Let's talk serious SCROG

Oh and im considering on doing scrog(reason im here) Like the idea, I have 2 separate rooms veg/bloom. Trying to figure best way to setup. All I can come up with is veg for few weeks in veg, move to bloom (600 hps) veg for a week under hps (18/6 with veg nutes) to fill screen then 12/12 with bloom nutes. I have a 2x4 flood table in bloom w/ top feed and flood feeding. My space is no bigger than my table, Im used to growing 6 plants about 2 1/2 foot tall. How many would I need if I scrog this setup? (dont wanna veg that long under the hps, need quick turnover)

So a 20 lb bottle of co2would have to be switched out every 14 and a half days @ 1500ppm for my space. Cool little calculator http://www.hydroponics.net/learn/co2_calculator.asp.
Anyway just got done upgrading some stuff today. Installed the 600(what a difference) and sealed the ventilation with a new fan. Built a new veg cab/tent thing. Just getting it painted and i'll post some pics if i can get it set up today. So far the cab has cost me 53 dollars. Not to bad since they wanted 225-325 for a tent near this size that didn't fit my area very well. lots of work to do. I'll gets some bud porn going as well to get myself back on topic. Looking forward to seeing the progress of those vk's and Legally's super setup. you guys r thru the flip now?

Think I found a temp fix to temperture problem, opening the box with lights on keeps temp in high 70s low 80s. Last night temp got down to 68 degrees lights off.....hope that's not a deal breaker as that's the range of temps I expect....84ish-68ish . Anyway I'm way long 71 days veg, wow (just snuck up on me).
I've taken cuttings and had em in cups for a week now. I've recieved tons of good advice here but my main grow gonna be outside coming spring so With these cutting I'm going against common wisdom and going to just do things to learn, like I'm trying to root them in Sunshine soil, veged for 1 week and now have them under 12/12. They don't seem any worst off than these started off. So here we are after 1 day flowering and my new cuttings....

Oh, a quick question, lol, as i understand it, if you have a male it just has balls and if it gets the chance it will fert any female and cause her to produce seeds ....what happens to a male if it's isolated and cannot get to any females or if it is isolated with other males? Everything I've seen says chop that boy unless you want seeds but was just wondering........

Don't fuck with males. Cull it !!!

legallyflying said:

Don't fuck with males. Cull it !!!

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no sex problems yet..... just curious

Pollen is really small. All it takes is one little slip up and woosh. You have seeds. If you want to breed you can always collect pollen from a male in a little bag then put that bag over a female flower.

In regards to the temp issue above, plant respiration and carbohydrate utilization (growth) will almost stop in the 60s. Plus you will get much more stretch with colder night time temps. The highest brix rating is achieved with very close night and day temps. I try to keep it within 3-4 degrees. A dehumidifier will crank out lots of heat, you could try that. You'll likely want one anyways depending on your ambient humidity.

Eternalghost said:

Hello, I been hanging around trying to make it through this thread, finally coming to the end. Question, I heard about this a while ago but never came across anyone who tried it. I actually brew my own beer (acquired taste) What exactly do you do to get the co2 to your plants? I use a 5 gal fermentation bucket with a air lock on top. I heard the amount of co2 produced while "brewing" is no where near enough. better luck just burning a candle (minus the light) thanks in advance
EG

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It is true that the co2 from brewing is insufficient compared to other methods, I use yeast to buff the co2 levels in my room but the biggest amounts of co2 come in the first 4-5 days so i have to dump it and refresh the mix, if brewing beer you won't be able to leave the beer anywhere near your setup as temps will turn it sour, kill the yeast faster and basically ruine that whole batch. If you want to try yeast just do it exactly like beer, run a tube from the airlock and thread it through the plants. My warning is this: longer than 5 days and the air coming out of the tube will contain alcohol, plants don't like alcohol, they will wither very quickly so you must watch this carefully, also, if you are doing hydro you must be super careful not to get any yeast in your res, yeast absolutely loves res nutes plus the dark environment and temps make a perfect breeding ground, I run yeast in a hydro room because I'm a bit of a risk taker but I am also very careful, if you fill the bottle and the yeast is able to ferment up into the hose your plants will get a great yeast shower and it will be all over from there, you will need to drain your res, clean it with peroxide or bleach and if you are lucky you will be able to get your roots clean after a few hours of hand spraying them into a bath tub... so ya, don't do that.

