DWC - ILGM - Fire OG

[ --- I guess GrowDiaries has a germination week now! Splitting my week 1 log entries to accommodate for this new feature --- ] Since germination happened midway through the first week, this first week is from the point of germination until the end of the week (so 4 days for this split week). Introduction - Week 01 Summary - There are a few important overall changes I made to this grow: - The water chiller and top drip ring have been removed. - Went from an 8" to a 6" net basket. - Greatly lowered the overall light intensity (25% strength instead of 100%) - I reduced overall PPMs (306 instead of 850) - I simplified the nutrient mixture (CalMag + beneficial bacteria only - No grow nutrients) - I changed the way I structure my feeding schedules (going by growth instead of time spent growing) So far, these changes seem to have worked beautifully because she's looking healthy and strong! Overall, this week went quite smoothly! Had a slight hiccup when I dropped the temperature meter into the bucket solution as well as a bit of low humidity problem towards the end of the week. But no slime all week! Also had more root growth in this one week than any of my other attempts (no visible deficiencies that I'm aware of at least) so I'm happy! By the end of the week, temps and overall humidity were dialed in too. Great! For this week, I decided to hold off on changing the bucket solution and will keep the current brew for another week. I'll most likely change the reservoir when there's a more developed root system. Or whenever I decide to add grow nutrients into the mixture. Until then, I'm going to continue to only feed her straight CalMag. [START OF WEEK 01] Day 01 - Thursday - 10/08/20 - Total Days: 06 ----------------------------------- - [0915]: Good morning little one! --- She's a bit warped because of the shell, but she is looking really green! Also her first set of leaves have already started to form! --- Temps under the dome were at ~75°F with a humidity of around 64% which is great! --- There was still quite a bit of water in the tray, but the water did lower as expected. --- Checked the tray solution. --- PPMs were at 197 --- PH was at 5.9 --- Great! So the PPMs were just under 200 in the tray which was a bit lower than I expected, but very good! The bucket will be around 300 PPMs to start so this tray feeding will hopefully help to acclimate her to the higher PPMs. - [1000]: Temporarily removed the cube from the tray to adjust the solution. I just set the cube on its side for a bit. The tap root was longer than yesterday, but still short enough to not reach the table when laying on it. --- Added straight distilled water to dilute the solution. --- PPMs dropped to 107 --- PH'd down the solution to 5.6 --- PPMs went up a bit to 118 --- I poured out a bit of the solution so the water level was just enough to fill the lower channels. --- I then carefully place the cube back and partially covered the tray to allow for more evaporation. --- Since I plan on transplanting tonight, going to leave the lights on for another 24/0 cycle. I will switch to 18/6 tonight. - [2100]: Aye looking good girl! --- Checked the final tray solution. --- PPMs were at 173 --- PH was at 6.4 - [2115]: Boiled both the hydroton and air stones in distilled water. --- Took the tray and dome out of the tent. - [2130]: By now the water has been boiling for a bit. So drained and placed the hydroton in distilled water PH'd down to 5.4 --- Also connected the clean air stones to their respective airlines within the bucket. - [2145]: Mixed her first batch of nutes! --- Going very basic for this first week. --- No grow nutes. --- Of course I'll be adding beneficial bacteria in the form of Hydroguard and Voodoo Juice. But not adding any enzymes for now. I really hope this will be enough to keep the slime under control. --- Since I don't want to use my tap water to feed her. I'm going to feed distilled water with straight CalMag. That's it. No grow nutrients until she develops some roots. --- Filled the bucket with 3 gallons of distilled water (PH 7.1 - 11 PPMs) - Turned air pump on. --- Added 15mL of Voodoo Juice --- Added 7mL of Hydroguard (PH 7.1 - 13 PPMs) --- Added 10mL of CaliMagic (PH 6.3 - 303 PPMs) --- PH'd to 5.4 (diluted with distilled water a bit before adding to bucket) --- PPMs went up a bit to 306 - [2200]: Okay! TRANSPLANT TIME! --- Placed the new 6" net pot into the bucket. The water is a good 2" below the bottom of the net pot. --- Added enough hydroton to fill the