Okay so I came home today to find out my roommate extended the light hours for the plant by an additional 15 minutes... only because previously it was off for 15 minutes longer than it stayed on... So the change did make it more towards 12/12. Will this stress my plants enough to hermie? Should I leave this schedule or go back to the regular schedule of 15 minutes extra darkness tomorrow to prevent any kind of stress or will 15 minutes not make a difference?
Your plants won't stress about a 15 min change. Don't worry about it. Set it either way. The plants won't give a fuck.
They will be fine. If you want to be extra careful you can set up your timers to give a little extra darkness (11/13 is pretty effective) Generally you want to start with 12/12, but as they get closer to harvest you want to cut it back to at least 10/14. This is what happens in nature so the plant believe that fall is coming and it speeds up flower production.
^^ wow. I never realized you had to lower your lights cycle for more then 12 houes of darkness. Going to do that when I get home tonight since I'm on my last week until harvest. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Grasscity Forum mobile app
Food for thought. Mimicking nature is not the best way to grow - nature is flawed. Rather than diminishing hours at the end, keep them stable - those extra 2 hours of light = lots of photosynthesis. Rather, scare the plant into thinking it is DYING! Raise temps for short durations, lower lights to provide higher intensity for short periods, let the soil dry to the point of slight droop. Death conditions scare the plant into maturing faster to save its seeds. This is nice if you want those rock hard nugs that come from a week of over-flowering, without that extra week. Why? Dry and warm conditions promote trichome growth for thermoregulation and water retention. Trich's get filled with resin to deal with heat issues. However, if done wrong you can stress the plant and really lower your yields - you have to give it water on time, and only have short durations of raised heat/light (periodic)
