Indoor Growing Scrog

[Mongoose]

looks sensational! do you water them like regular plants, pouring by hand directly to the plants root or have some kind of automation system doing the watering there?

Hand watering 4 times a day, two shot glasses each time. ~300 ppm General Hydroponics 3 part nutes, pH 6. In a week or so will start auto fertigation, 5 mins every 3 hours, and will up the ppm to ~600. I'm a rookie mind you, and making best guesses only. 420 is the dood.

 

[KingRatt]

And then you get two more going ( 4" rockwool cubes, stacked 3, wrapped and capped in panda film to avoid algae growth ) and two different strains present thusly. You gals are both cannabis, right?? I'm tellin' ya'.


View attachment 1732849

What strains? I like those fat leaves on the big girl!

 

[KingRatt]

Hand watering 4 times a day, two shot glasses each time. ~300 ppm General Hydroponics 3 part nutes, pH 6. In a week or so will start auto fertigation, 5 mins every 3 hours, and will up the ppm to ~600. I'm a rookie mind you, and making best guesses only. 420 is the dood.

When you set the timer watch the plants and see how long it takes to get runoff, then you know you will be watering sufficiently. You will have to add more cycles as the plants grow btw

 

[DOA]

And then you get two more going ( 4" rockwool cubes, stacked 3, wrapped and capped in panda film to avoid algae growth ) and two different strains present thusly. You gals are both cannabis, right?? I'm tellin' ya'.


View attachment 1732849

How tall is that stack?

 

[wangotango321]

How tall is that stack?

Looks tippy

 

[KingRatt]

Looks tippy

Once its in the net, no more tippy lol.

 

[Mongoose]

The stack is three 4" Grodan cubes. They've all been pH soaked, so are heavy. I was concerned too that they might be tippy, but they're beefy enough to be stable. ( I'm going to use 1" tall rock wool pieces, cut from a 4" cube, all around the bases to fill the trays, and cover them. Not exactly the same, but similar to, one of 420's recent grows. )

 

[420autoflower]

A wee notice for you and family.
I'm back making photoperiod strains.
Heavy indica , classic crosses , limited edition and new creations.
So much new creations today compared to 20 years ago. Watch this space .

Awesome Sawney! Might have to scrog a few out sometime!
I’m still growing this ILGM Peanut Butter Breath photo/auto they sent me to showcase for them awhile back. She never showed me pistils and I got sick of waiting for her to sex so I treated her like a photo and cut the light back on day 65. She did have the 420autoflower bent coat hanger treatment but no 420 scrog method done to her. She’s definitely a big girl and should weigh in close to 2.5-3 pounds but she’s sure taking forever.
As you can see she’s got at least a couple more weeks to go and she was already at day 127 in the pics. Strange how I can grow an auto that’s just as big in a 100 days or less.

Hello, question about the 420autoflower scrog method.
Do you pour water to the top rockwool? What other things you mix the coco coir with? Are there suggestions for the bottom pot size in gallons?

And do you always use clones to do the 420autoflower scrog method, because i will try making like 4 seeds of autoflowers and use the method.
Thanks

If you want the best results with the 420 method grow from seed and not from clones.
2 gallon containers is all you need for your main substrate.
Coco mixed with perlite will be good and top feed by hand for the first 20 days.

is the reason using the upper rockwool qube in the 420autoflower scrog method to make longer roots than usual, or does it have other additional values other than that?

Starting in the Grodan 4x4” cubes will extend your veg time, there’s no risk of transplant shock, they take up very little space and they will elevate your plants up 4” to avoid foliage or limbs touching your medium.

oh okay. would the 420autoflower scrog method work with dwc system just like in the picture below, rockwool on top of the dwc bucket, instead of a big pot of coco or rockwool below the smaller rockwool on top?
View attachment 1732727

I’m sure it would work fine but I don’t see how you would change out or maintain your reservoir below after your plant is locked in place with the net. I’ve seen other DWC systems with a separate area to fill so you don’t have to take the lid off but it doesn’t look like the unit above has that option.
I’m sure @Sandor or @Mongoose would have a better idea if your DWC unit would work good in a scrog.

I did DWC for three grows, total 6 plants, low stress training, with 3-4 oz yields per plant. I'm near harvest with a rockwool 4" cube, 6" rockwool cube and 1/2 6" cube, beneath -- one of Professor 420's assemblies. I have twice the plant size vs DWC, and we'll see what the net is, but best guess, twice the yield. Maybe more. I would do it 420's way, all the way. I think you'll be pleased.

