SmokinRasta - First DWC Try & Fail - Tropicanna Poison XL Auto (Sweet Seeds)

[SmokinRasta]

This is a NOT TO DO REPORT - I messed it up!

I decided to post it to share my mistakess with you.

I used to grow on soil about ten years ago. Now, since it is legal to grow over here, I decided to get out my old equipment and start a new run. I decided to go this time with hydro! I wanted to try it already years ago.

They legalized growing over here, so I ordered some seeds to start with the legalization, beginning this month.
The seeds came just in time on 04/01 and I started directly.



Strain/s: Tropicanna Poison XL auto (Sweet Seeds)
Genetic Makeup: Auto Hybrid
Pot/Bucket Size: 7.9 Gallon
Tent Size: 3.5' x 3.5'
Grow Space:
How Many Plants: 3
Environment: Indoor
Stage: Vegi
Medium: hydro, DWC
Lights: 250w MH vegi, 400w HPS bloom
Nutrients: F-Max
Room/Tent Temperature: 78°
Relative Humidity: 65%



Germination (03/30/24)

Here I did my first mistakes:
I was used to grow on soil and so I decided (for any reason) to germinate them in Jiffies. I overwatered them, so they needed more time and grew slower. I started 4 Tropicanna with 5 Dutch Blue and have now only 3 broken Tropicannas and 0,5 Dutch Blue left cause I was that stupid! It was definately to wet for them. Next problem was the germination medium - don't know why I didn't choose Rockwool! I wanted to go DWC and have them now in soil... so I decided to get them out to put them with expanded clay in net pots. While I was washing the roots I dropped some in the spout and the others were root damaged/ rotted through the overwatering.

Equipment/ setup

During the meantime I checked my old equipment. Had still refelctors and ballasts (250w, 400w, 250-600w digital).
So I bought a 3.5 x 3.5 grow tent, a filter & fan with humidity and temp control, bluetooth thermo- and hygrometer, PH and EC meter, air pump,.... I decided to run with a 250W MH for vegi and with 400W HPS for bloom and bought new bulbs. - If I'm back in business and want to grow continuously, I will buy a LED.
With our new law, I'm allowed to grow just three plants in flower at a time - so I will just put three ladies in my tent. (...with this 3 plants you are allowed to grow a total of 50g - guess they will have to work on that law again...)

Actually I wanted to put my box in the cellar. Fortunately I recieved my thermo-/ hygrometer before my tent! I placed one in the basement place and was shocked! We had a huge flood this year and it looks like we still got water in the walls: humidity 99% - so I had to make some room and put it in my hallway. Wanted to put it in my sleeping room, but the air pump is too loud.

 

[SmokinRasta]

04/04

The nutrients challenge (04/06 - 04/10)

On soil I used Hesi but on DWC I wanted to go direction Canna or TA/GH, but was not sure and wanted to ask the guy in the shop.
But then the nightmare started! I noticed already when buying my grow box on the web that prices are crazy and a lot of products were not available. All grow shops I tried to call were not available, so I had to drive to the next city. It was already Saturday and my Plants had to get out of their Jiffies and move over to the DWC! So I drove to the next grow shop (30 miles) to get the news, that all grow shops in Germany are sold out cause of the sudden legalization and law changes...
I didn't wanted to buy any nutriens or fertilizer, so I decided to drive back home and search the around shops on the web again. It was like they said, noone could deliver! So I had no other chance and drove back on monday to buy the onliest product left: the F-MAX starter kit.
I haven't heard of this company yet. Even their website doesn't look trustworthy... But people in the grow shop and even in some german forums I found a few reports of this product. We'll see how it will work out.

DWC welcomes the new ladies (04/10)

Cause of the root sizes I decided to use one bucket for all ladies at the beginning. When the roots will grow, I will put them in a seperat one.
Yesterday I tried already to move them over to the DWC, but I had problems with the water mix. I needed PH regulator and that was one of the products you couldn't get anywhere anymore. So I decided to use PH regulator for pools (sodium hydrogen sulfate & sodium).
I realy had problems to regulate it and had several times to add water again cause of the EC.... - mixing nutrients you definately have to practice and learn. Now, 14 days later, it's still not perfect but at least it's easier.

04/12
Lowered the water level. It was reaching the net pot bottoms before. Now I got a few centimeters between.

04/13
The first root is visible.

