BobThe420Builder
Well-Known Member
It's the actual watts draw at the wall is what u go by
Stunted seedlings?
- Thread starter TheCannaisseur
- Start date
-
- Tags
- seedling advice
Doug Dawson
Well-Known Member
Look for power draw or actual power listing. You want 35 - 50 watts of actual power draw per square foot of good led. Buds with less light tend to be fluffy underprducers even when the plants look good.
RetiredToker76
Well-Known Member
Doug's right on the money with his advice.
I won't give you a wattage or a light brand / style because I don't know your space, your number of plants or anything. I will tell you that, in germ you want around 100 - 150 ppfd, in full Veg you want around 400 - 800 ppfd, in flower you want 800+ ppfd (there's argument that you can take them all the way up to 2000 ppfd with CO2 and temp management, but I can't get there.) No matter the type, the higher your light intensity goes the more heat you have; it's MUCH better with LEDs however.
The PPFD is the photosynthetic photon density hitting the leaves. If you think of light as really small tennis balls being shot out of your LEDs and then hitting the leaves, it's kind of like that. The PPFD is also color dependent, so your blurple light doesn't correlate to PFPD the same way a HID or even a tuned daylight LED panel, to actually get the photoflux of each light they have to be measured slightly differently. If the readings on the advertisement are accurate, you could drop that light on top of the plant in flower, but you'd only get a few inches of good dense bud before it gets fluffy and light. Heat would be your only potential issue. The wattage doesn't matter, especially with tuneable intensity. If I'm too hot I turn down the power on my driver and lower the light distance to where my flowers are getting around 1250 - 1500 ppfd at the tops, that should get me around 800 ppfd to the lower leaves and buds on my lollipops while buying me 3-5 degrees drop in temp. If I'm running high humidity or it's too cold (cold doesn't happen for my area), I turn the light all the way up and raise the temp to burn off some RH by raising the light to keep it at around the same ppfd, as long as I don't go above around 83°F I'm happy. The wattage draw from the wall doesn't even matter at that point, it's what is hitting the leaves.
I use an app called Korona on my iPhone to measure my approx ppfd, unfortunate name this year but the app is pretty decent when you can't drop $300-$500 for an Apogee Quantum Meter. I had been running a bit too hot and burnt them, then over reacted and pulled too far back and had a really light yield. I'm about to pull my first yield using this app and so far I'm happy, I'll know more when I'm looking at the scale. It is absolutely NOT a high quality $500 ppfd quantum sensor system but it's better than guessing. Iit does get the estimates close enough that I have healthy un-burnt plants that look like I'll have a decent yield this weekend. It does have a microcharge addon for Blurple lights, FYI. Just follow the directions and use a decent diffuser paper or attachment.
Tuning the light, temp and humidity is where the results start to show; all other things being well tuned below the soil line as well.
Here's a rather conservative chart for cannabis and environmental controls, including light intensity. Rule of thumb this is a dry plant, it doesn't like to live in a swamp. Hydro-mediums that don't hold water for long are a different setup those roots still get air even if some are sitting in water, but in soil you want to error on the dry side. Rule of thumb, if the first 1"-2" of soil down is dry like it's new from the bag, it's time to water.
I start my clones with a small 8oz of water ever 3-4 days in 3-gallon pots, I think I'd use an eye dropper in a solo cup (never done a Solo Grow), by the end of veg (6 weeks or so) they're getting a full qt every other day, by the end of flower they get 3/4 a gallon every other day in 5gal pots and leaving them dry. Start them slowly, they're not athletes yet, drive them hard in late veg and early-mid flower, right now it's just trying to divide cells to make roots, it can't do that in a swamp. I've heard cannabis be called a "dry footed plant." Even if hydro plants are dangling in a bucket of water, they need air flow to breath or they will drown. Overly wet soil is even worse.
My rule for buying lights is purpose/color and spacer. Do I want Veg or Bloom color, how much area to I have to bathe in light. In my case I have a small 2X3 closet for flower with a 2X2 for veg. So I have a single Quantum board with deep blue added for a Veg at 135w (currenlty using something like 40w and putting out 600ppfd.) In flower I have a 3 Quantum Board light with deep red at 330w, running at full power for the last two days of flower.
BobThe420Builder
Well-Known Member
Nice chart, I'm stealing thatDoug's right on the money with his advice.
I won't give you a wattage or a light brand / style because I don't know your space, your number of plants or anything. I will tell you that, in germ you want around 100 - 150 ppfd, in full Veg you want around 400 - 800 ppfd, in flower you want 800+ ppfd (there's argument that you can take them all the way up to 2000 ppfd with CO2 and temp management, but I can't get there.) No matter the type, the higher your light intensity goes the more heat you have; it's MUCH better with LEDs however.
