Growing without branches / Single cola

[fendre]

I have seen several pictures of plants that have one main cola on the stem. After doing a bit of forum searching it seems these plants are put on 12/12 from seed. Well I don't have that many seeds available and I am forced to clone. Here is a example of what I am talking about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOhPxbPbpzY&NR=1&feature=fvwp


My clones are rooted and vegged under florescent 24/0 so the growth is a little slow. My clones are removed from my clone tray/tent around 4-5 days. The roots are nice and stable by day 7 and I usually put them in 4" rockwool at this time. They have a bit of a delay then the first new set of fan leaves grow out around day 12-14. Any suggestions on the optimal time to start the 12/12 in order to grow single cola plants? How can I accomplish growing plants through the first few weeks of flowering without getting crazy long branches?

 

[imrickjames]

you should research how to lollipop them since thats what it sounds like you are going for. Also sounds like you may want to get yourself some lowryder seeds

 

[beginnerbloomer]

I dont see any purpose to lollipopping other than experimentation or a personal asthetic reason,grow the bushiest bitch possible i say.

 

[imrickjames]

most people do it for sog grows. Its really only for utilizing all your space available and cramming tons of plants into a limited space.

 

[FuZZyBUDz]

lowryders a good 1 and veg fer a week then 12-12 it!~! do 3 of em!! i dont kno im buzzin and hi, just a good suggestion, wat lights u got?? 24-0 and no rapid growth u need nutes! hahaa and yep.

 

[FuZZyBUDz]

SOG id hydro, FOG is soil

 

[fendre]

lowryders a good 1 and veg fer a week then 12-12 it!~! do 3 of em!! i dont kno im buzzin and hi, just a good suggestion, wat lights u got?? 24-0 and no rapid growth u need nutes! hahaa and yep.

When I say "slow" I'm comparing florescent with 600W HPS. The nutes are good. I'm just too cheap to buy a MH currently and if I end up doing short vegging, what's the point.

 

[fendre]

I dont see any purpose to lollipopping other than experimentation or a personal asthetic reason,grow the bushiest bitch possible i say.

I currently have a relatively small flowing room. 24x44 inches and I have 44 inches between the light and the medium. So my plants really shouldn't be allowed to be much more than 30-32 inches tall. I am using this space to learn and experiment for a few harvests. When I have a better understanding of what I am doing and I get some cash saved up I will move my flowering room somewhere more suitable. Until then lollipopping may be the solution to allow me to grow 6 plants in my small space and still produce a decent harvest.

My other option, which I am also considering goes along with your bushy preference. I could just grow 4 plants at a time instead of 6 and let them bush out. Most likely this will produce the best harvest but it would be nice to be able to try the lollipop out to see how it compares.

 

[IgrowUgrow]

if you can let your plants to 30-32" tall then you are fine no need to 12/12 from seed you can let them veg for at least 3 weeks I would if I could but i only can let my girls 20" tall then start lst if needed.

 

[Mr Bomb]

Vegging from seed or right after cloning is a waste of time. If you veg the plant for a few weeks you will have a much larger yield.

 

[GangaFarmer420]

the more branches you got the more energy the plant needs to make those buds, so depending on the strain, some plants like pruning some dont at all, you gotta know what your working with to determine what to do for best results, like your video there, that strain obivously does better with less budsites because of how much weight it puts on but on another hand some strains that are pruned can suppyl the demand and make huge colas anyways, but lights nutes and mediums all play a big role in how big your shit gets.

 

[GreenFingerz88]

i'm not the biggest fan of cuttings because of the effort associated with trying to get the massive single cola, its not always easy...

i don't rate lowryder... its an autoflowering plant which means it doesn't need 12/12, it will flower regardless of light timing and therefore its best suited for 18/6 its whole life (more light to use, and it will still start flowering from the word go)

i always grow from seed but you don't have to put it into 12/12 straight away, i vegged mine for about 4 weeks and got em about 8 inches high before flowering. It takes a little longer than cuttings but i don't mind. I always use feminised seeds which means no wasted plants and effort...

I also find that if grown from seed, the root system is far far better and you can get larger plants in smaller pots...

I topped 2 of the plants and left 2 to form massive colas. The two that i topped have got 4 and 6 decent colas (maybe 8 inch long and 2 inch diameter) whilst the two that i didn't have formed lovely big colas (the larger one is about 14 inches high and with almost a 4 inch diameter in places, it has too many lower branches that i didn't cut off, i think the main cola would've been soo much bigger if i'd lollipopped it better)

see for yourself, they're almost done...

FYI - Ice-cream plants (Paradise Seeds, feminised) grown under a 400w hps in a 'converted' wardrobe with Hesi nutes, now at almost 8 weeks flowering (4 week veg under 2x125w CFLs)