If I am using a drip system, do I have to worry about root rot? Has it ever been a problem for you?
Depends on your media. If you try to drip feed an absorbent medium like rockwool, yes- you're asking for trouble. Never been a problem for me as I've never tried to drip feed RW. I have run drip feed on plants in pots of clay pellets some years ago. I abandoned drip feeds because of the tendency for drippers to clog with nute salts. Any advantage the method has is lost when a plant dies from a clogged dripper.
My plants are about 4 to 5 inches tall and the leaves are starting to droop down and have a light green color coming on. Some leaves are starting to fold upward like a taco. What should I do? I read some where that it could be root rot but I wanted to ask a Pro.
If you can get a look at the roots, your answer will be plain. If the roots are brown, you have root rot. I don't know what your media is and so can't comment any further.
Isn't Canna a soil specific nutrient solution?
Canna are mainly engaged in selling hydro nutes, but they do sell a soil-specific nutrient at present (but only outside of Australia) called 'Canna Terra'. If using soil, that's the stuff. Terra deliberately does not have some micronutrients which will be found in any good potting soil. Canna Terra thus isn't suitable for inert media.
For many years, all Canna sold was a hydroponic nutrient, intended for use with inert media like RW floc or pellets. That particular goo is now called "Canna Substra," and to my knowledge, it's now only available in Australia. It does include micronutes which don't exist in inert media.
They also sell a nutrient designed for coconut coir (Canna Coco) and another called "Canna Aqua" (outside of Aus) which I believe is suited for any recirculating hydro system with inert media.
Thanks for the answers Al, much appreciated.
Funnily enough I bought a cooltube a good few years back and stupidly thought a normal 4inch inline fan would be powerful enough to draw the heat from around the bulb. I noticed a bronzing on the shade after about 2 hours use and got paranoid so removed it and went back to normal shade. Oh if I only knew then what I know now.
Anyhow, I have every intention to purchase one of the AAW'S asap.
Thanks again.
It really doesn't take much air volume through a cooltube to make them work OK. However, long ducts (more than about 3m) or those with lots of bends will not work well with axial fans. However, I can see as how a 100mm (4") computer type fan wouldn't be anywhere near enough air for a cooltube, even with a single 400 in it.
I use an Allvent model A60, 150mm axial blower rated at 192CFM for my pair of cooltubes in series. Works fine for a pair of 1000HPS. I have just two 90 bends in my cooltube line and it is almost exactly 3m from fan to duct outlet.
My pair of 1000s in series cooltubes' outlet air temp runs about 12C higher than the intake air temp. The glass surfaces stay plenty cool enough to lay your hand on them, even with a 1000. Cool glass means the heat is going out with the cooltubes' exhaust air instead of being convected into the room's airmass. Never should they get so warm that you can't lay your hand on them, much less get hot enough discolour metals.
You were right to stop running it the way you were. Would have damaged the lamp tube, socket or other bits. Get a decent axial blower of the same diameter as your cooltube and she'll be right.
I swear I remember seeing a DIY article on how to attach a DIY batwing reflector to a cooltube.
Can anyone point me to that?
Cooltubes usually have two hanging points, a couple of pressed-in
pem nuts fitted into the aluminium collars on the ends of the glass tube, designed for a couple of screweyes. Just drill 2 holes in the batwing to suit the spacing of the pem nuts on the cooltube and run the screweyes through those. Too easy.
HEY AL. B FUCT, sorry bout the caps wanted you to see this lol. i have to admit that your way of cloning is the BEST. i admit i tried the old keep the 99%humidity and wet all the time and my clones all burnt up and turned yellow, i started foloowing your method with those clones and also cut more to your way and the new cuts caught up to the old ones in root size. THANK YOU very much. that cloning method is the SHIT hands down
Good.
Glad that's worked out for you. You wouldn't believe how many ppl over the years who have tried to tell me that I'm some sort of nutter, that'll never work, etc. Criticisms have
always come from ppl who believe grow guides (of any vintage, including Uncle Bob's 1972 Yippie Underground grow book) are bibles and their authors have never once gotten anything wrong... and naturally haven't tried my methods themselves.
I can walk you through different editions of Ed Rosenthal's and Jorge Cervantes' books from over the years and point out numerous places where they contradict themselves. To be fair- newer editions of any grow book
should have corrections- and as such, growers should buy the latest & greatest - and
burn the old ones!
The proof of the pudding is independent replication- which you've just done, with obviously good success. You're also not the first person to tell me they have much better success with my cloning methods than with traditional 'sauna' methods. Here's some comments from the rep points thingie:
Your reputation on this post is Extremely Positive.
