First Grow - DWC - Failure Imminent

This is my first grow. I've created a simple DWC kit using a light proof bucket (5 gal.), aquarium pump and a 5 inch air disk.

For this first attempt I full expect to screw something up and lose the plant and in the best case scenario have a terrible harvest with dirt weed.

Follow along and witness the fail first hand won't you?

Comments and suggestions are welcome as long as they're constructive. If you're just going to shit on something I'm doing without contributing anything helpful I'll just stop all comments. I'm new to this and I don't know everything I'm doing so I'm learning along the way.

Strain: Bag seed from my dad. He paid $200 for some good herb. Must have been a hermie plant as there 5 seeds in the oz. So I've decided to use this first instead of the bubblicious and ww seeds I got from Nirvana.

Nutes: Fox Farms Big Grow and Tiger Bloom. Also have Dutch Master Zone to assist in clean roots. PH up and down from General Hydroponics. PH will be monitored via some recommended dip sticks, can't yet afford a decent ppm/ph meter.

Lighting: 400w MH/HPS running 18/6 for veg. Seedling is currently under a 42w CFL until it breaks through the rockwool and gets a tad more vertical.

Grow Room: Unused bathroom in my basement. I've made it light proof for flowering though I have nothing reflective on the walls/floor/ceiling. I am only growing one plant so it will get the full attention of the light.

Pics coming soon......

So heres a few pics of my setup. Room temp is around 75-80 degrees F. Light is about 2 ft. from the seedling with a fan hitting it so the heat isn't very bad on the lil one.

Not much to report as of yet. Seedling is getting taller by the day. She's going up but not really filling out much. I think my first mistake was using a 10 inch net pot. I didn't think it would be as deep as it is.

Because it's so deep it's taking longer than I would have hoped for the roots to get into the bubbling water. I'm watering the rockwool daily to keep it moist and I'll just hold out until I see roots poking through the bottom.

Next grow I think I'll scale down to a 6 inch net pot though.

the net pot size dosnt seem to matter as much as the space the roots will occupy . looks good so far , love me a good bubble bucket grow . Google rumpleforeskin's bubble bucket grows for some reference if needed .

everything looks good but you need too drop the cfl lower if you want your seedling to bush out because having it that far it will be lanky




Blue Dream, Grand Daddy and Purple Kush under 1000 watt light hoping too yield big

Indoor monster plant

Thanks for the replies...

@ green.budz - good to know about the net pot, I went with the 10 inch initially because it fit perfectly into the 5 gal bucket. I think there are some out the that are smaller but still act as a "lid" on the bucket. Whatever, if this works good then I'm just nit picking =P

@ Real styles - I initially used a CFL similar to this which I clamped right onto the side of the bucket about an inch above the rockwool. About a day after she broke through I turned on the 400w metal hallide which is what you see in those pictures.

One thing I noticed is that sometimes the bubble disk moves from the center of the bucket and in once case it's flipped over and it messes up the nice bubble action. Not sure about putting a rock in there or possibly something else to sit on the hose near the disk to keep it in place. Wondering if a plain rock would screw with the PH in the water. Though about taking a small zip lock bag, putting in some hydroton rocks, sealing it and using that as a weight.

So it's been 12 days since I've germed and planted the seed. The lil one has grown about 3-3.5 inches tall.

I got tired and frustrated with the size and depth of the 10 inch net pot and the issue of the roots not yet being in the water. My solution was to carefully dig out the seedling (still in the rock wool) and place it much lower in the net pot. This allowed the roots to finally reach the bubbling water. I've also added a 1/2 strength dose of veg neuts. PH sits at about 5.5-5.75.

I'm also quite disappointed with hydroton in general. In the process of moving the seedling down the hydroton created an enormous amount dust that completely muddied the water. I did thoroughly rinse the hydroton before I planted the seedling. I've begun looking into other possible alternatives to hydroton and I've found this -> http://www.suretogrow.com/hydroponic-absorbents

It looks promising and much easier to handle. More pics coming later today.

Some new pics, just shy of the 2 week mark. It looks shorter than it really is since I moved it down about 2-3 inches in the net pot. I also dropped the light down a couple more inches. It sits about 10-12 inches above the plant now. The plant gets a bit of heat but it's only warm on my hand, not hot so I assume it's ok.

Upped some neuts today to about 80% strength, hope it doesn't burn it up.

It's officially been 3 weeks since it was germed. I only assume it would be much bigger if it hadn't taken almost 2 weeks for the roots to actually get to the bubbling h2o

Last Friday I cleaned the res and added fresh neuts + dutch master and balanced the PH. When I added the neuts I used full strength and it really took off.

On Saturday I topped it. Today is the 3rd day after topping and it's looking really nice

2 or 3 inches is optimum for cfls. Otherwise you're doing good.

