First Grow - Pro Grow LED Cabinet Grow

[Weezard]

If you use a PH meter, the reading will be sketchy with water that pure.
They don't really work at all, with distilled, or RO water, so we just call them 7.0.

Ya need Hydrogen ions to measure Potential Hydrogen, (PH).

Phenolphthalein or test strips will work.
Ours can be quite acidic depending on the vog.

Carry on.
Standing by.

Weeze

[d00g]

I just have the General Hydroponics pH test kit with the test activator drops that I add to a small sample of liquid. This snow is melting soo sloow. Gotta go out and do some more shoveling right now argh.

Ever lived anywhere that has snow, Weezard?

[d00g]

Okay update:

My smallest plant, although trying her best to power through whatever was ailing her, had to be retired. I wish I could give her a proper burial in the backyard but it's under a foot of snow. Even better, I wish I could compost but that would raise questions with my landlord.

Here are a couple pics of the setup right now. I turned the red LED's off for better pics. All comments are welcome!

Attachment 296824 Attachment 296825

I am also planning on switching to flower in about a week.

[Weezard]

Very healthy looking.
Well done so far! :thumbsup:

Aloha,
Weeze

[d00g]

Hey forum friends -

Here is a Christmas Eve EVE update! I have purchased saucers to go under my plants for much easier runoff drainage. Not much of a change there, but it looks cleaner and is MUCH easier to empty the runoff!

First picture is the current plants/recent growth with the new saucers under them. You can also, unfortunately, see some of the nutrient deficiency that I am dealing with in the leaves. I am continuing to try to combat this. Any help or suggestions is MORE than welcome. I do believe it is a Calcium deficiency and am treating it with Humboldt Sea Cal at about 4 mL/gallon of water.

Attachment 296920

More exciting (at least for me) - I pruned and topped for the first time! I was hesitant to stress the plants and do both the pruning and the topping during the same session, but I figured I'd jump right in and go for it - like I've said many times, I just can't keep my hands off! So, it's been about 24 hours since the topping, and the pictures include the new double tops on both of my ladies! I was so happy to arrive home from work this evening and find them growing!

Pruned plant -
Attachment 296921

New tops growing! -
Attachment 296922 Attachment 296923

My question for the experts today: In regards to collecting runoff/excess water that drips out the bottom of my pots after watering - is it ok to keep 100% of that, as long as it's pH tested? I feel like I am dumping a gallon or 2 of nutrient water down the drain per week, and reusing it would save some money. Also, again, any tips or helpful info regarding the Calcium deficiency in my plants would be much appreciated, too!

Happy Holidays, my friends!

[d00g]

Merry Christmas to everyone! I had some quiet time this morning to do the final transfer that I had been planning on doing, from 1 gallon to 3 gallon pots. My 2 ladies got their new shoes for Christmas

Attachment 296974

The clay rocks were such a pain to remove before flipping my pots to extract the plants that I don't think I will use them past the smallest pots anymore. I also wish I had gotten a picture of the mass of roots for everyone to see before putting them in the new pots. Switching to flowering this weekend! Nutrients remain the same that I had listed above. I am still using water that I have collected from the snow we've received this year. The soil is FF Ocean Forest with added Perlite. I wish I had purchased some Dolomite Lime to add to the soil also for some calcium because I believe I am still treating a calcium deficiency, but the newest leaves are looking healthy.

[d00g]

Update -

I finally made one of the changes that I had been planning for a while. I installed a dual-tube T5 lamp on the rear wall of my cabinet. I put two warm, 2700K tubes in it. They are old tubes and were given to me by the friend that helped me wire it, so I will buy some new ones when my wallet recovers from the holidays.

Attachment 297082

Aside from the new T5, you may also notice that the plants appear a bit shorter or look different. I have made my first try at training, and I am really excited about how it didn't feel as difficult as I thought it was going to be. I used some leftover kabob stakes that I had from summer grillin' :rasta:

I am going to pick up a nutrient P boost this week to feed my ladies for this, their first week of flowering. I have some other Humboldt products, so I will probably grab the Humboldt Ginormous.

My only other plan going forward for this upper portion of my cabinet is to add another intake compuer fan. With the addition of the T5 lights and 2 more CFL's (on the Y-splitters), the temperature will be going up. I expect to see it at a daily high in the low 80's by the time I get home from work tomorrow.

Then new seeds planting in about a month as I work on the lower portion of my cabinet for new seedlings and clones!

[tlranger]

Looking very nice, lots of light sure makes a diff, looking. very dense

[catbuds]

Wow! Dense little indicas! Mine were dense like that too, longer stem length on the sun leaves. So when I topped, I also thinned them. The sunleaves were blocking light & air to the new growth, & those new branches were getting no light. Yeah, made them ugly till new growth resumed, but I had to look out for the health of the future bud sites. I know how you felt. It really is hard to cut off that beautiful new growth. It's a case of 'tough love'. I dried & smoked my trimmings (still smoking). Not a bad buzz from leaf. Seeing how short & dense the growth is on modern indica hybrids makes it hard to remember how tall, thin & spindly growth would be when trying to grow old school sativas indoors back in the early 70's! Talk about culture shock! Of course high tech modern lighting helped change that too, but the difference between then & now is unreal! Happy growing! Wishing you a great harvest in the new year!

[GrowBitch2013]

..... as I have several varieties of seeds that my wife bought me for my birthday because she's amazing.

I bet she is
Seeds as a Gift - That's special. And u have long fun with this gift.