LED grow testing the Pro-Grow 260.

Hey guys.
Just to let ye all know, this isn't spam. I took the plunge with and LED light. Its my third grow in my entire life but I wanted to see if LED could do it. I did an indoor and an outdoor when I lived away foreign. The ourdoor turned out great, the indoor was under a 600w high-pressure sodium and turned out crap. I am running 4 x 20w CFLs too just for heating purposes. Those LED sure run cool.

I made a blog of my grow last night. I was keeping track of the grow with photos and I was keeping a diary. So I uploaded the pics and copy and pasted the word file. If you want to take a look at it then here is the link: ledlogger

I would appreciate any feedback. I tried to make the log on this site but the pictures always came in enormous. You would have to scroll left and right, up and down just to view one of them. My pics are done on my phone and are only 1.6 -2mb in size. How small do they have to be ?

Anyway, let me know what you think. I hope to get a good grow. I heard LED are very good for veg but not so good in bloom. We will see. The veg stage is amazing so far. Ill be blooming soon so we will see. :thumbsup:

Hmm, OK, I think I am able to attach pictures now so I'll load up my frow log.

LED Grow Update no.1, September 30th, 2011

Hey everyone and welcome to my first LED indoor grow. I grew indoors a few years ago (2006) under a 600w high-pressure sodium but I didn’t achieve good results. I didn’t do my homework for that grow. I decided to begin a new grow on the 25th of September 2011. I put BBxNL (Feminised x3) and 8 x seeds I got from a friend (he said they were AK47, non-feminised) between 2 pieces of kitchen roll. On day 3 the BBxNLs had shown good tap root and the AK47s were not far behind. I potted them all except one which didn’t germinate. It was one of my friends seeds so its not a big problem.

On the 28th of September I placed them in the compressed pots with simple potting soil designed for delicate plants. After the second day they were all opening up and beginning to stretch. The Pro-Grow 260 was set on blue spectrum at 16 – 18 inches above the plants. I am using no other light source at the moment but I will have to incorporate some CFLs soon to keep the temperature up. Humidity is at only 23% and the temperature is at 18 – 20 degrees Celsius. Im using a DR120 from Secret Jardin at the moment. I will be changing it soon for the new Twin Room DR90T as the DR120 is too big for my room. I’ll be back soon to show you an update.

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LED Grow update no.2, October 1st, 2011

After 6 days the plants have come on strong except one, which is having root trouble. I took it out of the pot and applied some rooting hormone to see if that might give it a kick-start. I’m not too worried about losing just one plant out of 10 considering it was one of the seeds I got from a friend.

Today I mixed the soil mix; 50L of potting soil, 15L of compost, 15L of moss peat, 15L of perlite and 15L of worm castings. I re-filled the compressed pots (as the soil sunk about an inch or so) to the top with the new soil to promote more root growth higher on the stems. This also may make re-potting less of a shock. I also added 2.5ml of concentrated seaweed fertiliser in 2 litres of water to feed the seedlings in the compressed pots. I decided to make a rich soil mix as the problem I foresee with using the Pro-Grow 260 is the plants will need far less watering as there is so little heat in the grow room.

Everything I will be using in this grow will be 100% organic. To fertilise I’m using bat guano, seaweed fertiliser and a seaweed and tomato soil conditioner. I will be making a worm casting tea from time to time also. I hope this will be enough to sustain the plants throughout growth from vegetative stage to bloom. None of these products will require a flush at the end to get rid of salts.

The Pro-Grow 260 impresses me thus far. It uses 180 watts when both spectrum are on. At the moment it is using about half of this. The Pro-Grow is only using the vegetative spectrum but it’s nice to be able to switch between both spectrum. The Pro-Grow offers 3 setting; blue spectrum, red spectrum or both spectrum on together. But the Pro-Grow is not as simple as red or blue. It has a 14-Band LED Grow System featuring UV + IR and gives off over 14,800 lumen with its 3-Watt Cree HO Chip-set. More info can be found at the Hydroponics Hut website. The plants are looking healthy, green, and are growing quickly. I have a fan to strengthen the stems and it comes on around 8 times a day. At night it comes on for just 6 minutes per cycle and during the day for a half hour per cycle. Altogether maybe 3 hours per day. I think this is enough for now. I lowered the light to 11 inches now to stop the stretch, as the stems are 3 inches tall by now. The second sets of serrated leaves are just beginning to show. The temp is 18 degrees and the humidity is 30%. I put a pot of water in the grow room to increase the humidity.