The PPFD is the photosynthetic photon density hitting the leaves. If you think of light as really small tennis balls being shot out of your LEDs and then hitting the leaves, it's kind of like that. The PPFD is also color dependent, so your blurple light doesn't correlate to PFPD the same way a HID or even a tuned daylight LED panel, to actually get the photoflux of each light they have to be measured slightly differently. If the readings on the advertisement are accurate, you could drop that light on top of the plant in flower, but you'd only get a few inches of good dense bud before it gets fluffy and light. Heat would be your only potential issue. The wattage doesn't matter, especially with tuneable intensity. If I'm too hot I turn down the power on my driver and lower the light distance to where my flowers are getting around 1250 - 1500 ppfd at the tops, that should get me around 800 ppfd to the lower leaves and buds on my lollipops while buying me 3-5 degrees drop in temp. If I'm running high humidity or it's too cold (cold doesn't happen for my area), I turn the light all the way up and raise the temp to burn off some RH by raising the light to keep it at around the same ppfd, as long as I don't go above around 83°F I'm happy. The wattage draw from the wall doesn't even matter at that point, it's what is hitting the leaves.
I use an app called Korona on my iPhone to measure my approx ppfd, unfortunate name this year but the app is pretty decent when you can't drop $300-$500 for an Apogee Quantum Meter. I had been running a bit too hot and burnt them, then over reacted and pulled too far back and had a really light yield. I'm about to pull my first yield using this app and so far I'm happy, I'll know more when I'm looking at the scale. It is absolutely NOT a high quality $500 ppfd quantum sensor system but it's better than guessing. Iit does get the estimates close enough that I have healthy un-burnt plants that look like I'll have a decent yield this weekend. It does have a microcharge addon for Blurple lights, FYI. Just follow the directions and use a decent diffuser paper or attachment.
Tuning the light, temp and humidity is where the results start to show; all other things being well tuned below the soil line as well.
Here's a rather conservative chart for cannabis and environmental controls, including light intensity. Rule of thumb this is a dry plant, it doesn't like to live in a swamp. Hydro-mediums that don't hold water for long are a different setup those roots still get air even if some are sitting in water, but in soil you want to error on the dry side. Rule of thumb, if the first 1"-2" of soil down is dry like it's new from the bag, it's time to water.
I start my clones with a small 8oz of water ever 3-4 days in 3-gallon pots, I think I'd use an eye dropper in a solo cup (never done a Solo Grow), by the end of veg (6 weeks or so) they're getting a full qt every other day, by the end of flower they get 3/4 a gallon every other day in 5gal pots and leaving them dry. Start them slowly, they're not athletes yet, drive them hard in late veg and early-mid flower, right now it's just trying to divide cells to make roots, it can't do that in a swamp. I've heard cannabis be called a "dry footed plant." Even if hydro plants are dangling in a bucket of water, they need air flow to breath or they will drown. Overly wet soil is even worse.
My rule for buying lights is purpose/color and spacer. Do I want Veg or Bloom color, how much area to I have to bathe in light. In my case I have a small 2X3 closet for flower with a 2X2 for veg. So I have a single Quantum board with deep blue added for a Veg at 135w (currenlty using something like 40w and putting out 600ppfd.) In flower I have a 3 Quantum Board light with deep red at 330w, running at full power for the last two days of flower.
raggyb
Well-Known Member
I didn't know cuttings like it cool. i may be going wrong thereDoug's right on the money with his advice.
I won't give you a wattage or a light brand / style because I don't know your space, your number of plants or anything. I will tell you that, in germ you want around 100 - 150 ppfd, in full Veg you want around 400 - 800 ppfd, in flower you want 800+ ppfd (there's argument that you can take them all the way up to 2000 ppfd with CO2 and temp management, but I can't get there.) No matter the type, the higher your light intensity goes the more heat you have; it's MUCH better with LEDs however.
The PPFD is the photosynthetic photon density hitting the leaves. If you think of light as really small tennis balls being shot out of your LEDs and then hitting the leaves, it's kind of like that. The PPFD is also color dependent, so your blurple light doesn't correlate to PFPD the same way a HID or even a tuned daylight LED panel, to actually get the photoflux of each light they have to be measured slightly differently. If the readings on the advertisement are accurate, you could drop that light on top of the plant in flower, but you'd only get a few inches of good dense bud before it gets fluffy and light. Heat would be your only potential issue. The wattage doesn't matter, especially with tuneable intensity. If I'm too hot I turn down the power on my driver and lower the light distance to where my flowers are getting around 1250 - 1500 ppfd at the tops, that should get me around 800 ppfd to the lower leaves and buds on my lollipops while buying me 3-5 degrees drop in temp. If I'm running high humidity or it's too cold (cold doesn't happen for my area), I turn the light all the way up and raise the temp to burn off some RH by raising the light to keep it at around the same ppfd, as long as I don't go above around 83°F I'm happy. The wattage draw from the wall doesn't even matter at that point, it's what is hitting the leaves.
