SHADRAX

Hello everybody,

I myself use 20/4 this is my first time growing indoors and I'm taking Uncle Ben's advice,but any way this happened to me..
Ive grown outside for many yars and have had pretty good luck (except the time my neighbors goat had a party with one of my girls) antway, one year I started 16 plants in a greenhouse,I gave a friend 8 and I kept the other 8.
I took very good care of them following fert. instructions,and alot of T.L.C while my friend just put his out watered whenever he thought about it.The results were very different 7 out of 8 turned female for me while 2 out of 8 turned female for him.
the seeds were from the same bag,I've thought for a long time that if it had to struggle to survive it would turn male to insure a higher pollination rate with the females that were there.I belive this, take care of them and they'll take care of you.

GROW SOME KILLA

__________________
GROW SOME GOOD N'S

highonline

Wazaaaaap? ( old one, i know ... )

OK, it's time for a bit of logic sh**.

Mother nature/god/aliens/... created night and day, light and dark, has been for 1000's of years, and guess what, it works. So in my OPINION ( make note of OPINION ) a plant needs light and dark.

I'm using 1000 Super HPS for veg and flower, and the facts are that my plants took 3 weeks after sprout to get to 18 inches with internodes at every inch or so, some more, some less, depends on genetics and strain, i'm growing Green Spirit( mix of Big Bud and Skunk ) and hash plant ( don't know the mix on this one. sorry ). and the lower branches are about 10 inches long already, catching up to the tops.

I'v already cut clones and all have rooted after only 3 days. With a light cycle of 18/6 . Would they be bigger with 20/4 or 24/7, maybe, but in my hum hum, OPINION, it has more to do with your setup than anything else.

If your grow conditions are perfect, more light, ex: 20/4 or even 22/2, might be better, but if your light is causing heat and giving you grief with wilting leaves and funky growth, less light and better control of the enviroment would be better. It all works, but you must adapt to what you have to work with.

My understanding of male/female is that it's all about genetics, not conditions, the plant should be male or female right from seed, it's just not visible, nature has the perfect ballance of consistency, and that is the secret, CONSISTENCY, how many hermaphordite humans do you know??? not many ehh.. guess why, bad genetics/crossbreeding.

I've given my plants nothing but plain PH at 7, water. They are nice and green, 1 or 2 are starting to turn pale green, so ferts will come in the picture soon.

Oh, and what the fu** is up with the flaming above??? GROW up.. if you can't say something nice or helpful, shut up.

highonline.

UncleBen

It's The Balance that counts, and that's what I hear you saying. I also believe in a dark period as being essential to good plant health (yep, it's natural) and as I said before, I feel the best compromise between 18/6 and 24/0 is 20/4. You get ample light to produce abundant food for the day, the plants get to rest in which a substantial amount of growth occurs (at night) alot of that being to the roots which really are THE foundation of the plant and should be baby-ed as much as possible, and a dark period gives the room and equipment time to cool off. If you live in a warm clime like I do, that is very important. Bottom line? With a 20/4 I'm ready to go 12/12 in about 3 to 4 weeks from the time the seed pops the soil's surface and my plants finish out as rather large bush plants for indoors producing from 3 to 10 oz per plant.

Peace,
Uncle Ben

highonline

Holy Crap Uncle.

3 to 10 oz per plant? did i get that right?

What strain are you growing? and How much light do you have? how long from the day you switch to 12/12?

Best i've been able to get was a notch above 4oz in 9 weeks of flowering.

But i absolutely agree, Balance is key.

high, am i ever.

highonline.

UncleBen

You got that right. I do SOB and if I get less than 3.5 oz per plant, I'm really disappointed. That is on strains like my own sativa crosses, Sensi Skunk, BG IOM, C99, etc.

>How much light do you have?

Depending on the time in the garden's life, I use fluors to HID's, ending with 600W HPS and 400W MH and as plants are harvested, ending up using only the 600W HPS. I have exclusively grown with fluors and HPS and had great results. I'm rather disappointed in my combo HPS/MH to be honest with you.

>>How long from the day you switch to 12/12?

I veg no longer than 4 weeks.

Botany rules,
Ben

highonline

SOB. " Sea of Bitc** "

What is this?

high, ly , confused.

Oh, and i meant, how many weeks OF 12/12.

bgetting

Uncle Ben is fielding a lot of these, well done.
Greenskeeper- read a lot more. I don't even know where to begin about that post, it shows no knowledge of plant phys., and so any answer I give probably won't make sense. Nothing mean, just read more, and you will find the answers.

As for flowering, OF COURSE THERE IS VARIATION!!!!
Plants are natural creations, they are not just fabricated to be all alike. MJ has been growing all over the world, and there are different conditions everywhere. For example, in the equatorial regions, there is never a 12 hour night all year long. Yet MJ flowers in that region. the trigger may be just 10 or 8 hours of dark there. But for a variety that has evolved to live in the temperate zones much farther north or south, they will not flower until the dark period reaches 12 hours, or more. This is because they get much more dark period at those lattitudes, and need to be sure when it is fall. Timing is important there, ans less important in the tropics. where the growing season is all year long.

As for changing sexes... plants are genetically both. they have the ability to be both. In nature this is so that if there happens to be all females in a certain population, some can change male to perpetuate the species. Of course, if the seed happens to land in an environment that will support a plant, but is not ideal, it is more advantagous for the plant to be male. That way it can grow, and spread it's pollen by wind. Whereas a female in the same spot may not have gotten as good of light, nutrients, etc. to support seed set.
This is where all those factors come into play. The biggest factor is genetics, and feminised seeds aren't helping. It is nice that they are female, but not fully. All of that is done by inducing hermaphroditism, which is then introduced into the gene pool, where it stays. The more of this that goes on the less stable the sex. After genetics, there is the environment, and if you are growing you goal is to create the perfect environment anyways.

UncleBen

Hello highonline. SOB=Sea Of Bush

Good show begetting et al....

My faves finish from 7 weeks to 15 weeks at 12/12 depending on genetics and temps.

Grow on,
Ben

greenlife

24/7 is good

this time im tring 20/4

peace
GL

Spaceman_Spliff

Alright, when I start my next crop in a month, I'm goin' with 20/4. I've made up my mind. Thanks for all the advice, everyone.

SS out

P.S. What's the deal with people saying bad stuff on this thread? WHy the ballbusting? This is the nicest, most civilized grow site on the web. Props to the moderators. Thanks for kicking out the useless hate mongers.