Good Brother!
Happy to know you’re getting good results with rockwool and top fed drip hydro.

I'm currently doing his method on DWC, in a usual 4cm rockwool cube, in a usual small DWC net pot (Oxypot), and without anything on top Works just fine.

That picture you posted reminds me of a top-feed system I once had, is that really DWC as well? If not, be careful with accumulating salt/minerals and the humidity... I lost a few smaller plants to mold in those systems. Sorry if you already know that, just trying to be helpful.

DOA: Could you give me a hint WHY that big cube is supposed to be so crucial? I keep hearing it, but I don't get it. Isn't rockwool just supposed to be a very neutral starter/grow medium? I use them all the time as well, sure, but never the big ones, just the 4x4 (cm) ones in DWC, and I can't help but suspect that doing so will raise humidity, and might explain some of 420AF's (to me) crazy water usage. But I might be 100% wrong, would just love to hear/know the reasons. Thx!

Oh and also, hi guys, new here, etc. But growing for 20 or so. Registered to share, as it only seems fit, standing on the shoulders of giants like 420AF


EDIT: "Never a risk of transplant shock or early flowering plants using the Grodan blocks.", that I get, that makes sense. Just them being required for strong growth, that I don't get, and doesn't seem to gel with my own observations. Or maybe that's just due to his main medium, that, without the blocks, that would be not enough? Makes me very curious, as does the whole thing. But my plants still have weeks to go, so, gotta be patient...

EDIT2: Thanks Lil Dab, so it's the other medium requiring it after all if I got that right - great to get answers so quickly

Welcome to the party my friend!
Always nice to get advice/opinions from an experienced grower.
Appreciate all your input!

I'm officially volunteering to help assemble, copy edit, and graphic-design, an official: "The 420autoflower Way", or something like that, PDF document. That's what I used to do for a living. As others have rightly noted, seems to me 420 should be able to monetize something like that. I don't know. But I would happily do my part to help, gratis.

That’s a very nice offer @Mongoose!
I do need the help bro! Not necessarily to monetize from the method but just to have something out there that people can refer too other than AFN.

I agree, if you are new research his methods and try to emulate exactly! Invest in a good ph pen and extra calibration solution. What you are attempting is not a beginner method, but if you research and keep the environment and the nutrient solution in their correct parameters, you should be fine! My best advice is start reading! Autoflowers can be tempermental so choose a strain that is recommended for beginners so you get the best results. Strains labeled as expert can be very tempermental!!! And choose an xl or heavy yielding strain as well, small fast indicas will be hard to adapt. Tell me more about your setup amd what youll be growing if you already have seeds ready!

Yes Brother!
So much you need to know to get decent results and that’s not including all the hours of hard work involved.

No offense but I don't think a first time grower should be doing any HST at all. Honestly, not even LST. You don't go tuning a car before you've ever driven one ever at all.

He won't know the plant, nutrient regime, the right timing, won't have the right tools... IMHO, a first timer should grow stuff "naturally", figure out what a normal grow looks like, THEN start trying to mess with stuff after a WHILE - and 420AFs method is just a whole bunch of advanced techniques combined. For a beginner... I mean... do what you like man, I sincerely wish you all the best of luck, but I believe you'd do yourself a favor learning to walk before trying to beat Usain Bolt.

Don't mean to be a party-pooper but a first timer should be starting out gently. This is world record stuff. Just my 2c.

EDIT: KingRatt said it while I was writing, it's really not for beginners. Still, try it if you feel like you're up for it, but don't have illusions of ultra-mega-crops the first time, trying lots of knowledge-requiring methods (just to not kill or seriously stunt your plants) all at once...

EDIT: And to add something more positive as well, as for the question if DWC generally works for the method - I'm trying it for the first time myself. That little plant of mine is still about 2 months away from harvest, in a smaller tent and at 1/4 the wattage 420AF uses, but I'm pretty happy with her - can't complain about any lack of growth, quite the opposite actually, schwazzing her weekly at the moment just to keep RH down (and all the other reasons). Ignore the crappy Amazon under-net lamps, just had those lying around, being useless, giving them a try

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Nice Bro!
Love your simple setup and great job on your first 420 scrog. Looks like you have some ginormous colas stacking and forming. I think this is the first time I’m seeing it done in DWC. Will be interesting to see her develop and flower over the next 8 weeks.

