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Invisiblemaryanne3087
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Registered: 06/27/10
Posts: 1,111
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: mad capper]
    #513335 - 01/12/11 10:57 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Coco is more soilless than peat is. Peat is more decayed and humus rich where coco is more of a fibrous inert medium. You can witness this a number of ways one way is growing in peat and noticing that the medium breaks down to approx 2/3 the size due to microbial activity (being more soil-like) something I never liked and tried to battle using denser more humus rich additions of worm castings and using additions that wouldn't break down as quickly which lead me to adding perlite and coco and ultimately switching to coco entirely.

Fungi and bacteria which are known as biological chelators do just that chelate and fix nutrients. This is beneficial in terms of yield and avoiding deficiencies but it should also be considered that they increase the uptake of heavy metals which are very present in peat but not so much in coco.

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OfflineChillWillis
old school fool


Registered: 06/14/09
Posts: 2,213
Last seen: 7 years, 3 months
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: mad capper]
    #513337 - 01/12/11 11:12 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

do you make your own nutrient teas?

and pandor since this is your first try you should probably try to keep it simple and use some pre mixed soil made for this hobby.

soil may take longer but it's A LOT more forgiving than other growing media


--------------------

It's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom.

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: ChillWillis]
    #513342 - 01/13/11 12:00 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

I keep thinking I've made up my mind, then I switch back.

ChillWillis, I understand what your saying about soil, and that is why I keep thinking I may go for it.

Isn't it reasonable that a person that has studied and is very attentive can get away with using coco on their first try?

I may just end up going for both. Doing one soil, one coco or something. I may even try hempy style. I am going to decide when I wake up tomorrow. All of these plants are going to be mothers. We germinated 3 feminized seeds for each strain, so all I need is one strong healthy plant from each strain to eventually take clones from in the future.

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Invisiblemaryanne3087
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Registered: 06/27/10
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513344 - 01/13/11 12:35 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Man, coco isn't anything scary. Proper soil growing imo is more intimidating to a beginner. Proper as in building a real soil and not buying FFOF and their line of nutrients which complement their incomplete soil.

Rinse your coco blocks well to make sure you don't have any nasty salt build up. If the texture is shitty add perlite. Keep your pH in check (5.7-6.1) the higher end is better to avoid acidification of your medium (as in it's safer to use 6-6.1 than ~5.7 some use 5.5 and don't have problems). Keep your PPM/feeding strength "low" I use a PPM of 700-840 if you think more is better definitely don't exceed 1100 for constant feeding or you will more than likely lock out nutrients, it's been proven time and time again that slamming your plants with high concentration of nutrients doesn't = more yield. Getting some run off each watering will also benefit the plants greatly as it's a mini flush each watering to avoid salt build up.

FWIW, if you want a worry free soil, build a amended soil and plant into huge fucking pots or better yet a soil bed and you won't have shit to worry about. Small containers and soil is where all the bottled nutrients come into play. This however isn't practical for most people because of transporting large amounts of soil. I think the biggest set back in a grow is pests too which coco excels at over soil 10 fold coco is heaps cleaner.

Time to sleep long day tomorrow, post up any questions and I'll do my best to sort you out.

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: maryanne3087]
    #513347 - 01/13/11 01:15 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

This stuff is all intimidating to me, mostly because I have never done it before.

I have a 4 in 1 soil survey instrument, which was given to me. Not sure how to use it, but I will figure it out.

Tomorrow, I am also going to need to purchase a PH meter for the water. We are using Reverse Osmosis filtered water from 5 gallon jugs.
So once I check the PH in the water, I adjust it using nutrients? I know what PPM and PH stand for and it's been explained to me but it all gets a little confusing.

PH is the potential hydrogen in the water. You don't want it too acidic or basic which is why you test it, and add nutes. PPM is parts per million, and I am not really sure how that ties in to the PH.

Should I buy certain nutes? Or is the clonex OK?
(I am now officially freaking out because I realize I left my notebook at Barnes and Noble yesterday)
I had some notes on nutes. Something like keep it simple with 3 different types.