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LED Grow update no.3, October 4th, 2011

Had some trouble today. Realised that I left the fan on 24 hours continuously. Grr, one of the BBxNL has drooped, as the front pots got quite dry. The rest are doing fine.

I felt that the grow room was a bit cold so I added 4 x 20w warm white CFLs (2700k) to give the temperature a little boost. I tried to find blue spectrum bulbs (6100k) but was unable. I wired for 6 batons out of the junction box in the photo. Two of the tails are not in use so I put a connector block on the ends of each of them and taped them up for now. I will find a use for them later.

Please be very careful when handling electricity. I do not condone unqualified individuals to do their own DIY electrics. However, if you do decide to DIY be sure you terminate all connections correctly and tightly. This will minimise the chances of fire.

I’ll keep an eye on the plants and I’ll leave the fan off until tomorrow.

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LED Grow update no.4, October 7th, 2011

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Some pics of the set up so far. The plants are doing fine. As you can see by my thermostat, 21 degrees Celsius is about 70 degrees Fahrenheit. I decided to put that in just in case I get any American readers. Another rule of thumb is 12 inches is equal to 30 centimetres. I might use both imperial and metric systems in this blog.

In the photos you will see the 4x20w CFLs hanging over the edges of the Pro-Grow 260. The temperature has increased thanks to them. And Iâ??m sure the plants are enjoying them even though they are so small. The Pr0-Grow 260 is very bright and it is difficult to look at the LEDs even from the side.

I must tell everyone that I do not work for the company who produce the Pro-Grow series and I am in no way affiliated with the company. I just did some homework before buying and spoke to other LED growers out there. One who was a great help is this person: Pro Grow 260 LED Grow Light Review | Growing Medical Marijuana He/she gave me lots of advice and told me what works for them. Iâ??d like to thank them for all their help.

I trawled eBay for an LED grow light and read all the reviews I could find. After a huge amount of research I finally decided on the Hydroponics Hut, Pro-Grow 260 series (2011). They offered a huge warranty and I also read on forums that they uphold this too. Also, they offer free postage to Europe and gave me a discount to boot. They are very friendly and answered every question I had promptly.

LED Grow update no.5, October 10th, 2011

It seems that one of the 10 plants has not developed properly. I must remind you that a lot of the seeds I was given by my friend were AK47 and a mix of I don’t know what. We will have to see if they are all AK47. Nine of the ten seedlings are doing great under the Pro-Grow 260 and only 80 watts of CFL lights. I switched the Pro-Grow to duel spectrum and I believe it draws 180 watts. Altogether I am growing 9 plants at around 250 watts. Most of it LED! It might be a stretch in my mind but I have heard good things about this Pro-Grow 260.

I saw roots protruding from the compressed paper pots today. I know roots don’t like light so I felt it was time to re-pot. I decided to take out the 2.5 gallon buckets and drill the ends for drainage. I put stones at the end of the buckets and also put stones under the buckets to keep them up off the water trays. This will give freer drainage for the plants. If the water trays begin to fill after watering I will use a 100ml syringe with an 80cm nozzle to suck up the excess. I realise the plants are very young to be going into the 2.5 gallon buckets but I think the soil is nice and airy and will remain that way. I stuck 2 soil ph testers in 2 different buckets to keep an eye on it. I used some peat so I think I should check the ph. I’m sure I read somewhere that if you plant a seedling in slightly acidic soil it can promote males.

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LED Grow update no.6, October 17th, 2011

This will be a picture update. The plants are doing very well. They have started to show very fast growth after settling into their new 2.5 gallon buckets.

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LED Grow update no.7, October 20th, 2011

(N.B. PICTURES WERE TAKEN ON 24TH OF OCTOBER 2011)

It’s been 10 days since I re-potted the 9 plants into the 2.5 gallon buckets. One was looking very weak so I placed it in the centre directly under the Pro-Grow 260 LED. It has made a fine recovery. The leaves were folding upward so I may have over watered. Vegetative growth has exploded in the past week. I already see 9-fingered leaves! It is truly outstanding and very shocking. I even burned one of the plants as it grew to meet one of the 20w CFL bulbs. It’s only a small burn on one of the leaves.

