Soil to DWC grow

[drudown11]

Alright so i got a couple of harvests under my belt and I thought I might do some reading and give Hydro a try.

I used to grow at a friends house because he had a place cleared out in the attic and at the time my parents werent cool with it. Well Im dissapointed to say that my friend has a reoccuring problem with smoking Oxy and hes a god damn junkie. All he does is smoke pills, sleep, and take his share when harvest time is there.

So with saying all of that, I grabbed 3 of my best strains, made a DIY DWC, and bolted with my lights.

[drudown11]

Alright so I have 4 plants total. 3 different strains in the DWC and one very special Purple Plant that keep in soil(just to make sure she survives, shes my mother for my outdoor crop) I have 6 5" airstones with 2 under each pot. My pH is very stable and it is usually around 6-6.2. Some of the leaves look a little shitty because I straight washed the dirt off of the roots and put them directly into the hydro. It stressed the shit out of them but they came through and now Im starting to see good growth.

I have a 250 watt Mh/hps that I am currently using(Mh as of right now), but i also have a big t5 fixture that im going to use during flower for the extra blue light. Temperatures stable during night and day(dont know exact temps but It is very mild) and I have a fan in my closet cirulating the air.

Being a newbie at the hydro i have a slight Over dosage on the nutes recently and you can see that in some of the leaves. Hydro is soooooo much more complicated than soil.

One of the pics is of my mother purple in soil. If you wanna stick around until flower ill post pics, it is a very special purple strain. Sometimes when you germinate bag seeds you get lucky i guess.

The last pic is of the Guard dog of the grow. Who am i kidding the only danger your in is being licked to death!

[LOC NAR on probation]

Bring your PH down to 5.8 for hydro.

Looking good for having to move things. Hydro is and can be simple. You'll get the hang of it.

Hope it's a good harvest.

[tinytoon]

I got one of them licking guard dogs too hehe :jointsmile:

[redtails]

Was wondering how they would react to the shock of the crossover...Glad they came through alright. I'd like to see pics once harvest rolls around in like 8 months, plus you gotta think of future generations not having a chance to see your buds lol!

Here's the little guy guarding my garden:

[drudown11]

Was wondering how they would react to the shock of the crossover...Glad they came through alright. I'd like to see pics once harvest rolls around in like 8 months, plus you gotta think of future generations not having a chance to see your buds lol!

Here's the little guy guarding my garden:



keep in mind that This is 2 and a half weeks after transplanting. Trust me they looked like real shit the first week. haha The plant in soil was actually my backup plan just incase the hydro transplant didnt go smoothly. Im just gunna keep her under my t5's when I flower the other girls and keep her as a mom. Shes gunna get LST'd too.

The hardest part for me was getting the nutrients at the right levels. At first it was that the nutes were too high and shit was getting burned pretty bad. Then I had some brown "algae" i was freaing out about. Then I noticed a very big similarity in the color of the big bloom and the color of my roots. Im almost positive that its the big bloom staining my roots so im not too worried.


Im debating whether I should top all of the branches or find a way to LST them. This is a closet and i have to make sure I watch my height.

[drudown11]

Alright so the first one is of the roots obviously. You can see how they are kinda brown. Ive seen root rot before and Im pretty damn sure that isnt it.


The next pic is of the room. I leave the door open most of the time with a fan blowing air out. Growth has realllllly started to pic up.

I want to transfer to five gallon buckets because I feel that things are getting a little crowded. I plan on topping every 4th node on every growing tip. With another month of vegging I will have some god damn bushes!




Also I got another question for some of you. I recently bought some DARK Energy from the hydro store. The lady there talked it up pretty good(she seems to know her shit pretty well ) so I bought a 20$ bottle. It smells like shit and I am being kind of cautious when using it because I cant find much information on it. Has anyone had any experiences with it?

[drudown11]

alright so ive been lowering my ph and keeping it around 5.7-5.9. Since doing that ive noticed an increase in growth. Who woulda knew that a couple of ph points meant that much difference!

