First time grower with red stems/yellow/spotting leaves

[The Silver Bullet Special]

when your soil is dry to the touch below the surface and your pot weighs less than it did a day or two ago... also if you're in 3 gal pots you dont have to water that much I water every 2-3days with my one indoor plant and 4-5 days outside because the humidity. Now when your plants get bigger this may change of course.

 

[growgreen420]

Okay the soil thing is what I was going by. I haven't watered in about 6 days because the soil seemed damp still? Anyways I just gave them a good watering so I bet they will perk right up.

How big do they have to be to start injecting CO2?

Also, will it be a good idea to get some FF nutes and start doing that are just let them feed off of the FFOF?

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

You wont need co2 for quite a while, if at all, what you need is just good ventillation you want to move the volume of air in your room out once every 5 minutes. I'm just going to let it feed off the soil till I see a sign of a deficiency. If I gave it nutes now it would surely kill it.

CO2 is really for bigger grow ops or people that dont have good ventillation. to do CO2 you have to shut your fans down anyways, if you choose MH you wont have that option as temperatures will soar rather quicky.

Ventillation will also serve more benefits than CO2 because keeping air moving will reduce the risk of mold and pests catching hold of your babies; aswell as keeping your temperatures lower if you choose the route of MH bulbs.

Make sure you have an oscillating fan giving your plants a slight "tickle" in the leaves, as plants release oxygen that air needs to be moved away from the leaves so photosynthesis can continue. Exchanging your grow room air volume every 5 minutes or less will bring a good amount of CO2 rich air into the grow room.

 

[growgreen420]

Okay thanks. Yeah there is a lot of air moving in the grow room right now.

Seems like I just need to chill out and watch these kids grow for a while, lol.

Thanks for all the advice so far!

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

Yup yup take it slow they'll let ya know when they get hungry. I'm pretty impatient lol when I have free time I check to see the progress on how they're going about every hour lol. I guess you can say I caught growing fever :icon_smile:

Also the plant I posted I topped it yesterday and now is starting two main shoots.

 

[growgreen420]

What does "toppng" mean?

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

Topping is where you cut the new growth on the meristem(main stem that growth takes place) above the 4-5th node(for the earliest you want to top, it will make the one main branch split off into two branches if done right. But dont just cut the stem anywhere it has to be on the new growth right above the node that just got its branches.

There's another way to "top" your plant its called FIM(F**k I Missed) and its the same thing as topping but just a little bit higher on the new growth and if its done right it will make 2-4 new main branches.

I got this picture off google(from another forum when it came up) to show an example of a topped plant the main stem got cut where the orange line is and the picture on the right the #2 wont grow anymore and the growth will be directed at the two #3's and those will be your main branches.

 

[growgreen420]

I kind of want to try this? What is the benefit? Just more growth?

Will it be okay if I decide not to top?

Thanks again for all the advice!

 

[growgreen420]

Can you clone the clippings or are they too small to clone?

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

It keeps your plant's height down , bushes it out, adds growth meaning your plant will yield more bud later cuz it gives more bud sites. Some growers will top twice before flowering. Or also will allow you to grow less plants in the same area(with more veg time) if your in a place like me that 5+ plants will dang near get you life.

Make sure you sterilize. Your cutting tools with rubbing alcohol before you make your cut it will help prevent disease.

 

[growgreen420]

Okay sweet. I think we will give the plants one more week of growth before we top them just to make sure they are doing good. Kinda of looks like they have a little nute shock from the FFOF?

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

Yeah mine are almost recovered from nute shock so see where they are in a few days and see if they're at the point to be topped you may have to wait till another node startes again

 

[growgreen420]

Thank you again.

Another question, lol. Is it okay for the plants to touch one another? You can kind of see this in my pics but it is a lot more now as the plants have grown. Will this hinder their growth? Do I have to worry about the taller plants blocking light to the smaller ones? What should be done about this, if anything?

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

I would keep all the taller plants together and shorter plants together, and it wont inhibit growth unless its blocking light. But its always good to give them their own space.

 

[Hick]

"IME".. topping will only increase yield minimally, all things equal. You will have two smaller buds/colas rather than one larger one. "IMO"' the increase comes more from keeping a more even canopy, which allows you to keep light intensity more even over more of the plant. Topping redirects growth hormones/auxins to lower portions of the plant, allowing it to "catch up" to the upper growth.
Outdoors with full sunlight, the increase is near negligible.
The taller plants will require you to keep your light further away from the shorter plant, inibiting growth and/or inducing stretch. An even canopy and keeping the light as close as possible to as much of the plants as possible, is my suggestion for maximum potential.

 

[The Silver Bullet Special]

:yeahthat: I Guess I should have worded it better Lol The goal is to shoot for a more even canopy for even light disbursment(sp).

 

[Hick]

:yeahthat: I Guess I should have worded it better Lol The goal is to shoot for a more even canopy for even light disbursment(sp).

:aok:... just clarifying sbs

 

[The Hemp Goddess]

I think it would be a mistake to top these. You have 10 plants and a tiny grow space--I don't think you are going to have nearly enough space, especially if you top these. That many plants in a 6 sq ft space will do far better grown as single cola plants, IMO. I have almost 20 sq ft and never ever put more than 10 plants in there and prefer 8 or less.

I also doubt that a CO2 unit for an aquarium is going to really have any effect on your grow. You are most likely better off just making sure you have good air exchange.

And as a side note, T5s actually put out slightly more lumens per watt than MH lighting (92 lumens per watt compared to 90 lumens per watt) and the heat difference is substantial. In addition, IMO, the T5 spreads the light more evenly and as mentioned, you can get the light right on top of the plants. You can purchase a 2' PPL T5 that has a 2' double tube that emits 5000 lumens each. You can buy these with 2 tubes (10000 lumens) or 4 tubes (20,000 lumens). I believe the 4 tube fixture is 2 x 2.

 

[growgreen420]

Hey thank you to all the great advice. We have decided to not top the plants just since this is our first grow and, yes, we have a small space. We still don't know if these are all females, yet. We still have to sex them. I also decided to get some t5's after some more in depth research I did and after reading the previous comments. Thank you to all the comments again and I will have some pics posted up in a couple days.

 

[growgreen420]

Something like this?

hxxp://www.htgsupply.com/Product-HTG-Supply-2-Foot-2-Lamp-PL-55-Tek-Lamp.asp#