I've had my hands full with it that's for sure

Lol!!!

You make alot of very good points! No first timer should walk into this expecting results like they see the gangsters getting. It takes time to learn the plant and i also agree that for your first time you should just try to get a plant to the finish line! But people are gonna do whatever they want. Ut takes alot of time and work to learn this plant(years, decades even)

Exactly!
Learning the plant and how it grows is key!
After awhile and a bunch of successful grows under your belt you’ll slowly understand the plant more and know exactly how it’ll react/respond from the manipulation and other growing techniques involved in a high yielding auto grow.
Concentrating on dialing in your basic growing skills and producing happy/healthy plants would be a good start.
All the other fancy stuff will come in time.

Thank you very much and couldn't agree more

It's really, really easy to mess stuff up, ESPECIALLY with HST, ESPECIALLY with DWC, ESPECIALLY with SCROG... so yeah, you get the picture The finish line, just like you said, just crossing that will be an awesome achievement.

But I totally get it, when I first saw that blog post on the Dutch Passion blog (purely by accident) about the legendary 420autoflower 1.3kg Daiquiri Lime, well, this was me:

View attachment 1732741

...and I believe that is anyone who reads about it the first time. So of course everyone wants to replicate it. Just make sure (as best you can) to not set yourself up for disappointment. Like I mentioned, I've been doing this stuff for going on 20 years... and I still make dumbass mistakes from time to time, that cost my plants a week or so. I don't kill em anymore, granted, but still.

I set up 2 plants (Dutch Passion Auto Lemon Kix) for this grow, I messed up both by overfeeding early on, then underfeeding after that because I got scared. Cost me a week, easy. Especially in DWC and similar systems, that'll show, clearly, and hard, even if only temporarily once you learn to deal with it. Still, the damage is done, especially on the little pheno - the big one doesn't care too much apparently, dumb luck if so.

So yeah, to finish my TED-talk, do what all the other nice, knowledgeable people here say: read, read, read, learn, learn, learn. Then go do it, go absolutely nuts with all the crazy techniques and rock that grow. But until then... don't make it too hard for yourself. Peace.

P.S.: That thing I said about shoulders of giants, like 420AF, was not a joke or a suckup-move. Don't underestimate how much trial and error it takes to get that good, along with smarts and a real feel for the plants. Guys like him are legends for a reason.

Appreciate the respect Brother!
I’ve certainly had my share of f”.k ups over the years but always experimenting with new methods and techniques keeps me busy and makes growing weed more interesting.

Can’t remember where I saw it lol but the saying goes something like this, The magic you’re looking for in life is hidden in the work you’re trying to avoid. Point is 420’s method is quite a bit of work all the way through a grow. It damn sure works though. Even if you want to jump in right off the bat, it definitely pays off to hang around here and read and participate. There was a learning curve for me for sure.

Thanks for chiming in Rick!
You know it!
Easier said than done Bro!

i get it may be hard but isnt there really some guide that you can follow so it will be perfect/near pefect every time?
like, exact amounts of nutrients added to water, how ofter given water and how much etc

or is it really that different each seed/strain that you need to do every step differently each run? not to mean to be arrogant but the stressing doesnt seem really hard putting the plant on some hanger/clinger and adding scrog too doesnt seem really hard

Sorry… no guide other than what you see here.
Still trying to perfect the method and with cultivars differing in so many ways it makes it hard to set things in stone.
Some of the process might seem easy but it’s all work if you want the best results. The training and canopy maintenance is probably the most difficult and time consuming throughout the whole process, It needs to be done daily and sometimes twice a day depending on how fast your plants grow.
To be honest, the 420 method is not for everyone! Most people like an easy and low maintenance grow and this style of growing is the exact opposite of that. We’ll always be here to help but get ready for many hours of hard labor if you want to give it a go!

Honestly, no, there never is. Cannabis is very easy to grow - once you know EXACTLY how to do it, you'll be able to do it drunk, high, while not having slept for a week.

But all environments are different. Just one example: water. In my "new" apartment, we have "good enough to give to your baby" level water. In my old apartment, it was "meh, it's fine" quality. At my mom's place, their water quality is 1% away from being out of the legal thresholds, because it's so dirty.

