Icemud's dual tent garden under led and using recycled soil, multiple strains.

[Icemud420]

Where did that black cherry soda come from? Is that the TGA pheno? Also by looking through your grow list you seem to be getting better results from leds? Is that correct? If so are you reducing your electricity or are you still running the same amount of watts total? Say you did a 600 watt hps on one grow. did you run half the watts in leds on next grow or was it the equivalent amount of leds to make 600 watts?

The black cherry soda was from a local clone dispensary here in socal, They actually messed up my order and as a result I got the black cherry soda, which was a blessing in disguise. I've had the genetics now for about 2 years and absolutely love the strain. Not sure the origin of it though, but a buddy of mine send a photo to Mz Jill and visually she told him it looks legit.

Well LED has definitely brought my power down as I was running 1000w of HID in my flowering tent, and now I average between 500w to 700w on most of my grows. Now the yield has also gone down, but my gram per watt has gone up and my best yield with LED currently was with 700w of LED I yielded about 100g less than my HID grows using 300w less of electricity. I've never run 1000w of LED though, so not sure if I actually could top my best HID grow yields. At the time of my HID grows though, I was scrogging my plants which I think also may have contributed to the higher yields than I currently am getting. I would say that around 80% LED power to 100% HID power is about equivalant, and I have actually seen same yields with 600w of LED vs 1000w HID, so its possible to yield better with LED. I personally haven't done it yet, but very close.

 

[zman33]

Thanks Icemud, keep us posted. Your grows look fantastic

 

[Fevs]

Very interesting journal. I was really keen to see how you got on with the cob x4 leds. You have given a good account of what these leds can do. A real good run to see what they can do.

I like the cob leds a lot. I use 315w cmh, but want to get some of the cob-x2's to run with them. It was important seeing them in action. I'm not looking for a high penetrating, raw power led. I'm just looking for lights to keep my plants healthy and happy. I think daylight produces a nice amount of leaf growth. Just enough stretch, so the light can penetrate in to the canopy better. The plants just seem to leaf pray to white light, almost immediately.

I know Budmaster have the new hps panels out, but these white cobs are what is interesting me the most. Exciting times in the led and growing world.

 

[Icemud420]

Thanks Icemud, keep us posted. Your grows look fantastic

Thank you Zman! Sorry that it takes me a while to get updates going... but I will keep them up been buried with work lately so haven't frequented as much as I should...

 

[Icemud420]

Very interesting journal. I was really keen to see how you got on with the cob x4 leds. You have given a good account of what these leds can do. A real good run to see what they can do.

I like the cob leds a lot. I use 315w cmh, but want to get some of the cob-x2's to run with them. It was important seeing them in action. I'm not looking for a high penetrating, raw power led. I'm just looking for lights to keep my plants healthy and happy. I think daylight produces a nice amount of leaf growth. Just enough stretch, so the light can penetrate in to the canopy better. The plants just seem to leaf pray to white light, almost immediately.

I know Budmaster have the new hps panels out, but these white cobs are what is interesting me the most. Exciting times in the led and growing world.

Hey Fevs! So far I really like the Budmaster COBS! great panels with good Citiled chips even though they are a generation behind. Now Budmaster has updated the COBS to a MCOB design, using a bunch of mini Osram COBs on a PCB and actually I believe it is going to be better than Cree CXB and Citizen COBs for efficiency but I'm not a number cruncher so hopefully someone will do the math, or they will publish the efficiency numbers.

I probably shouldn't say it yet, but I will be testing those HPS panels very soon, and I am super excited as I think they are doing the right thing by adding green, yep I said it, adding green to the panels. Its been my thought that the whole red/blue trend is completely backwards and that in grow lights green should be the prominant color, as its like music... if you can hear trebel really well (like plants absorbing blue/red well) you dont turn up the treble... you turn up the other sounds to match your hearing level, and I think with plant and horticulture lighting, its the same.. Most will probably disagree but I think Budmaster is on to something as sunlight is primarily green light... this is why COBs are blowing blurple lights out of the water and HPS is still the go-to for commercial production. Both COBS and HPS have heavy green light. I may be wrong, but I don't think so lol Anyhow I'm excited to use them very soon

Ill get some updates in this weekend as I just finished my 1st seed project, and currently am testing those Far Red Budmaster 730nm panels for flowering induction.

