armlengthbuds
Well-Known Member
I was a newbie once and I remember being overwhelmed at all the information that was out there including finding the proper nutes. Soil was one thing, lights another, ventilation, seed banks, seed strains, etc. etc. Well I'm no newbie anymore and I thought I would try to give in one thread some simple, yet important information about marijuana farming..
What I'll do is give some ideas on soils that you can buy at the store, and some that you can easily make.
2nd I will give you some information on lights, kelvins, and types,
3rd I will give you a rundown on popular nutes and try to break the hype down that surrounds some of the bigger names nutrients, I will give you quick info on ventilation, offer up some reputable seed banks, and some of the best seed strains.. So, here goes:
Soils: Soil is by far one of the most important, if not the most important aspect of growing. I would stick with organic soils for several reasons, better tasting buds and more control of nuting are just to name a few.... Some of the biggest sellers are FoxFarm Ocean Forest(very good mix, definitely works well), Whitney Farms Uncle Malcoms organic potting soil. I prefer this over Ocean forest because it has more micro nutrients like mycho and other trace elements not found in others, although they are made by Scots, Black Gold is much the same as Uncle Malcoms, just more expensive... Works great by itself or in mixture. I'll get to that in a minute. 4 corners organic, to be honest i have never used this stuff, but reputation is quite good.A couple other s I haven't used would be Green sense and ECO. Last and definitely least is Miracle Grow organic. I know some people grow in this stuff, but it is comprised of delayed release nutes, and It is hard to find a balance when it's constantly releasing some on it own. It would be great if it released proper amounts to keep Mary happy, but it doesn't so dont use!!! I end up using a combo of my own goodies. Here is some of my own combo's that seem to work wonders especially when I combine them with my nutes.
1st mix and the one i use the most is this: 60% Uncle Malcoms, 15% perlite, 10% saltless horticulture sand, 10% worm castings, 5% blood meal
2nd mix 30% worm castings, 20% vermiculite, 20% perlite, 20% Sphagnum moss, 10% saltless horticulture sand, 1/2 cup dolomite powder lime
3rd mix 1/3 perlite, 1/3 peat moss, 1/3 organic potting soil, 1 cup worm castings, 1 cup indonesion bat guano
The usual formula for mixing, although it doesn't always apply, is : 2 parts Sphagnum moss, one part horticulture sand, and one part perlite to each 4 gallons of soil. Adding other amendments will be your decision. Everymix I make from the above list, I give a full soaking of water and let it sit overnight and then check the PH. This is a must do all the time( when adding water, nutes, mixing soil, and just in general)...Actually, its a good habit to PH all the time!!
Next: Lights and Lighting... This is one of the most argued subject with growers. In one corner you have the L.E.D. guy, in the next you have the CFL(compact Flourescent lights), then the full size flouescent guys, the incandescent dude, and finally the HID guys. Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium. To make it easier here's the scoop on kelvins and spectrums... color rating emitted by all light is measured in Kelvins e.g. A light that has a kelvin range of 6500 emits more of a blue spectrum ( perfect for the vegetative state of a plant) A light with a kelvin range of 3000 is perfect for the flowering stage. It is more reds and oranges. Now depending on the Lumen count, the spectrum can be only so effective. For instance if you have a 4 ft' 6500 kelvin 32 watt fluorescent with 1900 lumen, your light penetration is going to minimal ( because its just 32 watts and a poor number of lumen).. Now Some higher wattage CFL's, like 125 watt, can put out around 20,000 lumens, good but not the greatest..... Incandescents are worthless so lets just say fuck them, and if you want to know more about them Google them. And last but not least we get to HID's. These lights are Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium, they put out the way more lumens and can increase the size of yields 3 fold commpared to the other light sources. Metal Halide in the 400 watt variation puts out around 36,000 lumen. That is ample for a grow room of 5'x5'. A 400 watt HPS or High pressure Sodium light put out around 45000 lumens. Ample for a 5'x5' to 6'x6' grow area. the same type of lights but in a higher wattage, naturally cover more area and have more lumen. e.g. 1000 watt HPS/MH puts out around 107,000 lumen, good enough for a 10'x10' to 12'x12ft' grow area. I have a switchable 600 watt (meaning you can use both a MH bulb and when it time to flower i screw in the HPS bulb) very conveniant and can save you alot of money.. I get my lights through a plalce called HTG SUPPLY ON EBAY. They have the best prices on swtchables, and other merch, and great customer service. The basic formula is for each watt of light, you get one gram of pot. However, growing marijuana has alot more factors involved then watt = pot theory. A good guideline for an approximate light production number goes like this: Incandescent= 17 lumen/watt, Fluorescent= 60 lumen/watt, metal halide= 90lumens/watt, HPS= 107 lumen/watt. A plant can do its best growing with a minimum of 3000 lumen per square foot, but the ideal is to get around 7,000 to 10,000 lumens per square foot. Hence the HID's being the most popular.
