First indoor grow: 2x4x5' tent, LED & CFL, WW femmed

So, I figured I'd start my own grow thread. I'm a newb here, and to indoor growing.

I've got a little tent as per my title, and started under a 135w Blackstar LED on April 1st in MG .14-.14-.14 soil after germ'ing with the paper towel in a ziploc method. I had a rough start as my seeds germ'd but didn't sprout well as I overwatered and over-compressed my soil, but since, I've got a couple that have sprouted, and started another that seems perfect. My plants are under various ages since the 1st.

Since then, I've wired up and added 6 - 23w 6500k CFLs that flank my LED thanks to someone's input. I've purchased some heavy-duty velcro and threw up my power bar above where my vent duct will go, and put velcro on the outside of the tent so I could 'pin' the doors open while I'm working.

I do not have my filter or inline fan yet, so I blow air in from external via a fan, and let it vent outward through the bottom passive ports. I have a heat-mat under the plants to get humidity up, but it was still low, so I bought a small humidifier to use until the plants get bigger.

I've been PH-ing my water to 6.5-6.8 consistently, and keep my water bucket in the tent so the temp is always the same as my room prior to re-PHing. With the humidifier, it seems to have stabilized at 42-43% RH, and my temp all along has been 79-82.

I'm running 24/0 with my lights.

Pics? Ok

On the left side are my herbs and tomatoes I'm seeding.

-spek

Good luck.

Thank you. I have done and been a part of massive outdoor grows in the past, but this is my first indoor.

Although I hope to get at least a tiny bit of yield here, my objective is to familiarize myself, then have both veg and flower tents. After this initial 'test' grow, all I am planning to stage is enough for my wife and a couple of close friends. I barely smoke anymore, I just like to grow plants. I have a 400w setup in transit (MH/HPS switchable), but I was bound and bent to test LED.

Eventually, the majority of what is grown will be used to make oil and cooking.

-spek

Update: My plants are a little disorientating as this is my first indoor grow. It's all a test with everything.

Back left is the first germ'd seed I planted, and it eventually rose to the surface and for all intents-and-purposes, browned out and died (as a seeded taproot). I shoved the seed back into the dirt and miraculously it has sprouted. Obviously it is very stunted, but she is looking good other than that.

The one to the right of that you can barely see was germ'd three days ago, and planted yesterday. She's doing well. The one in the green pot in front of her was also planted the same day as the first. This girl was hugely overwatered and apparently the seed floated to the side of the pot. She's doing well, but she's droopy. I'm not overly concerned, as she looks good as well.

The one on the bottom left is my baby, and her name is Iggy (as in 'Id-jey', like the girl's name in Fried Green Tomatoes movie). She was put into soil on the 11th of this month after I realized how to properly leave my soil aerated and loose. She's going to be my Mom if all works out.

All are White Widow fem'd from mjseedscanada.com, and they all germ'd. I'm still learning and am 100% down with harsh constructive criticism

Note: I have many of my outdoor herbs and tomatoes sprouting in my tent as well. It helps keep up my humidity. The pots you see that aren't weed are a variety of seedlings I've transplanted into larger pots, waiting for warmer weather here in Calgary so I can put them out on my deck.




-spek

Transplanted today!

I was absolutely shocked at how many roots my plants had, even the seedling that was only four days old. I had one in a 6" pot (the one that will become my Mother) and the rest in 4" pots.

Also went to my local hydro store, and they hooked me up with my nutes, rooting solution for when I get to cloning, and calibration liquid for my pH tester. My 400w MH/HPS will be here Monday, and my new carbon filter/fan setup will be here by Friday.

As soon as my Mom plant gets a bit larger, I've already got a separate area ready to veg Mom and clones. I'll take my LED/CFL setup to the veg area, and install my 400w HPS to flower the other three.

They're droopy, but what do you think of my babies?

Before transplant:



After transplant:



...and other than a case of Heineken, some groceries from my Local Organic grocery store and other odds and ends, today's purchase for the forseeable future:



Happy Birthday to my girl who will be the one who smokes the weed she wanted me to grow, and Happy 420 to everyone else!

-spek

Put the larger pots in the tent, and re-sorted things a bit.

Had to raise the LED quite a bit, but needed to lower my CFL hack. Manipulated a couple coat hangers and some electrical tape, dropped my three sets of 6500k CFLs about 2-4" off the perimeter of the plants, and used the UFO tie-ups to velcro my cables to keep everything in place.



