66w grow; 2 plants - Progress

Dwell on this quote for a minute:
"The purpose of a Gardener is to harvest sunlight through the methodical manipulation of plants."

Sand4x105 said:

Dude... If you would have vegged them for 10 weeks and really worked them to the max under your CFL's you would get maybe 4 grams per plant... four grams MAX...
Now if you would have vegged them under a 600 w MH/HPS for ten weeks you would have got 4 oz per plant....
Is any of this making sense to you?
You need more wattage of CFL's... I grow in veg with CFL's I have 1000's of watts of CFL....
MORE LIGHTS.... MORE WATTAGE....
you can not have too many CFL's...
Say that last line out loud....

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BSD0621 said:

adhaze, I wouldn't count on getting that OZ... that is HIGHLY optimistic... I got a OZ off a outdoor plant at 3 feet tall! So you think you really are going to get a oz from such little wattage? When I was a kid I thought the same way.. if you take my advise (get more lights and NEXT TIME aim for an even canopy) you will be happy with the grow other wise it's pretty much a waste unless you want to get a "feel" for how cannabis grows and it's stages of development. I say, being optimistic myself, you will get 7 grams dry..

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These kinda posts are seriously the last thing anyone needs in a forum dedicated to CFL. For starters, we all begin somewhere, and the majority of first time growers are extremely tight on cash to spend out on their setup... Yet CONTINUALLY small micro-growers get a constant knocking of 'MORE LIGHTS, BIGGER BOX'... I'm beginning to wonder if that should be RIU's tagline.

Secondly, both of these posts are bollocks. Confirmed by nothing more than spending 20mins perusing the micro-grow forum.

Let's tackle @Sand first.

If you would have vegged them for 10 weeks and really worked them to the max under your CFL's you would get maybe 4 grams per plant... four grams MAX

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Okay, well, as a first ever micro-grow, with only a couple HPS grows way way in the past... I managed to pull 26g off of ONE plant, under 69w of CFL. That was under 12/12 lighting from seed, so literally as little veg as the plant needs before it matures. I know that a lot of us seem to get off on being 'experts' at this, but seriously, to come onto a newbies thread IN THE CFL FORUM, and then tell them bullshit, followed by recommending MH lights?? What's your deal?

Now @BSD,

So you think you really are going to get a oz from such little wattage?

Click to expand...

This again is toss. Sure, @adhaze, there's no way you'll pull an oz from these two plants, let alone one oz from each.. But it's not your wattage that's holding you back. With 100w you could definitely pull an oz from a single plant grow.

There's been a couple posts on this thread that've been positive. There's been a couple that've been somewhat helpful. But it baffles me the difference between this board and the stealth/micro board. We're all about getting the most outa what we've got over there.

Now for me to chime in with my advice, so everyone can have a good flame back at me!

@adhaze - Mate, you're girl looks healthy. She's got some nice budsites on her, and you'll more than likely have a good handful of happy tokes from your adventures with these girls. BUT, it's not gonna be an ounce, it's not gonna be close to an ounce. They're stretching like hell, the vertical space between the branches needs to be SOO much smaller if you're looking at pulling a nice personal yield offa those CFLs.

Personally, I'd say you can happily keep yourself stocked with smoke on the wattage you've got, but you need to downsize your grow area. Pull yourself down to a nice cabinet size or even a large PC Tower. Get those lights all nice and close together, rather than being lost in an empty room like they are now. Once you've got that sorted, start learning how to LST like a ninja. A good LST can give you a tidy canopy, so the majority of your budsites are all getting an even amount of light.

It's not *easy*, but it's certainly not rocket science. Plus RIU has some of the most helpful souls out there to keep your grow at its best.

For this grow, I'd consider it nowt more than a learning project. Most of us fuckup a little on that first couple grows, but half of the fun of growing these girls is that come harvest, you're already thinking... "My next grow is gonna kick this bitches ass!"

So, you're doin alright mate, she looks happy and you sound pleased. Enjoy the grow, plan the next one, then do better. Rinse and repeat.

mewk.

mewk69 said:

These kinda posts are seriously the last thing anyone needs in a forum dedicated to CFL. For starters, we all begin somewhere, and the majority of first time growers are extremely tight on cash to spend out on their setup... Yet CONTINUALLY small micro-growers get a constant knocking of 'MORE LIGHTS, BIGGER BOX'... I'm beginning to wonder if that should be RIU's tagline.

Secondly, both of these posts are bollocks. Confirmed by nothing more than spending 20mins perusing the micro-grow forum.

