Well, my last grow finished in less than spectacular style. All 3 plants were male and I totally messed up on the other. I believe I learned a lot from that go round. So this time I am trying 2 Blue Dream autos and a Big Bud auto. The 2 B.D are now 2 weeks old and looking great. The B.B. is only 4 days old but picking up steam.
I am going about this a little different than the last grow. I had a lot of issues which I hope I learned from.
This go round I am using a different brand of coco coir and perlite. I am also using bottled water. my tap water here is a nice 530ppm. The bottled water is 23ppm. I am going to try and focus more on what the plants are telling me rather than just the numbers. So far. my numbers look great over all. A little high on the ph output, but I am not focusing on that. i will try to gradually get it down some. I am measuring how much water run off I have this go round also. To see if and how much my plant is using. So far, I am watering at 5 cups and only getting 4 cups back for run off. So a good sign. I just started giving her food at half strength. The run off ppm’s are lower than what is going in. Another good sign. I had issues there with the last grow.
This hopefully is more to show all those that helped me on the past grow that there time was not wasted and that I did listen.
I did a lot of reading and found that a lot of you seemed to have had better luck with a 12/12 light schedule for the autos. So that is what I am on now. The plants are growing a little slower than the non autos I dd. These are about 5 1/2 in tall at 2 weeks. If I don’t yield a lot out of this I am ok with that. My goal here is to try and do a clean grow from start to finish while asking as few grow related questions as possible.
With that, here are the 2 Blue Dreams at week 2. The Big bud is only a stem right now. A few more days and it should look like a plant lol
I figured I would add week one in as well
They look great for their age!
They are looking good and please, don’t worry about asking too many questions. I’d much rather have someone repeat themselves than not ask a question that could be detrimental. The trick is to recognize where you got off track and learn from the experience. Looks like you’re already doing that. 
Good luck and I’ll bet you’ll do fine this time around. 
I agree with @SilentHippie ask away
They look good
@Myfriendis410 uses coco so if you have issues hes a good guy
Ph range is important keep that consistent and youll be ok
Happy growing
I never go by a calendar either maybe as a general guide but learning to read your plants is best
Watching from the shadows. I didn’t have much luck with my Big Bud last year. It wasn’t an auto though.
Good luck…
Hopefully your new plants will cooperate!
I have used coco and like the medium but it is kinda labor intensive. I have been using Roots Organics coco/perlite which is washed so ready to use. We have a similar situation here in that my city water is between 450 and 550 ppm but is what I used until just a couple of weeks ago so high ppm will work.
Early on in my experience with coco I got a tutorial on how strong and how often I should use the nutrients (GH and FF in different grows) and @garrigan62 gave me a wonderful tutorial on feeding in coco. The upshot was to use package MINIMUMS instead of maximums during veg and at the lower end for flower. The frequency which you feed versus water can determine nutrient load too. Early on I was using a feed, water, water, feed schedule. Obviously that takes full strength nutes and attenuates it over time instead of over solution concentration. Feeding more frequently increases the plant’s exposure to those nutes when needed. It gives you another control point. Most media users do this daily but when the plants are on the small side for their pot it may be a good idea (and I did) to water every other day until the root structure supports daily watering.
Always water to runoff which benefits removing salt buildups and a product like FloraKleen or Sledgehammer might be a good idea too.
Holding your ph to a narrow band (5.5 to 5.8) will be beneficial too.
I’m doing soil now and I’m amazed at how much more slowly the grow is progressing over coco.
From Garrigan:
Additives are not needed, other than a bloom booster, and zone/h202 to keep things clean
*Rhizo as a foliar, and once @ transplant at 2ml/gal
*Canna wants you to pour your money down the drain.
*Plants over/underfed have very similar traits.
*r/o water works but you must add cal-mag, and preferably a higher cal product like…
*Cali-magic…to replace cal-mag+ for the win!
*LESS IS MORE>… .5 scale for those caring.
