Hey thanks for the advice ! I would love to hear how to super crop my 4 girls there 18" now ! If I don't act now I'll end up with the same yield right ! And as to what strains wud be best suited for my set up wud love 20 ounces a crop of 4 girls is that poss ? Thanks again
super cropping is very easy.. ill do the best i can to explain it...
1) pick a spot on the main, or any side branch for that matter, that you want to super crop at... know that wherever you choose, all the growth below that point will start to push up and out... so you want to do it more towards the branch ends... you can do multiple spots on the plant at the same time.. the key is to try to keep them all level to keep the canopy level... it doesnt really matter how close to the node you are.. i prefer to do it somewhere in the middle of any two given nodes..
2) with your pointer finger and thumb gently squeeze the stem until you feel it give.... dont pinch.. you dont want to damage or sever the stem... your basically just softening the stem... the giving will almost feel as tho something popped... or it will just give easily... you can use some force.. sometimes the stems are tough to squeeze.. but like i said.. dont sever it...
3) once you are done squeezing turn your hands 90 degrees from the original posistion and squeeze again... again this is to soften the spot the rest of the way..
once the stem has been pinched both ways it should easily lay over to the side... waa laa you have super cropped..
over the next 3 to 5 days here is what to expect... the spots where you super cropped will begin to upright themselves.. sometimes it happens quicker than other times.. dont worry, as long as you didnt actually pinch through the stem it will upright and be fine... all the growth below that point will start pushing upwards and outwards.. this means all the lower growth that usually is wasted is now up near the light and producing buds.... at least the tops of the lower branches are... plus it also fattens up the bush and the stems... you'll notice where you super crop at, after its all uprighted again, the spot where you actually did the pinching will turn into a little knot... thats normal.. dont worry.. also... sometimes when you bend the stem/branch over you can get some vertical breaks... this is ok.. as long as the breaks run up and down, and not horizontally, everything will be ok.. so if it does happen, dont stress..
you can basically do this as much as you want, and as soon as the plant has uprighted itself... i think i end up doing it at least 1 once a week during veg myself.. if you start now it will help for sure...
as far as strains.. well to be honest i cant remember what set up you had right now to tell ya... ill check back and let ya know in a while tho...
**edit** i checked.. you should try gigabud out... or critical mass... gigabud is cheaper.. matanuska tundra would be great... skunk.. chronic.. norther lights.. big bud... these would all be good.. if you can afford to buy them, or want to breed your own, auto flowers would work great as well...
i think i will do a grow and smoke report as soon as they finish mid january, here is a link to this guy who has some plants with big buds on the main stem only i asked him how he got them like that and he was real vague. maybe you can take a look at his plants and give me a better idea of how he got his plants like that go to page 44 on his thread he has some nice pics thanks simpson, www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/222941-raidermans-og-kush-og-kush-27.html
ill check it out and let you know....
**edit** checked on it... basically there are 3 possibilities.. all of which i think he does...
1) he has large clones go straight into 12/12... this causes few side branches to develope.. making 1 large cola only
2) he does seeds from 12/12... same thing as clones straight to 12/12.. but clones can be mature.. while 12/12 seeds will never reach their full potential since they dont have time to mature..
3) he has short vegged plants that keeps under 3 ft..
the 3ft thing is the key.. he uses 1000w lamps... this will penetrate a canopy about 3 ft... so a 3 ft tall (or under) plant under a 1000w lamp will flower almost completely from top to bottom... this is why his plants are like that...
SimpsonSampson.... i'm thinking of purchasing a HydroFarm radiant ac 400 w hps/mh reflector. i'm just wondering what the coverage area of a 400 watt hps bulb is, as far as the footage that would be covered with primary light. 5' x 5' ? i'm going to build my own " grow tent" setup and would like to use the 400 watt hps. also, how many plants would you suggest i put under 1 400 watt hps? thanks .
a 400w lamp would be good for about a 3x3 to 4x4 area... not much more than that... if you plan on having plants that are over 18" tall you'll want, or at least it would be ideal, to get a larger light.. like a 600w.. 400w's will only give you about 12 to 18 inches of good penetration into a canopy.. so the bottoms and energy are wasted at points below that...
i'd say keep around 6 to 8 - 18" or less plants.. if you find you have more room in the end to add another plant later go for it.. but thats a good manageable number for that light..
Hey, y ou definitely seem to know a lot so i thought i would ask you. A lot of people on here are a bit aloof. I am setting up my second room. First one i used a huge 9 and a half foot by 9 and half ft tent, have some plants vegging right now, couple weeks till i flower, i used soil (foxfarm ) on those and they are under a veg hilux 600 watt grow bulb. Right now I have 1 600 watt and 2 1000 watt lights, no digital ballasts as yet. I want to do hydroponics for the next room and there is no need to use a tent. I just used one for the first room to be safe but this other room is smaller. So I am thinking basically i have 18 babies growing right now, and i have another 40 that are just waiting to root a bit that were just cut off a great mother plant from my friend who is an expert. Basically what i am trying to get around to asking is, my friend said i should get 5 more 600 watt luminex sets with the ballasts, cords etc and he gave me a list of everything to use to set up the hydro. I am wondering how i would set up my systems in both the tent and the other room that will be hydro with the lighting i have. say 6 600 watt lights 2 or 3 1000 watt lights, and 18 babies that are planted and another 40 that will be planted. How would you set those up in two rooms, one that will be hydro and the 18 are in soil pots in tent right now. I hope that makes sense. I am just trying to figure out what lights to put where once my 18 are ready to flower and my 40 are ready to plant. My other room is not as big so i was gonna get two 4 x 8 trays ...will 40 fit in that? Sorry for the babbling, i am not the best at explaining things. Would love a reply if you havee the time to read my novel!
alright.. ill see if i can help ya...
so you'll have 6 x 600s.. and lets say 3 x 1000s....
no since you are planning on using flood trays, you will probably be sticking to smaller plants, probably clones that are straight to 12/12, right?? well.. ill assume that also... based on those things here is what i'd recommend...
use 1 x 600w lamp over each 4x4 section of flood trays... so thats 2 per tray.. or 4 total... you should more than easily fit 40 girls on there.. maybe more possibly.. but a 600w lamp for every 4x4 space will give you plenty of light...
i would set up the other lamps up in the other room.. i think if i were to hang 3 x 1000s and the remaining 2 x 600s i would do this... i'd place the 2 x 600s in a line and the 3 x 1000s in a line.. but have them on opposite axis's... basically have the 1000s run down the middle of the room with the 600's (ideally using a bat wing style reflector to spread light around more) on either side of the center 1000w lamp... with all the lights spaced as equally as possible... if you can control temps enough to use all batwing reflectors (which would take some definitely exhaust work) you'll see the best results since light will be spread more.. but even if they are all in air cooled relfectors youll get great results.. but you may have to rotate plants to get them under the lamps footprints...