Dstroy's first grow journal

7/15/17
Day 2 of flowering for the blueberry

Aero res
Ph 6.0
Ppm 261 (starting ppm 246)(added 5ml grow, 5ml protekt, 3ml ph up)

I think I'm going to add some root trellis in the buckets eventually

I'm hoping they show sex within a week so I can still get the trellis down on them for support, otherwise I'll just keep tying them down

7/16/17
day 3 of flowering for the blueberry

aero res
ph 6.0
ppm 260 (starting ppm 245) (added 5ml grow, 5ml protekt, 5ml ph up)

7/17/17
day 4 of flowering for the blueberry, two on right are girls for sure. One on left still on the fence, haven't had time to check it today yet. Been tucking fan leaves under as best I can, but as you can see they pop right back up a couple times a day.

aero res
ph 6.0 (5.72 before correcting)
ppm 260 (starting ppm 246)(added 5ml grow, 4ml ph up)

7/18/17
day 5 of flowering for the blueberry, culled the male, everything looked really healthy when I cut it down. I included some pics of the root ball, the female plants' root systems are just as developed.

aero res
ph 6.0 (5.75 before correcting)
ppm 261 (starting ppm 250)(added 5ml magpro (3 doses of grow, to one dose of magpro worked well last res) 4ml ph up)

I should see the reservoir require less adjustment due to removing the large male from the system.

Those roots look extremely nice, I'm envious.

Kontraband81 said:

Those roots look extremely nice, I'm envious.

Click to expand...

Thanks man

7/19/17
day 6 of flowering for the blueberry

aero res
ph 5.9
ppm 250 (starting ppm 250) I'm seeing the slightest bit of tip burn so I'm going to keep the ppm at 250 which is about 5.5% less

7/20/17
day 7 of flowering for the blueberry

aero res
ph 6.0
ppm 245

7/21/17
day 8 of flowering for the blueberry, I defoliated them starting yesterday and finished today. They responded well to the defoliation the last time, and I defoliated this time in a way that I think will encourage the lower branches that are almost at the top of the canopy to catch up. I'm going to remove the lowest and smallest branches that don't have a chance of reaching the canopy and clone them. I also tried to make the canopy as even as I could.

It looks like I have two different phenotypes, one has much larger fan leaves and is much more sensitive to nutrient concentration (N sensitive), clawing started at 260ppm which is why I'm letting the concentration fall down to 250, 5ml of grow raises ppm by about 10 so I didn't add anything to the reservoir today aside from correcting the ph.

I lowered the light intensity in the veg tent to 35% which is still 190w because only the cloner and one dark pheno grape ape are in the veg tent right now. I hope the blueberry clones that I just cut root soon so I can get them vegging out. I want to do 6 plants for the next grow flower cycle, and 30-45 days of veg time would be perfect for that.

The flowering tent light is at 100% (maximum, tent air temperature dependent)

Only one of my monstercrop grape ape clones is growing, so I'm going to have to clone it again which is ok. I'm just going to leave it alone for a while because I'm planning on running blueberry again. I picked up some florel, and wanted to try that to see if it would stop the grape ape from herming. I really don't want to give up on it, because grape ape is the one that helps my wife the most.

aero res
ph 6.0 (starting 5.83, added 3ml ph up)
ppm 245 (nothing added)

At the rate I'm using nutrients it will take me a long time to run out. I estimate that I have about 3/4qt of grow which is 141 doses @5ml, slightly less magpro, and like 3.75qt of protekt. The only thing that I am running a bit low on is mammoth p, but still have like 4 months of that left.

I have just been keeping the cloner at ph 6 and around 300ppm, no higher than 300 ppm. Haven't really had to mess with it more than once since it's been set up again because nothing in it has roots yet so it doesn't really change a whole lot day to day.

The chiller has been keeping both the cloner and main reservoir temps right at 69f even during the hottest part of the day. All of my tubing that carries chilled water is insulated. I add 3ml of bleach to the coolant every two weeks to keep everything sterile. No coolant comes into contact with nutrient solution at any time.

I accumulated a small amount of biofilm in my reservoir and on rubber things that are in my reservoir (tubing and suction cups) over the month. It only took one paper towel to clean it out, so it really was a tiny amount. The most grows on the tubing for the immersion coil which is nitrile rubber.

I haven't had time to work on the ph controller, but it's always on the backburner. I've been writing bits of code for it when I have the time. I want to finish it sooner rather than later for the added environmental control that it offers.

I really haven't had time to work on the schematic for my control box at all. If you've got questions about it I'll answer them.

I've been considering buying a venturi for air injection instead of using the airpump, they're cheap and work. I haven't done that yet because the airpump is working just fine, maybe when I need the air pump for dwc for moms I'll switch over.

There really isn't a whole lot else, maintenance of the garden is easy because the scale of it is relatively small with a maximum plant count of 24. I'm concentrating now on learning to read plants better and when is the best time in a plant cycle to do certain things.

