LED grow testing the Pro-Grow 260.

LED Grow update no.10, October 29th, 2011

Cropping Recovery after 4 days ! Exactly 1 month since they popped out of the ground !

I decided to bloom the plants in exactly 1 week from now. They have recovered ‘too fast’ after that super cropping and are becoming very bushy, as you can see by the photos. I think I should have tied them down too as they have all straightened already. The Pro-Grow 260 is giving them all the light they need to recover which is great. I’m not sure when the new tent will arrive, next 1-2 weeks I guess. I can still take cutting from the strongest 3 plants even 2 weeks into bloom and revert them to veg stage. I don’t think this will stress them too much.

So the lights will be down to 12/12 from next Saturday. I can’t wait to see this LED bloom these plants. It will also be interesting to see how many will be males. The good thing is that I can spot the females now before I make any cuttings. As soon as I see those white pistils the razor blade will be out. I might only need to make 10 or 12 from the strongest 2-3 females (4 cuttings from each plant). Remember that I have 3 x BBxNL Feminised in here somewhere. To be honest, when I re-potted them I lost the tags. But I think I know which ones are the 3 strongest, that’s all that matters.

My 9 plants are doing amazing. In just 4 days since I super cropped they have filled out and continued to get a little taller. Who knows, I might even have a harvest for New Years ! So here are some pics to show how lush, super green and bushy the plants are since I gave them a super crop beating just 4 DAYS AGO ! The nodes have healed and even straightened ! I will leave them a little longer to heal properly. In a week these will be looking amazing. Seven more days of healing should be fine for them. Ill be back again with an update when the plants react to the bloom.

You can find this grow log here also: LED LOGGER

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Ok, that's it from me for a while. The most important text of the Pro-Grow 260 is to come. Bloom :)

Take care boys and girls !

I think I might have placed this grow log in the wrong thread.

Is it possible to move it to this thread ?

http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-log/...row-260-a.html

Sorry, I'm just finding my way around this site.

LED Grow update no.11, November 2nd, 2011

Couldn’t help one last update before bloom to talk about the good and the bad so far.

It will be hitting the 5 week mark on Saturday when I will induce blooming with 36 hours of darkness and then into 12/12.

I hope my new tent arrives by then so I can take down the large DR120 by Secret Jardin. I’ll probably sell it soon enough. The owners of my flat check it from time to time so I want to have something more ‘wardroby’. I really can’t pass off the DR120 as a wardrobe as it’s 1.2m x 1.2m x 2m ! The new tent is in 2 parts, nursery and bloom room. Ill put the nursery (60cmH x 90cm x 90cm) on top of my real wardrobe and put a cardboard box face on it. It will just look like a brown cardboard box. The rest of the tent will be just 5 foot tall so it can pass as a small wardrobe (1.5mH x 90cm x 90cm). I’ll be running the airflow in through the nursery, then piped into the bloom room floor, through the carbon filter (which sucks, no pun intended) and out he window. I also want to take cuttings from some of the plants to keep the best genes for the new generation in SOG growing.

I have one very short and bushy plant (below) which has turned out very different to the rest. No matter what I tried it stayed bushy and short. I moved it further from the light to promote stretching but it just continued to stay short and dense. I’m wondering if this should be the plant I take the cuttings from or should I go for some of the strongest growers ? Ill take cuttings from a few plants and put them in the propagator. I’ll see how they all develop. What do you think ? Any advise is welcome.

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The canopy is looking fantastic at the moment. Its hard to believe that I have only given the plants two feedings so far; once when they were in the tiny pots in the very first post on this blog and just a week ago I gave them a good feeding. This was their only good feeding to be fair.
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Each plant is looking very healthy except for one which I think I over-watered just a bit.
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I must check the bottom of the pot and see if it is draining correctly on the next feed. I drilled plenty of holes on the pots. I’m sure it will come around soon. I am still using just the seaweed fertiliser, the seaweed & tomato soil conditioner and the bat guano to fertilise the plants. So far with only just one feeding I cannot see any signs of a deficiency in any of the plants. Even the initial seedling leaves are still alive on most of the plants. Every inch of them is looking healthy. I am quite worried about the bloom stage though I must admit. The feedings are coming only every 2 weeks so nutrients may be a problem. To put it into perspective, I have fed my plants on only 80ml or seaweed nutrients and seaweed & tomato soil conditioner in 5 weeks. I also added one 75ml spoon to each of the plants before the last watering too. That’s it… they had nothing else except water and the soil I mixed. I just hope I don’t see any deficiencies during the bloom stage.

