12-1 lighting schedule, has anyone actually tried this?

I just don't understand why you wouldn't do 13 or 14 hours straight on. NO plant in nature has a 5.5 hour break in their day and then just one more hour on, so I really don't see how this replicates nature in anyway. However, plants in nature do receive 14 hours of continuous light (albeit there are 2 hours of mostly diffused light... dusk and dawn). If anything, that one hour break in your dark cycle is stressing your plants to keep them in veg.
That's great that you tried it and it worked, however, to say that it's a better method without doing a side by side comparison is just plain flawed science. I don't think when Uncle Ben said you're in the wrong biz he meant that all growers are commercial. He was merely stating an idiom (colloquial metaphor).

mccumcumber said:

I just don't understand why you wouldn't do 13 or 14 hours straight on. NO plant in nature has a 5.5 hour break in their day and then just one more hour on, so I really don't see how this replicates nature in anyway. However, plants in nature do receive 14 hours of continuous light (albeit there are 2 hours of mostly diffused light... dusk and dawn). If anything, that one hour break in your dark cycle is stressing your plants to keep them in veg.
That's great that you tried it and it worked, however, to say that it's a better method without doing a side by side comparison is just plain flawed science. I don't think when Uncle Ben said you're in the wrong biz he meant that all growers are commercial. He was merely stating an idiom (colloquial metaphor).

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Not to be a dick but if you read the few pages where no bickering was going on, granted thats very few, you would have all the info you needed to know about how and all that, if your not interested enough to learn that much, why post your criticisms?

@UB i would appreiceiate it, if you would go to my thread entitled 25 hour like cycle and comment on it with your opinions questions, criticisms. Thanks.

dont for get to light up you ansty stoners.

-grapes

Not to be a dick but if you read the few pages where no bickering was going on, granted thats very few, you would have all the info you needed to know about how and all that, if your not interested enough to learn that much, why post your criticisms?

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I did read them. I disagree.
I agree with the initial statement that you ought to mimic outdoor conditions. But 12-1 schedule in no way mimics outdoor conditions. That's where I find the biggest problem with this.

Edit: I do agree with the flowering schedule. That's how I've always ran my flowering schedules because it makes the most sense to me.

mccumcumber said:

I just don't understand why you wouldn't do 13 or 14 hours straight on. NO plant in nature has a 5.5 hour break in their day and then just one more hour on, so I really don't see how this replicates nature in anyway. However, plants in nature do receive 14 hours of continuous light (albeit there are 2 hours of mostly diffused light... dusk and dawn). If anything, that one hour break in your dark cycle is stressing your plants to keep them in veg.
That's great that you tried it and it worked, however, to say that it's a better method without doing a side by side comparison is just plain flawed science. I don't think when Uncle Ben said you're in the wrong biz he meant that all growers are commercial. He was merely stating an idiom (colloquial metaphor).

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Actually you are totally incorrect about just about everything you state here... almost no where in the plant growing world actually gets even 12+ hours of usable sunlight. You are mistaking LIGHT for usable sunlight.... The most noted location in the US for sunlight is Tuscon Arizona with 3800 annual hours of sunlight, where most average about 2600 annual hours of sunlight. if a plant is in the shade when the sun is out, its not getting direct sunlight. Like the lower branches on your mj plant, those many people cut off, why dont they grow as much and many times if left alone barely grow at all, beyond twigs... because even though the light is onl 18 hours a day, they are getting almost non of that usable light.

The idea about mimicking nature is well, 12 hours straight is much closer to real world light than 18 or 20 hours of light. The 1 hour of light actually does not stress vegetating plants much if at all. Majority of stress in a vegetating plant comes from... temperature & humidity levels, then comes water/feeding (being over or under fed/watered).
The idea that a 1 hour period of light in the middle of a long rest more stresses a plant out more than a plant getting 18-20 hours of straight light is beyond me.

Again, the reason lights are not left on for 13 hours, is there are many strains that would actually try to start flowering with 11 hours of darkness, there are some that need only 10.5 of darkness, so the 1 hour is much needed to keep the plant from entering flowering.

Diffused light (light penetrating a layer of branches or going through something) is almost as beneficial as direct sunlight, if not more. What are you getting at when you say usuable sunlight... the plant uses the waves from the radiation, not what we can see. I know that in my area the sun is out for about 14 hours a day tops and 10 hours minimum. Even when it's dusk and dawn, the sun is still emitting wavelengths that my plant uses and sucks up. So I don't really see where you're getting at when you say usable light.
Cutting off lower branches b/c they don't get as much direct light is pretty silly to say the least. After the first level of diffusion (I think a foot or two after the waves go through something) the plant can still absorb up to 80% of the light. It keeps diminishing from there, so I guess if I didn't train my plants I might run into a problem.
Read up on Uncle Ben's article about diffused light. That's why reflective material in grow rooms is sooooo beneficial.
How about 14 hours straight, that's much closer than your 12-1, so is 15 actually, and you wouldn't have any problems.