As Needed
clean

Daily
check water in cloner and main reservoir, adjust as necessary

Weekly
vacuum/dust grow room and both tents
calibrate ph meter
vacuum out fans and intake filters

Monthly
clean chiller and A/C filters
change reservoir (pita, have to carry 5 gallon buckets, I want an adapter for the shower head or the bathtub which is the closest water source)
wipe off LED arrays with 99% IPA

Very nice

whytewidow said:

Very nice

Click to expand...

Thanks man

7/22/17
day 9 of flowering for the blueberry, they're looking good. The canopy is much more even, and it should fill in nicely over the next week.

aero res
ph 5.89 starting ph 5.8 (added 3ml ph up)
ppm 253 (starting ppm 240)(added 5 gallons premix@265ppm ph 6.0)

7/23/17
day 10 of flowering for the blueberry, coming along. Seeing more flower development but nothing huge to report. They're filling out again.

aero res
ph 5.96 (starting 5.73)
ppm 251 (starting 250)(added 5ml protekt)

cloner
ph 5.86
ppm 277

Something is up with my vacuum pump. I rebuilt the entire thing yesterday and still no joy. I can start it manually, the pump and motor spin freely and it's not the capacitor because it doesn't have one. All it has are two separate field windings, low and high speed, and a thermal overload protection switch. It switches between the two windings with a shaft mounted centrifugal switch.The actual pump for this one is made out of mild steel and was super fucking rusty. All of the journal bearing surfaces were pitted. I have an air/water separator on the vacuum line and it is completely empty. There wasn't any water in the oil and the oil was clear. Water was getting in there somehow, maybe from heat cycling. Really can't beat $50 for a vacuum pump though. Even though it "broke".

I've been manually vacuuming out the buckets several times a day. Not getting much water out of them but it still needs to be done, glad the new pump is coming tomorrow.

It only cost me $50 so I'm not that upset. I've got another one coming, different brand.

7/24/17
day 11 of flowering for the blueberry, things are looking good.

aero res
ph 6 (starting 5.84)
ppm 254 (added 3ml ph up)

It has only been two days but I need to top up the reservoir, it's about 5 gallons low.

The EC hasn't really been fluctuating too much, but the water level in the reservoir has been dropping. Looks like around 240-250ppm is just about right.

7/25/17
day 12 of flowering for the blueberry, stretching a bit but the canopy is staying even. Stems are about twice as thick compared to the start of flowering.

Got my new vacuum pump installed, it's working great.

aero res
ph 6.0
ppm 250

7/26/17
day 13 of flowering for the blueberry, things are looking good.

aero res
ph 6.0 (starting ph 5.83)
ppm 245 (starting ppm 243)(added 3ml protekt)

7/27/17
day 14 of flowering for the blueberry, looking good. I lowered the lights to 24" yesterday about an hour before lights out, this morning the leaves were raised up toward the light (pic is from this morning) so I moved the light up a couple of inches. Lights are still at 100%, 26" from the canopy.

aero res
ph 5.91 (starting ph 5.79)
ppm 254 (starting ppm 240, added 5 gallons of premix, ph 6.0 and 262ppm. This raised ppm to 243, so I added 5ml of grow as well which raised ppm to 254, and adjusted ph to 5.91)

7/28/17
day 15 of flowering for the blueberry, start of week 3. Defoliated them this morning, they didn't require as much leaf removal (like 1/4) as last time and I left the outside leaves alone for the most part. If I need to I'll remove more tomorrow. I only removed leaves that were covering bud sites. They have a bit of purple on the flowers, which I hope keeps up because I think purple flower is exceptionally pretty.

aero res
ph 5.95 (starting ph 5.79)
ppm 251 (starting ppm 250, added 4ml ph up)

clones are beginning to root, I'm picking the best 4 to veg once their roots hit the bottom of the net cups

7/29/17
day 16 of flowering for the blueberry. Finished defoliating them yesterday, ended up having more time to spend in the garden than I thought. Next run through the tent will be 4 blueberry plants, I'll wait until the end of week 3 before defoliating them and see what happens. I know defoliating is a controversial topic, and I'm no expert on the subject. What I have noticed is that since I removed so many huge fan leaves, and that's all I took was huge fan leaves with long petioles, is that the airflow through the plants is so much better and you can see all the bud sites. There is an added bonus that the humidity is about 10% lower in the tent as well since there aren't as many leaves transpiring. I understand that timing is important in regard to leaf removal, which is why I want to experiment a bit.

aero res
ph 5.96 (starting 5.84)
ppm 249 (added 4ml ph up)

7/30/17
day 17 of flowering for the blueberry, looks like they're out of shock from being defoliated. Flower development is continuing, the pistils are very straight.

aero res
ph 5.86
ppm 247