When to flower indoor sativa?

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Hi it's been a while since I have made a post and since that time I have started an indoor sativa/ sativa Dom hybrid grow. I am using my closet for veg and two 3x3x72 tents for flower under 400 watt MHs. one of my strains is Tikal. They are at day 31 and are in 1 gal pots. I've looked for sex but there is nothing I can really see and their height is now at 18 inches. So they flower for about 10 weeks or so. I'm thinking I will have a problem with height. I plan to flower them in 2-3 gal pots and really do not want their height to extend past 3 ft. I'm not a big fan of LST. Should I top them? Can I send them into flower before they show sex? Any tips or advice? It's my first indoor photo grow.

 

[Jellyfish]

31 days is enough veg time in my opinion. Especially if they're already 18" tall. I would start flowering and get ready for some three foot trees, easily.

I personally wouldn't top them at this point- I might lollipop them, you know, get rid of the lower branches that aren't going to get a lot of light.

I would be growing them through some kind of screen or something to tie it down to. If your room is 72" high, how much actual headroom do you have? 3 1/2, 4 feet?

I would flower them unsexed AND keep a very close eye for male plants. You can sex them before they have time to pollinate your girls. Maybe a week or two after you flip them.

 

[sc1]

There is about 4ft from the bottom of the container to the light. I just measured their height and found most to be at 17 inches, one is 20 inches. Doesn't look like much room.

 

[Jellyfish]

Are you measuring the plants from the bottom of the container? How tall are they from the base of the plant?

Yeah, like I said, you'll probably need to tie those bitches down.

 

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Oh I measured from the top of the container to the light. Also do I need to transplant into a larger container before switching to 12/12? They went fro solo cups to 1 gal on 11/15.

 

[Jellyfish]

If you are going to transplant to a larger container, it's best to do it before the switch. I can't say if you need a container larger than a gallon, because I don't know what medium you're using, or how many plants you've got in your space. The bigger the better in general.

 

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Damn well I think I'm going to try topping. The roots haven't filled my container so I really don't won't to transplant. I think I will top them to 13 inches

 

[Jhhnn]

I switch to 12/12 while they're in 1 gal pots & 12" tall if they haven't shown sex already. Even then, I get some management problems w/ height. I have 6'3" from the floor to the reflector. I start twice as many seeds as I have room to flower. I'm vigilant about determining sex at that point. The earliest pistils seem to show about 1/3 the way down the plant, not at the top. My limited experience is that females will show first. Once I identify six females I up pot them to 5 gals & trash the rest. Only once have I had fewer than 6 females from 12 seedlings & that was 5.

In the future, I'm going to try pinching back the tops when they're 6" or so when I know I'm growing something stretchy. Anything I cut off is wasted effort on the plant's part so I try to trim away the lower most branches when they're still small, before I go to the large pots. It works well enough that I get 2 oz per plant or a little better w/ 3-4 weeks veg time, depending on variety.

 

[sc1]

Thanks for the replies. I believe the plants became to large like 18 or 20 inches. I was reading around that under a 400 watt smaller plants are better like start them at 12" or so. So I trashed them and now I'm starting over. Gonna try puttin 12" satiiva hybrids into the flower room.

 

[Ganjagrower1]

Thanks for the replies. I believe the plants became to large like 18 or 20 inches. I was reading around that under a 400 watt smaller plants are better like start them at 12" or so. So I trashed them and now I'm starting over. Gonna try puttin 12" satiiva hybrids into the flower room.

I don't really care for sativa. Not only don't really care for the high but when you are limited to space you may want to choose something shorter. Just my own opinion.

 

[oldbean]

Thanks for the replies. I believe the plants became to large like 18 or 20 inches. I was reading around that under a 400 watt smaller plants are better like start them at 12" or so. So I trashed them and now I'm starting over. Gonna try puttin 12" satiiva hybrids into the flower room.

Ah you trashed them, that's a shame. You could have tried taking cuttings from a female when it showed & flower the cuttings as they should flower shorter due to chronological age.

Anyway, best of luck for the future, there are some fast flowering Sativa's around these days so I'm sure you will find what your looking for.

Peace

 

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Well I had some plants going behind the ones I trashed they are sativa. They have a ten week flowering time. I'm going to change them to 12/12 tomorrow, they are 12" tall. I also have 2 of those plants on 12/12 now and they are larger at 14+ inches. I would like to grow them not larger than 2-3 feet w/o topping.

 

[Ganjagrower1]

Well I had some plants going behind the ones I trashed they are sativa. They have a ten week flowering time. I'm going to change them to 12/12 tomorrow, they are 12" tall. I also have 2 of those plants on 12/12 now and they are larger at 14+ inches. I would like to grow them not larger than 2-3 feet w/o topping.

Sounds good looking forward to pics.

 

[sc1]

Cool so I'll post pictures tommorow afternoon. This is indoor photo grow #1 for me so I'm still learning about strains, when to flower, space, etc. wuz doing autos before. Seems like they started to flower after 8-10 inches or so.

 

[JamieShoes]

for me 18-21 inches is perfect for a 2m high tent...

edit: you trashed them? why didnt you just supercrop or cut the tops off so they were the right size? you live and learn eh bro...

 

[/sunglasses]

for me 18-21 inches is perfect for a 2m high tent...

edit: you trashed them? why didnt you just supercrop or cut the tops off so they were the right size? you live and learn eh bro...

my sentiments exactly. i would have just topped em then sent em to flower. no need to trash perfectly good plants.

 

[Jhhnn]

Well I had some plants going behind the ones I trashed they are sativa. They have a ten week flowering time. I'm going to change them to 12/12 tomorrow, they are 12" tall. I also have 2 of those plants on 12/12 now and they are larger at 14+ inches. I would like to grow them not larger than 2-3 feet w/o topping.

Expanding on what I said above, my plants usually reach 3'-4' using blumats in 5 gal pots, intense lighting & really good organic soil when going 11.5/12.5 at 12"-14". You can probably keep them somewhat shorter in smaller pots w/ less than perfect watering.

 

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Ok so here is a picture or two. One photo is 9 bangi @ 10-12 inches and the other photo has a bangi back center and front left, they are about 15 inches and have been in the flower room for two days. The other 4 are fem indica dom. hybrids.

 

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Had trouble getting 2 photos on that post. Here are the 9 bangi.

 

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So my flowering pots are 2 or 2 1/2 gallons. The bangi haze are 75% sativa. So maybe @ 12-14" they'll stay under 3 foot. I'm sorta inexperienced at topping and supercropping and all that. i had topped a few of the plants I trashed but figured I could not top them again because I had switched to 12/12. Well anyway still learning about it