First Timer, Closet Grow, CFL's

I'm starting a journal for my first grow. I've already done a bunch of research here, but I'm sure I'll still need lots of help along the way. Please chime in if you have some advice or comments. I am growing legally as a medical cannabis patient and I'm starting with clones I bought from local cooperatives.

The Plan
Starting with 4 clones (2-Chemdawg D's, 2-Ortega's)
4 sq.ft veg area (for mothers & clones)
7 sq.ft flower area (2-4 plants)
soil medium
organic nutrients
CFL lights

Here's current pics of the babies. I don't know their exact age, but I presume each clone was clipped at least a week before I bought them. So for this journal, I'll refer to Day 1 as the day I bought the clones.

The Ortega's started on 4/12 and the Chemdawg was started on 4/17. The ortega's are indica plants and the Chemdawg is an indica/sativa hybrid. I might add more clones or mothers as they become available at the coops (space permitting).

Methods so far;
-18/6 light
-organic starter soil in 3" peat pots
-straight water with foilage sprays to maintain humidity.
-temps are about 70deg (night) 79deg (day).
-RH is between 29% (day) - 47% (night)

This MJ garden is turning into a zen MJ garden. I've been playing with the set up trying to organize. I've isolated an area for large clones/small plants and surrounded it with 26w cfl's. The other side will be used for mother plants. Pic's of the new set up attached.

I'm new at this so it will be trial and error as I learn the process of watering and fertilizing. I just caught myself over watering and a couple of tops turned brown. It's either the watering or my tap water. I am now using distilled bottled water. I use small pint soft drink bottles by poking a small hole in the cap. It's a perfect for watering my smaller plants (pic attached). I waited until the soil was completely dry, and watered again today. It seems my small pots are drying up every 16-24 hours, so I added soil covers to maintain some of the soil moisture.

I checked on my Ortega's and I noticed my leaves started losing color. I wasn't sure if that was caused by over watering or lack of nutes. The plant's been in starter soil for about a week, and I'm not sure how long it lasts without supplement. So I threw caution to the wind and started fertilizing my plants today. But then the leaves started pointing down within a few hours after I watered with the nutes. I waited until the soil was dry on this water, and I soaked it today (about 1/4 pint for each plant).

-1st pic is after watering and fert'ing (1/3 dilution).
-2nd pic attached is before watering (plant soil dry and pealing away from pot on the sides.)

Is the drop on the top leaves caused by too much water or too much nutes? How do I rectify?

If no one posts and the babies look good in a day, I'll continue with my schedule. (1/2 dilution of nutes, water whenever soil becomes dry and plant becomes light. No foilage spraying.) I also plan to transplant these into their 8" square pots soon.

What a difference a day makes. Plants are perking up. Watering seems to be under control. Plants are really growing now with the FF Grow Big.

I'm thinking about a set up in the flower chamber with 2- 150w HPS +CFLs and a ScrOG for my first grow attempt. I'll upload pictures as it comes together.

I want to work with small lights to avoid heat/venting issues. Will two 150watt HPS's cover 4-6 plants under 8 square feet of net?

Anyone?

hey man. nice grow you have going on here. I also am growing for medical reasons from clone. I am going to subscribe to your grow and follow along. first time grower here to.

how did it turn out after you added the nutes?

my leaves are sagging really bad right now and I have never used nuts. I bought some today but I am just researching around to figure out why they would sag like this before I do anything that could make them worse.

i have a grow journal going also.
https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/179097-cfl-grow-jack-ripper-clone.html

I am doing a cfl grow but i do think that 2 hps 150w 's will work. but you may want some more opinions on that

Browntown777 said:

hey man. nice grow you have going on here. I also am growing for medical reasons from clone. I am going to subscribe to your grow and follow along. first time grower here to.

how did it turn out after you added the nutes?

my leaves are sagging really bad right now and I have never used nuts. I bought some today but I am just researching around to figure out why they would sag like this before I do anything that could make them worse.

i have a grow journal going also.
https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/179097-cfl-grow-jack-ripper-clone.html

Click to expand...

Thanks for the support. I subscribed to your journal and left comments on your girls.

My plants seem to be okay. I might have nute burn on a couple of the ortega leaves, but the new growth seems faster and looks healthy.

I just watered them with 1/2 nutes and will watch closely over next couple of days.

Browntown777 said:

I am doing a cfl grow but i do think that 2 hps 150w 's will work. but you may want some more opinions on that

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I'll start with 150W HPS using only half my flower area. I plan a ScrOG set up on the ortegas (about 4 sq ft). I'm adding a couple more clones and I should have 4 plants ready to flower by summer after I veg them for awhile.

I'm not sure if you can see it in the pictures but I'm growing Basil from seed. I'm always out of fresh basil, and I decided to buy some seed when I was at the nursery. I abuse this basil with over watering and heavy nuting, and it seems the basil is indestructible. In fact it responds with lush growth. Anyways, I thought I would push the limits by adding Basil to my garden. If anyone criticizes my basil for stealing light or CO2, save yourself the time. The basil is staying.

Coming to the end of week 2 on the original ortega clones. I also added 2 more clones as promised, so there's 4 ortegas and 2 Chemd's. These are on 18/6 light, so growth is a bit slower than 24/7. Can I switch from 18 to 24hours without making the plants go hermie?