 

[Fevs]

Good info on Budmaster, thanks for that. The thing with the new Budmaster hps, they have the same lenses as the god and od panels, which isn't what I'm after. For me they are much better primary lights source, or main light. I'm not after a main light. Already got cmh units for that. I don't want to have a led at the top, as it would get blocked out by the cmh reflectors. I also don't want to use cmh without reflectors. The cobx2's would fit nicely next to the cmh.

The white cobs can be put closer to the plants. I want to use them 18-24'' away.

I have been wondering recently if I should go for old tech Prakasa 90w ufo leds. Can get them delivered for £89.99 lol

Seen as I'm using cmh, they would add plenty to the spectrum.

Anyway, see how it goes when Budmaster get back to me with prices.

Cheers

 

[Icemud420]

Hey everyone!!! So its update time again! Sorry for the delay, been busy all weekend sticking up my hands removing all the seeds from my seed project, which was a huge success


So in the Emerson, far red tent... we are just about ready to put the girls into flowering. I will be paying much closer attention to the clones this time, and making sure to spray them daily, as well as monitor the water levels to ensure there is humidity, but not saturating the root riot plugs. Most likely I will flip them next week but will make sure the clones are in good health before I do.

Other than that, I will be giving them a few feedings of plain r/o water once the soil completely dries out, with some epsom salt in it as a pre flush before flowering... and then give them one last botanicare veg feeding before I push them into flowering the following feeding. I'm seeing much healthier leaves now, but still signs of a MG and K deficiency, so I really want to get the plants back on track before the flip.

Other than that.. just waiting...

 

[Icemud420]

Alright everyone!!! the moment my fingers have been waiting for... "really" lol... removing seeds from all these plants was definitely much slower, and stickier than trimming for sure.. LOL ... the only way I found quick was to quickly remove all the dead and fan leaves, then remove the buds from the stems, then twist them intbeween my fingers until it was a pulverized mess of shake and seeds.. then tilt the surface I was working on and let the seeds roll away from the shake.. lol and now its done!!! my fingers can rest.. after I type out this update.. LOL

So I managed to finish removing all the seeds from all 8 plants this weekend, and was actually perfect time to do it. The plants were dry, the weather was nice and cool, and the upcomming clones will need a place to call home soon as they root. So putting on some movies, some music, blazing away happily I removed the seeds and placed them into small baggies, and labled them all, then placed each plants seeds in an envelope to keep them separated, and labeled.

I will hopefully soon once finances allow be getting a vacuum sealer so that I can store the seeds for long term, as well as keep some out for use in the coming future grows. I read that its best to store the seeds around 10% oxygen or lower for better success for long term storage, so I figured a vacuum sealer would be my best bet.

Well not much to report on, I'm extremely happy how this grow turned out, how my 1st seed project was a success, and how I created my own seeds and strains too I'm very pleased. Thank you to everyone that contributed to this journal, and experience testing budmasters, making seeds, harvesting buds and having fun!

 

[Icemud420]

Ok!!! so we are back ...with another grow update ...

So things are looking really good in the garden so far, and I am just days away from flipping to flowering. I'm still waiting on my clones to root, and this will be my 2nd attempt at rooting them under my old reflector led. I've had horrible success rates with rooting under the reflector so if they don't root in the next few days, I will take a few more cuttings and put them under my 26w cool blue CFL which always works well. I don't know why they don't like rooting under the reflector, but they just don't and numerous attempts have failed. Maybe its too strong? maybe there is too much red? not sure why... but the CFL works


So in the garden, things are looking really good. I had a slight cal/mag deficiency as well as a K deficiency that I have been dealing with but so far it looks like the grow is back on track and the plants are getting healthy again which is good.. Ive been feeding them rotations of compost teas, earth juice teas, botanicare feedings and plain water.

