No Title
Hi all, been a good week but I've struggled with a lack of humidity because it's been a bit chilly and the heating has been on (okay it's been 62 degrees, sorry, I used to be able to do weather but I acclimatized). It's a wonder I got any gardening done this week what with the release of Horizon Zero Dawn
On the humidity and temp issue, it's intrinsic in my "perpetual" plan that my plants aren't always going to get the ideal environment. Once I'm in full swing I'll have a seedling, an early flower, and a nearly finished plant all sharing the same tent and conditions. I use the tubs under my plants to help add humidity and I'll use the AC once it gets hot again here, but manipulating humidity and temps for different stages of growth is gonna be mostly beyond me. Mystic #2 is still in it's buried solo cup, so I've been watering the main pot's coir in the hope of adding some extra local humidity for the seedling.
Growth has been good this week and the bubble seems to have recovered fully from it's stupid thumbs mauling a few weeks ago.
2-23-17 DAY 27 Trimmed a couple of fans from the very bushy Mystic, I'm being really cautious with this one after my Bubble mishaps. I went back to my old training method using binder clips on the edge of my pots and softwire to simply spread the 4 main branches. I watered with plain 5.6 Ph water, I vacillated over doing this as Canna recommends against plain watering. 26%/48% 68/79
2-24-17 DAY 28/1 Thanks to all your encouragement and advice I eased the seed shell off Mystic #2 and I'm calling today Day 1 for my second Mystic. As noted above I watered the main pot's coir to try and add local humidity for the Mystic 2 seedling in its buried solo cup. 26%/65% 68/79
2-26-17 DAY 30/3 Watered Mystic #2 around the rim of the solo cup. Bubble and Mystic seem to be drinking at different rates, the bubble's pot was still heavy but Mystic was ready for a feed. I'm on Canna's Veg II stage now so 8.6 A+B plus rhizo, zym, and now boost at 8ml/gal, 5.9 Ph. In 3 gal fabric pots and coir each plant takes about 1/2 gallon to water to runoff. Left with half a gallon of nutes I just store the leftover in black plastic food grade jugs. I find that using Ph Down my Ph hardly slips for up to a week or more of storing nute solution. I'm into week 5 with the Bubble showing its flowers now, so I decided to flip the flower switch on my P300. Bubble and Mystic are now sharing the full 185W. Later in flowering I'll add my 90W DormGrow red UFO. 41%/63% 68/79
2-27-17 DAY 31/4 Gave the very bushy Mystic a good trim, just removing fans that are blocking growth tips. Fed the Bubble the leftover nutes from yesterday, Ph eaxctly as it was yesterday 5.9. haven't noticed any negative from the extra light which is good. 46%/68% 70/81
2-28-17 DAY 32/5 Mystic drinking well but I'm gonna give her a day, don't want her to get soggy. 47%/63% 73/82
3-1-17 DAY 33/6 Made some plain 5.8 Ph water for Mystic #2. I always make a full gallon and store some in a light tight container, some in a spray bottle for spritzing, and then whatever is left over to add water to tubs to increase humidity. Made veg II nute solution for Mystic and fed her 5.7 Ph, as before saved 2nd half in black jug for the less thirsty Bubble. The Bubble seems to be fully recovered and now showing early flowers. I did a very light trim of the Bubble, 5 fans and 1 poorly placed growth tip. To give you an idea of how adding water to the tubs raises humidity, my ambient humidity is in the low 30s, adding half a gallon of water to the tub raised my tent humidity from 36% to 42% in 5 minutes, then to 48% in 8 hours.
Roll on the stretch!
What are your thought on plain waterings?
I've noticed Green75 doesn't do them but Nebula is (famously) a proponent. Canna suggests that it will mess up the delicate balance of your medium, but they're selling nutes...
Anyone have any other ideas for balancing temps and humidity in one small tent with 3 plants all at different stages of life?
N.B. My final pic -- not all seeds are created equal -- I've been growing out some Nirvana mystery seeds under CFL for a friend's first grow experiments. Of 6 seeds, 4 popped as expected, one did nothing at all in 2 weeks, and this weird little monster took nearly 2 weeks to break out of the jiffy pellet and is just really slow weird growth.
like you noting how much humidity can be raised by putting water in your tubs, i have been pleasantly surprised by how much i am able to raise mine by putting a fully saturated bath towel just simply hanging from the rod that my lights hang from. if i want to get extra crazy i set it up near the fan so that it dries more quickly. really raises the RH and fast! if you want to try it out on a semi-permanent basis i suggest setting up some sort of bottom reservoir that the bottom of the towel rests/remains in. this reduces the number of times you have to rewet the towel but more importantly, at least for me, it prevents the towel from swinging around depending on where fans are and how high they are set. it also makes it super easy to rewet the whole thing and just leave. like i come in, towel is almost dry, i take clothes hanger to which i have firmly attached towel, dunk it in the reservoir (in my case a plain plastic bucket), then just put it right back--1 minute tops.