New Grower 1st Grow - White Widow + Gorilla Glue - Curious, Educated, Excited, Scared?

[Growguitars]

Hello, AFN! I’ve been a distant reader for the past 2 months before embarking on my journey, and I have to thank you all for the huge amount of info, journals, guides, etc. Wanted to be well caught up before asking questions.

I’m starting my first run with 2 strains, ordered from Seedsman. Both autos of course - White Widow and Gorilla Glue - both seemingly resilient strains via what I read online.

I’ve got a “1000w” LED that I found on lightning sale on amazon for cheap - reviews seemed excellent! True draw from wall says 185w. A bit overwhelmed by the distance I should be keeping it from the plants! Some forums say it’s gonna zap 2 plants in my relatively small space, others say it’s essentially the same as a 300-400w light fue to the draw from the wall?

I’m growing in a crawl space, in a giant space bucket essentially... following the space tote idea from the forums on spacebucket https://www.spacebuckets.com/GNKtote

Lined everything with mylar, cut top hole for led access, 2 pc fans, and a room fan about 7ft away, at low.

However, mine are 55gal totes, with dimensions of 45inx20x19 - stacked onto each other opposite like the pic, working with 40in of height from bottom to top. Too short? Including the 10-12 in height of the pot, the surface of the soil is about 30in from the light. Too close? If so, I’ve already cut out the bottom of my tote, and built a wooden box the width of the base - and can set the plants in there - to subtract the height of the pots, and create more space between the lights.

Germinated my babes on Feb 11, planted Feb 14 (Valentine Babes)

Used Kellog Organic soil, recommended by a friend in CO... reading that it’s not ideal for indoor growing or potted plants, but I’m balls deep already...

Now, my issues - I’m scared my plants aren’t growing at the rate they should be! It’s now 13 days after planting, and 16 after sprouting quite nicely. The first few days showed steady growth, but now they're pretty stagnant at about 1.5in tall. 4 leaves came in nicely, with now 2 smaller ones coming in slowly.

I'm reading other grow journals and such, and obviously my babes are behind. Some of these mofos look smokeable at day 10! (kidding).

I do believe I overwatered the first few days, because it seemed my light was super hot and drying out the top of the soil. I never put more than 3/4 cup into a pot per day. After reading up on overwatering, I was convinced I should leave them be for a few days, and it turned out to be beneficial - they definitely took a little more shape and the leaves grew in size and texture.

My Advanced Nutrients Micro/Grow/Bloom Ph Perfect just showed up, and I mixed it up accordingly to the website and bottles, and gave only 2ml of each - with a good healthy water after 3 days.

Standing by to see some results over the next few days.

Here's how they're looking today, Day 13.

Wish me luck?

 

[Samwell]

Do you have any pics in more natural light?

I think those nutes night be a little heavy at 2ml for as small as they are.

I'm also guessing your count on days may be a few days ahead compared to some others you see at day 10 since some people don't count day 1 until after they get their first set of true leaves, others count day 1 as soon as she pops up above ground. Just be aware of that when you're reading journals.

 

[Growguitars]

Hello! Thanks for the reply. I do believe I see nute burn, which is my fault. Bottle and online says this and that, 2-4 leaves... Hopefully it'll survive!

I've been SO confused as to what counts as start date, thanks for clarifying. If they sprouted leaves at Feb 16 or so, that puts me around Day 11.

Grey pot is Gorilla Glue
Red is White Widow

Last pic shows droopy and burned

Hopefully they'll make it. My temp and humidity have stayed around 75F and 70%, now dropping to 50-60%. How can I raise this, without watering?

Still, slow!

 

[bakEQuatorial]

I'm having a similar problem as you with the same exact strain- White Widow. I planted 2 and 1 looks just like yours at day 11. Another freakin looks like she's ready to be topped! I do believe i overwatered cos that particular plant is the only one in a ceramic pot, which dries slower and the noob in me put the pot on a saucer, blocking the only holes on the bottom. Am starting to see mine recover. Hope yours will pull through too!

You really dont wanna water at all at this point until pot feels light and top inch is dry. I learnt this the hard way. Got my soil always damp and attracted bugs. I top dressed with perlite and that seemed to help. I however, did not consult anyone here b4 i did that. So take it with a grain of salt.

And i need to note that im a total newb. My plants only sprouted one day earlier than yours. Thats all the experience i have. I'm hoping for someone who knows better to chime in...


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[Growguitars]

Nice! We’re in it together then brother.

I’m closing the lid and leaving them be, just put the Beatles on for them too.

 

[jingo]

Hey Brother

Congratulations on starting your first grow. You've got yourself I'll pretty tough job head I think. Those two strains can get quite big and your space is what I would call very small.

Your plants look very healthy so far and I think they're doing just fine.

