J's 1545W CFL Test Grow - Multi Strain - Wilma

[jimm14]

Flower Tent 5x5x6.5
Mother/Clone closet 2x4x4 or close to.

Flowering System: Wilma 16x11L Pots.

Clone System: 20 site Aeroponic Cloner.
Mother System: 2 Site DIY DWC.

Medium: Coco coir 85% Perlite 15% for Seedlings,

100% Hydroton For clones/mothers.

Cooling: 5" inline fan w/carbon filter, 4" Intake fan (backup only) small clip-on fans

Lighting:
Mother/clone room: 4x 55w Flo tubes
Flower Room: 4x 300w Duel Spectrum CFL's 5x 23w Blue CFL's 10x 23w Red CFL's.

Nutes:

Hollands Secrets full range.

Mothers are feed Vitalink Grow with any additives as needed. (hydrozyme etc).

Strains:1x Greenhouse Critical+ auto (free seed), 1x Greenhouse Super Cheese fem, 7x Chocolate Thai x Silver Haze non fem (my own mix).

The Plan?

To start these seeds will be grown and a super cheese clone taken for a mother, Next the chocolate haze will need sexing and a good clone taken, again for a new mother.

Then they will be grow out as samples

Then back to perpetual with the two new mothers.



So this log will be using only CFL's/flos from seed. We all know CFL's work great for vegging but can they produce the same results or better then my 1000w HPS for flower, I'm not sure but I'm willing to try.

==========================================================

April 10th.

Chocolate haze seeds put into ph'd water in dixie cups, Put into dark warm spot.


April 11th.

CH seeds Tails showing, Removed from cups, put into Jiffy pellets soaked in 1/4 strength Royal Gold / nute Veg mix. Green house seeds put into cups dark warm spot same as before.

April 12th.

Green house seeds tails out put into jiffys as before.

April 13th.

All 7 Chocolate Haze have broken ground, roots out of jiffys, Transfered into 11L pots, 3 plants to a pot and one plant alone (looked a lil sickly)

The green house seedlings get a pot each (so i can hand water if needed) not broken ground yet.

Plants grown from seed get coco 85% perlite 15% mix,

spreader mat at bottom of pots to catch coco. Clones are grown with aeroponics so I use hydroton for them.


April 14th.

Chocolate Haze stretching up very fast, Greenhouse seeds no show yet.



I'll add pics of flower room fully set-up / mother room / cloner /etc when i can
since i have nothing else growing right now the seeds will be in flower room start to finsh.

This log mite not be updated much till I have my mothers chosen and a working digi camera (screen cracked hard to take pics). got phone but really poor pics will post them if i have to.

any questions ?

 

[Twelve12]

Re: J's 1545w CFL Test grow, Multi Strain. Wilma.

No questions. Very nice and clean setup looking forward to your grow!

 

[jimm14]

Re: J's 1545w CFL Test grow, Multi Strain. Wilma.

Thanks 12-12, means alot from you, being following your breeding program.

love the ''camouflage'' and ''Blood Queen'' Both sound like fantastic crosses (i'm a sucker for C99 and pineapple) and berry bomb just sweetens the deal, you thought about a strain share type thing? Ive got some retro beans and some F2 fem'd beans, F1 reg beans etc

Would LOVE to add a camouflage to my ladies. Where i live seeds are legal to mail just not grow.

The chocolate haze is a F1 cross so I'll be looking for a good pheno to keep (if any).

If anyone's interested I'll be editing the first post for the set-up, journal posts will be in new posts.

 

[jimm14]

Re: J's 1545w CFL Test grow, Multi Strain. Wilma.

Cloner.

Mother box.

Mother/clone room.

Update on plants, 3 of the chocolate haze are a bit slow so mite get the chop, Will see how they grow over the next week.

My Critical+ Auto seems a little slow too and the ''Super cheese'' has yet to brake ground, what is upsetting because I really wanted a mother from this one. Guess I mite choose another strain to throw in.