I found something that I have never seen before on one of the plants. I am seeing new leaves growing out of the centre of older leaves ! Is this normal ? You can see it in the pictures. Those new fingers are brand new growth. I find that a little strange. Is it normal or is it the super veg power of the LED light ?


The Pro-Grow 260 has done a fantastic veg state. The real test will come in the next few days when the bloom test comes. I have had a few readers on this blog and I know that you are all waiting for the bloom. I guess some of you might even be a little sceptical as its an LED grow. To be honest, I have no idea how this will turn out. I will get buds I’m sure but I want them solid and tricome covered. I don’t want to get airy, over spaced buds. My only 2 worries are the nutrients I decided on and the blooming power of the Pro-Grow 260.

My carbon filter is one of those sock type filters (Odorsok). You just pull it over the extractor and tape it on. I decided to attach it properly and I used an adjustable ‘O’ ring clamp. This makes sure the edges are air tight so all the air passes through the filter. I’m 1 month into this grow and this carbon filter is not doing its job very well I must say. I had to buy some low-profile, flexible, ducting to pipe the smell out the window (like the ducting in above picture). I shouldn’t have to do that at this stage, or any stage if the carbon filter was worth its salt. Some have said they had a good result with this exact type of filter, but not me unfortunately. I had to purchase an LED negative-ion bulb for inside the tent and two negative-ion, plug-in, air-fresheners for the bedroom and the hallway. These cost me about €70.00 on top of the price of the carbon filter. I would have expected the carbon filter to have done a better job. I could get that sweet, young plant smell all over the flat until I piped it out the window. This has created another problem as the window is open in the room to let the air out but it is also letting cold air in. This is bringing the room temperature down and this cold air is then being sucked into the tent harassing my plants. The tent temperature has dropped as the carbon filter needs to be on 24 hours a day now. I hope these new negative-ion generators do their jobs so I can close the window and not worry about strong odours. Im going to hang the LED negative-ion lamp in the tent above the Pro-Grow 260. I told you I would find a use for the 2 electrical tails I have coiled up. The CFLs are using the other 4 tails so that leaves me with one tail left. I’ll find some use for it yet ;) I don’t know if the negative-ions will damage the plants as of yet but I am going to see anyway. There is a mixed review concerning these ion generators. Anyone tried them ‘in’ a tent ?

Okay, that’s enough from me for a bit.

Get ready for blooming good time real soon !

LED Grow update no.11, November 2nd, 2011 (as above)

Some more pictures I couldn't attach to above post:

The new leaves growing out of older leaf
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Pro-Grow 260 doing its job
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LED Grow update no.12, November 14th, 2011

Hey everyone.

So here is an update of what has been happening. First of all my new grow tent arrived and I love it ! Its the Secret Jardin DRT90. It is much smaller than the last tent and 9 seeded plants are truly a squeeze. The tent is in 2 parts so I put the main part in my bedroom and the smaller, veg, part in my sitting room. It just looks like a storage box. I disguised it with other things so nobody will notice it. I had 2 friends around and neither looked twice so I think I did a good job.

I put together a light for the propagating room out of 4 x 2 foot strip-light batons. It cost me about €40.00 altogether. I need to get my hands on the ‘daylight’ fluorescent strip lights. What I am using now is somewhere in the middle at around 4300K at only 4 x 15w per bulb. I would like the 6300K and maybe 30w each. That would give me 120w for the cuttings and veg. I know I will need more light later. I took 21 cuttings altogether but I will be keeping only 2 or 3 future mothers and 9 cuttings. My new tent is only good for 6 plants from seed now so I am already pushing it right now with 9. However, with ‘sea of green’ (SOG) growing I think I will fit 9 comfortably.

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Only some of the plants have started to show signs of bloom. I can see very tiny pistils on some so I took 6 cuttings each from the 2 strongest female plants and I took 3 from that beautiful short plant. I’m not 100% on the sex of the short plant just yet. I’m hoping it is a female as I would love to keep one of its cuttings as a mother. From some trimming of the bases of the plants I made 6 more ‘surprise’ cuttings. I marked the plants I took the first 15 cuttings from but not the last 6. I overdid it on the cuttings but its better to over do it I think as not all might survive.