Magnificient said:

2 or 3 inches is optimum for cfls. Otherwise you're doing good.

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Thanks for the comment, it's currently under a 400w MH. I only used the CFL until about a day or so after it broke ground.

It's about a month since it broke ground now (26 days to be exact). It's looking really bushy since I topped it and I've raised the light about 6 inches to try and induce a little stretching. Would like it to get to at least 2-3 feet tall. Ideally I'd like to go higher but since this is just bag seed and it's my first grow I'm more concerned with quality over yield.

I'd like to continue veg until at least the 6th or 7th week before trying to flower. I'm hoping to see some preflowers by that time.

I also realized I'm using the regular soil concentrated FF grow big and tiger bloom and I've been using their recommendation of full strength. So far the plant has done nothing but grow whereas I've read it should be suffering burn and possibly lockout. Pretty resilient plant

So it's been just under 5 weeks now and I've decided to start the flowering process. I know I said I'd wait at most another 2 weeks but during my weekly changing of the res I noticed some nice pre-flowers and decided to give it a go. I also did some selective pruning on the lower parts of the plant. Mainly taking off the leaves that couldn't get light any more and looked like they were slowly dying out.

This grow is after all more about learning and growing quality, albeit small amounts, than growing for volume.

Back to the flowering info. I changed out my bulb and am now using 400w HPS instead of MH. Since it will continue to grow and light coverage is now more important than ever I will be adding two 42w CFLs to the sides in order to add some coverage. I double checked possible light leaks and all seemed good. I added fresh veg neuts on Friday and will wait the full week until I change the res again to add any blooming neuts. Even then I'll be still adding about 1/4 of the usual dosage of grow big just to keep it going.

Overall I'm pretty damn happy with what I've done/learned during 4.5 weeks of vegging. I think the plant is pretty healthy, the roots are nice and white and I think it's a nice size for barely over a month. Lets just hope it's actually a girl and doesn't start showing bananas

No pics today as I couldn't take them since the lights were off by the time I wanted to take pics. Will get some up tomorrow.

This past Friday during my normal res change I toned the Grow Big nutes down to about 1/4 strength and added Tiger Bloom in at 1/2 strength. By Saturday I noticed brown spots on my leaves so I started a thread in the plant issues forum looking for help. Based on the info I've gleaned from that thread I have a cal/mag deficiency and I've ordered some MagiCal and I'll start using that in addition to the nutes. It's something I should have done from the start but oh well, thats learning and also why I used bag seed.

On a positive note I can see visible pistils now so I know she's a she

I just hope I didn't/don't stress her and turn her hermi or worse, lose the entire plant

move the ballast and power cords off the floor

bumbleweed said:

move the ballast and power cords off the floor

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Ok, but why?

420n00b said:

Ok, but why?

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I put my power splitter into a plastic bin myself. It's a good idea, unless you want the "DWC failure" to result in a fire. If you get a spill, even knock something over by accident, you don't want any electrical stuff laying on the ground, especially a 400w ballast.

myselfship said:

I put my power splitter into a plastic bin myself. It's a good idea, unless you want the "DWC failure" to result in a fire. If you get a spill, even knock something over by accident, you don't want any electrical stuff laying on the ground, especially a 400w ballast.

Click to expand...

Fair enough.

Finally got to take some pics. Good news is that the affected leaves have gotten worse BUT no new leaves have been affected. I'm going to continue flushing for this week and next week re-introduce nutes + mag/cal supplements slowly and monitor it from there, gradually increasing nutes as the weeks pass.

She's now only one week into flowering and stinks like a mofo. If you touch the leaves/stems/bud sites it smells like weed mixed with grapefruit. I had the wife do the same thing and she also smelled grapefruit. It's pretty cool.

She's been flowering now for 20 days. I've added magical along with tiger bloom and a bit of grow big this week. The roots look good and the buds are developing. The mag/cal deficiency did stress her and I've found a couple of pollen sacks

I clipped the balls and will hope and pray that more don't sprout up. I'll just keep clipping them and hoping I don't get seedy herb.

Flushing for that week though I began to see signs of N deficiency. After adding the nutes back last week that has been largely reversed. The mag/cal deficiency has stopped as well.

My concern now is the lower branches not getting enough light. I've tried to supplement this with a couple of 42w CFLs on the sides. It's not optimal but it's better than nothing. Perhaps next grow I'll be able to afford a 90w LED UFO and add that on the sides for supplemental lighting.

I've also added a DIY CO2 bubbler using the sugar/yeast method. Again, it's not optimal (by a long shot) but my system can go 2-3 days without me being around so I figured it would make up for me not being in the room breathing. It's sitting in front of the small fan I have blowing just above the tops of the plant.