new grow, just have a couple questions

hey all, so i finished my first successful grow about a month and 1/2 ago. it went GREAT and i was sooo stoked!!! it was a single plant grow, done with 110w of cfl. i lst'd and got about a half oz or more. im now doing my next grow, a new challenge, and i need a lil advice. i have 3, unknown strain, seedlings going right now. they are 4 days old and were germinated in MG moisture control. 2 out of 3 look great, but one is a lil limp, should spring back though. my concerns are with lighting, always are. i have 3 23w cfls on them right now, one per, and i know for damn sure thats not enough light to veg them under, but i have a 400w mh ballast, all i need is a bulb and i set. should i veg under CFL or MH? before you answer, i have been growing under cfl because i like short bushy plant they prduce, and i want to keep it that way. i am however going to flower under the MH this time aound and its my first time with HIDs. can i get the short bushy plants i want with the MH like with the CFLs? i do want to clone a little here and there so i cn use my cfls for that, but can i get the plants i want tith the 400w MH? or should i veg under the cfls and then flower under the MH? thanks for all of the help!

oh ya, i dont have the option of running HPS, so i cant go that route, but i know they have conversion bulbs..... an thoughts?

its the light spectrum and strength of the light that make em bushy, or make em stretch, a high Kelvin color (5000K/6500K) that is high in the blue spectrum, is what your looking for in Veg.

I would use the small 23W for the fist few week`s as small seedling don't need much light (keep em close tho, 2-4 inch`s) you safe power and dont burn your small seedling ..

once they have few sets of leaf`s I would trow em in under the MH, but to start with keep em +2ft away and move it closer doing the fist week a little a day

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and yes a HPS in flowering would be perfect as its low in Kelvin (2000-3000K) and produce most red/yellow color spectrum

all we want to do is copy nature, in the spring the Sun stands high on the sky, in a angle that let most blue colors in, in the summer/fall the Sun stand low on the sky and let mostly red/yellow colors in, plants have adapted from thousand of years to this ..

also the Sun will give you 5000-10000 foot candles, 10000 on a clear sunny day, a Veg plant need atleast 3000 and a flowering plant +5000 to do good

and artificial light loose a lot of strength over a short distance

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p.s.

if you really want small bushy plants you should look in to training methods like LST and topping/FIM and scrog and of course grow a strain that is small and bushy like Indica`s not Stavias that can get to +10 ft outdoors

Thanks, wow, GREAT info! ya i cant really do hps unless i can find a converskion bulb, because i dont have the cash for another ballast. But i think ill be able to veg forba few weeks on the cfls, i have 2 more i can throw in. But the mh seems like the way to go. My original plan was to veg fully under cfl then flower under mh. But with 3 plants intead of 1 like last grow, i dont have enough cfls to do what i want. As soon as i see light deficiancies, then ill throw in the mh....

Now my grow room is a little less than half of a 12'x3'x5' closet. So il be working with about 5x3x5, will this amout of room alow me to run the mh without too many issues? I have zero experiance with HID lighting, im a cfl guy. Thanks for all the help. Just trying to get this all dialed in.

Oh ya, i am great with lst, my last plant was lst'd and had about 9 heads on it. I WILL be doing it again this go around.

Conversin bulbs arnt too expensive hit ebay and as far as the mh i start seedlings under mh everytime with no trouble. just keep it high and lower a little each day

Hell ya. Ill look more into a convesion bulb for flowering. An as soon as i get my new grow closet and a mh bulb, ill be doin the switch.