I had to increase the airflow through the extractor to pull the air through the carbon filter. The plants are already starting to stink a bit and I still have them in 18/6. My flatmate got a stench walking in through the front door. I have to be very careful with scent as I live in a block of flats. I might buy some ONA gel soon enough to help combat that issue but so far the carbon filter is working fine. I have heard a mixed review on ONA gel. Does anyone have any experience using ONA ? Would be great if you could let me know. Thanks

The plants are coming up on 6-8 inches tall now so bloom will be coming in the next 2 weeks or so. As I said, growth is explosive right now. I bought a digital light meter off eBay, which arrived today. The Pro-Grow 260 is giving off 700 x 100 Lux ! But that is at only 3 inches from the Pro-Grow 260. Further down, about 14 – 18 inches, it still gives 200 x 100 = 20,000 Lux (LED!). There is a difference between Lux and Lumen. A good explanation is found on this site:
www.brillianz.co.uk/data/documents/Lumen.pdf

OK, to be fair, I do have 4 x 20w CFL bulbs running simply for heating purposes but I’m still not complaining (why not heat with light!). I am running on 80w CFL + 180w on the Pro-Grow 260. I don’t think a 250w CFL could give me this sort of result! Not a chance! I had to RAISE the Pro-Grow today as the plants were getting too close and I wanted some more coverage. But to be honest, the plants on the edges are doing fantastic. I don’t even need a light rail as I thought I would. I haven’t had to move any plants around to give them more light, only the weak one I placed directly under the LED.

Temperature is 21 degrees Celsius and the humidity is 51%. But since I increased the fan speed and duration the temperature and humidity will certainly go down. My outside room temperature is about 15 – 18 degrees now as it’s late October in Western Europe ;) I can’t wait to see how this light performs during bloom. I must also say that many factors do influence the outcome such as; soil, fertilisers, heat, humidity, ventilation, watering schedules, pot sizes, etc. The only problem I foresee is the amount or nutrients I give the plants. The soil is very good and many soil types have been added, including 15KG of worm castings.

I have done my best to describe, in detail, what I have done and will be doing. If you have any advise/feedback, during or after, my grow I would appreciate it. By the way, I grew 1 small outdoor (in pot) and one small indoor grow before (which was a disaster). This is my third grow in my entire life so I will make mistakes. My indoor grow was shockingly bad but the outdoor gave high yields. I have done my best to study what people explain on-line and I have utilised that information as best I can. The only thing I changed was the light source and the nutrients I will be feeding my plants. It’s all about experimentation and getting it right, even if you deviate from the norm. I would like to thank everyone for sharing his or her knowledge and experience with me.

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LED Grow update no.8, October 23th, 2011

Took a few pictures tonight for you all. They are truly exploding at this stage. I re-raised the light again today to promote more stretch. It’s at least 20” to 25” from the tops of the plants and still giving them more light than they need. As you can see by the plants they are becoming very bushy and the nodes have about an inch spacing in most of the plants, but tighter in others. I want to keep the nodes at least 1” apart. They are looking lush and very green. I see no health problems in them other than the one I accidently burned with a CFL. I put the entire blame on the Pro-grow 260 as it made the plants grow too quickly!

I would like to take some cuttings off the strongest plants before bloom. But before I can do this I have to buy a cutting tent and a light. I’m going to buy a DR90T from Secret Jardin. Its a dual tent with separate veg bloom areas. 90cm x 90cm x 210cm. I don’t want them to grow too quickly in the cutting tent so I’ll get a florescent light. I’m sure I’ll be able to pick out the 3 x BBxNL feminised soon, but to be honest all the plants are looking equally strong. The only weak plant was placed in the centre under the Pro-Grow 260 three days ago and I can already see a dramatic improvement.

