First grow AK47

[renzore101]

Hello ILGM,

I have been prowling around this site for a couple days and subscribed to the mailing list to get access to the book and I figured why not get involved with this great forum. About a week ago I started on my journey into cultivation with no prior experience, just several weeks of research on the interwebs, primarily YouTube. So at this point I figured I would track my grow in this journal so here goes!

Here is my awesome 2x4 tent:

I am a zip-tie master:

600 watt Viparspectra LED, I secured it up as high as I possibly could with some additional zip tie wizardry. At this point I am thinking I may have gone overboard with this LED for the vertical space i’m currently working with, keeping my fingers crossed that this doesn’t torch my plant:

Needless to say, it’s going to be a pain if the light needs to be moved!

Based off my initial research the key points that i’m committing to memory are this:

1. Environment is extremely important - I need to pick up a temp/humidity digital display and a dehumidifier before flower so I can control humidity. I think I may be able to effectively control temps in the tent with the intake based off shutting/opening my HVAC vent in the bathroom i’m using as necessary.

2. pH is critically important. I calibrated my new pH pen yesterday and I am going to work to start accurately controlling the pH of my water. It’s around 7.4 - 7.5 out of the tap. Need to get a good feel for the peat moss i’m using still so I can accurately test runoff once I get to that point. When testing runoff do a flush first then come back and pour water a 2nd time to get an accurate runoff reading.

• Since transplant after germination i’ve been concentrating on watering very conservatively as i’ve read over-watering is the most common beginner mistake.

3. Light is very important - I hope my plant doesn’t melt. I currently have my LED on a timer with bloom and veg switches both on 18/6, planning on not changing this at all throughout the entire grow.

Below are the nutes I bought:

I actually mixed .75 ml of the grow of these nutes in one of the 1 liter bottles I started off watering my seedling with, but I may be starting the nutes too early, however i’ve only watered with the nutes minimally and offset 2/3 times with straight tap water. Planning on utilizing a 1 gallon jug to water moving forward as the pH pen doesn’t fit in the 1 liter bottles i’ve been using at this point.

Below is the MG peat moss i’m using (I mixed this with approx 30% MG perilite [not pictured] as well to assist with drainage)

Reading further on the interwebs it seems like not many folks are keen on using MG soils so I may move to coco next time. I want to get an accurate reading of the runoff ASAP to get a feel for how this MG soil pH level turns out but at this stage I don’t want to drown the seedling.

Heres my pH pen and pH up/down kit that I bought:

Hopefully this all is effective in controlling my pH levels.

Last but not least, here she is:

She looks to be off to a good start from what I can tell. Regardless this is really exciting to me, if I fail miserably I will persevere!

Sorry for the lengthy post, I look forward to any advice as well as some horticulture edumucation and happy growing!

[Seeddog]

Welcome aboard . It looks like you off to a great start . You can get lots of advise from folks here . I found some cranberry juice jugs have large openings big enough to get a PH pen in easily and nice handles for a good grip when watering . I would hold off on any nutrients especially if your soil has it already . How tall is your tent ?

[elheffe702]

Welcome to the forum @renzore101! You’ve hit the ground running! Lots of help to be had here. I love AK-47, it’s one of my favorites for my headaches. The first thing I see is that in that big pot, she will be very easy to over water. You are skipping any risk of transplant shock if that’s her forever home, which is the way a lot of folks do it, especially with autos. No biggie. Also, while she’s building her root ball in there, she’ll grow slow at first. She’ll get going after the roots start to fill the pot.

[renzore101]

Greetings Seeddog, thanks for the feedback! I know the exact jugs you’re referring to, I actually have a gallon water jug I may use in the interim, however I will pick up the juice jugs soon. I will also heed your advice on the nutes for the moment, I have been studying a coco grower on YouTube and probably getting too conditioned to throw nutes early for rapid growth, soil being different from that perspective. My tent is 4’ so i’m probably going to employ some training and most likely SCROG to discourage excessive vertical growth.

[elheffe702]

Sounds like a “Jaws” quote, but, you’re gonna need a bigger tent! The scrog will help, but once that sativa-dominant gets going, she’ll want to grow tall.

[renzore101]

Thanks for the warm welcome and feedback @elheffe702 !! I actually got these AK-47 seeds free with an order from a seed bank along with my purple kush seeds, my logic and thought process was starting with the AK-47 and saving the precious purple stuff for once I get some real experience under my belt, however after reading up on the sativa dominant AK47 i’m excited to see how this strain turns out as well so i’m going to be careful to see this grow through successfully, fingers crossed! That being said, I imagine this AK-47 is also going to want to grow taller vertically with the sativa genetics as well so that will be something else I may need to contend with in my situation. You also hit the nail on the head with the pot, I threw it in a 2.5 gallon with the intent of not transplanting and I have been very careful to water very conservatively at this stage but I definitely will want to get the “pick up the pot” weight technique down quickly, regardless I think I am going to try to stay as reasonably conservative with the watering schedule on this grow throughout as I can get away with. I will also mention these are auto/fem seeds as well, and as far as the growth I may just be a total noob but from my perspective I can see noticeable growth every day I get home from work so this pace is fine by me for the moment!