04/14
Roots are growing. I dropped the thermometer on a plant and ripped of a leaf.
(next to this I started 3 Blueberry Glue Auto on Rockwool - will write a seperate report)

04/17
Finally I put the tent in the hallway and the plants move under my good old 250W MH lamp. I put a humidifier in the tent and wanted to regulate it with a hygrometer plug. --> here I did a mistake too: you have to buy a humidifier with auto-start-option! Mine doesn't have that, so I can't use it with the automatic control.

 

[SmokinRasta]

till 04/21

Plants are growing great and looking good.
But the dutch breed looks realy bad, but I will leave it and give it a try.
I'm a little bit affraid that I might have root rot! I got to high temperatures in my tent cause I didn't programm the fan correctly. I had a real temp problem from 04/18-21! Water temperatur was 24C/75F to 28C/82.5F!!!
I emailed F-Max to ask for the use of H2O2. I can do, but have to leave out roots, enzyme and top factor. All other products work in combination with H2O2.

04/24

It's getting worser and worser!
I analysed my tap water and I have a Cal/Mg Problem! 26,8 mg/l Ca and 4,09 mg/l Mg!
I bought bitter salt (sulfur magnesium fertilizer) to work against it.

04/27

I decided to buy chlorine based bleach to fight against the root rot. Couldn't get any H2O2...

 

[SmokinRasta]

04/29

The chlorine seems to work! The roots look way better now!
I just recalculated my nutrients again and used all other stuf and mixed up new water. Before I put the plants back in I rinse out the roots with tap water.

I put aluminum foil on the buckets to prevent them from heat. But it seems like its not working as supposed...

What do you think, will they still make it? - I'm not sure, but decided to let it run and learn from my mistakes...

 

[Tokin Roll]

Wow sorry to see your plants in that shape @SmokinRasta

High water/solution temperatures is what causing your root rot problem.

I am across the pond, so I can get hydro-guard to add to my solution to prevent root rot from high temperatures.
If you can not get that, you will need to lower your water temperature below 70 degrees. I sometimes use frozen water bottle to lower the temps. Anything above 72 degrees will lead to root rot.

Hope this helps.

Stay safe and grow well my friend,
Tok..

 

[SmokinRasta]

High water/solution temperatures is what causing your root rot problem.

Thank you Tok!

Glad you see the same problem like I do. That must be the reason for the nutrient lockout and causes the leaf symtoms. I actually need both products: CalMag and Hydro-Guard.

This run seems to be lost, so I gave it a fast try with these chlorine and bitter salt to work against it.
Today I got H2O2, but I changed the solution so often the last weeks, that I decided to wait another few days to see what happens.
I found in a german forum the advises to work with bitter salt against my Mg shortage. And, I don't know where I read it anymore, but somewhere I found that information that Chlorine might even work better than H2O2. They are just figuring out if Chlorine might even be a secret nutrigen for Cannabis as far as I know.

The temperature is a pain in my ! I'm affraid of the bloom time when I switch over from 250W to 400W!
I tried already the bottle trick too, but it's not the way I like to handle it. I got a bad feeling with a frozen bottle swimming right next to the roots and besides that you have to change it to often, the danger of getting bacteria.

The onliest thing that helped till now, was rising the lamp and put the fan on <75°F to get my solution temperatur to around 72°F.
I tried to put aluminum foil on the buckets a few days ago, but that didn't change anything. I don't want to buy a chiller and have aditional electricity costs.

Maybe a RDWC System runs with lower temperatures?

I read about people running a dwc even in the 80s in combination with H2O2... - guess I have to try and watch how the Chlorine works or switch over to H2O2 and another nutrient brand...

 

[Tokin Roll]

Can you get Hydro-Guard?

 

[Wastei]

Thank you Tok!

Glad you see the same problem like I do. That must be the reason for the nutrient lockout and causes the leaf symtoms. I actually need both products: CalMag and Hydro-Guard.

This run seems to be lost, so I gave it a fast try with these chlorine and bitter salt to work against it.
Today I got H2O2, but I changed the solution so often the last weeks, that I decided to wait another few days to see what happens.
I found in a german forum the advises to work with bitter salt against my Mg shortage. And, I don't know where I read it anymore, but somewhere I found that information that Chlorine might even work better than H2O2. They are just figuring out if Chlorine might even be a secret nutrigen for Cannabis as far as I know.

The temperature is a pain in my ! I'm affraid of the bloom time when I switch over from 250W to 400W!
I tried already the bottle trick too, but it's not the way I like to handle it. I got a bad feeling with a frozen bottle swimming right next to the roots and besides that you have to change it to often, the danger of getting bacteria.

