Sativa time to show sex in sub-tropics (or 12/12 from seed)?

[Maria Sanchez]

Hola growmies,

My name is Maria. First thread here on IC but I'm on some other forums, especially the Autoflower net.
I'm a new/old grower. Grew mainly indoors in the 90s, but only started again outdoors in 2016.
I sometimes do autos, sometimes photos, have experience with both.

I want to ask you Ace people a question:
How long will most full sativas take to show sex in this light cycle?

I live around the Tropic of Cancer, 22 North, in a Köppen-Geiger climate type Af (Tropical rainforest).
If I go into the mountains a bit, it's Cfa (Temperate, no dry season, hot summer).
That means pretty hot, very wet, no dry season. Ranges from wet/humid to extremely wet/humid.

Midsummer light is about 13.5/11.5, and midwinter 11.5/13.5.

For example, if I'm running an Ace Golden Tiger reg, which is 11-14 weeks flowering,
how many days or weeks until it shows some pistils or stamens, to estimate another 11-14 weeks?
But I also know that the 11-14 is from flipping to 12/12 indoors, right?
Which should mean that maybe 1-2 weeks of that is just to show sex in the first place (right?)
So once my plants show pistils, I should be able to deduct those 1-2 weeks, then add the 11-14, to estimate finish time?
Hope that makes sense!

You might say in the tropics I can grow year round. It's true.
But I still want to avoid finishing in the wettest time of the year.
We get like 85%-95% RH here at that time, no joke.

My ideal plan would be to plant late summer, maybe July/August, show sex in August/September, harvest in November/December.

I ran a Thai Gold (hybrid of Thai sativa X Guerilla Gold indica) photo from La Buena Hierba a couple of years ago.
She took 4 weeks to show first pistils. Then about another 12 weeks after that.
She did well. Not dense, but no mold / bud rot, finishing in August,
temps about 37C, and we had about 400 mm of rain that month.

Thanks for any help!

Love and bong hits,
MJS

 

[Swamp Thang]

My experience straddling the Equator may differ from yours that is a few degrees distant from the Equator, but when I plant out pure Sativas they typically start to show their gender after as little as the first 6 weeks, after which they stretch like crazy under the tropical sun, while piling on resin and bulking up colas.

 

[Maria Sanchez]

My experience straddling the Equator may differ from yours that is a few degrees distant from the Equator, but when I plant out pure Sativas they typically start to show their gender after as little as the first 6 weeks, after which they stretch like crazy under the tropical sun, while piling on resin and bulking up colas.

Thanks @Swamp Thang for the response. That's really helpful.

With your handle, you probably know about growing in the wet, which is another issue.
I've tried regular pots, which were okay but held a lot of water, and fabric pots, which were better but then dried too fast when no rain.
I'm thinking about fabric pots, with a couple of holes punched in the bottom, and half buried in the ground.
If it rains enough to pool water, at least the top half won't be under water, and if it's drier then having half in the ground will keep it slightly moist down there.
Roots into the ground will also help hold them in place if the big winds hit.
What do you think?

 

[Swamp Thang]

On the muddy ground, you can grow some monster plants for sure. Swamp Tubes are easily made by cutting the floors out of plastic buckets or better still, cutting 3-foot lengths of a large-diameter plastic drainage pipe which can be placed in the muddy ground and supported with stakes pounded deep into the ground along the outside of the pipe to prevent it from tipping over.

With the tube thus held in place, simply dump in your rich dark earth till the tube is filled up, at which point would have a zero-maintenance, self-watering. grow site where feminized plants can be left to their own devices until the time comes to harvest massive colas that will last you a year vacuum sealed. If you can find the posts of Two Heads and Bob Dole in this forum, you will see some spectacular swamp tube grows.

 

[Maria Sanchez]

On the muddy ground, you can grow some monster plants for sure. Swamp Tubes are easily made by cutting the floors out of plastic buckets or better still, cutting 3-foot lengths of a large-diameter plastic drainage pipe which can be placed in the muddy ground and supported with stakes pounded deep into the ground along the outside of the pipe to prevent it from tipping over.

With the tube thus held in place, simply dump in your rich dark earth till the tube is filled up, at which point would have a zero-maintenance, self-watering. grow site where feminized plants can be left to their own devices until the time comes to harvest massive colas that will last you a year vacuum sealed. If you can find the posts of Two Heads and Bob Dole in this forum, you will see some spectacular swamp tube grows.

