RDWC + DWC Durban Poison (600W MH/HPS & 600W LED)

Week 2, Day 8 (part 2)

The root explosion continues, with new roots appearing by the hour. The plants also continue to bend back towards the sun so it's continuous bucket lid turning and tying down branches until 3 or 4 main branches form. I see a few starting to form already.

In past grows, the "real" top of the plant, if trained properly, can easily be trained back up so it can stay a top alongside the new tops. I have also "topped"/cut the top off the plants before, but LST gives virtually the same results, at least in my experience, and that's my plan for this grow.

The PPMs have started to drop a little, and the PH has stopped rising. The plants are taking in the nutes and have slowed down their drinking, it seems! I think I'll leave everything alone (no water addition tonight) and see what the situation is tomorrow.

I have a 17 gallon reservoir with 22 gallons total running through the RDWC system. I have about 3 gallons (or thereabouts) in each 5 gallon bucket, so that gives me 12 gallons in the buckets with 9 gallons remaining in the reservoir. That's a lot of extra water and nutes for the plants--about 2 gallons per plant--to use up before I have to add anything back. If and when that happens, that will be a great sign!

Week 2, Day 9 (Veg Stage)

The plants continue to do very well. All of my tent plants have been bent LST and all have already turned back up towards the light. The sunlit plant is not being bent/LST.

To my surprise and delight, my “window” sunlit plant (although to be fair, it does sit under a CFL for 6 hours) has popped roots. This means all 6 of my clones are now rooted and taking up nutrients. I’m just going to let this thing sit there for the entire grow; I see no need to put it inside of a tent. I think it will be able to provide me with clones in 8 – 10 weeks. I originally purchased the LED light to serve as the mother tent light…but apparently the sun and an old CFL light are enough in a DWC system to get healthy growth. I’ll keep my eye on this plant and if I need to put in inside of a tent, I have one. But so far, no need.

My PPM’s started at 650 after my nutrient/water changeout yesterday, and now my PPM dropped to 615 this morning. The PH has stayed within the 5.8 range. The plants seem happy taking up both nutrients and water.

Looking back on my previous grow journals and my best performing plant PPM levels at this stage of the grow, I realized that my PPMs were too low and I decided to try and bump up my PPM’s to around 800.

I mixed in 50% strength of GH recommended nutrients (I added 40% strength yesterday) to 2 gallons of RO water, mixed, and let sit for a while. I did not PH because I decided to make my system work for me, and to dump the concentrated mixture into my res. I shut off my pump and closed the gravity feedback valve to the close position, so my recirculating system was now a DWC system. I dumped about 1 gallon into the res, mixed, waited, THEN Ph’d. I turned the pump back on, opened the valve, and tested for PPM and PH about 15 minutes later. I had dialed it in to 750PPM/5.82 PH. I added ½ gallon more, and managed to get the entire system to 807; I was shooting for 800 so that about nailed it. As custom dictates, I immediately played Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal” in celebratory victory.

Now that the plants have plenty of water and nutrients at their disposal, I should see continuous growth every day. LST slows things down by about a week, which is why I usually veg for 4 weeks instead of 3, and that’s because not only are the real tops of my plants still growing outwards and upwards, but now all of these little sub/lower node branches are suddenly turning upwards as tops themselves. The plants almost look like menorahs So I have to give them a little time to get some height and sub branches themselves before I start the flowering, but it is well worth the extra time. I now have about 3 – 4 main tops for each plant. Topping does the same thing (and you can get more tops), but LST is just so darn easy, I decided to stick with that method for this grow.

My LED DWC plant looks smaller than the rest, but it is growing. I am completely unfamiliar with LED lights and bought the 600W LED just for vegging a mother, I never intended to grow the LED plant alongside my main system and, as I am now planning, into flower. I really like my MH/HPS lights because I have used them for so long…..but I see people with monster grows using LED lights, and they are so much cooler and less expensive to run, so I am happy to run this little side plant as an experiment. If nothing else, it has already shown me how impressive a 50$ LED light can perform. It makes me want to look more into more professional (expensive!), higher quality lights for a dedicated LED grow.

