Rubbermaid CFL grow - First Attempt

Hello everyone,
I am attempting my first CFL grow -- Rubbermaid style. A little ghetto so far I admit, but its what i had to work with at this time.

Rubbermaid tubs are 28inch L x 39inch H x 21inch W in dimension. I have a 6inch duct fan on the top for exhuast, aswell as a 1.5inch computer fan. I have a 3 inch computer fan at the bottom for intake, aswell as a 3 inch square passive hole, aswell as "drilled" holes. I have reflective mylar to line the inside with, just havent got around to it yet.

For lighting, I am running a 200watt Sunblaster 6400K CFL w/reflector for the main light(have 2700K bulb aswell) and 3 40w CFL, and 3 23Wcfl, all of 2700K color temperature. As the plants grow more mature, i hope to add 120w more once i can raise the middle light.

Growing inside:
2 Lowryder #1
4 Thai haze x Skunk (they are in this setup simple for temporary seedling veg)
10 Russian Rocket Ruel Automatics
6 random "Short Mixed Automatics" from Short Stuff Seed bank (surprise bag style!)

All are started in 4inch pots. soil mix is roughly:
4 parts Schultz Potting Soil Plus
2 parts perlite
2 parts vermiculite
added Domolite lime

My goal is to *hopefully* harvest 50 or more grams of dried, smokeable buds. The Thai Haze can be excluded from this setup as they are merely temporary in this box.

I have a 400w HPS w/lumnatek ballast at my disposal too, but its use hasnt been as practical in my last grow, difficulty in controlling temps, high-intensity orange light leaking from window, etc. So it will be collecting dust until I find a more practical way about using it. so all CFL for now! We'll see how she goes, wish me luck!

P.S. sorry for the long post and poor picture quality at this time (blackberry). I just figured it was easier to explain it all first before i ask the many questions I am sure to ask in the future, lol

What are the temps in there?

Schultz Potting UMM, it already includes perlite or vermiculture, 1 of those. or both.

Temps range from 78-86 degrees F, they generally float around 82F. If they start going a litle high i suually jsut crack the window in the same room open, and the cold winter air soon cools down the room to more optimal temperature.

Yes schultz already has atleast Perlite in it, however, without mixing my own soil, it didnt seem to have sufficient drainage for my liking. It made watering a mess, no matter how slow you poured, it would just "sit" on the top of the soil, hardly drain through.

I live in Nova Scotia, Canada --Finding any soil BETTER than Schultz at this time of year seems to be nearly impossible.

While all the seeds weren't thrown into the soil all at the same time (they didn't all germ at the same rate), im just using the average day for my day count.

This is day 13.
since planting, ive had 4 not make it for various reasons, so i had room to throw 2 of my flowering lowryder in the tub to fill the space.

I was wondering when i should transplant to bigger pots, I wanted to wait until sex was visible but ive read with Autos, that can cause alot of stress in a short life cycle. This may seem to be true, because my lowryders are substandard and i repotted on first sign of sex.

I never realized how much mylar relfects HEAT along with light, raises temps average 2 degrees in my set up.

The mylar is raising the temps to 82-87F degrees. How much am i sacrificing if i remove it? 82F was the HIGHEST temp without it.

Removed the mylar, temps down avg 3 degrees F. Going to line the tubs with white bristol board, or white mylar-poly tarping to see if that helps resolve the heat issue. Russian Rocket Fuel appear to be very chlorine sensitve, i ran out of bottled water on my last 2 plants, so i used tap water instead. both had "nutrient burn" type stress the following day.

Heres an update. Approximately DAY 20

• The pic of the bud is all that what remains of those 2 lowryders I harvested. Yield was 10.2g dried and cured, LOL! Poor yield, but a fun grow, and a surprisingly hard hitting high, relative to some of the complaints Ive heard .
• Out of the 8 under the HPS, 5 are confirmed females. Ive already removed several males. Russian Rocket Fuel has had a predominance for male so far. Not impressed.
• The male picture is a Lowryder male jsut chillin' by the window in my living room with a dome over him. I am going to either breed Lowryder seeds with my lowryder female, or cross it with a russian rocket fuel, jsut for some seed stock.
• The 2 tiny sativa-looking plants are Thai Haze x Skunk

I use both my rubbermaid CFL growbox and the 400w HPS in my closet right now, until i pick out the strongest females for keeping in the box.

