Air Pot Grow - Mixed Bag of Unknown Sativas and Indicas

[toaor]

Hello whoever you are and welcome to my fourth grow journal.

As it says above I don't know the exact strain I'm growing as they were seeds sent to me by a friend who got them from another grower friend of great repute.

I emailed him and was told they are probably a mainly Indica 12 wk auto developed in Holland for indoor growing but they weren't certain.

I started them off 26 days age(8-7-11) and transferred them to 3 Liter Air Pots yesterday, there's a slight nutrient burn on some of the seedlings, which is due to a Miracle Grow mix I gave them, as soon as I spotted burn I flushed with plain water.

There are 12 seedlings in 10 pots two pots have two plants in them, I dropped two seeds in and they both came up.

I will leave them in the greenhouse for a few more days and then may put them under lights in grow tent not sure yet, as I'm waiting for other seeds to arrive if they do I will put them in tent and leave these in greenhouse.

Anyway here's the pics.

Best wishes one and all,

Toaor

[toaor]

Oh shit, not what I wanted to hear !

Oh well they're in there now so have to give it a go, I think slow watering by hand is the trick will let you know, if not I'll block the bloody holes up with bluetack or wrap in cling film, lol

Toaor

[Earthman]

lol thats a suggestion anyway lol, maybe a drip feed system so that it gives the soil a chance to absorb the water beter at a slow steady pace

think they will recover just fine, just remember to get rid of those damaged leaves when there is enough new growth

as usual, all the best dude

peace

[toaor]

Day 29:

Hello again m fellow green fingered growers I hope all is well in your world.

Moved the Air Pot plants into tent yesterday and today went out and purchased a 125w blue spectrun CFL and cheapo Euro Reflector, all up £30 and put in tent on for 14hrs, then I have two small 11w CFL's, which are equivalent of 60w normal lighting, in two diagonal opposite corners for the remaining 10hrs.

I've done it like that so as I can find out how hot it gets before deciding whether to leave on 24hrs, probably not as it means extractor needs to run for 24hrs too but with just two small CFLs don't need it but they're getting enough light bearing in mind my space only has footprint of 60cms x 60cms, works out roughly 30w per sq foot and I've read minimum for good vegging is 20w per sq foot so getting 50%more than minimum.

I also fed them yesterday with Canna Terra Vega and Canna Rhizotonic for the roots before putting in tent, they were all fine this morning and haven't dried out at all, things are looking good so far just depends now on how hot the tent gets with 125w CFL, it got no hotter than 29 today and it was shut up from 6am till I opened up at around 6pm so had more or less 12 solid hours.

The plants seem to tolerate high heat during veg it's only at the 5/6 week stage of flowering that the heat was a problem in past, anyway here's the pics.

Best wishes one and all,

Toaor

PS: All plants are around 15cms tall at present, will veg to 25-30cms and then flower might use SOG nto decided yet.

Still with LED panel lighting

Nice temps and humidity range

Now with new 125w CFL and reflector

[toaor]

Update:

Lights on 24/7 and temp is now around 27 average, highest was 29 lowest 25, highest humidity 82% lowest 45%

Have set up webcam in tent so can see temp/humidity and at least a few leaves of a plant, gave them a good feed of Canna Terra Vega and Canna Rhizotonic that should keep them going a few days at least, no major problems yet with leakage from Air Pots holes, I think if let to dry out then you would have problems when first watering again.

[indicando]

great, I'm doing the same soon I hope

[toaor]

Update:

Have changed lights to 18hrs on 6hrs off because if they are autos 24hrs ain't no good, will run with this for the next week and then start dropping by 15 mins a day till down to14hrs, which should be enough for autos to flower.

Here's some more pics too the burning on lower leaves is from Miracle Grow I gave them, as soon as I noticed it I flushed and they're all doing fine nice lush green colour.

Best wishes one and all,

Toaor

[toaor]

They do look happy girls don't they, well I hope they're all girls not sure as seeds aren't feminised so need to keep an eye on the flowering and get rid of boys, I don't need any more of those seeds I still have over 60, lol

[toaor]

Hey Guys, latest pics of tent grow, they been on 18hrs of light for last week under the new 125CFL Blue light so am now going to switch to flowering and change to LED panels as they have more red spectrum.

[nirvana76]

Nice job Toaor!!!

[toaor]

Update:

Hi Guys,

I set the light cycle timer down to 13 hrs as the other plants I have out of this strain aren't showing any signs of being autos, 8wks and no flowering signs, so I'm focing the tent grow to flower by the lights, as I don't want to just keep going with 18hrs hoping they will flower they'll be huge if they're not autos .

They're all about 20cms in height and I work on them doubling or even trebling throughout flowering and my tent is only 140cms with some room needed for the lights approx 20cms and pots 25cms.

Not only that I have a feeling that there's a mix of Indicas and Sativas as leaf shapes aren't all the same in which case some are going to flower around 8-10 wks and others are going to take 10 plus, so this is going to be an interesting indoor grow.

Have a good week one and all,

Toaor

[toaor]

Monday morning update:

The plants in tent going well so no photos of them today just some of the Three Leaf freak in greenhouse with one of the tent plants that I couldn't fit in with the others so it's staying in natural light for the rest of its grow.

The three leaf was growing in tent before I put the others in so I just put her out in greenhouse and hoped for the best, she seems to be doing ok and is even producing more buds, she's only in a tiny 15cms pot but the resin smells really deep and skunky.