They all appear to be indicia strains. I don’t know if my friend gave me all AK-47s but so far it seems so. Perhaps the bloom will tell a story. I expect to bloom within 2 weeks by the looks of things. The plants are all about 10” tall by now. By the way, I thought you might be interested to know that I haven’t had to water the plants since I place them in the 2.5-gallon buckets on the 10th of October, 12 days ago! As the watering schedules will be so far apart, something I foresaw, I will be giving the plants a lot of 100% organic nutrients within the next few days. I will be making a cocktail of both the seaweed fertiliser and soil conditioner. Bat guano and worm castings will also be added to make it a highly potent fertiliser.

Using only 100% organic fertiliser I will have no problem with burning or salts. I wanted to make this a 100% organic, LED grow. I must remind everyone that the 4 x 20w CFLs are in the grow tent purely for heating purposes. The temp is currently 21-22 degrees Celsius and the humidity is at 33%. I’ll make another update in about a week. I’m sure it will be dramatic!

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LED Grow update no.9, October 25th, 2011

After plenty of thought and research I decided to super crop the plants so as to keep them low. They are growing ‘too quickly’ under the Pro-Grow ! Ever heard that complaint before ? This will help with keeping the plants low and let the Pro-Grow penetrate nicely. Although, in defence of the Pro-Grow 260, I have heard that it has amazing penetration through the canopy.

I looked up many websites that proclaimed to understand cropping, I don’t ! I found a lot of conflicting ideas but I went with the one which caused ‘the least’ stress (I know it’s highly stressful). You can find a link to super cropping on the main page under ‘Links’. Another reason that I am doing this is to stunt the growth while I wait for my Secret Jardin DR90T grow tent. I want to take maybe 6 cuttings from each of the top 3 strongest, female plants before I bloom them out fully. The best plants genetics will be kept. I will begin SOG (sea of green) growing as soon as I get the next generation of cuttings and after I bloom the current plants. I’ll give each cutting approximately 1sq foot each in the new grow. This means that I will take about 18 cuttings and keep only the best 9 and destroy the rest, horrible thing to do I know. I wish I could keep them all :( The new tent, the DR90T, is 90cm x 90cm x 210cm so I will fit 9 plants in the bloom room. I have a feeling the Pro-Grow 260 will be a beast in SOG growing.

So what I did was I took the 4th or 5th node and began to squeeze it gently between my thumb and forefinger until I heard a crack. I then moved my fingers 90 degrees and did it again. I then bent the tops over while being careful not to completely break the stem. The nodes were young and didn’t put up much of a fight. I bent the tops toward the Pro-Grow 260 in an effort to keep the 9-plant footprint as tight and short as possible. The area of the plant where I super cropped will now become the imaginary line to where all new tops will be trained to meet. The idea is to make a line over the canopy and keep everything short.

There is a great link out there on how to super crop and here it is: step by step how to super crop

This is my first time super cropping so I might just make a mess of things. But we are here to experiment and see how best to do things. I have heard a mixed review on super cropping so I would like to put my evidence on the table, good or bad. I will give the nodes 1 week to repair and then I will see how the under canopy has caught up. The plant now believes that the top has been destroyed so it will give more energy to the lower branches. In the end I will have multiple bud heads. The idea is to make a greater amount of bud areas all the same height. This removes popcorn budding on the lower branches. I also fed the plants today; 25ml of seaweed and 50 ml of seaweed conditioner in 3 gallons of water. The 9 buckets took all 3 gallons of water with a little run off to be sure they were well watered. I also added a heaped spoon of bat guano to the topsoil before watering. This is pretty much all I will be using for this grow. It is 100% organic and will give no trouble with salt and there will be no need to flush each plant. See you guys in a week or so to see how the super cropping nodes have healed.

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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!

The original Can-Filters is written on the side. Its a Can-9000.

Im guessing this is it: http://www.amazon.com/Can-Carbon-Fil.../dp/B00557SY4M

Its doing a fantastic job anyway...I never have to open a window..
Ill be putting up an update in about a week to show the start of flowering.
Its looking good so far :) I cut down 2 plants as they were male. But the rest are looking very sexy I must say ;)

So here we are after exactly 28 days of 12/12. Of the 9 plants I had in the room 7 turned out to be female. I would have preferred to have just 6 plants in the room as it is a bit crowded. I took some cuttings from the short plant in the middle and from 2 of the strong tall plants.