The onliest thing that helped till now, was rising the lamp and put the fan on <75°F to get my solution temperatur to around 72°F.
I tried to put aluminum foil on the buckets a few days ago, but that didn't change anything. I don't want to buy a chiller and have aditional electricity costs.

Maybe a RDWC System runs with lower temperatures?

I read about people running a dwc even in the 80s in combination with H2O2... - guess I have to try and watch how the Chlorine works or switch over to H2O2 and another nutrient brand...

In you situation I believe regular bleach (sodium hypochlorite) is your best option. H202 is more hazardous to use and has very low duration. H2O2 6-12 hours and bleach 3-4 days. I add 3ppm residual chlorine every 3 day and to anything going in to the reservoir.

Use this calculator: Chlorine dilution calculator

If you need any help filling out the calculator just PM me. You'll often find the percentage of sodium hypochlorite on the back of the bottle. My local brand has 5% sodium hypochlorite.

3-5ppm is recommended in DWC. For a ongoing Pythium root rot breakout 10ppm might be needed. On very large plants with large root masses you need to increase the dosage since the organic matter makes the duration and effect shorter. 3ppm for small plants and 5ppm for very large ones.

Hope that helps!

Cheers!

 

[SmokinRasta]

Thank you for your advices @Tokin Roll and @Wastei !!!

I think Hydro-Guard might be hard to get - but am sure there must be similar products or maybe anything from aquarium keeping. I even found an O2 product over there...

Looks like I got it now/ am going the right way... - the plants started growing again. Tomorrow I will cut off the dead leafs.

I used the calculator when I bought bleach. The first time I used the 4ppm way and today, 3 days later, I put in another 6ppm cause of my actual temperatures. Today we had summer temperatures already! That was not to handle - had 80°F today, same as air in tent!!!

Will definately have to do something against heat! I will try to isolate the whole bucket, even if I'm not optimistic that it will help. besides that, I will have to get a cool tube!
If that won't help enough I will build a RDWC for the next run - will have to do anyway, otherwise it will get hard to change solution with 3 plants if they are in single buckets. And last option is a chiller or switching to LED...

 

[SmokinRasta]

High growers


I let them grow and didn't do anything besides checking the PH, EC and cutted the totally dead leafs.

The roots are looking way better with the help of sodium hypochlorite. I use Danklorix, it has 6%.
On Saturday I put in 7ppm to check out how it is working. - I still got a heat problem I have to work against! My solution is at 80° with lights on, and the air is at 82.5°! Yesterday I added new bleach. I choosed 10ppm cause of temp and the root conditions.

I just went through all growers manuals again and checked my calculations... - and guess what... I made mistakes in thinking while calculating my Ca/Mg!!! I was that stupid and used the doubble concentration of Mg than needed!


This is how my tab water looks like without anything:

Tab water and Mg correction now (wrong mixture):

NEW tab water and Mg correction - will try tomorrow:

and with the F-MAX nutriens by sheme (if I put it in correctly) - will post the results when done, because I mix it by EC:

 

[SmokinRasta]

canecellation time... - I lost the fight

but I won't give up! I want to grow hydro and have to find my mistakes! Maybe someone of you can help me please?

I learned already a lot - but still it's not enough...


my mistakes
- grow environment
- Lamp hight
- DWC system
- solution failurs



grow environment:


It's the first time I try to grow in a tent - before I had a cellar and didn't had to use any ventilation.

I didn't set up the fan correctly and didn't realy care about the air input. I used f.e. an air channel reduction right behind the vent to go out...
I corected that outlet and used a 150mm channel (fitting directly to vent) - works way better now. Besides that I closed the tent windows and used the old air channel for testing. I opened all channel outlets and use them to get fresh air to the ground.

I placed a vent in the upper tent direction down to get a better circulation. Atm I use a wet towel to hold/ get more humidity.

I tested it the last two days and it looks like I made it! I can hold the humidty (what is the easiest part imo) and the temperatur won't go above 23°C/24°C (73.4°F/75.2°F) at light on and min 19°C/ 66°F at light off.

I want to improve the out/ inlet channels the next days: getting right sizes and taking care about light traps and use women's stockings to block the bug entries at the inlets.



Lamp hight:


I had solution problems, temperatur problems, root rot,... all that was way to much for the plants. I had a Mg shortage too, caused by my tab water. - So all this together made it hard to tell about the plants problems.

Way to late I noticed that I got a to high temperature at the leafs.
Was probably about 28°C/ 82.5°F or higher...
I have a many thermometers laying in the box, but was that stupid and didn't believe their readings.

