Hi guys, just wondering whether a 13 - 11 light cycle will force a plant to flower. Ive read people doing a 13/11 for bigger yeilds but none answer wether they will flower initially from 13/11.. any thoughts?? *Sorry for the noob question*
Nope. Got to get your lights down to 12 hrs on/12 hrs off to force flower. And...if you're not flowering, why deprive your plants light for those hours. Run the lights 24/0 in veg and switch to 12/12 when your plants are ready to flower. Light grows the plant...don't deny it any. TWW
ill be like white widow for a second and copy and paste lol sorry To simplify things, lets use an analogy. Try to think of a plant as a building… one constantly under construction. The plant needs raw materials, (fertilizers and water), and energy (light) in order to “build itself”. The raw materials are the “bricks and mortar” of the building. The energy is the workers, vehicles and power tools used to assemble the building. The Plant is capable of storing some raw materials and some energy for use later, but the amount is limited...think of a warehouse and a battery. * During the day, (Lights ON) the plant is collecting and storing light energy, and is using and storing raw materials. The plant is stockpiling raw material, and is charging it’s batteries… it is ALSO using raw materials and using the energy it is collecting. It’s building itself, literally putting itself together. During the day however, the plant is not as efficient at building itself, as it is at night (lights OFF.) It can build itself, but not as quickly. * While the lights are OFF, the plant is using energy and raw materials to build itself…. the plant is more efficiently using the raw materials that it stored during the day. The plant is better at transporting and assembling the raw materials. The bad news: since there is no light energy, the plant must rely on energy it stored while the lights were ON (its stored energy). (Essentially, the plant is running on batteries, and using raw material from the warehouse.) There is no light energy to collect. Since the plant needs energy to absorb more raw materials, it is easier for the plant to use raw materials that it stored during the day than it is to absorb raw materials through its roots. * Although the plant IS capable of “doing it all” with the lights on, (Collect, store and use energy & raw materials) it does a better job of actually doing the work (using the energy and raw material) while the lights are out. During the dark however, it relies solely on its limited supply of stored energy and stored raw material. One last thing to remember is the fact that a plant will always strive to maintain a balance between the size of its roots and the size of its canopy (Leaf mass.) The roots must be big enough to supply as much raw materials as the canopy can use, and the canopy must be big enough to provide the energy required to store those raw materials…. * Trim the roots on a healthy plant, and canopy growth will slow to a crawl until the roots have grown big enough to again support the canopy. * Trim the TOP of a healthy plant, and root growth will slow similarly, until the canopy has grown big enough to again support the roots. * If the plant is already in balance, the canopy and the roots will grow at the same rate. If you actually measured them several times daily over several days, you’d notice that they actually DO get bigger at night, but roots and canopy at the same rate, unless either has been trimmed, and as long as the “batteries” hold out. Author: Smokey D Dope
I dunno indoor is trying to replicate nature in a controlled environment i think darkness is necessary. Is there a way to simulate moonlight?
I have run 24 hours and 18/6....for flower....but i run 13/11 for veg . Thats 7 more hours a week x 9 weeks = 62 hours ÷ 12 = 5 more days of flower. Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk
Some of us grow autos using 24-0 lighting from seed to harvest, and our plants do ok without any darkness ever. My 8 ft tall Fast Buds Green Crack auto has never slept, nor have its 4-5 ft tall auto neighbors.
autos are a little different from photos but i believe light and dark cycle also effects the root zone and rizosphere helping ph of the medium, dont quote me on that but i think i read it somewhere. read so much i dont know anymore lmao
Dude must have a huge tent and some high ass ceilings.... 9ft including the pot plus 16-20" between the light and the top of the plant then another 8-10 to the top of whatever the light is hanging from. Thats like 11' at least... I wants to seee!!!!
I never expected such growth from autos, and I'm not happy about it. The green crack is now ABOVE the lights. Here's a picture from a couple of weeks ago.
some people do 12/1 (12 hours of light, 5.5 hours dark, 1 hour light, 5.5 hours dark) for veg then flower anywhere between 6-18 and 10-14 i saw one guys who even did 12 hours of 15mins on 45mins off, 5.5 hours dark, 1 hour light, 5.5 hours dark for veg and said he had no decrease in growth. literally only 4 hours of light per day....
No trying to offend but I've been through this debate. It's been scientifically proven that cannabis is part of a special group of plants that don't need a dark period during veg. If you want to get deeper into it I could spend my time finding some links but do some digging. It's true. At the same time I've tried 24 with some luck having increased growth but I find my plants have better long term health in veg when I run 20on/4off and give them a little dark. Even though the science show that 24hrs is fine. I personally don't agree that it's best for cannabis through the whole veg cycle. Plant biologist don't argue much about this though. That's one reason you'll find almost all commercial grow ops use 24hr veg. The plants growth rate is directly related to how much light it gets. OP: The traditional method of flowering photo plants is 12 hours of light. It is just that way because that is a reliable time period where they are guaranteed to flower. I would bet you that they will also flower at 13 hours. I've actually heard of people running up to 14 and close to 15 hours. You're walking a dangerous line though. If you push it too far the plant will get confused and start vegging again. This will really mess up your crop. There's threads on this subject at GC from recently and the consensus in that thread was that 13 hours is safe and won't cause revegging. You can use that if you want that extra hour of light to increase growth. You can push it to 14 and some people do but it's very strain dependent if it will take that much light without vegging or not. It may be really worth it. More light makes a giant difference in growth. Anyone who has tried 24 compared to 18/6 can attest to that. 24hr is way faster growth.