1st grow WW...comments/suggestions welcome

After many years of paying outrageous prices for kind bud, I have recently decided to try my hand at this whole homegrown thing. After doing some research, I ordered the essentials and I'm ready to go.

I will be growing WW (nirvana) in a hydroponics setup (6 site drip w/ hydroton) under a 250W HPS in a 3x6ft. closet. My grow site is 2.5x2.5.

I currently have 7 recently germinated seeds sitting in soaked rockwool by the window. I hope to have 4 females but will be growing 6 plants in the hydro up until flower and 1 insurance policy in a pot of soil if all my seedlings survive.

Ideally I will be updating once a week, possibly more if I'm having problems. I will start with pics a few weeks into veg if everything is running smoothly up to that point.

I went a bit over my original budget and I cannot afford an EC meter. I plan on starting with 1/4 str. GH flora series nutes when i place the cubes in my hydro and working my way up. I figure its safer to lean towards not enough nutes rather than too much nutes. If there are any signs of major deficiency (which I'm sure you guys will spot before I do), I will adjust my nute str. accordingly. And is their reccomended 3-2-1 formula for veg a good place to start. Also, say all my seedlings survive, can i place the rockwool cube directly in the soil or do I have to transplant.

Being that I'm inexperienced in the field, any suggestions are more than welcome. So come along as I share my first experience with you I'm sure it will be an epic, coming of age tale

My seedlings have yet to come above the surface of the rockwool. I have the cubes sitting in a tray with water covering about the bottom 2/3 of the cubes. I had nothing to record the pH when I originally put the seeds in the rockwool, but I bought one and adjusted the pH to 5.5 yesterday. However, the pH was 8.0 for 3 days before I brought it down. I attributed the minimal growth to the high pH, but I'm not sure seeing as how I've never done this before and do not really know what to expect. I know this is a critical time in their lifecycle and I'm hoping they all will pull through but I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

I can see the seed shells inching slowly toward the surface in about half of them. The others are still not visable from the top. I noticed that a few of the seeds were at or below the surface of the water in the tray so I drained a little of the water out to keep them from drowning. Im seeing drastic pH swings probably due to the fact I'm using vinager to bring it down. I'll invest in some pH up/down after I get my first check at this new job I'm starting this week. I put the tray under my light yesterday to keep temps up because my grow room has an uninsulated closet in it and temps stay pretty low. Its been 6 days since the seeds went in the rockwool and some have yet to show signs of life. I'm assuming if they are going to sprout, they should be popping out of the cubes within the next few days. I plan on putting them in the hydro in a couple days and just starting them with pH adjusted water until they get a set or two of leaves then ill start with the nutes. Still waiting for some feedback, not much going on at the moment but any advice is more than welcome.

Ok so I'm officially starting to lose my patience. I tore apart a couple of the cubes in which the seeds havent moved toward the surface and i was disappointed to see minimal taproot growth in three and no growth whatsoever in one. So I'm down to 6 now. Needless to say, I had to put them in new cubes. They are back about 3 ft. under the light in a tray of 5.5 pH water covered in saran wrap with holes in it. The others look like their shell is starting to come apart. My brother-in-law germed a few bagseeds like 5 days after mine and all have made more progress than my best one. The funny thing is he didnt soak his rockwool or adjust pH and gave them much less attention than I've given mine. Maybe thats my problem, just being a bit too meticulous about doing things the way I think they should be done. Every time he sees me with my tweezers, pH meter, and magnifying glass he calls me a mad scientist, then he starts limping around calling me master.Am I wrong to think that they are not making the progress they should be, or am I just being too impatient?

