1st Grow NL using HPS

Feel free to comment please. I'm sure theres plenty I don't know.


Started as seed, germinated in wet towels. 1st week of Jan

Moved to 2x4x6 tent. 2 clip on fans, in line 8 inch fan with carbon filter, 400w electronic ballast with HPS.

1/7 Planted in Fox Farms soil, 5 gallon smart pots, on rolling planter stands to allow air circulation and drainage under the pot.

Jan 14 pinched the main bud. Started fertilizer, grow big, (the other one too ).

Jan 21st stripped the leaves off the top node to stimulate further development of lower buds.

Jan 28th swapped over from 400 w HPS to metal halide.

Jan 31st switched back to HPS based on university studies. I'll find them and post them here. Strong anecdotal evidence is great, but strong empirical evidence is better.

Last pic is today 1/31.

Trying to keep the temp at 75, rh below 60. Been checking the pH of water and nutrients to keep near 5.5 to 6.0.

Have been treating the ladies like I do with my tomatoes with regards to getting them the shape I want. So far I have been lucky. The air circulation is vigorous enough that the main stems are nice and thick. All the stems are thick.

The ladies have their 1 month birthday. I flushed them with pH corrected water the night before. I'll replace all those lost nutrients on the next watering. Growth is still vigorous. If I had room I'd be tying down the taller branches to make a more flat profile and encourage additional bud sites.

Just put up the netting, pinched off a few very low buds. The flush yesterday resulted in a growth spurt. With only a 2x4 ft footprint I'm tight for space. Going to have to figure out a way to water and drain with out pulling them out again.

I have one NL (and one other) about four weeks ahead of yours. With a low height cabinet and an LED I've concentrated on lots of side light (CFLs) and 2 gallon pots to keep them short. So far it's been working but I may still have trouble as they continue to stretch in bloom.

Your leaflets are extra wide - looking great!

Day 3 of 12/12. I need to give them a proper flush before I see signs of stress. Otherwise no issues. Two 6 inch clip on fans above the canopy, one below to circulate air below the canopy. Also suspended a 10 inch oscillating fan upside down from of the 6ft top of tent to cover everything.

Day 5 in 12/12. Flushed them out about 5 gallons per pot. They perked right up and stayed leaf tip pointing to the sky all day.

Having them out of their little 2 foot by 4 foot tent really makes me think that one or two plants is plenty if they are cropped and trained right in a space that small.

I also need adjust the pH a bit higher I think. The input was 6.2-6.4, but run off bottomed out at 5. Next grow I'll adjust to 6.5-6.7 and since I got the tds meter midway thru this grow I'll better be able to watch for over feeding, salt build up.

Day 7 in 12/12.

Can really easily see the pistils. I've ordered some supplemental CFL lights to hang on my corners. I am thinking of running them under the canopy.

jim0202 said:

I have one NL (and one other) about four weeks ahead of yours. With a low height cabinet and an LED I've concentrated on lots of side light (CFLs) and 2 gallon pots to keep them short. So far it's been working but I may still have trouble as they continue to stretch in bloom.

Your leaflets are extra wide - looking great!

Click to expand...

I thought about it after reading your post and some others about supplemental CFL lighting, going to run it on one side of the tent and see if I get denser buds on that side.

I do believe the CFLs have generate some good lower buds, but they also generate a lot of heat. So I've had to play with the number of CFLs I can add without running up the cab temp. I'm using some large CFLs, (68 watt, 4200 lumin) but even the smaller ones put off a lot of heat compared to LEDs.

I'm starting to think what some compant needs to make is a smart light. A single bank of LED lights that comes with preprogrammed light schedules. Something that covers the daily routine and can switch over automatically to flowering. That knows how and when to blend in the different parts of the light spectrum. Even better if it could to be controlled by an app on the phone. You could have so much data to play with.

Took forever but the ladies are flowering. I added a 125 watt CFL and a couple of 23 watt UVB CFL reptile bulbs

The pic isfrom Day 17 of 12/12. Seems like it took forever for flowers to really show.

