Weffalo's West Coast O.G. First Time Grow: Indoor, Soil, SIP, Auto

[Weffalo]

Unfortunately the Mars one seems to be faulty but no worries, shit happens! I'll get in touch with them for a replacement but thankfully I'm at least tracking the accurate rH and temps now.

Tents at 65% rh and 25c so ideal conditions for my little seedlings to sprout (soon I hope )

 

[Weffalo]

Woop, first signs of life have appeared.

The initial inch of water I added around 32 or so hours ago to the saucer has completely gone, I'm not sure whether it was drunk or evaporated but I assume mostly wicked up, I've given the soil a light misting and later today/tonight I plan to refill the saucer and see how quickly it goes

1/3 showing signs of life:

 

[Azimuth]

It was most likely absorbed by the soil. Be careful about giving it too much water at this young stage. Keeping the top moist with misting helps the seed crack and the seeding emerge. Once that happens (like now) you should be watering from the bottom almost exclusively.

The roots are programmed to go looking for water, or at least moisture, and you've got that at the bottom where you want it.

 

[Weffalo]

Thanks mate, I have give them another light misting but just because two of them are still to sprout properly, from tomorrow onwards I'll stick to watering from the bottom.

My only worry is that it will be hard to know when to refill the saucer as I won't have any indication the soil is dry like you do with top watering? It's still possible to over/underwater from the bottom so I'm just wondering how I can try to avoid that?

 

[Azimuth]

You want the roots to adapt to a wetter environment so giving a little bottom water every day or two would be a good thing. In my experience it can take them a couple of weeks to adapt if you keep the soil too wet. Even if the top dries out, as long as there is moisture below the roots will find what they need.

 

[Weffalo]

Thank you very much @Azimuth.

I'll provide updates as/when I have them

Everything is going well so far, most recent issue is the rH dropping around 10% in the middle of the morning, humidifier is set to 60% *which is 65% in the tent* however when lights come on after being off it drops to around 53% during the first 2 hours the lights on and then gets back to normal.

I've disabled "Auto Shut-off" on the humid as I'm thinking it turned off then didn't turn on till it was already too low, infact if I can't fine tune it via the app I will look into a humidity power controller as I think that will be far more accurate!

 

[Weffalo]

So I saw @Bill284 posted this image in someone elses thread:

Does this mean ideal conditions right now would be say 21-22c/75% rH? or 23-25c/80% rH?

Seeing as I've bought everything to control environment I may as well get it perfect for my little seedlings start in the world

 

[Bill284]

So I saw @Bill284 posted this image in someone elses thread:

Does this mean ideal conditions right now would be say 21-22c/75% rH? or 23-25c/80% rH?

Seeing as I've bought everything to control environment I may as well get it perfect for my little seedlings start in the world

That's around . 87 to .95 vpd. perfect.
Then I work my way up to around 1.1 vpd in flower.
Gives transpiration the max amount of time to work and draw nutrients.
Your goal now is to grow a good root ball and keep up-potting.
Take care.




Stay safe
Bill284

 

[Weffalo]

That's around . 87 to .95 vpd. perfect.
Then I work my way up to around 1.1 vpd in flower.
Gives transpiration the max amount of time to work and draw nutrients.
Your goal now is to grow a good root ball and keep up-potting.
Take care.




Stay safe
Bill284

Thanks Bill, do you mean I should be aiming for .87 - .95 now? Just the colouring for the chart suggests VPD of .47 - .65 for this stage which is confusing me.

My thermo is saying I'm running at .82kPa right now 23c/70%rH I'm just second guessing if that's ok at the mo lol...

 

[Weffalo]

Think I'm getting a bit confused because the other websites I've checked mention leaf temperature as partof the relevant equation, when I put in the relevent info into this chart here: VPD Chart

It comes out with my VPD being within the acceptable range for this stage

 

[Bill284]

Think I'm getting a bit confused because the other websites I've checked mention leaf temperature as partof the relevant equation, when I put in the relevent info into this chart here: VPD Chart

It comes out with my VPD being within the acceptable range for this stage

These charts are slightly different so you don't need to be exact especially at this stage.
Seedlings an clones need warm moist air.
So above 22 ish to 27 ish with rh above 62 below 70.
Veg 20 to 27 ish with rh around 62.
Flower is more important to be accurate.
Stay in similar temp range, never above 28 if possible.
Rh around 55.
Like I mentioned I think I ran around 1.1 in flower.
Keep them warm and comfortable and they will be great.
Hope your having a great day my friend.
Take care.




Stay safe
Bill284

 

[Weffalo]

Ahh fantastic, thanks I can work with that!

Appreciate it Bill! Hope your having a lovely weekend!

Here's a preview of how the girls are getting on:

 

[Bill284]

Ahh fantastic, thanks I can work with that!

Appreciate it Bill! Hope your having a lovely weekend!

Here's a preview of how the girls are getting on:

Thanks Amigo.
Drip a little water on the seed case.
Softens them and hopefully fall off.
If not tweezers, but I'm terrible at that.
I killed a few that way.
So try drip first.
Take care.




Stay safe
Bill284

 

[Weffalo]

Thanks Bill I'll give them a drop of water and fingers crossed they fall off!

