First indoor grow, how am I doing?

New grower.
Seeds from Royal Queen. Two are gelato 44, a Tyson strain and two are Northern lights. All autos.

Planted in 7 gallon cloth pot. Fox farms happy frog dirt. Pots were watered with a combination of Terpinator and a root enhancer at 6.5ph.

Light: 100w led, rated for 820+uml at 12".
On a timer for 18 hours of light.
Will be getting another, when plants are bigger.
Lights currently at about 18 ", these have no way of increasing or decreasing intensity. But do have a veg and Bloom mode, currently in veg mode

Exhaust is on auto mode linked to a vivo grow plan.
Have a small fan at the bottom of the tent. Pointed upwards underneath the fresh air intake.

Using a reptile fogger with 6.5 ph. Water, running 18 hours with the lights.

Tent has a constant temperature of 72 to 75° f
80% humidity, 0.5 ppd.

Looks like one or two is just starting to get its five finger leaves.
The pots are still heavy with moisture.
When should I give the first feed of newts?

I plan on doing low stress sideways training to maximize growth for plants.
I only wanted to start with two plants but I ended up with four plants and I don't want to buy another tent right now.
Any recommendations?

They can usually easily grow from soil alone for a week
18" is safe distance for 300W HPS
Would do the hand test and get just a bit of colour, hell i would heatstress to learn the optimal distance.

Why didn't you plant them in the middle of the pots?

MickFoster said:

Why didn't you plant them in the middle of the pots?

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Because it's a 2x4 tent. Only planned on two seeds but they took more than 72 hours to pop. I prepped two more seeds and of course the first two popped. Not going to waste a second to the pop because they're $8 seeds.

Soulfreeze said:

Because it's a 2x4 tent. Only planned on two seeds but they took more than 72 hours to pop. I prepped two more seeds and of course the first two popped. Not going to waste a second to the pop because they're $8 seeds.

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But I also saw a video of a dude that planted in the side of the pot because the roots will do just fine. Then I'm going to low stress out to the sides and then up, to maximize growth room.
That tent is 2x4x5 so I should have room.

Joeykamma said:

They can usually easily grow from soil alone for a week
18" is safe distance for 300W HPS
Would do the hand test and get just a bit of colour, hell i would heatstress to learn the optimal distance.

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Gonna lower the lights to 12" for veg. This new lights supposed to give 1100umol at 12". Plus it's adjustable and when plug into the auto grow device.

How would I heat stress? Drop it till the look wilted?

Soulfreeze said:

Gonna lower the lights to 12" for veg. This new lights supposed to give 1100umol at 12". Plus it's adjustable and when plug into the auto grow device.

How would I heat stress? Drop it till the look wilted?

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Those are nice looking plants. Let's make them big, nice looking plants!


Not heat stress. LED's get warm but they don't give off heat the way HPS does.

At 1100µmol, you'll kill a seedling. Check the manufacturer's recommendations and/or if you tell me the make and model of the light, I can give you recommendations. I grow in hydro and am very aggressive with light (more light=more weed) but I don't get my grows to 1k until ~week 5.

Re. photoperiod —I've been growing autos 24/0 from drop to chop for a few years. If you want to maximize your grow, there's no reason to not run 24/0. OTOH, a lot of growers like 18/6.

Re VPD of 0.5 — 80% is OK for seedlings, but I'd drop it to 70%. High RH for germination and seedlings is needed because the high RH (and VPD) mean that the plant isn't forced to transpire much. Young plants don't have a (well) developd root system so their ability to take up water is minimal. Once they hit veg, they've started to develop the root system so you can drop RH. That will start water being pulled out which means water comes in and that water coming in will bring nutrients in. Happy plant.

At 0.5, there's very little water being taken up which means very few nutrients. Once you get true leaves (meaning you're in veg), the nutrients from the cotyledons will have been consumed so the plant will need that water+nutrients.

The bigger driver is ambient temp. At 72-75°, your rate of photosynthesis is about 1/2 what it would be at 85° and, unfortunately, you can't make up for low temperatures in veg by raising temps later.

One of the functions of the vegetative stage is to grow out the canopy and running at 86° (max) will tend to provide the highest level of "leaf expansion and canopy establishment", as the pointy-headed guys call it, in this case Mitch Westmoreland.

Joeykamma said:

They can usually easily grow from soil alone for a week
18" is safe distance for 300W HPS
Would do the hand test and get just a bit of colour, hell i would heatstress to learn the optimal distance.

Click to expand...

Whah?? He's got a 100watt light.

OP: I'd recommend 2 more 100watts for that tent MINIMUM. Honestly I'd go for a light over each plant, but it'd probably be cheaper/better at that point to get an elongated higher powered light for 2 foot depth tents. You WILL be disappointed at 200watts spread over 8 square feet; I was recommended 50watt/sq ft mininmum when I started and I wish I had 2 150watt viparspectra XS1500. Granted tech has come a long way the last few years so watts aren't everything.

I'd encourage you to get these and have your 100 watt in the middle. They're $90+tax right now: https://a.co/d/8Coy4s9

bignugs68 said:

Whah?? He's got a 100watt light.

OP: I'd recommend 2 more 100watts for that tent MINIMUM. Honestly I'd go for a light over each plant, but it'd probably be cheaper/better at that point to get an elongated higher powered light for 2 foot depth tents. You WILL be disappointed at 200watts spread over 8 square feet; I was recommended 50watt/sq ft mininmum when I started and I wish I had 2 150watt viparspectra XS1500.

I'd encourage you to get these and have your 100 watt in the middle. They're $90+tax right now: https://a.co/d/8Coy4s9

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I was going to recommend a light after he replied.

RE. the Vipar - the XS 1500 Pro was a trendsetter when it was introduce two years ago but check out the new Migro lights. The 150 is an absolute gem. It is about $60 more than the Vipar but the spectrum and the PPFD map are superb. Two things at play—it's a newer design than the Vipar (the unstoppable march of technology) and Shane has juiced the PPFD by going red-heavy but photons is photons and that 150 is a stunner.

Delps8 said:

I was going to recommend a light after he replied.

RE. the Vipar - the XS 1500 Pro was a trendsetter when it was introduce two years ago but check out the new Migro lights. The 150 is an absolute gem. It is about $60 more than the Vipar but the spectrum and the PPFD map are superb. Two things at play—it's a newer design than the Vipar (the unstoppable march of technology) and Shane has juiced the PPFD by going red-heavy but photons is photons and that 150 is a stunner.

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Hahaha I figured it had to of gotten beat by now. I wanted it when they came out, but they were $130ea then.

Check those out OP! Lights VEERRY important for product

Its just my mistake, never been on the safe side with light distance.

You're off to a good start for your first grow, Op.
Having so much control over the environment will pay you back in buds.
My only advice, other than upping your light game, would be to keep on top of the LST so you can maintain a level canopy. Having different strains in a small area can make light distance tricky.
Good luck