3 Days of 24/0 at the End of Flowering?

[Buddha88]

So today i was looking at the calendar, choosing the ETA for harvest so i can roughly plan out the next crop(im setting up a perp grow so im making sure all is on schedule). Anyways i had a thought. If you gave a plant 3 days of 24/0 at the end of flowering (right before harvest) wouldnt it kind of simulate 6 days of growth. Heres the real theory though. All plants are different but each plant would have a "breaking point" where 24/0 would either cause hermies or reveg. But up until that breaking point the plants would flower quicker due to the increased light(obviously). If a grower learned how long a plant took to reach the breaking point, they could presumably reduce flowering by up to a week. I hope im explaining this clearly. Anyone ever done anything like this before? Im even thinking that it would be better to do 20/4 since dark is required for trichome production and i think it would relieve some stress allowing the process to be used longer, increasing effects. Anything to this?

[corvoid]

Yeah, heck why not? At that point, the buds are already there. It's too far along to worry about stupid hermying or any such nonsense. I'm growing Lowryder right now under 24/0 all the way through (see it here). I don't see why other strains wouldn't also benefit from the extra energy.

On the other hand (thinking stoner thoughts right now ) I was considering doing the opposite. My Lowryder under 24/0 might plump up its buds better if I gave it some dark time. What do you think?

[Buddha88]

Originally Posted by corvoid

Yeah, heck why not? At that point, the buds are already there. It's too far along to worry about stupid hermying or any such nonsense. I'm growing Lowryder right now under 24/0 all the way through (see it here). I don't see why other strains wouldn't also benefit from the extra energy.

On the other hand (thinking stoner thoughts right now ) I was considering doing the opposite. My Lowryder under 24/0 might plump up its buds better if I gave it some dark time. What do you think?

dark is essential to the production of trichomes(atleast thats what i was taught). Im thinking this technique though could be used to help reduce time during flushing or could be used by people who have to harvest early.

[corvoid]

Well, dark can't be essential for trichs (at least for Lowryder, cause they're crystally) but it would be nice to know if it helps.

I guess we're both talking about speeding things along, and I like your idea. There's gotta be some literature or posts about switching to 24/0 late in the cannabis life cycle.

[toastybiz]

Extending light period and shortening dark cycle at any point of flowering is the exact wrong thing to do.

Far more important in flowering than the amount of light the plant gets is the the length of uninterrupted dark. The dark period triggers the hormonal reaction to flower. If anything, some growers give their plants 2-3 days of continuous dark at the very end of flower period, which some believe signals to the plant that the season is ending and stimulates a last-ditch effort by the plant to get pollinated by swelling the buds and increasing the resins.

Extended light at the end of flower will not cause buds to grow bigger, if anything it will have the opposite effect.

[buthidae]

Originally Posted by toastybiz

Extending light period and shortening dark cycle at any point of flowering is the exact wrong thing to do.

Far more important in flowering than the amount of light the plant gets is the the length of uninterrupted dark. The dark period triggers the hormonal reaction to flower. If anything, some growers give their plants 2-3 days of continuous dark at the very end of flower period, which some believe signals to the plant that the season is ending and stimulates a last-ditch effort by the plant to get pollinated by swelling the buds and increasing the resins.

Extended light at the end of flower will not cause buds to grow bigger, if anything it will have the opposite effect.

Good info. Makes me wonder, what if you gradually reduced light during flushing, maybe to 10/14, or even 8/16? maybe this would be a slightly more productive last-ditch than complete darkness, just because they would still have some light to produce during the "day."

[cateros]

Actually I have read that at the end of flowering if you can force a plant to hermi and the male flowers bust a day or so before you harvest the pollen from the plant can be used to create feminized seeds ? As i read that plants that become hermi from stress have a higher content of the amino acids that control sex determination during the creation of offspring (seeds)and the pollen although male has female chromosones and will therefore when used to polinate another pure female in the next cycle will produce 90% female and the rest will be male or hermaphrodite. Anyone else read this anywhere? I have sent away for the cannabis breeders guide as I plan on researching the creation of feminized seeds so that I can make sure of my supply in the future as I would love to just never need to buy from a seed breeder again. Cant you just imagine having a few hundred feminized seeds of a bunch of kick as strains. Of course I could always just grow enough in one harvest to last me the rest of my scrip for the year and just buy a bunch of good seeds and just let them go nuts for 2 more grows but that would be rather easy and it would be way more fun to be able to do what the big seed banks do.