But atleast I have 6 strong very fast growing chocolate haze to choose a mother from.

It's now 7 days since seeds hit water.

 

[jimm14]

Re: J's 1545w CFL Test grow, Multi Strain. Wilma.

Decided to add another strain to grab a mother, I have lots of seeds but fancy trying somthing new.

In the mail today arrived.....
5x G13Labs Pineapple express (fem)
1x Rokerij Seeds Sour Diesel (fem)
3x G13Labs Cheese(fem) (freebie)
1x Delicious seeds LA DIVA (auto) (freebie)
1x Samsara seeds Flash Babylon (auto) (freebie)
1x CH9 Super Haze (fem) (freebie)

Attitude seeds do great deals first time buying seeds online and very pleased. and thx guys for the code. every little helps you know.

So, I like to keep seed stock so I can always regrow them winning strains. So I will be choosing 2x Pineapple Express and 1x cheese seeds to germ and the auto seeds will get popped at same time, I have no use for auto seeds because i prefer clones.

The haze/diesel and spare pineapple/cheese seed will go into my long term seed stock for future grows.

Oh Finally, the Chocolate haze is doing well, six plants with very uniform growth, very fat leaves. 3 with uniform slow growth maybe just genetic traits? they are around the same size as the auto Critical+

anyway +1 to attitude seeds and I'll update progress with seeds when i soak them tomorrow.

 

[jimm14]

Right Not much going on but I'll update some boring bits.

Firstly since the super cheese didn't germinate and I only have one strain and a auto. I needed to get some more strains on the go.

I Soak my seeds for about 24 hrs in ph water with a small amount of root additive. I'm worried the freebie seeds look a bit scrappy. the paid ones look good.

After I put the seeds into Jiffy pellets, then finally into a cup of coco/perlite mix to keep the pellets moist.

Ok next I decided to transfer all the plants to hydroton since they would now be waiting for seedlings to catch up and I wanted to move the plants growing at same rate together. one plant got the scrap as it looked weak and still only have seed leafs.

I am using hydroton from my last crop so I wash them in a bath with a few cap fulls of bleach, then give them a final wash with plain water before using them. It really helps with molds and pests.

Babys in there new home. 8 Chocolate Haze and 1 Critical auto

General grow room stats:

Room temp 22-24c
Nute temp 20-21c
RH 50-65%
PH 5.5-6.0 (I allow it to wander but not too much)
EC 400ppm (waiting on seeds) Just low veg mix.

 

[jimm14]

Not much interest going on but I'll update anyway, Since I'm a happy boy today.

Had a lucky day today my friend had 15 clones left over from his newest crop, 14 very healthy and one looking very sorry for itself.
Grabbed them up and throw them in the tent. ''White Berry'' His grown this for 11-12 years. I'm not a massive fan of the end produce but who can say no to free clones?

Anyhow the whole room will be vegged for 7-10 days then thrown 12/12. The seedlings mentioned earlier will go into my clone room and brought into flowering tent when there ready.

Comments suggestions any and all please, enjoy! and happy 420!!

 

[jimm14]

Small update.

Res changed out.

1000ppm grow nutes
200ppm royal gold / prop-o-gator
5.4 PH (allowed to rise to about 6.8 before dropping again)

Next week I'll begin my flowering nutes and additives.

My friend had also asked for a few of my chocolate haze for his personal stock, So I'll be giving him 3-4 plants for him to grow outside (His hoping for trees).

He gave me the 15 good clones so I couldn't say no lol.


Next week's nute schedule. week 1 of 12/12.

Per gallon (euro)
6ml Micro
6ml Grow
10ml Bloom
8ml Super B+ (Vitamin B1 / sea kelp etc)
5ml Royal Gold (liquid Fulvic)
1g Carbo Blast (Carbohydrates)

''Holland's Secret'' Range by Plant life products. extremegrowing.com/.co.uk for info.

