shade. Its nice because it folds up out of the way when I want to sing to my Honeys and carress them to sleep.

At the moment I am still hand feeding. I learned a big lesson already. Babies don't eat grown up food !!

I filled the hydroponic system with Distilled water (I dind't have the meter yet and had no idea what kind of Tap water I had) Adjusted the water to a PH of 6.0, used less than 1/2 of the Fox Farms grow big 3-2-6. Whoops......wrong move. By morning I had nute burn. I flushed and went back to hand feeding for now till they get a little older.

The meter arrived finally. I calibrated it and tested my water. Thats when I found out that the dropper method of testing PH sucks. Way off. Anyway, Right now I am feeding Regular Tap water with a few drops of Superthrive. PH of 5.8 and a PPM of 350. Tempature in the closet stays at 75 to 77 day time and around 65 to 70 at night. Humidity stays around 40%.

The babies seem content right now and I am just playing the waiting game at this point. Wishing them bigger and bigger.

Nighty Night.

 

[Bagzgroove]

Nice Job. . . Keep it up.

 

[blowin.endo]

nice setup .. and cabinet

 

[Akornpatch]

Damn Pirate...nice work. PLEASE PLEASE keep this going.

Akorn

 

[CustomMX6]

I'm excited to follow this man! Good luck!

 

[Pirate]

Thank you Guys. I am totally new at this sort of thing but I'm a very technical kind of guy and this sort of thing is right up my alley.

I do intend on finishing this Akorn.

Thanks for loooking in.

 

[highlifeisdalif]

cool dude...

 

[Henroc420]

very nice set up hope to see them babies grow big.

 

[highlifeisdalif]

me two!

 

[Pirate]

I will update a little later tonight. (No plant photos) My babies are growing. The forth set of leaves is coming out. Most are looking good. A couple are............well...............lets just say................alive! LOL I'll get a few photos and maybe some of you experienced growers can tell me whats up with a couple runts.

Thanks for the looksies

 

[Stix]

Setup looks good. I wouldn't over analyze the runt problem to much. I chalk my runts up to bad genetics. That way I feel better about myself.

 

[Pirate]

Setup looks good. I wouldn't over analyze the runt problem to much. I chalk my runts up to bad genetics. That way I feel better about myself.

LOL. I already did. It seems that the Nirvana Northern Lights seeds all have some sort of weird growing about them. The White Widows are all good looking thought. Its still early so, we'll see how things turn out.

I'm hoping they grow out of it.

 

[Pirate]

Questions:

I just swicthed from Floros and CFLs to a 250 watt MH. The Metal halide is 15 inches above the tops of the seedlings. Seedlings are 17 days old. Is that to close? I checked the heat levels and it seems good for now. But it is night time and its cooler outside. I have noticed an immediate change in the way the plants respond to the light. Within hours the leaves are perkier and looking towards the light. Within hours I can see that the growth rate will be faster.

2) Will using this light (250 MH) cause the plants to stretch alot more tha using the floros since I need to keep it much farther away?

3) At what point do the first set of leaves (the little round ones) fall of ? It appears as though they are all turning yellow on allmost all the plants and they look like they may be wanting die and fall off. Is that normal at day 17 to 20 ?? I did have nute burn a few days ago but corrected that problem. I belive its not a nute problem because I am feeding strait water and a few drops of Superthirve only. It is only the little round leaves, not the fan leaves turning yellow.

Water ph = 5.7
PPM = 140
Air Temp = 75 / 78
Humidity = 40%

Any help, ideas or opinions is appreciated.

 

[Racefan]

MH's are good lights for all aspects of growing. Some believe a HPS is neccessary for flower but it's not. I've had greaqt results with MH's all the way through.
Your floros aren't half as hot as the MH so you need more distance with it. Your distance from light to plant is fine. as long as the plants are happy, so should you be.
The coyteldons(sp?)(first set of leaves) falling off at 2 to 3 weeks in is normal. Most of the time it even happens sooner for me.
Are you soil or hydro? Soil ph 6.2 to 6.8 is ideal so yours is a tad low. If hydro..your fine. Humidity could stand a little raising. 50% is ideal 40% will work if it's a pain to adjust.
Sounds like your doing alright. How about some pics?

 

[Pirate]

Hey, Thanks man. You answered almost all of them for me.

I am growing hydro. I will have some updated photos tomorrow. Its 11pm now and unfortuantly.................I work in the morning

Thanks again Racefan.................(what kind of races are we a fan of)? I'm going to the drags NHRA in Pomona this weekend. I went last Nov and watched "Force" take the crown.............AGAIN.