bottom of the net pot. --- I removed the rockwool cube from the humidity dome and removed the plastic wrapper. --- I carefully placed her in the center of the hydroton. --- Then I very carefully added more hydroton to fill around the cube along with just enough to cover the top of the cube. --- Nice! I only needed about half of what the larger net pot used. --- Finally I top fed about 10mL of the solution to wet the rockwool cube. --- Transplant done! --- Now that she's in the DWC bucket and closer to the light, the distance between the light and the top of her leaves is 30". Hopefully this is not too close. --- Temps were around 77°F with the humidity at 54% --- Adjusted the AC/exhaust fan temps a bit and lowered them to 75°F --- Also switched the light to from 24/0 to 18/6. --- So from 10am to 4pm, it's lights out. - [2230]: I checked basket for light leaks and ran into issues.. --- I kept finding light leaks through the net pot. I took way too much time rearranging the hydroton. But light leaks along the edges were really obvious.. --- To check for leaks, I basically lifted the basket out of the bucket and held it above the reflective floor of the tent. Then, while looking straight down above the net pot, I checked to see if I could see any part of the floor shining though the basket.. --- I kept seeing bits of light. Damnit! --- I really didn't want to risk damaging a leaf again so I did not want to fill the basket all the way yet with hydroton. --- Once she gets larger, I can easily fill the basket with more hydroton to seal the leaks, but until then I needed a temporary solution. --- I started to think of a ways to seal the leaks. Maybe a lid of some sort? --- After a bit of thinking, I found a quick fix in the form of a sheet of aluminum foil! --- I took a sheet of foil and pressed it over the top of the lid of the net pot. This made a clean circle outline. Then using a pair of scissors, I carefully cut a slit to the middle of that circle. Then I cut out a small diamond shape in the center. That's it! I'll draw a simple diagram for later referencing. --- I was able to easily shape this foil to fit into the net basket to cover the top of the hydroton. I sealed the slit I cut earlier with aluminum tape. Then used a bit more tape to secure the foil to the top of the lid. Done! Light leak issue solved! --- Side note: --- Apparently an air gap between the nutrient solution and the bottom of the net pot is very important when growing in DWC. This space gives room for proper drainage and aeration of the rockwool cube along with keeping the top roots from drowning in nutrient solution. The bubbles in the bucket not only oxygenate the water, but as they pop along the surface of the water, they create a mist that sprays and slowly wets the bottom of the net pot. This constant misting gets wicked by the hydroton and eventually reaches the roots. --- Basically learned that you should never need to soak the hydroton directly in the nutrient solution. Day 02 - Friday - 10/09/20 - Total Days: 07 ----------------------------------- - [0830]: Good morning! --- Checked the bucket solution. --- PH was at 5.8 --- PPMs were at 296 --- Tent temps were at 77°F --- Humidity was at 47% --- Aye no slime! The foil cover along with the beneficial bacteria in the res seemed to have kept the slime away! --- Also, even though it's only been a day in the bucket, she is looking really healthy! Each OG Kush seedling I attempted to grow (RIP) had a bit of yellowing around the edges and their leaves were more of a yellowish green. But this Fire OG is looking great so far! The green in her leaves is a lot darker and there is no yellowing at all! --- The new adjustments in both the lighting and feeding seemed have fixed a lot of those issues I encountered during my last run. It could also be the strain too, but I am happy with the results so far! --- The green in her leaves is nice and even. --- Now hopefully I can keep it this way! - [2000]: Nice! still looking healthy! --- Checked the bucket solution. --- PH was at 5.9 --- PPMs were at 296 --- Tent temps were at 77°F --- Humidity was at 54% --- Still no slime! --- Top feed about 10mL of the solution. I did this in another bucket so runoff would not affect the bucket solution. Day 03 - Saturday - 10/10/20 - Total Days: 08 ----------------------------------- - [0700]: Looking great! --- Checked the bucket solution. --- Nice! Tap root is already shooting out of the net pot! --- Opps. Dropped the temperature/humidity meter into the bucket.. I hope this