DNA Sharksbreath grow in Hempy Buckets

[jela10]

Kinda late starting a journal on this one. It’s already at 25 days since the 12/12 flip and things are looking so good I thought I would share the experience from the start. There is a really great long thread here on RIU where this strain was grown in full but unfortunately all the pictures are missing after one of those cyber-attacks that frequent this forum. Some other grow threads are incomplete where the grow was dropped or the grower simply stopped posting. I will get you to “home plate” I promise. I grow on a small scale in a tent for my wife and mine’s personal medication and we live in a medically legal state where we have cultivation rights. I have learned over the years that less plants in my grow space means “bigger plants” with better yields so I tend to run just 2-plants in a perpetual grow and usually hit >4oz per plant with the hempy method and a good medium. The hempy method is a very simple and effective “drain to waste” hydroponic method that is perfect for the amount of attention I can afford to give with my workaholic lifestyle. You will see shortcuts and tricks I use to minimize watering, make mixing nutes easier and virtually remove the need for checking pH and PPM’s.


Here is my meager but effective setup:

4.5’ x 2.5’ x 6.5’ high tent (Hydro Hut Silver Addition)

Lighting: Veg-T5’s, Flower–400w Digilux HPS with Lumatek digital ballast and Sun System’s II Air-Cooled Reflector

4” 165CFM exhaust fan

Grow Medium: A mixture of 75% Canna Coco and 25% Grodan Rockwool Grow-chunks in 2gallon hempy buckets. The reservoir of the bucket is all rockwool grow-chunks.

Nutrients: Canna Coco A&B, CaliMagic (Cal/Mag) Rhizotonic, Cannazyme, Pk13/14 and Canna "Boost".

 

[jela10]

2/23/13 - Here are the initial 4 sprouts at 3 days. I grow from seeds as we like to try a variety strains. I sometimes sprout seeds in rapid-rooters and sometimes wet paper-towels after a 24hour soak in a shot glass. Here I’ve used the paper towel method and planted in solo cups. These are hempy solo cups (chunky perlite in the res and Canna coco up top). I put a hole in the side with a hot nail at 1.5” from the bottom. BTW, these cups will sustain plant life for a long time until the day comes when you are ready to transplant. Some have flowered plants in these cups per a competition here on RIU. Pardon the basil and bib lettuce…they are freaking cute aren't they? They grow like crazy with the hempy method and we put them in the living room under another T5 with other house plants. We are “basil heads” and use it a lot in our cooking.

 

[jela10]

2/27/13 - 7 days old. Here is where I start using Canna "Start", a 1-part nutrient just for clones and seedlings with lots of micro's they need. No fear of burning with it either. Notice the coco drying out a little...I think it's key with this method, allowing air into the root system. Too, there's always a growth spurt after next watering. I personally believe you can't over-water coco in a hempy bucket, as it holds enough air to keep you honest (great for you newbies out there). But I do believe in "airing" out the medium between watering's. Here it's still to early to tell which two I'm going to grow out, but with today's feminized seeds it best to start extra's and pick those that are the most even...I tend to keep the light down low and I want both plants to have equal lumen's.

 

[jela10]

3/6/13 - 14day mark under the T5's. At this point I'm running the "light" nute schedule published on Canna's website for Coco A&B, and some cal/mg as is necessary for coco grows. I'm liking two of them, very even in stature. There is a larger one with some twisted propeller like leaves and one "runt", considerable behind the others. The runt will become an experiment in the future....you'll see it added to the grow later in a smaller 5qt. bucket with Canna "Substra" for nutes to see how it does with coco. Waht could it hurt, won't take up much space if I don't top it and the smaller bucket should keep it small. I can't stand tossing a plant and usually give the extras to fellow "patients".

 

[jela10]

3/7/12- 15days - Time to move into the 2g buckets. (did he just say 2g buckets?) Yes, believe it or not I get remarkable results with this size over larger 3.5g buckets. You will see when I chop! Watering and mixing nutes is a no-brainier too, even while stoned. As it works out, with this type of "ringed" utility bucket, if you drill the side hole so that the bottom of the hole is exactly 2" from the true bottom of the bucket, it will take 1 gallon of water at feed time with a little bit of run-off to ensure reservoir freshening. With 3.5 gal buckets I had to water 1.5gals per plant. So with two plants running I mix nutes effortlessly in a 2g polycarbonate jug and just dump that in my gravity feed watering setup. I'll show you later, makes life a breeze.

 

[jela10]

Hempy grow medium for this grow: you might call me a "student" of the original Dali Hempy on another forum who somewhat made the hempy bucket popular. He started with all perlite and after initial successes eventually moved on to coco coir with a perlite reservoir. Myself, after running plain coco over perlite for over a year with awesome yields I starting getting restless for something possibly better that would put hempy up in the DWC class yield-wise. I was also concerned that when I broke down my coco buckets, depending on the strain, the roots would stop at the bottom of the coco and not penetrate the perlite res area as much. Just a concern, yields were exceptional so I went off looking for something different and "fun". In came "mapito", a mixture of rockwool and polyurethane couch foam, it was fun and interesting and rocked my world with yields >4.5oz per plant but I had an awesome strain working for me too. With mapito you didn't need a different reservoir medium and roots were pervasive in the res area too. See my Pineapple Express grow here: https://www.rollitup.org/hydroponics-aeroponics/579299-mapito-has-anybody-used.html
But... there was some effort rinsing and pre-charging with nutes to buffer the mapito's pH and the availability is still shaky cause everyone wants some right now. So this grow I'm trying a my own concoction of Grodan rockwool 3/4" "Grow Chunks" and their smaller 1/2" "Grow Cubes" as a mix with the coco. You can't see from the pictures in the previous post, but I lined the bottom 2.5" of the bucket with the Grodan 3/4" "Grown Chunks" for the reservoir and the upper medium is 75% Canna coco wit 25% Grodan 1/2" "Grow Cubes".