Let's tackle @Sand first.

Okay, well, as a first ever micro-grow, with only a couple HPS grows way way in the past... I managed to pull 26g off of ONE plant, under 69w of CFL. That was under 12/12 lighting from seed, so literally as little veg as the plant needs before it matures. I know that a lot of us seem to get off on being 'experts' at this, but seriously, to come onto a newbies thread IN THE CFL FORUM, and then tell them bullshit, followed by recommending MH lights?? What's your deal?

Now @BSD,

This again is toss. Sure, @adhaze, there's no way you'll pull an oz from these two plants, let alone one oz from each.. But it's not your wattage that's holding you back. With 100w you could definitely pull an oz from a single plant grow.

There's been a couple posts on this thread that've been positive. There's been a couple that've been somewhat helpful. But it baffles me the difference between this board and the stealth/micro board. We're all about getting the most outa what we've got over there.

Now for me to chime in with my advice, so everyone can have a good flame back at me!

@adhaze - Mate, you're girl looks healthy. She's got some nice budsites on her, and you'll more than likely have a good handful of happy tokes from your adventures with these girls. BUT, it's not gonna be an ounce, it's not gonna be close to an ounce. They're stretching like hell, the vertical space between the branches needs to be SOO much smaller if you're looking at pulling a nice personal yield offa those CFLs.

Personally, I'd say you can happily keep yourself stocked with smoke on the wattage you've got, but you need to downsize your grow area. Pull yourself down to a nice cabinet size or even a large PC Tower. Get those lights all nice and close together, rather than being lost in an empty room like they are now. Once you've got that sorted, start learning how to LST like a ninja. A good LST can give you a tidy canopy, so the majority of your budsites are all getting an even amount of light.

It's not *easy*, but it's certainly not rocket science. Plus RIU has some of the most helpful souls out there to keep your grow at its best.

For this grow, I'd consider it nowt more than a learning project. Most of us fuckup a little on that first couple grows, but half of the fun of growing these girls is that come harvest, you're already thinking... "My next grow is gonna kick this bitches ass!"

So, you're doin alright mate, she looks happy and you sound pleased. Enjoy the grow, plan the next one, then do better. Rinse and repeat.

mewk.

Click to expand...

Finally. Mewk- you are the man. You said everything i wanted to say just in a much nicer way than i could have. I would love to see what some of these guys' FIRST EVER grow looked like. Micro/cab growing has alot more challenges than just throwing a bunch of plants under a big HID.

I'm with Mewk.

The most unimaginative advice I've read (repeatedly) in the CFL sub-forum is to either quadruple the amount of watts a grower is currently using, or to dump their CFL bulbs entirely for an HID system. It would be like a cyclist asking for the shortest/quickest route from A to B, and laughed at and told to buy a car because, by their very nature, cars tend to move much faster than bicycles. This doesn't address the reasons behind choosing to cycle in the first place.

Using CFLs for cultivation does have merit under certain circumstances (cost, heat, space, ...), and the general advice in the CFL sub-forum should be in aid of maximising the potential of a CFL grow. All that being said, the OP hasn't done as much research into growing as he should have. A quick search would reveal that 66W is barely sufficient to bloom 1 plant to any kind of standard, let alone the 2 he has in his grow space. Further, in order to achieve a decent yield return on three months of cultivation efforts, a simple vertical grow with a couple of small bulbs in a cupboard isn't going to cut the mustard. Training techniques are necessary to expose as many of the bud sites to the available light as possible, which hasn't been done here. As such, the resulting flowers will be small, underdeveloped, and 'airy'. They'll lose 75% of their weight after they've been dried, and what looks like a decent wet yield will dry out to very little smokable bud. A quick search would return lots of successful micro-grows with yields of an ounce or more, most of which involve being creative with training the plant for optimal bulb proximity to the flowers.

I really feel a beginner grower gets back what he puts into the grow. If you invest $40 into your setup, it seems naively ambitious to expect much more than that value of smokable bud at the end of it. The more time and money you invest into your grow, generally speaking, the more you can expect to yield in return. The most valuable lessons a beginner grower learns at the the end of their first successful grow is to appreciate the importance of keeping the plant healthy throughout its life cycle, and to manage final yield expectations based on the tools and methods they're using.

The good news for the OP? Grows get easier the more times you complete them, and you can increase your yield potential by looking at other grows and adopting some new techniques.

Good luck.

@mewk thank you for the advice. i am enjoying it.

