Flowering start times (northern Cali)

[Organilush]

Does anyone else have plants that don't start to flower until September? Do some plants/genetics not transition into flowering until September?



The first couple years I grew I recall all of my plants transitioning into flowering pretty quickly right around the beginning of August, and by the end of August they were already getting frosted with trichomes and they were all ready for harvest around the end of Sept/beginning of October. So I was left with the impression that the beginning of Aug is when plants flip into flowering in my area.

But last year and this year, I'm at the end of August and still don't have any distinct flowers developing. All plants are stretching a bit and a few plants have some flowers just starting to cluster/stack up, but it's about to be September and none of them are in full on flowering yet and some haven't started to develop any shoots/bud sites at all.

Is this normal? Do some strains/genetics just take a lot longer to switch into flowering?

For reference, I am in central/northern California....And the strains I'm growing are Wedding Cake, Ice Cream Cake, Kush Cake, Mac-1, and Sherblato. The Sherblato is def starting to flower, I can tell the cakes are getting close, and the Mac-1 doesn't look close at all yet.

At this rate they won't be ready for harvest until almost the middle of November....this just doesn't seem typical, is it?



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[Dankwolf]

All the Strains I am going this year are late ones as well . No frost to be seen in my garden yet . Not good strains for out door . Pick plants that trigger earlier . Pretty sure wedding cake is a late to trigger Strain

 

[Organilush]

All the Strains I am going this year are late ones as well . No frost to be seen in my garden yet . Not good strains for out door . Pick plants that trigger earlier . Pretty sure wedding cake is a late to trigger Strain

I see...

That's kinda what I figured was going on, some strains just take longer/need a greater amount of darkness to trigger flowering.

Just wanted to touch bases with some other outdoor growers and those that have grown for more years than I to see if this is a "thing" .

The Sherblato I have going does have a touch of frost/trichomes on the leaves around the baby buds, but the buds are just barely starting to cluster/stack up...which leads me to feel it will likely be a pretty resinous strain if it's pushing out trichomes this early in flowering.


I grew Wedding Cake last year and it did take a while to get into the full swing of flowering, but I was also dealing a mite issue for my first time ever around early flowering and I wasn't sure if that was impacting the development of the flowers and the timeline of flower development or if that strain just takes a while to transition....Last year I took that Wedding Cake down on Nov 10th, so it indeed does appear that's just how that strain is (as well as most of the others I have going).

Fortunately it remains relatively dry and mild in my area through out early to mid fall...but def much shorter & cooler days and damp mornings towards the end there.

Dang...got a bit of a ways to go......I'm hoping that Mac-1 leaps into flowering soon here because from what I've heard it tends to have a 9 to slightly over 10 week flower time.


Thanks for the reply.



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[St. Phatty]

I have to deal with a lot of wildlife, so I put my official plants in a deck area with a fence.

They lose some sunshine that way. Shaded by trees after about 2 PM, shaded by a mountain ridge earlier and earlier in the day starting in late September.

Usually they show the signs of flowering, that lead me to set the date of "first flowering" at somewhere the first week of August.

I agree, plants that don't start flowering until September are headed for a difficult end of flowering.

If you can do it, I would start building a framework so that you can give them artificial light in October November.

Though if you're in a flat area, you might get enough light from the Autumn sun.

 

[Organilush]

I have to deal with a lot of wildlife, so I put my official plants in a deck area with a fence.

They lose some sunshine that way. Shaded by trees after about 2 PM, shaded by a mountain ridge earlier and earlier in the day starting in late September.

Usually they show the signs of flowering, that lead me to set the date of "first flowering" at somewhere the first week of August.

I agree, plants that don't start flowering until September are headed for a difficult end of flowering.

If you can do it, I would start building a framework so that you can give them artificial light in October November.

Though if you're in a flat area, you might get enough light from the Autumn sun.

This is the first year that it's become apparent to me that some strains/genetics will take a lot longer to transition into flowering. Next time around this is something I will take into consideration when choosing what varieties I grow.

I'm still getting 10.5 hours of sunlight on November 1st, I think that should be enough for the plants to finish up. I've actually never heard of people providing supplemental lighting during the fall, only spring time, makes since though if one is farther up north.

I had a plant go all the way to November 10th last year. No big troubles with it, but it was starting to get a bit cool and damp in the late night & mornings.


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[panick503]

I have experience doing Wedding Cake full season last year. It was definitely late to trigger, and wasn't fully done when I pulled it in late October. Definitely won't be running that one again outdoors in Oregon again

I have some Ice Cream Cake that is outside this year, and it already has some decent flower sites that i started noticing in mid August. Have to see how it finishes, but as of now I'm not mad at it. Who's to say if its the same phenotype as you have tho

 

[PolyChucker]

Last year I was growing some GSC mutts and they flowered from about 8/15-10/15

this year I’m growing some bagseed, looks kinda like Blue Dream - pistil clusters first week august. These were kinda weird in that they had primordial preflowers at 8 wks but didn’t actually show preflower pistils or male preflower until much later.

can’t say exactly what makes them tick as they start flowering around 14 hours of sun though they get much less than that directly. I also tried a cruel experiment putting one old clone outside in February at 12 hours to see if it would finish around the time of the equinox but it started to flower and did a slow reveg and it’s now flowering some more. Sunlight hours is the most important signal but it also needs to be decreasing and temp plays a factor too it seems