1st hydro system - dwc

[bluntman_77]

stealth , i cant have anything visible outside the wardrobe . its got to look like a normal wardrobe at 1st and 2nd glance .

 

if I could do stuff outside I could do the resoviour and float valve thing to , but its all got to be self contained .

[Luke Skywalker]

A reservoir can be a couple of large storage boxes, one on top of the cupboard as a feeder, and one next to the cupboard as the control. All connecting hosing going from the "feeder" to the "control" can be hidden behind the boxes themselves, and as they should be lightproof already they'll just look like storage boxes. Or you could build a third cupboard, much smaller like a drawer/cabinet type unit, which would contain both of these, or just the feeder.

 

You can certianly run DWC without a feeder or float valve setup, but you'll need to top up the water level with fresh, ph adjusted water every few days, less in the initial stages as the plants won't be drawing up that much, but the larger the plant, the more they transpire, and you'll be topping up daily pretty quickly. This is why a float system is advantageous. The larger the containers the better, this will provide a little more water so that the system doesn't get drawn down too quickly. There is a point where it's just too big, but I'd say about 30l or so is a good size for individual plants growing to 3 or 4 foot or so. 50l will supply you with a bit more insulation from that.

 

Oh yeah, ideal root temps are around 22 or so, a simple and cheap method to monitor the solution temp is with a couple of aquarium thermometers, one for each plant, and one for the control. These already have the correct areas usually marked out in green on the thermometer.

 

Note that oxygen deprivation is also a problem with high temps. The higher the water temp, the less oxygen it can hold, and much past about 28 it drops like a rock. More air will simply not dissolve into the water no matter how much you bubble through, so try and keep temps around the 20-25 mark as much as possible.

 

And just on the two cupboard thing, you're probably better off using one cupboard as a mother/cloning/preveg room and keep the other room as a dedicated late veg/flowering chamber under hps. The mother room could be lit by high intensity fluoros, or even a small MH, but you'll not be growing particularly large plants anyway as you'll be in a wardrobe, so you can probably afford to use the one room for late veg and flower, and one for mothering/cloning. If you were cloning in the same room as the mother plants under an MH, you'd be best off with fluoro lighting in a small crib for them, as they're not keen on intense lighting. You could also shade them if you couldn't afford to put together a small clone space.

 

With both mothers and cloning spaces, you'll still have enough area left over even with several small bonsais of mother strains to hold a feeder res somewhere.

 

Just a thought anyway.

 

Hope that helps fire off some ideas.

[bluntman_77]

thanks luke ! always good advice from you .

 

ive been rethinking and i now think a 4 bucket system , 1 control bucket in the main flowering room . possibly a feeder depending on how i can rig it , but definetly a control bucket .

 

then a bucket for a mother and a 50l tub for 3 or 4 small veg plants , not ideal but the root mass should be small and easy to keep seperated , move them into the flower room after a few weeks . if I have trouble ill switch to 4 individual buckets again if theres room in the veg cupboard .

 

i already have the 400w mh from a previous grow so i might as well use that . I also have a ablite 2x18w fluro clone box for my clones , so the veg room is just for the mother and early veg so no worried about the clones under the intense light .

 

ill have to read up on the mother plant thing tho , how do you keep the mother small ? do you trim the roots or stems all the time , bonzai it sort of thing ?

 

so i think this should be an ok little system .

 

one question , if im starting from seed should I plant say 4 seeds , take clones of all after a few weeks , switch to flower and remove the male plants and clones after theve been sexed . then put 1 back in veg as a mother and move the clones to the flower . OR , do the same but dont take clones , do a full cycle and reveg the best female and clone that . harvest that female and keep one of the clones for a mother ? the 2nd way i sacrifice a bit of yeild if I only get 1 or 2 females , but I can pick a female to clone based on yield and potency which I cant if I take clones in early veg .

 

thanks again for the help so far

[Luke Skywalker]

3 or 4 small veg plants , not ideal but the root mass should be small and easy to keep seperated , move them into the flower room after a few weeks . if I have trouble ill switch to 4 individual buckets again if theres room in the veg cupboard .

 

I'd be spacing those plants out as far as you can initially. The root development in a well run DWC system is prolific, and will quickly merge after only a few weeks of development. I'd say you're best off with max two plants per pot, and if you must have more, you'll have to absolutely hold yourself to flowering when very short, or you will be stuck with them where they stand...

 

btw, will they be clones?

 

ill have to read up on the mother plant thing tho , how do you keep the mother small ? do you trim the roots or stems all the time , bonzai it sort of thing ?

 

Yeah, sorta. Keeping light intensity low helps, as well as keeping them under a low nutrient strength, without starving them of course. Fluoros are ideal, as the plants develop slowly but with enough cf's or tubes, or a strong unit, you can have very happy plants. You could keep a much larger mother under a 400w mh, but it just seems like a bit of overkill to me. Maybe not to others.

 

Small root zones, keeping the plants pruned every few weeks, with careful and judicious pruning mind you, not just cutting willy nilly, But yeah, essentially bonsai, with a long light period, or even 24/0 day/night in some cases, to ensure the plants don't start to flower. It's a good idea to exchange mother plants with clones of themselves every six months or so, just to ensure the plants aren't susceptible to diseases of age, and potentially losing the strain. There is no such thing as losing potency in a clone line, imo, unless you clone from a sick plant. Then you have a sick clone, nes pas? But keep your stock healthy, and replace it on a regular basis with the healthiest clone from the lastest batch taken, and you have the begininngs of an "eternal" supply of plants to grow out.

