One of those days ... ever had one of these?

Just had a killer day at work after spending the last week in Vegas, and knew that I had a ton of shit to get done in my garden tonight as well. So far I am 16 hours in on the day combined between work / working in the garden, and I am gonna just post here to blow off some steam ... smoke a bowl and get my head straight... Here's what I have to do up there today on my list. X's next to what I have completed so far...

Trim 2 plants - X
Refill Res with RO from Water and Ice (25 Gallons) - X
Buy 200 lbs of Play Sand from Home Depot - X
Carry play sand and water upstairs - X
Excavate top 2 inch layer of soil from 40 Sq Ft of Garden (to remove fungus gnat larvae) - X

and what's left...
Amend top layer with Wormcastings, Alfalfa meal, Kelp Meal, Neem Meal, Cottonseed Meal mixture
Water top in lightly with some Bti
Apply 1/2 " layer of play sand to 40 Sq. Ft if Bed to prevent fungus gnats from moving in and out
Make Home made Sticky traps for every where in room to keep track of populations
Sweep / Vacuum / Mop / Scrub remove any debris from the room they may want to eat on
Water Veg tents
Transplants
Cuttings


If all goes well I think I can be done by 5 or 6 AM tonight (or this morning depending on how you look at it). As you can see I am dedicated to remove these little fuckers from my room .

Anyone ever had a day like this where you just had to get a bunch of shit done.. your body is giving, your mind too, but it HAS to get done?

My sleep schedule nowadays is 36 hours going then a nap, another full 12 hours then crash for 10 hours. Then coffee and the process starts again. Nothing like a little stress to keep you going all night.

Haha I feel you.. I must be vegas'ed out a little still... Maybe I should get into one of those jobs with crazy long shifts

Here's the bed with the layer of sand on it ..


Now we're growing in the desert sun!

Just need to clean everything up now, make sticky traps, water the veg, and .... DO TRANSPLANTS AND CUTTINGS I see the light at the end of the tunnel... maybe that's the sun coming up...

I had one of these days today, that began almost 24 hours ago when I flooded my bathroom while filling up my reservoir with RO/DI water...Had to pH 7 hugo blocks, presoak them in nutrient solution...Tranfer 3 plants into flower, pop clones in the presoaked hugo blocks...remove an 11 week DJ Short Blueberry from the flower tent to flush...Break down an RDWC, including the bulkhead breaking on me and dumping a couple gallons of water inside and just outside of my grow room...Sprayed the vegging plants with neem, and the seedlings got sprayed with spinosad...

In addition to all this, I broke down a saltwater aquarium system, cleaned it, set it back up...Mixed 11 gallons of saltwater...Added sand and heaters and connected the aquarium to a sump...Broke my refractometer, but it still sorta works...Set up an LED lighting system for the aquarium...Now I still need to transfer the live rock and corals from my other tanks to the new system. That's probably the biggest job of all.

Metasynth said:

I had one of these days today, that began almost 24 hours ago when I flooded my bathroom while filling up my reservoir with RO/DI water...Had to pH 7 hugo blocks, presoak them in nutrient solution...Tranfer 3 plants into flower, pop clones in the presoaked hugo blocks...remove an 11 week DJ Short Blueberry from the flower tent to flush...Break down an RDWC, including the bulkhead breaking on me and dumping a couple gallons of water inside and just outside of my grow room...Sprayed the vegging plants with neem, and the seedlings got sprayed with spinosad...

In addition to all this, I broke down a saltwater aquarium system, cleaned it, set it back up...Mixed 11 gallons of saltwater...Added sand and heaters and connected the aquarium to a sump...Broke my refractometer, but it still sorta works...Set up an LED lighting system for the aquarium...Now I still need to transfer the live rock and corals from my other tanks to the new system. That's probably the biggest job of all.

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Some of the better things in life take a little work, where'd you pick your led light system up from? I've got a buddy in the industry that has been bragging about his aquarium line a ton

Sprinkle cinnamon on top of the soil. Fungus gnats begone!

how much cinammon would I need to apply to 40 sq. ft of soil? might be worth a shot... no effect on taste?

Just got done with one of those nights lol. Went into my room at night to find my AC not working. My breeding room was at 98 degrees :0 kinda pissed me off as this is a new AC unit..."don't fix it unless its broken" has been the statement playing through my head over and over again. But oh well lesson learned. Took me an hour, almost 2 to get my room back to 78 degrees. Thank god my girls are about to be chopped here soon...only flaw in this grow has been this spike in temperature :/

You have the right idea on your Fungas knat situation. When I had a bad infestation using sand worked quite well. I just basically top dressed it in my soil and withiin a week or two they had seemed to be completely gone. Also neem has always seem

Bird Gymnastics said:

Just got done with one of those nights lol. Went into my room at night to find my AC not working. My breeding room was at 98 degrees :0 kinda pissed me off as this is a new AC unit..."don't fix it unless its broken" has been the statement playing through my head over and over again. But oh well lesson learned. Took me an hour, almost 2 to get my room back to 78 degrees. Thank god my girls are about to be chopped here soon...only flaw in this grow has been this spike in temperature :/

You have the right idea on your Fungas knat situation. When I had a bad infestation using sand worked quite well. I just basically top dressed it in my soil and withiin a week or two they had seemed to be completely gone. Also neem has always seem

Click to expand...

