What's the minimum time from seed to harvest?

[infiniteawesome]

Ok, so I've been saving my bagseed from the last year of smoking now, I have about two hundred or so . . .

Anyways, so I've had two very unsuccessful grows in the past and have generally just bought schwagg to mids and saved the seeds for a grow that will hopefully yield me enough bud to last me three months or so (that's a big hope, but meh).

Anyways, I plan on growing four plants under a 400 watt hps light in my closet, which I still need to figure out how to mod for ventilation. I plan on using yeast and sugar in water for co2 production since I don't have enough room for a co2 tank and generally don't want to go through the setup trouble since I won't be growing after this anytime soon unfortunately. This is my only chance to grow for the next two years, so I'm hoping I can pull it off.

I want to start off my seeds under two 60 watt compact fluorescent floodlights and five 30 watt compact curly fluorescents but I don't know how long I can keep them under them before I will need the more powerful 400 watt.

Due to energy conservation concerns, I want to keep them under the fluoros until flower, but am unsure if the plant will survive under them long enough under those conditions. I'd even prefer to flower under them due to energy constraints, but my desire for a higher and better yield has recently convinced me to flower under my 400 watt.

How long can I keep them under the fluoros before it would become detrimental to the plants' health or yield?

I know enough about LST and FIMing to maximize yield (but we'll see, maybe not), but I want to keep time to a minimum while still yielding about a half oz. to oz. per plant. How long would it take me to get such a yield? I have a time constraint of 3 to 4 months before conditions would prevent me from continuing, but under that time would be preferable as I would still need quite a bit of time for harvesting, manicuring, drying, and curing (six weeks I believe is the recommended drying and curing time).

Let me know, plz. Thanks in advance, growers.

[ganjamen]

Few things: do you have all the lights already??? you could grow all the way with fluoros, but as you mention youll yield more with an hps because of lumens and spectrum are better for flowering. In such a short time, don think you could get such hi yields from your plants, specially iof they are bagseed (unless you smoke some nasty shit on a daily basis) If your bagseed are sativas you are pretty much screwed, chances are you wont go from seed to joint in 4 months. Beind indicas could be doable sacrificing yield. If you have so little time and so many seed, maybe you would want to try going massive, and keeping 3 or 4 ladies as special ones and having the rest pretty much as back up. That way youll guarantee a lot of leaves that later can be used to "fill" the joint along with some bud. i think it would be better to go HPS all the way, but if money is an issue then dont Hope it helps

Time is of the essence.

[infiniteawesome]

Yes, I already have all the lights, I purchased them a year ago and have only used them for a test grow which failed for other reasons (ventilation, reflection, etc.)

Most of the bud I've bought I've ascertained from the seedlings and high that they are almost all 50/50 hybrids, though I'm pretty sure I have some all out indicas in there as well due to just the way the highs varied etc.

I can stretch to five months, but it'd be pushing it. Isn't there a way I can cut back on time without sacrificing yield? What can I expect in a 3 to 5 month period in terms of yield?

Plus, isn't 400 watts a little much to start seedlings on? If you recommend using the 400 watt hps earlier on, then HOW early would you recommend?

Sorry, i'm well versed in book knowledge with growing but am unexperienced generally speaking.

The bagseed I get is from mexico I'm pretty sure, but based off of appearance, high, and amount of seeds, I can generally assume that alot of the bud I'm getting comes from a grower down south who only knows a little about growing or something . . . not quite sure to be honest, however, due to my previous ventures in growing I am pretty sure that they are all hybrids of some sort. I have been unable to acquire seeds that are of a particular strain because I would prefer not to purchase seeds over the internet for various reasons and generally I don't like to invest in chronic that often and of course, when I do invest in chronic, it never has seeds in it.

Anyways, thanks for the reply, hope for other opinions on this topic as I am desperate for information regarding time constraints specifically.

[mrtwomuchskill]

yo dude 4-5 weeks vegging and 2 months flowering with most indica and indica sativa mixes since its bagseed you might end up with sativa so flowering might be longer and for vegging you should have atleast 150 watts of power they sell those at homedepot but the bulbs are really 42 watts so get 4 for a combined wattage of 164 watts you should be okay know

[infiniteawesome]

Originally Posted by mrtwomuchskill

yo dude 4-5 weeks vegging and 2 months flowering with most indica and indica sativa mixes since its bagseed you might end up with sativa so flowering might be longer and for vegging you should have atleast 150 watts of power they sell those at homedepot but the bulbs are really 42 watts so get 4 for a combined wattage of 164 watts you should be okay know

what do you guestimate/estimate my yield would be with such conditions? just out of curiosity. And thanks for replying.

[Joint]

You *can* keep the plants under CFL throughout vegging, but I don't really recommend if it if you already have a HID light. The difference in how the plant grows is amazing: CFLs generally will give you a pretty basic, scraggly, relatively undeveloped plant. HIDs will make your plant bush up and form colas like they're hot, giving your way more yield when it comes time to flower.

[unoit]

HIGH All, hard to say what you'd get awesome and I won't guess....if you can I'd use the Floros for a few weeks then the 400...you have some good advice from the posters above.

[ganjamen]

okay, hps light is better for flowering but its good enough for veg. MH would be a HID better option for veg, but you dont have one, you have fluoros, and not a ton. So, why not use a lot of light, just be careful not to put it to close to the little babies.

If you are pretty much sure you have indicias and indica-sativa mixes, use the indicas only, if you sorted them out. I got like 4 indicas under fluoros right nor for month and a half. They did flower. Somo other seed that came from what i considered to resemble ak47 bud also is flowering. The rest of the group which are pretty much mexican bagseed and nothing out of the ordinary are not flowering yet. My conclusion, if time is vital, go indica all the way, and plat lots of seeds, more than any experienced user will advise. Why, you can place the correct amount of ladies in the brightest spot, and the others around, close so they get some light, but not close enough to steal the light. Or grow a bunch in a put and have a mini see of green.

from the point i am, i think that my indicas will be ready by the time the sativas start to flower, and the indicas that i will plant then will be ready about the same time that the sativas i have right now. 2 indica generations for 1 sativa.

If not comfie in depriving the blueish spectrum, put both systems, its now or never.

Also nute, but go easy, you dont want to spoil a lot trying the get some little more bud..

[infiniteawesome]

Unfortunately I didn't sort my seeds based off of what species I thought they were

Thanks alot for the advice guys. The basic problem I have is that my roomies are finally okay with growing, but they don't want the electricity bill to go up like it did the last time I TESTED my hps for 18/6 during my first grow, which failed anyways, but still, our bill went up considerably and while I paid a greater share for those two months, I didn't want to keep our bill that high as it looked suspcious having that sudden of an increase.

Nevertheless, I consulted them all about it again and said I would try and keep energy costs to a minimum, so I'm researching every way I can to save energy while growing. I may even turn off my computer during that time, but am unsure. I don't use alot of electricity as is, but with the exception of my aquarium obsessed roommate who still only runs about 270 watts of electricity in his room, most of my other roomies don't use alot of electricity either.

ANYWHO, I have one more question for you guys and this'll be it I think. THANKS ALOT FOR THE ADVICE, +rep to all that I can give it to and sorry if I haven't spread around enough rep for the others . . .

Here's the question: Would it be worth my money and time to invest in a 70 watt hps security light to solve my electricity problem? I was thinking about ordering from e-cono light as they have the best prices I can find. Thanks again.

[Joint]

Replace every single light bulb in your house with a 11 or 18 W compact flouro. That's an energy savings of about 80% for all your lights. Even if you don't grow it's a good idea, and you can find CFLs for $1.50 (and they last longer than regular bulbs too, and pay for themselves quickly). For example, my kitchen and bathroom combined used to use between 600W and 900W (10, 75-100W bulbs, about what a smaller microwave uses), but after replacing them all with CFLs it's down to 100W (9, 11W compact flouros).

[infiniteawesome]

lol, we've already replaced every bulb in the house with 20 watt fluoros, the 400 watt hps is what would be taking up most of the house's electricity bill at that point and I don't think I could afford that as electricity seems to be somewhat expensive in my area . . .

[Joint]

Wow, what's your bill? I live in a high cost area too, but when I grew it was under $100 incl an always on 250W hps.

[TheFxckingHero]

dude... it would only be like 20 bucks more....