r/SpiderFarmerLED

Day 22 of flower and the tent is fully shifting into production mode.

I moved the light up as high as the tent allows to prevent leaf curling while keeping a viable PPFD. Also, shifted the exhaust to the side to keep as much vertical room as possible. The plants are drinking a gallon a day now, and after stretch I lollipopped most of the lower growth to push energy into the tops and cut down on larf.

Airflow is locked in, the lower zones are cleaner, and the whole canopy is getting more focused instead of wasting effort underneath.

Running Gizzard Punch from The Captain’s Connection:
Wizard Punch (Purple Punch x Blissful Wizard) x Girl Scout Glue (GSC x Gorilla Glue)

This is one of my favorite points in flower because the structure is set and now it’s all about what the tops do from here.

Just harvested Apples and Bananas recently. Figured I'd share a pic of part of the end result. There were quite a few that ended up like this. Been having nightmares of bud rot lol

Day 14 of flower on this Spider Farmer DWC run and today was defoliation day.

Now that I know what’s actually going to make the canopy, I went ahead and cleaned them up. At this stage I’m not interested in letting the plants waste energy on weak lower growth that isn’t going to produce. I’d rather open everything up, improve airflow, and make sure the plant is focused on the tops that matter.

One of the biggest reasons for the cleanup was airflow. Once the canopy starts stacking and the plants begin drinking harder, the environment can shift fast. Opening up the lower and middle sections helps air move through the whole plant instead of just across the top, which matters a lot more once flower gets moving.

They’re drinking about a gallon a day now, so uptake has definitely increased. Because of that, in between weekly water changes, I’ve been topping off with a lower EC instead of chasing the same feed strength every time. The last thing I want is for the reservoir to keep concentrating and get too heavy on salts while the plants are pulling water hard. For me, this stage is more about balance than just pushing numbers.

That’s one thing I think DWC teaches fast: you can’t just feed by habit. You have to watch what the plants are actually doing. If they’re drinking faster than they’re eating, EC climbs, and that’s your sign to back off and bring the solution back into balance instead of blindly adding more nutrients.

The roots are still exploding too. That’s another reason I stay on top of the top offs. Healthy roots, good oxygen, steady water temps, and a cleaner reservoir make it a lot easier for the plants to keep pushing without unnecessary stress.

What I’ve focused on:
- cleaning out lower growth that won’t make the canopy
- improving airflow through the bottom, middle, and top of the plants
- watching daily water uptake
- topping off lighter so EC doesn’t keep creeping up
- keeping the root zone clean while stretch transitions into early flower

The structure is where I wanted it, the tops are set, and now it’s about letting flower build without getting in the plants way.

Posting today’s video because this is one of those stages where a few correct adjustments can make the rest of the run a lot easier.

The Captain’s Connection - Gizzard Punch

I’ve been messing around with the Spider Farmer GGS AC5 and ended up building a working local API for it.

No cloud, no phone constantly involved, no rooted Android device. Just my PC talking to the controller directly over Bluetooth.

It took a lot of trial and error because the controller sometimes replies with 200 OK even when it doesn’t actually change anything, which made debugging pretty annoying. But I eventually got the important stuff working:

live sensor readings

outlet control

light dimming

fan control

blower control

a small local browser dashboard

MQTT support for automation

Still cleaning things up, but it feels pretty nice to have proper local control now.

UPDATE: Small update on my Spider Farmer GGS AC5 local control project.

The first version was mostly a proof of concept, but I’ve now turned it into a full local dashboard/API. All main app functions are implemented locally, so I can control the setup from one browser page without cloud access, a phone bridge, or a rooted Android device.

It now has live sensor readings, outlet control, light control, fan control, blower control, per-device settings panels, graphing, and MQTT support for automation.

Still polishing the UI and testing edge cases, but the local control side is working.

I had a fun idea for a new product. Thanks to some ai magic It became a real concept.
Please send me the first ones hehehe

Leaf throwing reproductive tissues along with other leaf mutations. Extra leaflet growth is forming off the fan-leaf petioles, and now I’m seeing pistils/bud tissue trying to form on a leaf itself. Looks like a genetic leaf-bud/adventitious flowering mutation rather than a deficiency. Plant is healthy otherwise, so I’m letting it ride and watching closely for stability through flower.

Hi guys! Thanks for all the tips on the last post of my first grow. 🌻

They are 40 days in flower right now, and I was wondering when to know if they are ready to be harvested.
I also had some problems with leaves dying and getting burned for some reason. Never happened before. Cut off those.

I will be sharing some images and videos on the link below because I can’t share that much apparently. Link: https://imgur.com/a/0Hrwl4p

Hey guys. G5000, 11 months old. Started flickering A couple weeks ago. Week ago, dead. Tried outlets that r definitely working. Power strip is fine, as pictured supplement lights on same strip r fine. Not the app, don't use it. Tried all solutions found online.

I'll bet anything it's gotta be replaced! Spider farmer I hope u get ahold of me, I lost 4 nice plants from this!

The Spider Farmer GGS is a solid little controller, but it ships with a closed cloud-only app and zero documented local API, so it doesn't talk to Home Assistant out of the box. I spent some time reverse-engineering the protocol and built SpiderBridge: a small MITM proxy that sits between the controller and the SF cloud, mirrors every change to MQTT, and exposes everything as proper Home Assistant entities via MQTT Discovery. Comes with a custom Lovelace card that brings the SF-App UI inside HA.

Repo: https://github.com/iceboerg00/spiderfarmer-bridge

Screenshot of the card

What you get

Every knob in the SF-App, but as native Home Assistant entities you can automate, dashboard, and script:

• Lights with full mode control
• Fans and blowers with speed, oscillation, natural wind, and the full preset matrix: Manual, Schedule, Cycle, and the five Environment modes (temperature, humidity, and the priority blends).
• Sensors and outlets auto-discovered: soil moisture, temperature, humidity, and any switched outlets attached to the controller.
• Custom Lovelace card that mirrors the SF-App layout, one tab per device, mode-specific settings panels, and a Save button that commits pending edits in one click.
• Two-way sync so changes you make in the SF-App still show up in HA, no need to abandon the app if you don't want to.

Install

One-click as a Home Assistant Add-on from the repo. Bundles its own MQTT broker and auto-registers the Lovelace card. Standalone Pi install also works. Bit of WiFi steering needed so the GGS dials the bridge instead of the SF cloud, there's a guided script.

Credits

Big shoutout to schedule-4-real by Eddie Piazza. That repo was the spark that convinced me reversing the GGS Controller was doable.

MIT, PRs and issues welcome.