I feel pretty relieved bird... I feel like I have a firm grip on the situation for the first time in a while... My back, however, is freaking sore as hell from all that work lol

I know you use neem meal... and I have literally 4.5 lbs left of my 5 lb bag.. let me know if you need a little

1337hacker said:

Haha I feel you.. I must be vegas'ed out a little still... Maybe I should get into one of those jobs with crazy long shifts

Here's the bed with the layer of sand on it ..

View attachment 2259069
Now we're growing in the desert sun!

Just need to clean everything up now, make sticky traps, water the veg, and .... DO TRANSPLANTS AND CUTTINGS I see the light at the end of the tunnel... maybe that's the sun coming up...

Click to expand...

The hard work looks like a paid off man... I'm curious to know if the sand will help reflect the light back onto the lower plant?
Will you be removing the sand during water or will it remain?

Chronicseeker said:

The hard work looks like a paid off man... I'm curious to know if the sand will help reflect the light back onto the lower plant?
Will you be removing the sand during water or will it remain?

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the play sand I got is silicate based so it won't effect the medium too much if I do water... but I haven't decided yet... Things are brighter for sure. We will see how it plays out

1337hacker said:

how much cinammon would I need to apply to 40 sq. ft of soil? might be worth a shot... no effect on taste?

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A light sprinkle will do...though i've accidently sprinkled more than I wanted to no detriment. I have not noticed any taste because of it. The plants seem to really like it and the gnats are gone in a couple of days. I get it at the 99cent store.

1337hacker said:

I feel pretty relieved bird... I feel like I have a firm grip on the situation for the first time in a while... My back, however, is freaking sore as hell from all that work lol

I know you use neem meal... and I have literally 4.5 lbs left of my 5 lb bag.. let me know if you need a little

Click to expand...

I have some sample of a plant I cropped early...it should help with the pain I'm glad you are getting it taking care of. Those little buggers can get very annoying. But it does look like you finally have control of the whole situation.

PixiDustr said:

A light sprinkle will do...though i've accidently sprinkled more than I wanted to no detriment. I have not noticed any taste because of it. The plants seem to really like it and the gnats are gone in a couple of days. I get it at the 99cent store.

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I have alway read cinnamon powder is a natural fungicide that has been shown to be particularly effective against fungus gnats by destroying the fungus that the larvae feed on. Only true Ceylon cinnamon, will work.... Sprinkle enough cinnamon to form a visible layer across the top of your potting media, and repeat every few weeks, as needed. Never done this personally because I worry that if it's killing the fungus it might also be killing my colony, but people tout its success.

I use gnatrol to prevent the fungus gnats. Nothing like a little BT to kill off the larvea. If you don't want to buy gnatrol you can also use mosquito dunks. I have had my fair share of fungus gnats and watering in with gnatrol every transplant and switching away from ffof has eliminated the problem. That's a lot of work dude. I feel ya on the work load. Its a busy job but someone has got to do it; ).

irieie said:

I use gnatrol to prevent the fungus gnats. Nothing like a little BT to kill off the larvea. If you don't want to buy gnatrol you can also use mosquito dunks. I have had my fair share of fungus gnats and watering in with gnatrol every transplant and switching away from ffof has eliminated the problem. That's a lot of work dude. I feel ya on the work load. Its a busy job but someone has got to do it; ).

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i have tried everything for gnats and I have had success with Azamax and gnatrol, but I really like using predatory nematodes to my pots. I add them once during early veg and once during flower they really work. They just cling to the larvae and keep other gnats from wanting to get near the soil. I also paint the trunks of my plants with the sticky stuff to keep gnats from crawling up and down.

Hey thought I'd let everyone know how the bug situation is..

after another one of those nights... lol... I removed all the sand to check the status of the gnats (and because I hate watering with the sand)

The entire night I counted less than 10 adults in the whole room while removing the sand... It seems as if my diligence paid off...

Now.. this was quite a process... let me outline all the steps I went through.

1) Removed the top layer of dirt in the beds (40 sq ft x 2 inches)
2) replaced with EWC, Neem meal, cottonseed meal, kelp meal and a 1" layer of sand all on top of that
3) Made lots of sticky traps, put tangle foot anywhere the gnats fly around or enter the bed
4) Sprayed any adult fungus to death and areas I noticed bugs congregating with isopropyl/ alcohol mixture everytime I was in the room(50/50 knocks them down quick, less of a concentration takes more sprays)
5) Added hydrogen peroxide to dehumidifier catch daily
6) Let the beds dry out more between watering more than I normally do
7) Watered with Gnatrol

I figure the neem meal / gnatrol is dealing with the larvae, and my attention to detail with the sticky traps and alcohol spray took care of the adults. But I did a lot of shit so I can't say 100 % for certain

A lot of work to take care of some bugs that weren't doing much else than buzz in my face... but I still feel it was worth it