I have only grown once before. I grew two plants and they came out pretty good. I should have waited a week or two but was rushed. I ordered some of the Jack Herer seeds. I’m a beginner so of course I have a few questions.
When I germinated, I dampened a paper towel, folded it into quarters, I placed the seed in the center and place it in a ziplock bag taped in the window. It took around a week last time for the seeds to sprout. Do you have a better way?
I will only be growing one at a time. I’m using a 2.5 gallon bucket (to hopefully keep it from getting over 5-6ft) with “Natures Way: Ready to use natural and organic soil mix.”
For nutrients I have a few different products. I was told that when I water, I can mix the nutrients that I give the plants. Do you know a good schedule to use each one or can I mix them all and alternate with giving only water?:
- General Organics: BioRoot 1-1-1
- General Organics: BioThrive 4-3-3
- General Organics: BioBud 0.5-0.1-1
- General Organics: CaMg+
- Fox Farm: Grow Big 6-4-4
- Tiger Bloom Extra Strength Fertilizer 2-8-4
- Advanced Nutrients: Bud Candy 0-0-1
- Advanced Nutrients: Overdrive 1-5-4
- Advanced Nutrients: Big Bud 0-1-3
For lighting, I am using three clamp lights with cfl bulbs. The first cycle I am using bulbs rated 6500k. The second will be 2700k. They are energy saving bulbs. What light cycle would you do for each grow phase?
I noticed I had a lot of fungus gnats (I think) that hide in the soil and come out when I’m in there trimming or watering. I hung a ton of fly sticky tape and it catches a lot of them, but they aren’t working well enough. I have also sprayed Organic Laboratories Ready-to-Use Organocide 3-in-1 garden spray. It kills live ones but the next day there are even more. Do you have any suggestions?
I appreciate and advice you can give. Especially with which nutrients I can mix when I water and when to use them.
Excessive fungus gnats is often a sign of over watering, in the soil is where they live and breed, the larva live in the too wet soil and eat fungus and rotting roots that have drowned from too much water. Diatomaceous earth will help but so will watering less. Just having properly aerated soil, heavily amended with coarse perlite, 40% - 50% perlite to soil, will help a lot. You should get a feel for the weight of a fully saturated soil and a nearly dry soil and water less often, not until the soil is nearly totally dry by the feel of the weight, this will drastically reduce the number of fungus gnats alone. The nice thing about Diatomaceous earth is it is totally safe as long as you are not breathing in tons of the dust, you can even eat it as a mineral supplement and it is very good for you, and it can contribute good minerals to the soil that would be beneficial to your plants as well.
Yes, it seems like you have way too much stuff, too many cooks spoil the pot, right? There could be good mixes made of all that stuff but that would be for someone very advanced that knows a lot about NPK ratios and not something to be learned easily in a forum. I really recommend K.I.S.S., keep it simple stoner. Also light schedules indoors are simple, as Latewood said 18 hours of light per day for the vegetative growth photoperiod until the plant is about half the total size you want it and then 12 hours of uninterrupted darkness per day to induce flowering and through the rest of the bloom until harvest. Some people like to simulate decreasing light hours to try and more accurately simulate what happens outdoors as it gets closer to winter, but there is little to no benefit for all the extra trouble.
I figured the soil was too moist. I was trying to save a clone that had dried out and I poured in way more than I should have. The clone died and I set a fan on the bucket to dry the dirt. I’ve already seen a decrease in flies. I see what you mean about getting a feel for the difference in weight with dry and saturated soil. The bucket was heavier then I thought it would be. I am waiting on the seeds to get here still, but plan on waiting for the soil to dry before I do anything. I want to make sure all of the flies die first.
The reason I have so many nutrients is a friend was going to throw them out. He bought all new nutrients from a different company and didn’t want the old stuff. I just happened to bring up that I needed to get some a day before he threw them out. Unfortunately I have no idea so I was using a different one or straight water every 2-3 days.
My last grow I did the 18/6 then the 12/12. I keep hearing mixed reviews on 24hr light cycles but it kinda seems like overkill. Think I will stick to what both of you have suggested and with what worked for me in the past.
I drilled 5 holes an inch from the bottom of the bucket around the sides and five in the bottom. I’m hoping that’s enough for water drainage.
Thanks for the help. Anything else you can think of would be greatly appreciated.
24 hours is fine for veg, many people swear they get much tighter internodes veging under 24 hours of light. I do it with LED lights in my nursery with great success and never seem to have any problems but I use advanced methods and super low amounts of light that still does not promote stretching with special LED panels to keep the plants kinda stunted until I want to explode their growth under the intense light in the flowering room with a couple of weeks of intense veg growth light cycle before switching the lights to the 12/12. For beginners growing with fluorescents and not having separate more intense lights for flowering, you could try bumping your veg light to as much as 20 hours for shorter internodes and then go to 12/12 for flower, also some darkness is good for root development. 24 hours of light is a must for autoflowers of course. 24 hours of light will add a bit to the electric bill, so that is also something to keep in mind.
Wish you would have mentioned a friend gave you 3 different nutrient systems. 
You should do well. Don’t over complicate things, and you will do better. Learn how to grow by using s imple schedule to start with.
Stick with the more natural light cycle. Proven over decades. The only use for 24/0 photo period is: auto flower genetics.
Expert Sativa growers around the world use even shorter photo periods in order to manipulate shorter finish times. 
Watch for an article here real soon!