An easy formula for figuring out how much light you will need (or lumen) you will nee , is determining square footage of your grow area. For instance if you have a 4'x4' room you have 16 square feet. You will just take the length of the room times the width. So, if you are running a 1000 MH/HPS light that makes 107,000 lumen. You divide your square footage(in this case) 16 by the lumen count of your light, again in this case, 107,000. This equals out to be, 6687 lumens per square foot. Perfect for full canopy penetration. A good reflector is key in this type of grow. I would recommend a cool
tube vented out from the grow room.
.
Ventilation is key here. You want to setup a charcoal filter for your exhaust tubing or carbon filter.I run all tubing to one big hose one filter than out my attic and then I even have another filter attached to the base of the exhauset port on my house, you know the the things that spin around on top of your roof. no probs with scent ever. I have two box fans moving air inside the room. A hygrometer, thermometer, and bubbbler from a fish tank to keep my nutes perfect. On to nutes..
Nutes range in complex chemicals, to complec organics. Some have eye catching labels and jaw dropping prices, some burn your roots no matter how lil u add to them etc. I've personally grown with FoxFarm, which is almost organic, ans had great success with their products. I also paid a fortune for them. I have used Dutch BC and didn't care at all about them. It seemed my plants just wouldnt get along with them, and they made my PH a living hell to try to adjust. I've used grotek's monster bloom and keep on using monster bloom, but that's for one phase of growth. I used Advanced right after the initial hype got started and I have to say I was impressed, but honestly not so impressed I would pay 500$$$ to nute my plants. I have friends that just use fish emulsion, kelp extract, worm castings, guano, and superthrive and have had better grows.... Then I found the one that works best for me and my soil,. BMO (Blue Mountain Orgaincs) straight from the Ozark Mountains in Arkansas. Their Super Plant Tonic was given to me by a friend who said "your going to shit" and I did... He says they benn selling around Arkansas for 5-6 years and just started selling on e-bay. So, of course i found them on ebay by searching "Super Plant Tonic" And there they were. Unfancy bottles, with simple lookin labels, guano of multiple kinds,sands, and they were F****ing Cheap. But at this point I had used their Super plant tonic and new that if everything else was of this quality so I ordered their whole line up plus some high nitrogen guano.. $39.00 plus 8.00 shipping! I couldn't believe something so good could be so cheap ( hence the boring bottles and simple labels) but this stuff is for real and if you make it to there ebay store, they list everything that goes into their 100% organic products. They hide nothing, they dont try to win you over with pretty labels and high prices, to make you think your getting something more special. They are just super comcentrated teasload with microbes and all kinds of other goodies that your plant with fucking flip for.
Moving on. Choosing bucket to grow in. I have found that if u start in a lil cup your way more likey to get root bound and of course the shock of transplanting them. I germinate/clone in a homemade dome made from materils at wal-mart, works perfect and then I move them to their permanent home a 7 to 10 gallon bucket depending in strain.
Now to strains. There are so many it can be ridiculous trying to figure out the one, two, or more for you, so here's the lowdown. sativas up energetic can act normal around cops but your fucked out your mind, sociable, a great party strain.
Indica- oh sweet indica. Will knock you on your ass while you forget how walk. Indica for me helps me to finally bring they day to an end, it hekps me to relax, and let's me get some good sleep before I hit the sativa in the morning!! lol My favorite strains of both would be: jack Herer-sativa, willie nelson-satvia, Big laughing-hybrid, AK-47-indica, Kali mist-not sure, the one and only Light of Jah, of course white widow, And Blueberry, blueberry x cinderella#9, blueberry x AK47, tiny bomb(oh SHit), The Cheese, Arjann's Ultra haze, and G13/pure Gold. I'm sure i could go on for days about the herbs i like. but this is what i've grown!
Now to some reputable seed companies because you can easily get took out there. here's a list I have used multiple times and if I haven't my friends have!
attitude seeds-excellent great stealth packing
Dr.Greenthumb-excellent
marijuana-seeds.nl-excellent
PeakseedsBC-excellent
hempdepot- no propblems reported by friend
worldwide-marijuanaseeds.com-excellent
WEll, Good luck to all of you! If you any questions just ask. Make a thread even if it's a question and the people who on RIU that give a shit a bout other people will answer or help as quickly as possible. There are some real good guys and girls on here so dont be afraid to ask...