I use an app called Korona on my iPhone to measure my approx ppfd, unfortunate name this year but the app is pretty decent when you can't drop $300-$500 for an Apogee Quantum Meter. I had been running a bit too hot and burnt them, then over reacted and pulled too far back and had a really light yield. I'm about to pull my first yield using this app and so far I'm happy, I'll know more when I'm looking at the scale. It is absolutely NOT a high quality $500 ppfd quantum sensor system but it's better than guessing. Iit does get the estimates close enough that I have healthy un-burnt plants that look like I'll have a decent yield this weekend. It does have a microcharge addon for Blurple lights, FYI. Just follow the directions and use a decent diffuser paper or attachment.
Tuning the light, temp and humidity is where the results start to show; all other things being well tuned below the soil line as well.
Here's a rather conservative chart for cannabis and environmental controls, including light intensity. Rule of thumb this is a dry plant, it doesn't like to live in a swamp. Hydro-mediums that don't hold water for long are a different setup those roots still get air even if some are sitting in water, but in soil you want to error on the dry side. Rule of thumb, if the first 1"-2" of soil down is dry like it's new from the bag, it's time to water.
I start my clones with a small 8oz of water ever 3-4 days in 3-gallon pots, I think I'd use an eye dropper in a solo cup (never done a Solo Grow), by the end of veg (6 weeks or so) they're getting a full qt every other day, by the end of flower they get 3/4 a gallon every other day in 5gal pots and leaving them dry. Start them slowly, they're not athletes yet, drive them hard in late veg and early-mid flower, right now it's just trying to divide cells to make roots, it can't do that in a swamp. I've heard cannabis be called a "dry footed plant." Even if hydro plants are dangling in a bucket of water, they need air flow to breath or they will drown. Overly wet soil is even worse.
My rule for buying lights is purpose/color and spacer. Do I want Veg or Bloom color, how much area to I have to bathe in light. In my case I have a small 2X3 closet for flower with a 2X2 for veg. So I have a single Quantum board with deep blue added for a Veg at 135w (currenlty using something like 40w and putting out 600ppfd.) In flower I have a 3 Quantum Board light with deep red at 330w, running at full power for the last two days of flower.
RetiredToker76
Well-Known Member
I can't really get my room below 74° before the wife-ometer kicks in and starts yelling at me that it's too cold. I do aeroponic cloning, a little 25 bay ez-cloner amazon thing. The water HAS to be kept below 75° and I'm much more comfortable at 70°. As far as ambient temps, my clones are a victim of my marriage and they'll sit at 74° - 80° depending on the time of year. The game changer that gave me 100% strike rate every time was humidity, I had gone with the "aero cloning doesn't need to worry about a humidity dome" for years and been satisfied with 80% strike rates. Really I only need 4 cuttings out of the 25 sites. The other 21 either die or get given to friends. Once I started foliar spraying them and pushing the humidity up to the 60% - 70%, I started getting roots 100% of the time within 8-12 days.
While I can't "control" VPD particularly well, that's what I've been going with the last half of this year. I found out that the humidities and temps which the plant can handle under LED's isn't the same as under HID (I just switched in 2020.) Article about it. So after a year of completely fuckered harvests, one with mold, two extremely light, and one gloriously heavy; I think I've finally gotten the new lights dialed in. Mostly through "chasing" VPD. I keep a IR thermometer to get leaf temp, and have hygrometers at hanging in the center of the canopies to get RH and Temp (really cheap shiatty Amazon ones I need to replace but they're there.) I adjust the house temp, dehumidifier, and lights as necessary to get as close to the target VPD as I can.
Clone/Germ is .7 and lower.
Veg is around 1.0/1.2
Flower is around 1.3/1.4
I still try to keep the humidity/temp combination out of mold range, but am more than willing to push 50-55% RH in veg for development. With enough airflow and lowered temp, powdery mildew shouldn't be a problem.
For 10 years under my HID I just aimed for less than 78°F and less than 55% RH if I could pull it off, I live in a very hot/humid area. The LED changed everything about how I grow. It's been a grumpy year, with too many trips to the dispensary for the wallet to be happy; but I've completely rebuilt how I grow as a result of my old HPS and T5 set biting the dust.
I gave this company my spam e-mail address and got their VPD excel spreadsheet and calculator and use it 3-4 times a day to check my VPD for each area of my grow. I tried to just link the file but RIU apparently doesn't take excel files. I'm not pimping their hardware, I do just fine with a $15 IR therm from Lowes and two $5 hygrometer from Scamazon. Their excel sheet is handy though.
https://pulsegrow.com/blogs/learn/vpd#chart
guitarguy10
Well-Known Member
You don't need much light at all, the pic is like day 9 or 10 from planting and under just 2 x 40W cheap CFL.
