First Timer Hydro LED AK-48 Grow

[Ihaettypos]

Hey there everyone! Long time lurker but first-time poster. I decided to get into growing my cannabis by myself since I can control quality and I know what's in it. Without further ado, here's my grow!

Strain
• AK-48 (courtesy of Nirvana)

Setup
• Gorilla Grow 2x4x6.5 Tent
• 450W LED Lights w/ Flower + Veg lights separate (x2) (Uses 200W each)
• 190 CFM Exhaust Fan w/ Carbon filter
• 240 CFM Inlet Fan
• 10-gal Tote (x2)
• Water Pump (x2) (GONE!)
• Air Pump (x2)
• Air Stone (x4)

Supplies
• FloraMicro, FloraGrow, FloraBloon nutrients
• pH testing and adjusting chemicals
• Hydroguard

Grow Area
I have the grow area situated in a 5x6x8 closet with a single door. I plan on running a vent from the exhaust fan through the wall into my living room. No roommates or anyone to worry about there. Right now the vent is just pointing up and out with the door open most of the time

Week 1 - Seedling
I had received my seeds in the mail and was excited to get them germinated. By the third or fourth day all three plants had sprouted. I put them in my DWC setup, which also has a top-feed system in both reservoirs, and then fed them some nutrient, hydrogruard, and pH'd water. I accidently put the FloraBloom in the first feeding (or put too much of one of the others - metric to imperial is hard!) and the plants went yellow. I immediately changed the water to just hydroguard and pH-adjusted. They perked back up! By the end of the week they were growing just fine.

Sorry no pics for this week

Week 2 - Veg
This week was much better - the plants SHOT out in just 7 short days. I replaced the pH'd water with 1/4 the recommended dose of nutrients and 1/2 the recommended dose of Hydroguard. The plants are growing super well and fast with beautiful green leaves!

Week 3 – Veg
This week started off with me adding an outlet to my living room to cool the space down. I also started putting frozen 2 liters into the water to keep it nice and cool in there. The temperature gets down to 75 during lights out and at max 80 or 81 during the peak of the day. I removed the top-feed pumps and tubing so now the roots just chill in the water. Like an idiot, I took some terrible advice from another forum telling me to put REAL GROWERS RECHARGE into the reservoir. I quickly dumped the water the next day, cleaned the reservoirs and rinsed off the roots. Yikes! The plants began to droop and the roots grew slowly for a good while. I finished off the week by adding a hanging fan to help control interior temps during the day and by covering the entire remainder of the totes in aluminum foil to keep light penetration into the reservoirs to a minimum. The frozen 2 liters seemed to help keep the temps down and last my entire day at work. I usually come home to water in the 72-69 degree range.

Week 4 – Veg
This week I haven’t seen much improvement. The water is still hovering around 65-70 and in the grow area it’s still the normal 75 to 80. The plants still have brown areas on the roots. There is no smell, no slime, and I can make out individual strands in the roots so I highly doubt it’s root rot. Even with Hydroguard, the temp control, and being conservative with the nutes, I still see drooping and growth appears to still be slow with yellowing tips of older leaves. Oh and the other day I topped off both reservoirs with lower-pH’ed water and it evened both tubs to 5.8 which is within normal ranges. It was at 6.8 prior to topping it off. The plants shouldn’t be this small after a whole month, should they? What other advice can ya give? I am at a loss as to why these conditions are present. Thanks!

All pics can be found here: https://malzo.com/ihaettypos/albums

(I did all this from my tablet so sorry for typos, lol, and formatting)

[BuddMarsh]

Nutrients can discolor your roots and so can the clay balls if they were not rinsed really really well. I think your roots look fine no need for a touch up ;-) Great formatting so easy to read with all the nice breaks you put in. I hate walls of text. Subbed in . Oh and Welcome to the forum

[Ihaettypos]

Nutrients can discolor your roots and so can the clay balls if they were not rinsed really really well. I think your roots look fine no need for a touch up ;-) Great formatting so easy to read with all the nice breaks you put in. I hate walls of text. Subbed in . Oh and Welcome to the forum

Phew! Good to know! I had read that and when I touch the roots it just comes off (the brown coloring). What can I do about the temps? It's hard to keep the tent under 80 most days. Do my intake and exhaust fans seem appropriate for a grow room of this size? I live in Florida so heat is definitely an issue and I know lower than 80 degrees is optimal. Thanks again

[NebulaHaze]

If your leaves are green and not droopy, you know your roots are doing great! I agree it looks like your plants are fine even if the roots are discolored. They don't look slimy. Here's an example of healthy roots that were stained by nutrients and they look a lot like yours:



Here's some pictures of root rot if you want to compare!

Is it possible to post a picture of your plants in the setup? Sometimes that helps give us clues as to why it's hard to control the temperature

[Jason]

Which feeding schedule are you following? The online version from GH or the suggestions on the bottles of the Flora Series. The online concentrations are about double what's on the bottles. I used those for my first WaterFarm grow and all went well. No root problems at all. I use a 4" diameter air stone to over oxygenate as anti microbial and you can't give a plant too much 02 in the food.
Good luck.