I will be growing 9 plants again from the cuttings During the veg cycle next time I will grow 3 nice mothers in with the new cuttings. It will be good to have the mothers under the Pro-Grow 260 for a while. I have only 4 x 2 foot tubes and they only have 4200k. I know this is not the optimum light for veg but I can’t seem to find ‘daylight’ tubes… Everywhere I go I see white (4200k) or warm white (2700k). I will keep looking for the 6500k. A few weeks under the led and I’ll have 3 fine mothers to keep in the veg room. I think I will invest in two of the 50w plasma lights from HydroponicsHut.com after this grow. I think the veg room will enjoy a couple of them in the coming future. I received my electricity bill today.The charges for 2 months was €120.00. I think that is quite reasonable as there is 2 of us living in the flat and the electric heating has been turned on quite a bit. That works out at just €2.00 per day to keep everything running. TV, laptop, electric heater, fridge, Pro-Grow 260, 4 x 20w CFLs, extractor and fan.

A couple of the plants have grown much too tall and I will need to do some low stress training (LST). I will simply be tying the plants down to stop them growing over the LED light. It will be different when I begin the SOG growing. The plants will be bloomed sooner and will be naturally shorter as they are cuttings.

In the point of odour. I had to invest in a proper carbon filter. The Odorsok carbon filter just wasn’t doing a good job and I would not recommend them. Some people have had a good experience with them but unfortunately not me. The new carbon filter is doing a fantastic job. What a difference. It’s a ‘Can 9000′ and about 70cm long and 15- 20cm in diameter. I don't think I’ll have any trouble with odour in the future. Thanks for the tip Bigsby. Odour control is vital where I live.

I have been feeding the plants the same stuff since I started them. Seaweed soil conditioner, seaweed and tomato fertiliser and bat guano. I have seen no deficiencies since starting this grow which is great. Hopefully it will stay this way. A few of the leaves are a little burned by the CFL’s but they are fine.

Ill put up much clearer pictures next time. I took these pictures on my new iPhone and the auto focus was very annoying. I’ll have to figure it out. The pistils are really starting to show up now so I'll take much more pics in about a week. I'll be sure they are all clear.

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Hey everyone. Things are starting to get exciting now after 35 days of 12/12… It took the plants nearly 2 to 3 weeks to show signs of their sexes after switching the light cycle. A comment came in from Grow Medical 420 (see link on home page) which reminded me to start the bloom cycle when the pistils are visible, and not when the light cycle is changed. This makes sense as the plants need some time to react to the cycle. So technically they are in week 2 of flowering, depending on which plant we are taking about. The plants are beginning to produce a lot of pistils and 3 plants have had a spurt of growth.

The feedings are still the same 50ml seaweed and tomato fertiliser, 50ml seaweed soil conditioner and a couple of spoons of bat guano mixed into a 3 gallon bucket. The seaweed is concentrated so I am just following the directions on the bottle to be honest. I’m feeding them about every 4 to 5 days now with about 2 litres per plant. If the plants get a little too much water I drain the collection trays under the pots with a 200ml plastic syringe. This will prevent root rot and other issues such as drowning the plants as the soil isn’t airy, lack of oxygen to the roots will kill them too. I reuse the water I collect from the trays so the plant food will not go to waste. The plant in the picture below is looking a little different to the other. I am curious to know if it is a hermaphrodite. It took until a week ago to show its sex properly. The bud in the picture doesn’t look as pistil-full as the other plants either. I am keeping a close eye for any male pollen sacks hidden in there.

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The plants are showing no signs of deficiencies so far. The only problem on the grow room right now is the over crowding. I wonder if it might be a good idea to take out the little short plant in the middle… Maybe stick her in the veg tent as a mother, but perhaps she is too far into a bloom to turn back. But I’m sure I read somewhere that a plant can be reversed at any stage of bloom by changing the light cycle back to 18/6. I would like to free up some space in there. 6 plants from seed would be still pushing it for space, I have 7. A couple of plants have reached up to 4 feet high so I just tied them down to keep them below the light.

