Quote Originally Posted by Roughrider
10,00 lumens is probably enough for the first few weeks...until your plants get big, you can veg 6 plants with 10,000 lumens. I usually start 6-8 plants under 3 10.5? reflector units with Y-sockets at 26w bulbs...it's 10,000 lumens, and it;s fine for the first two weeks. Plants are small, you keep them close together. It';s when they start to get big and have more area to absorb the light energy that you need more light.

Your proposition sounds fine. Change to the warm white (2700-3000k) bulbs. One thing about CFLs is that they're pretty consistent in efficiency. HID lights get more efficient as they get larger; CFL's are almost all between 65-70 lumens per watt. For a normal plant, that means around 70 watts/5000 lumens per square foot. You can flower 3-4 plants with 24,000 lumens. Good luck!
Thanks, you've helped me much! I know there are a lot of threads/questions about lighting here so I felt a little dumb posting something so...redundant but I just wanted a straight forward answer from someone who has had good results. When I was reading different guides and books they all didn't say much information about CFLs. I look forward to (officially) starting. I think I may start a grow log...I'm still debating.

Quote Originally Posted by pudder
I used 8 4100k CFLs for 10 plants in a rough 4 square foot cab. I ended up with 2 girls and these girls did fine with the lights that I had. The CFLs that I had were the same wattage and were 100 watt equiv. I pulled a half ounce of these 2 plants. I also did nothing to these plants no LST or anything and pulled then at 2 1/2 feet. I really didn't care about how much i git from my first grow. Now I know how to grow and what they need. So this helps in the long run.

Its your first grow man. Use it for a learning experience. Try what you can afford because if you stick with it it will cost you more to upgrade. which is fine like I said use it as a sorta tool, an experience. It will be very helpful for future grows. These plants will grow with the lights you are using. Experiment and you will learn what they need and what works best for you. Everyones experiences are different.

Oh and continue reading eveything you can. This is one of the biggest things that will help you grow.
Half ounce for each or total? If I got that much (each OR total) I would be satisfied, although from reading what people here have been growing it seems most people expect around 2 oz. per plant...

I've read so much! I found a post, I can't remember if it was here or another place, but it had 20 books (in PDF files) about marijuana-related things, and about 6 of them were about growing. Reading the grow logs here help, too, along with all the other parts of the forum. I've been reading constantly because I feel like I'm going to fxck it up. I'm confident but I have low expectations...I think that's a pretty good mind set to have starting this kind of project :thumbsup:

Thanks guys