I need to invest in a good ph pen. It will give me more accurate readings, because right now Im stuck with the liquid ph test and i have to test 2-3 times just to make sure im getting an accurate reading. Its a pain.

[drudown11]

alrighty here so its been a week and all I can say is WOW. The roots have been becoming huge masses and the plants are growing about an inch per day.

I transfered into five gallon buckets so i could space them out more and have a little more control over the nutrients each plant recieves.


If you look at the picture of the roots from this week and last week(same plant), youll notice a huge increase.

I plan to flower in a week as soon as i get paid. Im gunna get an axial fan with some ducting for ventilation because right now if it a little hot in their i open the door. I come from a family of drywall tapers and electricians so my dad's gunna cut holes and install intake and outake fans in my closet. My closet will then be more equipped to grow pot then to store clothing.

Im also gunna get some botincare sweet and cal mag+.




The other pics is of my mother purple in soil. She is my favorite girl.



If you see the pics of the of some recently finished of my purple plant. It smells very sweet and at week 2 of flower ALL of the buds turn a dark purple. It has a fruity taste and smell when growing but after you cut her down its more of a sweat skunky smell.

all of the strains i grow were origanally bagseed that all bred with each other druing my first grow. With all of the mixing of the strains i grew out the seeds and found this crazy purple stuff. What the hell should i name it?

[LOC NAR on probation]

I'd call it some pretty damn good bagseed.

There are soo many purps. I would call it Blue Blood. Kind of a royalty thing.
Awsome bud.

[drudown11]

The purple plant was a cutting taken from a re vegged female. I feel that i dont get the yield i would like because I dwarfed the damn thing by revegging it. I didnt know that it was purps until the 3rd week of flowering when everybud turned purple, so i waited until harvest, left a few branches on her, and flipped the lights back to 18/6

I would like to order some very high quaility seeds, grow out some big males, and pollinate a few purple buds. I thought that bc bud depot's "god" bud would keep the purpleness of the strain i have but add some veryyy nice genetics as well.


or maybe....... someone on these forums would like to donate some of their own seeds and i can cross the two strains.

The point is I NEED to seed her out and make a new generation. I feel that my from seed females always yield better and grow faster than my clones..

[crf70rider]

name it grape koolaid since purps were originally a african strain and we know all how those african love koolaid expecally grape

[drudown11]

name it grape koolaid since purps were originally a african strain and we know all how those african love koolaid expecally grape

lol you know what it actually kinda has a grape taste to it. I wanted to get some of that botinicare sweet in grape flavor. Who knows maybe it will sweeten ther taste and smell of the buds. If all else fails at least it will make my room and resevoir smell good, because that dark Energy makes it smell like roadkill. Seriously, that stuff smells realllly bad.



Im leaning towards "Koolaide". I like the sound of that one.

[crf70rider]

yeah but they love that stink .... just like bat guano ! ..so are you just runing bubblers in the buckets or do u have a top feed for watering cause i want to start a dwc and was wondering if i could just hand water for the top or does it even need water on top?

[drudown11]

I have 2 airstones at the bottom of each bucket with a 100 gallon pump powering them.

When I do add fresh water to the resevoir I pour it down on through to clay pellets. I do this about once a day. Hand watering it is fine, but in the future i plan to get another pump and make a top feed recirculating DWC.


I am still new to the dwc and i hand water everyday to top off the buckets. Ive had fine results with doing it that way. If i dont top off with water and stablize ph at least once a day, leaves get burned.

[drudown11]

ohh yeah and I flipped the switches on them bitches. ii Popped in the Hps and changed to 12/12. I changed every bucket and gave them my Blend of big bloom, tiger bloom, and dark energy.

Also I ordered Cal Mag +, boticare sweet, and botinicare clearex. I will be using them when they get here.



BUDS ARE ON THE WAY!!

[crf70rider]

well about the ph can i just add nutes to get the ph down or do i need ph down and upand a digital ph tester? and i got a bitch in flower been 10 days on 12/12 you down to trade some product atthe end ?? i heard the mail works only with first class though

[drudown11]

I use a liquid ph tester. It works but its not exactly accurate and sometimes i have to test twice.

