1st Time Medicinal Setup. Any tips , comments , or criticism welcome.

My first grow setup and so far I am very excited. All knowledge I have of growing is that from talking to some buddies who have been doing this for quite some time. Now its my turn to learn the ropes. If you have any constructive criticism please feel free to post any thoughts / ideas. I will greatly appreciate them. A little background now on my current setup. Using a growlab 80L 2x7 (front to back), 4X11 (length) , 6X7 (height). I got 12 clones in here at the moment, all in Foxfarms Ocean Forest Organic Soil, getting Botanicare's Pureblend Pro Grow Soil formula and liquid karma nutrients. (At suggested dosage) On clones that are big enough I have spread a half inch layer of playground sand. (This I was told to keep tiny bugs undercontrol) I got a daystar ac hood running a 600w Conversion Halide bulb. Powered by a Phantom 600w digital ballast. This ballast gives me an option to run at 60% 75% or 100% power. Due to lack of a blower atm, I have ghetto rigged some wal mart fans to my growlab tent to create decent cold air circulation from a neighboring window. Currently temp is sitting at 78-79 when tent is closed, will quickly drop to 75 when tent is opened. Humidity is fluctuating between 50 - 60%. They are on a 20 hour light 4 hour dark cycle vegging. Water ive filled up gallon jugs from my water filter system and have been letting it sit with nutrients mixed in, for couple days before use. So for now that is everything I have going.

Clones are a variety of Grapefruit Kush, Lavender, Green Crack, Chemdog, Hefe, Hogsbreath and/or Skunk 1.

Again any comments or advice about the setup and any tips for the future will be appreciated. Im looking for good quality as this is all for personal use.

Pictures are of setup and the 2 oldest clones about 1.5 weeks old. Grapefruit Kush and Lavender.

*addition*

Picture of my macgyver skills, wal mart fan pulling hot air out above.

And picture of my chem dog clone. It looks kinda sickly I think. The leaves on 1 half are all small and some leaves twisted. Is this bad? Comments please.

Welcome to RIU!

The X's in the dimensions through me off but I looked up the tent you have and I understand it now lol. I just bought a growlab tent as well, the GL80, mine is just a 2'7" square tent but I still really like it. I've been growing in cabs since i've started and this thing is nice because of how light and easy it was to put together.. not to mention if I need to take it down that will be hella easy compared to 200lb cabinet lol.

Now for a little constructive critism. Next time make sure you fill your pots up all the way to the top. The plants won't use the top few inches of soil so you should give them as much of it as possible. The sand idea doesn't seem that bad I guess as long as it doesn't mess with ur PH, but seems kinda unnecessary imo. It also seems unnecesarry for you to let your nutes sit for a few days before you water, generally you let the water sit if you have a lot of chlorine in your water to let it evaporate out, but that's before you even put the nutes in. I would also suggest picking up some Cal/Mag nutes along with your PBP and liquid karma, you'll notice some strains really need it.. like white widow.

Other then that everything looks great, the temps and humidity are perfect it sounds like so that's good. Your plants are looking real healthy so keep it up!

A little update for the journal. Been trolling around RIU and found a thread on FIM, made it sound super easy and sound like the worst that can happen is a couple days delay. SO being as medicated as I was FIMd 3 of the 11. Oh ya ripped one up due to the sickly look and what looked like powdery mold. So since then ive kept a close eye on everything else all the leaves look good no signs of powerdy mold on anything else. Going to buy a dehumidifier for the tent, I want to drop it a little bit to reduce the chances of mold. Plus I guess 30% humidity is good for flowering anyways.

Ventilation I believe is fully up and running nothing more I can afford to do. With my brothers help, weve rigged something I find to be pretty nice. Pics are below. Overall cost of fans = 48$. My brother had the alluminum duct. Temp has dropped almost 5 degrees its sitting at 75 tent closed up for a long period. So basically chained up a fan to one side of my hood to pull air from inside the tent blowing through the hood / duct where I then basically plugged up the duct hole with another fan. Using duct tape on the fan so it will pull air from only that hole. (No duct tape on tent at all) Like before still have a fan plugged into lower hole on the opposite side to pull cool fresh air in. Fans have been placed on ground level to circulate air around the tent aswell as strengthen up the ladies. Other than that, a couple days ill know how my FIM job went.


Pazzo thanks for the advice, I already wish i wouldve planted them higher, I think they would be growing that much better getting atleast some light underneath from reflection. Ill be sure to do that when I transfer them to something bigger. Going to get them in some Sunshine Mix or HP Pro.

Looks really good man, I like how you have it all set up. I just have a 6" fan clipped onto my hood blowing on the bulb but i've been wanting to get another fan cause my temps hover around 80-83. I wish I woulda went with an air cooled hood but oh well, I just didn't think I would have the room but I probably would have. I think after seeing how you have your fan set up in the vent hole that might be a good way to go.. I just gotta make sure to get an enclosed fan cause I have a litter of kittys runnin around the house and one crawled in there through the hole and was stuck in there for who knows how long lol.. wouldn't want them to get chopped up.