Week 2, Day 10 (VEG)

The plants continue to explode with root growth. Although it doesn’t look like much from the top foliage due to LST, the roots tell another story.

This LST will certainly add at least an additional week to my veg, maybe more. I have the plants LST’d to just about level now, where the “true” top is level in vertical height with the new vertical branches that have appeared. Once they all start taking off, I won’t need to be bending and tying down as often. The consequence of this constant bending is that the plant has now shifted energy into producing 4 or so new main tops, so I am basically starting a “new” veg cycle for these new main tops, which start off very small.

The benefit, beyond the multiple colas, is that once all of these tops begin to grow level with one another, because the roots are so well established in nutrient rich water, they will grow fast. At about the end of WEEK 4, I’ll probably be ready to flower. I’m basically waiting for each new top to reach 24 - 36 inches in vertical height. They will usually more than double their height once they go into flower in a system like this but this strain is new to me so I have no idea what it will do.

For today, the main system plants alternated between taking in nutrients and water. For the first half of the day, they took in water (PPM rose, PH lowered slightly) then towards the afternoon, they started gobbling up nutrients (PPM lowered) but also water PH remain ever stable: fluctuate from 5.7 to 5.. I noticed that the plants will switch to taking in water after I bend them. After 12 hours of not bending, they will start to take up nutrients. Again, LST is adding to the length of veg as the plants need to adjust their nutrient/water focus to the new shape, but once it adjusts it begins gobbling nutrients.

I bumped my two DWC buckets from 350PPM to 800 range PPM. So now both my main RDWC system and my two DWC buckets are in the low 800PPM range. PH continues to remain stable within the 5.7 – 5.9 range. That’s where I like to keep things for veg. My LED/tent DWC bucket is duplicating the PH/PPM fluctuations of the main system because I am bending it as well. My Sunshine/CFL plant is steadily gobbling nutrients and slowly drinking water because I am letting it grow straight up for the purpose of cutting clones and it's not dealing with the stress of bending.

With no leaks at day 10 and the system running exactly as it is supposed to, I am very impressed with this “beefier” RDWC build. Time will tell if the 1 ½ inch return pipes are large enough to prevent clogging from roots, but beyond that potential annoyance, this extremely basic design (which can easily be enhanced and built upon) is working like a charm. Even in my past grows, I was not seeing roots like this until day 14, so to see it on day 10 is amazing. I am nicknaming this rig the NX-01. My next build will be beefier, better constructed, and more complex. I am working on the design now. Its nickname is, of course, NCC-1701.

Week 2, Day 11 (VEG)


Video Link: https://vimeo.com/user128887500/review/492925319/2a118fed75


The plants are drinking a lot of water. This is a reaction to the LST and explosive new foliage growth of main stems. I am happy to report that I had no need to bend today, although I did go in and prune a few old/dying leaves so resources were not wasted on them and to free up the canopy for lower leaves.

MAIN SYSTEM: The PPM’s have risen slightly and my PH lowered slightly from 8.5 to 8.2. This is how I know the plants are taking in water. The roots continue to explode and the plant foliage, now that it’s all growing in the upwards direction, is stating to flesh out. I predict rapid growth in the leaves and height over the next few days.

I have not had to adjust PH at all; I let it meander from the high 5.7 to the high 5.8 range and it has remained perfectly in balance within that range. I think one reason the plants are drinking a lot of water is due to the low humidity. It’s 20% or lower, even with my humidifier. I have been spraying the foliage with RO water every hour to try and help.

LED/SWC: I think I finally found the right height for the LED light. I had the light MUCH too close to the plant. It seems like that would make sense since you can do that with CFL’s, and these put off about as much heat as a CFL so it would seem sensible to hang it as close to the plant as possible, I think it was a bit too much for the plant, so now I have it hanging much higher and the plant seems to be happy with that. PPM and PH are mimicking my main system.



Sunlit/CFL Plant: This plant is also taking in a lot of water but slowly eating nutrients as well. It is growing tall and bushy. It will give me many nice clones! It also smells nice and skunky.