I use plain water, after that i add my nutrients. Use half stregthn on the nutes its better to underfertalize than too over fertalize.

My is always ph low, and i only ever use PH UP. I have a bottle of PH down and never use it unless i fuck up(which i try and go slow with the ph down to reduce this) I only really need to the ph up, because over time my ph always rises and i always have to dilute it with water and ph up. Other wise for me, its a constant battle to keep that ph higher than 5


You send me seeds, ill breed and send you back seeds in return.

Im still really cautious about the sending marijuana in the mail . Im sure i would'nt get in caugght but i grow weed and ill always have a little bit of paranoia surronding it. The trtuth is that I have plants growing in 4 different locations and i have a hand in all of it. Im realllllllyyy paranoid. I think it paranoia keeps me honest(and out of jail).

[drudown11]

god damn, IM DRUNK@!!! and i apoligize for any spelling mistakes and for diluting this site with the deadly poison which is alchohol.





If marijuana was legal i wouldnt be drinking this intoxicating poison. But i am weedless in seattle and need to make due.

[drudown11]

some updated pics

[LOC NAR on probation]

You can get by pretty good with no PPM meter but a PH meter is so easy and acurate. I had a couple high dollar ones and they coast too much to keep up. Here's some that I get 2 or 3 at a tme just to have. Give one to a bro when he drops it in the water. LOL.


pH METER (Hand Held) Milwaukee pH600 (http://www.aquariumplants.com/pH_METER_Hand_Held_Milwaukee_pH600_p/pr1408.htm)

Don't forget the calibration solution. and gets some good ph up and down.

Once you use a meter you will wonder how you got by with out it. No muss no fuss.

[Diablo420]

Hey man what is the issue with the leaves, do you know what is causing the yellowing?

[drudown11]

lol There actually is no yellowing at all. I had a Metal halide for veg but because i switched to 12/12 I put a High Pressure Sodium bulb in. It gives off a beautiful orange/yellow glow. These plants are actually reaaalllyy green, but under the HPS they look yellow.


Its all an optical illusion my friend.

[crf70rider]

well i got an ice x master kush seed i have from last years outdoor on branch got seeded but idk i was think about the possibilities Master Ice or some icy kush idk im just waiting for a good setup to bust it out id be in heaven if it is a female

[drudown11]

yeah man for a small one plant grow DWC would be perfect. AFter they establish themselves you will have some god damn trees. (Which
we all love)

[drudown11]

pics

[drudown11]

so theyre about 9 days into flower. Im starting to see buds on each plant and they are stretching INCHES per day.

Bascially i am having to raise the light everyday because theyve almost doubled in size already from the stretch.

[crf70rider]

alright well i got some clones going right now i got 6 im think keep a couple for soil cause i gots a few soil grows uder my belt ...and experament with the other four which are purple widow so wat do i need for a basic setup can i use a little 2-3g toat and use plastic cups with holes for net pods? and set the rockwool in the cups and grow with just rockwool or should i use washed gravel cause i have tight funds but i have a airpump and a toat so do you have any easy setups u could show me ?? id apreciate it cause the club dont have anything thats really bomb and i want to grow some kill for me and who ever helps

[drudown11]

Hydroponics, Indoor Gardening Supplies, Hydroponic Systems - Home (http://www.ecogrow.com)
Hydroponics | HIDHut Discount Hydroponics Supplies and Equipment (http://www.hidhut.com)

Those are some good hydro shops online.
go there, search through some things, and find materials MADE for what you wanna do.


Net pots, hydroton, airstones, Ph up and down will cost you roughly 30-40$.
It might cost you a little bit more money to buy some quality components for your system but in my opinion your wayyyy better off. Hell theyll even ship it too you and you dont have to go anywhere.(or you can go to your local hydro shop and they should have it all too) MAKE SURE YOUR AIR PUMP IS SUFFICIENT. I had a small fish tank one that i had for years and thats what i started with and its shit. I upgraded and spent 50$ on a good one and now i have 3 times more bubbles(and youll learn that in DWC, more bubbles=more oxygen=more growth!) Its the best investment Ive made for my girls.