I'm sad to say that theres no new growth, in any, at all. I believe I overwatered my seeds when they were only a few days old. I didnt realize the hole punched in the rockwool cubes goes down half way through the cube and when I first placed the cubes in the tray of water, the water level was higher than the bottom of the hole, completely submerging the seeds. I saw that the cubes barely have to be wet for the seed to completely sprout when my bro in law's seeds blew past mine. They are now over 2 inches long and have their first set of leaves by the way. I'm glad nirvana seeds are so cheap because I could be out $50 or more worth of seeds rather than only 20 or so. I'm going to use this as a learning experience. Anyone think they still have any life in them or am I right to think that they are gonners considering its been 12 days since they germed.

try em again in moist soil ..... and y dont u germinate in wet paper towel for 24 hours then try the rockwool ?

yeah just germinate them in paper towel.then throw them inta some soil.try not to mess around with them too much.its hard to not pay too much attention to them.put up some pics when they start to sprout. good luck man

Now its becoming more clear as to why the good kind bud cost so much!!

So I trashed em all except one which finally started to show some life. I did actually use the paper towel method to germinate but I misinterpreted a grow guide I read and put the cubes in a water tray with way too much water. Needless to say those delicate taproots dont survive long when they are underwater for a couple days. I'm starting over with the rest of my widow seeds and also bagseed this time. I have some hawaii x skunk but I think I should get a grow under my belt before I try to grow a big sativa thats better suited for outdoors. I'll get the journal up some time soon. Live and learn I suppose.

Just checked on the new prospects. Once again the bagseed are really progressing much much faster with all 4 already showing green leaf. I hope I'm not having a repeat of what happened last time but I think I've fixed all my mistakes from the first time around. Cubes are moist but not sitting in water and this time I let the root get a bit bigger before I put them in the cubes. I'm real close to saying forget this hydro shit and just pop them in some soil.

All my newly germinated seeds have really taken off in the last couple days. All three of the WW seeds are showing some real growth. So theres nothing wrong with the seeds and the first run was error on my part. Keeping a journal like this is helping me see my mistakes and correct them before making the same one twice. They should be ready for light in a day or two. 3 bagseed 3 widow, I'll have pics up soon.

All six plants have their first set of leaves, allbeit very small leaves poking out between the cotyledon. They have become quite spindly, I think I waited too long before putting them under the light (which I did this morning). They are all around 4-5 inches tall and a couple cannot support their own weight and have a serious lean going on. No worries they seemed to look like they were perking up just a couple hours after putting them under the light. The rockwool dries out incredibly fast under the light. I havent put them in the hydro yet because they are so scrawney it didnt seem necessary yet. I'll probably put em in it tomorrow or the day after. I have a 13 gallon rez I'm planning on starting out with 3 tsp. each grow, bloom, micro (no TDS meter yet). Hows that sound guys?

sounds good man.any pics?

Just ordered everything I was missing to help make this a successful grow. GH pH control kit, TDS meter, and digital timer to maintain consistant light cycles. The only thing I dont have are additives other than my GH flora grow/bloom/micro. Should I be feeding anything else to maximize growth/yield potential. I'm a total noob when it comes to nutes other than the basic info I was able to find online. BTW no photos yet, I need to find my digi camera its around here somewhere. Just imagine 6 stretchy seedlings starting to form their 2nd pair of leaves.

edit: Just to give you an idea of how much its cost me so far about $600 everything included. About the price of 2 oz of quality kind in my area. I do have what I need for the duration of the entire grow and atleast 1 more. I would call that a pretty decent investment even with average yields.

So after doing a little research, I'm thinking 250 watts is not gonna be enough juice for 6 mature plants grown in 1 sq meter, even though I'll be lucky to have 4 females out of the six im growing right now. I want to make the switch to fem seeds to fully utilize the little space I have to grow. I was so royally pissed off to see a 400w HPS for the same price I paid for the 250w on ebay and another which comes with MH conversion bulb included for about $40 more. I posted mine up on craigslist, some jackass offered me 1/4 of what i had it listed for. Hopefully I can get rid of it in time to buy a 400w for flower. I totally jumped the gun when I decided to grow and let my excitement get the best of me. I bought the first thing I saw which was a big mistake even though it was relatively cheap. That interchangeable one sounds sweet, MH for veg then switch to HPS for flower. I'm sure that would make for some nice bushy plants with little space between nodes, or should I just buy the HPS and take the extra $40 and buy a 430w enhanced spectrum bulb. Feel free to put in your two cents guys I expected a little more feedback but I guess I'm not at that stage in my grow where everybody is interested. Its my first time so you guys with experience would really be doing me a big favor if you just gave me some friendly advice.