 

[jimm14]

Ok, Things going to plan so far. I have FIM'd and LST some plants to make the growth uniform. Since some pots have 3 plants each there growing at different rates. The tallest ones got LST and the ones 2-3" higher got the FIM treatment.

All seems to be growing very uniform now.

The critical seems to of taken off and is now the same size as the chocolate haze.

Forgot to add these last update, When I removed the plants for my friend I snapped a pic of the roots at 10days old. They seem to like the royal and super b.

my grow tent security system.

Next week when I start flower I will snap pics of all the plants alone so I can keep better record of each plant and the effects of my FIM/LST efforts.

Just a recap on what I have growing and ages.

4x Home mix reg Chocolate Haze. 12days since breaking ground.
2x G13 Labs Pineapple Express. Fem 2days since breaking ground.
1x G13 Labs Cheese Fem 3days since breaking ground.
1x Delicious seeds LA Diva Auto 2days since breaking ground.
1x Feminised Seeds Critical+ Auto 11days since breaking ground.
15x Clones. White Berry 14days since cut from mother.

24 in total, Clones for mothers will be taken in flower.

So far I also think I don't need the extra CFLs But we'll see when I hit flower, They seem to kick up more heat then expected and I'm starting to think my 1000w will be cooler then all the CFLs together. Veg has been good with the CFLs, low stretch with the lights so close and just raise them up when you want stretch (what I've had to do). Temps have been very easy to control but it's not been hot lately. I'm guessing in summer it will become a issue as much as a single HID.

 

[jimm14]

Changed from 24/0 lighting to GLR timing (12hr on 5.5hr off 1 hr on 5.5hr off) Will change to 12/12 in 5 days time

 

[jimm14]

Update time......

Few pics from a couple days ago. I seem to have forgotten to of taken pics of two pots (WB#2 / Critical) but oh well. Lighting got switched to 12/12 today.

So next update will be first week of flower for alot of the plants, The smaller ones will stay under 12/12 aswell.

anyway here you go.....

CH = Chocolate Haze, 2 per pot, As you can see all 4 plants look different, the ones I gave away looked different too.
WB = White Berry, 3 per pot.

Enjoy.

 

[jimm14]

CH#2 Has been pulled from room as it looks to be growing male preflowers (tiny crabclaw) under 45x eye loupe. I've kept him just in case but it's no longer in the room.

CH#1 Looks to have shown sex also, seems to be female.

Only CH#3/CH#4 to sex the rest are female clones or fem'd seeds.

 

[donpaul.p]

loving the journal mate, wish i had decent camera and id take more pics, loads of info one of the best journals ive came across in a while, im also a couple of weeks into flower and mine are just showing white hairs everywhere and buds are starting to form at the end of branches. i also started with cfls, i had the same problem with growth, mine was in veg for 7 weeks and the plants had very little vertical growth they just kept bushing out instead of growing taller, i was planning on going to flower at 1ft tall but the plants didnt want to get taller, anyway i managed to pick up a 400watt dual spec light for next to nothing so im now using this to flower mine off in.

i noticed you put yours to flower early, i have not tried that before although now i have just started a feeds seeds 12-12 from seed so ill see what i get off them as they wont go to flower till sexually mature so they will grow for a few weeks before starting flower stage, im thinking about 4 weeks under 400watt hps, have you grown plants like this before and put them to flower at that size, if you have id be interested to here what yield you got as im undecided how long to veg for before switching the lights to 12-12, im looking at getting the best yield i can in as little time as i can, so as soon as these plants have flowered off ill put some more in, or even put some in while these are finishing off, im hoping to get a harvest every couple of months but need to get enough to last me till the next harvest

 

[jimm14]

Hi donpaul thanks for the comments, This has been a test grow, prior to this I used big power HIDs so I have no idea what size to expect under CFL.

