mutton
Member
Hello fellow CFL growers. This is my 2nd attempt at growing weed ever; so any advice would be appreciated, although it all seems fine to me so far. I have grown many other plants but never weed and it seems pretty easy compared to many other plants.
I am growing one Autoflower feminized Blueberry from Dutch Passion seeds and it is exactly 30 days old today from germinated seed.
I have found that 8 x 26w 2700k CFL lights seems to be a good number of lights for this plant and gives me a total of just over 200 watts all added up which from what I have read should be ample for one plant.
I have cool air blowing in from the bottom of my cabinet (which is 2ndhand and cost 10 euros
using a 120mm computer fan and up top I am just using a small 60mm fan (I think thats the size) and it is to exhaust the hot air. So nice cool roots but lots of heat up top around the apical bud. I have had a few heat issues, as 8 x CFLs will still give off plenty of heat but a little tweaking with the fans and it is now very easy for me to raise or lower temps from use of adjustable speed settings on both fans.
I found making reflectors for the CFLs to be a waste of time as the light just reflects of the walls anyway as the cabinet is not that big. Being able to adjust the lights to be totally surrounding the plant seems to be crucial for fast large bud development I can raise or lower or move foward, back, left, or right with each of the 8 lights so each part of the plant has a good light coverage and also allows access to the sides of the buds not just the top.
I had read that you should keep the bulbs 1 inch away from your plants. This seems too close to me , perhaps with just 4 x CFLs you can get away with it but I tried that last night instead of my usual 2-3 inches and the leaves were starting to wilt from the heat...it was not lack of water or ventilation just too close, people saying 1 Inch are taking them too close I reckon. My plant tells me what is a good distance...just listen to your plant it will give you good or bad signs if the light is too close or too far away that seems to be the best strategy working for me .
The yellow marks on my leaves are sweat that I dripped over my plants when trying to wire up the bulbs after making some changes, just goes to show that the leaves are quite sensitive! I have used very very little nutrients thus far, about 8ml of bio liquid nutrient in 30 days, weed does not need much food it would seem in pre flowering state.
I will increase the nutrient addition as the flowers start to fatten.
I will keep this updated on a weekly basis from now on and post pics etc. I hope this will help some other first time growers that may be struggling. This entire set up cost me less that 160 euros to make and that's including the seed.
I am growing one Autoflower feminized Blueberry from Dutch Passion seeds and it is exactly 30 days old today from germinated seed.
I have found that 8 x 26w 2700k CFL lights seems to be a good number of lights for this plant and gives me a total of just over 200 watts all added up which from what I have read should be ample for one plant.
I have cool air blowing in from the bottom of my cabinet (which is 2ndhand and cost 10 euros
using a 120mm computer fan and up top I am just using a small 60mm fan (I think thats the size) and it is to exhaust the hot air. So nice cool roots but lots of heat up top around the apical bud. I have had a few heat issues, as 8 x CFLs will still give off plenty of heat but a little tweaking with the fans and it is now very easy for me to raise or lower temps from use of adjustable speed settings on both fans.I found making reflectors for the CFLs to be a waste of time as the light just reflects of the walls anyway as the cabinet is not that big. Being able to adjust the lights to be totally surrounding the plant seems to be crucial for fast large bud development I can raise or lower or move foward, back, left, or right with each of the 8 lights so each part of the plant has a good light coverage and also allows access to the sides of the buds not just the top.
I had read that you should keep the bulbs 1 inch away from your plants. This seems too close to me , perhaps with just 4 x CFLs you can get away with it but I tried that last night instead of my usual 2-3 inches and the leaves were starting to wilt from the heat...it was not lack of water or ventilation just too close, people saying 1 Inch are taking them too close I reckon. My plant tells me what is a good distance...just listen to your plant it will give you good or bad signs if the light is too close or too far away that seems to be the best strategy working for me .
The yellow marks on my leaves are sweat that I dripped over my plants when trying to wire up the bulbs after making some changes, just goes to show that the leaves are quite sensitive! I have used very very little nutrients thus far, about 8ml of bio liquid nutrient in 30 days, weed does not need much food it would seem in pre flowering state.
I will increase the nutrient addition as the flowers start to fatten.
I will keep this updated on a weekly basis from now on and post pics etc. I hope this will help some other first time growers that may be struggling. This entire set up cost me less that 160 euros to make and that's including the seed.
