Hydroponic Trip

[hobodelic]

Hello fellow growers! I started my first grow a few weeks ago. I wish I kept journal from beginning but better late than never right?

My plants are 14 days into 12/12 light stage. I don’t know what to do next🤔 Any advice is welcome😁

I am flat broke atm so Im lacking some equipment like EC meter and fans etc. Anyway here is my setup:

120x120x200 tent
600w hps (dimmable 250/400/600)
Carb filter
Ducting fan 940m3/h (this is overkill and noisy )
GHE Rainforest2 hydro 65Liter res
GHE flora series nutes
I also have another 600whps, 250w esl, 135w led just in case I need more light. So far I think 600w hps is enough

I put 5 seeds in glas of water. Only 3 of them germinated. I put them 3 in rockwool and eventually in tent. Everything went smooth. 1 was and is still lagging behind in growth. I feed 1:1:1 ratio in veg.
Last week of veg and first week after flip I feed
10ml - 15ml - 5ml /10liter
Now is day14 of flower and I have started giving 10ml/20ml (micro/bloom) Buds have started to form.

Plants are very bushy. I have been defoliating like crazy every 2 days and they ladies just keep making more leafs I read somewhere that I shouldnt take too many leafs at a time but taking them every day cant be good either, right?
29C and 62%RH in tent when lights on.

Today some light/wind burn show up directly under lamp😱 I raise it from 26cm to 36cm. Maybe is still too close we will see🙂

My goals for this grow are to keep plants healthy and cross the finish line. If I succeed my next grow will be about plant training/scrog

I will update at least once a week! Thanks in advance for any tips and help​:grin:

[ifish]

"Are you a leaf yanker " topic : )
29c is the highest I would let the temp get too , if it gets any higher I would dim the light as envioment is more important than the higher wattage ( plant growth will begin to slow )
Keep an eye out for leaf tip burn etc as plants shall be drinking a lot more due to the higher temp to cool down , thus uptakeing more than usual nutes , if so , dilute the feed slightly to compensate
Plants are lookin good
: )

[Shadey]

As Ifish says you might want to lower the temps if you can. So don’t add anyore light.

Keep checking the light distance from the plants tops, you could tie a piece of cord to the light at the correct height so you have a visual reference.

[ReikoX]

The RH will need to be brought down a bit too as you get in full flowering mode to avoid mold

[Foreigner]

Looks great! You are getting good advice above.

I have 2 thermometers in many tent - one directly under the lights and one under the canopy.

The one under the lights hits 30C but the under canopy reads 25C. All good.

If they both hit 30C I would be concerned.

Full speed ahead!

All the best

[hobodelic]

Awesome to wake up and see so many replies

@ifish You are spot on! I found some burned leaf tips. Very little burn so I wasn’t sure if I should adjust. I diluded to 7.5ml/15ml anyway. The girls sure are drinking a lot. Around 25 liters in 2 days I will get the EC meter next week. No more guessing game

Pic of burned tips

@Shadey That cord tip sounds good I’ll add that as soon as I find the optimal distance. Thanks

@ReikoX Thanks for the heads up! What is the best way to drop humidity? Yank leafs? RH was at 67% when light went on. Now its at 51. I start to worry…

@Foreigner Thank you for your kind words!

The fan was blowing to plant tops in a downward angle which probably boosted the burn under lamp. Now it’s blowing slightly up from canopy level.
I tucked the tallest branches directly under lamp to get more even canopy

Now here is why I dont like this GHE rainforest system: The sprinkler will not spray roots once water level drops below ~60% of reservoir This means I have to refill at least every other day. I will have to leave town for mon-thu next week because of work… my plants might be in trouble Would probably be a good idea to dim the light to make the girls less thirsty

Thanks to everyone for reading my diary and helping me out!

[Hugh_Glass]

Setup a self watering float. If you put a tub of clean water above the hydro system it will water itself .

Hydroponic Mini Float - Water level controller- interior/ exterior mount | eBay

[Shadey]

I see no tip burn, just a slight yellowing, which may be just new growth darkening up, they look good

[Papalag]

The plants look great my friend
Stay safe
Paps

[ReikoX]

@hobodelic

Thanks for the heads up! What is the best way to drop humidity? Yank leafs? RH was at 67% when light went on. Now its at 51. I start to worry…

At this stage of growth, I wouldn’t be too worried about it. In late flowering, you want it closer to 40-50% RH during lights out.

