FirstCav's First Journal Sponsored By the Cultiuanna CT-660

Like it says in the title, I've been lucky enough to receive a light to test from one of our site advertisers, Cultiuanna. Thank you @Cultiuana . I have the CT-660 model I'll be testing for them during this grow which draws 660 watts advertised from the wall and is available for review and purchase at https://cultiuana.com/collections/full-spectrum-led-grow-lights/products/full-spectrum-led-grow-lights-660-watt-4-by-4-full-cycle.
I just installed the light yesterday in my 4x4 tent and have 4 plants in veg that I hope to be flipping to 12/12 in a week or two at most as size is becoming an issue. I'm running 3 Steve Lemme OG x White Cherry Truffle crosses from GuamMaineian Gardens and a pre 98 bubba kush from Dookie Farms that's clone only. I just finished transplanting the last plant and super cropped the bubba kush heavily as it was a good bit taller than the other three.
I'm finishing up on editing some videos and hopefully I'll have those figured out by tonight or tomorrow. For now here's a couple shots of the Cultiuanna in the tent at 40% on the dimmer. It draws 262 watts from the wall at 40% and a whopping 700 at 100%. The 700 watts was 6% over the claimed 660 but within the usual 5% range I've seen with my other lights accounting for my not so accurate Amazon meter. I don't have a temp gun to check exact temps but it's cool to where you can rest your bare hand on any part of the top of the fixture and driver's at 40%.
Plants will be in Roots Organic soil and I added in 2 tbls per gallon of the 4-4-4 Dr Earth dry amendments before transplanting them. They were getting GH 3 part nutes in the 2 gallon pots as I never have good luck with organics in small pots. I'll be using Dr Earth flower girl dry amendment fertilizer for the bloom cycle and add Epson salt for extra Magnesium to the well water they get.
I'm hoping that the better spread of these lights will give me a more even light distribution across the canopy and reach the sides of the tent better.
Its going to take some getting used to so let's hope this doesn't become First Cav's crispy plant show .
All advice, comments and questions are welcome. I keep things really simple in my grow as I'm cheap, and try to do this for as close to free as possible. I don't stress about perfect leaves and bent branches. I'm disabled and I get rough with stuff, sometimes on purpose, sometimes it's just life happening. Somehow it usually ends up with some pretty decent medicine for me and the wife, which is why I do it. Hope you guys tag along and enjoy the journey.

Bubba Kush after super cropping

It amazes me how fast they bounce back from even a really aggressive super cropping. The one I did yesterday was about as hard as I go, breaking the main stem just a little past 60% up it's length. I decided to support it while it heals for a couple days with an extra plant yoyo because of its weight. Once the knuckle has formed at the break and it's holding weight, I'll remove the support and the canopy will be way more manageable.
The bubba kush was going to be part of another grow I had planned before I found out about the chance to test this light and it was much farther along than the Steve Lemme OG plants that were just seedlings I had vegging at a friends house to choose one from. Once I got the light my original grow plants were too big and I decided to grow out the three Steve Lemme plants for this grow instead. Since we can have four plants legally I picked the bubba kush to try and run with these. It was the smallest of the others and had the least stretch. Hopefully after the training it will work out. Here it is today, less than 24 hours after being bent in half. Looking good and bouncing back nicely..... thankfully

Chiming in so I get the updates

Grow baby, grow! With your skill and experience this tent is gonna be busting at the seams! I look forward to watching and learning from your efforts; I’ve already learned so much from ya and I really appreciate it!

Retired engineer said:

Grow baby, grow! With your skill and experience this tent is gonna be busting at the seams! I look forward to watching and learning from your efforts; I’ve already learned so much from ya and I really appreciate it!

Click to expand...

Thanks man, I've learned a lot from you too. This forum has been so helpful to me when I hit snags I can't figure out, which is often . I'm sure this is going to be much different for me since the Cultiuanna light has so much more power, watt wise, than anything else I've run before. Once the girls get adjusted to the organic soil and start showing better leaf color, I'm going to flip. They were hungry in the small containers because I ran out of the grow bottle of nutes and tried a mix of just the micro and bloom nutes. Like I said, I'm cheap.

I've been fighting a deficiency for the Steve Lemme OG plants all week that has only gotten worse. I'm pretty sure it's a magnesium deficiency and that there's also an issue with them being underfed. Decided to foliar spray them with a solution of 1 tbls per gallon of Epson salt to try and get the magnesium issue under control and fed them all 2 tbls per gallon of media of Dr Earth 4-6-3 which is a new formula for me. Hoping that the extra P will help with issues I've seen in stretch using the 4-4-4.
I changed up the size of the pots I usually use this run from one gallon starters into 5 gallon final pots, to 2 gallon starters into 4 gallon airpot style pots. This meant the transplants had a lot less organic amended soil to draw food from and I should have probably top dressed then at transplant some as well. They also were underfed to begin with as I had run out of the GH liquid nutes I use when they're little.
Pretty sure that the foliar spray and top dressing will bring them around quickly, and it better, cuz I'm flipping to flower soon no matter what. They're too tall already based on some quick math I did today and will require some creative training to keep them under control during the stretch. I might have to give one away and just run three if it gets too crowded so I have room to spread them out more. I'll just see how stretch goes and decide then. I'm more concerned with airflow and access to the plants then maximum yield so we'll see how they do once they hit 12/12 in the next few days.
I bumped the power up on the Cultiuanna to 60% as I have it set fairly high height wise and was being really conservative with it since it's new. The girls seem to be responding really well to the better spread of the light and the lux testing I did this weekend showed better light distribution throughout the whole tent than what I'm used to. Hopefully that translates into better, more consistent flowers. We'll see in the next few weeks as I crank up the ppfd.

