going from inside to outside

[feral]

Hey fellow growers. gonna try my hand again growing outside and need some advice and hope i can get the answer i need. I haven't grown outside since the late '70's and i was a teen who didn't really know what he was doing then.
My question is on light and flowering. I live on the 38 degree and my longest daylight hour is in June (of course) at @14 1/2 hours per day according to the chart i read from the weather service. I was planning on starting my babies inside the beginning of May and keep them under 24/0 or 20/4 for 4 weeks and then put them out around the first of June. Would doing so send my babies into flowering mode since they would go from 24 hours of light to @ 15hours of light even though the days would be getting longer for about 3 weeks after i put them out before the sun reverses direction and heads south? I am hoping that it does but not sure. It would be nice to be able to harvest say mid sept.
thoughts/input?
appreciate the feedback.

 

[Ulysses]

Welcome to ICMag!

Veg your plants as long as possible indoors- get a large well established root ball, sturdy stems, and plenty of foliage. If you are going to top them, do it two weeks before you put them out so they can recover a bit...

While they are vegging, you are digging holes and sourcing water. There are many many soil mixes posted around here- pick one and use it, you don't want to experiment much yet... Get the dolomite lime and earthworm castings and a bit of perlite in there...

Put them out in June, mulch around the stem (but not touching the stem) to retain water. September harvest? Depends entirely on the strain...

Good luck- let us know how it grows...

 

[SmokeAnother]

I would veg them at 18hrs/day, and as you get closer to your june plant date maybe knock it to 17 or maybe 16 hrs/day to closer match your natural light time. This is general advise, all depending on the strain and how fast it will trigger flowering, but generally speaking veg 18hrs maybe knock it down a bit before they go outside. Good luck! Smoke

 

[Guest]

Howdy feral and welcome

Ulysses and SmokeAnother too!

Im at 38ish as well.

Many years of outdoor growing and moving in and out is going to force me too disagree a little but thats ok, i almost always hope to hear more than 1 opinion on any given subject and its something I would recommend to all. Its always good to hear and take into account, alternate views.

There is never a benefit from pregrowing plants for more than about 30 days. Root binding, unatural lighting schedules and shock all result in growth delays after transplanting. It is my assertion feral that a plant pregrown indoors for 60 days will never be as big and healthy or finish as fast as a seedling planted right beside it.It took about 5 years of that happening for me to realize that will happen every time. 30 days is your optimum pregrow in my view,

Mimic the outside conditions with your lighting. If your going to transplant on may 1, then your lighting should be set on 14.5. Lighting variations are very hard on cannabis and going from 18 or 16hrs to 14.5 will be traumatic, and will result in flowering and growth delay by up to 3 weeks. It has the same effect as cutting the lights back to force a plant to show its sex and then resetting the lighting at normal day lenght which is a sure fire way delay flowering. It would be my suggestion that the minute sunshine and temps will allow you to start setting them outdooors during the day, i would go for it, especially if you can get them outdoors by the 3rd week of groth when in my mind is the beginning of sex determination. I find plants that sexed under the spring times bright blue sun have a 30% better chance of being female . For several years now, I have started my plants during the first week of April, because a couple of weeks later, i can begin setting them outdoors during the day.




Double the importance of these recommendations if using femmed seed which is what i would use if i were you. No culling of males, just sprout, plant and harvest. Its been a new world since i discovered them.

Im sure you'lll hear other opinions on the issue. Good luck with it.

 

[Gunnarguchi]

i think Silverback made a very valid point on regarding not pre growing them more than 30 days or more time will be a waste of light
i havent tried longer myself but i once had some early danish genetics under 24 hours of light as i was going to use them later en crosses
they all started going auto flower from 30 days and onwards
i moc´ved them outside then but due to being very photosensitive ( all early genetics have that coded in the genes to survive) they reverted back to growth as it was longer days outside

if your using some partly early genetics they should start flowering when moved outside and due to your short days compared to the latitude where im at i think thay would stay in flower
most of the genetics from where im at starts there flowering as early as 16-17 hours of light a day
any less and they start flowering right away
any more and they will burn back to growth due to being very photosensitive

this site can be used to compare day length on different locations and latitudes
http://www.jgiesen.de/daylight/
longest day in Denmark is also min june with almost 18 hours of sunlight
all our genetics have adapted for that and will therefore be more early at more exotic latitudes with shorter days
take early dane, danish passion, royal dane and others and bring them outside in anything less than 15-16 hours of daylight and they will start flowering right away or shortly thereafter
as 7-8 weeks strains they will give a nice harvest shortly after and be more potent than any lowryder or crosses therefrom and yield a lot more also

 

[feral]

wow!!! good points and I appreciate the advice and feedback.
I plan on doing mandala#1 which I believe will be ok but I also got those free thai x skunk seeds that were listed has doing 12-14weeks for flowering and I just don't want to lose to much bud/potency due to having to harvest early because of frost. I don't think the thai's will be ready before hand, but we'll see.
I do know this, the art of growing has become so advanced and there are so many varietys/strains nowdays that this can be really confusing for a 'newbie' grower. But! I don't like paying what i feel are outrageous sums of $$$ for weed. When you consider the money saved, knowing what was used to grow it and knowing that i grew this myself from seed should make it worthwhile.

 

[SmokeAnother]

I am at 40degrees in the heart of the emerald triangle, if I were to put out plants on may1 they WIll(most likely) flower. Round here may 20th is safe with 16/17 or so hours veg time prior. I know this works for many people. Some folks I know begin in feb, and have no problems and avg 5+lbs each. I think may 20 is good because the days are long enough to not trigger flowering, and the day length are increasing untill the solstace

I look at it like this, most of my outdoor plants will naturally start to show flowers around aug 15-20. with approx 13.5 hrs of sunlight, may 1st also has approx 13.5 hrs sunlight. In june the longest day has ~15hrs sunlight, and may20th has approx 14.5 hrs sunlight. The slight difference in time on may 20th and june 21 will not effect your plants, however the difference on may 1 and june 21 is huge and will have an effect on plants causing flowering and revegging.

This is the way I have been taught, and it works for me. Thought I should respond again to clairify my post it was vague.

Everyone has what works for them, where they live. Study your light charts and also look at the twilight hours and grow monsters. Smoke