All in all, brewing is a bad way to make co2, if you need co2 as a filler and can run a super long hose go for it, otherwise do what most hardcore growers suggest and get a co2 tank and reg.

legallyflying said:

Pollen is really small. All it takes is one little slip up and woosh. You have seeds. If you want to breed you can always collect pollen from a male in a little bag then put that bag over a female flower.

In regards to the temp issue above, plant respiration and carbohydrate utilization (growth) will almost stop in the 60s. Plus you will get much more stretch with colder night time temps. The highest brix rating is achieved with very close night and day temps. I try to keep it within 3-4 degrees. A dehumidifier will crank out lots of heat, you could try that. You'll likely want one anyways depending on your ambient humidity.

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I have a great pollination story!

A buddy of mine went to a farm, in the Field there was a bunch of wild pot plants so he cruised around checking them out, they were a bunch of stringy, seedy trees that had been reproducing on this abandoned land for years. He then went home to tend to his garden, he told me he didn't even think to change his cloths before rummaging around, long story short; 2 weeks later he had 3 lb of seedy pot, hundreds of dollars in wasted electricity and nutrients and he might have broken even financially. "DO NOT GET AROUND POLLEN WHEN YOUR CROP IS FLOWERING" he has yelled this at me on numerous occasions.

To add to Legally's temp discussion; I am currently experiencing exactly what he said would happen if evening temps are too low (mine ran in the low 60s for the first 5+ days of stretch) my stalks are massive and long, some have 2-4 inches between nodes, i still expect a beautiful harvest but I will be chopping gaps come trimming time and may get jipped on giant/fat colas.

Oh, and I love the use of the word "Cull" btw! word of the day!

At the risk of giving away ALL the secrets...

Motivated grower must read: http://www.maximumyield.com/article_sh_db.php?articleID=694&submit=Go

And http://www.greenhousemanagementonline.com/gmpro-0410-preventing-plant-stretch.aspx

Thanks prof, I have been at wits end with co2, I have wrong setup/not a sealed room for co2 tank, just wasting money. Unless i only used co2 fall thru spring. What about my scrog idea? Do I get the concept, will that work.

Eternalghost said:

Thanks prof, I have been at wits end with co2, I have wrong setup/not a sealed room for co2 tank, just wasting money. Unless i only used co2 fall thru spring. What about my scrog idea? Do I get the concept, will that work.

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Your time frames may be a bit off, you may need to veg under the screen for a few weeks depending on the strain. Start 12/12 when your screen is mostly full but keep veg nutes for the first week. I slowly ween my plants off veg nutes during week 2.

have hundreds of leaves but have about 10 brown tips nothing to worry about.

Big update on my scrogs.

Had to chop down one of the two Afghan/skunks that made up the U shaped scrog, it had been ph locked and I figured just flush it and move on, I don't plan on growing that strain again so no real loss. Now I can focus on the monster Violator kush plants in my 4x4 tent.

Here's a pic of the underside of the screen after chopping.



And the top.



Here are a few pics of the Vks with a 2L bottle as a size reference, they aren't smelling up the place but flowers are exploding, the one on the left is drinking a gallon and a half of 2k ppm water a day!

i cant get past 400 ppm without showing tip burn on ro water. Looks great. Were you able to save the ph lockout plant for some decent smoke?

luv2grow said:

i cant get past 400 ppm without showing tip burn on ro water. Looks great. Were you able to save the ph lockout plant for some decent smoke?

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Oh ya, was able to get about 5 oz out of it, just had to harvest early so only was able to flush for a week and the trichomes were still mostly clear so the high is very up and strong, hits like a truck then fades after about an hour, my patient seems to be enjoying it but its not ideal smoke for pain management, was hoping for a bit more cloudy and amber, boost the cbd content a bit, oh well, still have another one flushing, it should ripen a bit before it gets the axe.

Best run-on sentence ever.

SO you are still in veg or are you getting tip burn in flower? 400 is low but some strains are sensitive. It could be nutrient lock, plants tend to look similar during nute burn and nutrient lock. If you are in flower and getting yellowing it may be a deficiency, the plant wants to make flowers and if it can't get enough nues from its water it will start eating its fan leaves. Check your ph and try a flush, if it doesn't clear up, raise your nutes to around 1k ppm and see if it helps.

Post a pic and your ph/ppm readings maybe we can get a better idea of whats going on.

