Quote:
Originally Posted by biloyp
Your cucs will want to spread out and your tomatoes will want to grow up and out. To me it seems that you may not have enough space but keep going with it and see what happens. As for pollinating, I believe both need some help from bees or maybe shaking them might help (not sure). I am gonna grow lettuce and pepper since peppers are self pollinating and lettuce don't flower. I am going to try and grow lettuce and peppers fro now and maybe jump into tomatoes later. I would say keep going with what you have, keep good records and post so we can all learn and contribute to the world of hydroponics!
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Hey biloyp-
I'm with you, I think the cukes and tomatoes are going to need a lot more space. But for the time being I'm going to do as you suggest and just keep on going with what I have. Pollination of the tomatoes will be handled with a little oscillating fan mounted on the wall, from what I have read they are very easy to pollinate. The cukes I will pollinate by hand by taking male flowers and dabbing them on the female flowers, should I even make it that far! I will hopefully keep this post updated with progress as I go.
Quote:
Originally Posted by halfway
Paul, do you intend on supplementing with hps for red spectrum when it comes time to flower and fruit those maters and cukes? I am interested in seeing your solution.
The lighting system is what is preventing me from moving to flowering veggies because of initial expense and continuing expense. You caught a great deal on the light setup, so that puts you well ahead of the curve. Adding the red spectrum (to me) seems to be the challenge.
Great setup! |
As much as I would love to supplement with HPS I am trying to keep the budget on the shoestring level. I know there are HPS conversion
bulbs available that will work in a MH fixture but I am just going to stick with the MH bulb as the conversion bulbs cost more than I paid for the entire MH fixture shipped to my door!
Keep an eye on E-Bay if you are interested in doing an indoor HID setup. There are a bunch of hi-bay fixtures on there right now for the same amount I paid for mine. My biggest concern is what it will do to my electric bill. The
lights are designed around a 220 volt power source. So I am assuming that the amp draw is going to go up being fed from a 110 volt feed. Therefore I assume the 400 watt bulb is probably drawing the same as say maybe a 600 watt bulb, although that is only a guess at best! But even at 400 watts running 16 hours a day I am sure there will be a significant jump in my monthly bill.
Don't underestimate the lowly MH light for your entire veggie grow from start to finish. There are A LOT of documented grows out there that used MH from start to finish and have had great results. Admittedly they are for marijuana but the principles are still pretty much the same. I'm not in this at all for pot growth but I have to say, the folks that have documented their marijuana grows online have helped me a lot with ideas and tips!
Judging by what I see online, if people put as much effort into growing vegetables in their closets as they do growing pot I think a lot of grocery stores would have no need for a produce section!
