Little Black Cabinet Stealth First Time Grow

Thanks @covertgrower ! Will try setting up a fan later on.

When should I be starting nutes? I’m on Day 15, and I think the Northern Lights is going to need a drink in the next couple of days. I was thinking of going for a half strength seedling dose.

Thanks for the advice; I reckon I’ll definitely try the CFL as you suggested next go around.

What soil do you have @slsjohn? Fox farms ocean forest?

I’ve got an Australian local Coco with no nutrients. Brand is Nutrifield. It’s straight with no perlite.

Okay, I’ve measured my pots and I’m pretty sure I’m going to have to repot into my bigger fabric pots. The current pots are only a half gallon, and the fabric pots are 5 Gallons.

Does this sound like a good idea? If so, I assume I should do this soon, right?

@slsjohn Yes you should do this soon. For your nutrients go 1/4 strength. You can always add more if a deficiency shows up, but it screws things up when you overkill.

Wednesday 16 May, 16 days old for the Northern Lights Auto and 6 days old for the White Widow Photo.

Big update today, transplanted both plants to their forever homes, 5 Gallon Fabric pots, filled with straight Coco. I was pretty nervous transplanting, but I think I did an okay job and haven’t disturbed the roots too much. Was a bit tricky adjusting heights as my light hangers are now at maximum extension, so have had to prop up pots with various boxes to get to previous height of 14 inches from light to soil. I can’t prop them up any higher without completely blocking my air intake on the left.

Photo: Northern Lights on Right, White Widow on left:

I fed both plants, 1 Litre each, and kept it around the seedlings. I couldn’t get right up against them, as I read somewhere to avoid splashing on the leaves. Is that right?

I’ve watered the White Widow Photo with 1 litre tap water (Natural PH is about 6.5, I probably should have lowered this to 6 but forgot). White Widow:

I’ve given the first 1Litre of nutes to the Northern Lights Photo at half the recommended seedling strength (I meant to do 1/4 but also… kind of forgot). Had trouble adjusting PH as it was my first time and I was only doing 1 Litre. A drop of PH down goes a long way at this concentration. Got it to pH 6.1 which wasn’t my goal, was hoping for 5.8-6. photo of northern lights:

So I’m guessing that I can expect a bit of a growth stall as a result of the transplantation. Hopefully nothing worse than that! :pray:

As always, comments, criticism and advice are very welcome to this newbie.

Everything sounds on track @slsjohn you may not experience a growth stall, so here’s hoping!

Just a FYI. If you do notice the plant does not seem to be growing for 3 or 4 days. It will probably be because most of the effort is focused on the roots growing. You should be fine though.

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Good point @Not2SureYet. She’ll work mainly on filling that big pot with roots, then she’ll really take off.

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Love this! I’ll be watching, best of luck with the grow!

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Set to watching too! I know a guy looking to do a stealth build! :wink:

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So does this vipar have the veg and bloom switches?

I’m assuming it does, because I can see them lol. In post 8, it appears the bloom spectrum is on mostly red light. That would account for the stretch. I would probably be running with veg only at this point, or with both on. In which case that light is probably too close to plants not too far away. Just a thought.

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Thanks for the advice. I think I’ve only been using veg lights the whole time, but it’s possible I had it backwards during that photo — I just had a look with the bloom lights on and it looks like a different pattern of lights than was on in that photo.

Four days ago I noticed that some of the leaves on the Northern Lights were looking a little dry and “crispy” which makes me think the lights were too close. So I’ve been raising them an inch or so a day and now I’m at 18 inches above the soil and the newest growth on top is looking a lot less dry.

Update today, Sun 20 May. Northern Lights Auto is 20 days old, and White Widow is 10. I think I’m starting to see the first new growth since the transplant, and it’s all been looking pretty good. Luckily didn’t have any wilting issues or anything so I think I avoided root shock.

So far the cabinet setup is working quite well, have been loving using the bottom shelf for storage underneath:

White Widow Photo:

Northern Lights Auto:

Here’s a question I need some help with: can someone help me understand what Flowering time means, and advise when I should flip the lights to 12:12 for the White Widow? The Flowering time is listed from the breeder as 55 Days, does that mean that after the light flip they would be ready for harvest after another 55 days?

As previously mentioned, I have a hard deadline for my grow with an overseas trip. This is in 66 days from now. My plan is to hand my harvested buds over to a trusted friend to finish them off for drying and curing on this date, which should be just enough time for the Northern Lights Auto according to its advertised harvest time.

Obviously the White Widow Photo would ideally have a much longer time than this to come to harvest. It’ll likely be a very small crop if it works at all. Assuming that It needs 55 days from flip to harvest, this means I’d have to flip the lights in 10 days?

I’m looking for advice as to when I change my lights to 12:12. Or if perhaps the White Widow is so unlikely to work in this small amount of time, that perhaps I shouldnt worry about what’s ideal for it and instead just flip the lights when the Northern Lights Auto decides to flower.

The flowering time listed on seed banks’ and growers’ websites are estimates. Flowering starts when you start to see pistils form at the bud sites, which is generally about 2 weeks from switching to 12/12.

You will want to let the photoperiod plant(s) grow in veg until they are at least mature enough to produce flowers, somewhere around 4-6 weeks from sprout. Then add a couple weeks for the plant to actually start to flower. Then as I said those numbers are estimates, so she might not be ripe necessarily “on time.”

Autoflowering plants will begin to flower on their own, regardless of lighting schedule, and from what I’ve seen the seed banks usually give a time estimate from seed to harvest. If you’re leaving in 66 days, the auto might be ready, but even if you flip now, you’d probably have a couple weeks left on the White Widow. Could your trusted friend be trusted to finish her and harvest her too?

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Nope, doesn’t really work like that. Flowering time is generally that long from first pistils. But plants won’t do that until they’re mature enough. That’s usually about 4ish weeks from seed.

So you’ll have about 4 weeks, plus transition time, plus flowering time. And the breeder estimates are just that, estimates. Could be shorter longer, but if they’re estimating about 8 weeks it’s rarely shorter than that.

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Thanks for the learnings! I think the best plan for this White Widow then might be to try and give it away to someone who can finish it off properly.

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Minor update, 21 may. 21 days old for Northern Lights Auto and 11 days old for White Widow Photo.

The Coco was starting to look a touch dry tonight so I’ve fed them: 5 litres at full seedling strength for the Northern Lights and 2 litres at half seedling strength for the White Widow. pH 5.8

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Couple of pics after last night’s feed; looking pretty healthy this morning. 22 May, 22 days old for Northern Lights, 12 days old for White Widow.

Northern Lights Auto:


White Widow:


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I’m thinking that the next feed (likely in 5-7 days) for the Northern Lights I should increase by a couple of litres until I get a partial run off through the bottom of the fabric pots into the trays below. Is that right?