@sunnyjim i didn't do LST but i know now. i put about $100 into it. if i get 1/4 oz total off both plants that will break even

i have lots of flowering time left do you guys not think i'll get over 1/4 oz?! no way!

35days since i switched to 12/12:


'the ultimate'


'the haze'

there is 35-40 days left in flowering how do they look for such a small amount of light? only 78w lol i know you guys say it is not enough. i am having fun with this grow. it is my first so if i break even with 1/4 oz total i will be okay with that

If this site didn't suck balls and wasn't so unreliable, i'd post my first ever grow... it's linked to this forum name. you can search my post's since it wont' load for me. I have issues even viewing these forums most days. So yeah, I proved that point. And nor did I even say "get a HID" as, hid's don't even hit the right spectrum!

Finally got to it https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/699324-my-first-cannabis-grow.html

Im with Mewk.

Dont know why some people post such negative rubbish...

I myself, as explained before, have pulled half an oz each plant with them under 50w of CFL total in 3 litre pots... Lol.

I have seen a guy grow around the half oz mark with a 24Watt Desk lamp CFL with nothing else other than plain water. 2 foot high plant.

Sand4x105 said:

Dude... If you would have vegged them for 10 weeks and really worked them to the max under your CFL's you would get maybe 4 grams per plant... four grams MAX...

Click to expand...

This made me laugh hard.

I have seen autos on a 2 week veg with less light pull off 3x that amount... No, that isnt the max.

Adhaze,no matter how much you get this time at the end of the day youll know next time to keep those cfls in as close as possible from the start,and also youll be able to put right any other mistakes you may have made.As long as you learn from your mistakes its all good mate!
As far as this grow goes,all you can do is make sure your lights are as close as possible.
Ignore the negative bullshit,cause thats all it is.Good luck brother

Changing back to 12/12. Had them at 13/11 the last few weeks. I read that helps with the start of flowering.

I am thinking of keeping at 12/12 until near the end and I can increase darkness to 13 and light to 11 for last week maybe? A good idea? It could increase resin maybe? Dutch Passion says the last 2 weeks is "explosive growth" so would it be better to reduce light to 11 or keep it at 12/12 all the way until harvest?

the haze without the light on is this trichome production good?

Oh and can someone please suggest a better nute for them I have been giving them NPK 14-10-27 the last few weeks. As in what ratio is best for 5 weeks into flower?

You should really get some mylar for these cabinet walls to reflect the light back to your plant. Or you could paint it white. Maybe get some reflectors for your bulbs.

adhaze said:

Oh and can someone please suggest a better nute for them I have been giving them NPK 14-10-27 the last few weeks. As in what ratio is best for 5 weeks into flower?

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aim for a 7-20-15 nute.

First number is nitrogen, which will make a plant grow leaf wise.
Second number is phosphorous, which is for flowering sites.
Third number is potassium, which is for root growth.
N-P-K

I'd say stay away from nutes. On a first grow just try and feel your way through it, don't go diving in to the technicalities, therein lies problems. Also I'd suggest maybe occasionally turning the plants around, to try and get a bit more light to those untouched areas. As for the light's, keep them 12-12, don't fuck with that.

Just my 2 cents.

what mewk said ... don't mess with light schedule. keep 12/12 going man . stop stressing her out . if something you can let her be in dark for 2-3 days at the end right before harvest.

Stress? How is that stress? Normal sunlight would fluctuate and get darker quicker as the flowering continues. How could that be stress?

Sunlight does not fluctuate. It steadily increases or decreases depending on the season. You dont get 12 hours a day one week, then 13 the next then 12 the one after that. Changing the light cycle is gonna confuse the plant and it will revert to veg or hermie on you.

It may or may not stress your plants, but I think the point is to not mess too much with a simple formula. 12/12 is the recommended light cycle for plants in bloom. If 13/12 was overwhelmingly more efficient at sexing a plant, I think it would be common knowledge and a widely adopted technique. It isn't, so the effects must be negligible, or at the very least ambiguous, imho. Keep things simple this time around.

Trust me, if there were magic gimmicks which help flower a plant much faster than 'normal', or specific periods of darkness before harvest that would add 10% extra resin, everyone (including myself) would be using them every grow.

Just try to move the plants and bulbs around every couple days to expose all the bud sites to an even amount of light over a week-long period. Watch them grow, try not to over/under feed them, read some grow journals for some tips on your next grow (you're welcome to check some of my older grows in my sig), and try to improve on this run next time.