WEEK 2, DAY 12 (VEG)

Video of Day 12 of RDWC Grow: https://streamable.com/sw0z9t



The plants are really sprucing up and looking fantastic. They spent the morning guzzling water, and then they guzzled some nutrients towards the afternoon, then continued to guzzle water. I have included a few pics of the daily notes that I keep on my levels.

I have pruned some leaves here and there and did a little bending last night right before bed. I continue to mist the the plants every hour with regular RO water due to my low humidity. They seem to enjoy this. My LED plant also is finally looking good now that I have the light at a good height.

The PH is remaining very stable; it fluctuates fractions of point up and down depending on if the plant is drinking or eating (or both).

Tomorrow I will fill my mixing tank with 20 gallons of tap water, turn on the bubblers, and let it sit all day/night. I’ll mix my nutrients into the tank the day of the drain/refill and let it sit for 12 hours before adding it all into my res. I plan on bumping up my nutrient mix to 60% or so recommended nutrient mix, get it into the 900 PPM range or thereabouts.

I ordered a new part for my system that I hope arrives in a few days. If it does, I can install it during my third water changeout in a week. I ordered 4 suction line strainers that fit over 1-1/2" PVC, so I plan to slip them over my drainage pipe inside each bucket to help prevent roots from getting into the pipes.

My Sunshine/CFL Mother is also doing great. I am already salivating at all the clones I see her producing. I definitely want the same genetics for my next grow, using the Lucas formula and one 12$ package of dry nutrients for the entire grow. I’ll di a blind smoke test with friends to see which “grow” they prefer and if “expensive” liquid nutrients really do make a difference.

WEEK 2, Day 13 (VEG)

I fell asleep before posting my update from yesterday:

Things continue to run smoothly, despite some warmer than usual weather. The weather is dropping significantly over the next 10 days by at least 10 degrees so it’s back into prime temp territory, but I was misting the plants every hour today. It may even rain in a few days so hopefully that will raise the humidity.

I continue to bend slightly here and there, not nearly as severely as the first few bending sessions. I am letting the plants flesh out now. One has an almost perfect 90 degree bend with a new, main branch spouting on top (see picture). I have noticed the main stem on all plants REALLY started to thicken up. This is my first grow using silica blast and it looks like it is working.

I have 19 gallons of tap water bubbling away in my 27-gallon mix tank. I’ll mix my nutrients tomorrow morning and then do a changeout towards the evening. Because I am doing a 4 week veg, I am treating this upcoming week 3 as another week 2, and since the plants have been fairly stable in their PPM readings and PH levels, I am going to repeat my 50% - 60% week 2 nutrients for week 3. During week 4, I’ll bump it up to 80% of the recommended week 3 nutrient measurements. Flower begins at the start of week 5.

WEEK 3, DAY 14 & 15, (VEG)

I did my nutrient/water transfer on day 14. Here are the baseline ntrueint mixes, PH, and PPM/EC for this week. I will add plain RO water or nutrient mix based upon the daily changes/needs of the plants.



Main, 4 bucket RDWC system:

WATER: 17 gallons, tap water

PH: 5.81

EC/PPM: 1,571EC/789PPM

Nutrient Mix: 65% strength of General Hydroponics recommended strength level for week 3, including

• FloraMicro
• FloraGro
• FloraBloom
• FloralicousPlus
• BotanicareHydroguard Bacillus Root Inoculant (100% strength)
• Silica Blast (100% strength)
• CALiMAGic (1/8th recommended dosage since I am using tap water)

LED DWC System:

WATER: 3 gallons, RO water

PH: 5.88

EC/PPM: 1,406/708

Nutrient Mix: 65% strength of General Hydroponics recommended strength level for week 3, including

• FloraMicro
• FloraGro
• FloraBloom
• FloralicousPlus
• BotanicareHydroguard Bacillus Root Inoculant (100% strength)
• Silica Blast (100% strength)
• CALiMAGic (100% strength)

Sunshine/CFL Mother DWC Plant:

Water: 4 gallons, RO water

PH: 5.72

EC/PPM: 1,798/836

Nutrient Mix: 65% strength of General Hydroponics recommended strength level for week 3, including

• FloraMicro
• FloraGro
• FloraBloom
• FloralicousPlus
• BotanicareHydroguard Bacillus Root Inoculant (100% strength)
• Silica Blast (100% strength)
• CALiMAGic (100% strength)

This is my first time ever using silica blast/silicone in a grow….and maybe it’s psychosomatic, but I swear the stalks look beefy as hell since I started adding the silica blast to the mix!