***200 ppm of a + b for veg…is plenty…
***400 ppm of a + b for flower is plenty.
Calimagic/a+b ratio
150 ppm/200 ppm = 350
100 ppm/3ooppm = 400
50 ppm/ 400 ppm= 450
*** 5.8 ph***
*** when transplanting…no charge, no double dose, and no flush…just absolutely water to 3o% run off.**
Thanks @MattyBear, @Myfriendis410, @SilentHippie, @Countryboyjvd1971 & @FloridaSon. I am using an organic coco this time. I never feed above 1/2 strength. I was told early on. less is more, especially when you are learning. With all the up down issues I had with my ph on the last round. I figured it to be my water. I am second guessing it now since I put water in at 5.8 and run off went back to 6.1 I am accepting that for now. I am going to try any figure it out slowly as to making to many changes. I think that is what got me last time. I was looking for immediate results rather than giving it a few days to respond. I will have to see if @garrigan62 might be able to share the feeding info with me too 
I had been feeding every other day last time. This time I was thinking maybe every third day? To me, I think what is going to help most will be keeping track of how much water the plant keeps. Towards the end last time. it seemed like i was getting all the water back. It was @Myfriendis410 & @MattyBear that pretty much walked me through all this last time. I feel more relaxed this time. Starting off fresh and not waking up to brown leaves every morning is a great feeling. I also learned for me at least. My seedlings don’t seem to respond to the LEDs to great. They didn’t seem to want to grow. As soon as I got them back under the CLs. They shot right up. Seems for me at least. I need to leave them there for the first 7 - 10 days. Then move them to the tent. I guess I will have to wait for sunday when I measure them to see how they are growing. For now, every thing is great. I probably should have waited and kept a 18/6 schedule since I was all ready familiar with that. But I had read from others here that had better luck with the 12/12. I will be doing a few grows with the autos before I try the regular seeds again.
Thanks for all the great thoughts.
Wow @Not2SureYet your plants are incredible for only two weeks. I may need to totally rethink my approach. Will be watching your progress and learning lots.
@merlin44, Thanks. Since I have the lights off during the day. New pictures will be added Saturday nights as they progress.
It’s not your water but your soil. You put in 5.8 comes out 6.1
Keep doing that until your run of is 5.8 that will mean that you now have washed all the salts and out and any nutrient the plant was unable to up take.
So then you can go back to to your feeding cycle. Witch you said was 1/2 strength
Will
Thanks. With the plants only 2 weeks old. Do you think it would be ok to use floraKleen at about 2ml like they recommend tonight to remove the salts? Or should I just water till I am in Spec.
To tell you just the truth, I would just water tell 5.8
thanks. That is what I will do. Every thing is looking good so far. I hate to mess up when every thing is going so good.
I agree with Will. Keep doing what you’re doing!
Very delicate, quite hairy and healthy.
Thanks guys. unfortunately. my no questions did not last long. I think I have a BIG problem in the making. I watered tonight. Run off was 7.0 I left that and went to fill a 3 gallon smart pot to prep for the big bud when it is ready to transfer. I ran 9 gallons of ph 5.8 through it. The run off was and still is at 7.1 on that too. I am at 7.0 on the plants now also. I want to figure this out before I have any issues with the plants. I know the road I am headed down again. Do I keep running water through till the numbers drop? Once I figure this out. I will do the same to the plants while they are healthy. I am thinking I wasted my money on the organic coco. I still have about 30 gallons of it left. At least with the home depot stuff I could get it to 5.8 easy. I thought using coco was supposed to be easier. “total frustration here now” I feel like all I can do right now is wait for the issues to start with the plants. Sorry to be grumpy. I really thought I had a good shot this go round.
Thanks again.
This is the coco I got this time to use. I thought I would be good to go, or with a few flushes.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01IGX6POW?tag=greenrel-20
Ok a 3 gal pot would take 9 to 12 gal of water / how much water did you use
Using the coco that comes in brick form, and not ready to use out of the bag, you need to rinse the hell out of it before planting to get to the ph you want. I’d keep trying to get that right, even if that means running more ph’d water through it.
First, I am sorry for posting when I am frustrated like that. I am just having a hard time adjusting to not being able to do very much now. I will walk away from this before posting next time.
@garrigan62 I have ran 9 gallons though so far. I have one more 5 gal. bottle here I will run through, then go re fill them. looks like I may have to order another 3 bottles so I can get 2 pots ready at once for the next go round.
@MattyBear, if that is the case. Once I am done with this brick. I will start getting the coco in bags. That is if I have not switched to soil by then. 
As of last night, the Blue Dream still looked good. One plant is growing a little more than the other, but they look good. They do look a little bleached. Probably my fault for trying the lights low. I raised them up to 22 inches. I had them at 18 inches. If more water does the trick for the 3 gallon pot. i will run a couple gallons through the B.D. plants tonight when the lights come on. See if I can get the ph down to at least 6.5. From there I think regular watering might do the trick. Or I could throw them in the tub and flush them till they are down to the 5.8 or so. Right now i am going to focus on one thing at a time.
Thanks for all the help
I keep forgetting that you can’t drown them in coco. I would look into using it, but I’m not sure if it would be safe for my son’s ol’ lady. She’s allergic to coconut.
Plus it seems like you would need more nutrients than in soil…I’m cheap because I’m poor…