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 !