LOL at your kitty. I got 2 cats of my own. They are grown up tho, and thankfully havent expressed the need to explore my tent. Tho Ive kept it in a corner so there is nothing to helping them get to them top. I just pray they dont decide they want to climb the sides cause they could easily rip up a couple holes. OH ya poped up a Jack Herer seed that I got out a 8th from a dispensary. Its just shown up over the night we will see if its a dick or chick and lets pray its a chick. If it is wondering if I should get a small new tent and just mother it out and clone off. Pic below, like tom brady in the off season, just posing.

Yeah, definately try to let them know it's a bad thing to mess with your tent. I have about a year old cat that was playing around on a couple bins I have next to my tent and the top bin slipped and she tried catching herself on my tent and I got a nice 3 inch scratch in it.. nothing tape can't fix really but still. For a mother you could just go down to walmart (or wherever) and see if they have a small cabinet and you could put some fluoros in there with 1 of those fans and you should be good to go.. probably end up being cheaper then a new tent. But if you want to keep a few moms and maybe have a clone spot then a tent might be a good idea.

Oh btw, do you get your clones from a dispensary? If so do they have Trainwreck?.. that's a strain i've wanted to try for a long time but seems like I'll never be able to without a clone because I don't like feminized seeds. I got a fem. super skunk going right now and I think it's a male/hermie.. Think i'ts time to plant my master kush.

Nice good to know about the walmart thing. Lets pray its a lady tho first off. ya got my clones at the dispensary. No trainwreck from what ive seen. Ouch on your super skunk. Hmm I have no experience with seeds except the one I got going. I know that the next batch I will be gettting a ton of random seeds. Ill prolly sprout em see which ones I like and grow out. Got my big ass bag of Sunshine mix 4 for transplanting the plants in the future and to grow this seed. Anyways happy 4/20 . GL

Ok first nice problem that Im going to have to control now. Thankfully Ive already ordered a dehumidifier, Ive got powerdy mold forming =(. I believe its from a clone I picked up a local shady dispensary. First and Last time I am getting clones from dispensary. I shouldve realized that they prolly dont give a fuck about their clones. They cant make that much money of them. But ya using Serenade formula to wipe down any leaves showing signs of PM. Gonna pump the humidity lower than 50% hopefully that will keep the PM under control wish me luck.

Alright so I am baked and bored. Decided to give an update on the babies. Aside from powdery mold, everything seems to be going good. Im getting a sulfur burner from a friend to help kill the PM and got a dehumidifier to drop the humidity.

Alright 1 week since last post, and everything seems really good. The plants are looking healthy. RH is down to about 25-35% with my dehumidifier. Dont laugh when you see the picture of how I hooked it up to the tent. It works amazing! Duct tape, ducting, trash bag. Its feeding in the dehumidified air in 24/7. Just transplanted all of em into their final pot. Im giving about 1 gallon of water each watering session per plant. Does that sound about right? The jack herer baby is trucking along once im able to sex it depends on wether Ill spend any money on it. In a couple days Im going to set up some netting and will start bending to try and do a Screen of Green technique. Other than that wish me luck, and good luck to all of you in your projects.

Grow Journal Update. Got a Sulfur Burner and used it ! Haha so ya Pm shouldnt be a prob now the plants are looking healthy and full. Im going a 1 -2 more weeks of vegging and should be ready. Got a Hortilux 600w HPS for flower. Stay classy .....

Hey bene,

Looks like you're doing pretty good. I tried the 1" layer of sand thing a couple of crops back to control an out break of fungus gnats. It didn't seem to help much. Of course they were pretty well established by the time I put the sand on. Between the messy-ness of the sand getting every where and it keeping me from seeing the soil surface and keeping it "tilled-up" so it could breath I decided not to do that any more. I prefer to keep some of those yellow sticky traps (on sticks stuck in to the soil) spread around the space. Since after a while watering tends to pack down the soil surface I occasionally till mine up using a kitchen fork. The same reasoning applies as to why you do that in your out door vegatable garden. Got to let that soil breath.

I'm also using pots similar to yours. I've got mine set up on some 1/2" rings that I've cut off of 3" diameter PVC pipe. Not only does this help them drain good when you water but it lets air circulate up under the pot and keep that from becoming a damp zone for mold, algae and bugs (especially fungus gnats). Plus I think it helps the roots breath. Also in the interest of good drainage I've drilled a bunch more 1/4" holes in the bottoms of my pots.

If those were my plants I believe I would consider easing them out of the pot and putting some more soil in the bottom of the pot. That will give the plant more room to develope a bigger, healthier root mass.

You mentioned something about having a powdery mildew problem and getting a sulfur burner to control it. Being as that's something I've yet to have a problem with (at least not that I know of) I was wondering if you might have any pictures you took of it so that I could get an idea of what it looks like. Last crop I was getting some white spots (and trails) on some leaves that at first I thought might be caused by some form of fungus or mold. It turned out it was caused by thrips.

