New Grower First Grow - ILGM Blueberry - Indoor

[Bruce Campbell]

Day -3

About to start my first grow, and things are starting to show up at my door. Should be ready to start in a few days. Here's my overall set-up / shopping list so far:

Strain	ILGM Blueberry AF
Number of Plants:	4
Indoor / Outdoor:	Indoor
Light	Phlizon CREE Cob Series 2000W (400W Actual)
Tent	Gorilla 2' x 4'
Filter	VIVOSUN 6-in Carbon Filter
Fan	CastleGreens 6 Inch Inline Duct Fan - 330 CFM
Controllers	Inkbird Temperature Humidity Controller ITC-608T
Pots	Superoots Air-Pot THAP3 2.2 Gallon, 4 Pack
Soil	FoxFarm Ocean Forest -1.5 Cubic Foot
Nutrients	Fox Farm Cultivation Nation 3-Part (Grow, Micro, Bloom)
Additives	Mycorrhizal Inoculant by DYNOMYCO
Supplements	Liquid Silica Boost by Bloom City
Dechlorination	Vitamin C Powder (8 oz) Ascorbic Acid

Objectives:

1) Don't kill my plants.
2) Get some kind of yield.
3) Establish a baseline for what to tweak / improve for next grow.

Expected Challenges:

1) I'll be venting into the lung room, but can leave that open to the house. Overall temp/humidity control, equipment, and set-up will need to be adjusted / modified as I go.
2) I'll be using tap water which will impact nutrient ratios and varies a bit month-by-month in my region. I'll be trying to adjust the vendor feed schedule accordingly, but their NPK ratios make it difficult to fine-tune for individual levels.

 

[Bruce Campbell]

My decision process for planning out the basic set-up was as follows:

1) Home-grow is legal in my region, but limited to 4 plants.
2) I have a spare bedroom / office. A 2'x4' tent fits nice and snug in the corner, anything bigger would be awkward in the room (e.g., block windows, be in view of webcam for work calls, etc). After sizing out pots, etc, looks like it will be a bit cramped. Lesson learned for next time.
3) I settled on the Phlizon after reading a review on a grow-light website. Main point was "COB is awesome, Phlizon is worth considering based on its price." Went with 400W actual based on the 50W/sq-ft rule of thumb.
4) Could add a window / clothes dryer vent kit to a window for outside exhaust, but I live in a condo complex and neighbors may not like that. Have a bathroom exhaust fan I could use, or add a dehumidifier to lung room.
5) Will include carbon filter in tent. Settled on cheaper brand / lower-flow fan because it had a lower listed noise level. Without significant ducting, should be able to reach the 3 turnovers/minute rule of thumb.
6) I'll build out the specific control and additional equipment as I go.

 

[Bruce Campbell]

Next item to consider was nutrient plan / feed schedule:

1) Settled on Fox Farms Ocean Forest at the start without knowing too much, so I'll be working around that.
2) I'll be using tap water. My goal is to be able to use spent aquarium water for later grows, so learning how to adjust / work around tap water should help me learn.
3) I'll be using Fox Farms' Cultivation Nation 3-part Grow-Micro-Bloom line. Or, more accurately, its feed schedule. That gives me some kind of baseline for how they expect their soil to perform.
4) I'll be adding myco with the goal of increasing P bio-availability (See below).
5) I'll be adding a silica booster with the goal of improving overall uptake. There seems to be limited downside (i.e., no toxicity issues), except for it possibly not being needed.

Here's an outline of how I adjusted their feed schedule:

My local water has decent N and K, but a bit low in P. It can vary a bit month-to-month, and can be reasonably hard. The calcium / hardness may be an issue but we'll see how the final feed EC and pH work out:

	ppm = mL/L
	N	P	K	Ca	Mg
Tap Water (Nom)	1.57	0.4	2.8	30	7
Ranges:	0.86 - 2.72	0.37 - 0.43	1.8 - 2.8	27 - 32	7.0 - 7.7
TDS:	130 - 220	ppm
EC:	0.27 - 0.39	mS/cm

Here's the soil and nutrient ratios:

	Wt %
	N	P	K	Ca	Mg
Grow	2	1	6
Micro	5	0	1
Bloom	0	5	4
FFOF	0.3	0.45	0.05	1

I worked through the math to convert their feed schedule to an "NPK per week" basis:

	Equivalent ppm N-P-K of Fox Farms Grow-Micro-Bloom Feed Schedule
	Week
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
N	2.6	11.7	11.7	11.7	11.7	9.1	9.1	9.1	6.5	6.5	0.0	0.0
P	1.3	2.6	2.6	9.1	9.1	7.8	14.3	14.3	13.0	13.0	13.0	13.0
K	7.8	17.0	17.0	22.2	22.2	14.3	19.6	19.6	11.7	11.7	10.4	10.4

For comparison, here's what percentage of that NPK will be provided by my tap water itself:

	% of N-P-K Feed provided by tap water
	Week
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
N	60%	13%	13%	13%	13%	17%	17%	17%	24%	24%	-	-
P	31%	15%	15%	4%	4%	5%	3%	3%	3%	3%	3%	3%
K	36%	17%	17%	13%	13%	20%	14%	14%	24%	24%	27%	27%

Now, I subtract the tap water NPK values from the NPK feed schedule, and then comes the difficult part. I need to back-guess at mixture ratios that will provide what I actually need. But, I can only get it in the ballpark based on their individual product ratios. Also, I'll aim overall for only providing 50% of their total schedule for now, based on the rule of thumb that autos need less than photos.

