Soldiers Co OP Led Test grow

[papapayne]

Some of you may know already know me, but for those that don't, I am pretty active long time RUI forum member. I have been growing for a few years now, have had successful outdoor and indoor harvests. I am disabled army combat vet, and I run a legal non profit Co Op grow for a group of disabled veterans and a few of their wives. Anyways, I was asked by growrevolution to test out some new LEDS they have released onto the market. I am pretty excited to see the newest technology in growing, so jumped on board to test them out.



My first impression when they arrived is they look to be very well built, solid and not cheap looking. And they are VERY bright.

papapayne Reviewed by papapayne on 11-06-2013. Soldiers Co OP Led Test grow Some of you may know already know me, but for those that don't, I am pretty active long time RUI forum member. I have been growing for a few years now, have had successful outdoor and indoor harvests. I am disabled army combat vet, and I run a legal non profit Co Op grow for a group of disabled veterans and a few of their wives. Anyways, I was asked by growrevolution to test out some new LEDS they have released onto the market. I am pretty excited to see the newest technology in growing, so Rating: 5

[papapayne]

Papapayne next time around I want to work on making my own soil. I'll undoubtedly be peppering you with questions.

To be honest, you should start making the soil now. Organic soil needs a little bit longer to break down and "cook". A MUST READ is TGA subcools guide to super soil. He has it in hightimes and all over the internet. Its the definitive hands down best soil to make for beginners and is very clear and concise. If you cant find it I can get you a link. And I am happy to answer any questions

Foxfarms is mostly a chemical type nute especially all the extra additives that their line up they has. Its a great product though and is used with great success by many growers. With organic living soil you feed the soil biology not the plant. That's the main difference, at least to me. So like I make 2 batches of compost tea a week. one for flower and one for both veg and flower. Both batches get earthworm castings, molasses, catalyst by earth juice, and depending on which batch making, either fossilized bat or fruit bat guano, and either fish meal or kelp meal this is then aerated 48 hours with water pumps. It costs about 40 bucks to get the bucket and pumps and like 100-150 bucks to get the supplies to actually make compost tea, but that same 150 bucks invested has lasted me 3 flower cycles (big plant counts to, each plant gets a gallon of tea and 9 months worth of veg time now.

[Chromophore]

So, do you consider the Foxfarm nutes to be synthetic? I used them only during flower, and at half strength.

[tlranger]

Just. :twocents: but if their green and growing good I don't believe your starving them. Some take longer than others.

[Chromophore]

ranger that makes sense. One reason cutting nutes at the end makes a kind of sense to me is that the plant is essentially dying anyway. It's trying desperately to reproduce before it's ghost is given up. So cutting nutes may accelerate that process, and in doing so increase trichome production as the desperation intensifies. Just a thought.

[Chromophore]

Papapayne next time around I want to work on making my own soil. I'll undoubtedly be peppering you with questions.

[papapayne]

This makes sense to me, and I've never been comfortable with this notion of starving the plant during flower. I understand that many believe the nutes adversely affect flavor, but I've come across others who say this is rubbish. I've gone ahead with this protocol because many experienced growers have advised me to do it. next time around I'm going to do a sided by side comparison of feed vs no feed on two identical plants and see what the real difference is or isn't in the final product.

I can tell you hands down with a certainty chemical nutes vs organic living soil fed compost tea MAJORLY changes the taste and flavor and smell. If you look at the top growers hitting 25+ % thc and the legit growers making medicine (read: Not a commerical grow with profit being the bottom line) the majority of them are using super soil and feeding compost tea. Most the clubs wont ever put hydro grown bud as the true "top shelf" bud. Don't get me wrong, you can and people do grow great knockout fire bud hydro and with synthetics and when flushed right it tastes good.

[OMB]

It's interesting to note the type of lighting appears to have an affect on the chlorosis process. My T5 plants yellowed early, the HPS one's didn't until 6+ weeks in.
Same strain, same age, same nutes....but WAY earlier for the T5's.

[papapayne]

that also is common sense to think about. Leaves are solar panels basically...the more light they get the more energy the get thus the more energy they have to function.

One other reason many people stop nutes way to early to is because they are running synthetic nutes/chemical nutes which leave a nasty taste in the plant which they have to flush that out. IDK if you can tell from my tone, but I much prefer organics. I used to use the typical hydro line up shoved down the cannabis community and spent hundreds per cycle on snake oils and bud hardeners and flavor enhancers and overdrive all that shit, and after switching to super soil and compost tea and I will never go back. The smell and taste and health of the plant cannot even be compared. Most strains respond VERY well to organics, and once you get it figured out, is very sustainable especially if you have a back yard to compost in. Yo do have to change your understanding of how things work if you want to special tailor your supersoil. I started out using TGAs super soil recipe, and have gradually changed things to make it work better for me.

[Chromophore]

Ah, yes I remember catbuds telling me the same thing. I used Foxfarm nutes exclusively. I'm not clear on whether these fall into the "synthetic" or "organic" classification, though most people seem to consider them organic. I'm still feeding my flowering plants molasses, and that does supply Iron and Magnesium in addition to the sugars. Catbuds told me that with the Foxfarm nutes flushing really wasn't necessary but that I should gradually cut back on all the added fertilizers as harvest time approaches.