doesn't contaminate the solution. Damn it Ensign. --- PH was at 6.2 --- PPMs were at 303 --- Still no slime, but I'm not sure if dropping the meter into the water, or my own arm reaching all the way down into the water to take it out, could have affected the solution.. For my own sake, I'm definitely going to do a reservoir change tomorrow. This way I can be sure that everything will be clean. --- I decide to add more beneficial bacteria to the solution. --- First I removed about 2 cups of the solution. --- Then I filled a measuring cup with 1 cup of straight distilled water. --- Added 1mL of Voodoo Juice --- Added 1mL of Hydroguard --- Then added a squirt of PH down --- Poured the entire solution into the bucket. --- PH dropped to 4.8 --- Added some diluted PH up to bring it up to 5.3 --- PPMs were at 296 --- If the water isn't slimy by tonight, I'll top feed. - [0730]: On the positive side, even though completely submerged for a few seconds, the temperature meter seems completely undamaged! Initially the screen was dead, so I removed the battery and tried to dry the unit under a fan. After about 15 minutes, I popped the battery back in and everything seems to be working just fine. Great! - [1845]: Aye looking bigger! --- Okay I think I am doing something right this time! Since this morning, her root literally doubled in size! --- What a relief! I guess dropping the temperature meter into the nutrient solution had no negative effects. I'm still going to be careful from now on. Lesson learned. --- Checked the bucket solution. --- PH was at 5.5 --- PPMs were at 292 --- Everything looks clean and no sign of slime! --- Top fed outside the bucket (about 10mL) and placed her back. Day 04 - Sunday - 10/11/20 - Total Days: 09 ----------------------------------- - [0745]: Growing nicely! --- Checked the bucket solution and still no slime! --- PH was at 5.7 --- PPMs were at 286 --- Nice! I think a steady slow increase in PH along with a decrease in PPMs means that she is uptaking nutrients. --- Wow! Her root is looking longer too! Without a doubt, she's growing the fastest of all my attempts. --- With the reduced nutrient mixture (basically straight CalMag), this seedling's root is longer than any of my previous grows. This proves that yet again, less is more. --- Debating on whether to do a reservoir change tonight or not. --- It would be of the same strength and everything still looks really good with this current batch. I may try and go another week before changing out the nutrient water and a just add CalMag as needed. --- Temps look good a ~77°F --- But the humidity has been really low at 19% --- According to a VPD chart for veg, the optimal humidity should be closer to 60% at 77°F --- I sprayed a bit of distilled water on the top of the lid and table to hopefully bring up the humidity. To keep her dry as I did this, I temporarily covered her with a cup. - [0800]: The water seems to be drying pretty quick. So using a glass bowl as a humidity dome, I placed it on the lid of the bucket. --- If this works, as she grows bigger, I may need to find a larger dome, but for now this bowl is a perfect fit! Just enough room for the temp meter as well. Left an air gap to allow for air ventilation. --- After placing the bowl over her, the humidity meter immediately started to rise. Nice! --- At least for now, I think using some sort of a dome should fix my humidity issue. --- I also placed the humidity dome's tray on the floor of the tent and fill it with tap water. Maybe the evaporation from the fan blowing across the water will help increase the overall tent humidity? --- I can't afford a humidifier at the moment, so I'm trying to figure out cheap ways to keep humidity under control. If the dome doesn't fix the humidity issue, I might try hanging wet towels or spraying the walls of the tent later. - [0930]: Humidity is ~45% which is almost perfect! I'll check the meter again after the night cycle to see how the humidity changes. - [1915]: Okay! The humidity dome seemed to have fixed the issue! --- Humidity was at 59% --- Temperature was at 73°F --- Checked the bucket solution. --- PH was at 5.8 --- PPMs were at 292 --- Solution temperature was 74°F --- Hmm.. PPMs went up a bit. Could be that she's drinking more water now. But all levels are within acceptable limits. --- Not going to worry. Water still looks clean and no slime. --- Top fed another 10mL outside the bucket. --- Still only have one visible root, but it's continuing to get longer! Stay healthy girl! [END OF WEEK 01]