Have a good week one and all,

Toaor

[kdstanhope]

All in all I'd say Congrats! Looks like an interesting plant you got there. But what's up with the algae growth on the soil in the pot? That could be dangerous man!

[toaor]

Thanks mate, as for Algae you get that in greenhouse with natural light and humidity, I get it sometimes on indoor grows too must just be my water round here never seems to have done any damage in past though.

Toaor

[lamsbread]

Fungus gnats love algae, they lay thier eggs in it. when the eggs hatch, the lavae will attack you roots.

use an old dinner fork to keep the top of the soil cultivated and free of algae.

Keeping your soil free of pests and diseases its essential for healthy plants.

wether you grow in a grow room or a green house, hygene plays a major part in a sucessful grow.

[kdstanhope]

H 2 O 2.....

[lamsbread]

hydrogen peroxide/bleach is another method i grant you but i would rather cultivate with a fork or top the pot with gravel. Using noxious chemicals, would be a last resort for me.

[toaor]

Thanks for the input guys.

Toaor

[toaor]

I repotted her into 10liter bucket and will hope tfor the best.

[toaor]

Air Pot Grow

Swapped blue vegging CFL or 120w LED panel, which is mainly red spectrum, just the one for now but in a couple of weeks I willput the second panel in there too.

Looking at the leaf structures I have a mix of Indica and Sativa just look at the pictures, sorry they're a bit flourescent pink but that's LEDs for you.

This is definitely going to be an interesting grow with god knows what strains I have there's 11 plants in a foot print space of 60cms x 60cms.

Best wishes one and all,

Toaor

[lamsbread]

Excellent , i am very interested in LED lights.

Chair pulled right up , nose pressed against the monitor , like a kid outside a toy shop

Can you tell me the make and model othe panels you are using?

[kdstanhope]

Yeah, I'm with lamsbread on that one. LED is interesting stuff! But I just can't make up my mind about it...

Toaor, have you used LED before, how does it perform against the CFL's and HID? Those plants look pretty happy to me, and the colours are pretty!

I've only used LED once and it was no good. Granted the panel was only 50watts or so, but I just couldn't believe that the light intensity was anywhere near enough so I put the trusty HID back into play...

[lamsbread]

Intitially LED lights used poor quality LED, low wattage LED and used too few of them , producing poor light penetration.

That has changing in a big way, i've seen some really nice buds grown with LED.

There was an influx of rip of chinese ufo's which were of poor quality, many people bought these and then complained that led technology was not up to the job.

When buying an LED lights, it is best to check the wattage of the LED, you will want at least 1w diodes, some panels are using 2w & 3w diodes and there is even one using 6w diodes.

Also look to see if they are using american diodes, such as Bridgelux or Cree, these are high quality and there is much competion between the manufactorers, to make better and brighter diodes.

In the knock of chinese lamps they use inferior mass produce generic diodes which are only useful on the front of your stereo.

New refocusing lenses are now being made which refocus the light that is normally lost through the sides of the LED, this doubles the efficiency and lowers the wattage needed to grow your plants. (x-lens from hydro grow)

Some of the new generation of panels are so bright that positioning them too low to the plants, can cause bleaching an it is advise dyou to hang them 12 to 24 inches (30 to 60 cm) above your plants.

One massive benefit to using Led panels is that they can be used to veg and flower, without the need to change lights.

Another benefit is low heat production, this can be very beneficial in areas where police copters are using flir (forward looking infrared) cameras.

LED's are also low power consumption, great for saving you money on electric bill and contain no mercury.

This makes them a greener option, added to that on average they have a 50,000 hours life, though as with all lights, efficiency will drop of with age.

As with all things new, there is lots of room for improvement and there will always be haters (lots of people don't like change, or what they don't understand).

In the future panels made in china and elsewhere will copy new technolgy and use better diodes and make higher quality panels.

In time the cost will drop dramatically with mass production, this is already starting to happen.

Though you need to chose your panels wisely, always do your research and compare lights on different web sites.

In the future the inovators who lead the way, will produce some awesome panels,giving bigger and better yields, which may lead to Led panels becoming the norm.

There are already some great panels out there and i love to see people growing with them.

When ever i see a grow using LED i will ask what panel they using so in time i can see which are giving the best results.

As soon as i get one (need to save my pennies) I will be doing a grow and will post a grow report.

I leave you with a link that may be useful, it is an independant web site and they give unbiased reviews of LED panels. http://www.myhydroponicgardening.com/

All the best me hearties and happy growing

[kdstanhope]

Right Then!

I like this LED idea!

But looking through the specs of some of the available products, I'd say Lamsbread is right, there certainly is a bit of room for improvement....

The prices are, in my opinion, way too high! I'm sure that a highy effective device could be built at a fraction of the cost!

Hmmmmmmmm.... I wonder....

[lamsbread]

At the budget ent of things the cost is kept low by using poor quality led, cheap fans . and lightweight heatsinks.

Build quality is king and the more people buy Led lights, the cheaper they wiil become, as more companies vie (strive for superiority) for market share.

I have seen diy builds on other forums and they got ok results, cost can be reduced by diy as labor costs are omitted.

It would be great if in the future as this forum expands and grows if there was a dedicated diy area, where people would share thier diy projects and knowledge ie diy carbon filters , diy Led lights and of course diy hydroponics.

You never know maybe a even a LED grow section.

peace to the highest and happy growings