first hydroponic grow

[funtime1]

hi all
newbie here, my first posting.
i'm not very experienced in growing. I've done 2 small (2-3 plants each) previous grows in soil that turned out "fair" but nothing to brag about to say the least.

Wanted to try something different so decided to try hydrophonic growing and without the mess of soil and problems of over/under watering, etc.

Being 100% CLUELESS on hydroponics I did some online research and decided on a very simply growing design/method.

I bought:
(3) 18 gallon storage totes and lids.
(9) air stones
(3) air pumps
airhose tubing
(18 ) plant baskets 3"
HyDroton pellets
Rockwool cubes
FoxFarm nutrients (Big Grow and Tiger Bloom)


The worst part is that the only seeds I have are regular bag seed. some came from some pretty decent smoke, while other seeds were from somewhat lesser quality smoke but it's all i have to work with so i have to make do and I have no one to get very high quality seeds from so it is what it is.

On each storage tote lid I cut out holes for 6 plant baskets.
Each storage tote got 3 airstones (for plenty of oxygen in the nutrients) running off a dedicated air pump for each tote.

I started the seeds in 1"x1" rockwool cubes under a plastic lips to retain moisture and humidity until the seedings were about 2"-3" tall which took only a few days.
At that point I moved the rockwool cubes with the new seedlings into the 3" baskets and supported in place with the Hydroton pellets and put each basket onto the storage tote lid holes.
The nutrient solution in the totes was high enough to keep the rockwool cubes wet until the roots developed.
The nutrient solution is 3 teaspoons of FoxFarm Big Grow per gallon of water. I used regular tap water.
sorry, I don't have a PH meter to tell you how high or low the PH of my water is.

I ended up only using 2 of the 3 tote set-ups for my grow since I realized early on that my light coverage wasn't good enough for all 3. My light is a 400W HPS.
I ended up using the third tote set-up for kitchen herbs and have it in a separate room under a Floro light.

You can see this 3rd set-up in the first two pictures since it lets you easily see the 6-hole arrangement on the tote lid.
The second picture shows you the 3 airstones in the nutrient solution.

Sorry, no pictures of the grow when it was still seedlings or small plants but i'm AMAZED at the growth speed and overall difference compared to when I grow some plates in soil. Hydroponics grows SO MUCH faster and the plants looks so much better and healthier than they ever did in soil.
The 3rd and remaining pictures are from this morning. I started the seedlings around the second week of Sept so they have been in Veg growth for approx 4 weeks now and to me they look to be doing pretty well. They are all under the 400W HPS on 24/7. Again, they are doing SO MUCH better than when trying to grow in soil.
Because of the mix of seeds I had plus I ended up needing to start 2 or 3 batches of seeds to gets seedlings some plants are about 1 weeks older than some others and they range in height right now between 15" - 23".

I'm figuring about one more week of veg until the plants are all at least 18" which should give me a range of 18" to 27" or so and than I'll switch over to 12/12 lighting and switch the nutrient solution to the FoxFarm Tiger Bloom.

I'm actually pretty amazed at how well they seem to be doing considering I really haven't got a clue what I'm doing.

I'm open to comments or suggestions to help improve my grow from more experienced people.

I realize that right now they are pretty tight together so I'm thinking I miscalculated when I allowed for 6 plants per storage tote but i'll see what happens after they show sex and I cut out the males. Hopefully that will still give me a decent number of females but also more space for them to get light.

Oh, other info:
grow is in a spare bedroom closet. Size is 5'10" wide, 2" deep.
400W HPS light
fan blowing on light to help keep temps down

 

[funtime1]

a few more pics:

 

[s0high]

ph pens is a must have item for hydro, Your girls look real nice otherwise. And yes 6 plants per tote is to much

 

[funtime1]

ph pens is a must have item for hydro, Your girls look real nice otherwise. And yes 6 plants per tote is to much

yeah, I know I'm going to have to pick up a PH meter soon.
Again, after sex shows and I cut out the males i'll have more room.
i'll know to figure less plants per tote on my next grow in any case - this is definitely a learning experience.

 

[s0high]

Like I said, lookin good mate. You plants look very healthy so your ph has to be in somehwhat good standing.

One thing to plan for, when these bitches get big they will be drinking some water. Make sure you always have a stock of ready to go water to add daily. My plants average a gallon of water a day per plant. So just be prepared!

