First Grow with CFLs, homemade box

[dadank54]

First grow, have made some mistakes, but I'm looking forward to what it brings.

I germinated the seeds in January, using paper towel method. Germinated within a few days, planted them in a few plastic cups using Miracle Grow Potting Mix (I won't do that again...pain in the butt). Just gave them tap water (after leaving it out for 24 hours). Put them under one 23W CFL 2300K.

Here's the pics of the "birth"

dadank54 Reviewed by dadank54 on 03-23-2008. First Grow with CFLs, homemade box First grow, have made some mistakes, but I'm looking forward to what it brings. I germinated the seeds in January, using paper towel method. Germinated within a few days, planted them in a few plastic cups using Miracle Grow Potting Mix (I won't do that again...pain in the butt). Just gave them tap water (after leaving it out for 24 hours). Put them under one 23W CFL 2300K. Here's the pics of the "birth" :) Rating: 5

[dadank54]

I started 5 or 6 seeds, realized 1 bulb wasn't gonna be enough. So I put them in the corner of my closet and put them under a couple more lights. I put them in bigger pots when they got bigger. 2 of them didn't break ground fast enough (I'm impatient), so I chucked them

[dadank54]

I then realized that the corner of my bedroom closet wasn't going to suffice (too small, light leaks, looks ridiculous...lol!).

So I decided to follow the Rubbermaid box idea I saw on another thread. I don't have a carbon filter (I don't feel like spending the time and money for one). I did put a fan on one side. The top of the box was (at first) a cardboard box with holes cut on it to put the lights through. Pretty ghetto...huh?

I also bought some Oscmocote (or whatever it's called). That's the only nutes I could find at Home Depot, since it's Winter.

Here's some pictures of the setup. I had 5 CFLs: 3 2300K and 2 6500K.

[daihashi]

I started 5 or 6 seeds, realized 1 bulb wasn't gonna be enough. So I put them in the corner of my closet and put them under a couple more lights. I put them in bigger pots when they got bigger. 2 of them didn't break ground fast enough (I'm impatient), so I chucked them

Your plant in the third picture here is suffering from heat/humidity problems. Plus that soil looks really really dry. And in the second picture it looks like you are barely watering it. You need to get the entire medium evenly moist when watering. Not sopping wet, but just nice and moist.

What is the temp at the plant level? What is the humidity level in the grow area?

[dadank54]

Yes, the plants were suffering from heat stress. The temps were at 90 degrees I think. But once I realized that, I made some changes and got the temps down to a cool 75 consistently. Humidity was about 35%.

As for the watering, I was watering them almost every day. The tops of the soil became crusted because of the heat, but again, I fixed that. Also I have started watering the whole soil, not just the central part.

I have updated pictures of my plants but I haven't posted them yet. I killed all but two of the plants because there just wasn't enough room. One of my plants has tons of branches (but I'm pretty sure it's male), and the other one is taller but only one main "stalk" (not sure what the sex is yet).

I'll post pictures later today. Thanks so much for your input!