Comments on this Post:
* good clone forum... bet you've helped alot of people
* most informative
* Fucting brilliant!
* Al thankyou so much for your clone info i have the most trouble with clones and know you told me they should be like 25-30gr thankyou
* Nicely done. This will help a lot.
* dude thanx again! My clones finally came out perfect!
* nice clone info
* this is the kind of knowledge with great pics that are essential for the young grower like me
* incredible cloning howto
* Awesome thread!!!
* Great Info man....
* Great detail on the clones!
* very nice man
Simple as this, I don't write anything that I can't prove,
particularly when I am defying conventional wisdom or contradicting well-known grow book authors. I'd be wasting my time and yours. Getting bad info from yahoos on pot forums is easy. Getting better info from a pot forum than the grow books is unusual- and ppl are right to be sceptical, but I'd take the scepticisms more seriously from people who would just have a try before spewing off.
I don't have the latest from Ed & Jorge at this moment, but I would not be surprised to see that they include similar methods to mine- or if they don't now, will in upcoming editions.
Al, this question is a tad off topic but I figure you're in the prefect position to answer it.
How much weed does it take you to get high?
The reason I ask is cuz you have a large, steady supply of quality weed and from what I've read, smoke quite a bit of it. The reason I ask is becuase I see these medicinal grow videos where these guys have 40plant+ gardens and it's ALL PERSONAL. This one guy said he'd have 4ozs off each plant w/ 47 plants and that was BARELY enough "medicine" to last him four months. I don't see how these MM patients go through so much weed.
4oz x 47 plants = 188oz. To smoke 188 oz in 4 mos (120 days) means that person is using 1.56oz/day.
If you're making brownies or cannabis cookies, it's reasonable to use much more than one would use if smoking- but 1.5z/day is just wacky. You'd be
quite ill (rapid pulse, dizziness, sometimes paranoia, general yucko feeling) if you tried to eat a batch of brownies with 1.5z of weed in them in one day.
I don't even think it would be
possible to smoke 1.5z in one day, unless there were an awful lot of wastage (i.e huge spliffs).
While cannabis affects almost everyone slightly differently and there is a 'tolerance' effect with chronic use of cannabis, where it takes more bud to produce a suitable effect, it's folks like the one you cite who give med users a bad name.
Cannabis is unique among drugs in that users stop using the drug when they've got a sufficient effect. While one can build some level of tolerance, one doesn't become immune to THC. Even chronic smokers can get a bit of a buzz on if the weed is any good at all.
Anti-drugs campaigners, more familiar with the effects of central nervous system depressants like alcohol and opiates, presume universally that the more of an active ingredient in a drug or compound, the more harmful or dangerous it is. This is a reasonable idea for alcohol and opiates, where high doses are fatal.
THC is a rare exception. Not only is THC totally non-lethal (aspirin has killed many more people- see Reyes' Syndrome), the more THC in a particular sample of cannabis, the LESS the user will smoke. With good buds, it's rare for a smoker to smoke a whole joint at once- they'll usually have a couple puffs and put it out.
Me, I go through about 1/4-1/3 oz a week. I have a cone with my coffee first thing in the morning (4-5am usually) and more cones about every 2-3 hours until bedtime (midnight). I don't get whacked-out spacey kinda high on a cone or two, just a bit lightheaded for about 20 mins. Thing is, I don't LIKE being whacked out. I just need my orthopaedic pains a bit dulled down. A cone or 2 is enough.
Hey al B
Sorry for all the questions but i just love the way you grow =)
Do you think Master Kush would be a good strain for this type of grow?
Choose hybrids which are mainly indica dominant. The breeder's website or the seedbank should tell you.
Hey Al what do you think of The Hempy Collective? I am sure you are familiar with the Hempy buckets. I am a little interested in them now, especially for low budget and ease of use. As of right now, those are the pros that I am looking at. I heard of root rot as a con, but all the users say not true. You are my go to guy, what do you think??
Hempy users swear they do not rot roots. Some have posted pics of seemingly intact rootmasses (though the roots were covered pretty well with perlite, making it impossible to tell what sort of shape they were in).
Being non-recirculating hydroponic systems, Hempy buckets, like wick systems, can't provide the level of root oxygenation that one can apply in recirculating systems. May as well be soil. The greatest oxygenation comes from NFT, DWC and aero systems, where there's no or minimal media, permitting even continuous flooding or watering. Those systems have drawbacks in maintenance and reliability, so systems with some media which can tolerate frequent flooding with freshly oxygenated nute solns without saturating are a good compromise. Systems which use absorbent media which does not tolerate frequent or constant flooding/watering provide the least oxygen to the roots- and will pretty much perform like soil.