What I'll do is give some ideas on soils that you can buy at the store, and some that you can easily make.
2nd I will give you some information on lights, kelvins, and types,
3rd I will give you a rundown on popular nutes and try to break the hype down that surrounds some of the bigger names nutrients, I will give you quick info on ventilation, offer up some reputable seed banks, and some of the best seed strains.. So, here goes:
Soils: Soil is by far one of the most important, if not the most important aspect of growing. I would stick with organic soils for several reasons, better tasting buds and more control of nuting are just to name a few.... Some of the biggest sellers are FoxFarm Ocean Forest(very good mix, definitely works well), Whitney Farms Uncle Malcoms organic potting soil. I prefer this over Ocean forest because it has more micro nutrients like mycho and other trace elements not found in others, although they are made by Scots, Black Gold is much the same as Uncle Malcoms, just more expensive... Works great by itself or in mixture. I'll get to that in a minute. 4 corners organic, to be honest i have never used this stuff, but reputation is quite good.A couple other s I haven't used would be Green sense and ECO. Last and definitely least is Miracle Grow organic. I know some people grow in this stuff, but it is comprised of delayed release nutes, and It is hard to find a balance when it's constantly releasing some on it own. It would be great if it released proper amounts to keep Mary happy, but it doesn't so dont use!!! I end up using a combo of my own goodies. Here is some of my own combo's that seem to work wonders especially when I combine them with my nutes.
1st mix and the one i use the most is this: 60% Uncle Malcoms, 15% perlite, 10% saltless horticulture sand, 10% worm castings, 5% blood meal
2nd mix 30% worm castings, 20% vermiculite, 20% perlite, 20% Sphagnum moss, 10% saltless horticulture sand, 1/2 cup dolomite powder lime
3rd mix 1/3 perlite, 1/3 peat moss, 1/3 organic potting soil, 1 cup worm castings, 1 cup indonesion bat guano
The usual formula for mixing, although it doesn't always apply, is : 2 parts Sphagnum moss, one part horticulture sand, and one part perlite to each 4 gallons of soil. Adding other amendments will be your decision. Everymix I make from the above list, I give a full soaking of water and let it sit overnight and then check the PH. This is a must do all the time( when adding water, nutes, mixing soil, and just in general)...Actually, its a good habit to PH all the time!!
Next: Lights and Lighting... This is one of the most argued subject with growers. In one corner you have the L.E.D. guy, in the next you have the CFL(compact Flourescent lights), then the full size flouescent guys, the incandescent dude, and finally the HID guys. Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium. To make it easier here's the scoop on kelvins and spectrums... color rating emitted by all light is measured in Kelvins e.g. A light that has a kelvin range of 6500 emits more of a blue spectrum ( perfect for the vegetative state of a plant) A light with a kelvin range of 3000 is perfect for the flowering stage. It is more reds and oranges. Now depending on the Lumen count, the spectrum can be only so effective. For instance if you have a 4 ft' 6500 kelvin 32 watt fluorescent with 1900 lumen, your light penetration is going to minimal ( because its just 32 watts and a poor number of lumen).. Now Some higher wattage CFL's, like 125 watt, can put out around 20,000 lumens, good but not the greatest..... Incandescents are worthless so lets just say fuck them, and if you want to know more about them Google them. And last but not least we get to HID's. These lights are Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium, they put out the way more lumens and can increase the size of yields 3 fold commpared to the other light sources. Metal Halide in the 400 watt variation puts out around 36,000 lumen. That is ample for a grow room of 5'x5'. A 400 watt HPS or High pressure Sodium light put out around 45000 lumens. Ample for a 5'x5' to 6'x6' grow area. the same type of lights but in a higher wattage, naturally cover more area and have more lumen. e.g. 1000 watt HPS/MH puts out around 107,000 lumen, good enough for a 10'x10' to 12'x12ft' grow area. I have a switchable 600 watt (meaning you can use both a MH bulb and when it time to flower i screw in the HPS bulb) very conveniant and can save you alot of money.. I get my lights through a plalce called HTG SUPPLY ON EBAY. They have the best prices on swtchables, and other merch, and great customer service. The basic formula is for each watt of light, you get one gram of pot. However, growing marijuana has alot more factors involved then watt = pot theory. A good guideline for an approximate light production number goes like this: Incandescent= 17 lumen/watt, Fluorescent= 60 lumen/watt, metal halide= 90lumens/watt, HPS= 107 lumen/watt. A plant can do its best growing with a minimum of 3000 lumen per square foot, but the ideal is to get around 7,000 to 10,000 lumens per square foot. Hence the HID's being the most popular.