 

[jela10]

3/10/13 - Time for my usually FIM job and I totally blew it...days went by before I noticed the Sharkbreath was hardy enough to keep growing with that "clipped" leaves look. I eventually took off the nodes with the bad leaves and FIM'ed a little deeper on the next node...I got what I wanted, just took a couple of try's and days of watching though.

 

[puffntuff]

I grew thus strain out. It would never finish had foxtail growth. It was a creeper buzz but didn't keep her due to it never wanting to finish. Good luck tho

 

[jela10]

3/14/13 - 22 days veg - looking great, gotta love those fat-ass'ed lower fans on Indica hybrids...they are the first to go later on...my fans usually dry them out fast.

 

[jela10]

3/18/13- 26 days veg, bushy down low, FIM taking effect at the top...soon to hit the flower tent and flip the lights.

 

[jela10]

3/22/13 - 30 days veg, now flipped to 12/12. Now in the flower tent under the 400W HPS.....

 

[jela10]

Remember the runt I mentioned earlier?...it's been in a the solo-cup this whole time, looking at me, working on my mind through some form of "extra sensory perception" given only to runt like creatures. What the heck...I'll set up a little 5qt bucket (1.25 gallons) and see if it grows a single cola without taking up much space. I threw in some rockwool chunks for the res, leveled it off with perlite and threw plain Canna coco on top....gonna use Canna "Substra" for the nutes on this to see if it works well with coco...did me a big yield with the mapito medium on an earlier grow.

 

[jela10]

3/27/13 - 7 days since flip - one nice even canopy, the runt in front.

 

[jela10]

4/2/13 - 13 days flower....nothing much to say but "robust" growth...not too much stretch in the first 2 weeks...which is good for tent dwellers.

 

[jela10]

4/4/13- 15days flower, just after lights off....my camera shows a lot of yellow here which is not true to visual. Second is "flash-off".

 

[jela10]

4/8/13 - 19days flower. They hit the 36" height mark. Lots of bud sites. My stems down low are usually fatter, like 3/4" to 1"....these are just a little larger than the 1/2" feed tubing for my watering "halo's". But every strain is different and I'm running a different medium this time too. With this method I rarely have to secure plants with stakes and cages...they hold themselves up fine with monster colas. These watering rings are connected by a "tee" fitting just 1 foot above the buckets. A single 1/2" tube feeds the tee from a 2g bucket on a wire-rack shelf up higher next to the tent. I just pour my nute mixture from my 2g mixing container into the 2g feed bucket and gravity takes care of the rest......no getting down on your knees to hand water. Sometimes I don't open open the tent doors....fast food junkies in my tent....I think the spray from the rings also oxygenates the nute mixture during feeds.

 

[jela10]

4/13/13 - 24 days flowering (middle of week4). Here colas are forming their lengths. The one in the back is already 16" long....come week 5 I'll be applying the PK13/14 and these will be swell like ball bats.

 

[jela10]

Today - 26 days flowering. Ok, I've shown you the past to catch you up on the grow stage by stage, now we are real-time. I'll update as often as possible. With 2 days left in week 4, its time to start thinking about the PK13/14 additions that usually happen in week 5. I say "usually" because its strangely worded on Canna's grow charts. What I can tell you now after several bonking grows is that when the smaller buds that make up the longer colas start becoming "connected", it's time for PK13/14 adds. Also because PK13/14 is some "hot" stuff, I usually drop my base nutes a couple of ml/gal to keep from burning anything. I usually add it for 3 feedings (7-10days). Thanks to the advice of AZCannaman here on RIU, I've had awesome results. You are now at the perfect time of this grow to see the magical effects that happen in the oncoming weeks...so pull up a chair.

 

[jela10]

So you hate mixing nutrients all the time at every feeding?....So do I..... Sometimes plants want feeding in the morning when I'm least likely to want to mix up a batch too. That friggin shot-glass measurement sucked and pouring nutes from bottles was messy business (stoned or not LOL). I'm freakin anal and use a 500CC syringe to get exact measurements for my nutrient mixes.These days when you travel you can only carry 3oz or less liquids so pharmacies like Walgreens now carry these 3oz bottles approved by the TSA, made of very good plastic that serve well as pre-measured nute containers. On the weekend when I have time, I measure my nutes in the syringe and fill each 3oz bottle with each ingredient. Then when feeding time comes during the week I just dump the stuff in my mixing container and feed. I do like some sit-time (≈1hr) though for proper pH buffering. Still, it makes feeds less of a hassle any day. Remember CAL/MAG goes in first to properly buffer the solution.

 

[jela10]

Oh yeah....I mentioned earlier about my gravity feed to the watering rings in each bucket. Here it is...simple as can be but a really big help for my bad knees....this 2g bucket sits on top of a 5' wire rack shelving unit next to the tent. I just pour my nute mix into this bucket and the job is over....you can hear the water gushing/spraying/fizzing through the watering rings in the buckets due to the high pressure of gravity alone. I have a valve there to regulate flow if needed. My previous mapito grow needed a slower feed to keep from splashing water on the rockwool surface of the medium. Coco likes it "full throttle". I imagine one could easily make a distribution manifold to water more than two plants as I do with a simple "tee"...easy stuff...big time saver.