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I gave the plants a good feeding today too. Some of the pots were very light and other were fine. Same feeding as before; seaweed and tomato and seaweed soil conditioner. I didn’t give them any bat guano this feeding even though I should have. The feedings are becoming more frequent now as the plants are bigger and the temperature has risen due to the smaller tent. It’s a little stuffy in there. I think I would like to have 3 males so I can kill them and make some room in there. Some of the lower leaves are not getting enough light and were looking a little sickly so I trimmed up the ends of the plants. But not too much, I didn’t lollipop the plants in an extreme way, just a light trimming. It is not the fault of the Pro-Grow Led light. It was my fault from letting the plants veg too long at 5 weeks. I had a bigger tent and didn’t realise how stuck for space I would be in the new tent. Live and learn ehh…

I have the extractor on 24 hours a day now so the plants are getting a continuous flow of fresh air and the fan comes on more frequently too. I also bought some kitchen extractor carbon filter refills and I stuffed the Odorsok with it. I still don’t smell much of a difference. I am still piping the air out the window. I would prefer to be able to keep that warm air to heat the flat.I’m pretty sure these filters are of activated carbon but it doesn’t say so on the package.

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For extra odour control I decided to buy two plug-in negative-ion generators and I must say that I am very, very happy with the work they do. Negative-ion generators are completely harmless and have even been said to have health benefits for humans and even the plants. People who suffer from seasonal affective disorder (SAD) or other depressive symptoms are advised to use these generators. Not that I suffer from any sort of depression or anything ! Anyway, they do a great job at neutralising the odour from the plants. You will see immediate results. I definitely recommend them.

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So that seems to be it for now. Over the next week or 2 I will be sure of the sexes of all of the 9 plants. The pistils are so small right now even I strain to see them. When they become more pronounced I will post some pictures of the wonderful moment. I’ll leave you with some pictures of the set ups and the plants.

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Humidity is fine and the temperature is looking a little on the warm side. I increased the extractor fan speed so the temperature will go down. I checked the PH levels too and everything is looking great. 6.5 – 7. Plants are looking green and are showing no sign of any deficiencies so far apart from the cramped conditions discolouring just a few lower leaves. Some of the plants are coming up on 2 feet tall. I will be back with the sexing update soon. I hope you are enjoying this grow journal as much as I enjoy writing it. Any comments/advise are welcome of course.

Careful with the negative ion generators. They produce ozone which is poisonous. For your window, get a rectangular piece of cardboard or wood, cut out a circle to match the diameter of your pipe an stick it through. This will help with the cold air. However, you are going to face serious issues once this thing goes full flower. Get a proper filter, not an odor soak. I grow LED and love them. They are slower than HPS by 1 - 2 weeks mostly at the ripening stage in the last two weeks. That said, they do a great job all the way through flower.

Thanks for the heads up bigsby.

I will put in an order for the best carbon filter I can find as soon as possible.
Hopefully it will be good enough to let me keep the warm air. Do you think it would be possible to buy a filter this good ? Or will I have to vent also ?

I am now down to 6 plants after spotting 3 males. I cut down 2 so far and gave the last one a bit more time to be sure.
I must have a look at some of your grows on here if you have any. Can you give me a link to a good one ?
Im sure I made a very good choice in the Pro-Grow 260. The plants are loving it.

Ill get on to that carbon filter within the next few days.

Thanks again for your advice :)

Take care.

Don't get more filter than you need. Do the calculations. You can save $$ and get a quality with the saved $$. See the link in my signature on fan sizing. I vent my room into an adjacent part of the house no problem. I have a mountain air filter rated for 3 years of continuous use. It was a bit pricy but I have had no issues. So long as you open the door daily you won't need to run the fan until they are 1.5 - 2 feet tall or until they start stinking, which ever comes first. Even after they start to kick a stink I run my fan on a timer rather than keeping going all the time. 1x every 2 - 4 hours.

I don't post grow logs or pictures. I'm crazy paranoid. I did a bunch of out door grows as a kid. I'm on my 4th indoor run. Each has gotten better and better. I use 300w of LED and get a bit more than .6 grams / watt but I'm not maximizing my grow space yet. I'm pretty confident I can get to .8 / watt or better. I've had 2 plants in scrog for the first 3 runs due to males in the mix. This run I have 3. My setup will max out at 4 - 6 plants.

Good luck!

Hey,
So here is the update on the filter. It arrived today.
Its a big one ... but it only cost me €65. Thats about $80 - $90 I think.
I can already smell the difference. Those Odorsok filters are really bad... I can smell nothing on the vent right now. Not a bit and even if there was a bit of a smell my negative ion generator takes care of the rest. Thanks a million for the advise bigsby. I can now close the window and not worry about leaving all of that nice warm air out ! I attached some photos. Ill have the extractor come on, at a slow speed, 15 minutes out of every hour and see how it goes.

Hope you enjoy the pics :)

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Take care all

That's a nice setup you have running. Well done. You must be pretty pleased with the carbon filter, eh? They do work a charm. What brand did you end up getting? Just curious. Look forward to watching this grow play out. Peace!