3rd or 4th node ... ???

[Dreamscape]

Hola amigos!

I was wondering if you kind folk could possibly lend me some insight / advice on a situation i'm curious about ??

The plan is to plant seeds so that clones can be taken from the strongest ones and become mothers. After the cuttings have been taken these seed plants would be flowered out.

Im having a tough time nailing down the specifics of the most effecient way of plucking the males out without putting too much effort into their growth in terms of time , soil and nutes. Obviously anyone would prefer NOT to put more time than needed into a male plant that would get tossed ...

I was told the quickest way to find out what the sex is would be to grow the babies out till they hit their 3rd or 4th node and then Top them , replant the tops in soil and then flower them out to find their sex ... Does this sound right to the rest of the experienced out there ?

Also when they hit 3rd or 4th node would likely be small enough still to be in beer cups or by this time would they have likely transplanted to 1 gallon pots ??

I ask because I wouldn't want to over shoot and end up with more soil / perlite than needed ...

Many thanks as always friends
~ Dream

 

[vinivici]

dream,

if your planning on flowering your plant you wont wanna top it that early. take a extra week grow it out till you can take a clone, and flower the clone as soon as it roots.

or, check out the bonzi mum thread http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=31919

if you find a seed with good genetics no point in no keeping a mom (unless you have limited space)

anyways, i'd say take a clone rather than topping, if your plant is big enough to top it should be big enough to take a clone.

heres a good cloning thread http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=46778

-Vini

 

[Danknuggler]

instead of putting those cuts into soil just put them into individual labeled cups of water then flower to see sex. when you say beer cup do you mean 12 oz or 16 oz 32 oz? it really depends on a feww different factors if they will outgrow the cups by 3-4 nodes. hope this helps a little. nuggler

 

[Dreamscape]

Thanks for the help guys,

Nuggler - i've read about tossing them in water before but didn't really follow it ... Do they have to stand up or can I just toss them in there , let em float and flip to 12/12 ?

As far as the beer cups go , I haven't really thought about the size yet but put it this way - If I can sex before they outgrow a cup of a certain size , thats the cup I'm going to use , so i'm going to assume the 32 would be a safe bet ?? What factors are you referring to - nutes & light , LST'ing ??

thanks again
~ Dream

 

[Guest]

your plants really shouldn't outgrow 16oz beer cups by the 4th node if planted from seed unless you have a monstrous light over them. I have my seedlings at the 4th node with nice big leaves under a 150hps right now in 16oz cups andthe roots haven't even begun to fill the cups. you can probably keep them in the 16oz cups until they hit at least the 6th-8th node depending on your strain and grow conditions

 

[Dreamscape]

They would be under 600w hps with a Lumatek Digi Ballast and daystar AC reflector ... I could always raise the height on it though right , X amount of feet ?? Environment would be pretty much sealed with the exception of an exhaust and intake ...

 

[Danknuggler]

in the water like fresh cut flowers in a vase ok? stems submerged ya know? never tried to float em. as far as factors i was talking soil and light etc. I mean if you got really light, airy soil and fairly strong light those roots push on through faster than if you were in some crappy soil that was just packed into the cups and under a weak shop light. nuggler

 

[Guest]

Thats a huge light to sex a cutting,I'd get a 4 ft 2 lamp flourescent in the future.Try a 14 dark 10 light photoperiod also,it usually knocks some time off compared to 12/12,they needn't root to show you their privates.

 

[Prone_2_Clone]

just an idea.... i have never tried this but it sounds logical enough to work. someone told me that while your plants are still vegging you can take a peice of black trash bag or other simular material and wrap one of the branches to keep it dark for 12 hours out of the day. so the rest of your plant will be exsposed to 18-24 hrs light while that one branch will only be exposed for 12 hrs. this allows your plant to continue vegging and growing while the branch exposed to less light will show sex with in a week or so.... again havent tried it, it may cause stress but like everything else its always fun to experiment. let me know what you thank
prone 2

 

[Prone_2_Clone]

the only thang that succks is you have to manually change the bag every day at the same time.

 

[Dreamscape]

they needn't root to show you their privates.

Can you elaborate on this ?? Are you saying I can just pop the seed in the soil and flip to 12/12 and as soon as they break top soil it'll show ?? you lost me with that one ...

@prone 2 clone - Logically , that does make some type of sense but i'm not in a position to and dont desire to gamble on experimentations so thats out the window. Thanks for the input though ...

 

[Guest]

A cutting need not root to show sex and many won't,some will.Giving the cutting the extra 2 dark hours(10/14) instead of 12/12 gives them a little jumpstart over a normal 12/12 photoperiod