I suppose you could do the plastic cup thing, but net pots are cheap and i would just spend a couple of bucks and get the real deal. Alright so your 3 gallon jugs will work fine, youll just have to cut holes in the top for the net pots.

I use Jiffy cubes to root all of my clones. I have never used rockwool so i cant give you any advice there. I would just wait until you have some solid roots before you transplant into the hydroton, or whatever medium. (i mean good strong roots, not the ones that are just popping out of the cubes)

[crf70rider]

alright thanks bro the hydroton has me stumped i havent been to a grow shop in a while since the last one burnt me on a switcable ballast dam thing quit after a week of flowering and they gave me a new one that started smoking when i pluged it in ......never did go back i said fuck it but im so interested in the hydro i want a the bigger harvest and all those crystals....its like why screw a whore when you could fuck the virgin next door ...dirt is so dirty i wish there was a way i could just put a needle in a clones stock and shoot it up with the nutes it needs but thats next on the sceintific shit .... i gonna go check out the hydro shop probably tommarow check prices need new nutes and stuff for next grow....i got tons of shit going mothers,clones ,4 flowering plants(1 of thems got 40 days left),shit i got 3 plants outside that look amazing and we got 40f at night and like 57 during the day i wonder if there start budding this time of the year ?

[AquaponicHerb]

good work:rastasmoke:

[drudown11]

i have no problem with growing in dirt.................................. except for the fact that my plants grow twice as fast in the water!

[drudown11]

Here the ladies are week 2 1/2 of flower. They have done quite a bit of stretching but i think that theyre done. Now im starting to see alot more growth going into the buds. I hope theyre done because im running out of height.


I wish my camera was better because i would show you the buds turning purple. Its only on the two plants on the right(the one on the left is a monster that smells like vanilla, shes my best growing strain). By the end of flower they will be the most beautiful shade of purple ive ever seen on marijuana(that ive personally seen and smoked.) Only a couple of weeks and its going to be a NUGFEST!

[drudown11]

I have some t5's that i added to the sides for additional lighting. Im hoping theyll do better with the extra blue light, they should be getting the full spectrum now. I am seeing ONLY bud growth now.






This is where all of the fun begins.

[drudown11]

on the picture of just the cola, if you look at the bottom you can see the buds turning purple

[tinytoon]

nice job!!

oh btw Rockwoll sux. I use to use it but graduated to Rapid Rooters which work real well :thumbsup:

[drudown11]

ok so I bumped the PPM's on them to about 1200. When it gets to about 1300 ppm i notice some burning on the tips of the leaves.

Ive also noticed something about this stuff ive been using Called Dark Energy. Honestly, When i add it to the res i notice a huge increase in growth opposed to when i dont use it. It stinks but it really does rock.

in one of the pics you will see a picture comparing all of the plants. The one in the middle is the same strain(same mother) as the plant on the left. The DWC is easily twice the size than the soil plant, and the clones were taken at the same time.


In the third pic you will see a top cola of my Giant purple plant. Im getting a little bit of burning on the leaves because she sucks so much water/nutes that PPM's jump by the end of the day. Im getting quite a bit of resin starting to frost over. Ive never had this much this early.


The quaility of the Hydroponic bud is way better than anything ive ever grown in soil. I just wish i had a system that had a more stable PH, and PPM. When the girls get big its hard to keep PH and PPM dialed in because they get so thirsty.

[drudown11]

Alright so the guy at the hydro store gave me a sample of Bloombastic. I am very cautious about using it because as you can see in the first pic, it tends to burn the shit out of them when the PPM's spike when Im at work. I definatly noticed a difference though since I put it in the mix. 2 ml per gallon is all you need. Ive noticed increased resin, as well as thicker and chunkier new growth.

Things are starting to fill out in there. You will start to see alot of purple soon. God this is my favorite part about growing marijuana. I just stare at my plants and everything in life is ok for about 10 minutes.