Just planted 5 Short Stuff #1, have 3 Indian Skunk (tiny ass seeds! not germinated after 2 days hmmmm(seedsman seeds) )

P.S. Not many people respond to this forum is basically just a growlog for my own sake LOL

GardenKing said:

Heres an update. Approximately DAY 20

• The pic of the bud is all that what remains of those 2 lowryders I harvested. Yield was 10.2g dried and cured, LOL! Poor yield, but a fun grow, and a surprisingly hard hitting high, relative to some of the complaints Ive heard .
• Out of the 8 under the HPS, 5 are confirmed females. Ive already removed several males. Russian Rocket Fuel has had a predominance for male so far. Not impressed.
• The male picture is a Lowryder male jsut chillin' by the window in my living room with a dome over him. I am going to either breed Lowryder seeds with my lowryder female, or cross it with a russian rocket fuel, jsut for some seed stock.
• The 2 tiny sativa-looking plants are Thai Haze x Skunk

I use both my rubbermaid CFL growbox and the 400w HPS in my closet right now, until i pick out the strongest females for keeping in the box.

Just planted 5 Short Stuff #1, have 3 Indian Skunk (tiny ass seeds! not germinated after 2 days hmmmm(seedsman seeds) )

P.S. Not many people respond to this forum is basically just a growlog for my own sake LOL

Click to expand...

looking good so far! have you thought about elevating the plants on something(box, books ect) to get them closer to the cfls? I'm on my first grow also, and throughout my research it seems w/ the cfl's the closer they are they better! Good luck & happy growing -PirateSmoker

p.s. how are you germinating the seeds? I had some that didnt wanna sprout... i put them in a sealed tupperware box in grow cab, and with the elevated temps in there they took off

piratesmoker said:

looking good so far! have you thought about elevating the plants on something(box, books ect) to get them closer to the cfls? I'm on my first grow also, and throughout my research it seems w/ the cfl's the closer they are they better! Good luck & happy growing -PirateSmoker

p.s. how are you germinating the seeds? I had some that didnt wanna sprout... i put them in a sealed tupperware box in grow cab, and with the elevated temps in there they took off

Click to expand...

Funny you should mention rasiing the plants! the only reason i ahdnt in the first place is because i had too many in there when i first started and not enough books! But just moments ago after i posted i just 4 slice black n decker toaster box in my storage closet, fits perfect and brings them 4 inches from the lights now, should see some increased growth.

As for how i germinate them, i place them in papertowel and spray them with a water/super thrive solution. Has always worked for me. These indian skunk seeds might just be stubborn or slow poppers, well see!

What strain is it that you are growing?

GardenKing said:

Funny you should mention rasiing the plants! the only reason i ahdnt in the first place is because i had too many in there when i first started and not enough books! But just moments ago after i posted i just 4 slice black n decker toaster box in my storage closet, fits perfect and brings them 4 inches from the lights now, should see some increased growth.

As for how i germinate them, i place them in papertowel and spray them with a water/super thrive solution. Has always worked for me. These indian skunk seeds might just be stubborn or slow poppers, well see!

What strain is it that you are growing?

Click to expand...

Right on random boxes have never been so useful to me!

The strain I'm growing, I'm not too sure of - it's some pretty dank Alaskan bag-seed, the plants are good, but the dude i get it from has no clue about curing properly - so I'm interested to see how it turns out.... if it keeps growing and everything goes well

Good luck man!

Just a few points i've noted along the way.

• Lowryder will take a beating from Mike Tyson.
• Russian rocket fuel out of 10 seeds, 10 germinated, 3 males, one died from cancer mutation and also may have been hermie, 2 hermies, 3 female, 1 undetermined.
• Short Stuff #1 have tend to have 100% germ rates, however, 2 out of 10 sprouted seeds tend to have yellow damaged, or even a MISSING cotyledon upon first pop. Half of these mutated tend to survive and thrive.
• Having 2 seperate mini grow areas has great advantages to my setup. It allows me to only pick the strongest females to keep in the Rubbermaid box