An easy formula for figuring out how much light you will need (or lumen) you will nee , is determining square footage of your grow area. For instance if you have a 4'x4' room you have 16 square feet. You will just take the length of the room times the width. So, if you are running a 1000 MH/HPS light that makes 107,000 lumen. You divide your square footage(in this case) 16 by the lumen count of your light, again in this case, 107,000. This equals out to be, 6687 lumens per square foot. Perfect for full canopy penetration. A good reflector is key in this type of grow. I would recommend a cool
tube vented out from the grow room.
.
Ventilation is key here. You want to setup a charcoal filter for your exhaust tubing or carbon filter.I run all tubing to one big hose one filter than out my attic and then I even have another filter attached to the base of the exhauset port on my house, you know the the things that spin around on top of your roof. no probs with scent ever. I have two box fans moving air inside the room. A hygrometer, thermometer, and bubbbler from a fish tank to keep my nutes perfect. On to nutes..
Nutes range in complex chemicals, to complec organics. Some have eye catching labels and jaw dropping prices, some burn your roots no matter how lil u add to them etc. I've personally grown with FoxFarm, which is almost organic, ans had great success with their products. I also paid a fortune for them. I have used Dutch BC and didn't care at all about them. It seemed my plants just wouldnt get along with them, and they made my PH a living hell to try to adjust. I've used grotek's monster bloom and keep on using monster bloom, but that's for one phase of growth. I used Advanced right after the initial hype got started and I have to say I was impressed, but honestly not so impressed I would pay 500$$$ to nute my plants. I have friends that just use fish emulsion, kelp extract, worm castings, guano, and superthrive and have had better grows.... Then I found the one that works best for me and my soil,. BMO (Blue Mountain Orgaincs) straight from the Ozark Mountains in Arkansas. Their Super Plant Tonic was given to me by a friend who said "your going to shit" and I did... He says they benn selling around Arkansas for 5-6 years and just started selling on e-bay. So, of course i found them on ebay by searching "Super Plant Tonic" And there they were. Unfancy bottles, with simple lookin labels, guano of multiple kinds,sands, and they were F****ing Cheap. But at this point I had used their Super plant tonic and new that if everything else was of this quality so I ordered their whole line up plus some high nitrogen guano.. $39.00 plus 8.00 shipping! I couldn't believe something so good could be so cheap ( hence the boring bottles and simple labels) but this stuff is for real and if you make it to there ebay store, they list everything that goes into their 100% organic products. They hide nothing, they dont try to win you over with pretty labels and high prices, to make you think your getting something more special. They are just super comcentrated teasload with microbes and all kinds of other goodies that your plant with fucking flip for.
Moving on. Choosing bucket to grow in. I have found that if u start in a lil cup your way more likey to get root bound and of course the shock of transplanting them. I germinate/clone in a homemade dome made from materils at wal-mart, works perfect and then I move them to their permanent home a 7 to 10 gallon bucket depending in strain.
Now to strains. There are so many it can be ridiculous trying to figure out the one, two, or more for you, so here's the lowdown. sativas up energetic can act normal around cops but your fucked out your mind, sociable, a great party strain.
Indica- oh sweet indica. Will knock you on your ass while you forget how walk. Indica for me helps me to finally bring they day to an end, it hekps me to relax, and let's me get some good sleep before I hit the sativa in the morning!! lol My favorite strains of both would be: jack Herer-sativa, willie nelson-satvia, Big laughing-hybrid, AK-47-indica, Kali mist-not sure, the one and only Light of Jah, of course white widow, And Blueberry, blueberry x cinderella#9, blueberry x AK47, tiny bomb(oh SHit), The Cheese, Arjann's Ultra haze, and G13/pure Gold. I'm sure i could go on for days about the herbs i like. but this is what i've grown!
Now to some reputable seed companies because you can easily get took out there. here's a list I have used multiple times and if I haven't my friends have!
attitude seeds-excellent great stealth packing
Dr.Greenthumb-excellent
marijuana-seeds.nl-excellent
PeakseedsBC-excellent
hempdepot- no propblems reported by friend
worldwide-marijuanaseeds.com-excellent
WEll, Good luck to all of you! If you any questions just ask. Make a thread even if it's a question and the people who on RIU that give a shit a bout other people will answer or help as quickly as possible. There are some real good guys and girls on here so dont be afraid to ask...
- here's the link to BMO if interested. http://stores.ebay.com/Blue-Mountain...01017QQfrsrcZ1