Lesson: If I'm going to fine-tune a feed schedule like this in the future, would probably be best to use a 3-part product line that provides N, P, and K individually.

Skipping a bunch of the numbers, here's my final planned feed schedule (with tap water) vs. the vendor feed schedule, and the final strength compared to their schedule:

	Fox Farms Feed Schedule: Tsp (5 mL) per 1 Gal (4 L) Water
	Week
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
Grow	1	2	2	2	2	1	1	1	0	0	0	0
Micro	0	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	0	0
Bloom	0	0	0	1	1	1	2	2	2	2	2	2

	Actual Product Usage (tsp/gal)
	Week
Grow	0	0.76	0.76	0.76	0.76	0.30	0.30	0.30	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00
Micro	0	0.46	0.46	0.46	0.46	0.46	0.46	0.46	0.30	0.30	0.00	0.00
Bloom	0	0.00	0.00	0.46	0.46	0.46	0.91	0.91	0.76	0.76	0.76	0.76

	Strength (%) (- = Underfeeding; + = Overfeeding)
	Week
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
N	-40%	-44%	-44%	-44%	-44%	-42%	-42%	-42%	-45%	-45%	-	-
P	-69%	-47%	-47%	-52%	-52%	-52%	-53%	-53%	-59%	-59%	-59%	-59%
K	-64%	-45%	-45%	-47%	-47%	-43%	-46%	-46%	-39%	-39%	-35%	-35%

Note: I'll be using a 3 mL pipette with 0.5 mL graduations to mix each batch, which is why the actual schedule isn't in nice even teaspoons.

It's a lot of math, but it turns out to not be a straight "divide everything by X" adjustment. It should keep me within 40-60% of their overall feed schedule with my tap water and leave some margin for month-to-month variations in my supply. Not sure how the Ca and hardness will impact the grow, but we'll see. Overall, an interesting learning exercise...

 

[Carve]

Are you planning to start nutrients in week 1?

 

[Bruce Campbell]

Are you planning to start nutrients in week 1?

Good call - Probably not. For now, that's just me adjusting the Fox Farms schedule, which is 12-weeks long and starts at Week 1. What's the general rule of thumb? Start around ~3-4 weeks / ~3-4 full leaves?

I may start a bit earlier than that at 10-20% the FF strength and ramp up. Main thing was to put together a spreadsheet where I could tweak the strength as I go, but maintain the overall NPK ratios based on my water.

 

[Carve]

Something in that time frame. Caveat: I'm a new grower too. I didn't start any nutrients until around the end of week 4ish (off the top of my head) and they weren't really screaming for it. I'm using the fox farm trio as well, but in the less-rich happy frog soil. Your mileage may vary, of course. I don't claim to know what I'm doing yet and my plants stalled for a bit, but managed to grow through it.

 

[Bruce Campbell]

Hey, if you haven't killed your plants yet, you're still winning.

You've gotta think that growth is so slow those first few weeks, anything you're putting into the soil is just building up even if it doesn't kill the plants. The biggest challenge is we don't really know what's going on in the soil, just what we're putting in - so the vendor schedule is the best way we have to account for it.

My main take-aways from looking at it all was:

A) There's almost no potassium (K) in FFOF, so I'll need to add some at some point. I may pick a different soil for next grow.
B) My tap water gives a decent amount of N and K, but not much P. On bad months, it can be almost 50% of the fox farms N and K just in my tap water alone, and you're always adding that. If people are in the same boat as me, and not realizing it, that in itself could be why a lot of people end up burning their plants.

 

[Bruce Campbell]

Planted seeds today.

Prepared soil and pots a few days ago to give them some time to absorb water. Air pots can be a hassle when the soil's completely dry since the water will just run out the sides. Used coco starting plugs, but then put those directly into the final pot.

Light's running, but just as a heater for now with the Inkbird controller set at 80F. May add solo cups tomorrow to keep in the humidity. I ordered a Sonoff / Zigbee-based bridge and temp/RH sensor, so I'll probably switch over to a smart home setup in the future.

Still setting up ventilation, but sealed / taped up all the unused ducts on the tent. Gonna order some extra ratcheting hangers for the carbon filter. Vivosun just gives you nylon straps, but I never got my knot-tying merit badge, so don't trust myself using those to hang a 20-lb filter above my plants.

Also, ordered a second light in case I need it. I don't quite trust the PPFD map I could find for it - it only gives values in a 2' x 2' area when they say the light coverage is 4'x4', and the values fall off pretty quick. Tried some smart phone apps, but didn't seem to give great readings. Phlizon lights are so cheap, though, figured I'd just order one in case I need it.

 

[olegren]

Loving your thorough documentation and methodical approach. No doubt you're gonna crush it. Looking forward to updates!

 

[Bruce Campbell]

Three have sprouted so far - one after 56 hrs, two more after 68 hrs (although just barely breaking soil). Still waiting on the last one.

Here's the earliest one:

Switched the lights to their half-power blurple-only mode, 12/12, ~24 inches. Ventilation set at 80F. RH is low around 45-50%, so should probably add some domes.