I agree overwatered.
I agree overwatered.
Attachments
raggyb
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the ideas. Now that you mention it when I was looking into auto-cloning a while back and was suggested to keep the water around 78. but the chart above says room T should be 72. And as you mention vpd 0. Maybe room temp should be 71 and water temp can be 78? Thats kind of difficult to do with a dome on to get 100%. I've noticed dome off is no bueno.
Sorry, not trying to steal the thread op with my sidebar.
LEDHabitat420
Well-Known Member
I like the fact that you're actually using the correct metrics/numbers/measurements for growing plants. It is about umol not about wattage. And in addition, it is also very important to have a high quality spectrum. Which should be different in veg and flower.Doug's right on the money with his advice.
I won't give you a wattage or a light brand / style because I don't know your space, your number of plants or anything. I will tell you that, in germ you want around 100 - 150 ppfd, in full Veg you want around 400 - 800 ppfd, in flower you want 800+ ppfd (there's argument that you can take them all the way up to 2000 ppfd with CO2 and temp management, but I can't get there.) No matter the type, the higher your light intensity goes the more heat you have; it's MUCH better with LEDs however.
The PPFD is the photosynthetic photon density hitting the leaves. If you think of light as really small tennis balls being shot out of your LEDs and then hitting the leaves, it's kind of like that. The PPFD is also color dependent, so your blurple light doesn't correlate to PFPD the same way a HID or even a tuned daylight LED panel, to actually get the photoflux of each light they have to be measured slightly differently. If the readings on the advertisement are accurate, you could drop that light on top of the plant in flower, but you'd only get a few inches of good dense bud before it gets fluffy and light. Heat would be your only potential issue. The wattage doesn't matter, especially with tuneable intensity. If I'm too hot I turn down the power on my driver and lower the light distance to where my flowers are getting around 1250 - 1500 ppfd at the tops, that should get me around 800 ppfd to the lower leaves and buds on my lollipops while buying me 3-5 degrees drop in temp. If I'm running high humidity or it's too cold (cold doesn't happen for my area), I turn the light all the way up and raise the temp to burn off some RH by raising the light to keep it at around the same ppfd, as long as I don't go above around 83°F I'm happy. The wattage draw from the wall doesn't even matter at that point, it's what is hitting the leaves.
I use an app called Korona on my iPhone to measure my approx ppfd, unfortunate name this year but the app is pretty decent when you can't drop $300-$500 for an Apogee Quantum Meter. I had been running a bit too hot and burnt them, then over reacted and pulled too far back and had a really light yield. I'm about to pull my first yield using this app and so far I'm happy, I'll know more when I'm looking at the scale. It is absolutely NOT a high quality $500 ppfd quantum sensor system but it's better than guessing. Iit does get the estimates close enough that I have healthy un-burnt plants that look like I'll have a decent yield this weekend. It does have a microcharge addon for Blurple lights, FYI. Just follow the directions and use a decent diffuser paper or attachment.
Tuning the light, temp and humidity is where the results start to show; all other things being well tuned below the soil line as well.
Here's a rather conservative chart for cannabis and environmental controls, including light intensity. Rule of thumb this is a dry plant, it doesn't like to live in a swamp. Hydro-mediums that don't hold water for long are a different setup those roots still get air even if some are sitting in water, but in soil you want to error on the dry side. Rule of thumb, if the first 1"-2" of soil down is dry like it's new from the bag, it's time to water.
I start my clones with a small 8oz of water ever 3-4 days in 3-gallon pots, I think I'd use an eye dropper in a solo cup (never done a Solo Grow), by the end of veg (6 weeks or so) they're getting a full qt every other day, by the end of flower they get 3/4 a gallon every other day in 5gal pots and leaving them dry. Start them slowly, they're not athletes yet, drive them hard in late veg and early-mid flower, right now it's just trying to divide cells to make roots, it can't do that in a swamp. I've heard cannabis be called a "dry footed plant." Even if hydro plants are dangling in a bucket of water, they need air flow to breath or they will drown. Overly wet soil is even worse.
My rule for buying lights is purpose/color and spacer. Do I want Veg or Bloom color, how much area to I have to bathe in light. In my case I have a small 2X3 closet for flower with a 2X2 for veg. So I have a single Quantum board with deep blue added for a Veg at 135w (currenlty using something like 40w and putting out 600ppfd.) In flower I have a 3 Quantum Board light with deep red at 330w, running at full power for the last two days of flower.
It is definitely not about pretended potential maximum wattage of led chips used. We've been fighting these false metrics since we started our company.
Thank you.