I need help. 2 Weeks and just minimum Growth. Here's my Pictures, Setup, and Soil. Any help is much appreciated

Hey thank for the response. Yeah this is our first grow, so this is all news to us. I would’ve thought Auto flowers was much easier to grow. But we’ll see.

Hey Cap_Ron thank you for the reply. Let me ask you, how are you able to control your temps so easily? Ours is in our basement and the temps vary. And we don’t feel that we have enough room to put any type of heater in there. Thoughts?

It is funny how when this was illegal growing was simple. Start a seed, plant it in the woods, and come back in the fall and harvest. Now we are allowed to grow and seeds won’t start, soil isn’t good enough, lights aren’t right and it became difficult to get any amount of harvest. I’m ready to go back to planting outside like the old days.

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Hey Joey, thank you for the response. That could be the case. I may try what Cap_Ron suggested with the 18/6 or 20/4 and see how it does.

Hey VTGrow thank you for the response. I didn’t even notice that it is a Miracle Grow brand at the top. I tried my best to avoid Miracle Grow from reading before going to purchase. And the first thing on my mind was to get something as natural and organic as possible. And didn’t notice it was a Miracle Grow brand until you said something. Wow. I will look into the Happy Frog. You’re the second person I’ve heard say that. Let me ask you; do you think it’s too late to get Happy Frog and have the seedlings transferred over without disrupting them?

I don’t believe it’s too late but it’s a 50/50chance

The reason I say that is the plant is already stressed and transplanting again would be another stress. However if it does and thrives you would have a very resilient plant

Hey Myfriendis410, thank you for your reply. I was hoping not to have to get involved with dealing with PH when we purchased these autoflowers. Which is why I tried to keep it as close to just organic and all natural as possible. Like anything, learning and becoming knowledgeable is key to growing in the right direction. I need to familiarize myself with this PH thing for soil. I definitely see the importance.

As for the temps, how in the world do you control your temperature? Thank you for the advice on the dome for the plants, that will probably be the first I take. And let me ask you, in a small 3’x3’ grow tent, should I be using a bigger or more powerful light? Or do I need to increase the amount of lights in there?

I’m not familiar with what the PH should be. I’m not sure if it’s like keeping the PH correct in a pool or if they’re on the same level. And I’m not familiar with the term TDS. I’m assuming when planting, the soil needs to be a certain PH and also when watering the temp should be luke warm and the PH must be correct in the water as well?

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Hey BlacknIrish, I use small 700 watt oil filled heaters. They work great, and they’re only about 40 bucks on Amazon. I took a pic of one next to a 5 gallon jug so you could see how small they are. Always keep a fan blowing on it in a tent or closet to prevent hot spots and excessive heat to the plants closest to it. It’s operated by a day/night temperature controller also from Amazon. I use Vicks cool mist humidifiers during the hot months, and Vicks warm mist humidifiers when it’s cooler, and you can get both at any Walmart or from Amazon. You can get an Inkbird humidity controller on Amazon as well, and I got a 70 pint dehumidifier for the room at Home Depot. I’ll post pics of the control areas for my closet and one of my tents so you will recognize the items when you search for them on Amazon. Oh yeah, I use AC Infinity exhaust fans, I like the flexibility they give with the digital controllers.

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This is a worthwhile goal and there are some others doing the same: search for ‘living soil’ on the forum. @MidwestGuy, @Covertgrower you’re good all around; who’s some organic growers?

I am currently growing one plant in a 2 X 4 X 5 tent in the garage in SoCal. I have a variety of strategies MacGyver’d in there to manage temps. First off I HATE paying to heat the space. Second; I have high efficiency lights that don’t generate a huge amount of heat. Third; I can see freezing temps of 80F in any given week. So it’s an evolving thing lol. I have an inline 4" for refresh air, a 6" exhaust on a thermostat to vent the warm headspace above a preset temp, I have a 300 watt aquarium heater in a 5 gallon bucket of water with the lid on and set at 85F to provide a warm thermal mass in the grow space. Last, I have a big dehumidifier in the space to manage humidity prior to harvest (this is a big deal to avoid bud rot).