[jtsik330]

wow drudown congrats, the ladies look like they are going to be quite tasty, I'll be keepin an eye out for the purple nugs:pimp:

[drudown11]

There is aboslutely no smell in my house when i have the outtake fan on. when i turn the fan off when i Put Dry Ice in there for co2, my whole house smells like ganja.

My 3 100 watt odor eating cfl's have no effect when i have my plants out of the closet. They work good to mask the smells of vegging and work well when used in conjunction with outtake fans and ventiliation. They dont work well enough to conceal the smell of flowering plants on its own. I wish marijuana was legal so i didnt have to worry about odor. I happen to love the smell

[drudown11]

Just a quick update. Dropped my damn PPM meter in the water. Now its 30 ppm off. God damn an idiot.

Things are getting very heavy, so heavy in fact that you will notice some of the big nugs starting to fall over. I love it when they get so big you have to tie them down.lol

[drudown11]

The Weather has been absolutley beaufiful lately so im gunna take a break and share some things I love besides marijuana.


First one is the pup, doing his damn thing.

second is the raspberry patch starting to show signs of life for the spring, you can see the start of the vegetable garden in the back. me and my old man have just recently been able to work outside tilling the soil.


The third is one a very close relative to my marijuana plants, they are my hops. Cant remember what variety my brother planted, but they are about 3 years old. Theyre just starting to poke out of the ground but as you can see, i have a shit load of them. I still have hops in the freezer from last year and now I have 3 times as many plants.


The last is one of my earlier blooming blueberry bushes. You can already see flower clusters starting to form.



All of these get the remnants of my hydroponic buckets, so theyre all getting fertalized with fox farm nutes.



Summer will be here before you know it.:hippy:

[tinytoon]

hehe maybe next month stuff outside will start growing around here, call for snow in morning again :mad:

[drudown11]

yeah its the great Pacific Northwest. Everyone else is having a crazy shitty winter while we had the best one in years. Not alot of snow, no big wind storms or outtages, and we dont get tornadoes or hurricanes. Its a little gray and rainy in the winter, but the summer's are perfect and there is green as far as you can see. Hell last year we even had some very good pot growing weather.

[drudown11]

camera wasnt working for almost all of flower. I harvest all of my other plants. I got 1 1/2 ounces off of the soil plant, and 3 ounces off of the purple plant. I just cut down the last one today and here she is.

Some of the buds were soo big that they actually fell over and broke this morning, so i had no choice but to cut her down.

That picture with the arizona tea can is actually a 16 ounce can. I love giant colas.


I love hydroponics and have learned so much this grow, but unfortunatly i have to go back to soil for the summer. My mom is gunna quit drinking and try and get her life back together and told me that she would like me to not grow at the house anymore. I have no choice buy to take my clones outside and hydronics isnt an option anymore.

[khyberkitsune]

Outdoor Hydro is an option, actually. :) I have tomatoes going outdoors here in SoCal. You just have to keep up daily with pH and nute levels.

[GetThisOrDie]

Hes right. My brother in law has a big outdoor hydro garden. I thought it would be very difficult to do so but he has many different kinds of plants.

Nice grow by the way!

[drudown11]

I know you can and i would love you look into it. Right in my back yard I have a huge concrete court equipped with outlets all around. I know i could set something up and it would be pretty easy. It would probably be really easy to set up a drip system rockwool(simple is better), i would just need to do a little research and invest a little money. No MJ plants though, i live right on a main road so there is no way i would even try. It would just have to be veggies and herbs.



I was really impressed with the yield of DWC. I just thought it was a pain in the ass having to correct my ph and PPM so often when they got big. The day before harvest she sucked almost 2 gallons of water. When im working and not at home, ppm would sometimes spike to 1800-1900.

[khyberkitsune]

"The day before harvest she sucked almost 2 gallons of water. When im working and not at home, ppm would sometimes spike to 1800-1900. "

This means the pant is drinking far more water and taking in far less nutrients, you should drop your nutrient level judging by how the plant is dealing with nutrient and water uptake.