 

[ReservoirDog]

HI Weffalo, better late than never I hope. Congratulations on your new setup!

You'll find that there are often a lot of microclimates in a tent, and readings can be quite different moving around and up and down. This is a big reason we use fans. Hope MArsHydro sends you a new hygrometer. I like the wifi loggers too. Usually everything with a hyg. on it is also capable of calibration. If you put all your hygrometers in the same place you can calibrate them and going forward have fewer worries.

If you want to even out daytime/nightime temps, something of large mass, like a 5 gal pail of water with lid will absorb heat in day and radiate at night. It's worth 4 deg C in nighttime in a tent, my experience. Lid off will boost rh few percent but eventually start growing stuff in the water. Eventually.


Bill likes to water his seedlings with a syringe poking down into the bottom so you should be fine bottom watering. You can always mist the top, or put an upside down ziplock over the pot with a couple of holes in it. Prob take it off at lights out though and the idea is to harden them to the world asap.

What do your SIPs look like?

Does your outtake fan have any timer or situational controls? Or just up and down? Does it exhaust into another indoor room or all the way outside? Last one, how big is the room your tent is in?

Great start on your journal and I'm subbed in to hang with you.

 

[Weffalo]

HI Weffalo, better late than never I hope. Congratulations on your new setup!

You'll find that there are often a lot of microclimates in a tent, and readings can be quite different moving around and up and down. This is a big reason we use fans. Hope MArsHydro sends you a new hygrometer. I like the wifi loggers too. Usually everything with a hyg. on it is also capable of calibration. If you put all your hygrometers in the same place you can calibrate them and going forward have fewer worries.

If you want to even out daytime/nightime temps, something of large mass, like a 5 gal pail of water with lid will absorb heat in day and radiate at night. It's worth 4 deg C in nighttime in a tent, my experience. Lid off will boost rh few percent but eventually start growing stuff in the water. Eventually.


Bill likes to water his seedlings with a syringe poking down into the bottom so you should be fine bottom watering. You can always mist the top, or put an upside down ziplock over the pot with a couple of holes in it. Prob take it off at lights out though and the idea is to harden them to the world asap.

What do your SIPs look like?

Does your outtake fan have any timer or situational controls? Or just up and down? Does it exhaust into another indoor room or all the way outside? Last one, how big is the room your tent is in?

Great start on your journal and I'm subbed in to hang with you.

Hi mate, thanks for replying and joining me on the journey, good to have you along!

Mars have agreed to send me some $ towards my new hygro which works out great.

Thanks for the tip regarding nighttime temps, I could probably fit that in at the moment but when I put these into the SIPs there will be a serious lack of room.

Currently my environment averages are something like this:
25c/65% rH during day cycle (20 hours)
24c drops to 21c/64% rH during the night (4 hours)

The problem I've got at the moment is after the lights come back on and the temp raises my rH is dropping to around 58% but I think I can solve this with scheduling a higher target rH during this window (The humidifier isn't entirely accurate but I'm sure I can work around it lol).

I've been filling the saucers with around 1.5-2inches of water and waiting until that is drained, it was done on Sat morning and all saucers are now dry around 48 hours later so I'm thinking now would be a good time to fill them again but this is of course the part I'm most worried about currently

My SIPs are 5gallon buckets with GroBuckets, I like the premade setup for my first grow but I know there's plenty of ideas for DIY or other options in future.

The ventilation fan is currently just plugged into speed control, all manual. There is an option to buy a thermostat controller from Mars Hydro which I think would offer more situational controls?

Room the tent is in is probably about 11ft x 11ft maybe a smidge larger and this is the room that's being exhausted into, no outside ventilation (Not possible due too how cold it is and opsec however there is a window so it's possible to bring fresh air in if neccessary).

Great to have you along <3

 

[Weffalo]

Small update on how the little seedlings are getting along:

All looking good I think but all still need to fully shed the seed shell, I've been adding a drop of water to it directly. Just added a few inches of water again today but slightly concerned with the darker colour soil/compost, I think maybe it's just really dry but it's gone a bit black almost in some areas, probably nothing to worry about

Little pic of the setup currently, not put all fans in as it's not needed this early I think

 

[NickHardy]

Looking good mate - yeah even with the laws here "opsec" is going to be a thing I think. My garage/carport is easy enough to bunk a wall and the law can be applied differently on a whim, especially if not Thai (my wife is and so the licenses are in her name but still)

I'll swap you some of your cold air for my too hot air!

 

[Weffalo]

Yeah always pays to be safe and keep what your doing private, if not the authorities then it's still a big chunk of cash even more so near the end of the crop!

Some sort of quantum entanglement deal where we can trade air between spaces would be ideal lol, it's not got cold here and I'm still having to run a heater 24/7

 

[NickHardy]

Yeah always pays to be safe and keep what your doing private, if not the authorities then it's still a big chunk of cash even more so near the end of the crop!

Some sort of quantum entanglement deal where we can trade air between spaces would be ideal lol, it's not got cold here and I'm still having to run a heater 24/7

Its theft I'm most worried about but the flowers always going to be totally secure, when we got the house the architects said they envisaged that room being either a maids room or a safe room - it will fingers crossed be keeping something safe in a few months!