I changed the air ventilation in the tent and raised my 250W MH lamp.
It looks way better now. I will buy an infrared thermometer to check it correcly.

I thought I might have to buy a cool tube, but at the moment it looks like changing the lamp hight and improving the air circulation helped out already. We'll see...



DWC System:


I wanted to go by RDWC, but cause of my problems and plant sizes I only used one bucket so far.
So I got my 8 gal bucket (got 5 of 'em in total) and my air pump with 4 outlets 600l/h 15W (160gal/h).
I definately have to get a reservoir. Can't/ don't like to use frozen bottles directly under the roots to cool the water.

So this is my modofocation plan so far:
I want to go RDWC with 4 grow buckets and the reservoir outside of the tent.
I will build something between the PA Hydroponics and the Alien V System.
I love these nano air inlets and hope I can get rid of my air pump then. I can't stand the "hum" and the vibration noises. I have the pump already in a separted room and wrapped it into acoustic foam, but you still hear the vibration (got transfered thourgh the walls I guess).

I want to use something like a 4" outlet connection from the buckets. To prevent the roots going through I will add a filter to the outlet side. Am just not sure if I use a bottom outlet or a side outlet.

It doesn't matter much if I wrap my buckets in silver foil or not depending to the solution temperatur. It always stays around my tent temperatur 23°C/ 73°F (now, after my modifications).
I think with the reservoir outside I can use frozen bottles for cooling and won't even need a chiller. I will also add aquarium fans to the reservoir for cooling.

Also I will add a drip ring system to the buckets for the early period of the plants when they don't have roots yet.



solution failurs:


Besides the temperatur I did mistakes with the mixing order, checking point for ph & ec and even with the products I used. I was in rush and didn't take myself enough time to get all the stuff together.

So I had to hurry and bought PH + and - for pools. Had to use both in the beginning when I was to stupid to mix solution correctly. I don't know if you can use it or not, you read both on the web - but for my next run I will order the specific products.

I use tab water for my solution (0.3 EC, 8.79 PH). I have a Mg/ Ca deficit in my opinion. My values are 26.8 mg/l Ca and 4.09 mg/l Mg. I tried to correct this value by using bitter salt (16% MgO).
I used the "Dr. Dina solution calculator" which I found in a german forum. Someone added all the nutriens and additional products to it. So I just completed it with my F-Max nutriens facts.
But then I made a mistake with the MgO! I used for calculation just the 16% and didn't thougt about the nutrient conversion factor (0.603 for MgO)... besides that I thought there is a mistake in the Dina calculator. But there isn't! Today I noticed my mistake: I calculated up to 40% difference Mg/Ca but forgot to take into acount the Royal A + B mix of my nutriens. (On my acutal test I got twice the amount of Mg than needed now...)

On my next run, I probably will use an osmosis system instead of tab water and use a CalMag product.

I want to have the option to use bleach (thx @Wastei it helped me around my temperature and root rot problem) for the grow process thats why I have to use mineralic nutriens and fertilizers.
F-Max is a mixture, so I have to change it too. Any advises?
I thought about Terra Aquatica or Canna.

I wish I would know about all the facts (Mg, Ca, N, PK, S Fe,... ) to mix everything by myself... - but I should better start slowly and get used to hydro and the rdwc system first.


Ok grower and hydro community, please give me your comments, advises and neck punches - I need that!

 

[Wastei]

canecellation time... - I lost the fight

but I won't give up! I want to grow hydro and have to find my mistakes! Maybe someone of you can help me please?

I learned already a lot - but still it's not enough...


my mistakes
- grow environment
- Lamp hight
- DWC system
- solution failurs



grow environment:


It's the first time I try to grow in a tent - before I had a cellar and didn't had to use any ventilation.

I didn't set up the fan correctly and didn't realy care about the air input. I used f.e. an air channel reduction right behind the vent to go out...
I corected that outlet and used a 150mm channel (fitting directly to vent) - works way better now. Besides that I closed the tent windows and used the old air channel for testing. I opened all channel outlets and use them to get fresh air to the ground.

I placed a vent in the upper tent direction down to get a better circulation. Atm I use a wet towel to hold/ get more humidity.

I tested it the last two days and it looks like I made it! I can hold the humidty (what is the easiest part imo) and the temperatur won't go above 23°C/24°C (73.4°F/75.2°F) at light on and min 19°C/ 66°F at light off.

I want to improve the out/ inlet channels the next days: getting right sizes and taking care about light traps and use women's stockings to block the bug entries at the inlets.



