Is This Normal? (Grow Problem)

[NeuroGheist]

Okay. So i'm a first time grower, and really know next to shit about growing marijuana. I know the basics. Lighting. Watering. PH. Soil medium. NPK. And Nutrients.

I know not to over-water. Not to over-nute. And to make sure the shoot (taproot coming out of the cracked seed) is atleast an inch or so long, before planting the germinating seed.

Okay, so i've followed all these rules.

I'm using peat-pellets to grow my seedling in. And plan on transfering to a larger pot, in 3 weeks, when the plant looks more mature, and the roots start poking out of the mesh fabric on the pellets. The seedling sprout is under a 150 Watt flourescent light. The light is about 8 inches away from the seedling, because the lighting setup I have, puts out alot of heat, and I don't want to scorch the sprout. I am watering the peat pellet once to twice a day, lightly. Because the light system dries out the peat after awhile, due to the heat.

So you'd think that me paying careful attention to all the rules and whatnot, that nothing would go wrong, eh?

Here's my problem.

Well, like I said. I'm a first time grower, so I have no idea if this is normal or not. I followed all the rules, came up with a healthy looking plant. Doesn't slump over, or anything. Isn't burnt, discolored, etc. The thing sprouted within two days. The two begining circular leaves (cotyledons) spreaded out, and the first pair of true marijuana leaves (about 1 cm long) were showing up.

Everything seemed to be going okay, in terms of vegetation.

Well just this morning, I noticed that the cotyledons, closed back up!! They were sprouted open, and everything. And out of nowhere, on day 3, the cotyledons closed back up, as if the plant is trying to un-germinate itself.

The coloration is still green and everything. And the plant still looks healthy to me. It's just weirding me out. Are cotyledons supposed to do that? Just close back up out of nowhere? And if not, what on earth, may be causing this to happen? Over-watering? Under-watering? I haven't been giving the seedling any nutes, because I don't want to burn the thing this early, and take any chances of insta-killing the plant, before it starts vegetative growth. So yeah.

So i'm just curious...what's causing this?
And is it even normal for a plant to revert like this?

I personally have never known a plant's cotyledons, to shut back up, after opening. So i'm somewhat worried here. But maybe i've got nothing to be worried about.

Any opinions on what could be going on?

BTW - I Posted this in a different forum thread topic (Recreational), because I totally didn't see a "cultivation" topic. So if any of the mods find the other one, feel free to delete it. =P

NeuroGheist Reviewed by NeuroGheist on 10-19-2006. Is This Normal? (Grow Problem) Okay. So i'm a first time grower, and really know next to shit about growing marijuana. I know the basics. Lighting. Watering. PH. Soil medium. NPK. And Nutrients. I know not to over-water. Not to over-nute. And to make sure the shoot (taproot coming out of the cracked seed) is atleast an inch or so long, before planting the germinating seed. Okay, so i've followed all these rules. I'm using peat-pellets to grow my seedling in. And plan on transfering to a larger pot, in 3 weeks, when Rating: 5

[emmpey]

Because cannabis is intensivley cultivated and bred it's not unusal to have seedlings from particular strains that do weird stuff because the gene's are not too stable - I had one a couple of weeks ago that came out with thee leaves, each with three blades for the first set and then promptly died - may be worth germming at least 3 seeds to make sure you get a female.

You don't need to let the root get an inch before planting, pop it in the medium as soon as it shows. You would be better of putting them straight into a pot as well as those root will grow FAST.

[hudson88]

I'd sort out your lights, if the heats stopping you from getting the lights closer you should change them for cooler lights. It sounds similar to a problem i had when i started growing, my lights were too far away and the seedling stretched to get closer to the light and the leaves started pointing upwards and looked like they were closing. It may just be a weird one off problem as emmpey suggests but you need to get your lights closer anyway, around 2".
I'd back up what emmpey says about planting before the root gets to an inch also, i find that if i let the root get long it bends and that causes problems, plant when the root first starts to pop out of the seed.

Good luck :rasta:

[NeuroGheist]

Hahah, yeah. I've only been planting once the root gets an inch long, because if I do that, I only have to wait 1-3 days to get a sprout out if it. But if I do it right when I see the shoot sticking out of the sprout, I usually get results in rather 6 days, or never. And when making it an inch first, I always get results. I honestly don't know why, lol.

And yeah. The only lights at my disposal atm are a 150 watt incandescent grow light (24 hour sun-spectrum), a 250 watt infared flood light, and the 150 watt flouro i'm using now, on my seedlings. Which seems to be the coolest light of themall. I'll switch to the 250 FL when they're up there, in the vegetative stage.

I'm too cheap to get any of the HPS or HID lights and setups, at the moment. So i'm doin' all this shit from scratch. And it seems to be working out well, thus far.

I just recently decided to try again with planting once I see the shoot, and will see how that goes. Although I know it's gonna take probably 4-6 days to see a result...oh well. So long as I actually see one, and don't get a dud, i'm fine.

The faulty plant I talked about earlier, ended up dying for some reason. It looked fine at first, just closing up. Then not much sooner it fell flat.

Anyways, i'll try again, with the 1 I planted earlier today, and the 2 others i'm germing right now. And will post the results, when they happen.

[hudson88]

You don't need to get hps or mh to grow, they will give the best results but cfls work well too and aren't expensive in the uk i can get 20watt cfls for £1 and i've seen a lot of guys here in the states that can get 42watt ones. For starting one plant you can use one of the 40watt cfls and just add two more over the next 6-8 weeks. They give off very little heat so you can get them a lot closer to your plants. Incandescents are notoriousley bad for growing and i don't know much about the infra red light you've got but i doubt you'd find many people here using them. Whats the fluro you've got? It may be that its a cfl (compact fluro light) or is it a long tube? A pic would be helpful.

[NeuroGheist]

I'd post a pic but my cam is fucked up atm, so i'll do my best to explain the bulb. Overall, it looks kind of like a garlic shoot. It's round on one side, an somewhat pointy on the other. Yet, instead of being pointy, it's flat. Or a beter way of putting it, is it kind of looks like a hershy kiss, when held rightside up, but the "tip" of the kiss, looks like it was chopped clean off. And that flat part, is where you screw the light into the system. So i'm guessing what i'm dealing with is a CFL.

I recently found out that my system could be SERIOUSLY faulty here, aswell. As the lamp i'm using for my bulbs, is a HEAT LAMP. It puts out a max of 500 watts, and has 2 sides. Each side for a different light. When the switch is hit, both lights turn on. Since I found out it's a heat lamp, i've been placing the bulb even further from the plants, now. Because if it's meant for heat, then i'm quite sure practically nowhere is safe for my plant right now, except at about 13 inches away from the plant.

I got the heat lamp for about 2 bucks, and thought it'd work out well. It was cheap, and it works. But finding out that it's a heat lamp, kind of worries me. Because I don't know how i'm going to do this right, without killing off my plants. It seems that with a heat lamp, no matter how low the wattage of light you put in there, it still lets off a decent amount of heat, reguardless.

So I may need to find a new (and inexpensive) light system.