Hey guys,

I gots a problem...

Well I have been battleing with height issues for weeks now and have come to accept that they are huge and there is nothing I can do about it.

I have two strains, Skunk #1 & Black Widow. The two Skunk#1 are at around 5ft and around 2ft. The Black Widow's are now way over 6ft from the top of the pot...that means over 7ft with the pot in a 6ft 3" room.

I have been wondering why they are this tall, I put it down to the strain, Black Widow. Dunno if they are strechy but they do look it but this just seems silly.

I gave up batteling and fighting and just let them grow... the two Black Widow are now bent round string from the top of my room.

I thought that that would be it and they would then bud fine. The smallest SK#1 is budding the best & I was quite happy with it's progress. The taller SK#1 is not budding quite as nicely but it still is...Not as much as everyone else's round here though for 5 weeks.

The only thing that I have noticed recently is that I have a light leak...quite a bad one at that. It's ok when an inner door in front of the room is shut but people open it.

I know this means my plants may hermie but I found out about it a couple of weeks ago and I have no way of fixing it for the minute.

So basicly I am wondering if light leaks can cause exessive growing and slow budding?

If it does cause the above is there a way to still get a decent smoke still? Will they have to grow longer or am I just buggered?

Cheers in advance, 3PH

Just relised there are no pics of the plants.

Click to view attachment Click to view attachment Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

The light leak needs fixing ASAP and I think its contributing to the excessive stretch, you've got to have absolute darkness for 12 hrs every day.

I reckon you should top them and start flowering again once the light leak is sorted. Maybe leave the smaller one as its not causing you any height problems. The other option is to tie them down, again once the light leak is fixed.

Something needs fixing, they don't look good for 5 weeks flowering, should be much more flower development.

Cheers for responding guys.

Sigh, I think I will have to take the plants out today then, light proof the room (once again....) & hopefully they will be better then.

If I was to sort the room out today and make sure there are no light leaks would I still be able to grow these? I think they were ment to be down in a few weeks time but looks like they gonna take over a month & a half...yay.

Cheers again guys, 3PH

Hi mate

Have they been getting 12 hours dark, you haven't been interrupting the dark cycle have you, otherwise you must have bad light leaks because they don't even look like they've gone properly into flower, mine look better than yours at 21days flowering. What are your temps like, that stretch is quite bad.

You should be ok to flower it but your yield will probably be lower than it could have been.

What light are they under?

Your other option would be to do a SOG grow, take cuttings, 1 week to root them, veg them for a short while then flip them to flower.

Me, being me, would just probably be tempted to carry on as it will be a shorter time to get some smoke but cloning is probably the better option.

Also, the plants grow tall, you should have tied them down. In my tent I would weight the plants down with lead weights and tie them over so the energy of growth goes into the side branches.
How much room have you got, tie the plants down so you make good use of the space you've got, don't let the plants get above light level if you can help it.

If you fix the light leak you can go on to a good crop.But if you don't fix the leak totally and I mean totally,the pot won't produce resin like it should.

Just tie and trim the plants back down to the light.You can also bend them till they kink and hang down.looks drastic but is quite handy as the plant isn't tied down and can be moved easily for spraying or whatever.

hi guys,

cheers very much for replying!!!!

I have spent all today toaking the plants out of the room, light proofing it...AGAIN! but proper this time. Last time I used blutac and the balck & white has slid downwards causing the light leaks etc.

Got proper black tape and no light getting in now

To answer the questions:

ChrystalFarmer:

I haven't touched them while they are in darkness, maybe two mins after lights out just to check they all ok but not after that.

They are under a 600W Digi HPS

I have cuttings ready for another grow straight after this one

I should have tied them down but never got round to it and I never thought they would stretch this much!?

dr rockster:

I have now fixed light leak

How much would you say to take off?? I have taken the reflector off the bulb so that I could grow the plants along some string above the light... good idea or just cut back to below the light and whack the reflector back on?

Fatmanbob:

I vegged them for around 4 weeks, give or take 1,2 days. Tallest was below 2ft I think.

I did repot yeah, I went from 4" to 7" to 11ltr square pots (25cm,25cm,25cm) about a week before going 12/12.

If there are any other questions then I am more than happy to answer.

Im hoping that this should sort it out.

Only question I have to ask really now is how low should I cut them down? Will they grow or stay around the hieght I cut them too?

Cheers again guys, 3PH

P.S. Going to put extractor on a diffrent timer so it can be run at night. What intervals would someone surrgest me putting them on?

If I was you and was decided to top the plants instead of tying them down, I'd top them all to the size of your smallest plant on the far right of your 1st pic.

i would not top at this stage, bend em' round or weigh em' down

what are you feeding them?

my first ever grow i had the same problem and found out too late about adding in boost with the bloom. having said this i am growing in cocco

I think 3potheads is gonna have some trouble doing much else but topping them in a 3ft x 4ft growroom.

Cheers to all for responding!

I am Happy with the work I done yesterday & that the light is now being kept out. The only place where a tiny bit of light is coming in is getting sorted today.

I haven't topped the plants yet as I want to see how they do without topping for the minute. They are still managable with me tying and bending them around the room. I will be switching off the light a little early this evening so I can get in there & have a look at them with the light off and see how close they are growing etc.



Mr Jolly:

If I top the plant would I not lose more bud than I would gain?



Spence:

If I keep bending etc will tht be better than topping?

Im feeding around 10-12ml of grow and 20-25ml of bloom (Biobizz range)



Mr Jolly:

I understand what you are saying about topping them and I have already run out of room really but like I sed I can keep it up for the time being. Would topping be the best long term solution though?



