CFL Stealth Box veges and herb

After an unsuccessful first grow (male) I've set up another round, this time with 6 bag seeds which i will weed down to hopefully 2 females through the process. I'm also getting sprouts started for my garden in the box. I have 6 of each cucumber, zucchini and tomato. Feel free to give any input you'd like in this journal. I will be checking up on it multiple times daily.

Starting 18/6 light cycle tonight with 2 26w 6500k CFL bulbs. Plan to let the cucumber and zucchini germinate for 14 days before planting in my garden, the tomatoes 15-20 days. Will transplant my 4 best herb sprouts into disposable cups after germination, hoping I can grow them til they show their sex. From there I will pick out the best 2 (assuming more than 2 are female) to flower.

Cool! Glad you were able to get a new grow going again although I'm sorry to see you had a male last round. I'm doing a Mandala Satori grow now after my dog tore up my last Northern Lights x Big Bud grow. I decided to do her(??? -- always optimistic) outdoors this time in a greenhouse as I've never done a grow outside before. She is just 14 days old from sprouting. Even if she turns out to be a male, I like the breeder so I may go ahead and grow it out to collect some good seeds. I may be moving in a few months anyway so it will be great to have a multitude of good seeds so that once I get settled in my new place I can germinate 10 or 20 and have a better chance of having some females. Anyways ... too much coffee this morning so I'm a bit chatty. I'll be checking up on your grow as always man. Good luck to ya!

HAPPY GROWING!!!!!!!!!!!

Day... 13? update.

Have 5 sprouts transferred into small foam cups. Going to continue growing til they show their sex and focus on the females. Will weed out any that don't grow right, sick, pests, etc.

One of them has a very long stem, as it was the fastest growing, yet furthest from the bulbs.

End of day 18 update.

They all seem to be doing fairly well. Not entirely sure what I'm going to do at this point. All the plants are quite mature, yet still small. (I like this, as I'm guessing it may increase the possibility of multiple plants flowering in my box without taking much room)

I'm unsure if there's any early ways of telling sex, but a couple of my plants have more elongated leaves, whereas a couple others have very stubby and fat leaves. This also may be a factor of multiple strains as I don't remember where all the seeds came from in particular.



EDIT: If anyone happens to be reading this, I'm curious.. Would there be any complications with planting all the females into the same soil? You can see from the picture I have a container that could possibly work, but I don't know if the roots running together will cause any problems or whatever. So anyone who has more info, it'd be much appreciated.

ekofux said:

End of day 18 update.

They all seem to be doing fairly well. Not entirely sure what I'm going to do at this point. All the plants are quite mature, yet still small. (I like this, as I'm guessing it may increase the possibility of multiple plants flowering in my box without taking much room)

I'm unsure if there's any early ways of telling sex, but a couple of my plants have more elongated leaves, whereas a couple others have very stubby and fat leaves. This also may be a factor of multiple strains as I don't remember where all the seeds came from in particular.

View attachment 2141948

EDIT: If anyone happens to be reading this, I'm curious.. Would there be any complications with planting all the females into the same soil? You can see from the picture I have a container that could possibly work, but I don't know if the roots running together will cause any problems or whatever. So anyone who has more info, it'd be much appreciated.

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I would keep each plant in its own pot because of the rate at which cannabis grows. The roots will quickly tangle up together, the plants will fight for nutrients also. There are bound to be deficiencies in the plants if they are all grown together. I believe even in plants that are grown outdoors it is recommended that there be at least 5 ft. between each plant. Hope this helps!! Happy growing!

ekofux said:

End of day 18 update.

They all seem to be doing fairly well. Not entirely sure what I'm going to do at this point. All the plants are quite mature, yet still small. (I like this, as I'm guessing it may increase the possibility of multiple plants flowering in my box without taking much room)

I'm unsure if there's any early ways of telling sex, but a couple of my plants have more elongated leaves, whereas a couple others have very stubby and fat leaves. This also may be a factor of multiple strains as I don't remember where all the seeds came from in particular.

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The elongation of some plants could be due to the different strain as well as lighting. If you add a few more bulbs it can reduce the stretch. Another thing to remember is while they may seem to be staying small now, when the flowering cycle begins they thrust into a spurt of rapid growth and stretch at first, so it's hard to say how much room you will have if a majority of them turn out to be females.

I just noticed that you said the "leaves" were elongated and not the stems. Hmmmm ... some of the strains may be sativa dominant while the stubby-leaf ones are indica dominant perhaps. Hope you get females from each one, especially the sativa; however, the sativa will take longer to flower than the indica strain.

Much grow love!

Day 23 update.