WEEK 3, DAY 15 (VEG)

The plants are exploding with growth and are flush with color. Although the tape measure show they are all around 8 inches to 10 inches, keep in mind the stems are bending around in a curve so they are actually longer than they appear from the canopy. The actual stems are closer to 12 inches when using a measuring tape used for inseam measurements.

The length of the plant is important because it will triple in size during flower, and from what I have read from other journals and reviews of Durban Poison, these will stretch more than that. So I need to really be careful on how big I let them get during veg. I usually consider veg when they get to be 18 inches – 24 inches. Any taller than that and it’s risking outgrowing my light, which has happened before in past grows. Keep in mind that if I had allowed these to grow straight up, I’d have foot tall Christmas trees in there, but they look smaller due to my bending them over. So it could be a week, it could be more, but the overall length and bushiness/width will determine for me when to begin flower….and I am still a few inches away from that.

As expected, the GH nutes stained my beautiful roots. I freaked out the first time this happened years ago and thought my plants were dying….now I now better. The plants communicate very well when they are having problems; right now they are communicating they are extremely happy.

As the nutrient mix settled in overnight with the plants, they sucked up some water. The PPM/EC was higher and continued to rise all day. I added a gallon and a half of RO water to the reservoir which brought the PPM/EC mix to their original range, and that’s how I plan to manage my res this grow. If the PPM/EC continues to rise, I’ll lower the PPM/EC even more with my next top off, until it balances itself out, or I see the EC/PPM fall…then I add nute water.

My biggest surprise continues to be this 6 year old CFL bulb/sunshine mother plant that is just about 12 inches tall now and already sporting at least 5 or 6 future clones I am greedily watching grow before me. Not only did I never expect the initial shrimpy clone to survive in my hastily built bubble bucket, but it seems to be doing just fine without the—stuck in the mail-- 24"x24"x48" mother cab I have been waiting for.

WEEK 3, DAY 16 (VEG)

Main System: I continue to bend and the plants continue to grow. They continue to drink a lot of water. The PPM/EC/PH are remaining relatively stable.

LED DWC: I am so happy with how this plant is turning out. This one is gobbling water and nutrients.

Sunshine/CFL: Still growing up; I had to move the light up a rung on the chain.



I am now considering starting flower at the beginning of week 4. The plants are fleshed out and healthy, and I think in a few days they will be the perfect height and width to begin the flower stretch. I’ll hold it a few days more if necessary, but based on what I have seen over the past 2 days, I don’t think I’ll be going into a 4 week veg anymore.

for some reason it didnt notify me u updated shit. Them roots look nice and the girls are looking healthy. <3

ikushy420 said:

for some reason it didnt notify me u updated shit. Them roots look nice and the girls are looking healthy. <3

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Thanks! They are so bushy today, it has solidified my decision to start flower starting week 4. Other DP grow journals talk about an aggressive stretch during flower and the LST tops are fully established and strong

My mother is also producing a lot of future clones, and I ordered my bag of 12$ dry GH nutrients I will use for the next grow, comparing the same genetics with a back to backngrow using bare minimum nutrients vs. the full GH lineup.

WEEK 3, DAY 18 (VEG)

Main System: Plants continue to explode with growth. It’s getting very bushy all around. I think I will start my flower in 3 days at the start of week 4 as the main system plants are just about ready to go. Or should I give them another week?

LED DWC: This plant has just about caught up to the main system. It isn’t quite as bushy, but it is very healthy. Also going into flower at the start of WEEK 4 if the main system starts flower.

Sunshine/CFL Plant: Holy cow, this thing has taken off. It now stands at about 14 inches!



