Grow Room Mr.Sparkle’s Arduino Controlled 5 Gal Bucket Micro Grow 2017

[Mr.Sparkle]

Day 11 upped the feed which is straight maxigro at 500ppm but gonna watch it and feed straight water occasionally to level out the high feed rate at the moment till the plants can handle it in a week or two. I didn't take any mid weeks shots this last week so just getting a weekend shot.

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

Day 14 Even though i stated i upped the feed in the previous post i might dial it back a tiny bit to maybe 420-450 ppm or so just to be safe as i see a couple tiny signs that could be nothing, but imo better to run a bit too lean than too much.

But definitely picking up now 3 days later, the two bigger plants the roots are coming out the bottom now.

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

Day 21 Moving along could be better though, did some light defoliation just to air things out and remove older leaves that had deficiency issues from the past,

One thing i have changed is now they are getting top watered through a 4 way splitter which is made of three three ways that are combined and i raised the bottom grating they sit on off the bottom by about a cm, just need to change the programming which i'll do shortly, but i'll be decreasing the watering setpoint and increasing the watering time slightly, goal is to get it to a point where a tiny bit of run off comes out the bottom of each pot which will just evaporate or when high enough be re sucked back into the pots.

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

Day 23, did some training on the Cream Mandarine XL and Big Devil XL, just a rubber band holding down the tops slightly, also bent over the Dark Devil top which will catch up shortly alongside the Red Poison,

If left as they were they would of ate of the height quickly over the next week or two, so in order to keep them in check i'll also probably defoliate slightly as we go on.

That and i started doing an approximate half and half mix of MaxiBloom and Gro at 400ppm total concentration, just cause they are starting to flower so i can start transitioning to bloom nutrients, also i'll up the feed if they start asking for it but with the increased watering frequency that may not be needed, i need to get my feeding schedule locked down for this bucket as it seems a little more finicky, my guess is due to a lower light concentration but i don't know, that or less air circulation compared to my PC cases.

Oh also Killed my DHT22 sensor, got it wet, so now it throws off a false RH% reading, not really needed but nice to know.

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

Day 26 did some defoliation yesterday, will probably need to do it again in the next couple of weeks but the less i touch it the better, still the odd fungus gnat or root aphid flyer which i just kill any that i see and im not to concerned at the moment as it bound to happen as they are in full force outside right now.

It will be interesting to see how much these plants will start to pack on here on out, the only real issue is the Dark Devil F1 is doing a weird leaf crinkle on the upper most bud site but is fine other wise, mind you it was a little funky since the get go so here's hoping that it wont be an issue.

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

So i now think i know why i've been seeing less than normal growth out of all the plants grown in this bucket, i've been underwatering, we will find out if that is the case in the next round, but reason why i think that was the case is i started increasing the watering cycle by manually forcing watering events quite frequently as of late, and the roots of the plants are now growing how they would if in one of my pc cases and growing pretty good.

So it will be something i will have to play with, down side is the fliers like the wetter environment, so i'll have to keep an eye out for issue till the summer big season is over.

Also accidentally broke off the top of the dark devil which sucks but we will see if it recovers.

 

[trueSight]

You can make a façade to keep wet place out of sight maybe?

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

You can make a façade to keep wet place out of sight maybe?

nah they can find it, as the bucket is in a closet and since bug season has hit ive been finding the odd insect running across the floor or flying around, there either sneaking past a window or door seal or are coming through my outside air vent for my dryer which i think is more likely the case, or some unknown passage i don't know about.

 

[trueSight]

I covered the soil surface with construction sand (approx. 2-3 cm. deep) and it helped a lot. Since you are bottom feeding it may help you way more.

 

[Mr.Sparkle]

I covered the soil surface with construction sand (approx. 2-3 cm. deep) and it helped a lot. Since you are bottom feeding it may help you way more.

Switched to top feeding back on day 21, but saying that i saw no fliers today, but that's probably due to another reason...

Day 29 Almost half way there its moving along but when i re inserted my soil sensor yesterday it was either bumped and wasn't making soil contact or something else but it ended up giving some false readings, and flooded the pots, so much so it emptied the reservoir and the excess poured into the outer 5 gal bucket, which bring up a good point to have your electronics higher than your lowest air intake just encase which all mine were was but yeah anyways no damage was done and the plants didn't even slowed down.

Definitely looking better this round, im gonna have to tie down the red poison shortly i think which is in the bottom left, also will start having to take side shots to try and get everything as well.