[elheffe702]

@renzore101

starting with the AK-47 and saving the precious purple stuff

I did exactly the same with my free White Widow for my first grow, for the same reasons. It paid off. I’m still cloning the genetics from the second grow, the seeds I actually paid for.

Autos behave a little differently, as I’m sure you’ve read/heard. Some say you should baby them to avoid shocking them, and shorting yourself yield. Others top and train autos with no issues. I would start slow with any training you choose to do, especially as you’re learning what you can and can’t get away with.

[renzore101]

@elheffe702

Sounds like a “Jaws” quote, but, you’re gonna need a bigger tent! The scrog will help, but once that sativa-dominant gets going, she’ll want to grow tall.

Yeah see this was one of my main concerns and I do have a limited footprint in my current available grow space as well. I wonder if a 2 x 2 x X footprint grow tent exists?

[renzore101]

@elheffe702

Autos behave a little differently, as I’m sure you’ve read/heard. Some say you should baby them to avoid shocking them, and shorting yourself yield. Others top and train autos with no issues. I would start slow with any training you choose to do, especially as you’re learning what you can and can’t get away with.

This is also a great point, autos generally grow smaller across the board regardless of species right? I will also keep this in mind in regards to the training, I definitely don’t want to go snapping branches or overly stressing the plant out.

[elheffe702]

For sure! @raustin @MattyBear and I believe @TxGrowman grow in 2 x 2 tents. You can probably get like a 6’, or even 6’6" one and have 0 worries with a scrog.

[elheffe702]

Not necessarily. Ask @HornHead about his 100 something day auto…beastly!

And it depends on how long you veg a photo, by comparison. Generally speaking, yes, they yield slightly less because of the lack of control as to when they begin flowering and stop, or at least slow growing.

[HornHead]

Yeah, i had a white widow auto that went almost 6 months. Pulled about an lb off it. Not the best but good smoke either way. Lwt me know how you 20c. Sorry , !@#$ed at monment

[renzore101]

@elheffe702 @TxGrowman @raustin @MattyBear So after poking around on Amazon it appears that my options are somewhat limited in the 2x2 tent footprint as far as height goes. I only saw a couple other vendors that offered between 50" - 60" height tents. Of these vendor options some also did not have stellar reviews either. In the comments folks are bitching about light leak and questionable quality. At this point I would like to try to maximize my horizontal growth as much as possible but I don’t know if it’s even going to be possible given the 4’ height constraint. In the current configuration in the grow space that I have my tent installed it is also a bathroom. Taking this into consideration there is a standing shower directly behind my tent that I may be able to re-purpose as a grow space, however I would really prefer sticking in the tent. Given my situation is it even realistic or possible at all for me to maximize the 4’ height with bushy grow techniques?

Edit: I also wanted to add that from my perspective maximum yield is not of utmost priority. If I can manage 1 - 2 oz of high quality off the plant I would be satisfied.

[elheffe702]

It’s certainly worth a try! There are some things you can do to maximize the space, just in how the equipment is configured and things like that. You could also get a tent, and modify it. Or get two, and stick them together. You could do very aggressive training and scrog the plant. You could do 12/12 from seed to keep the size down. You could even do something way outside the box…grow your plant big enough to take clones. Take a dozen or so, and once they’re rooted, do a sea of green in that space. Lots of options.

One more, you could build your own “tent” from lumber and panda film, probably for much less, too.

[renzore101]

Updated pic from earlier today:

I would say she cant be stopped at this point.

[elheffe702]

I’m out of likes, but that looks textbook. Maybe slightly wet, but I know the camera can play tricks. Just be careful not to overwater. Keep it up

[raustin]

You can get a 2x2x5’ tent on Amazon, that’s what I have and have no problem growing nice big plants.

[renzore101]

Yeah I just watered quite a bit today as I hadn’t watered in a couple days. I’ll hold off for a few more days now since it’s pretty damp now. @raustin I’ll pick up one of the 2x2x5 tents in a couple weeks then probably, i’m sure that extra ft will go a long way.

[elheffe702]

You know what, wtf am I saying?! My closet space that I’m currently flowering in is only 40" high. Just top and supercrop, or scrog or whatever. Here I am thinking 4’ is so much smaller that it actually is (with the lights and whatnot in there).

[renzore101]

@elheffe702 Ok cool maybe i’m good then. And yeah between the LED and the zip tie wizardry i’m probably really working with more like 3’ 6".