While trying to figure out how I've been overwatering today, I decided to take a look at the bottom of the pots. I found out how they're getting too much water pretty quickly. They have totally open bottom grids and included built in feet for supports. The feet had slits in them for drainage and since I haven't been draining the drain pans 100% the plants have grown roots down into the drain pans and have been drinking the runoff. I'm going to try to get them elevated as little as possible to keep the height down but get them up out of the runoff and make it easier to get more of the runoff up when there is any. I'm just glad this Scooby Doo mystery is solved, it was really bugging me. I haven't had this much trouble in veg stage in a really long time , it was driving me nuts. Hopefully they're going to get on track and flower won't be this much work. I want to focus on the light change and using this extra power.
Here's what the bottom of the pots look like just a week after transplant. The roots sure look like they're happy in the soil to have spread out so quickly at least.
This was the rootball at transplant

Yeah, the airpots allow for some awesome rootball development. When I was using them, I’d sit them in a drip pan, and about 15 minutes after I finished watering use a turkey baster to suck the drainage out of the drip pan. Keeps the roots at the bottom out of standing water/feed, and I used the collected runoff on my houseplants. Waste not want not…

these are looking awesome - you are in the Zone of Zen, zat’s 4 zure!

Thanks, they looked a little greener this morning after the Epson foliar and some watering the last two days with a good bit of Epson salt in it. I'm flipping tomorrow as they are way past the point height wise I wanted them to be. I just wanted to get this magnesium issue sorted before they got into flower.
I use a turkey baster to get the runoff up too, but I'd love to get something electric with a long siphon hose. Just to make it easier to get the ones in back. I'll be watching them now that I know what the roots were doing.

Hey man, I clicked the watch button to follow along. Hope the light does well for you.
Seems I read that you were in VA and same here. The roanoke times newspaper has been having a monthly write up about growing weed this summer. Seems so strange since its been illegal for soooooooo long, right? Anyway the guy is using Dr Earth nutes also. Todays article was about flowering and possible deficiencies. I still cant believe seeing these articles in a newspaper!
Anyway, good luck with the light and the grow.

RottyRzr said:

Hey man, I clicked the watch button to follow along. Hope the light does well for you.
Seems I read that you were in VA and same here. The roanoke times newspaper has been having a monthly write up about growing weed this summer. Seems so strange since its been illegal for soooooooo long, right? Anyway the guy is using Dr Earth nutes also. Todays article was about flowering and possible deficiencies. I still cant believe seeing these articles in a newspaper!
Anyway, good luck with the light and the grow.

Click to expand...

Thanks, I'll have to see if I can find it online. I've run four or five cycles of the Dr Earth dry amendments now and I've seen small issues here or there, usually right after stretch. It's the reason I switched from the 4-4-4 to the 4-6-3 this run. I want to see if they do better with the extra P in veg and stretch. Using a liquid organic nutrient to give them a boost and running worm castings is a great idea, but I'm on a pretty tight budget and I try to load up the amendments and use Recharge to get decent microbial activity to help as much as possible. I'm thinking the Steve Lemme OG plants are going to stretch pretty hard and use a ton of food doing it. They'll be the ones I worry about. Bubba Kush is a pretty light feeder and didn't stretch too bad last run so I'm thinking it will be good.

FirstCavApache64 said:

Thanks, they looked a little greener this morning after the Epson foliar and some watering the last two days with a good bit of Epson salt in it. I'm flipping tomorrow as they are way past the point height wise I wanted them to be. I just wanted to get this magnesium issue sorted before they got into flower.
I use a turkey baster to get the runoff up too, but I'd love to get something electric with a long siphon hose. Just to make it easier to get the ones in back. I'll be watching them now that I know what the roots were doing.

View attachment 5177761

Click to expand...

They look pretty damn healthy to me!

Found the article and it's a well written piece. The guy tried to get a good bit of information out in a short period and kept it simple and very positive, which I really like. I don't agree 100% with him but what do I know. It's cool that we've come from hiding in closets to grow journals in the main newspapers. For anyone interested in reading it here's a link to the last article.

Retired engineer said:

They look pretty damn healthy to me!

Click to expand...