You will stunt your plants if you water too much early, your temperatures are off usually too low, or you start feeding too early. The only time you want to feed a new seedling is if you're in a completely inert growing medium like cocoa or rock wool or vermiculite. Anytime you have soil or something with some nutrient value in it you usually want to wait to feed until you see deficiencies. Once you got lots of experience with your soil and your nutrients and Autos you can feed earlier and grow some monsters.

How far you can keep your LED from your plants is going to be dependent on upon the wattage of the individual chips. They should give you the wattage in a nominal term like 1 watt chip or 3 watt chip or 5 watt chip. I suspect you have one watt or smaller chips in that light and it will be best in a smaller space probably?

You're going to want air movement across those seedlings very soon. In a larger space that would be an oscillating fan. in a smaller space, I don't know I might hang a PC fan from a string tied to the top of the totes to the bottom of the totes. I think what that would do is let the PC fan just kind of swing around and move the air round, never tried it it would be an experiment. That fan will strengthen your stems which is really important and even more important it will keep mold spores that are always present in our environment from settling on your plants and starting powdery mildew. That's something you get with low air movement low temperatures and too much moisture.

You're also going to want to be able to have air flow through that box once they get to a certain size. That will actually be more for the roots then it will for the vegetation on top. Your top vegetation really like CO2 where is the roots just like 02.

If you don't have one one of the first things I would do would be to get a temperature gauge with your humidity read out.

In a strange kind of way it may be better if you stunt those plants a little bit. White Widow can get very large and Gorilla Glue can get very large. The last time I grew White Widow I think I had a four foot tall plant in a 3 gallon pot that yielded over a pound. That was part of a zambeza seeds test and I think we had a group journal on that one.

I'm afraid I don't have much experience growing in such a small space. However you can always tag me in for specific questions you might want just put the @ symbol in front of my name.

 

[Growguitars]

@jingo thank you! Lots of insightful info.

I’ve got an intake and exhaust PC fan close to the pots at the moment - they definitely move some air. Only installed those yesterday.

Definitely planning on training these babies to fit in this space, and if I must, I’ll get a tent eventually!

Light says 10w chips?

Amazon product

Probably made a mistake feeding this early, going off the bottle (as I read not to). But as you said, maybe a good stunt will help them grow into their place! Hah

Thanks again, stay tuned for updates.

 

[jingo]

That's interesting that your lights is 10 watt chips. Hopefully that's Cobbs or chip-on-board. They tend to group a whole bunch of smaller wattage chips together and then multiply that and count them as 10 watts when really you might have a hundred 1/10 of watt chips.

The thing about the old LED chips is they get less efficient the higher in wattage you go. So a 1 watt chip May return an efficiency of 90% and a 3-watt chip might have 70, but by the time you get to a 5 watt chip your less than 50% efficient. Because of that drop in efficiency I wonder if maybe you don't have actual single 10 watt chips. Your wall watts are actually less than 20% of your rated Watts. Anyway, the reason I bring all this up is if those are true single 10-watt chips they will be too powerful in that space and you'll end up having all kinds of deficiencies and maybe even some bleaching.

 

[MickJ]

Hello! Thanks for the reply. I do believe I see nute burn, which is my fault. Bottle and online says this and that, 2-4 leaves... Hopefully it'll survive!

I've been SO confused as to what counts as start date, thanks for clarifying. If they sprouted leaves at Feb 16 or so, that puts me around Day 11.

Grey pot is Gorilla Glue
Red is White Widow

Last pic shows droopy and burned

Hopefully they'll make it. My temp and humidity have stayed around 75F and 70%, now dropping to 50-60%. How can I raise this, without watering?

Still, slow! View attachment 870933 View attachment 870934 View attachment 870935 View attachment 870936

I'm in and learning still but have a few grows under my belt. My space has evolved over time, but like you I have low headroom. I have had to do a few crazy things with the tall ones but if topped and timed right in a smaller pot, I can keep the girls at 24" with a nice canopy. Still perfecting this but I'm getting there. Check my link, you will see some crazy shit. I find if the plant grows too tall I move from under the light. I turn all my plants a 1/4 turn per day to keep them even. I have supercropped one and modified another in an unorthodox way, you would have to see it lol. Anyway good luck and if I can help I will.

Sent from my comfy chair. Link to my grows.
[emoji16][emoji41] [emoji43][emoji848]
"https://www.autoflower.org/index.php?threads/63634/"

 

[COALTRAIN]

Subbed up. I dig seeing how we all adapt to different growing situations.

I started in a closet and now a tent and just this week heard of people growing inside 5 gallon buckets/totes with pc fans. Very interesting. @jingo @Rollin_along have great advice and have great starting instructions of what to look out for.

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