As far as the coco bricks go, I used to do a cheat and "pasteurize" them with hot water and leave them covered for an hour or so.
I do remember coco being very clean and that's why I would love using it again.
This was with the mushrooms, I'm sure it's different with plants. But I remember rarely, almost never having contamination issues.
I was thinking about making one brick, rinsing it like you suggested, and adding either perlite, vermiculite, or both. Our tap water is pretty shitty here so I'm not sure if I should be worried about the rinse.

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction, Maryanne. Always look forward to hearing from you.

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Invisiblemaryanne3087
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Posts: 1,111
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513348 - 01/13/11 01:48 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

You're in luck. Insomnia strikes again, I'll be online until the medication kicks in.

If you're using RO the people you're purchasing it from should be able to tell you what PPM the water is if it's close to 0 ppm it should have a neutral pH since distilled water or pure H2O = 0 ppm and a pH of 7.

For pH you really only need to pH after you've added nutrients before adding nutrients isn't really relavent, if you're always using RO water you could probably get away with formula mixing just using the same mix each time. Checking for my reservoir is easy because I invested in a Bluelab Guardian which tells me the temp, pH, and EC/ppm/tds of the water which is handy because it can drift.

PPM is a conversion of Electric conductivity to assess the hardiness of water or the concentration of nutrients in our case. If you've got the money I'd suggest buying one of these also.

I don't know about the Clonex product, it sounds like it's for seedlings. I personally use General Hydroponics Flora series or Floranova. The Floranova is a one part nutrient and is fairly easy to use you I don't know if I will continue with the Floranova after I run out and currently I'm just trying to use it up so I switch between doses of Floranova and Flora Micro + Bloom which is a consistent mix and seems to be more pH stable. Mixing 2 bottles isn't very complicated either considering some growers mix 10 sometimes 20 different products to achieve similar or worse results. I'd suggest buying a bottle of Flora Micro and Bloom and using 6 ml micro, 9 ml bloom for full strength and clonex should do you good until you can feed this formula. I can tell you that using RO water and 6/9 formula you will be bang around the money for pH, you may even be able to get away with just buying a $10 dropper pH kit and testing it once to make sure your pH is in the right range.

Rinsing with tap water shouldn't be a worry unless you have like 1000 PPM tap water, even then it's probably loaded with calcium and Magnesium and the excess will just get flushed away when you water with your nutrients. If you buy a good brand of coco you can get away without rinsing but I never really trust it, if your coco is a bad batch which can happen with any company and the salt content is too high your roots will basically stop growing once transplanted into it and you likely won't noticed for a week or so since that's the expected time for transplant shock and then you're either set back big time or you lose your plants. Happened to a friend of mine on a rather large grow with Canna coco. Your criteria for selecting coco is texture and low salt content basically if you got that sorted you're good.

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Offlinemad capper
old head
Male


Registered: 01/02/11
Posts: 30
Last seen: 12 years, 6 months
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513368 - 01/13/11 10:55 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Pandor take a look at organics for beginners its a great thread. I have always done organic and harvested plenty of great nugs without worrying about PH. It really simplifies things. A soilless mix with worm castings and dolo lime have more than served me well ,especially if i use Nitron A 35 and superthrive. The water youre using is perfect for organics. Give yourself a break and start slow. Also i think that clonex you have is cloning hormone to soak rockwool or your medium when you have clones or seedlings.


--------------------
*constantly choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil ~ jerry garcia*

Mad Capper's Moonshine Tek under construction lol

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: maryanne3087]
    #513478 - 01/13/11 08:22 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

maryanne3087 said:
You're in luck. Insomnia strikes again, I'll be online until the medication kicks in.

If you're using RO the people you're purchasing it from should be able to tell you what PPM the water is if it's close to 0 ppm it should have a neutral pH since distilled water or pure H2O = 0 ppm and a pH of 7.

For pH you really only need to pH after you've added nutrients before adding nutrients isn't really relavent, if you're always using RO water you could probably get away with formula mixing just using the same mix each time. Checking for my reservoir is easy because I invested in a Bluelab Guardian which tells me the temp, pH, and EC/ppm/tds of the water which is handy because it can drift.