Cannabis metabolizes ‘mobile’ nutrients: you’ll see the N, P, and K ratios on fertilizers for example. These are the 3 ‘base’ nutrients needed to grow cannabis and they happen to be soluble in water at different PH’s. They overlap at somewhere between 5.5 and 6.8 PH. In soil that is refined to 6.3 to 6.8 PH and is the issue you will have with your existing soil mix. A small dose of dolomite lime top-dressed into your soil will help to ‘buffer’ the PH into the range of cannabis. But don’t do anything until you have a PH meter and can perform some diagnostics.

Total Dissolved Solids, expressed as US PPM (one scale) UK/Canada PPM (a different scale) and EC (short for ‘electrical conductivity’)

A very valuable tool to determine the salt concentration of a soil, or nutrient solution. Along with PH you can manage the variables to keep your plants in the middle of nominal values.

More than likely you will need a better light. Fortunately plants need a fraction of the light needed to properly flower-off a plant. Strongly suggest you use this time to get smart on lighting technology. Some climates you may want something like Light-emitting ceramic (LEC) for the additional heat generated. In other climates LED’s would be a better choice, and new latest generation lights are superior to anything except sunlight. Look at Horticulture lighting Group. In a 3 X 3 you would need to of their 260’s. They are NOT cheap but can run half the power of the Amazon lights (blurple).

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Can’t think of anyone else and I’m pretty much a straight HF guy with few amendments.

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@Mrcrabs as well as a few others just having a moment of forgetfulness.

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@Skydiver is another one.

The MG being used is what I used for seedlings last grow with no issues at all. There’s no time released nutes in it and best I remember the nutrients in it were good numbers for seedlings.

I used the same soil for my seedlings my last grow with no issues. I think lie MyFriend started you need humidity, ph your water and some heat

Neil freakin Peart!

What a RUSH

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I only give space on my grow room walls to true legends! And my plants listen to a lot of Rush, lol.

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One of my all time favorite albums…2112…that combination of numbers just sings to me!

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I would give it a shot. I think they will most likely be stunted a little anyway but they will be happier in the new soil if they make it. If you have some other seeds I’d start a couple more in new soil and compare your results between those and transplanted.

Hey @BlacknIrish excited for your upcoming harvest.
They should be able to recover. But you can replant the worst and see or all just cut a big enough cone of soil and have the other pot ready with same size hole as plant. L As they are autos and they are already stressed you may just want to adjust the environment within range.
Soil Ph 5.8-6.8 is normal for me depending on how moist the soil is and that changes with depth at least what I’ve experienced anyway.
I use this to check the ph of the soil.


I use these for checking liquids when needed.

I too grow in a basement one tent in finished section and one tent in an unfinished room. One way to up the temps in the tent is to up the temps in the house. I know my first floor temps are about 6f higher than my basement temps. I also either open or close the door going down to the basement depending on if I wanna cool more door open (summer) (heat rises…cold falls) or retain heat door closed (winter) etc. you can also look at any duct work in the basement and possibly tap off of one to have heat come out near tent area. Small analog heater (not a digital one with read outs aren’t compatible with inkbird controllers if you decide to get one later) place the heater where the lower passive vent in tent is and allow that to help with heat if you don’t have room for it inside. They draw a lot of amps usually so may want to make sure you can support the draw where you plug it in. May need to run it at low setting etc.
This chart is what you’ll want to use to dial in your temps related to humidity during the various stages of growth…or as close as you can get.


Your plants can grow in that soil but you’ll want to think about what your going to use as they get bigger as that soil alone won’t get you to harvest.
I too used miracle grow on my first grow with Photo seeds. They made it and I was happy with yield and taste/effect etc but I had some bumps and also realized I needed to add additional nutrients as well and I wanted an all organic grow for my health issues I was going through.
Here’s a link to that first grow it may help with yours.

Another way to raise the temps is getting a great light that will grow big fat dense buds and you will need more than you have now in the near future as they get bigger and then go into flower where they need the most photons (light)!
Your tent footprint is basically a 3x3 and here are a couple lights to consider.

Not sure what your feeding them and how much but that’s usually the first thing to know and go from there. Are you using tap, well, RO or distilled or rain water?
Take a couple tablespoons one from one area and depth one from different or split up with 4 areas to get a average and put that in a small container and add about the same amount of RO or distilled water and stir it and let settle for 20 min. Check with the calibrated PH meter and write down the reading. You’ll need to stir it up with the meters probe a little bit to get a stable reading. The one you have for the pool may work just fine reading liquids just need to calibrate it first so you know your readings are on.

Anyway hope this helps
Dam this got long…Mmm Pineapple

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