About 45 days of flower left.

Before today's defoliation
And after

Day 21 of flowering
After much reading both on this board and in botany journals, and synthesizing what I know of how wild grasses and such respond to natural grazing, plus experience with 25 years as a rosarian, I'm risking a grow on the belief that there will be vigorous regrowth triggered much of it flowing to those buds.

Rearranged the tent after getting my lux meter. There should be an equipment list for beginners. The lux meter needs to be on it.
The buds are coming along well I think. About 40 days or so left. Cha Ching and Beastie Bloomz to be added to the nutes. Looks like the same ingredient list on both cans. I'm going to mix my own in the future. Put those college Chem classes to use.

Hey dude I'd also like to do some pruning myself, because of my grow space, I want to utilize the small area as well as the plants. Do you have any recommendations as to pruning my plant? It's been in the flowering time phase for almost 2 and a half weeks too. I'd love to get cola's rather than a bunch of popcorn buds

I'm subscribing to the defoliation method this grow too. Once I get my girl fully ready to take the 3x3 space I have I'll flip her and defoliate for the first 4 weeks of flowering. Seen loads of examples of it making buds explode!

DankTankerous said:

Hey dude I'd also like to do some pruning myself, because of my grow space, I want to utilize the small area as well as the plants. Do you have any recommendations as to pruning my plant? It's been in the flowering time phase for almost 2 and a half weeks too. I'd love to get cola's rather than a bunch of popcorn buds

Click to expand...

I'll post up on this thread links to what I've used for guidance. Although they all link the defoliation success to extra light, I'm thinking that's only part of it. Pop just one fan leaf off a node and leave its opposite and though the light hits both bud sites, the pruned side gets the growth. I'm guessing it's a hormone thing. Super easy to see how it works with cherry tomato vines. Just pop a leaf off where you want a new stem to grow. And that was outside where light wasn't an issue.

OK off to harvest links for you

One of the better guides...

http://www.growweedeasy.com/marijuana-defoliation-tutorial

Also some good guidance.

https://www.rollitup.org/t/defoliation-removing-fan-leaves-for-higher-yield.352300/

I'm watching videos of giant buds, with cured yields of 1.4 grams per watt and over using defoliation. It definitely has its haters, but so did prescribed burns with forest management. Sounds a lot like the cries that came out of the old school when that concept of using fire as a tool kept coming around. It seemed so obvious, how can fire healthy too a forest of trees? Turns out it actually is. Trees evolved with with fire. And so cannibis evolved with herbivores, and insects that defoliate.

And if you're new like me make sure you have at the minimum these meters:

pH meter

...adding nutrients will change the pH. Check it both when it's just water without any added nutes. And also when on days your adding your fertilizer to the water. Make sure you have the little pH adjusting bottles. Knowing what your acidity is doesn't help if you can't adjust it.


PPM (parts per million) / EC (electric conductivity) meter

This one makes sure that you're not missing too much fertilizer into your water. Basically how much dissolved salts are floating around in your water. Not all salt is sodium chloride. I'm referring to the potassium salts and such.

Lux meter

Measures the amount of light your plants are receiving at any given point in your grow space. You can really up your efficiency making small adjustments to your light. Raising or lowering it can make a nice difference. Plus it lets you see how much a good reflective material can do. I've been opening and closing the fly on my grow tent stuffing my meter in to see the difference in Lux with the grow tent door open and closed and its significant.

Thermometer/humidity meter

Mine records the highest and lowest temperatures over the last 24 hours. It led me to buy a tiny space heater for the tent to keep the nighttime temperatures just at 70 degrees. If your soil is getting chilled at night it's going to take a couple hours to warm it back up. That's a loss of efficiency as I see it.

PH meter, EC/PPM meter, thermometer, Lux meter. You can get all of them together for about $60-75 on amazon. I'm guessing whatever you pay you'll get more than back in increased Harvest.