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The Room is very crowded as you can see but the Pro-Grow 260 is still keeping the lower leaves alive. The lower leaves are 4 feet away from the LED light ! And there is a lot of foliage in the canopy. I would have thought that they would have withered and died by now, but no.. I am going to do some pruning soon to take away some of the popcorn buds before the plants put more effort into them. I don’t think that super cropping went the way I had planned… The LED light made them recover too quickly and I should have bloomed at 4 weeks or earlier instead of 5. With some pruning at least the light will penetrate further and the plants will get a bit more light each. I cannot fault the Pro-Grow 260 so far. It has more than impressed me through the veg stage and the pictures will speak for themselves through the bloom.

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Here are some shots of a few very young buds. Remember that only 2 weeks ago they showed their sexes. So this is the result of 2 weeks of pistil growth. The picture are not the greatest I have taken but they will give you a good idea of what’s going on. The auto focus and auto detect on the iPhone4 is a bit tricky to control. I must try to learn how to control my new phone. It’s not the phones fault, its mine I’m sure.

The below picture came out quite clear. You can see the beginning of the wonderful crystals forming. I read somewhere, I think 420magazine, that LED can produce much more trichomes than HPS lighting. I won’t be doing any comparison grows as firstly I don’t have the space and secondly I don’t want to have to deal with all that heat. The Pro-Grow 260 runs totally cool. The average temperature in the tent is a comfortable 23 – 26 degrees Celsius. The extractor fan has a speed controller and is set to the lowest possible speed. I leave the extractor fan on continuously to constantly move and replace the air in the tent. The new carbon filter I bought is doing an amazing job. It the Can 9000 if anyone is interested in it. I would recommend it for sure.

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Thanks for stopping by and checking out my grow journal. I hope the information I provide can be useful to other growers out there.

hi silent.how are things looking?? from your last pic all looked good,but are those lights not a bit close??

Sorry for the late reply on this thread everyone. Here is an update for the 10th of December. Remember you can also follow this grow on Led Logger on wordpress

LED Grow update no.15, December 10th, 2011

Hey everyone. So the plants are looking good and are now 3 weeks into bloom. Plenty of pistils are forming and bud sites are starting to fill out. The feedings are coming about every 4 days still, maybe a little longer.

I trimmed up the bottoms of the plants as they have become so tall and bushy the bottom buds would have been just a waste of energy for the plants. But even those bottom leaves that I took off were still healthy and green, 4 feet away from the Pro-Grow 260. After trimming the bases of the plants, energy will now be focused towards the larger buds.

It’s still a little overcrowded in there and I might have to do some more pruning to let each plant receive an equal amount of light. I really cannot believe how big some of these plants got, and how fast they grew. There is certainly no doubt in my mind on the vegetative power of the Pro-Grow LED light. If it can perform this well in the bloom stage, which I think it can, I will never change the light I am using. I will be keeping everyone posted about every week for the remainder of the bloom stage.

Regarding PH and other soil issues, I have had no issue with the PH or anything else soil related. The plants do not have a single sign of deficiencies and I didn’t use any of the professional fertilisers. Just the Seaweed and tomato fertiliser and the seaweed soil conditioner. I mixed in some bat guano sometimes but that has been the extent to my fertilising. All of these products are 100% organic and the soil will not need to be flushed before harvest. I don’t even believe that it is possible to ‘burn’ the plants with these products.

I will feed the plants just water for the last feeding. It will be a kind of flushing as I’m afraid the weed might taste of seaweed ! Might be interesting ! Who knows…

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LED Grow update no.16, December 24th, 2011

Hey everyone.

Sorry for not posting earlier but I had to study for exams and then I became quite ill for the past week or so. The plants are looking great and are still showing no signs of deficiencies. It seems that the seaweed fertiliser is doing its thing very well. So here are some pictures of the plants. I’m sure you will agree that they are in fin condition. The plants have all grown quite tall and are very close to the Pro-Grow right now. I really should have bloomed on week 3 or so. I waited until week 5 as I thought they might need it as they are all grown from seed. Hopefully the cuttings will keep themselves much shorter. So, enjoy the pictures.