The clones dont need to veg and most strains will flower week 3-5 under 12/12 from seed, My chocolate haze showed sex one day after 12/12 at 4 weeks old. I decided to flower now because I'm not after trees and there very bushy and short.They should have a good stretch now it's flowering. Normally I would expect 30-40g dry from each clone since I don't veg them(under 1000w hps), a lot more on the seed plants would be happy with 14g dry from cfl tho. So not a massive amount i'm after but fast turn around once your going (clones take 7-10 weeks flowering depending on my strain).

Ive try'd a few techniques (FIM/TOPPED/LST/CLEAN) to see what clones grow best later on, My clones seem to love being tied down under the CFL's over topping or FIM. so far I would guess CFL's should be used for a uniform SOG or SCROG on a smallish scale or to veg short bushy plants before flowering under hps, Ive noticed the heat of 1200w of CFL's is very close to a 600w HID. So my argument that CFL's are cooler to run is sitting on thin ice. I'm giving this full grow the CFL treatment I'm not going to bail on them yet because that won't prove anything.

Once Ive taken a few clones for mothers (Ive got 8(toppings) rooted so far but there going to a friend) next run will be all clones, Next time I've decided to run 2 plants per pot so I can LST them better, so 32 plants every 7-10 weeks depending on what mothers I choose. Like I say hoping 14-15g dry per plant under cfl, but if I don't get it this time I'll be back to HID.

I'm a ''chronic'' user(lol?), So I use about 4-8g a day 500g every 8 weeks does me fine so I don't need to hit high targets.

When I've grown large amounts I would veg 7-8 weeks, top and LST then flower as long as needed, averaged 3.5 ounce dry per plant. takes a lot longer but massive yields if you can wait and have room and light rails. for personal use 5 months is soooooo long to wait and I want to choose what I weed I smoke not just the same weed for 8 months after lol.

 

[Electricthom]

Super Journal. great info and the coolest system I've read about so far. Thanks for sharing with us.

 

[jimm14]

Not an update but Ive forgotten to tell a few things.

Hydro system.
The Wilma has a massive res, about 40gal US, So it's only in late flower when i fill it near the top, I fill it with about 10gal for each fill and keep a few 5gal drums filled with top-up nutes, PH'd at 4.0 and 5.6, Why 4.0? It saves me doing my ph until the next refill. late flower I PH to 5.6 only because the water gets drunk so fast that 4.0 would bring the PH way to low.

I'm not as fussy with the wilma as I am with DWC when it come to emptying my res. I don't empty the res weekly. It's costly and just unneeded. I will fill it and use two 25l drums I premix before I clean it. Late flower the plants drink so much I just use the drums premixed as needed and don't clean the res at all until flushing.
The motherbox DWC is only about 20l to fill it and when it needs cleaning it's take 2 secs, I rarely have ph trouble since they drink it before it needs adjusting and the top-up premix is ph 5.6. I use Vitalink easy 1 part nute on mothers (I used to use MAX) and it's simple 3ml per liter with 1ml per liter of vitalink bio-pac to stop rot root. using RO water that gives PH 6.0 + 400ppm when settled with no adjustment.


PH.
When I do a clean fill of my res I will set the PH 5.6, If I over do it and hit 5.4 I'll still use it in lol. I then leave my res untill I find my PH has risen to about 6.8 (4-7 days depending on stage) and top-up with my low ph premix. I guess it takes 10l of PH4.0 premix to drop about .8 or 15l for 1.0, 20l for 1.2. This isnt always right but i add premix untill I drop PH as close to 5.6 again as I can.

Watering.
I love hydro because I like low maintenance growing, with hydroton I use the flooder drippers on 24/7. The flood tips never get blocked up unlike the 2lph dripper and I don't turn the pump off because theres just no need(IMO), the top roots become air roots, lovely cotton hairs and the bottom that have flowing water become thick water suckers. if i was to turn if off it would be at lights out, only doing 1hr of feed over a 12hr lights out. they do look a bit sorry during lights out with the water always pumping.
the motherbox is dwc and just stays topped up when in use.