They are in the hydro now. Two of the plants have pretty much fallen over their like 6" tall and their stem is really thin. My TDS meter came in today. I'm still waiting on the pH stuff so I'm still using vinegar for now. TDS is 150 pH is 5.5. The rest are all looking pretty solid except one of the widows looks like somebody was gnawing on the leaves. Its coming in all mangled and twisted, but coming along nonetheless. Not sure what to do with the lanky ones. I work the stems back and forth every day so they get a bit stronger. Their propped up with plastic forks right now, looks pretty ghetto but work with what you got right. I think I lost my camera can't find it anywhere. I'll just have to borrow my sisters I guess.

Both of the plants that were falling over are now standing up straight due to some obsessive bending of their stems. My pH control kit arrived today. I didnt realize how strong that stuff is. It took me like 15-20 caps of vinegar to bring the pH down to a reasonable level, took like 3 caps full of the pH down. It has a bigger cap but whatever. They are steadily making progress, nothing spectacular to report at this point. I changed the water in my rez because I didnt wash the hydroton off as well as I thought and some of the sands washed down into my rez making it look like dirty dishwater, plus the vinegar made it smell pretty bad. TDS still around 150 well actually its a little above 300 but my tapwater comes out at around 150, pH is 5.4. I've come to the conclusion that I will never see my camera again because I let my old roomate borrow it before I moved out. I'll go out and get one eventually. Back with more soon.

Some of the top leaves have faded due to the fact that I closed the closet door and the heat got really intense. I have a fan in the room now so there are no more hot spots or heat build up. They are all starting to form their second node. The WW that is growing in weird still looks like a mess. It looks like its already been topped, the new growth is below the first node too, odd.... Anyway, I borrowed my sisters camera and snapped some pics but forgot to take the memory card out before I gave it back but I WILL have pics up late tonight or early tomorrow. My timer just got here too which is a relief. The light cycle has been inconsistent so far to say the least.

So I moved the light down this morning, it now sits about 22 inches above the top of the plants. I got that memory card and once i uploaded the pics I soon realized they all looked like shit expect the only one I took while the HPS was off. I upped the TDS to a little under 300, may have been a little too strong, I noticed a couple light green spots forming around the outside edges of the leaves on a couple of the plants. pH stays between 5.4-6.2. Heres the good pic, I'll get more up soon. The left 3 are the WW, the deformed one is front left.

So after doing some research, I've decided to LST all my plants to fully utilize all 250w that my undersized light is putting out. Although I've read that 250w is fine for up to 1 sq. m., I've also been told that my yields will really suffer if I'm anywhere under 50w per sq. ft. I will start training after they grow their 5th or 6th node which should take another week or two. Another reason I want to LST is because my plants are very stretchy with them being 5 or 6 inches tall and just having started on their third node. I wish I woulda bought fem seeds now that I think about it. I could easily make a 1 sq. m. canopy with 6 plants but I've already accepted the fact that I'm probably only going to have 3 females. Best believe my next grow is strictly fem seeds or possibly all clones if I find a decent WW mother. Being that I only have 1 light, I'll need to regen the mother if I do decide to do so. I have so many ideas running through my head now for further down the line in this grow as well as future grows and I have this constant feeling of anticipation. I guess every first timer is like that in one way or another, but this shit is really testing my patience and were only 2 weeks in lol, can't imagine how I'm going to feel when I start seeing the fruits of my labor.

I just realized like 5 of my posts start off "So after doing some research", that should give you an idea of how much this shits got a hold of me, I spend 2 hrs a day on these damn forums lol.