One last thing, I have heard ro water doesnt always get rid of chloromide (chlorine gas) the only real way i have found to get rid of chlorine is to bubble the water in a bucket for 24 hrs before using it, works great for me and our water is so chlorinated you can smell it from a good distance.

My water was the same way. Im running into this tip burn on both sides. My ph in the dwc's run 5.5-5.65 ppm is a conversion of .74 from my ec meter at 375ppm (hanana) Its hard to get a good tell on these plants. I keep building new rooms and adding better equipment. To be honest its not really a problem. Im just adapting to it for the time being. I keep thinking once the rooms r done i can focus on the why's?
Now if it was ruining crops i would be going crazy. Actuallly now that im thinking about it. I bet its a trace mineral problem. Gonna give that a shot. Im pretty happy with scrog. I really find more joy in it than growing traditional. Got everything dialed into pulling a plant every 2 weeks. Pretty sick. I just finished the new veg tent. Its not finished by far so dont beat me down over it. I built it to accept my old 400 and used the left over 3 ft of rail to make it work. Just need to pick up the motor and i can install it. final dimensions r 5.5ft by 5 ft H 3 ft D. Cost 61 dollars by the time i finish the entrance.

Thats a sweet tent luv2grow, never seen one like that before. 4x8? Not finished upgrading your rooms?????? But honestly are we ever?

luv2grow said:

My water was the same way. Im running into this tip burn on both sides. My ph in the dwc's run 5.5-5.65 ppm is a conversion of .74 from my ec meter at 375ppm (hanana) Its hard to get a good tell on these plants. I keep building new rooms and adding better equipment. To be honest its not really a problem. Im just adapting to it for the time being. I keep thinking once the rooms r done i can focus on the why's?
Now if it was ruining crops i would be going crazy. Actually now that im thinking about it. I bet its a trace mineral problem. Gonna give that a shot. View attachment 1873005View attachment 1873006Im pretty happy with scrog. I really find more joy in it than growing traditional. Got everything dialed into pulling a plant every 2 weeks. Pretty sick. I just finished the new veg tent. Its not finished by far so dont beat me down over it. I built it to accept my old 400 and used the left over 3 ft of rail to make it work. Just need to pick up the motor and i can install it.View attachment 1873007 final dimensions r 5.5ft by 5 ft H 3 ft D. Cost 61 dollars by the time i finish the entrance.

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After a better look at your leaves (hard to see but i get the picture) when I have had leaf burn like that (burnt serrations not just leaf tips) it has been a nutrient issue. I have never had it happen in soil unless I had mild root rot. how wet is your soil when you water? maybe try a higher ph range, soil doesn't mind the low to mid 6's, decomposition in soil can cause alkalinity so if you are giving them water that is in the mid 5's it can drop to the high 4's due to organic matter breaking down. I might even go as far as to flush the system with 6.5 ph and see if you can get the salts out of there. I'm also going to add that less than 400 ppm is like giving plants tap water, they are trying to produce buds and have no place to draw energy from, my water comes out of the tap at about 300 ppm. I have gotten shocked looks from other growers when I tell them that by week 2 of flower my girls are drinking 2k ppm mix, then they come and see my happy, healthy plants and say "dood, I want that shit!". The suggested feeding regimen on most nutrient bottles is less than half of what plants can use to thrive.

These opinions are all "shots in the dark" because I can't literally see your setup but in my experience these are things that may be a factor.

In summation; I hate soil. It's close to impossible to really control your plant's nutrient uptake, every soil compound has different properties and the more I pick over soil grows on these forums the more I see people having nutrient issues and ph problems, I'm not going to bash anyone for growing in soil because I did it for years but as strains become more hybridized they become more sensitive to environment, as an example; I grew a strain once called "original purple haze" (also known as old timers haze) its an older strain with very little crossbreeding in its lineage, I gave it water straight from the tap, no ph and filled with chlorine, it never had any issues, took all its nutes from the soil and finished in about 20 weeks (yes, thats not a typo, 20 weeks almost killed me) its as close to wild as you can get and hearty like an oak tree.
Different strains react differently to the environment, the last 20 years has seen an explosion of 8 week finishes and full 50/50 hybrids, these plants are ideal for seasoned growers because they are designed by seasoned growers. I tend to follow the breeders recommendation whenever available, if they say "this strain likes hydro" it generally means they had issues growing it in soil.