PPM is a conversion of Electric conductivity to assess the hardiness of water or the concentration of nutrients in our case. If you've got the money I'd suggest buying one of these also.

I don't know about the Clonex product, it sounds like it's for seedlings. I personally use General Hydroponics Flora series or Floranova. The Floranova is a one part nutrient and is fairly easy to use you I don't know if I will continue with the Floranova after I run out and currently I'm just trying to use it up so I switch between doses of Floranova and Flora Micro + Bloom which is a consistent mix and seems to be more pH stable. Mixing 2 bottles isn't very complicated either considering some growers mix 10 sometimes 20 different products to achieve similar or worse results. I'd suggest buying a bottle of Flora Micro and Bloom and using 6 ml micro, 9 ml bloom for full strength and clonex should do you good until you can feed this formula. I can tell you that using RO water and 6/9 formula you will be bang around the money for pH, you may even be able to get away with just buying a $10 dropper pH kit and testing it once to make sure your pH is in the right range.

Rinsing with tap water shouldn't be a worry unless you have like 1000 PPM tap water, even then it's probably loaded with calcium and Magnesium and the excess will just get flushed away when you water with your nutrients. If you buy a good brand of coco you can get away without rinsing but I never really trust it, if your coco is a bad batch which can happen with any company and the salt content is too high your roots will basically stop growing once transplanted into it and you likely won't noticed for a week or so since that's the expected time for transplant shock and then you're either set back big time or you lose your plants. Happened to a friend of mine on a rather large grow with Canna coco. Your criteria for selecting coco is texture and low salt content basically if you got that sorted you're good.




I'm a little confused because all the posts I have been reading about nutes. The floranova series is recommended often but mostly I read that people are using "grow" for veg and "bloom" for flower with "micro" as more of a supplement. Are you telling me I should skip the "grow" ?

I am transplanting the seedlings tonight. Wanted to buy the nutes today too but as of right now, I am just too confused. Maybe I will just give them low doses of the clonex for now.

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513492 - 01/13/11 08:58 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

I just bought the floaranova grow, bloom, and micro.

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Invisiblemaryanne3087
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Registered: 06/27/10
Posts: 1,111
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513538 - 01/14/11 02:01 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

whoa whoa whoa...

I hope you didn't buy Floranova Grow, Floranova Bloom, and Flora Micro...

Floranova grow = single part for Veg
Floranova Bloom = single part for bloom
Flora Micro = 1 of 3 parts as the base component that contains micros/nitrogen/etc not very useful on it's own.

It would basically be either Floranova or Flora Micro + Flora Bloom... Using both isn't useful.

Since the single parts are self explanatory...

When using the Flora series you have the Grow component, Micro component, and the Bloom component. The Micro is the back bone for lack of a better analogy you could call it the meeting grown for Veg and Bloom, it contains what is essential throughout your grow and the Bloom and Grow components are to tailor the mix to the veg and bloom needs of a plant. There's a lot of consensus that plants needs don't change much between veg and flowering and that a sensible nutrient profile will nourish your plants throughout their life. The 6ml per gal Flora Micro and 9ML per gal Flora Bloom will give you a sensible nutrient profile that will nourish most if not all plants esp when grown in coco. A couple of breeders over at ICMAG.com actually use this formula to grow all of their strains with seemingly no problems at all, I modify my nutrient regiment to include more potassium, calcium, magnesium and silica and less phosphorus.

Opps, wrong this out and didn't hit post for a while :P

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Offlinegrbrlt
Kenny fuckin' Powers


Registered: 11/27/10
Posts: 66
Last seen: 12 years, 22 days
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: maryanne3087]
    #513556 - 01/14/11 06:19 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

maryanne is right your speaking of two lines of products from one manufacture you need to pick one, flora or floranova not both, you will get nutrient problems if you use both. Only the additives or supplement can be added to either flora or floranova and if your ph is 7 to start better get some ph down you need to start your ph after your base nutes are added and I think that GH nutes are ph balanced  it's been awhile since I used GH nutes.

