my setup for automation / monitoring on vacation

hi!

i'm a noob and sprouted a seed i found in my weed. i left boston for the holidays, so i quickly set up my plant to be [hopefully] self sufficient while i'm on vacation...

_ LED strips for additional light, since the length of natural daylight is shorter during winter
_ automated watering
_ webcam that tweets a photo of my plant everyday [ https://twitter.com/semisweetspell ]
_ unfortunately i didn't have time to hook my sensor data to the internet...

anyway, i realized that the real sun is wayy superior to 15 LEDs at close quarters. i had always wondered if grow light companies are trying to rip people off - i can now see that regular WS2811 strips are not that strong [i was only comparing wavelength spectrum, but i guess the real issue is intensity].

while i was in town, i was watering my plant a teeny tiny bit every day [or every other day]. right before i had to fly out, the cotyledons started turning yellow... is it normal for the cotyledons to do that? or is there too much water, etc?

i'm not using any commercial nutrients - i just grabbed some soil from my yard. if my plant survives and turns out to be female i'm pretty sure she'll taste bad, but my goal here is to learn and move away from a black thumb.

i discovered that i should have set up my webcam to take a picture when the lights are off... it's kind of hard to see how it's doing with everything purple. and i wish i had time to tweet my sensor readings as well.

i'd like to hear your thoughts / concerns / questions!

She will be fine,but I am wondering why you did not buy soil?

fandango said:

She will be fine,but I am wondering why you did not buy soil?

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when i found the seed, i casually decided to try sprouting it without a lot of preparation. i also thought it would take at least a couple days to sprout, but it sprouted after 1 day!
so i quickly grabbed a random pot and some soil in which to keep it safe. i figured there should be SOME nutrients in the soil, right? eventually i will want to give it proper food, but i haven't done that research yet.

I never seen a set up like yours, but it is cool. How ever I foresee problems in your future. Yard soil gets more compact with every watering . So if you up pot to good soil , It'll be fine. Maybe some more light.
Good luck and happy growing.

Cool babby like your name aswell ha ha

You get 100 points for ingenuity lol

Do yourself a favor and get a bag of fox farm ocean Forrest...although for fairness, many say Fox Farn happy frog works better with seedlings...though I've never had any problems with ffof start to finish.

tiffknee said:

hi!

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Hi Tiff, impressive electrical work. It's amazing watching a seed sprout, is this your first time? If so nice work! From here though, best practices aren't a goal, they're pretty much a requirement. The soil, water, nutrients, lighting, all critical elements to getting MJ from this point to finish. The led strips are like holding a key chain light up to it, nothing really happening there. The soil, water, and nutrients matter as she can grow very fast which is very demanding.

I wish there was one piece of advice to offer, but yeah youd have to have it all tgat figured, plus it sounds like you're busy so you'd need the grander scale setup to be automated.

thanks all for the tips about soil! i'll look for fox farm ocean forest when i return.

yes, it's my first time - it's been very satisfying witnessing its growth from a seed.

i wanted to go with LEDs because i have a lot of them from previous projects, and felt that there is more flexibility in terms of changing wavelength/color spectrum. although they appear really bright in the dark, it's definitely no comparison to the sun...

are regular LEDs just ineffective? is quantity the issue, as i only wired 15 LEDs in my setup - or do i need to invest in real grow lights?

Yes you'll need an LED grow light, unless you buy the right chips and make your own. It's a huge market with Chinese panels available for every budget. Generally inefficient, big panels can output 400w HPS equivalent heat, or better. You have COB written all over you though, should you lean LED. Higher price points, but definable price points. You'll need soil and nutes. lemme know if you'd like more info. I can message later