Happy gardening.

Jack

Jack in the Bud said:

Hey bene,

Looks like you're doing pretty good. I tried the 1" layer of sand thing a couple of crops back to control an out break of fungus gnats. It didn't seem to help much. Of course they were pretty well established by the time I put the sand on. Between the messy-ness of the sand getting every where and it keeping me from seeing the soil surface and keeping it "tilled-up" so it could breath I decided not to do that any more. I prefer to keep some of those yellow sticky traps (on sticks stuck in to the soil) spread around the space. Since after a while watering tends to pack down the soil surface I occasionally till mine up using a kitchen fork. The same reasoning applies as to why you do that in your out door vegatable garden. Got to let that soil breath.

I'm also using pots similar to yours. I've got mine set up on some 1/2" rings that I've cut off of 3" diameter PVC pipe. Not only does this help them drain good when you water but it lets air circulate up under the pot and keep that from becoming a damp zone for mold, algae and bugs (especially fungus gnats). Plus I think it helps the roots breath. Also in the interest of good drainage I've drilled a bunch more 1/4" holes in the bottoms of my pots.

If those were my plants I believe I would consider easing them out of the pot and putting some more soil in the bottom of the pot. That will give the plant more room to develope a bigger, healthier root mass.

You mentioned something about having a powdery mildew problem and getting a sulfur burner to control it. Being as that's something I've yet to have a problem with (at least not that I know of) I was wondering if you might have any pictures you took of it so that I could get an idea of what it looks like. Last crop I was getting some white spots (and trails) on some leaves that at first I thought might be caused by some form of fungus or mold. It turned out it was caused by thrips.

Happy gardening.

Jack

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Hey Jack thanks for the great input, ya i took the sand out a while ago, i came to the same conclusion about letting the soil breathe and not being able to see the soil. I had a thrip issue asweel took care of that very quickly. Ive already gotten a sulfur burner and used it once. Ihavent seen any signs since so far of PM, gonna do a full sweep today to see if I see any. If I do Ill grab a couple of pictures for ya Jack. And Jack have you seen the new pots they are in? I dont think i can afford to put them in bigger pots because they will grow to big. Lol kinda weird that it could be a problem. I just got limited space and light can only hang about 6 ft high. Other than that thanks for looking at my journal and the good input. I hopefully wont be able to get you pics of PM but we will see.

benefit420 said:

Grow Journal Update. Got a Sulfur Burner and used it ! Haha so ya Pm shouldnt be a prob now the plants are looking healthy and full. Im going a 1 -2 more weeks of vegging and should be ready. Got a Hortilux 600w HPS for flower. Stay classy .....

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i know im asking all these stupid questions but what is that net thing and what does it do for the plant

kush614 said:

i know im asking all these stupid questions but what is that net thing and what does it do for the plant

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I dont feel your asking stupid questions because I asked them not to long ago also, the net is their for support for the branches. When I go to flowering, the plants will double/triple in size they will grow through the net the lower buds should need the net to help support them and to also train branches/leaves to go where I want to. Sulfur Burner is for Powdery Mold, its really hard to get rid of thrives in higher humidity, and sulfur burning is the only known way to get rid of it from what Ive read.

benefit420 said:

I dont feel your asking stupid questions because I asked them not to long ago also, the net is their for support for the branches. When I go to flowering, the plants will double/triple in size they will grow through the net the lower buds should need the net to help support them and to also train branches/leaves to go where I want to. Sulfur Burner is for Powdery Mold, its really hard to get rid of thrives in higher humidity, and sulfur burning is the only known way to get rid of it from what Ive read.

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im going to look for the burner if i can find one within a month or so i will buy it but thanks for all the help

Quick Update: 5/16 started flowering 12/12 cycle. I made another noob mistake, I was having temp problems again before I got a new blower, now everything seems to be good. But before I fixed the problem ended burning some of the new growth like a dipshit. Its grown out and with a little trimming everything is looking healthy again. Tho I have no room at all. My tent is packed, and Ive been trimming big fan leaves here and there to make sure all the bud spots are getting light. Here are so quick picks nothing up close due to the fact they look a little thin from me burning some of em. (Im such a dumbass tho , live and learn / trial and error)

Can't wait to see how much they have popped...! pictures, pictures.....

Sorry busy and shit..... Heres some pics this is day 19 of flowering, + pics of my new tent. Using it to hold mother and veg plants. 4 bulb t5 4 foot lighting for the new tent. And the new seeds are World of Seeds Fem Strawberry Blue , Star 47, and New York Special Diesel. 3 of each of those. Along with 1 Fem Church from Greenhouse Seeds. I also have germing..... 10 Super Lemon Haze Fem Seeds from Greenhouse and got 3 other free seeds. So for now heres some pics. Pics arent too great they are from the camera on my phone and with the red from HPS it makes it hard. I dont think these pics do em justice.

Dude thats whats up....! I'm turning a little green with envy... The girls look like there coming along nicely.... Cant wait to get out there......