 

[s0high]

O sorry I almost forgot. Your roots will be really intermingled together so when you cut out the males plan to deal with some shock to the other plants and plan to change the water out alot. The roots will be dieing/rotting when you cut the males out. No way around it at this point.

 

[funtime1]

O sorry I almost forgot. Your roots will be really intermingled together so when you cut out the males plan to deal with some shock to the other plants and plan to change the water out alot. The roots will be dieing/rotting when you cut the males out. No way around it at this point.

yep, the roots are very intermingled, you are right. I figure when cutting the males out I'll have to just cut the roots off close to the baskets and let the remaining roots just stay.

As far as watering, I've already had to add approx 7-8 gallons to each tote over the last 3 weeks and i've noticed that as they are getting bigger they are getting thirstier (no surprise there - the larger the plant the more water they need).
Once in flowering I figure i'll have to check and add water to the totes every week to keep the level up

 

[DSB65]

Im fixing to start hydro myself yours look good you need you need to look through the new post or in door growing section and find rosemans posts he has guides to show you every thing happy growing

 

[s0high]

Excellent plan of attack funtimes. I little tip for you : Cut the roots like you plan and then in say 2-3 days go in there and try to pull some more roots out. Once they start to die a bit they will come out a bit easier. Still going to be a mess tho

 

[funtime1]

Im fixing to start hydro myself yours look good you need you need to look through the new post or in door growing section and find rosemans posts he has guides to show you every thing happy growing

thanks, I'll look for his posts.

Excellent plan of attack funtimes. I little tip for you : Cut the roots like you plan and then in say 2-3 days go in there and try to pull some more roots out. Once they start to die a bit they will come out a bit easier. Still going to be a mess tho

thanks for the tip on getting the old roots out.

 

[appleseed]

So in this system you keep the nutrient level constant about halfway up the pots and run the bubblers 24/7? How often are you changing the nutes? Looks like good results so far to me.

 

[funtime1]

So in this system you keep the nutrient level constant about halfway up the pots and run the bubblers 24/7? How often are you changing the nutes? Looks like good results so far to me.

At the beginning before the roots really developed I made sure the nutrient solution was high enough to get to the net pots to keep the rockwool wet. Once the roots developed and was hanging down into the solution I figured the level was quite as critical as long as the roots were in the solution and had plenty to drink but I added water a couple times - approx 4 gallons the first time and approx 3 gallons the second time to keep the nutrient solution level high enough to be safe.

I didn't have a clue if or how often I should have changed the entire nutrient solution or just suppliment it when i added the water or what. I read lots of varying opinions and methods on this but nothing definite or anything that seems to agree with anything else I read so I ended up going with the method that I read that was the easiest which was not to add more nutirients or change the solution until you have added enough water to equal the original amount. Since these are 18 gallon tubs I figured I started with approx 18 gallons so I wasn't going to add nutrients or change the entire solution until I added another 18 gallons.
I'm only halfway there in about 4 weeks and plan to switching to flowering in another week so won't have to change that nutrient solution at all since I'll dump it all out to change to the flowering solution with the FoxFarm Tiger Bloom.

On the other hand I already said I was clueless going into this so I wouldn't go by my method since I have no idea how correct it is or isn't. For all i know i'm doing it completely wrong and the fact the plants are still alive could be nothing but pure dumb luck!

Yes, the airstones run 24/7 to keep oxygen in the nutrients. Even when I switch the lights to 12/12 i plan on keeping the airpumps running 24/7 unless i'm told by more exprienced people that I shouldn't

 

[funtime1]

Update: 10/13/09

I just measured my plants and the smallest one is now 18" and the tallest one is about 26". They are growing faster and faster everyday it seems!
I was going to wait until Sunday to switch to 12/12 lighting for flowering but now that the smallest plant reached the 18" mark I'm thinking of switching them over today or tomorrow - if I wait another 5 days they are just going to get taller and therefore taller during the flowering growth I don't want huge tall plants.

1. Any reason NOT to switch them over to 12/12 lighting?

2. When I switch them to 12/12 lighting for flowering should I switch the nutrient solution at the same time or do I wait a week or two before switching the nutrients?
In the current veg stage i'm using FoxFarm Big Grow and have FoxFarm Tiger Bloom for flowering. So, when it the best time to switch over the nutrient solution?

Thanks for any help!