600W HPS Blackjack Tent Journal

Hello fellow RIUers!

I'm growing 5 feminized seed Blackjack plants in a tent using a 600w HPS and cool tube.

I'm fishing for, and open to any suggestions on my setup!

They are currently 3 days from germination and just popped soil 2 days ago. I have the ballast running at 50% power to keep the temp down and not be to harsh on the new sprouts. They are potted in 5 gal smart pots in some cheapo organic soil I bough from the local hardware store.

Interesting that you started in such big pots rather than implementing even just one transplant. My last 2 grows were BJ, and other than a varying pheno, its quite a good plant. The lanky fluffy stuff not so much, but the short, fruity dense pheno is awesome and VERY stony. Ill be subbd' to see how yours come out.

Thanks for watching KlosetKing!
I was thinking about starting out in smaller pots, but then i was thinking the less I have to stress them the better. I once read that its good to start out in a smaller pot and transplant because the roots shoot straight to the bottom or something like that? But I've seen roots grow in all kinds of crazy ways on here, and I figured they would probably have no problem growing every which way they can to go all throughout the medium.

I just placed a thermometer right next to one of the seedlings and its reading at 94 degrees F! Is this too hot? I'm trying to not run my fan all the time because it's slightly noisy and I'm trying to keep the power consumption to a minimum.
I bought a fan controller which slows it down to what i guess to be about half of its normal operating RPM, but it's still kind of loud... Anyway I'll be updating rather frequently.

94 is a bit warm indeed, you may want to work on that, even a few degrees can take you from almost dangerous to tolerable. i hear ya on the loud fan, maybe for now just move the light a bit farther? (not sure what kind of room your workin with in that tent). If you cant, you could look into controlling your environment a bit more and introduce some Co2 (which would actually make 94 and warmer an optimal temp) but thats a bit of a process and sometimes money sink, and even i havnt played with it yet in my kloset.

Okay, so I decided to start up the inline fan. After an hour the room by the plants is holding steady at a nice 85.5 degrees F.
I've also decided that I'm going to use these as mother plants and try to do a perpetual SOG grow with enough 2 gallon pots to fill the entire bottom of the tent.

Fuckin A man, sounds good! Im actually about to start trying my own hand at cloning, but i want to try to isolate the cherry pheno of my ak48 (if i dare get so lucky as to get one of them).

Quick update,

The girls (hopefully) are 13 days in under 24/0 600w HPS (I'm too cheap to buy a MH bulb).
On the leaves I'm seeing some very mild nute burn, so I wont be adding any for a while.
It looks like I have one more indica looking pheno and one runt.
My plan is to veg these bitches until I get a good number of decent sized cloneable sites to fill the whole bottom of the tent with one or two gallon pots for a SOG which hopefully I'll be able to keep perpetual.

I'm thinking of using Advanced Nutrients Sensi Bloom and Connoisseur when I start flowering. Any suggestions for good veg nutes? I'll probably end up purchasing all Advanced Nutrient Sensi line.
Any suggestions on a carbon filter? I'm trying to go overkill on the odor control. I'm looking at the CAN 33. I'll most likely be adding any inexpensive supplemental odor control things I can find also. Febreze True Air etc...

Shoot me some suggestions!

Well being a legal med patient, i have never had to worry about my scent issues, so i don't have much help there. As for feeding goes, my BlackJacks were rather touchy, but i used the FF liquid lineup. Once again my opinions rather limited from there, as ive changed my philosophy on feeding a plant. I don't just add anything anymore. I address any deficiencies i see as soon as i see them (usually i can manage to do it right), then i simply maintain healthy foliage. If i can get to the end of a grow and not lose more than 3 leaves, and they are all nice and dark green, ive done my job right imo. I also don't do much on flushing anymore either, as my new approach has never left me with anything but sweet, dank, awesome bud that was by no stretch of the imagination 'harsh'.

If you got the indica pheno, your gunna love it. Do your best to try to isolate the 'fruity' pheno if you can, they were by far my favorite. They seemed exclusive to the indica pheno, none of the sativas had anything other than what i would describe as a 'medicine' smell. Almost like stickin' your nose in a pill bottle or something.

In fact, i wasnt happy really with the sativa heavy plants in the end. Half of them displayed strange mutations, and they were definitely lanky and airy buds. The indica pheno was short, tight, dense, and 10/10 smoke in my book. Damn near 2 hit wonder for me. I got one oddity that had the smell and taste of the sativa pheno, but of course the structure and growth of the indica, and it was only mediocre smoke as well. Your best bet is definitely to find that 'fruit loop' pheno, and make a mother, you wont be disappointed =D

hey i'd suggest that you take that ballast out asap. I've knnocked my humidity bowl over numerous times and it probably won't be pretty with that ballast there. I have basically the same setup as you though, with the 1000 watter. Electricity is a bitch and i'm running mine at 75 percent cuz the heat was getting in the 85-90's. can't wait to see how this turns out man. i gotta read over this but i just wanted to say that thing about the ballast. I have mine just outside the tent where i know no water or other stuff goes.

KosetKing,
I'm feelin' your outlook on just treating for deficiencies and leaving them be otherwise. I don't know if I'll be able to resist playing with all these fancy nutrients... I'm crossing my fingers for the more indica pheno being the nice fruity one you describe! I'm kind of bummed about your description of the medicine smell.

Gogowitz,
After reading your post I took the ballast out. It actually dropped the ambient temperature almost 5 degrees! And I didn't even think about accidentally getting water on it! Man, I'm dumb.

nice, that's a win win. once i figure out how to suscribe i will. always wanting to see how similar setups end up. good luck man i'll be checking back. also i read you didn't wanna buy a mh cuz your were too cheap, feel it, but you should maybe think about doing a 18/6 or something like that. Running the thousand watt at lower percents 24hours rose my electricity bill from 40 up to 260 a month. PGE starts charging more per electricity when you use over certain amounts... So watch for that as well. and for carbon filter it's one of the most do it yourself things made on this website. All around 30-40 dollars or so for pretty decent filters. As long as you have the fan to run it through, but don't worry about smell to later flowering.