The hardest thing to learn when growing is patience. These are plants and will do what they do on their own time. The only thing you can do is optimize their growing environment. Changes in your plants are generally a result of something that took place many days ago and the remedy may take just as long to correct. Many new growers “love their plants too much”. If they look happy, let them be. 
7 Likes
Welcome @Oldsoldier1976. You are in the right place. I’m a newbie to all of this too and everyone has been great. Anything you need to know will be found here! It is absolutely awesome!! I hope you enjoy as much as I have and good luck with your grow!
6 Likes
If you don’t listen to anything else; this is pretty much all you need. It’s all on their time for sure.
Over watering is number 1 mistake
Feeding too much is number 2
Not managing PH is number 3
FYI adding soil to coco makes weak soil. It would be wise to do a slurry test to determine the native PH of the medium. Take a small sample and mix in double the volume distilled water. Let stand for 30 minutes then measure with your PH probe. It should be around 6.0. That would be the target PH of your water and any nutrients you choose to use.
3 Likes
Thank you again. Those will be the things I will pay attention to. I tested my soil this morning with my probe and found the PH to be 7. The coco to organic soil I used was about 3 to 1 soil to coco. I actually think my soil is too rich so from here on the only thing I will do for the foreseeable future is just make sure I am using PH adjusted water. No feeding for a while. Is it seriously important to get a nutrient meter? Maybe later in my grow?
@dbrn32 that is great information. I see you have built your own lighting system. That’s cool. I don’t think I want to get to that level of it. Anyway I plan on buying another of these 1500 watt lights. I think the light is really only good for 2 pot plants each. Currently though the plants are small and there is no hurry. I have to wait to let them grow.
1 Like
One thing you will want to do right away is get a good pH tester and actually test your water. Test it before (whether plain water or a water/nutrient mix) and once they get big enough for full watering, test them after (test the water that runs out the bottom of the pot) and you can see how things are changing as the fluid flows through the soil.
This is probably the most popular pH tester around here:
Apera PH20 tester
1 Like
@dbrn32 can make you a great recommendation from Horticulture Lighting Group for a Quantum Board lamp that will work well in a 4x4x6.5 tent. They have fully assembled models as well as kits you can put together yourself.
HLG LED lamps
4 Likes
I am thinking this out in my head. Is it advantageous to have a large tub of water from which to water from? By that I mean have a properly PH source of room temperature water in the 50 to 80 gallon size. By making a water tower and connecting some plastic lines similar to a hydroponic system without the pump. Just use gravity and a radiator faucet connected to the source. Or should I use a drip line to the tub and water them all at the same time? I know all of this is getting into an advanced grow application but so far I see that as it stands right now I cannot actually flush my plants easily if it was important to flush the soil.
@TommyBahama
@dbrn32 turned me on to the HLG 260 xl lights for my 4x4. 2 of them ran me $700 unassambled. Assembly is a breeze and these lights are awesome! I just pulled over a lb. from 4 plants. I also could have saved myself about $250 if I’d bought these first instead of my MarsHydro 600s.
2 Likes
We all know what you mean; small plants it would be nice to pre PH as it were a supply of water or nutrients and draw from that as needed. Unfortunately the PH tends to drift over time and requires adjustment so that doesn’t work. Also; pre mixing nutes is generally a bad idea.
Your watering practices should reflect the plant’s needs: cannabis wants to cycle from wet to dry and loves airy soil. I normally take my plants from watering (10% runoff every time) to almost wilting before watering again.
If you are using a meter that probes soil it is in all likelihood worthless (unless you spent a couple of hundred dollars on it). A proper soil slurry test is what you want. And yes: a “nutrient pen” or TDS meter is a good idea when you do get to the point of feeding.
The light you have is pretty generic to the industry but here’s the thing: outdated LED’s are used, at least 3 generations behind the state of the art and are very inefficient compared to the current tech. As an example: I started like most by buying a couple of these lights. Then a couple more. I ended up with NINE of them and they were pulling 1,425 watts at the plug for 24 square feet which is fine as far as it goes. Made the switch to Bridgelux EB strips, 3,000K last year and am running less than HALF of the current I was before. My current lighting can peak at 720 watts but I normally run it at a peak of 600 watts (200 per panel). The reason I can get away with this is the efficiency and efficacy of the lights are double what is sold on Amazon. You are getting 80 or so lumens per watt. Mine (and not the latest most efficient tech) are 153 lumens/watt. Heat is also less and the spectrum is ideal for cannabis. My lights have paid for themselves in the year I’ve had them.
4 Likes
thank you all of that makes sense.
2 Likes
So the moral of the story I posted is: you can do it TWICE or do it right. And my overall investment in lights would have been far less if I had bought high end to begin with.
1 Like
Lemme know when you have money burning hole in your pocket 
4 Likes
When I wrote that. I understood that because I have tried my probe didn’t think it was working. I had made a slurry and tested it with my probe. It came up at 7. I am going to get a nutrient tester as well. I am also looking at my water delivery system is as well as draining. I think it would have been smart of me to get some drum drain pans. The trays I have are just not going to cut it. At least long term. I still think I want to have a large room temperature filtered standing water. Maybe not 80 gallons but I think a 20 or 30 gallon tote would serve quite nicely. I can put a radiator faucet on it through a 1/4 inch line. Pour it into a watering can to PH it and add a little cal-mag. This way the water has lost the chlorine and warmed up enough for the plants.
Why is it that as you start something of a project like this it always makes you feel stupid because you see how it could have been done differently. As for the cost I equate it to education. I paid to get my bachelor’s degree. This is no different. Yeah hind sight can be 20/20 but there is no sense in lamenting over it. It is only money and pot. You can’t take it with you.
Anyway thanks for the help. Now it is a matter of waiting. See you all in a week.
1 Like
This is my Maui 10 days sprouted. Is this orange spot brown spot something I should be worried about?
2 Likes
Not necessarily. Watch for more of them.
I took the second pair of leaves off my Maui. They were beginning to brown. It started on one leaf then the twin began. There is still a nice color to the top leaves and I am pleased so far. I did the same with the Durban Poison. The plants are in my opinion doing very well so far.
I now have a question about ideal temperature and humidity. I am sure this will become very important very soon. I am adding two more fans and evaluate it when they are installed. I had not been using my 189 cfm exhaust vent fan with carbon filter until now. I had seen my temperature at 82 to 84 and humidity off the charts until I opened up vents. I started the exhaust fan and my humidity dropped significantly to 45%. I think somewhere on this site I saw something about ideal humidity will depend on strain but most like it over 50 and under 70. If I am wrong I hope someone will tell me so.
I have a question though that I have not seen. Should I keep the exhaust fan on the timer schedule or should it operate independently of the timer and light schedule?
You want to exhaust all the time preferably. Try keeping temps below 80 with hid lighting, and rh up while they are small.
2 Likes
forgive me HID lighting? RH up? I am not familiar with that. If HID is the high voltage stuff I am not with them I have an LED setup I got from Amazon. Both are on and about 25 inches above my plant tops. they are small still. rh I don’t understand. I am in a 4 x 4 x 80" grow tent with 4 plants. I will add more pictures to this reply. So I am right about being over 80 is not good. Great. What about humidity? Where is a good range?
4 Likes
I have been in and out of my grow tent often so the heat really has not been constant. I am still trying to set stuff up in the tent. I have to bring in some plastic tubs to drain in when I can no longer pick them up to water them in my sink. I have a plan to use two under bed plastic totes. My wife works for a company that makes them so they will be free. The next part is to be able to raise the pots off the bottom so that I can keep that above the moisture that might be at the bottom.