DWC round 2

there are ways of controlling Height or vertical growth. A lot depends on distance from the lights.

They're starting to grow upwards. They're not stretching they're just growing another level of leaves.

Yuffie and Midna are both standing at about 3". Nyx is at about 3 1/2". Chloe(the runt) is just over 2".

I know this doesn't mean much but Midna's canopy width is about 10". Yuffie's is about 7 1/2". Nyx's is also about 7 1/2". Chloe's is about 6".

they're all lookin' happy.

I'm feelin' lazy today so i didn't take pix but i will upon request.

consider this a formal request...

PIX!!!

kp

your request has been accepted. i'll go hound the roommate for his awesome camera. they should be up in a few.

As requested kp,

Yuffie:


Nyx:


Midna:


Chloe(the runt):


the reason Midna's and Chloe's leaves look so dark is because they're in the back and i had to practically lean over everyone to get a picture, which meant i had to block the MH light.

Nyx is leaning but probably because one of the fans is sitting right over her. I should probably move it.

In other news:
I'm currently modding my setup since problems are arising. Basically the platform is crapping out on me. The plat form is make out of 3 layers of cardboard wrapped in saran wrap. Underneath are two layers of styrofoam for buoyancy. In each corner i have a safety pin )that i rebent so it was straight) poked it through the 3 layers of cardboard and then bent it again to poke it back up into the cardboard then sealed it off with packing tape.
well it wasn't as well constructed as i hoped. one of the pins(the one in Yuffie's corner) came out and tore the saran wrap on the bottom.

What that means is the cardboard has be come soggy and now useless as far as structural support comes. So long as the platform remains floating it'll be fine for the plants but change the res water has become difficult.

The Mod:
The solution is i'm gonna put stilts on the bottom of the res so the platform will float normally but when i drain it via water pump, the platform will simply rest on the stilts which are high enough to keep the net pots from crushing the roots underneath. i'll post pix of what i mean when i'm finished making the stilts.

Not much news to report other than they're getting wider. Yes i say wider and not bigger because while they are growing new leaves they're expanding sideways much faster.

I'm actually convinced that they've reached their full adult height, but for the next 2 1/2 or more months will just keep growing wider to the point where it'll just be a carpet of green leaves.

very nice!!

uhm, out of curiousity, how come theres so much water in the hydroton? do you have the level up that high to the cups. i was told to have about an inch away?

let me know

mine are just barely sprouting. just "hatched" and placed in the dwc today

yours look amazing ^^

asiankatie said:

uhm, out of curiousity, how come theres so much water in the hydroton? do you have the level up that high to the cups. i was told to have about an inch away?

let me know

mine are just barely sprouting. just "hatched" and placed in the dwc today

yours look amazing ^^

Click to expand...

When they are seedlings I personally run my nutrient solution right to the bottom of the cup. When they get roots I move them away. I could be wrong though. lol

wow, so i completely forgot about this grow journal. oopse, sorry. Anyway to answer your question. the reason why you can see the water is because that's a floating platform.

Kant said:

wow, so i completely forgot about this grow journal. oopse, sorry. Anyway to answer your question. the reason why you can see the water is because that's a floating platform.

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floating platform?! wait maybe i dont understand. heres what i have, a 10g tub with holes cut in the lid, in those holes are 5 3" net pots. inside the tub i have water up to about an inch from the bottom of the cups, the seedlings (sprouts) in rockwool thats inside the cups with hydroton around and below it. oh a bubbler inside, and a MH about 15 inches from it.

should the water be up to the pots??

SmokerE said:

When they are seedlings I personally run my nutrient solution right to the bottom of the cup. When they get roots I move them away. I could be wrong though. lol

Click to expand...

wait what? i thought they werent supposed to see nutes till their 2nd week

asiankatie said:

floating platform?! wait maybe i dont understand. heres what i have, a 10g tub with holes cut in the lid, in those holes are 5 3" net pots. inside the tub i have water up to about an inch from the bottom of the cups, the seedlings (sprouts) in rockwool thats inside the cups with hydroton around and below it. oh a bubbler inside, and a MH about 15 inches from it.

should the water be up to the pots??

Click to expand...

what you have is what most people have. what do you mean by bubbler? If that's an airstone then that's good. A floating platform is exactly what it sounds like. Your "platform" is your lid. For the setup i used, the platform is floating on the surface of the reservoir water.

asiankatie said:

wait what? i thought they werent supposed to see nutes till their 2nd week

Click to expand...

Most people will say "don't introduce nutes until the second week". Personally i use nutes from the get go. I usually use about 1/4 - 1/3 strength and my plants never seem to mind.

yeah yeah, it is an airstone. i just made my grow journal.

its one of the long airstones as opposed to the little weirdo ones.

that's interesting the floating platform, i mean it's literally just floating in the water then, as opposed to raised above. i mean it seems to be working. your plants have amazing color!

The floating platform is styrofoam. The only problem with that I see is if the medium, rockwool, and styrofoam have too much weight when the plants get larger to almost submerge the plants. When the plants get larger in my experience it's better to have some space between the bottom of the cups and the nutrient solution. I haven't looked back in this journal yet, so he may have proved me wrong.

SmokerE said:

The floating platform is styrofoam. The only problem with that I see is if the medium, rockwool, and styrofoam have too much weight when the plants get larger to almost submerge the plants. When the plants get larger in my experience it's better to have some space between the bottom of the cups and the nutrient solution. I haven't looked back in this journal yet, so he may have proved me wrong.

Click to expand...

interesting

how much nites are u using? and whats ur PH

Let me bring everyone up to speed. the post with th pix is about 2 1/2 months old. I neglected to update because shortly after that post i got strep throat. that pretty much put me out of commission for 2 weeks. The only time i looked at my plants, while i was sick, was to change the light to an hps and start flowering. when i finally did check my plants, 3 of the 4 were males(that was depressing day). Then in early august i had to abandon my girl for about a week (i had to go to a wedding in boston), so there was like a month period where i didn't check RIU. I harvested the sole female a couple of weeks ago.

even though it was only 1 plant, the platform held up pretty well. I built it so it would fit snuggly in the res. Since the water didn't have anywhere to go (except through the net pots), it held the weight without signs of stress.

the one female put out about 1 1/2 oz.

I did actually mod my set up a little. I added stilts to the bottom of the reservoir because it got to be a major pain the ass to change the water when they got bigger. The problem was i had to lift the platform out of the res to get at the water. So i hacked down the 3 males, i put in stilts and just use a water pump to get the water out. when the res is emptied of water, the platform just rests on the stilts. The stilts are about 5" long so the roots wouldn't be crushed by the weight of the plant.

Yeah Im gonna have to see the old journel in a minute I am surprised these even live being in the water that much as they are drowning the roots and you never want that much water covering the hydroton and rockwool cubes as no oxygen can really get there and its beging for root rot.Are you addy any h2o2 to help stop rot and give the roots some o2??

The slits will be an issue also if they get going since the roots will follow the flow of the watre and go through them if Im understand the setup and you will have knots to try and break casuing stress.