[mardanlin]

Light degrades the THC. That's why people usually harvest right before the light cycle is supposed to start for that day.

The plants know when the light is supposed to come on and they have maximized their production of trichomes thinking the dark period is almost over.

If anything, give them more dark. 24 hours of darkness at the end before harvesting has been said to be beneficial but I've never seen this proven. Definitely don't give them more than 12 hours of light though, horrible idea...

[vLaDii]

Originally Posted by toastybiz

If anything, some growers give their plants 2-3 days of continuous dark at the very end of flower period, which some believe signals to the plant that the season is ending and stimulates a last-ditch effort by the plant to get pollinated by swelling the buds and increasing the resins.

Extended light at the end of flower will not cause buds to grow bigger, if anything it will have the opposite effect.

Ya, this sounds the most logical, since the shortened light cycles replicate the shorter days in fall, I assume the 3 complete days of dark would just shock the plants into trying to squeeze out its last force to release bud and produce a larger yield but might still allow for a couple of seeds to be formed, probably even an unsubstantial amount to even consider due to the gain in crop, while still preserving quality.

[LBH]

For that extra bump at the end, you want to give the plant an extended DARK cycle, not an extra light cycle.

[Buddha88]

Well im no stranger to the dark concept(played a role in the light idea) but ive never read anywhere where the grower got any kind of real results with it. I know a couple people on here are doing trials with it now but i havent seen the threads updated so i think the trials are still ongoing. Ive struggled to see how that concept works though. With zero light how could photosynthesis occur. I know plants build up light energy but cells are only able to hold so much, reasoning that it would be used up within 12-24 hours(if plants are only growing this day and not the other 2 that would explain the reports of marginal results). Most of you think im going for yield though and like i said im looking at this more of a way of speeding up flush and helping if a grower has to harvest early. In both of those cases youd want to maximize photosynthesis in order to use up the last of your nutrient(more light = more photosynthesis). To appease both sides of the argument what if you did 72 hours of light followed by 24 hours of dark?

[LBH]

I have no idea, but what I DO know is that the guy who very first came up with the concept, had stayed at a Holiday Inn the night before so......

[lazygrower]

Originally Posted by cateros

Actually I have read that at the end of flowering if you can force a plant to hermi and the male flowers bust a day or so before you harvest the pollen from the plant can be used to create feminized seeds ? As i read that plants that become hermi from stress have a higher content of the amino acids that control sex determination during the creation of offspring (seeds)and the pollen although male has female chromosones and will therefore when used to polinate another pure female in the next cycle will produce 90% female and the rest will be male or hermaphrodite. Anyone else read this anywhere? I have sent away for the cannabis breeders guide as I plan on researching the creation of feminized seeds so that I can make sure of my supply in the future as I would love to just never need to buy from a seed breeder again. Cant you just imagine having a few hundred feminized seeds of a bunch of kick as strains. Of course I could always just grow enough in one harvest to last me the rest of my scrip for the year and just buy a bunch of good seeds and just let them go nuts for 2 more grows but that would be rather easy and it would be way more fun to be able to do what the big seed banks do.

Portugal, indoor growing 2006:

Female plants in the end of flowering, let´s say two and a half months on a 65 day flowering strain, tend to produce a few male flowers in a attempt to produce seeds, since until that time period she hadn´t been polinated by a real male, and this is simply why cannabis is a diocious (male an female) but with hermafrodite potencial plant. it´s not an defect, it´s a survival proper trace. This prolongment of flowering is a key factor because it´s the unique form in wich to obtain male flowers in a normal state of the plant, something she is supposed to do naturaly and not by stressing her with quimicals or by flutuating the light period, or by manhandling it roughly wich really means "making the plant crazy".

This understood, whe should also know that when used to polonate a female plant, this pólen will produce seeds with XX cromossomes for 100%. It is essential that the female plant to produce pólen be very stable, and also the plant to produce the seeds, wich means using a hermafrodite plant (an very unstable female plant) is not viable. We´ll use the ability of cannabis to be hermafrodite in normal conditions, not un unstable plant which doesn´t knows if its a male or female.