So it should just be a matter of time before the girls get flipped into flowering. Just waiting on those dang roots!!! LOL

I'm also debating whether I should incorporate 2 new strains into my breeding project since technically I can do 8 plants in my tent, and the 9th being the reversed female with CS. Right now I only have 6 strains on hand, so I'm thinking about either popping some of my own creations or some gifted Lanikea seeds I have... the only issue with doing that is I am not pheno hunting first, so pretty much that method would just be a random opportunity to cross strains and hope for luck and success... so still debating whether its worth adding strains and phenos I am unfamiliar with, or just doing the strains I already know well.


Other than that, not much else to report on, the plants are growing fast and so far very happy ...

Here are some pics

 

[Icemud420]

Good info on Budmaster, thanks for that. The thing with the new Budmaster hps, they have the same lenses as the god and od panels, which isn't what I'm after. For me they are much better primary lights source, or main light. I'm not after a main light. Already got cmh units for that. I don't want to have a led at the top, as it would get blocked out by the cmh reflectors. I also don't want to use cmh without reflectors. The cobx2's would fit nicely next to the cmh.

The white cobs can be put closer to the plants. I want to use them 18-24'' away.

I have been wondering recently if I should go for old tech Prakasa 90w ufo leds. Can get them delivered for £89.99 lol

Seen as I'm using cmh, they would add plenty to the spectrum.

Anyway, see how it goes when Budmaster get back to me with prices.

Cheers

Here are some Par readings of the Budmaster COB 4's that I did, now they changed the design of the COBs and now instead of using Citizen LED cobs, they are using Osram SMD cobs in a cluster as the reasoning is that its more efficient. I don't have the data nor have analyzed it to see if this is correct, but it does make sense as most LEDs run more efficient in smaller sizes driven at lower currents so it will be interesting. I will be testing out their new HPS panels which are much closer to sunlight, with more added green and slightly higher Far red amounts... but this will be in a couple weeks before I receive them.

 

[Icemud420]

Well I picked up some worm castings today... its been actually quite a while since I've had them added to my soil, maybe about a year or so. I wanted to make some really good compost teas and the soil even though doing well I wanted to add some new life to it. So tonight I prepared a nice compost tea with just molasses, yucca extract and a paint strainer with a couple garden shovels full of worm castings, and 1 shovel full of my premixed soil. Going to bubble this for 2-3 days and should be ready by the time the plants need a new feeding.

I also will hit them with a nice compost tea foliar feeding too

I decided to take some more photos and while I was in the garden, I wanted to take some brix readings which I haven't done in a while.. I was quite surprised with the readings as they all were over 14, and the highest was brushing 25

 

[Icemud420]

OK... so I went to the electronics store today and pulled the trigger on the LED striplight for my humidity dome. It has no brand, don't know what kind of LED's are in it but its 6500k color temp and I think it may be about 10w... but I don't know, so I will plug it into my kill a watt later to see. The bar is slightly longer than my humidity dome, but definitely lights it up as good if not better than the 26w cool blue cfl which is great to know. It also gives a much more uniform light over the dome where the bulb barely hit the edges...


We will see if it works but I have a feeling we should be golden. I may have to clone my plants 1 more time though as some of them are looking pretty unhappy...

So the striplight was $20 and the cord/switch was $10... its made fore desks and cabinets and such... probably not the best quality but hey, if it works, saves me money in electric then I'm all for it


So I decided to why wait and test the strip light for actual draw, and PAR..

OK... so its 9w and 0.11A not bad at all!

I checked the PAR too since I was at it... and with the plastic, at leaf height, which is about 3-5" away from the light and plastic dome, I was getting around 56-82 Umol/m2/s-1 and without the plastic dome and just under the light at the same height is was at about 85-110 umol/m2/s-1 which is not bad at all for 9w!!! haha... so I think that should be enough to get these babies rooted.