 

Keeping motherplants small, like less than a foot tall and wide, allows you to maintain several of them as well, which gives you options as to your strains to grow out. This could be vital if you grow in an area where the summer is particularly brutal, and you find a heat tolerant strain. Or if you live in a zone which has cold, wet and still winters, which would encourage moulds and fungi, then a mould resistant mother could provide you with fresh stock to grow out in that time whilst you maintained your mother plants carefully in the intervening period...

 

Just a few ideas here...

 

one question , if im starting from seed should I plant say 4 seeds , take clones of all after a few weeks , switch to flower and remove the male plants and clones after theve been sexed . then put 1 back in veg as a mother and move the clones to the flower . OR , do the same but dont take clones , do a full cycle and reveg the best female and clone that . harvest that female and keep one of the clones for a mother ? the 2nd way i sacrifice a bit of yeild if I only get 1 or 2 females , but I can pick a female to clone based on yield and potency which I cant if I take clones in early veg

.

 

You could do it either way, but I'd say option one, where you grow out several seeds, (the more the better your chances of not just getting a female, but a good female) then before they mature you take clones from each and sex these during cloning under 12:12. You then can the males, grow on the females, (which are all marked out clearly on each pot and clone as to who is what. ) and then use the experience to pick the best female strain from those seedlings. You can then either keep them all, or try to grow out more if you're not impressed, or try something else and just keep one or two of the females as mother plants for future grows.

 

Revegging isn't hard, and you can certainly do it, but it takes a lot of time, and means that you have to grow out a several seedlings, then select one or two and grow them on to full maturity, then flower and reveg and clone and so on... I know the first option was long but this one takes a even longer.

 

All that time you've got a risk from fungi in the older flowers which will die on the stems of the new shoots... as well as being older plants...

 

I'm rambling here, damn I'm toasted... I think it was the afghani, which would explain it...

 

Hope that helps, and remember that all I say is my humble of humble opinions, and never to be taken seriously by anyone.

 

Good luck. Keep us posted man. You sound like you've got a plan in your head that's itching to come out, and I feel that it will do so spectacularly.

[Tom]

stealth , i cant have anything visible outside the wardrobe . its got to look like a normal wardrobe at 1st and 2nd glance .

Get a small set of draws or a bedside cupboard, remove the internals and stick it next to the wardrobe, put the control reservoir in that.

 

[bluntman_77]

btw, will they be clones?

 

yep , ill run my 1st grow from seeds in the flower cupboard in individual pots . ill use the 2nd veg cupboard just for mother/clones

 

Yeah, sorta. Keeping light intensity low helps, as well as keeping them under a low nutrient strength, without starving them of course. Fluoros are ideal, as the plants develop slowly but with enough cf's or tubes, or a strong unit, you can have very happy plants. You could keep a much larger mother under a 400w mh, but it just seems like a bit of overkill to me. Maybe not to others.

 

given i already have the 400w mh , would it be ok ? i assume i just have to be more vigilant with pruning .

 

You could do it either way, but I'd say option one, where you grow out several seeds, (the more the better your chances of not just getting a female, but a good female) then before they mature you take clones from each and sex these during cloning under 12:12. You then can the males, grow on the females, (which are all marked out clearly on each pot and clone as to who is what. ) and then use the experience to pick the best female strain from those seedlings. You can then either keep them all, or try to grow out more if you're not impressed, or try something else and just keep one or two of the females as mother plants for future grows.

 

if i do that , how do i know which is the best female , cause all my clones will be young . or do i keep the clones in veg until the 1st gen females grow out and then do a cycle from the clones after ive seen which females perform best over the entire grow ?

 

cheers again luke

Edited April 22, 2005 by skyhigh

[bluntman_77]

Get a small set of draws or a bedside cupboard, remove the internals and stick it next to the wardrobe, put the control reservoir in that.

 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

my garage is soon gonna start looking like a dodgy 2nd hand furniture store !

 

[bluntman_77]

hey incase anyone has any suggestions ....

 

this is my abline 2x18w clone box and ive got some seedlings from crappy bag seed seeds i had . the seeds are like 2-3 years old , only got a 50% germ rate .

 

anyway a cople of them seem to have yellow spots/tips as you can hopefully see . it seems to happen after giving them nutes . im only giving them a tiny bit , like 1-2ml per litre to avoid over nuteing them . after that i just give them plain water for about 5 days and there fine . i dont have a ph meter yet is that the cause ?

 

this is just bag seed i chucked in cause i was bored and thought id practice germination before my real grow started so its no big deal.

[bluntman_77]

oh well there all dead , except one which is yellow and sad

 

theres more to this hydroponics stuff than seems

 

my water is like 500ppm before adding nutes and it seems to be messing up the little seedlings . this is going to be a problem I think

[Pickle]

There is no real way to tell what the best plant will be as far as potency or taste until you consume it but you can see fast growth, short or long flowering periods, short internodal spacing and big yeilding traits just by looking.

 

Take a cutting from each plant, label the cutting and the plant and decide when you have all relevant info.