Stealth cabinet grow

[Hushpuppy]

I got this new aeroponics cloner about a month ago and just put some cuttings in it about 10 days ago. Time to set the new girls in some coco

 

[7greeneyes]

Man, those are some healthy gals :aok:

 

[Hushpuppy]

Thanks, I love the aeroponic cloner, they root so fast and so well. I get nearly 100% more often than not.

 

[7greeneyes]

epic

 

[Hushpuppy]

Just got a smoke report on my BlueHell plants. I haven't had the chance to try it myself but a buddy told me that it has great pain relief and a very clean, heady high. He was very impressed. The Buku is smelling great in the jars. Still curing it, but it smells like fruit punch I can't wait to try them this weekend.

 

[Hushpuppy]

So I am helping a couple peeps with setting up their grows and I want to show some of the things that I do. The first 4 pics are my coco that I use, I mix it with water in my 5 gal bucket and it expands to 3-4x its compressed size, I mix in pearlite at about 3cups coco to 1cup pearlite. I got these nursery pots from a friend(about 2liter) and drilled a bunch of 3/8" holes in the bottoms and up the sides from the bottom about 1-2"(we need lots of good drainage), The big round thing is a coco-weave mat that you can buy from Lowes or HD or walmart. I turn my pot over and trace out a circle on the mat and then cut it out. I put this cut-out mat in the bottoms of all my nursery pots so that the loose coco/pearlite mix doesn't wash out the holes and clog up my rez pump. last pic is the DIY aerocloner and my Burmese Kush mother :icon_smile:

 

[Hushpuppy]

Next, I fill my pots after pushing the coco-weave mat cutouts down to the bottom to cover all the drilled holes. I like to wet the coco a bit so that it sticks together good then form a nice little hole in the center for setting my clones(when I plant from seed, I do the same thing with the pots except I don't dig a hole for the seeds, and I don't hook them up to the watering system until they are growing well and are able to take as much watering). I take my clone babies out of the cloner(unplug the pump first or take a shower) the neoprene pucks that hold the cuttings are slit in one side so that all I have to do is open it up like "pac man" and gently remove the now rooted plant, set her in the coco and back-fill it and gently press it down just a bit to hold them in place. I try to set them as high in the pot as I can so that they have the max amount of root space within the pot(once they are set in the totes the roots will eventually grow right out the holes in the bottoms of the pots and hang down into the mini-resevoir formed within the totes). Then its time for making up the rez solution :hubba:

 

[Hushpuppy]

So after I get my plants set in their pots I put them in temporary hydro beds, which are basically a shallow plastic tote in a deep plastic tote. I drilled 3/8"holes in the shallow tote so that the watering will drain back into the rez below. I drilled a larger hole in the center and ran my main hose(1/2") up to the dispersal head. The pump is submersible and sits on the other end of the hose down in the rez. The water pump is on a timer and pumps water to the dispersal head and out to each pot through 1/4" hose so that It just trickles for 10minutes, then cuts off for 4hrs. I have a large air stone in the rez as well to keep the water fully aerated as that is key to Hydroponic growing. So I am using Advanced Nutrients' Jungle Juice but as you can see I have a few other things that I add to it. I mix up my nute solution in a 5gal bucket that is marked to hold 15liters of water and I mix it up 15liters at a time so that I don't mess up and get too much or too little nutes. I use a "baby meds" eyedropper that has up to 5ml on it. This may seem a bit tedious to measure out nutes this way but to me it is the best way to maintain a proper ballance of nutrients. Fortunately I have found that I don't have to wait 24hrs to check the PH as there are no buffers in the Jungle Juice. I just mix it real good and wait for a few minutes then check my PH with my pen that also gives me temps of the water. With my water and nutes mixed I usually get 6.1 straight away, for the little ones in veg I adjust it down to around 5.6 which will climb over a period of a few days as the solution is used by the plants. When I top up my rez I will adjust the PH back down to 5.6-5.8 depending on how fast it is rising.