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Invisiblemaryanne3087
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Posts: 1,111
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: grbrlt]
    #513560 - 01/14/11 07:07 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

pH of 7 + additional nutes will likely make his nutrients too acidic for the record or at least more acidic than my own recommendation.

My pH is like 8, I use the 6/9 formula and end up ugh I can't remember but it's not very far off target then I play with things.

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Offlinekyuzo
Stranger Than Fiction

Registered: 07/05/10
Posts: 981
Last seen: 11 years, 3 months
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: maryanne3087]
    #513574 - 01/14/11 08:41 AM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Mary, are you saying that you don't feel peat needs to be buffered, or that it does need buffered, unlike cocoa?


For the record, I never buffer my peat mix(2 part peat: 1 part chunky perlite:1 part small charcoal)with house plants and never had any issues

Edited by kyuzo (01/14/11 08:42 AM)

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: kyuzo]
    #513604 - 01/14/11 12:06 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Upon closer inspection, I realized that I bought floragrow, floragrow, and floramicro. I did not realize it's not called floranova and I did not realize there are 2 different types.
Hopefully these work out for me. They seemed simplest to use. Also they seemed to be highly recommended throughout the forums.
Upon closer inspection of my new notes, I realize they were recommending floranova, not flora. Did I buy the wrong thing?

So they called for a quarter of a teaspoon from each bottle for seedlings per gallon and that's what I used. I followed the chart on the bottle.

As for the medium, on 4 plants, I used a mix primarily of coco/peat and added a little verm and pearlite. The other 6 I did hempy style.

The pH on my water was a perfect 6.

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InvisibleMagashM
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Registered: 04/21/08
Posts: 6,634
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513626 - 01/14/11 12:51 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)



--------------------
All creatures tremble when faced with violence. All creatures fear death, all love life. If we can only see ourselves in others, then how could we possibly hurt another creature?


:growingweed: Join us at the Growery! :growingweed:

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Magash]
    #513666 - 01/14/11 02:32 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

That's not the same chart that's on my bottle. Should I be using that instead? Mine looks like this.


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OfflineChillWillis
old school fool


Registered: 06/14/09
Posts: 2,213
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513669 - 01/14/11 02:38 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

I'd do what's on the bottle but you'll end up fine tuning it based on what you feel is best for your crop.

it's all about trial and error ime


--------------------

It's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom.

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InvisibleMagashM
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: ChillWillis]
    #513690 - 01/14/11 03:25 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

*****************Micro    Grow    Bloom
Seedlings        1/4      1/4    1/4
late seedlings  1/2      1/2    1/2

Early Veg        1        1          1
Middle            1 1/4    1 1/4    1
Late Veg        1 1/2    1 1/2    1

Early Flower      1 1/2    1      1 1/2
Middle Flower    1 3/4    3/4    1 3/4
Late Flower        2        1/2    2
Finish Flower    2 1/2    1/2    2 1/2-3

Measurements are in tsp per gallon

Flush the last week

This is my personal mix with these nutrients let me know how it works. I had to dig threw mounds of old nutrient testing I've done to find this. :mad:


--------------------
All creatures tremble when faced with violence. All creatures fear death, all love life. If we can only see ourselves in others, then how could we possibly hurt another creature?


:growingweed: Join us at the Growery! :growingweed:

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InvisiblePandor

Registered: 10/01/10
Posts: 503
Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Magash]
    #513693 - 01/14/11 03:42 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

Thanks, Magash.

Here they are today.



What do you consider "late seedling"?

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InvisibleMagashM
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Registered: 04/21/08
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Re: First timer. Critique my germination process and my veg room. [Re: Pandor]
    #513699 - 01/14/11 03:57 PM (13 years, 2 months ago)

:thumbup:


--------------------
All creatures tremble when faced with violence. All creatures fear death, all love life. If we can only see ourselves in others, then how could we possibly hurt another creature?


:growingweed: Join us at the Growery! :growingweed:

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