Thanks for your concern Bigguy1977, I tied the Pro-Grow 260 to the top of the tent. It certainly was a bit too close. Anything less than 8 inches (20cm) can bleach the leaves and even the buds. I was told that growing with LED can prolong the bloom for 2 weeks, so I would expect to harvest within the next 2 weeks or so. The pistils are looking good and white and the tricomes are all looking clear and not milky. Ill make another update very soon.
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Actually, no, it wont be in 2 weeks. Technically the plants only went into proper bloom in the last week of November. So that would mean that they are only in week 6.5 or so by now. As the Pro-Grow LED light can prolong a bloom by 2 weeks (think Bigsby told me that) then I could be looking at another few weeks yet. The plants will tell me when they are ready. One or 2 plants have been stunted due to the over crowding in the tent. I have 7 plants in there when the tent is only good for 4 plants. I should get 5 good plants anyway. I'll put in 4 plants for the next run.

LED Grow update no.17, January 6th, 2011

Hey all,

So things are coming along great at the moment. The only issue I have is the overcrowding in the 90cm x 90cm tent. as I mentioned, I have 7 plants in a tent which is fit for 4 plants. I took on of the plants out as it was being smothered by the others so now Iâ??m down to 6. For my next grows I will never grow more than 4 plants in the 90 x 90 space and I will bloom from seed at week 3, not 5.

This should take care of the height issues I have had. I think I would have had much more of a yield if I had only grown 4 plants as the light would have been better dispersed. I have 6 cuttings left from the last batch and I will keep 2 as mothers and 4 as the next batch. At least I know that all of them are female. I just planted them into larger pots to get ready for the big move into the tent as soon as the current plants are done.

The buds are looking very good so far. They are a nice size as you can see by the AA battery I am holding up beside them as a reference. The buds directly under the LED light are absolutely covered in trichomes. These buds are look really good to me and Iâ??m looking forward to trying them. All the trichomes are still clear even though some of the pistils have begun to brown. I will keep a good eye on the trichomes will harvest when there is 80% amber and 20% milky or transparent. I donâ??t know how long this will take to be honest as I have never grown these strains.

Don't forget that you can follow my grow journal here on LED LOGGER

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Anyone wanna let me know if they think these buds are looking good after 6 - 7 weeks of bloom under LED ?

:rasta:

LED Grow update no.18, January 12th, 2011

Hey all,

So over the past 2 days I have noticed one of the plants showing a deficiency, damn it... To me it looks like a magnesium issue. I gave that plant an extra feeding of bat guano and some seaweed and tomato fertiliser. I mixed a heaped tea spoon of bat guano in warm/hot water and mixed it well. However, this extra feeding did not seem to fix the problem.

I did some reading on the subject and I cane to the conclusion that it might be that the magnesium is being locked out. Locked out meaning that the plant roots can no longer access the magnesium in the soil due to other issues. The water in my area is very hard and this can cause issues with magnesium uptake, over time. Possibly the hard water has affected the soil to cause this.

I went to the chemist and I bought some Epsom salts (magnesium sulphate) in an attempt to unlock the magnesium from the soil. I mixed one tea spoon with one gallon of water. I haven’t used all the water yet on this plant. I poured 1 litre of the Epsom salt water into the soil. You can see where I got this information on the home page of my blog. On the right hand side, where the links are, look for plants problems/disease. This is a very good link which shows many different plant problems and how to deal with them.

So I hope this will resolve my magnesium issue. It seemed strange that this plant was the only one affected. But then I remembered that this plant has been watered much more than the others as it was positioned under the fan. This extra watering, with hard water, could have caused this reaction. I believe it is the calcium in the drinking water which affects the soil. I will keep you updated on the recovery of this plant.

It could be possible that I will have this issue with all the plants over the next few weeks. On my next grow I will have to get filtered water for the plants.

Enjoy the pics. If anyone has other ideas as to what has happened to this one plant I would like to hear it.

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LED Grow update no.19, January 21st, 2012

Hey all.

So here is the 19th update on the grow. Everything is going to plan all the way to this point. I am happy to say that I haven’t had any major issues with the plants so far.