I did notice that a black cherry soda and harlequin were rooted, so I put them into soil and on a 24/0 schedule for now until the roots grab hold.

Still no roots on the other 4 though... I'm going to give them a few more days and if nothing then I will reclone them, and flip the other tent to flowering...

So just out of curiosity, I tested the PAR on the 26W cool blue CFL that I was using... which was housed in one of those old aluminum round cheap reflectors. The CFL at the same distance about 3-5" away was at dead center about 140umol/m2/s-1 of PAR but at the outer rim of the reflector it was only reaching around 30 umol of PAR, and at the edges of the humidity dome it was only about 10 PAR...

So overall the new LED strip uses about 3x less energy, and provides a nice even 50-80 par across the whole dome, where the CFL reall only reached the middle half... not bad! I'm impressed.

 

[Icemud420]

By the way...

I have officially named the strain I made Tangie x Black cherry soda....


The new name for the F1's is Black and Tange (pronounced Tan-g)

I looked and didn't see any other strains by that name... so there it is .....Black and tange by...me... Icemud

 

[Icemud420]

This update is titled "Hi, I'm Icemud, and I am a genetics addict"

LOL



So pretty much every week I search around my area looking for Grand Daddy Purple clones and usually come up unlucky, or find a source that just isn't really reputable, and today, I found a dispensary about 1 hour away that had 1 GDP clone left... I told them to hold it and I would be heading out immediately.

Well I think I entered clone heaven...Back about 3-4 years ago, a lot of dispensaries used to carry clones, but after all the recent law changes in California, many many dispesaries closed and there is literally only like 6 clone suppliers in a 2 hour radius of me, in southern california... so finding what you want is much more difficult...

Anyhow, I have picked up the supposed GDP about 3 other times, and each time it was a bunk strain, and not GDP... but today the collective I found... I knew I had the right place...

So I probably shouldn't have, but you know me... I love my good genetics... and I left with 6 new strains to add to my garden, seed projects and perpetual grow...

I picked up 1 of each of:

Grand Daddy Purple
Candyland
Trainwreck
Mendo Grape Kush
Jet fuel og
Gorilla Glue #4

So the choices actually were pretty stratigic in my choices, as the end goal will be to produce feminized seeds, but also work the genetics to create something amazing....

Also being that I have been searching for GDP forever... I will be certain that I make plenty of feminized seeds of it for the future use

Candyland also really caught my eye because that is 2 of my favorite strains combined...what could go wrong with that ? GDP x GSC yum!!

Race Fuel OG was kind of a splurge buy, but I know I needed a good OG as the fire OG I had just wasn't doin it, so Race Fuel OG is a "High Octane" OG x Face Off OG BX1

Gorilla Glue #4 I have had my eye on for a long time as well. Not only a cup winner a couple different cups but very very popular, super frosty and high in THC so I had to pick this one up... very glad I did..

Mendo Grape Kush: Well what can I say.. another 2 elite strains bred together... Mendo Purps and OG kush... couldn't go wrong with this one.

So all of these clones were placed into 3 gallon round pots in my premixed and recycled soil, given some good mycos and compost tea as well as a foliar spray and placed under the lights in their own tent. I will quarentine them for a while, just to make sure they are not sick or any pests, but upon visual inspection, they look perfect, no marks, pests or disease I could see, and very healthy and lots of roots... should be good.

 

[Icemud420]

So I dedided that... Today is Day 1 of floweing.

I made the executive decision last night after looking at my jars of meds getting low and knowing that I need to get these plants into flowering. I decided to set the timers to 14/10 for the regular LED lights, and I have the emerson panel set for starting 15 minutes before lights off turning off 45 minutes after lights out. So it runs for 1 hour total at the very end of the day. I decided to stretch out the period from 1/2 hour to 1 hour just to overlap the lights out timer, since they have a tendency to drift sometimes.