Just the water quality will make a huge difference for feeding, so you'll have to try for yourself, find the right way to do it specifically for your location (even depending on how old/rusty (if metal) your water pipes are), and then improve on that, iterate on that each time, get better each time.

And then there's air. And humidity. And light. And different strains. And different phenos. And and and and and.

Seriously man, I get it, I would ask the same question - can't you just give me, like, "the definitive guide" to follow?

Yeah, it's out there - just not in one piece. Read Cervantes books. Read other books. Read this entire forum. Watch videos on Youtube if you like. Grow for 20 years. There's your guide

Nah man, just give it a go. Pick good seeds (high yield, with the taste and strength you like, that are easy to grow according to the seedbank you get them from), buy equipment you feel comfortable using (soil and such mediums are VERY forgiving, DWC and others DO NOT FORGIVE, DO NOT FORGET - they require CONSTANT RIGOROUS checking), and just try growing normal plants. You WILL run into issues even with just that. And hey, if you don't, awesome! But if you do, as you will, well, learn from it. And if you're really committed and really into it, you'll be surprised at how good you and your plants will be soon enough.

As the youngins say... you gotta git gud.


EDIT: Personally, I "grew up" with Jorge Cervantes and his works, he's an old school High Times (iirc) guy, and their grow editor or something... he made the "Ultimate Grow" series of videos, and he wrote the "Jorge Cervantes - Marijuana Horticulture - The Indoor-Outdoor Medical Growers Bible.pdf"... those would be a good start, and you learn just about everything from there. But it's old now, the old editions didn't mention LEDs for example, but yeah, the general idea is still the same as it always was - be good to the plant and the plant will be good to you.

Oh, and as for the "not seeming hard" part... look man, when you watch a chess grandmaster win a match, it looks easy. When Tyson fucked people up - easy. When 420AF grows kilos on a single plant - easy. You catch my drift. Grandmasters always make that which they're grandmasters at look easy. Don't be fooled, it's not because it's easy, it's because they know their shit in and out.

Said from experience!!!

Never be perfect every time even veteran growers have issues and equipment failures stuff you can't plan for i've seen it happen to the best. Yes he can tell you how much feed to add and all that but controlling your envrieomnt is a huge role and we have people from all over the world totally different environments. Some folks don't need dehumidifier I won't grow without one. There are too many variables but if you follow what he does exactly you should do fine but there will be learning curve.

You got that right @Lil Dab!
A lot of different variables involved in growing a high yielding auto and things do happen.
How’s your girl doing buddy? She should be filling in and frosting up nicely about now.
Will you be scrogging anymore in the future?

So true. It's full of frustrations, particularly for rookies like me. "What am I doing wrong, mama?" No answer. But I'm convinced that in 420's case, it's the Sparkling Peach energy drink boost during flower that's the secret. ( Kidding! )

Lol! Not cool brotha!
Wish you wouldn’t have given away my secret.

And then you get two more going ( 4" rockwool cubes, stacked 3, wrapped and capped in panda film to avoid algae growth ) and two different strains present thusly. You gals are both cannabis, right?? I'm tellin' ya'.


View attachment 1732849

Nice clean stacks @Mongoose!
I like how you fully wrapped them with Panda film.
This will be a good one!
192 cubic inch stacks versus your current 388 cubic inch stack.

 

[TristanTheDestroyer]

That’s a very nice offer @Mongoose
I do need the help bro! Not necessarily to monetize from the method but just to have something out there that people can refer too other than AFN.

Yes! That would be awesome you guys. 420Autoflower and Mongoose collaboration ebook/grow guide/course/blueprint, whatever it ends up as..

 

[Mongoose]

Nice clean stacks @Mongoose!
I like how you fully wrapped them with Panda film.
This will be a good one!
192 cubic inch stacks versus your current 388 cubic inch stack.

Ha, I did the cubic inch comparison too. Couldn't resist the temptation to try it this way, after seeing that guy's success with only one 4" cube. So ... I removed the Grodan covers, added the panda film, and left it about 1/2" up from the base. I then sacrificed a 4" cube to make 1/2" slices, laid in the best direction to allow roots to make their way into the slices. Yep, will have to do some root trimming around the drain hole. The covers are 1/4" plywood. The tray cover has panda covering underneath, attached with spray adhesive. ) We'll see how this works out for me ... Makin' it up as we go along. ( The plant is Dutch Passion Auto Power, growing very fast but her leaves a little splotchy. She looks better today after upping her nutes a bit yesterday. )