Try and try again. I gave up on the closet as a grow space as it was very difficult to control the environment without destructive means.
So now I am back to where I started which is my 3x3 tent but using LED instead. And so far, everything seems to be working well with temps at 71 with 52 RH. Not ideal but way better than the figures I had using the HID.
This current setup of mine looks promising. Since I can only use a small room humidifier, I have to refill every 4 hours. Lights off temps go down to as low as 65 with RH slowly decreasing when the humidifier runs out of water.
Funny part about all this is my extractor fan is a 12v computer fan attached to a 15 foot flexible hose that is coiled on top of the tent to help decrease the flow. I am in legal country and there is no concern for smell. For my intake, I have another 12v fan sucking fresh air from the window through another 15 foot hose. And with that, my tent still displays the classic sucked-in look. Hah!
I have heaters in both tents and keep the temperatures between 75-77. I have a dehumidifier in the one tent to keep the humidity under 60, but that was during summer. Now that itās cold the humidity stays around 35-40 and itās too much a hassle to use a humidifier. I like the lower humidity, especially now that theyāre in flower because I dont want to have mildew problems. Ideally, I would like to have a finished room where these variables could be on automatic controls. If that were the case, I think I would have the humidity around 55%. It seems like every strain has different preferences and those are usually contradicted by different sources. Do you think humidity levels make that much of a difference on the end product?
From the last HID grow I did with temps at 96 and RH @ 25, humidity killed any chances of that plant from producing any trichs, scent or stickiness. It basically cooked them all off. We had a heat wave for a good 3 weeks. That was the mother of the Afghani clones I just finished off and while her buds were nice and big, they were light and airy with no scent or stickiness. That was an extreme case though.
I do believe higher humidity is important for the plantās overall growth during the vegetative period. Right now, you are RH 35-40 during flowering and that would be what I strive for once I flip them. The Afghani clone I just grew under the LED suffered as if I had grown it under the HID with RH of 20 or so. Same problem, barely any trichs and scent but bud size severely suffered due to the low humidity and I suspect the lower powered light.
Mid 50s RH is a good compromise I think.
I used Promix Veg&Herb instead of peatmoss for this go around and Promix HP works real well. The compost/wormcastings were homemade from my worm bin or outdoors (dried leaves and rotten felled trees are a good source). Peat moss would work as well, you just need to inoculate with some mycos to get the microbe population going.
Mix all ingredients well and moisten with water until you can form a clump with your hand that will hold shape yet readily crumble. The mix was cooked for about 3 weeks since Alfalfa generates heat while decomposing. I would turn the mix over if it starts smelling ammoniated and moisten if it gets too dry. You can cook them in your final pots.
Anyway, I think that is all the basics. This is a water only recipe. I use tap water with a PH 8.0+ and 190 PPMs. Once in a while, I do a molasses/water feed (1T per gallon) to feed the microbes especially prior to flip. Veg is when I follow the wet/dry cycle to promote good root development. It also kills off a lot of microbes so I give them a tea of what I have available.
Hope this gives everyone some ideas and try their own hand at making their own soil.
Wow! Thanks for sharing, thatās quite the recipe.
Our base mixes are identical but if I donāt use peat I usually buy Black Gold Organic potting soil as a substitute and the plant growth appears the same regardless. Never tried Pro Mix, maybe I will next time.
Iām still fiddling with my recipe but it has worked very well for me. Other than the obvious differences it sounds like we follow the same practices overall. I use carbon filtered tap water but I adjust it to 6.8 and rarely water to runoff unless I want to check its pH which sits around 6.5. Occasionally watering with some teas. The major difference is the amount of amendments we both use, dang! Have you run into any issues running that mix?
For my current grow I decided to experiment with amended coco and followed the exact mixture that mr.canucksgrow on youtube uses. I actually donāt really agree with his method but I want to see for myself. Throughout veg the plant has looked fantastic. I just recently switched to flower so weāll see how it turns out.
Yes I think that most all ārecipesā floating around is a variation of the Clackamas Coots orginal mix. It started out as a simple mix and then just went downhill from there. heh hehā¦
My three current plants are in this mix. The youngest GDP is the second plant to run through that pot. I had a seeded female in there and I wanted to see how many plants it could sustain before running out. In my previous grow using 15G pots, I was able to run 4 plants through without a topdress or re-amendment. I did run into some N tox with that mix, possibly due to adding alfalfa, bone and blood meals. I did not use them with this current mix and so far, no toxicity issues. There may be deficiency issues later on but I am still in the veg period. We will see.
Your plants are looking real good as well. Do you have a grow log going? I love weed porn!
Here is the small GDP under natural light. New growth was getting too light green for my liking so I top dressed with 1/4C mixed neem/karanja and watered with molasses added. Also snagged more worms from the bin to get them munching on the previous roots. Should keep them busy for awhile.
Clackamas! I was trying to remember the name⦠Subcool also had a good looking mix but I havenāt tried it yet.
Unfortunately the āGrow With Janeā app does not want to work on my phone. Iāve tried reaching out to support but havenāt heard back yet. If I canāt get it sorted I might just start a thread, not sure yet.
I have the google pixel 3 if anyone here knows of a fixā¦