I also discontinued using the Emerson Far red panel during the daytime peak hours, as I want to see the effects of the flowering trigger by itself, without the extra far red during the daylight. I did notice that with using the Emerson panel during veg, during the peak daylight hours, it definitely made some of the plants leaves stretch out more than I have ever seen. It also really helped the ogiesel stretch as the ogiesel usually is very tight together and dense, it definitely helped create longer internodes... I could see the stretch from the extra Far Red during daylight being very useful for short bushy indica's.

I also decided to locate 1 taller stem, near a bamboo stake, and used a marker to mark off hash marks every 2" starting at the level of the top leaf. Now this will help track the stretch and when it stops, and hopefully it doesn't overgrow the marks.

The other big change I made to the flowering/Emerson tent, was that I added 2 more plants to the tent. I had 3 random bagseeds that I got from one of my friends in chicago, and just out of curiosity planted them. Well now that I have 6 new know strains to play with, really I don't need to keep an unknown around because I need the space, so I transplanted 2 of the 3 bagseed plants into 5 gallon pots, and added them to the flowering tent.





I will have to keep close watch, so I placed them in the front, because I don't want to have a hermi pollinate the tent, and with unknown seeds, anything is possible. I definitely can see that they are a indica dom by the fat leaves, and have a very skunky smell already. Maybe will surprise myself ..lol. I do have a couple seeds left in case it is something spectacular...LOL. I also will keep the 3rd plant for now, and if one of the others hermies, or is male the I will swap it out. I don't really have intention on keeping these going so figured instead of waste them, might as well flower them out and see what I find.. adds to the suspense...lol

 

[Icemud420]

Quick update video of whats going on in the garden, enjoy!!

 

[Icemud420]

Hey Everyone!!

I was pretty tired the other day when I posted that video, so I didn't get around to also posting the photos I took that night so here is a quick update:


The Far Red Flowering test:

So after making the video, and thinking about how to approach this Far Red test, I figured since I have read people use it many different ways, ranging from running it 15 minutes after lights out on a 12/12 schedule, some mentioned the ability to use a 14/10 schedule with it for 2 hours after lights out, and lots of information combining the 2 options... so at first I figured why not cut it down the middle and go with 1 hour, which will bridge the gap of the lights going out by 15 minutes and end up on for 45 minutes after lights out... well after thinking about it I decided to bump up the use of the far red to 2 hours after lights out. I figured lets test this theory first, and if it works then we can try next grow reducing it to 15 minutes to see if that works, which will then test both ways... I figured its better than trying something new and only going with an hour... so as of today, they will be on for 15 minutes before lights out, and run 1 3/4 hours after lights out.

Other than that, the plants are doing well. The 2 mystery bagseeds are definitely stretching a lot since I put them in the tent, and flipped, and the Ogiesel also is stretching quite a bit more than I have seen it do before. This actually could be a benefit for those running indica dom strains that don't often stretch, as adding Far Red definitely caused longer internode distances than every before without it, so could be good for stretching out those compact indicas. On the sativa dom plants, the stretch is far less noticeable, and really doesn't look any different than past grows without it, so I find that pretty interesting as well.

As far as plant health, my tangie #5 in the front left is not to happy and really showing me some deficiencies which looks to be a Nitrogen deficiency as well as the leaves seem to be really curling up. Other than that Tangie #5, the rest of the plants look pretty happy and are growing nice, but still showing a slight K and Mg deficiency.

With the last feeding, I prepared some botanicare pro grow and bloom, some 1-1-1 b1 organic seaweed extract, and a 1/4 amount of earthjuice grow, to bump up the N, and some botanicare cal/mag. Yesterday I fed the girls as they were pretty dry and we are getting the usual fall/winter dry winds off the desert, so the girls were pretty thirsty.