Lamp hight:


I had solution problems, temperatur problems, root rot,... all that was way to much for the plants. I had a Mg shortage too, caused by my tab water. - So all this together made it hard to tell about the plants problems.

Way to late I noticed that I got a to high temperature at the leafs.
Was probably about 28°C/ 82.5°F or higher...
I have a many thermometers laying in the box, but was that stupid and didn't believe their readings.

I changed the air ventilation in the tent and raised my 250W MH lamp.
It looks way better now. I will buy an infrared thermometer to check it correcly.

I thought I might have to buy a cool tube, but at the moment it looks like changing the lamp hight and improving the air circulation helped out already. We'll see...



DWC System:


I wanted to go by RDWC, but cause of my problems and plant sizes I only used one bucket so far.
So I got my 8 gal bucket (got 5 of 'em in total) and my air pump with 4 outlets 600l/h 15W (160gal/h).
I definately have to get a reservoir. Can't/ don't like to use frozen bottles directly under the roots to cool the water.

So this is my modofocation plan so far:
I want to go RDWC with 4 grow buckets and the reservoir outside of the tent.
I will build something between the PA Hydroponics and the Alien V System.
I love these nano air inlets and hope I can get rid of my air pump then. I can't stand the "hum" and the vibration noises. I have the pump already in a separted room and wrapped it into acoustic foam, but you still hear the vibration (got transfered thourgh the walls I guess).

I want to use something like a 4" outlet connection from the buckets. To prevent the roots going through I will add a filter to the outlet side. Am just not sure if I use a bottom outlet or a side outlet.

It doesn't matter much if I wrap my buckets in silver foil or not depending to the solution temperatur. It always stays around my tent temperatur 23°C/ 73°F (now, after my modifications).
I think with the reservoir outside I can use frozen bottles for cooling and won't even need a chiller. I will also add aquarium fans to the reservoir for cooling.

Also I will add a drip ring system to the buckets for the early period of the plants when they don't have roots yet.



solution failurs:


Besides the temperatur I did mistakes with the mixing order, checking point for ph & ec and even with the products I used. I was in rush and didn't take myself enough time to get all the stuff together.

So I had to hurry and bought PH + and - for pools. Had to use both in the beginning when I was to stupid to mix solution correctly. I don't know if you can use it or not, you read both on the web - but for my next run I will order the specific products.

I use tab water for my solution (0.3 EC, 8.79 PH). I have a Mg/ Ca deficit in my opinion. My values are 26.8 mg/l Ca and 4.09 mg/l Mg. I tried to correct this value by using bitter salt (16% MgO).
I used the "Dr. Dina solution calculator" which I found in a german forum. Someone added all the nutriens and additional products to it. So I just completed it with my F-Max nutriens facts.
But then I made a mistake with the MgO! I used for calculation just the 16% and didn't thougt about the nutrient conversion factor (0.603 for MgO)... besides that I thought there is a mistake in the Dina calculator. But there isn't! Today I noticed my mistake: I calculated up to 40% difference Mg/Ca but forgot to take into acount the Royal A + B mix of my nutriens. (On my acutal test I got twice the amount of Mg than needed now...)

On my next run, I probably will use an osmosis system instead of tab water and use a CalMag product.

I want to have the option to use bleach (thx @Wastei it helped me around my temperature and root rot problem) for the grow process thats why I have to use mineralic nutriens and fertilizers.
F-Max is a mixture, so I have to change it too. Any advises?
I thought about Terra Aquatica or Canna.

I wish I would know about all the facts (Mg, Ca, N, PK, S Fe,... ) to mix everything by myself... - but I should better start slowly and get used to hydro and the rdwc system first.


Ok grower and hydro community, please give me your comments, advises and neck punches - I need that!

It's a learning curve for sure! You're very much like me diving in head first and learning as they go along. You read someone else's recommendations that you follow to a tee but still end up with problems following the same recommendations and formula.

Then you start to adapt to the problems and find solutions and your own way of doing things. It's good to try different things with DWC and water cultures since you learn alot about root health and development. I struggled for months starting out in hydro!

Terra Aquatic and Canna are both solid alternatives!

Cheers bud!

 

[SmokinRasta]

You're very much like me diving in head first and learning

Thanks bro, that gives me hope I can still make it once!


I won't give up for sure - if I start something I want to complete it. And then I start to study, learn and try until I have success.
When my soil run is bigger I'll take cuttings and give it another try...

 

[SmokinRasta]

...can't believe the goodfather of hydro was saying this to me