Not too sure what I'm going to do at this point. My plants are just small things, but I'm alright with that. Giving the possibility of waiting til they show their sex in veg cycle, but also considering forcing into flowering and transplanting as sex shows. Any input on this would be great.

Plan to try to find the cash to get another socket and splitter for a 3rd, possibly 4th bulb. Also would like to paint my box at some point, but I'm afraid I won't have enough time between light cycles for it to dry, thus leaving my plants to bake in the fumes (I'm assuming this wouldn't be necessarily good for them). Maybe between this grow and next I'll do it.

Anyways. Input on whether to wait for veg sexing or forcing into flowering then transplanting would be great. I'm looking to narrow it down to 2 plants, but I wouldn't be against leaving a 3rd or 4th scraggler female to catch any light they can.

Yesterday
Today

DOUBLE EDIT: I should note, growth has been quite substantial over the past few days. I gave them all a small nute shot earlier today, so the effects should really be showing by time I wake up and inspect my box with my morning coffee. Secondary growth is still lacking, but this was to be expected considering my light setup and space between plants. I'm mainly only looking for top colas, however. (easier to manage, I'd think.)

interesting; the trunk set-up. i like the space. LST a cpl of Indicas maybe. good luck. ima watch this one.

ekofux said:

Day 23 update.

Not too sure what I'm going to do at this point. My plants are just small things, but I'm alright with that. Giving the possibility of waiting til they show their sex in veg cycle, but also considering forcing into flowering and transplanting as sex shows. Any input on this would be great.

Plan to try to find the cash to get another socket and splitter for a 3rd, possibly 4th bulb. Also would like to paint my box at some point, but I'm afraid I won't have enough time between light cycles for it to dry, thus leaving my plants to bake in the fumes (I'm assuming this wouldn't be necessarily good for them). Maybe between this grow and next I'll do it.

Anyways. Input on whether to wait for veg sexing or forcing into flowering then transplanting would be great. I'm looking to narrow it down to 2 plants, but I wouldn't be against leaving a 3rd or 4th scraggler female to catch any light they can.

DOUBLE EDIT: I should note, growth has been quite substantial over the past few days. I gave them all a small nute shot earlier today, so the effects should really be showing by time I wake up and inspect my box with my morning coffee. Secondary growth is still lacking, but this was to be expected considering my light setup and space between plants. I'm mainly only looking for top colas, however. (easier to manage, I'd think.)

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Since you are already more than 3 weeks in and are limited in space and lighting, I would wait no more than 28 days to force them into flowering so you can see just what you are working with. This way, you'll know exactly what provisions you need to supply right away or whether you can hold off a little longer as funds become available. I have grown beautiful plants that I forced into flowering after only 3 weeks of veg time, but since your girls seem to just now be picking up their growth spurt, hold off till they are at least a month if you can. See how big they get in the next week.

Much grow love my friend. BTW, yeah ... it will be a good idea to paint the box white before the next grow for sure.

Luv2grow1221 said:

Since you are already more than 3 weeks in and are limited in space and lighting, I would wait no more than 28 days to force them into flowering so you can see just what you are working with. This way, you'll know exactly what provisions you need to supply right away or whether you can hold off a little longer as funds become available. I have grown beautiful plants that I forced into flowering after only 3 weeks of veg time, but since your girls seem to just now be picking up their growth spurt, hold off till they are at least a month if you can. See how big they get in the next week.

Much grow love my friend. BTW, yeah ... it will be a good idea to paint the box white before the next grow for sure.

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I'm starting them into 12/12 tonight. Took some thinking, but I've decided it my best bet.

I have 2 pots ready to go, gonna just let them show sex in the cups then immediately transplant. That way I can know what they are, and if they don't take well to the transplant, I suppose I could always bring em back to veg until they look healthy enough to flower again. Or who knows? Maybe I'll re-veg them in general.

Either way, I'm trying to take this grow easy. Do what I gotta do to harvest some smoke, no real guidelines to follow besides common sense and my own knowledge. My only fear currently is that my plants will all become root-bound before they show their sex. If this seems to be the case, I'll probably just transplant the 2 best plants that show any sort of sign of being a female. Crossing my fingers that I'll be able to afford feminized seeds next time (or even auto-flowering, seems they do fairly well for my personal purpose). But damn, are they expensive. At least by my wallet's standards.

Anyway, I'm stoned and babbly. Take it ezsqueezey



Video update from a day or two ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Z-sMtSH8AY

End of day 24, first day of flowering.

No real update today. But does anyone else love the contrast of the soft white 2700k bulbs against the green of the leaves?