This being explained, I took some pólen of a stable female I left flowering for a few more days and polinated a branch on a AK47 and on a Chronic I had flowering for a month an a half. That gave me some 15 seeds each (micropolination if you like). Seeds should mature after croped so only after almost a year I ended up sowing them, first 10 Ak47 and then I tried 10 Chronic. The statments below are as true as you are now reading this:

100% germination in less than 36 hours. 20 seeds=20plants sowed, growned, harvested and smoked).
100% stable females without any trace of male flowers or any seed found in the weed smoked.
20 Vigorous plants that practilly grewed by themselves, whithout a single trace of disease, weakness, lack of anything, resistant and easy to grow as they can come...
They produced heavily (only ten main tops filled me 6 - 1,5 liters- jars tightly packed, no stems, and the rest of the plants gave me as much) a very potent weed. The 10 wich I named "Ak Widower" semelled just like ak47 in flowering. The other 10 were named "Chronic Widow". If I were a professional grower, I might just had produced an easy widow to grow

Of course, they have a good enviroment, 400w sodio, 500m3 air remover on only 1m2, fertilized by biobizz, normal setup, nothing much, but I have learned, before all this, that the enviromental external factores are decisive, like light periods and nutrients, so I proceeded acordingly and I believe it made some diference:

Fotoperiod: first I decided to flower with 11h/13h, but also decided to reduce it gradually from a 24h/0 fotoperiod. That is, growing for 2 weeks or more on 24h/0h, then 18h/6h and so on t´íll 11h light and 13h darkness or even more. The seeds you have are XX chromossomes, so you need to focus on reducing the stressing factors so she doesn´t produce male flowers, so she doesn´t "hermafrodite" on you. People often think that feminised are hermafrodites, that´s wrong, all of them are, it´s simply a matter of equilibrium and stability not to trigger it.

Nutrients: amonium (nitrogene): more than usual and up until the last two weeks of flowering.

Relative humidity: higher than usual.

Setting: it is advicible that you keep plants close togheter instead of apart. (If plants "sence" more plantes they are triked to believe they may be males. Also increases r. humidity).

Moíst plants lightly and often, when switching from light to dark only on top surface of leaves, and a bit on flowers, but take care when doing this and don´t do it when on the last two weeks or if Relative Humidity is very high.

There are a couple more factores, but more dificult to endure and light, nitrogene and humidity are the most important I think.

There is no reason on not growing feminised because of hermafroditism, as it is a proper trait of cannabis that you can and WILL FIND on regural seeds, plus you can count on at least half of them will be actual males...

About using "home" seeds, I used these but I knew where they came from, what they were, if you don´t know you should not use them... plus I knew I was taking some risk and I wanted to make this particular experience or experiences. And it went very well I must say. if it weren´t for adeventures people cannabis woudn´t be what it is today, so I don´t really advocate that you should only seed from banks...I believe you should learn and learn and experience and learn.

[belialtheunholy]

I wouldn't prolong the harvest if it were going to yield me an extra 10g per plant- dried.

[toastybiz]

Hermaphrodites are caused by a variety of reasons, and you cannot count on pollen from a hermie resulting in healthy females. For example, some hermaphroditism is from screwed-up genetics, you don't want to pass those genes along.

Yes the whole point of switching light times for flower cycle is, in the first place, to mimic the shortening days of Fall. The plants have evolved to be attuned to the signals of both longer nights and the shift in sunlight to more red spectrum (caused by the sun coming in at a lower angle as the earth tilts away, causing the light to filter through more of the atmosphere resulting in a redder spectrum for much of the day). Extended dark at the end of flower is designed to signal the plant that even the Fall season is ending, snow and hard freezes are soon on the way, and it's do-or-die time, literally, for the plant to procreate.

In some strains, unpollinated females can produce a few seeds on their own at the very end of flowering, again as a survival mechanism. These are not hermies and are not the result of pollination -- they are, in effect, a "seed clone" that the female produced herself in the hopes of procreating. These seeds are viable and 100% female.