Dozers Secret Hydro Lab: Part Deux

I read quite a few places that plants can only efficiently use 16-18 hours of light a day. I have never and probably will never run 24/0. Not even on my clones, just because in the real world, it gets dark. Plus plants perform alot of their processes in the dark as well. I think dark time is necassary for the plants whole life. Peace.

Are you still runnung the drip system 24/7 and are you using the air pump that came with WaterFarm to run all your air stones as well?

That's what I heard too. Most animals are like that too - if they don't get enough "night" time they get stressed out and can even get sick.

zeke907 said:

I read quite a few places that plants can only efficiently use 16-18 hours of light a day. I have never and probably will never run 24/0. Not even on my clones, just because in the real world, it gets dark. Plus plants perform alot of their processes in the dark as well. I think dark time is necassary for the plants whole life. Peace.

Click to expand...

Hey Guys,

Sorry for the lack of updates. I'll begin posting pictures again once my girls are flowering. There are enough pictures of 3-4 week old plants here to keep someone occupied for years. The proud father in me wants to show off my druidic offspring, but the pragmatist in me wants to wait until there's something to see before going apeshit with the pictures like last time.

I had to try the 24/7 thing for myself, and came to the conclusion that a dark period is necessary for healthy growth. The only thing 24/7 lighting did is produce heat, slow growth, and increase my power bill by %40. Fuck that noise. So, I switched the lights back to 16/8 a couple of weeks ago, and greatly reduced the amount of nutes I used from last time. One of my girls(we'll call her alpha) is growing at an insane rate. I'm doing a lot of pruning. The other(we'll call her beta) is a little slower on the uptake. Both Alpha and Beta have roots dangling down into the nutrient solution in their individual pods. Last grow, about %50 of the root material that entered the nutrient solution was black and slimy. This time, with the introduction of the airstones, the roots are all stark white and super healthy looking. I'm removing a full branch from Alpha every week, and at this time Beta is one big main stem with just a couple of offshoots. I topped Beta two days ago after deciding not to ScroG her, and now more branching is appearing. Since reducing the nutrient load, I'm noticing everything is a lot greener than my last grow. This time, I think I'm going to afford them a lot longer to veg. This will give me the opportunity to prune and develop strong healthy bases before loading them up with sticky icky flowers.

Hustle: I am using one, 2 port air pump for each of the pods. One hose goes to the airstone, and the other to the drip ring. The controller has a single port pump driving the circulation mechanism.

Stay tuned kids!

D0z3r

Sounds like you've got this wired tight.

How soon are you gonna flip to flowering and get us some new pics?

d0z3r said:

Hey Guys,


Hustle: I am using one, 2 port air pump for each of the pods. One hose goes to the airstone, and the other to the drip ring. The controller has a single port pump driving the circulation mechanism.

Stay tuned kids!

D0z3r

Click to expand...

I am trying to figure out if i can run all the air stones and my drip sysytem. I have a pretty beffy air pump that has four individual ports that are controlable individualy (meaning I can shut any of the 4 ports on or off). and have spliters for the tubing. I know it can run the 8 buckets but trying to figure out if the 8 air stones would bog it down. any thoughts and I look forward to your updates learning alot from you. I did all the MODS to my WaterFarm you suggested.

Thanks again

Basically the way I do it is I consider a bare minimum to be "double" what the pump is said to be designed for. Since the air pumps are mainly marketed for fish tanks, which have much lower aeration needs, I double up (or more, preferably more) what the pump says.

So for a 30 gallon reservoir you'd want an air pump that is designed for at least a 60 gallon fish tank.

The number of air stones you use is important, but if you've got enough pump per gallon the air stones tend to sort themselves out, in my experience.

Nice setup and helpful tips. I like the modifications you did to your waterfarms! Im going to look into doing the same on my setup to. I just started the waterfarm with 5. My first hydro to.