Here's week 2 pics...

1st pic: Ortegas - 2-week old clones on right. (you can see the nute burn on a couple of leaves).
2nd pic: ChemD's - 1-week old clones
3rd pic: Basil - Over-nuted and still growing.
4th pic: the veg area.

I've made some progress. All the plants grew about an inch last week. But despite growth, two of my Ortegas continued getting sicker. So I got rid of my soil covers and transplanted them into 1 gal pots. I also started training two plants.

Growth- 1 week (soil):
Ortega 1: 1" (current ht: 6")
Ortega 2: 1" (current ht: 5.5")
Chem 1: .75" (current ht: 4.5")
Chem 2: 1.25" (current ht: 4.25")

Current Veg Set-up (soil):
-6 cloned plants (4 ortega's, 2 chem D's)
-3 sq. ft. area
-18/6 lighting - 7 cfl's (179watts; 11,200 lumens)
-Uni-Gro Premium Organic Potting Soil (forest products, peat moss, vermiculite, pumice, bone meal, blood meal, cottonseed meal, alfalfa meal, earthworm castings) mixed with Perlite.
-watering every 36-48 hours.
-(1/4 dilution) GrowBig (6-4-4) once a week

Considering for my next Grow:
-going HPS all the way. 150w in Veg area (I like cfl's, but moving them around is becoming tedious).
-building a hydroponic set up (soiless).

Changed the veg to 24 hours of light. They seem to like the extra light and the 1 gal pots.

Also added more lights to my veg set up (total of 9 cfl's. 225watts/14,400lumens).

I made some progress with the flower area build. I'm setting up for 8 plants under two 150W HPS's (w/ some cfl's). I'm planning a rotating crop of 2 plants every 3 weeks, with a 2-plant ScrOG taking up the 4th space harvested every 8-9 weeks. (see pic attached.)

Instead of limiting myself to a large ScrOg, I'm designing a smaller ScrOG set-up that's portable. If it works, I'll be able to rotate 4 trays, and harvest a ScrOG every 2 weeks.

I might be pushing it with 8 plants which averages to about 1 plant every square foot. I'm a few weeks away from moving the plants in, but I think it's a good start.

Nice set up , where did you buy all your growing equipment?

Status:
4 Ortega's
2 Chem D's

All healthy. Ortegas showing minimal nutrient burns.

Veg Area:
10 cfl's (250W; 16,000 lumens)
24/7
1/4 nutes (GrowBig)
LST'ing all plants.

I'm not totally happy with the growth so far, but it's my 1st time and I've been playing around, doin stuff like cutting off burned leaves, leaving the ortegas with stem & smaller leaves (not good)...

My two chems are looking different and I'm starting to wonder if one of them was mislabeled. Until I know for sure, I'll still refer to them as chem's. The ortegas are more sensitive to nute burning than the chem D's. I've been feeding with 1/4 solution. 24hour light. I can't measure height accurately since I've been LST'ing all the plants with paper clips.

*I will be able to put the babies outside in sunlight this week, so I'm interested to see what difference (if any) it has on the growth. And no more cutting leaves. I've stopped doing that.

kingdick said:

Nice set up , where did you buy all your growing equipment?

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I've been building as I learn, so I'll wait to add up all materials when everything is up and running. So far, I've used all local hardware and garden stores... Wal-mart, Lowes, Home Depot...

-all tools and wood material $free
(scrap wood from the garage)
-plastic sheeting $9
-Mylar $6
-weather stripping (17') $3
-4 outlet power box $free (garage)

Coming soon...

- (2) 150W HPS lights ( from HTG supply) $70/ea)
-(2) 4" Duct with in-line fan-80cfm (from HTG supply) $20/ea
-(2) 4" dryer vents w/ 5' hoses $14/ea
- misc. duct equipment $10-15
-carbon filter (will look for one on craiglist or will try making homemade)

kubrickzghost said:

-carbon filter (will look for one on craiglist or will try making homemade)

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Good luck building a carbon filter man. If you do end up building one successfully I would be interested in finding out your method. I have to make one soon also.

going with the HPS huh.

Browntown777 said:

Good luck building a carbon filter man. If you do end up building one successfully I would be interested in finding out your method. I have to make one soon also.

going with the HPS huh.

Click to expand...

Thanks for checking out my grow. I decided on the HPS for flowering, but will keep it small and simple. I think (2) 150W's will be enough to get nice flowers and two of them will allow me flexibility in the space.

Here's the carbon filter I plan to make;
http://weed-forums.com/diy-tutorials/11083-diy-mini-grow-carbon-filter.html

It's about 4 weeks since I started. Plants are growing nicely now. The nutes are starting to really take effect making them look really healthy. They're filling in, and the LST'ing is coming along well. My biggest plant (10-12") is LST'd to about 4-5" with at least a dozen tops rising up.

I have (2) 150W HPS lights ordered and they should be here by next week. I plan to move (4) plants into the flower room next week and then switch to 12/12 in week 5 or week 6.

SCROG...

A pic of my homemade 2 sq. ft. ScrOG is attached. It fits into its space perfectly. I plan to scrog (2) Ortega plants, and since I'm LST'ing all my clones I'll be able to compare the scrog vs. bonsai harvests in this grow. I made this portable scrog for $20.