Wasabi:

I don't think that they are streching that much any more and although there are no proper buds forming yet I can see where all the budsites are on the two tallest plants.

Like I said cheers for all your input and I am now considering both ideas. I will go and take some pics in a min and then you guys can see how bad they are.

Question is this:

Will buds form if the plant is touching something? (I.e, I have a branch pushed up against CF, will this bud or not?)

Also if I do bend them etc would it be better putting relfector back on and bending them below this or keeping the reflector off and bending them above the light?... Or just top them and put reflector back on?

Cheers so very guys as without this site I think I would be tottally lost with this grow!

Cheers again guys!!

3PH

The way I see it is, the plants are still partly vegging, so when you give them proper 12/12 they may stretch even more.

You would lose bud, to answer your question. But I thinks the plant will put out more once they get the full 12 hours of darkness.

Buds will form if they are touching something, but the trichomes and bud may get damaged.

You could compromise and top them a bit and also tie them down.

I prefer to keep plants below the light/reflector if at all possible, but they will still grow above it.

Your feeding 10-12ml of Bio-Grow (per litre), is that a typo.

Those pots look quite small, to the overall size of the plants.

Hey Mr Jolly,

I think I may comprimise and put the relfector on and cut and tie them down below the reflector.

So the bud will form but not as good as they could if the plant is touching something....?

The feeding isn't a typo but it is to 5 litres sorry, forgot to add that rather important part!

The pots are 11ltr square pots (25cm x 25cm x 25cm) Don't have a tape measure near me but I thought they would be big enough... The plants may be too big now for the pots but if they had stayed smaller would the pots be an ok size?

Thanks again for your input! GOD BLESS THIS SITE!

Cheers again, 3PH

The trichomes are quite delicate so I wouldn't allow them to be pushed up against anything.

If the pots are 11 Litres then thats OK, I'm not very good at estimating size.

3ph,

you will be amazed how much the plant bends round and it can double back on itself with some training without problem (and to be fair thise are some big monsters you have there).

on my grow my plants are bend alternate, pot on the left plant bent to the right, then pot on the right and bend over to the left. my room is not huge and this works well for me and i maximise light coverage. some of the buds do touch the foil but this is not ideal but okay, I then swap the plants over (changing sides to compensate for the light)......but don't take my word for it:
http://www.uk420.com/boards/index.php?showtopic=92714

I also agree that it sounds like your plants are still in veg. Having said this I have not had any experience with my first grow. I am sorry I have no experience in anything but cocco and as I mention my problem was the nute mix (my missing factor was no boost with the bloom) and since having sorted that I go from strength to strength.

Finally my last tip is to get some lowryders in. I cannot praise these plants enough (they autoflower and care not about light cycle), so my vote is to stick them in parallel to what ever you grow, the turn around is only 12 weeks in total so guess what I am now smoking while my other babies finish off.

(Worst case is that you just have extra smoke of a different plant at the end of the day).

So I recommend to tie down and to see if they improve, someone else needs to comment about the food. If things don't improve then it is probably time to make some cuttings, but lets cross that bridge if we come to it.

Hey guys,

Cheers again to all who replied!

Mr Jolly:

Ahhh, I see. So it's the trichs that will be damaged, not the buds. That's what I didn't understand, cheers for clearing that one up!

I thought that they would be big enough pots but when you said that I did start to worry. Cheers for clearing that one up as well!

Spence:

I now know how much they bend , I never wanted to bend them before but now I have given it a go (no matter if I did break them cause I could always top them...)

I think I will tie them down and bend them around till the end of the week and see how they are doing. If they still going on tour I will top them.

The lowryders sound like a good idea & may have to get some for the next grow, I already have cuttings of the plants downstairs & I must say the genetics do follow from the mother plant don;t they! The round potted one always look rather lanky and all it's cuttings are the same! Its amazing really .

A few pics of the damage


Click to view attachment A pic of me light and how close a plant is getting to it

Click to view attachment One brach on the biggest plant bent round some string on the roof

Click to view attachment Other branch of the biggest plant bent round some string

Click to view attachment The three tallest branxhes touching the roof

Click to view attachment The other branch bent up under the Carbon Filter...

Again cheers guys!

3PH

A few more pics...

Click to view attachment The jungle as it now is...

Click to view attachment Trying to escape out the door...

Click to view attachment Im not all shit (smallest plant...)

Cheers again for your help guys and I hope now I got the extractor fan running for 15 mins every 30mins and light proofed the room there should be no more probs!!

Peace & smoke to all!!!

3PH

3ph.

i don't like the look of the one touching the light!

i think you can bend these round more than you have, the main steam will bend over and angle of 90 degrees without any trouble (do you understand what i did with my plants, i can make a pic if not to show you.....cos' i think this would help here).

for someone else in a normal 'post do you feed them boost as well as bloom during flowing?

sg.

Hey Wasabi,

I Think I am going to try bending them until the end of the week and if they are still growing stpuidly then I will top them. I want to try and bend them below the reflector really, which is what I was about to ask...



Spence,

If you could explain to me a bit more about this bending marlarky plz? It all seems very stressfull on the plant to me and scares me .

The one touching the light I have now moved but is a little burned

Hopefully it will all go well & if I can't bend them below the reflector I will be topping the start of nex week.

Cheers and thanks again!

3PH

hi 3ph,

just consider training any type of plant, you can tie it off a different points (e.g. string on the stem to screws/nails in the wall). the plant will then take that shape. after a few days you can bend it more and tie it off again etc.

i see you did this with one of the branches from the pics, so basically do the same with the stem.

sg