Good people of Rollitup,

As promised, I have refrained from taking pictures of every little hurdle and growth spurt until I have something to show. Things have progressed well for the most part. First off, so far the two plant solution has been a success! One of my girls has grown up to surpass my expectations. It looks as if my healthiest girl will exceed my total harvest last cycle. This pleases Doz3r. The other girl lives just outside of the plastic curtain, and as a result has taken to stretching as if light starved. She's now around six feet tall. I had to remove the devices I was using to control the HID height, and basically attach the lamp to the ceiling to allow her any light at all. This makes d0z3r sad. Next time, I will be replacing the visqueen in the whole space. I have a plan to create a visqueen curtain with a dowel rod weighted bottom to increase the light in the space. More on that later. Anyways, due to "stretch"es insatiable desire to be close to the lamp, I've had to prune and re-prune the tops off her repeatedly. This has understandable stressed her out, and as it currently stands, I am skeptical that I'll be able to harvest both plants simultaneously. I may have to come up with an alternate place to dry out the bushie one while stretch finishes up. I think bushie is 3-5 weeks from harvest at this time. I'll post more pics when her hair starts going red.

looking tastey man, bet u cant wait, rep+ for u if it lets me lol

Ladies and gentlemen,

Looking at how everything is progressing, I'm thinking I'll be ready to harvest in three to four weeks. These pictures are all of one plant.
My other plant is very difficult to photograph as it is 7 1/2 feet tall and all stretched out. The buds on "stretch" are a good three weeks behind bushie. I'm not sure what to do about that.

Veterans of rollitup:
If one of your plants(the producer) outpaces the other plant in your garden(a MUCH lower yielding stretched out fucker), do you let them both grow to maturity? Are there problems with leaving mature buds on the plant for a few more weeks? The problem as I see it, is I have to flush with Final Phase 2 weeks before harvest to avoid the chem'ed out bud flavor I got with my last grow. When I do that, the detergent will actually be leeching nutrients out of the plants, and as my waterfarm is a singular system, there's no elegant way to only flush one plant, as both plants have grown themselves into place with no good way of moving them before harvest.

Doz3r requires some sage advice people.

Thoughts?

Oh yeah, and some pictures:

Damn Dozer, them some nice looking buds. Sucks about flushing one, having to flush both, but I think you'll have a good harvest!

So, I think Bush is 3 weeks from completion, but stretch is lagging by at least an additional 2 weeks, maybe three.

What would you do if one of your plants looked like this:



And the other one looked like this:


???

Stretch is having light issues. Due to my inexperience, I failed to line 100% of the grow room with white visqueen(the door is not covered) and as a result, stretch is getting loads less lumens/sqft then bush.
Since stretch has already grown all the way to the ceiling, moving her will definitely result in the mainstem snapping(she's grown in).

Bushie, on the other hand is developing very nicely. She has very dense large, stinky buds sprouting everywhere. As it stands now, Stretch would be unusable, a total loss were I to harvest today. In three weeks time, I'm not sure she'll have time to catch up.

What advice do the sages of rollitup have for the D0z3r?

Halp?!?

why dont you just harvest the two separately?

they both look like they could go another 4 weeks easy. i'd keep doing what you are doing for at least 2 or 3 weeks then check back in.

Thank you for the advice my friends! It is greatly appreciated!

If it's four more weeks they desire, then four more weeks they shall have!

D0z3r

The waiiiiiiiting is the haaaaardest part.
-Tom Petty

Bushie:


Is doing oooh so well! She smells all fruity, and skunky funky in my little hydro lab.

Her sister Stretch, however, is still way behind.


Per FDD's advice, they're going to get at least one more feeding this Friday, and then I'll repost next week for more guidance.

D0z3r hopes stretchie reaches full maturity before it's time to chop.

Hey Dozer thanks for the help on the WaterFarm made all the Mods you suggested and working great I got 8 girls in there just about a week take allookif you like thanks CaddyLuck too.

Got my 8 pack WaterFarm up and going (Pics)

Thanks man!

Your garden looks great!
+rep