No dont yank leaves, those are like the plants’ solar panels. The best way to control humidity is with a dehumidifier or increasing your exhaust.

[vernal]

Looks good my dude.

Don’t be shy about defoliating. You won’t even slow them down unless you strip it totally bare and even then they recover within a few days. With those temperatures plants will be respiring quite a bit; airflow is paramount to avoid problems.

I have noticed extra leaf mass doesn’t translate into more bud mass.

[hobodelic]

Humidity is out of control and ph dropped to 4. Water is between leafs everywhere. Weather is very hot and humid atm

If I decide to remove lots of leafs I’ll do it on sunday before I leave town so maybe 25 liter is enough when the girls are in shock.

I browsed lots of threads and didn’t see anyone have as bushy plants. Defoliate or not to defoliate?

[hobodelic]

I’m back from my work trip. The girls stretched a lot while I was gone. Maybe 10-20cm. Rez was almost empty so they drank almost 50 liters in 4 days. I didn’t find any problems. I was very nervous during my trip Now I will stay home for the rest od the grow so everything should be fine.

Leafs are getting thinner

The fat leaf is from last day of veg

HR is 59% with light on. I need to do something about it soon.

[LabRat]

Finally a picture under normal light!

Not the best time of year to be flowering when you want lower RH especially the last few weeks when the buds form colas and get much more dense.

I’m not a fan of defoliating but you could remove a lot of leaves from under the canopy without any harm to get better air flow. I’m seeing a lot of heat stress in the leaves with the turned up edges so you might want to lower the nute amount even more to half the original to prevent toxic salts buildup. What kind of water are you using? Minerals in tap water add to the salts load so I only use RO water myself.

Good luck!

[hobodelic]

Haha yes sorry about the lighting I didnt want to mess with the light cycle at all. I guess a couple of minutes every now and then doesnt hurt much.

I am giving 7.5ml/15ml (micro/bloom) per 10 liters. Down from 10/20ml. Do nutes contribute to heat stress?

Buds are forming nicely so I think I will defoliate next week to try to bring RH to 50%.

I use tap water. Unfortunately i dont have EC meter yet. I’ll know more about my water quality next week.

[LabRat]

What happens when there is heat stress is the plants draw up more water and open their stoma wide to create more evaporation in an attempt to cool down. The edges of the leaves turn up to increase that evaporation and it the main sign of early stress. As they pull up more water they also draw up more nutes than they can process so the salts get stored in the leaves. This eventually leads to toxic salts buildup, TSB, and the leaves start to cook from the high salt levels. Normal signs of nute burn are browning tips and edges but with TSB the leaves cook all over and go thick and stiff eventually turning all yellow/brown and crunchy. That can progress right into the bud leaves in later flowering.

It mostly starts in the lower fan leaves but when the lights are causing the the upper leaves to overheat then it shows up there first. Low RH contributes to that and has been a problem for me for 20 f’n years up here in the north where it’s really dry most of the year.

You should be able to contact your water supplier and get a free copy of their water analysis sent by email. Just knowing the ppm isn’t good enough really. Sometimes there are fairly high levels of minerals like sodium or iron that can mess with the plants not to mention high alkalinity.

[hobodelic]

I got the water analysis. The table is huge i dont know what to make of it. I need to study this stuff a bit. Some numbers:
Alkalinity 0.14 mmol/l
Na 1.92 mg/l
Fe 600 ug/l

I diluded the solution. We’ll see if the stress goes away. Lamp was just 30cm away from the tops after stretch. I raised it to 42cm. Temp dropped to 28C which should be low enough.

[hobodelic]

Day 31 in bloom. Not much interesting going on. Advice has been spot on. I can’t find any problems. The shortest plant has been stretching probably because ive been raising the lamp. Her lower buds are far apart compared to her sisters. I lost my even canopy. I hope it doesn’t affect yields too much.

I just stick to basics. Removing dead leaves and checking ph

Here’s some pics in different lighting🙂

[Shadey]

Looking good, got some good colas developing there, nice work

[hobodelic]

Hey whats going on OGs!

As the buds grow bigger I grow more impatient At least 2 more weeks to go…

One of the ladies is having problems. The other 2 look just fine. It looks like nute burn to me. They’re drinking from the same reservoir tho

RH is still a bit of a problem. I’ll get a dehumidifier next tuesday. Should I put it inside or outside of the tent?