That one dead in the middle on the pics. from 5/1 looks healthy as hell! Would probably go wild if you transplant into a bigger container. Usually the fast-growing big ones tend to be males, but it would be lovely if it was a female! That's a nice bushy plant just like I like them. The others are looking good too but you are right, they look as though there may be a threat of becoming root bound soon. :-/ Hopefully they'll show some sex signs in the next 2 weeks. Now that I look at your most recent picture though, they are all looking nice. I hope you have at least 2 females.

Luv2grow1221 said:

That one dead in the middle on the pics. from 5/1 looks healthy as hell! Would probably go wild if you transplant into a bigger container. Usually the fast-growing big ones tend to be males, but it would be lovely if it was a female! That's a nice bushy plant just like I like them. The others are looking good too but you are right, they look as though there may be a threat of becoming root bound soon. :-/ Hopefully they'll show some sex signs in the next 2 weeks. Now that I look at your most recent picture though, they are all looking nice. I hope you have at least 2 females.

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Well originally there was just 1 that looked real nice, bushy and healthy. Now there's 3 or 4 like that. They're all growing at quite a nice rate and looking very good. I'm in hopes that they will show their sex around day 30-ish. Which is less than a week from now. If the rootbound problem comes into play, I don't have much of a choice but to try to get some opinions on which ones to keep. I can only do 2 full plants with the space I have. I'm unsure which one's I would blindly pick though

DOUBLE POST MAYHEM.

Quick update end of day 26/3

Just a pic update again to show how well my plants have responded to the small nute shot and flowering cycle.



Edit: Theres 2 that seem much different than the others. The leaves tend to droop on them a lot during dark hours then perk back up bright and shiny after the light is turned on for about 30 minutes. They're also heavy in scent and have darker leaves. (on the left and top right)

A couple others are quite short, yet bushy and very aesthetically pleasing in the leaf formation (6 o clock and 12 o clock)

Then there's one that was stretched quite a bit during seedling stage because of light distance, seems to be a bit bare but it may just be the fact the nodes are more spread out. However, I'm sure it's possible it's just a hybrid strain, seeing as how none of the other seedlings had trouble with stretching. (bottom right)

DOUBLE EDIT FRENZY.

I might pluck out the tall skimpy plant. Possibly put it in my window or something. It seems to be causing troubles with my other plants getting light and I'm not so sure it would be the most ideal plant, either. Any inputs on this? Such as whether or not I should have hope of it being female or if it looks like it would obviously be a male or produce very little bud.

Another even quicker update day 29/6

One of my plants beginning to show its sex. This is great news, as I'm in hopes they will all show their sex before they become rootbound.

I'm vaguely assuming this one is a male. The preflowers are just barely showing, but appear as just smooth balls. Also, this plant in particular has grown in vertical height tremendously and the nodes are spaced fairly far apart.

Here's a pic of a couple of sexing nodes (enhanced for easier viewing)

Full size: http://i.imgur.com/IOGIM.jpg

And here's a full view of my babies (lights just turned on, so they're all still a bit groggy waking up)

Update day 31/8-ish?

My plants are all beginning to show sex little by little. One of which is definitely a male, one other appears to be male, but I'm allowing to grow a bit longer to be sure.

My expectations seem to be dwindling. I'll be pretty damn disappointed if I don't get even a single female out of my 5 plants.

*warning*
6 zucchini will feed an army. 1 or 2 plants, for a family is plenty.

scroglodyte said:

*warning*
6 zucchini will feed an army. 1 or 2 plants, for a family is plenty.

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Lol, I am aware. I had zucchini plants about 6 years ago that were up to my chest tall, producing calf sized squash. If it helps ease your mind any better, only 4 survived to garden transplant, and out of those I expect 2 or 3 to take root and grow.

Edit: Also, where I live it's a very tight knit small town. I'll be giving vegetables away to many different people. Much like I would share some herb with whichever family member or friend may stop by.

Day 32/9 quick update

Down to 3 plants now. Two of my five have shown obvious male flowers.

Only two of my current three are showing any signs of gender growth. One of which appears to have a very-very small pointed thing growing that MIGHT appear to have 2 nearly microscopic hairs on the end. However, I'm quite stoned at the moment. I may have just imagined that I saw it.

In either case, I'm trying to keep my hopes up and stay optimistic that at least one of my plants will be a female. Any bud is good bud at this point.

Another note, like I've mentioned before, I plan to take any females I get and re-veg them for about a week after transplanting into new container. What should I expect in this process? I'm assuming she'll just go back to growing foliage until I revert back to flowering. But is it totally necessary to re-veg while transplanting in flowering or should I be good as long as the roots stay intact well?

Day 33/10 update

I'm about 85%+ sure that I have a female. I transplanted it without problem into a larger container. Waiting on my other 2 to show flowers before I decide which one of them to keep.

Things are definitely coming along.