My First Grow Journal...EVER! 600W MH/HPS Bubbleponics Cabinet Grow

[Aloner]

I just used standard duct tape and squeezed the duct together at the end and wrapped the tape around

GENIUS! I'm in the early stages of planning for an indoor grow space -- I'm adding that to my notes.

[ellz]

07/06/2017:
11:00AM: Turned on the light after seeing that all of the seedlings were now above the surface or just at the surface of the Rapid Rooter. The White Poison ones are doing the best right now. The Rug Burn is still trying to figure out which way is up! LOL. Either way, they are ready for the light and they have it now. I also modified my ducting to eliminate the sagging from the extra duct weight. I just used standard duct tape and squeezed the duct together at the end and wrapped the tape around and voila! It definitely helped bring the temps down a bit since the air can flow much more freely. I also ordered an inline duct booster fan because I believe that will help bring the temp down a lot more. That won't be here until Saturday so I am going to see how the system does without it during the next couple of days. Outside temps are supposed to be over 100ºF each day through next week.

[ellz]

07/05/2017 (continued)...
10:00PM: Did a temperature check on my cabinet and it had dropped down to 93ºF so I am okay with night time temps if I need to leave the light on. All of the seeds have popped and are on their way to growing up big! I have posted pictures of their 2-day progress below, but I am very impressed at how fast they opened and started to root! 2 days in the cabinet with the water and air running, no light and now they look like this! Awesome! Probably going to turn off the light at 11:00PM and check on the sprouts in the morning. If they have come up more I will turn on the light for good, but I want to let them come up some more before I really start pushing them.

[ellz]

Welcome to the show!

[ellz]

07/05/2017 (continued)...

12:27PM: Went out to check on everything again and it looks like only one of each plant has started to sprout for sure. The other two are trying. I relocated the internal clip fans so that they would bring cool air down from the intake to the charcoal filter while passing over the plants themselves. I have attached a couple of photos showing how everything sits now...

01:45PM: With temps blazing outside at 107ºF and the humidity down to a measly 10%, I decided to go check everything and I was happy to see that the cabinet was still sitting in the mid 80s with only around 30% humidity. I decided to test out my temps with the light on and the swamp cooler blasting and I am still pretty nervous about the high temps but we shall see how that goes. I watched as the light added an extra 10ºF to the air, raising the inside temperature to around 93ºF after only a few minutes. However, I was able to slow the rate of increase by placing the cooler in a position further away and focusing the vent upwards towards my cabinet's intake. Rather than raising half a degree every few minutes, it had slowed by half with the change. I also think moving my fans was a good idea since the air flow is much better inside and there is nothing at all in the way of my grow space! I turned my light off and left everything else running and will check on it later. The 2 sprouting seeds haven't broke the surface just yet so I will hold off on the light until they do. Maybe by then the temps will go down outside but from what they say it's only going to get hotter the rest of the week! Maybe this will be a short lived heat wave and by the time I am ready to turn the lights on it will start cooling back off. Fingers crossed!

9:30PM: All four seeds that I planted have started to sprout! Two are really coming up and the other two are just a bit slower but the seeds are all open and the tap roots are all out! I turned my light on around 9:00PM and plan on giving them a few hours of light and check on them before bed. If they haven't stretched at all, then I will turn off the light for the night but if they pop up farther I am going to leave the light on from now until flowering, but may swap to a 18/6 hour cycle if the heat gets too bad during the day time. I can easily turn the light off during the hottest 6 hours of the day if need be. With the light on for about 30 minutes, the inside cabinet temperature had risen from 88ºF to 94ºF and seems to have leveled off at that. I also have the swamp cooler going because it's still hot outside (~86ºF). I will likely turn that off before bed so the humidity doesn't get too high in the garage.

[Aloner]

Got a front row seat!

[ellz]

Greetings everyone! I am fairly new to the forums but I have a decent amount of growing experience. Hopefully I can help others while learning myself. That being said, I am keeping my very first online grow journal since where I live it's 100% legal to grow cannabis. Intros and a full rundown of my grow setup can be found on this post.

Plant #1 (Left hand side of cabinet): Rug Burn OG seeds frozen from 10/27/2015. Tested THC Content:25.62%
Plant #2 (Right hand side of cabinet): White Poison (White Widow x Durban Poison) seeds frozen from 10/27/2015. Tested THC Content: 7.08%

All times listed are in Mountain Time Zone

Playing catchup for the first couple of days:
07/03/2017
11:36PM: After pre-soaking the four selected net pots and Rapid Rooters, I inserted two seeds from each strain, one in each net pot, 4 total into the Rapid Rooters. The system was turned on except for the light, and was left running and the doors were closed.

07/04/2017
01:30AM: Decided to check and see how things were running since this was my first grow in this system. Turned the garage light on, opened the cabinet doors and everything was running smoothly. I decided to turn off the system and let the seeds sit in damp Rapid Rooters with zero air flowing (air can still pass in and out in some places). I closed the cabinet doors and flipped off the power switch on my surge strip and the garage lost power altogether! It wasn't a huge deal since I wanted the system off, but it was something I would have to remedy first thing in the morning because the circuit breaker wasn't tripped!

08:45AM: Upon waking up, I thought of why the power was out in the garage. There is an outlet on the outside of my house that has a test/reset function and sure enough, that is the main feed line for the garage! Pushed reset and power was back on! YAY! Went inside the garage, said good morning to the seeds and turned the system back on except the light.

03:00PM: Checked on the cabinet since the outside air temps were around 98ºF and inside the garage the temp was almost 90ºF. I bought a portable swamp cooler to keep the garage cool during the daytime heat so I turned that on as well. Inside the cabinet, the temp was about 88ºF and the humidity was near 38% (very dry, I know). I left everything running to check on later.

04:00PM: Checked on the temps after an hour and they had dropped a good deal. Inside the garage was down to around 83ºF and the humidity had increased to 45%, also observed nearly the same inside the cabinet. I was still concerned that heat would be an issue since we are going to have a week straight of over 100ºF so I decided to go ahead and install a second intake fan in the cabinet. I turned everything off, covered my plants and my wife held a piece of paper under my drill for me and I cut the second intake hole. I then installed the fan, vacuumed everything up, turned the system back on and shut the doors. I also left the swamp cooler running.

04:35PM: Checked the temperatures with the second fan installed and they had come down a bit more so I feel confident that with the swamp cooler and the 2 fans things should be okay but I also have 2 more slower speed fans I can install should I need to. Leaving the system on without the light for the night and will check on everything tomorrow. Turned off the swamp cooler.
(caught up)

07/05/2017:
09:10AM: Went and checked on everything. The temperature in the cabinet was 77ºF and the humidity had dropped to 28% overnight. I checked the seeds and noticed that 3 of the planted seeds (2 of the White Poison and one of the Rug Burn) had already cracked open and began to establish their taproots! That was fast! Not sure about my other Rug Burn but time will tell. Closing the cabinet and leaving everything on but the light and the swamp cooler. Will check on later.