 

[Hushpuppy]

Initially when I mix up my rez for young seedlings or just rooted clones, I will add Technaflora's Root66 and Thrive Alive as these are both plant tonics and root tonics. I use these 2 tonics for the first 2 weeks of veg then discontinue after that. There are some who don't use such additives but I have found that I get good results with them. I also add Technaflora's Magical to my rez on every feeding as coco has the tendency to lock up magnesium and cause a deficiency. I have found that by using 10ml of Magical to 15liters of water every time I fill the rez prevents any problems.

Once the plants have vegged sufficiently(~6wks for seedlings, fewer for clones) I move them from their temp hydro tanks to the flowering totes. These totes are 10gal totes and have holes cut in the lids so that the nursery pots sit down into them but don't touch the bottom. The totes are connected to the larger rez, which sits beneath them, by the pump hose/dispersion head and drain lines. When the pump turns on, the water is pumped to each plant through the 1/4" lines connected to the dispersal head, then it drains through the plants and drips out into the totes where it forms a shallow rez for the "water roots" to reach without drying out. The water then drains back to the main rez where it is aerated and pumped back up again. This way(enclosed system) I can keep evaporation to a minimum.

 

[Hushpuppy]

For anyone noticing the rockwool cubes in pic 3 above, That is an experiment that I tried on this last run. A friend sold me a whole ebb n flow system with 4" Rockwool cubes. I decided to try a run with the cubes to see how I like it. I don't like the rockwool cubes I have had a lot of trouble regulating them and the plants have grown far more "spindly" in the rockwool than in the coco. The problem is probably not with the rockwool but with me not being used to working with that medium. But I love my coco and will stick with it

 

[Diameed]

What are the approx dimensions of your
Grow cabinets? Thx

 

[Sol]

Great explanation of your set up, HP. If i ever consider going hydro i will hafta refer back here -good resource pal.

 

[Hushpuppy]

Thanks Sol, if ya ever need any help just give me a shout and I'll be glad to help yu.

Diameed; sorry to not answer any sooner. My cabinets are 4'wide by 30" deep by 7' tall. That gives me 10square feet of growing area in each cabinet. I am actually going to break down my cabinets and put up tents as I need to expand to grow more. I already have removed one cabinet and will be building a level floor to put a 5'x5'x80" tent in place. That will more than double my capacity. I also have some MKUltra and White Rhino that I will be growing next. I also have some Sheherazade(aka AllKush) that I am going to pop later. I will discontinue the BUKU, Blue Mystic, and Bluhell as I want to try the new beans. Here is a few pics of the cabinets with the BuKu and Bluhell:

 

[Hushpuppy]

Here's an update on the girls in the cabinets: They are rocking right along. The kush has fat trichomes already and it is still 4 weeks from finishing. :icon_smile:

 

[7greeneyes]

I'm aiming for Hammerhead strain after the Mataro run, Hammerhead is White Rhino x Medicineman cross, so I'd love to hear how your White rhino turns out.

p.s. you have such a sweet setup bud

eace:,

7ge

 

[Hushpuppy]

check out the trichomes

 

[WannaBgrower]

Very Nice!!
Is that a Dissecting Microscope with the Digital USB camera??

Well Done

 

[Hushpuppy]

Those pics were taken with a smasung digital (basic) camera and a 30x jewelers loupe(MJ trich loupe) with LEDs to add lighting.

 

[Hushpuppy]

So here is a few pics of my new tent setup. It is a 5'x5' Secret Jardin "Darkroom" I got 2 600wHPS and have my hydro setup around the rez in the center. The last pics are the water chiller setup that I put together for cooling my rez temps from 80f to 70f. Plants are now in and rockin

 

[Hushpuppy]

I couldn't get the water chiller pics to attach right away. Had to resize them. Here is my Bluhell in flower as well, smelling so sweet in the tent :icon_smile:

Well :doh: I attached the wrong pics. The first 2 plant pics are my BKush that are in my cabinet. The last 2 are the Bluhell in the tent