[drudown11]

final weight on the last plant is 6 1/2 ounces. God damn i wish i had a basement full of those monsters.

Off three plants i yeilded a total of about 10 1/2 ounces. Thats with 250 watt MH/HPS and a 94 watt t5 fixture. I think thats not too shabby for a closet grow.

[khyberkitsune]

final weight on the last plant is 6 1/2 ounces. God damn i wish i had a basement full of those monsters.

Off three plants i yeilded a total of about 10 1/2 ounces. Thats with 250 watt MH/HPS and a 94 watt t5 fixture. I think thats not too shabby for a closet grow.

You're pretty close to the ever-ambiguous g/w mark with that grow!

[drudown11]

That 250 watt lumatek really packed a punch too. For a closet its perfect, the heat output is managable and quite honestly Ive never seen closet CFL grows even come close in terms of yield.


I wish i had the funds to give LEDs. I want those dank full light spectrum nugs!

[khyberkitsune]

That 250 watt lumatek really packed a punch too. For a closet its perfect, the heat output is managable and quite honestly Ive never seen closet CFL grows even come close in terms of yield.


I wish i had the funds to give LEDs. I want those dank full light spectrum nugs!

You could find cheaper LED modules for supplementary lighting which should drastically improve your yield and quality. They wouldn't be as effective as mine, but they'd work well enough.

[drudown11]

yea i saw some on ebay, but ive been very cautious about buying low qaulity components. You definatly get what you pay for in my experience.

There was just so much bullshit buds at the bottom that could have grown into good size buds if i only had side lighting. Usually i chop all of the bottom branches off to put more energy into the upper buds but i didnt this time.

[drudown11]

You could find cheaper LED modules for supplementary lighting which should drastically improve your yield and quality. They wouldn't be as effective as mine, but they'd work well enough.



do you make your own?

[khyberkitsune]

"There was just so much bullshit buds at the bottom that could have grown into good size buds if i only had side lighting. Usually i chop all of the bottom branches off to put more energy into the upper buds but i didnt this time. "

That's why I mainly moved to LED, so I could more easily control lighting application and get areas that would lack better exposure without burning the plants. I like the bottom buds, they seem to be sweeter. I wonder if it is because they're closer to the nutrients compared to the colas?

"do you make your own?"

I design them, the Chinese make them for me, but yes, technically I make them and supply them.

[drudown11]

"There was just so much bullshit buds at the bottom that could have grown into good size buds if i only had side lighting. Usually i chop all of the bottom branches off to put more energy into the upper buds but i didnt this time. "

That's why I mainly moved to LED, so I could more easily control lighting application and get areas that would lack better exposure without burning the plants. I like the bottom buds, they seem to be sweeter. I wonder if it is because they're closer to the nutrients compared to the colas?

"do you make your own?"

I design them, the Chinese make them for me, but yes, technically I make them and supply them.


yea its definatly not easy lighting a 5 foot plant on the side. Even with my t5 fixture, fidning a way to hang it side ways is a pain in the ass. LEDS are small(+easy to handle/move around) and from what i understand can be placed extremely close to the plants.

[khyberkitsune]

yea its definatly not easy lighting a 5 foot plant on the side. Even with my t5 fixture, fidning a way to hang it side ways is a pain in the ass. LEDS are small(+easy to handle/move around) and from what i understand can be placed extremely close to the plants.

Mounting a T5 unit isn't that hard assuming it's one of the typical high-bay fixtures. Pull your bulbs, unscrew the reflector, put the high-bay against the wall, mark your holes, drill, set anchors, screw panel in, screw reflector back on, re-insert bulbs. Takes about 5-10 minutes if you've got the right tools at hand. I had mine mounted like that to help provide major side lighting. It's what I did when I started working with T5HO.

LEDs can be placed extremely close, assuming you're not pushing out severe power. What a plant doesn't absorb gets reflected or radiated off as heat, and if you give a plant enough light, no matter the cooling, you'll burn the plant.

[tinytoon]

Nice finish dru :thumbsup: