Couple questions for an experienced grower

[can i buss]

My brother is in his 5th week of flowering and he is wondering do you flush in the 6th or 7th week of flowering in an 8 week cycle. And a couple of his top buds are white still and the leaves around it looks yellow brown like there almost dead will those top buds still turn a little orange in 2 weeks

[dc2TypeR]

it could be that u needs to keep ur girls in longer than 8 weeks but not for sure. in my experience most of my plants have taken a week or so longer than the standard 8 weeks. if u are using like foxfarm or any soil mix u want to switch to plain(prefereably RO water) 7-14 days before u harvest. if u are hydro its 3-14 days before harvest. and as far as ur hairs still turning color on the top, yes. you're patience will pay off. the experienced grower will harvest when 75 to 85% of the hairs on the entire plant turn red/brown in color.

[Chasin]

Different people will tell you different things, I've read people say 1 and 2 weeks before harvest. Some people say 2 weeks prior if soil, and 1 week prior if hydro. Are you going flush with 3x volume of the container, or just switch to straight water?

[2Lazy]

Some strains finish faster than others, and with the leaf yellowing I'd say he's getting close to the end of the cycle.

Flushing is only needed if you've been adding fertilizers to the soil. Do 1 gallon at a time over the course of an hour or so until it's all drained through. 5 gallons of water for 5 gallon planters. The bathtub or shower makes a good place for this.

If the plant is pretty big, with a really strong root system, it should be able to pull all the water out of that planter in about 7 days. Sometimes it takes more like 10 days. I try to time the soil drying out with harvesting. The window for a flush is somewhere in the 5 to 15 days before harvesting.

[ChochMachio]

Originally Posted by 2Lazy

Some strains finish faster than others, and with the leaf yellowing I'd say he's getting close to the end of the cycle.

Flushing is only needed if you've been adding fertilizers to the soil. Do 1 gallon at a time over the course of an hour or so until it's all drained through. 5 gallons of water for 5 gallon planters. The bathtub or shower makes a good place for this.

If the plant is pretty big, with a really strong root system, it should be able to pull all the water out of that planter in about 7 days. Sometimes it takes more like 10 days. I try to time the soil drying out with harvesting. The window for a flush is somewhere in the 5 to 15 days before harvesting.

I have always heard, and practiced, three times the water as container size for flushing. 5 gallon pot gets 15 gallons of water.

[-mu]

Plants need nutrients right up until the day they get chopped, still being alive and all (not all nutrients are relocatable within a plant, they can't get everything they need from their old leaves). But you might need to flush, especially if, like most people, you overfeed your plants.

But the "how much flushing?" can surely only be decided measuring the run-off. If I had to give a guide, I'd say drop the plant down to 150-200ppm for its last week, and make the very last watering a plain double H2O. But really, if the feeding is done correctly, big flushing shouldn't be required.

It's not possible to give specific advice, as the others have said, all strains are different, finish at different times, need different feeding, and so on. The top leaves you describe might be withering naturally, or the plant might be overfed, and that's nutrient burn. Pics would help.

For ripeness, ignore the hairs, watch the trichomes.

-mu