-spek

Update 24 hours after my transplant... plants are looking healthier. The droopy one looks a bit better, but I'm sure she'll come full circle. The non-weed plants are obviously a mix of herbs and tomatoes



-spek

spek9 said:

Update 24 hours after my transplant... plants are looking healthier. The droopy one looks a bit better, but I'm sure she'll come full circle. The non-weed plants are obviously a mix of herbs and tomatoes

View attachment 2625450View attachment 2625451View attachment 2625453View attachment 2625454View attachment 2625455

-spek

Click to expand...

That first transplant is full of anxiety isn't it? Then you get through it and you're like "I was psyching myself out over that?" Looks good keep it going!

blowincherrypie said:

That first transplant is full of anxiety isn't it? Then you get through it and you're like "I was psyching myself out over that?" Looks good keep it going!

Click to expand...

Heh, you got that right!

I'm impatient to begin with, so I was watching my plants trying to grow like I'd watch paint dry.

I've calmed down in the last few days, and just let the babies be. I'll water only when they really need, and if they have deficiencies, I'll deal with it then. Otherwise, I'm going to be hands-off from now on

-spek

I'm impatient as well, I'll sit there just staring at them for seems like hours. Hoping they'll turn into monsters over night, haha!

Quick update...

I've learnt something and I'm quite happy this morning. Just before my transplant, I noticed some discolouration on my earliest two plants. I figured it wasn't light burn as the taller plants weren't affected.

I then did some research (external to RIU and by following plant problem type threads), and figured it was lack of nutes. I'm in MG organic, so I figured after ~3 weeks I would have to start feeding.

Well, a few days after transplant, the new soil obviously has started feeding again, and my plants are all green

Now I know what to look for when it comes time to start feeding the nutes I bought.

I'll post pics after work.

Cheers!

-spek

I think it is really true that 24/0 keeps nodes exceptionally tight, and turn to 18/6 if you want a bit of vertical growth.

I'm having a few small issues, but my plants are doing really well. Space between nodes is surprisingly tight. The timing between my babies is erratic, and I've got a business trip coming up, but I think I've got things organized mentally to have separated veg from flower before that.

First pic is of my mom if I keep her alive, the rest of the pics are with everyone situated back in their tent home.



-spek

Three of four are still looking green, but a tiny bit unhealthy and very droopy. This was my fault.

I got my 400w cooltube setup and fan/filter today, so I'm just designing my tent now while having a few margaritas and rye/gingers (Wiser's Deluxe ftw!).

I'm about to throw the HPS and filter/fan in my tent and test out temps, so I brought all my babies out in the sun. As some of you know, I got an MH/HPS lamp setup, but I'll be building a new veg area so HPS will be in the tent.

Here's a couple snaps of my Mother plant... sprouted from soil on the 11th of this month, so 15 days ago. At 0600 MST, she was fimmed (hard to tell by the pics, but it's done!).



-spek

They look great! I want my white widows to look like that!

Few more pics.

Didn't get time to install everything as I have an 'informational session' on *cough* geo-engineering to share with the public tomorrow, so I threw all the babies back in the tent with the LED/CFLs until Sunday.

Although things could be going better in my Miracle Grow, I'm relatively happy with what's going on thus far.



-spek

EDIT: fimmed Mom today. An observant grower might be able to tell

Rigged up my new kit today, 400w and my filter/fan. Thanks GanjaHome for your help

Plants are in the bathtub after a feeding, and so I can run the tent with the new setup so I can monitor temps for a few hours. I'm going to go to an 18/6 cycle with the Halide for one week (then I have a business trip across the country for a week), then I'll start flowering three of my plants and move mom to my new veg area with the LED/CFLs. At that time I'll swap to 12/12 with the HPS.



Plants under the new Halide:



-spek

how was the led?

badways said:

how was the led?

Click to expand...

I think it works very well, especially supplemented with the CFLs.

This is my first indoor grow though, so I had a lot of trouble getting used to the soil/indoor.

After I get mom moved into a new veg/cloning area, I think I'm going to put those under CFL only, and have another separate area to do another test straight from seed to see if I can do better and create a proper, more experienced baseline on the LED by itself.

-spek

spek9 said:

Rigged up my new kit today, 400w and my filter/fan. Thanks GanjaHome for your help

Plants are in the bathtub after a feeding, and so I can run the tent with the new setup so I can monitor temps for a few hours. I'm going to go to an 18/6 cycle with the Halide for one week (then I have a business trip across the country for a week), then I'll start flowering three of my plants and move mom to my new veg area with the LED/CFLs. At that time I'll swap to 12/12 with the HPS.

View attachment 2635311View attachment 2635312View attachment 2635313

Plants under the new Halide:

View attachment 2635358View attachment 2635359View attachment 2635360

-spek

Click to expand...

Great setup bro!! ur ladys looks really good... keep it up!! BTW change the title to HID 400W MH/HPS instead of CFL