i am hours away from starting fist grow.....

[misstress morbid]

due to seeds germing really quick.....they have like 1 inch heads/tails with a helmut so i guess heads? i am starting grow officially today.on my way to pick up a 400 w light now, and some medium(probably rockwool) so i need as much advice as possible.o...and i guess i will get some nutrient too.....

thankfully grow room in new home is unreal!!! turns out i can get mylar(or some other reflective canvas...silver on one side, green on the other for nothing....so i have covered complete grow room space- like 2m by 1m by 1.5m in that.

can a normal household fan do 4 now...

if so....how long do i leave it on a day???

i am really worried about heat in there...i have left some gaps for heat to escape( alas also smell?light?) there is 4 about 12cms long by 5 cm high...am hoping i don't have to rig up some sort of exhast fan???

so my questions....have i allowed enough space to dissapate the heat around sides of room???(1 400w hung from the roof)

how many adult (1.5 m high) plants will i be able to grow with 1 lamp in this space...

i am soooo excited i am finally stating this!!!!today!!!!

[Buddy]

If your doing hydro, go for the best nutes and buy General Hydroponics (GH), Expanded clay for your medium provides more space and less resistance for your roots to reach the nutrients and is also re-usible.

Ordinary household is fine adjustable speed is better.

Leave it on 24 hrs, it helps to fatten the stems.

I wouldnt grow more than 3 plants but it depends how high your going to let them grow.

[Guest Wilderbud]

Itd be good to see what youre talking about.

 

I had no heat problems with a mylar-covered 3Mx3M room with 1.5x1.5M tray in the centre but I did have humidity problems so recycling the air would be good. What I did was opened a man-hole in the roof and put a fan there to pull air out of the room and it worked well if I opened the door a few times per day - itd be good if you could do something similar [especially since its Summer-time].

 

I agree with the General Hydroponics range - Im now positive that the nutrients I first used was GH [although it was 2-part grow and 1-part bloom that I used about 8 years ago?] - same bottles and similar labels.

Edited November 16, 2003 by Wilderbud

[red13]

Sorry to say it but u prob will get heat probs. i also would not put more then 3 and prob 2 . a 400w gives u the are of about a metre square. i would try to keep them short no more then a metre high. u can top them 2 help u achieve this. gh is a good nute and so is canna. don't over nute i would use less then the recomened amount while they are so young . as u ,may fry them. don't like rock wool. i think 4 that type of system coco fibre is better.

 

i'll come and give more tips when u post again.

 

oh 1 vary important tipDON'T TELL PEEPS U ARE GROWING. OPPS OK WELL DON'T TEL ANY 1 ELSE GOOD LUCK

[AussieToka]

don't like rock wool. i think 4 that type of system coco fibre is better.

 

What do you find to be the difference? what I mean to say is why is the Coco fibre better than Rockwool?

 

Im at the stage where I cant decide weather to use rockwool or Coco??

 

please help.

[Luke Skywalker]

Comparing apples to oranges mate, it's whatever gives the best results for you.

 

Coco is great stuff, but it has limitations. It holds a lot of water, so most growers lighten the mix with perlite or expanded clay, this provides some more drainage, which our favourite plant loves. Coco is also organic, so it will draw on and affect the nurient concentrations present in it. Short answer, it needs a different spectra of nutes to take this into account. You can buy many brands which are designed for just this purpose. You can use normal nutrients designed for hydro, but you may not get the best possible results.

 

Coco's organic nature can also make for a lovely home for pests too, particularly scarid fly, aka fungus gnats. This is one of the hardest pests to eliminate from the growroom, so if you are going with coco, make sure you can exclude insects from the area, and don't allow any potentially contaminated soil/clothes get into the growroom. Coco has many advantages tho, as it's organic it's not mined from the earth and is recyclable. Not to mention compostable. And run to waste coco systems are some of the best out there. And if organics is the aim, and you'd still like to be using hydroponics, then coco could be for you.

 

As to growool, great stuff, couldn't praise it more. But once again, it has it's drawbacks and advantages, and you should be aware of these. Rockwool holds a lot of moisture in it's fibers, but also holds a large amount of air inside it too, which allows it to be more open than it would appear to be. It's easy as to use, you can plant seeds or root clones in small cubes, planting them up as they grow and require more room. No digging, no pissfarting around shovelling media out of the way and being careful not to damage the roots, you just stick the plug into the hole on the larger cube, and from there you place the cube onto a slab, or into whatever other media you're using, even soil!

 

Growool also has some interesting effects on the nutrients within it's structure, and if you were planning on using it as an exclusive media I'd suggest looking into growool specific nutrients. Once again, you can use normal nutes, and get great results, but you may not get optimum results. Growool is also a slightly alkaline media when first purchased off the shelf, and needs to be "set" to the correct ph level before using, otherwise you'll definitely run into nutrient absorbtion problems down the track. This is done by soaking the growool for 24 - 48 hrs before use, in a solution of ph adjusted water, at around 5.0 or so. This set's the level within the growool a little higher than the water you've treated it with, at around the optimum 5.5 - 6.2 levels which hydro plants love. From then on the nutrients applied to the growool is at normal, (5.5 -6.2, where ph should be in the nute tank) levels ph wise.

 

Growool is used by a very, very large proportion of the hydroponics industry. And Holland is almost built on the stuff. But it's not the be all and end all media, there are lots out there, and after all, it's your grow, in your house, and you're looking after it. You can only learn all you can, and experiment, and hope it works like it should for ya. Experience will be your teacher as to whether one of these media is better for your situation.

 

Whew, that took a while... anyway, hope that helps ya on your path Aussie Toka, have a search of the boards, and look up some info on the net about different hydro media types and systems. There are more ways to grow pot than there are growers, but we all follow some basic principles really.

[Guest Wilderbud]

What Luke said but I have to add something to the growool description.

 

Growool comes in cubes and people usually just put it in a wick system in the open - you need to cover it with insulating medium as it can become very cold and this isnt good for your clones or roots. Ive heard a few people in here like to have perlite around the cube and this would insulate it from the cold a bit more but I think you really need to use a fishtank heater or heating mat to keep the root area warm.

 

I havent tried the perlite around the growool yet. My first experience with growool had me putting the cube in a plastic container after wetting and draining [drop and lift a few times] it and I lost every single clone.

 

Oh yeah - make sure you fluch the growool also to get rid of the stuff they use to keep it inert or whatever. petroleum jelly? Whatever it is flush it well.

 

I love peat+perlite [straight peat is a problem indoors for me though] and I will be using rockwool one day when I try an NFT system [they look so professional]. Theyre both great for starting seeds and clones and the rest of your grow should determine which one you should use!

Edited November 29, 2003 by Wilderbud