Seeking Advice

I'm on my first go at growing and I've learned a lot but I have much more to learn. It's day 19 and my seedlings have been sluggish (see pics). Germination went really well. I started 2 northern lights auto fems and 2 purple kush fems in rapid rooters soaked in R/O water under cfls. All 4 broke soil on day 3. I only re watered with r/o once plugs were dried out.

My grow tent, and 400W setup are outside in an uninsulated shed. Temps have been hard to regulate with CFLs so I added a space heater set to cut off at 65. One morning after a cold night (day 7), I checked seedlings to find temps in low 90s and 2 seedlings dead. I turned over to HID lights afterwards and removed the heater and relied on my 440 cfm exhaust fan and my 240 cfm intake fan directed on light to regulate temps. Since then temps have ranged from the low 60s to low 80s.

I have moved the rapid rooter plugs to red solo cups with coco coir perlite soil mix and have watered with non ph'd r/o water as needed since. On day 16 I added a tiny amount (1/4 tsp/gal of nutes) to help give them a little boost. They sit about 18 inches under the MH 400W lights on an 18/6 schedule. The 6 dark hours are during the afternoon when it's warmest outside.

I mist them with r/o water everytime I check on them (2-3x day). I have a small fan blowing on them when it's not too cool outside. Humidity as been around 20%.

I am currently building a smaller, insulated shed dedicated solely to indoor growing so as I can maintain a more stable ambient temp and better regulate room humidity.

My 2 biggest questions are:
1. How far behind are my seedlings on the growing curve (how stunted?)
2. What's causing them to be stunted? Is it the prior temp shock on day 7 - the wide range of temps that fluctuate throughout the day - the non ph'd non/low nuted r/o water - low humidity - over watering - more lighting required - or any other factor that I can not see through my noob goggles?

I am working to alieviate most of the possible problems mentioned above with an insulated grow shed, minimum nutes, and today I will put the cfls on them to give them a wider light range.

Is there any other factor that I have neglected to consider and need to change? Any advice will be gratefully recieved.
 

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Yeah that's what I had suspected. Total noob move on my part. I'll cut the dailey misting and water more on container weight instead. I hope that they pick back up. Thank you.
 

Bareback

Well-Known Member
Can you add the cfls back almost like side lighting but real close, just check for heat issues . Also my ro is 7.0 ph and you need something like 5.6/8 or something close to start check the run off to see what happened, you can figure out how to adjust from that .
And your ph needs to swing so all the nutes are available from 5.6/8 to 6.3 .

I might be wrong so check it out first.
 

chillok

Well-Known Member
OP you received a quick answer as to why they're not thriving. Forget the heat stress, some died but if these made it any new issues are on you, cause they're quite hardy otherwise. So.. use the 400w and exhaust/circulation fans to help regulate temps. Ambient temps? humidity? Buy a $7 yellow pH pen off eBay, if anything, to start pH adjusting everything. mist less, water to saturate then dry out, drainage, low nute dose, and continue work to create a hospitable ambient environment.
 
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