I flipped the day I put the plants in there. They were just rooted clones in plugs. I'm afraid if I vegged at allthe roots would clog things up!
Shane's Vegetable Farm
- Thread starter Shane Karmann
- Start date
Dboybudz
Dazed and Confused 😛
That's impressive straight from a rooted clone. Im just getting the hang of indoor and need to remind myself I don't need to veg for two months then flip especially in a closet to grow something decent. Cloning will be next in my learning curve, thanks to everyone's help feel confident in any phase.
Thank you, laddy! I learn by doing and confirm the facts later. I'm definitely a FAFO grower.
Speaking of which, I finally did some reading on growing hydro strawberries and I'VE BEEN DOING IT WRONG!! It's been a couple months, they've grown like crazy, flowers and runners everywhere and I'm thinking yeah, this is so easy but I haven't gotten much fruit, just a few handfuls and they are small and distorted, sweet and juicy though. Turns out my nutes are twice the concentration they prefer and I was supposed to be trimming all the runners and most flowers because they suppress fruiting. Tough for them because cannabis comes first. I'll adjust that near the end of flowering.
I've trimmed off all the runners and chose 27 nodes, put them in rockwool and banged them back into the system. They already have little root nubs on the bottom, so I expect they will be fine. Another thing I learned is people who go this route with mail order bare stemmed plants usually grow those out and take the pups to put in hydro while discarding the originals. I intend to do that as well.. Dormant bare root plants tend to bring root rot with them. I have been a dirty boy. Gallon of Hydroguard coming.
Speaking of which, I finally did some reading on growing hydro strawberries and I'VE BEEN DOING IT WRONG!! It's been a couple months, they've grown like crazy, flowers and runners everywhere and I'm thinking yeah, this is so easy but I haven't gotten much fruit, just a few handfuls and they are small and distorted, sweet and juicy though. Turns out my nutes are twice the concentration they prefer and I was supposed to be trimming all the runners and most flowers because they suppress fruiting. Tough for them because cannabis comes first. I'll adjust that near the end of flowering.
I've trimmed off all the runners and chose 27 nodes, put them in rockwool and banged them back into the system. They already have little root nubs on the bottom, so I expect they will be fine. Another thing I learned is people who go this route with mail order bare stemmed plants usually grow those out and take the pups to put in hydro while discarding the originals. I intend to do that as well.. Dormant bare root plants tend to bring root rot with them. I have been a dirty boy. Gallon of Hydroguard coming.
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Most of my strawberry cuttings have roots poking out of the rockwool now. So I got that going for me. Outside, I picked my first tomatoes of the year, extremely late it sems to me, but everyone is saying the same.
Got a lot more fruit setting and ripening after cutting the runners off. New plants from cuttings are thriving mostly.
This is my average haul now every 3 or 4 days. I have been cycling out the original plants and replacing them with rooted scions from the runners. This has been really fun, I expected a total fail but now we need fresh lettuce and strawberries at all times.
A good tomato year too, if late. Nothing ripened until September. Hydro lettuce makes BLT season last longer. Who has lettuce outside by September?
Weird tomato season. Did June get a chilly start for you too?
Totally. I put them outside late May and they just suffered. Then we had monstrous heat and rain. Early fruit had mild blossom end rot from too much rain interfering with Calcium uptake.
My lettuce rig has been very productive the last 90 days but this design is not ideal. It has to be shimmed just right or it will not flow properly. I've had 2 floods, all caught in the waterproof tent floor but it's a pain. Half the res in this picture is on the tent floor.
I found a new system that I wish had been for sale last December when I first started this.
The v shape is much better for lighting and flow and this unit comes with its own stand. My current V shaped system is entirely hanging from the tent frame and I worry with light, fan and a waterfilled system overloading the tent poles. This is a Vivosun grade tent, not Gorilla! I plan to expand my hydro veggie options this winter with tomatoes and peppers, cucumber and more leafy greens.
The v shape is much better for lighting and flow and this unit comes with its own stand. My current V shaped system is entirely hanging from the tent frame and I worry with light, fan and a waterfilled system overloading the tent poles. This is a Vivosun grade tent, not Gorilla! I plan to expand my hydro veggie options this winter with tomatoes and peppers, cucumber and more leafy greens.
Scheming ways and means to transfer all this to my basement. I need to set up another system, get it running, and then I should be able to transfer individual plants into the new system. I'm on my third cycle of strawberries, they're blooming a lot now. I just constantly root new plants from runners. It's been great. The lettuce is now essential and so easy.
When I started in rails I built my own system. The Aeroflos that looked so sexy were so small. So I got 8" diameter PVC and grew in those. Here's my system. Not even close to as nice as yours. The roots didn't clog up the pipe but they did snake into the res via the return. I kept my pump in nylon bag so it wouldn't creep into the impeller.
8" lmao huge!
The devil's lettuce makes demands and not even as close to as lovely as Shane's lettuce.
My pipes are small. Even lettuce can be hard to wrench out and get all the roots, bigger pipes and larger openings for plants would be nice but then your losing space in other ways. My pumps are in a bag because of debris that washes out of the rails. I've still never actually change out the res completely, I just top up and keep it below 900 ppm.
I failed at cannabis, probably because I just jammed it in with the veggies. It.got monstrous deficiencies that I didn't want to remedy for fear of losing my strawberries.
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