Edit: I'm pretty sure at dusk and dawn most of the light emitted is in the uv range, hence why uv-a and uv-b lights have been popping up in grow rooms. As seen by evidence from indoor growing, we know that uv lighting is both used by the plants and extremely beneficial.

Must distinguish between the hormonal effects of phytochrome, a photoreceptive hormone, and photon levels/accumulations which drives photosynthesis. Also, it's mostly FR light that ends up penetrating into the lower canopy. Never bothered me, I had good production even on the lower branches.

Funny you should mention diffused light. Now that the greenhouse is finished, I'm fighting chlorophyll bleaching and that's with much shorter days now and lower intensity than what they were getting outdoors during the summer. They aint kidding when they say this polycarbonate covering gets light into the canopy.

UB

im done with this tired thread these half witts cant get it,
it works ive done it. as far as im concerned for me its end of story.

whileilaydying said:

what happend to people just growing pot? lol i mean what kinda of trickery bs is this?

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i am playing around with a decending day flowering schdule and i will be updating my journal with the first installment of how it is affecting my girls this week i am in wwek 5 and they are on 11 on 13 off ... but as for the veggie cycle i used a flicker last year to keep outdoor plants vegging in march but to do that shit indoors seems hard to schedule for my life i like 20-4 light cuz it gives me options on when i can work ....

Ive been on this schedule for about 2 1/2 weeks and my plants are doing just fine

I like seeds....

/thread kill this bs

They do this sort of thing in floral production greenhouse's to make sure that photosensitive plants dont start flowering to soon. We used to use construction style flood lights to intertupt their night-times. and its cheaper than running hps's for long periods of time........ Food for thought

buttrick said:

They do this sort of thing in floral production greenhouse's to make sure that photosensitive plants dont start flowering to soon. We used to use construction style flood lights to intertupt their night-times. and its cheaper than running hps's for long periods of time........ Food for thought

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I've yet to find documentation of this in nursery's. So you've used it?

snew said:

I've yet to find documentation of this in nursery's. So you've used it?

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I've visited greenhouse complexes where certain 6x250' tables had strings of incandescents over them simply to lengthen photoperiod as the plants are started shortly after christmas when there's little over 10 hours of daylight.

The quality of light is irrelevant, it's just light. They'd leave em on all night though.

I chimed in a few weeks ago and said I would try it. My soil grown look outstanding as well as my hydroponics. Anyone knocking 12-1 clearly hasn't tried it.

Gaspar said:

Ive been on this schedule for about 2 1/2 weeks and my plants are doing just fine

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oh yeah. hehe. keep trying

hlink262 said:

oh yeah. hehe. keep trying

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Me for one my plants are great. Getting ready to harvest and please all the way around with the results of gardening 12-1. My plants are the size I wanted, the buds are dense and full of crystals. My harvest time is right on breeders schedule, I always needed to go and extra week, but not now.
I did this during the summer so I could run my light during the summer (hot room). It was just what I needed.

snew said:

Me for one my plants are great. Getting ready to harvest and please all the way around with the results of gardening 12-1. My plants are the size I wanted, the buds are dense and full of crystals. My harvest time is right on breeders schedule, I always needed to go and extra week, but not now.
I did this during the summer so I could run my light during the summer (hot room). It was just what I needed.

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Mine are finishing up a week or so early as was said earlier in this thread by someone else, I kinda wish they didnt finish this early as I just started flushing this past weekend and I already have some cloudy's and an amber trich here and there before week 8 on all 8-9 week strains. Querkle is the only one thats a 60-70 day strain and that is the only one I started the pre harvest flush on time that should finish a little after all of my others, but still a week or more early. I am guessing the querkle will be done by the weeks end which will only be the middle of week 8 or so, I think I'm on day 49 today and I could possibly be cutting down 9 out of 11 plants very very soon, with only a few days of flushing and its making me nervous. I hit them all with clearex and now I have them on straight RO water, but most are still kinda a little too green at finish for me, I really hope these dont taste all that bad. I may let them go a little longer just to get more water through them, as long as my trichs dont go amber on me I think I'll hold out as long as I can. But I will say I am 100% happy with the size of the buds as well, of course bigger is better but they are nice and dense as well as stankin heavily, I'm happy on all accounts except my late start of the flush. Other than that I cant say a single bad word about 12-1 or the diminishing light sch. in flower. I doubt they are going to make it to 9/15 (on/off) though.


Aside from all that, my clones are just starting to root under 12-1 in my small veg tent, so hopefully I'll have those potted up and moving along in the next couple days, actually hoping they take a little longer, like a week so I can get the harvest taken care of.

I'll get some pics tonight while I'm there.

whitey78,
I wouldnt be too worried about the flush, green means the plant is healthy. Now I don't know what nutes you use, but in past my nutes have either been fox farm nutes or what I use now DynaGro and my flushes on soil grows were never 2 weeks of no nutes, nromally no more than about 3 days... nutes were cut back a little the last 1-2 weeks. I have never had a complaint. I think your week of flushing will be sufficient. harvest your plants when you feel they are ready for your needs.

Glad the 12-1 schedule has worked out so well for you!