Andrew's 2nd Indoor Grow

[Andrewk420]

My goal: to grow quality buds in a small space on a very realistic budget.

A little of my experience first: I grew one successful plant indoors in a wooden 3x3 box I built under a floodlight that I wired the photo-sensor out of. Harvested a little less than a zip of okay buds. I have also had two successful outdoor grows, but both were 50/50 mother nature's and my success. The plants were 2.5 hours away and only got intermittent care. But I still always have that experience under my belt.

I am starting a very small grow because I don't have a lot of room where I live (matchbox sized house). I am documenting from absolute beginning to end just. I feel like these kinds of grows are still the overwhelmingly most popular, so maybe someone can learn from my mistakes or be inspired.

Today I got off the ground. I built a custom sized tent to fit in my closet. I'm less than $40 all in on this tent. $15 for a 10'x10' piece of panda film, $15 dollars in PVC and connections, and a fan out of an old computer.
The dimensions are 24"x32"x62".




I have a 300w led and two clip on reflectors on their way from Amazon. I already have two 42w CFLs that I'll put in the reflectors.

I have a friend who grows and he said he'll give me whatever I want out of his clones, but I have to show him (via snapchat lol) that I have a stable environment for a week before I can have them.

I might post a silly picture of my conditions and the lights when they're installed. But if I don't, I'll definitely update after I have plants in the tent.




I did a journal here 10 years ago with my first indoor grow and it really helped hold me accountable for staying on top of the grow.

 

[Andrewk420]

I germinated 3 bagseed and 2 popped. I figured I'd get something going before I go get the clones to put in. They are under (4)42w 6500k cfl. I have a 300w (140 actual) LED that I just haven't gone to get chain to hang with. The hanging system it came with doesn't work well with the PVC frame.

Anyway, 5 days from putting them in paper towels to germinate we have life....



I have had baggies with holes sprayed inside with water/h2o2 rubber banded over the cups but I removed them for the picture obviously. It's winter here and it's tough to keep humidity above 30% in the tent. If I stay on top of spraying down the walls and keeping a damp towel hanging in it it'll reach 45% (ish) but that's it.

 

[max420thc]

If you can find Capt Morgan's grow it might be helpful for you to study it some .
I seen him grow a monster plant under a couple of CFLs in a small area.
He is a really good grower .

 

[ANC]

You have enough light there for one plant for 10 weeks If I'm being generous.
Anything more is setting yourself up to fail right from the go.
I'd take the shortest running strain he has, veg it for 2 weeks and flip, grow a single cola.

 

[Andrewk420]

You have enough light there for one plant for 10 weeks If I'm being generous.
Anything more is setting yourself up to fail right from the go.
I'd take the shortest running strain he has, veg it for 2 weeks and flip, grow a single cola.

I appreciate it. I have plenty more lighting, I'm just working on getting it to work with my diy tent. Basically I just need to get my ass to the hardware store for some hanging chain.

But, I don't plan on vegging long or any plans on growing monster plants. I know I'm working with a small area.

If anyone has any ideas on arranging the lights, let me know. I'm kinda going for the LED covering a 20"x20" area in the middle and letting the CFL fill in on the corners.

 

[Andrewk420]

So the two bigger seedlings are now 6 days since breaking soil. I transplanted them to solo cups yesterday, because with the low humidity those little starter cups needed watering a lot.

The other little guy already has a soft spot in my heart. It's from an ounce of Alien Wreck from a dispensery in Denver. It was the only seed I found in the whole oz, and it was tiny. Like half the size of what I would consider an average seed. But it was mature, really smooth marbled and striped. I germinated it in paper towel for 24 hours and it popped the biggest taproot I've personally ever seen. I wish I'd have taken a picture, but it looked like a lima bean taproot. It was pure white, no yellowish at all.

Obviously made a big ado about a random seed, but I'm cheering for it now.



And I also finally got the LED hung up.



Basically nothing real exciting, but hang in there. Worse comes to worst, you can watch me fail.

I think I'm kinda giving up on the clones for now. My buddy is in Cali for a wedding and to hang out for the next two weeks. I think I'll just see how these seeds do and reevaluate.

 

[Andrewk420]

I transplanted those into the solo cups Wednesday. Today (Friday) there is new growth.

Does that pretty much mean I'm in the clear from transplanting?

Edit: Just so it's documented, I'm using black gold organic potting mix .5-0-0.

 

[Gentlemencorpse]

Well I'm following. I started with a pretty similar setup. I'll let someone else chime in on transplant timing though. I've been using fem seeds so I plant directly in their final home once they sprout.

What are you gonna use for nutrients?

 

[Andrewk420]

Well I'm following. I started with a pretty similar setup. I'll let someone else chime in on transplant timing though. I've been using fem seeds so I plant directly in their final home once they sprout.

What are you gonna use for nutrients?

Thanks man. How did you do with your set up?

And I am planning on using a combination of compost tea, fresh worm castings/worm tea, and fish tank water.