Haha, you make it sound so easy!
But, hey, good to know that this is a thing to do.
My site is near a river, local govt cuts these deeper zones that I think are for flooding catchment.
Yeah, can get really wet there, but I thought I could use it to my advantage.
Can't do it like you say, because this site is literally in the open, people can see it.
But they don't like to get into the wet damp grass reed zone, so that's where I plant.
That's where that Thai Gold above was grown, along with some Jack Herer, Safari F2s, and other stuff over the years.
How do you think it would go with a large fabric bag partially dug into the moist soil? Feasible?

 

[Swamp Thang]

A large fabric bag would definitely work and would be much harder to spot than a plastic bin amongst the vegetation. You could even drape some old fishing net around the bag, then weave dry reeds and other debris into the mesh to break up the silhouette for a really stealthy spot that could be missed even by someone looking right at it.

As a footnote, If snakes are common there don't use netting for camo or you might catch one as I did in my swamp. That was the day I surprised myself at how fast I could run through knee-deep mud.

 

[Maria Sanchez]

If you can find the posts of Two Heads and Bob Dole in this forum, you will see some spectacular swamp tube grows.

Hey.
Couldn't find "Two Heads" or "Bob Dole".
I did find a "Bobdool", but searching he has no posts.

 

[Swamp Thang]

Hey.
Couldn't find "Two Heads" or "Bob Dole".
I did find a "Bobdool", but searching he has no posts.

I wonder if those swamp growers deleted their threads due to security concerns. Over the years they were very consistent about posting swamp grow pictures that were inspirational. If they have pulled a D.B. Cooper then it is sad to see them leave that way.

 

[Swamp Thang]

Double post

 

[Swamp Thang]

I tracked down the legend himself

https://www.icmag.com/members/two-heads.10853/#recent-content

 

[Swamp Thang]

Some pictures from back in 2013 when I ran a grow that was only accessible by dugout canoe. The things I do to evade the long harm of the law.

Equitorial Swamp Jungle Float-Garden

Thanks for the kind words, GanjaGardener. I did a lot of hauling of heavy bags of soil by canoe, to fill those 12 swamp tubes, and then I settled in and spent a good while using water weeds to methodically camo the whole setup. I have started to harvest a few of the plants, and when dry these...

www.icmag.com

 

[Maria Sanchez]

Some pictures from back in 2013 when I ran a grow that was only accessible by dugout canoe. The things I do to evade the long harm of the law.

Equitorial Swamp Jungle Float-Garden

Thanks for the kind words, GanjaGardener. I did a lot of hauling of heavy bags of soil by canoe, to fill those 12 swamp tubes, and then I settled in and spent a good while using water weeds to methodically camo the whole setup. I have started to harvest a few of the plants, and when dry these...

www.icmag.com

I was just stalking that thread yesterday, haha.
Impressive work. Much I can learn from, though I'm not strictly speaking in a 'swamp'.

 

[dubi]

Welcome @Maria Sanchez to this room and thanks for considering our sativa genetics for your outdoor tropical location, we have many suitable sativa genetics for your conditions.

@Swamp Thang is correct, most pure sativa strains will show gender after approx 6 weeks of life under equatorial photoperiod, some sooner or slightly later, depends on the genetics. After that if your photoperiod is around 12/12 and decreasing sativa plants will start to flower and from then you can start counting flowering time as stated in our strain descriptions.

Let me know if you have any other, more specific doubts.

 

[Maria Sanchez]

Welcome @Maria Sanchez to this room and thanks for considering our sativa genetics for your outdoor tropical location, we have many suitable sativa genetics for your conditions.

Let me know if you have any other, more specific doubts.

Thanks for the kind welcome.
I like it here. Lots of sativa lovers, growing tropical and subtropical genetics.

 

[Maria Sanchez]

... most pure sativa strains will show gender after approx 6 weeks of life under equatorial photoperiod, some sooner or slightly later, depends on the genetics. After that if your photoperiod is around 12/12 and decreasing sativa plants will start to flower and from then you can start counting flowering time as stated in our strain descriptions.

Great. I can now take my planned finishing date, work back the flowering time and the six weeks or so veg time, to find when to start my grow. Brilliant!