You can't really see the leaf chlorosis I guess as much as I do in person. It had gotten bad on one of the Steve Lemme's. They seem much happier and are spending the next 24 hours in darkness to see if that does anything different from my usual routine of just flipping to 12/12 outright. Then it's going to be trying to control height as I just found out that White Cherry Truffle likes to stretch a fair bit. I'm not sure how that will translate in the cross with the Steve Lemme OG but I have a feeling I'm going to be super cropping more than I like to later in flower. I'll find out in the next few weeks.
Here's a couple pics of what 2 tablespoons per gallon of Dr. Earth looks like and the little rake I made out of a dinner fork. I use the rake to blend the dry amendments into the top layer of the soil and I'll turn over the top 1/2 inch or so every couple days to break up any clumping from the dry amendments. Hope everybody's plants are doing great!

So the girls are officially in flower!! I flipped Wednesday and bumped the light up to 100%. I checked the lux readings and at 100% I could leave it where it was set and get 46-50K lux at the canopy tops so I decided to go that route instead of bumping it to 80% and lowering the light down. I'm hoping the intensity will maybe help limit stretch a little as they grow up into the higher lux ranges. There's a little droop at the very top fan leaves about an hour before lights out so I'm pushing DLI at this stage I think and will have to watch for light stress as they grow up.
The Cultiuanna puts out a whopping 700 watts at this setting and I'm used to running a COB setup at 417 watts from the wall so it's a lot more light than I'm used to but it's more evenly spread out over the tent by virtue of the bar design. The lux readings were 46K at the very far edges and 50k right in the middle hot spot areas with most readings being right around 48K. Those were taken about 30"- 32" from the light. I really like the even distribution of the light. Can't wait to see the first clusters of flowers forming.

The three Steve Lemme OG x White Cherry Truffle


Pre 98 Bubba Kush

I did some minor defoliation and some lollipopping on day one of flip and will do another more intensive defoliation on day 21 for the final shaping and stripping. I don't like larfy buds or trimming them so I don't leave many lower branches that I'm not sure will produce dense buds. I don't strip many leaves off on day one as I figure they need them to support the growing they're doing in stretch and I'll decide what to take on day 21. I prefer to just tuck the really big fan leaves out of the way of the secondary bud sites as much as possible to help get them up and growing quickly with indicas. It's just my personal style and what works for me and there's lots of good ways to grow. The lollipopping just makes it easier to water with my bad back and it helps to eliminate some of the problems with pests and hermis from areas that get poor light and ventilation. Hope y'all have a great weekend.

Looking great bud!

Rurumo said:

Looking great bud!

Click to expand...

Thanks! It's going to get a lot more crowded than I usually like but we'll see how it goes. I normally run 3 big plants or 4 small auto's but had the three Lemme OG plants at a friend's vegging to try and pheno hunt the best one. When I got the chance to try out a much bigger light I put my other grow plans on hold and decided to try all three Lemme plants here with the one bubba kush clone from the original grow I had planned as it doesn't stretch very much. I can always move the runt of the litter outside if it gets too hard to water and inspect them after they're done with stretching. I figured I'll just see how it goes as I've never grown anything with the white cherry truffle genes and don't know what to expect.
You've been such a huge help with your journal and the great science based articles you include in it. I've come a long way in the last year thanks to what I've learned here from you and a few others. The link you put up from Oregon on the heavy metals levels in fertilizer the other day was terrific. I forgot what thread it's in but I saw how high my Dr Earth is and now I'm doing some reading on acceptable levels for human consumption. Appreciate all the great advice and killer journal.

There's been about 3" of growth since flip 6 days ago and lots of bright green new growth. It was getting crowded, in my opinion, so I defoliated and lollipopped a little more to give them some airflow down low. They look a lot better than two weeks ago when I first got them in the tent. I'm adding a gram of Epsom salt to every gallon of water and it seems to be working to stop the Magnesium issues I was having. Here's a few pics from earlier.

Plants are doing well and the more vigorous of the Steve Lemme OG plants has really jumped ahead as far as bud set. It had nicely formed bud centers at day 7 and bubba kush is just starting to get there. The other Steve Lemme is a little ahead of bubba kush as well but lagging behind it's bigger sister.
I pulled the smallest plant out of the tent to give the other three more space as they stretched this week and just to make it easier to work with them. It was going to be way too crowded for me to inspect them with my back and watering was becoming a real chore. It gave me room to supercrop bubba kush some to even out the canopy as well. I really want a good harvest from bubba kush, the flavors from that strain are one of my favorites.
I top dressed with Dr Earth Flower Girl and the new veg formula I'm using mixed 50/50 at 2 tbls per gallon for the Steve Lemme OG plants and the Bubba Kush got 6 tbls which is 1.5 tbls per gallon as it's a little bit of a light feeder and looks like it has plenty of Nitrogen for the stretch. Here's some shots of the girls and I'll update again soon with some details on the genetics of the Lemme cross and why I chose it.