As has been noted in several of the Durban Poison grow journals I have read in preparation for this grow, this strain really likes a lower PPM/EC range and this has been very true for this grow. I am using 60% of the recommended nutrient mix as is, and the plants continue to drink water and prefer to be in the LOW 800 range. This is true for the plants in my DWC as well as the RDWC system. By adding RO water and bringing them to a low 800 level, they are completely happy and I can ignore the PH until my next water changeout. In fact, I haven’t adjusted the PH since the last water changeout. I’ve just added RO water and/or nutrient mix to get the PPM/EC to where I want, but no PH has been needed. Low 800's seems to be the sweet spot for this veg stage.

I will assess the situation in three days and make a decision on flower. This strain is reported to be incredibly stretchy, and I think my small bushes are just about there.

Subbed. I ordered Durban poison but it got confiscated...

Anonymousm0nkey said:

WEEK 3, DAY 18 (VEG)

Main System: Plants continue to explode with growth. It’s getting very bushy all around. I think I will start my flower in 3 days at the start of week 4 as the main system plants are just about ready to go. Or should I give them another week?

LED DWC: This plant has just about caught up to the main system. It isn’t quite as bushy, but it is very healthy. Also going into flower at the start of WEEK 4 if the main system starts flower.

Sunshine/CFL Plant: Holy cow, this thing has taken off. It now stands at about 14 inches!



As has been noted in several of the Durban Poison grow journals I have read in preparation for this grow, this strain really likes a lower PPM/EC range and this has been very true for this grow. I am using 60% of the recommended nutrient mix as is, and the plants continue to drink water and prefer to be in the LOW 800 range. This is true for the plants in my DWC as well as the RDWC system. By adding RO water and bringing them to a low 800 level, they are completely happy and I can ignore the PH until my next water changeout. In fact, I haven’t adjusted the PH since the last water changeout. I’ve just added RO water and/or nutrient mix to get the PPM/EC to where I want, but no PH has been needed. Low 800's seems to be the sweet spot for this veg stage.

I will assess the situation in three days and make a decision on flower. This strain is reported to be incredibly stretchy, and I think my small bushes are just about there.

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Goodluck

cirE said:

Subbed. I ordered Durban poison but it got confiscated...

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That sucks!!! I have not grown from seed yet since, in a legal state, clones are cheap and readily available. 6 Durban Poison clones cost me a total, after tax, of 80 bucks. They were just about 10 bucks a piece. Hopefully, when you do get seeds, you can stash a mother to the side so you can have reliable genetics ready to go.

Anonymousm0nkey said:

That sucks!!! I have not grown from seed yet since, in a legal state, clones are cheap and readily available. 6 Durban Poison clones cost me a total, after tax, of 80 bucks. They were just about 10 bucks a piece. Hopefully, when you do get seeds, you can stash a mother to the side so you can have reliable genetics ready to go.

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I'm in California, but the closest place I've heard that sells clones is 3 hours away. I was planning on making my own seeds to keep a supply up because I Have a small tent and keeping a mother wont work for me right now. Eventually I'll get Durban poison. I've even told my wife i wont buy Durban poison bud until I grow it because I dont like any of the dispensaries around here. Then again the closest one is an hour away so maybe that's why I get upset Having to pay so much. Lol.

cirE said:

I'm in California, but the closest place I've heard that sells clones is 3 hours away. I was planning on making my own seeds to keep a supply up because I Have a small tent and keeping a mother wont work for me right now. Eventually I'll get Durban poison. I've even told my wife i wont buy Durban poison bud until I grow it because I dont like any of the dispensaries around here. Then again the closest one is an hour away so maybe that's why I get upset Having to pay so much. Lol.

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How much is an oz of DP in the shops there?

bernie344 said:

How much is an oz of DP in the shops there?

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$350 according to weed maps. I havent gone in and checked since they Are over an hour away.

Wow thats top $ I was paying 260 in our $ here.
Thats about $200 in real money.

That's more than all my grow equipment minus seeds lol.

I don't think I've ever purchased DP bud; I do, however, always snatch a DP vape if they are in stock.