This grow i'm using the Hollands secret nute schedule to make my mixes for each stage which I'll link so you know what I'm feeding.
https://www.futureharvest.com/app/d..._feed_schedule_liquid_powder.pdf?t=1332817065

It's 1.9mb PDF file So decide before you click the link if you want to wait. I've just filled the res with 40l of week1 and will be following the 8week run.
After this grow I want to try vitalink easy 1part + buddy +biopac/bioplus, Ive had get results in the past with the 2part vitalink max + buddy etc and less work is always a bonus as long as it produces.
Comments, suggestions, all welcome.

 

[donpaul.p]

hows it going, ive been trying something for the first time with the grow im doing, i had an old aerogarden that i had not used, so i soaked a seed and when it rooted i put it in the aerogarden, it has a sort of constant water feed over the roots then the roots grow into the res, no bubbler in the water so not sure how the roots will take to been submersed in water, but i havnt been measuring nutes, i decided to look at the plant and go by that, i noticed the first set of leaves going a lighter green so added more nutes, now its a perfect color and seems to be growing great, do i need to change the res at any point or just keep adding to it as its used up, its a first for me so not sure what to expect,

 

[jimm14]

If it's easy to then pour out the old nutes when it's at it's minimum then do it and refill. What you dont want is a large amount of old nutes left each time you refill but with small pots or just a few liters it doesn't really matter.

I know most say cannabis doesn't like wet feet, but as long as it has enough o2 they thrive in water like nothing else. I think your roots will be ok for 1-2 weeks, I'm guessing the movement of water would keep it aerated in the res when you only have a few roots hanging in there but I doubt you could go a whole grow without a even a small air stone.roots will just fill the bottom after a few weeks. keep a good eye on the colour of the roots, they go dark brown first, then start getting slimy, then finally turn to what can only be described as shit jelly.

try add some vitalink bio-pac or cannazym to the res it'll help keep the roots rot free longer.

 

[donpaul.p]

thanks, i got tropical fish so got some spare air pumps and stones i could put in, i had this aerogarden a while but never had the net pots to fit it so i made my own, i didnt expect it to work at all and thats why i never measure the nutes, i just gave what was left over from feeding my new plants so i added that then it started growing and it looked a bit yellow so i added more of the bpn and now its back to a perfect green colour, when i open the flap at the front i can see 3 roots growing down and one is at water level, im just concerned about the lack of air, it was made to grow veg and herbs with so should work as is, it has holes for 6 plants but ive only got one in at the minute to sort of test the water so to speak as ive only ever used a full soil grow before so ill see how this one goes, the bottom dont hold loads of water id say 3 or 4 ltrs at most, its sort of a aerogarden you leave on your kitchen side and leave it to run, the light has a timer which is 18-6 so ill be changing that as and when needed, but its new to me, never used it before, i was going to use it without the res as a cloner for cuttings due to it having the light attatched to the base, but i decided to try it properly and see what happend, and so far so good, but only time will tell, the pump runs 24-7 but it only trickles the water onto the roots and drips down into the res, so i think it would be best to add a small air stone just to ensure the roots get good 02, thanks for the info mate, ill keep an eye on things and see how it goes

 

[jimm14]

Ok had a few problems with my timers, I hadn't noticed the timer not turning off when it should. So since switching to 12/12 it's being doing the off period once it's unstuck randomly.

So I took the timer apart and cleaned it, lubed it and put it back together.

Seems OK now but I just don't trust it and brought another one.

The old timer now runs the dripper since it doesnt matter if it sticks. It goes on/off every 15 mins then only comes on for two 15min feeds during lights out.

New timer is back to 12/12 for the lights.

Few pics while I'm here.

Looking more like the SOG it should be.

The suspected Male likes his new coco cup home, He'll get planted outside soon so I can harvest his pollen.

Finally I got a new screen for my camera so I can see what I'm taking pics off lol, So I tried a few close ups.

Used my eye loupe held in front of cheap kodak point and shoot.