I figured I’d post a grow journal here to document my first legal grow.
I had some poe cameras from the last house that I’ve incorporated into the tents and room for monitoring.
I’ll be growing four cannabis plants and some curry and birds eye peppers in the 4 x 8.
I’ve been tracking my grow tent environmental data in preparation for the plants germinating right now. Thankfully I’ve got time because it’s taken a bunch of changes to get the parameters where I’d like them.
I was surprised at how high the water temps got, even while running the lights at 30%
I installed a water chiller and got temps in a tighter range.
I’ve got my chiller set to 67 degrees with a 3 degree variance until it kicks on, so instead of it constantly running it just waits until the temp gets to 70 and then drives it down to 67.
Looks like it runs every 2.5 hours or so.
I’ll be adding another light, heater and humidifier this week to the main tent to get those numbers squared away.
You are using a niwa garden hub yeah? Cool setup!
I’m using two Niwas, I really dig them.
I’ve got one in my germination tent and one on the main tent.
I back both of them up with another device to monitor temp/light/humidity but it’s not really necessary.
I got the tent squared away just in time for my first four gals.
I had two problems during seedling phase I’m still fighting, they started stretching quite a bit and I couldn’t get lights for a week. The humidifier went bonkers overnight and sprayed water soaking them…pool of water everywhere and fungus gnats in one night…wtf.
Anyhow, got that managed, dried them out for a couple days, neem oil and got rid of that humidifier.
Will be building up my own humidifier next week using one of those sonic discs and a fan, not sure on best placement of nozzle in the tent yet, but will be bringing it in via 3" duct hose.
I’ve got the light set to 400 ppfd, fairly low and set to 40% to try and reduce heat but I think I’m still going to need an AC unit.
Thankfully I got a larger tent to fit all the crap needed as well as plants!
I figure that CO2 bag will be almost useless, but I’m interested to see if it’ll increase levels at all. Since it takes like 40 days for it to get going I figured I’d set it up now and see what happens.
Trying to get the VPD levels correct is not so easy.
The water temps in my reservoir are finally all squared away.
Oh, forgot to mention.
I’m growing seeds from ILGM, Autoflowers, 2 Bruce Banners 2 Girl Scout Cookies.
I’ve got my Niwa controlling the lights, humidifier, heater and fans.
And running my lights at night
I am interested in seeing how your Bruce Banner does. It has been shortlisted several times but I keep holding back due to the mention of it having such a powerful odor. Now that we have the greenhouse it won’t be in the house.
I’m getting a small tent to use for my curry plants, lettuce and peppers as I don’t want to deal with introducing bugs, light schedules or other hassles in the main tent.
Was concerned about plants reactions to my initial feeding, so I replaced with water only for a couple days and they’re rebounding well. This plants leaves were dark and curled pretty darn good on friday.
I’ve found that even with lights at 40% it’s hard to keep the tent under 76 degrees…which I’d like to do to keep the VPD solid. As I get into flowering and need to reduce the humidity I think I’m going to need to put an AC in the tent.
Will be reading on you’alls recommendations in these threads. My basement is usually pretty darn cold, so I think that it’ll only need to bump down temps by 5 degrees or so most of the time.
Was also thinking, heck, if I’m putting in an AC why not seal the tent and use a co2 monitor as well, doesn’t seem to increase the costs too much.
Things going better now after giving them a couple days of water only.
Now running half nutes.
Haven’t caught any fungus gnats
Decided I was sick of changing water in the humidifier so often so I got some of those House of Hydro mist makers with waterproof fans and mounted it all on a 20 gallon husky container.
Hey awesome grow you have going on.
What setup do you have, what lights do you have ?
I’m enjoying the grow, plants seem to be doing well now that I’ve stabilized inputs as much as I can
I’m running the mammoth 8 bar led, only have the darn thing at 50% with par at 550.
I’ve ran aquaponics systems for the last ten years or so building them from ibc totes and let me tell you, the prices that PA Hydroponics is charging for the fallponics system can’t have much profit in it after purchasing everything individually.
I really dig Gary at pa hydro he’s super accommodating, answers questions and I’ll be expanding from four container to six after this grow.
I’m running a chiller and automating the lights, fans, heater and humidifier through my niwa smart hub.
All plants in that system are autoflowers, setting up a photoperiod tent for coco as well.
In the last month Niwa also updated their software to calculate VPD and allow setting climate parameters considering it.
Pretty darn cool
the niwa thing is pretty cool. I will incorporate it into my system. What are you using for your nuttrients, how often do you change your water? I also want to grow 6 x white widow autoflower and 2 x jackpot auto… i think i could fit it all in a 4x8 tent.
The niwa is great, only thing is it’s somewhat testy about networks, it won’t join a mix 5ghz/2.5 network, unless you can turn off the 5ghz one…which many access points like my eero allow.
I love it though, allows me to focus on other tasks and learning in the grow.
I’m using hydroponics-research nutrients at a reduced level to their chart. I’m using Stackwell as cal/mag/water prep, veg+bloom and life+.
I change my water out weekly, keep the chiller set at 65 with a 3degree variance.
6 seems a better fit for a 4x8 as I find that my input tubes for humidifier and air, dehumidifier, fan and heater take up the space of 2 plants in my tent…making 6 the right number for me for my 4x8.