I'll probably get an organic bloom nutrient when the time comes.

I think I'm going to let them grow for a month(ish) depending on how much room they start taking up, then flower. Hopefully I get a girl or two out of them.

 

[Gentlemencorpse]

Thanks man. How did you do with your set up?

And I am planning on using a combination of compost tea, fresh worm castings/worm tea, and fish tank water.

I'll probably get an organic bloom nutrient when the time comes.

I think I'm going to let them grow for a month(ish) depending on how much room they start taking up, then flower. Hopefully I get a girl or two out of them.

I did alright. My bud tasted nice (Bubba Kush) but the buds were pretty light, and i let my tent get too crowded and had mold problems. I've added or changed every grow since then haha. You basically have enough light for one plant, and barely that. I added a second 300w LED halfway through my grow. Then built a DIY DWC system next. Now Im ordering a COB light kit next week cause I still want more/better light. It never ends!!

Make sure you have a circulation fan in there and defoliate early in flowering to make sure the light penetrates would be my recommendations.

 

[Andrewk420]

I did alright. My bud tasted nice (Bubba Kush) but the buds were pretty light, and i let my tent get too crowded and had mold problems. I've added or changed every grow since then haha. You basically have enough light for one plant, and barely that. I added a second 300w LED halfway through my grow. Then built a DIY DWC system next. Now Im ordering a COB light kit next week cause I still want more/better light. It never ends!!

Make sure you have a circulation fan in there and defoliate early in flowering to make sure the light penetrates would be my recommendations.

I already have plans on another led. I got a $50 Amazon gift card and $22 bucks in my PayPal from winning HQ trivia (humble brag). I'm considering one of the cheap plug and play COB set ups, but I don't know.

 

[Gentlemencorpse]

I already have plans on another led. I got a $50 Amazon gift card and $22 bucks in my PayPal from winning HQ trivia (humble brag). I'm considering one of the cheap plug and play COB set ups, but I don't know.

I spent a month looking at those Amazon COBs and I'm just not sold on them. If you can handle the temps I think you would be better off with a cheap HPS, though if you do go for the COB I'm looking forward to seeing the results! I set aside some scratch and am gonna try a kit from these guys: http://timbergrowlights.com. But it took me over a year of growing with my current lights to make that jump, and I definitely grew enough good nuggs for it to have been worth the investment. I just want more!

I'll take a current pic of my plants tomorrow with the two 300w blurple led lights so you can see how it's going.

Also, well done on the trivia.

 

[Gentlemencorpse]

here's a couple pics of my two plants under two of those 300w LEDs. I only use the CFLs for my starters now because I just don't have room in the tent. But as you can see, those lights are adequate to grow a couple plants as long as you keep them small. Just don't expect the massive snowy buds you see in some of these guys grow logs haha

 

[Andrewk420]

@Gentlemencorpse those are some fine looking ladies. I would be perfectly happy with a grow like that. Are they trained at all?



Depending on space, I'm going to try to crop/train mine over the course of about a month and go for flower at the beginning of March. About a month from seed shouldn't be too big of plant(s) for me to handle.

 

[Gentlemencorpse]

Thanks! No training this time, just topped once. One thing I do like about the LEDs is if you keep the lights close it's really easy to get a nice, compact, bushy plant.

 

[Gentlemencorpse]

Also about a month should be good. Those were vegged 28 days from their first true leaves and I probably let them go a little long. My tent is only 62" tall so my lights are completely maxed out. This Great White Shark stretched a little more than my Bubba Kush last time.

 

[Andrewk420]

Also about a month should be good. Those were vegged 28 days from their first true leaves and I probably let them go a little long. My tent is only 62" tall so my lights are completely maxed out. This Great White Shark stretched a little more than my Bubba Kush last time.

We have the same height going on. Thanks for following along, it'll be nice to have someone who's growing in similar conditions to bounce things off of.

 

[Andrewk420]

Figured I'd give a little update since I was messing with them today. I pinched this one off at the new growth. I may(probably will) regret it. But it's already taller than the other one so I figured I'll try to stay on top of trying to train. Plus it's kind of an experimental move.

Here they are in all their glory this afternoon.

 

[Andrewk420]

I also think I have a slight ph problem. I got a ph kit for my water now though, so hopefully it'll correct itself.

 

[Andrewk420]

I transplanted the first two into 2 gallon smart pots yesterday morning. I'll probably leave them in there, but maybe not. We'll see.

There is plenty of healthy new growth on the bigger plants. But they are a little drippy compared to pre-transplant, but I gave them a nice compost tea feeding. Hopefully they'll perk back up with that in the next day or two.

The little guy is growing very slowly. I don't think it likes the low humidity much.




I also think I botched my little topping job on this guy. I think I just deformed the new leaves. But it didn't slow down the growth much. Needless to say, I don't think I'll get much of a topped or even fim'd effect.




Anyway, that's all. I'm smoking a bowl so I figured I'd update.