The experimental feed that I am using is giving the plants what they need if not more. The only deficiency in the grow was a magnesium issue. That was resolved very quickly with some Epsom salts. Someone told me that the nitrogen seems to be a little high in some plants as the leaves are too green but now that I am only feeding with water this issue will fix itself. I gave 2 plants a little more Epsom salts today, a small spoon between them in the water. So far the Pro-Grow has lived up to what Hydroponics Hut promised. They really have built a great LED light. I can already see a return on the investment I made in the light. At this stage I can recommend this light without hesitation to anyone who wishes to try this technology. I have saved a fortune on electricity as the Pro-Grow only uses 190 watts. The four 20w CFLs are another factor of course but the entire tent is running on less than 300w (including extractor, timers, and fan).

Harvest can't be too far away now :)


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God damn ! I wish these trichs would turn amber already !

I have cutting ready to go down to the bloom room and they are beginning to stink my sitting room up a bit. They are in the second part of my twin DRT90 Secret Jardin tent. Strangely, one of the cuttings has begun to bloom in the veg tent. The lights are set for 18 on / 6 off. I don't know why this happened. Perhaps I stressed them a little. I am becoming very impatient as I can smell the plants in the veg tent clearly in my sitting room... Waaagghhhh.... And so can others if they come in here. Ill give it one more week. All trichs are clear still in week 8 -9 and I haven't seen one amber.

Ill give it another week and then the axe is coming out.... HERE'S JOHNNY ! :)

LED Grow update no.20, February 1st, 2012

Hey all.

So hereâ??s whatâ??s been going on. As I mentioned before, the tent was too overcrowded. 2 plants had basically taken over the entire tent. I took out the other 4 plants and cut them down. I made a little hash and I have only about an ounce off them all. It was a little disappointing in this regard. It was entirely my own fault by letting the plants veg too long and get too big. The good news is that the remaining 2 plants have big buds on them.

Just one top on one plant is looking like everything I got from the plants I killed. So, if 2 plants have nice sized buds then the light must be doing its thing. Those 2 plants took over the tent and won the battle for the light hands down. I will grow 4 plants in the next grow from the cuttings I planted. The cuttings took a long time to take root and begin to grow. As soon as I changed them into the new pots with the soil from a plant from my current grow they took off. The high nitrogen content of the soil helped those cuttings explode in growth.

Iâ??ll post some pictures of the nuggets in my tent. I see a few ounces on these plants, even though they were in competition with the other 4 plants I removed. There should not be much left in this bloom. Iâ??m looking forward to putting the cutting into the tent soon. This time I will be careful not to overcrowd the tent. Live and learnâ?¦

What I have noticed since I removed the 4 useless plants is that the last 2 plants are really filling out. Very fast growth on the buds...

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I'll add some more pics below

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One of the best Grow Logs I need , Enjoy the Smoke:stoned:

Thanks for the compliment :)

I hope it can help you in some way.

I certainly will enjoy it ;)

:rasta:

look, i found a great thread . thank you .
mark and then read it carefully !

LED Grow update no.21, February 10th, 2012

So it’s week 10.5 and the 2 remaining plants have exploded in growth. The best decision I could have made was making the bloom room less cluttered. Removing the weaker plants resulted in the last 2 strong plants producing very nice buds. The plants were competing too much for the light but now they could not be happier.

The LED light really has impressed me. It has the potential to create very nice buds and even the veg stage was shockingly good. Just by looking at these plants I can see that I have made a return on my investment. I saved over 60% on energy costs and I got some fine buds to boot. I have learned some valuable lessons in this grow. Firstly, do not let plants veg for more than 4 weeks under the Pro-Grow 260 as I grow in a short tent. The plants turned into monsters in a very short space of time. Never underestimate the veg power of the Pro-Grow ! Secondly, do not overcrowd the tent thinking you will get more bud as there are more plants. I learned this the hard way. I will keep the plants shorter (2 feet) in future and never put more than 4 plants in the tent. If I only grew a small amount of plants I would have a huge amount of bud right now. There is a lot on these plants but the overcrowding created a war for the light between the plants. Enjoy the pics and I will post some more pics of the harvest and I’ll give you some figures on the yield too. I’m sure it will be a very nice weight by the looks of things. I will be starting a new grow soon.

If you want to check out the LED technology used in this grow then follow this link:

www.hydroponicshut.com

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Ill put 5 more pics in a new post below

LED Grow update no.21, February 10th, 2012

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