So I haven't seen any flowers form yet, but I can tell the plants are starting to get read to flower as I see a few developing slightly more white pistils at the nodes than a week ago, so I think they should pop flowers within the next week. It will be pretty cool to see if this 14/10 with far red works, on all strains and I have quite a variety which will show if it works with all or just some.

Other than that not much else to update at this time with the garden: Here are the pics from Day 6 flowering.

 

[Icemud420]

Feminized seed project: Round 2

When I took these photos a few days ago, I hadn't noticed any new bright green growth on any of the clones yet, so I decided to give them a little water with some added 2-0-0 cal/mag just to help bump them along, and knowing from my other grow that my soil seems to be low on Mg, I figured why not start them out right. Well it worked and just as of yesterday, I noticed all the clones had some nice fresh green new growth so they all now seem to have adjusted to the soil, and are starting to dig their roots in. sweet! I was worried about the GDP because first of all its as strain I have wanted for a very long time, but also it was the "runt" of the clones I picked up and was very small, hardly any leaves, but did have some good roots. I was just hoping that it would take and it did

Right now I have the lights on 1/2 power each (Budmaster GOD 8 and GOD 4) and have them about 3' above the plants which seems to be more than enough light for the young plants. I also have been giving them foliar sprays each day of just a r/o water, cal/mag, and 1-1-1 b1 vitamin spray to help give them a little something until the roots are large enough to supply the nutrients. I am still waiting on my ogiesel and black diamond og to root, and be added to this tent, and I also cloned tangie 3 and 5 both again, as the clones I took I was not happy with and they could be healthier for the breeding project. So I am also waiting on them to root.

I think I will be going with my ogiesel as the next plant that will be sprayed with colloidal silver, and I will use the ogiesel pollen to make seeds of all the other strains I have, plus feminized ogiesel seeds too. Ogiesel has been my favorite indica dom strain I have had for probably 2 years now, and I would love to make sure to keep these genetics on hand, in case I have to move, or for some reason my plant goes sour... so I figured it would also make an excellent strain to cross as its so potent... and grows very hardy and usually causes no problems. excellent genetics.

Other than that, I am just waiting now for the last of the cuttings to root, and we will get started, so as soon as all the clones have rooted and been potted, the fun will begin, and I will get that new journal going.

The new LED light bar for my clone dome seems to be keeping the plants happy, but I think that I almost would be better off with 2 of them just to bump up the intensity slightly, so maybe I will pick another one up soon, they have a daisy chain ability so should be pretty easy.

Other than that... here are the photos from the other day .

 

[Fevs]

I reckon if I used the emerson led for photoperiods strains, I would use it for 2 hours at the start of the dark period, plus 1 hour at the end of the dark period before the other lights come on.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the sun as it rises and sets, gives out a more far red light spectrum.

I reckon with auto's, I'd run 24-0, normal lights for 20 hours, this emerson led for 4 hours.

 

[Icemud420]

I reckon if I used the emerson led for photoperiods strains, I would use it for 2 hours at the start of the dark period, plus 1 hour at the end of the dark period before the other lights come on.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the sun as it rises and sets, gives out a more far red light spectrum.

I reckon with auto's, I'd run 24-0, normal lights for 20 hours, this emerson led for 4 hours.

I've actually decided to change things up, and thats actually what I decided to do.. I wasn't seeing any flowers pop by day 12 from the flip to the 14/10 with the 2 hours of far red after lights out, so decided to move it to a 12/12, with 15 minutes of far red after dark, 15 minutes of far red before lights on... and 1 hour of far red at mid day (emerson effect, and to hopefully to counter mid day depression and drop in photosynthesis).

I've searched high and low for the correct answer on what part of the day offers more far red, and haven't found a specific answer. I would think at mid day the earth receives more of all wavelengths of light, where at dawn and dusk, since it travels through more atmosphere of gasses and water vapor and dusts and such, I would guess that the total amount of far red is lower, but the ratio of far red to blue and far red to other higher energy shorter wavelength light is higher... but that is just my guess....