Is it possible to restart the flowering process?

Basically I have a crop of 11 plants in flowering, throughout the grow I've been picking buds off 2 specific plants, now the plants I haven't been are swelling very nicely where as the ones I've been taking off have small immature buds that keep regenerating.

My question is, could I slap the 2 plants back into veg for a week or two, and then put them back into flower and start the process over again? They're currently just into week 4 of flower. I want these plants to yield what they originally were going to, and I don't mind waiting, I have a batch of 11 clones that are about to go into flower as well, and I figured this would be good time to do it.

nine33 said:

Basically I have a crop of 11 plants in flowering, throughout the grow I've been picking buds off 2 specific plants, now the plants I haven't been are swelling very nicely where as the ones I've been taking off have small immature buds that keep regenerating.

My question is, could I slap the 2 plants back into veg for a week or two, and then put them back into flower and start the process over again? They're currently just into week 4 of flower. I want these plants to yield what they originally were going to, and I don't mind waiting, I have a batch of 11 clones that are about to go into flower as well, and I figured this would be good time to do it.

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they will turn hermie.

Yes, yes you can. This is called secondary budding.

What you usually do is star flowering, then in the middle of flowering you switch back to 18/6. Revegging starts, the plant streches more, creates more bud sites, while the buds keep on growing. Then, after 2-4 weeks, you switch back to 12/12 and the old buds will continue growing while new ones pop up in the new bud sites.

Heard of this technique first time from KingSp4d3. I'v enever heard of this process producing hermies, even thou it seems stressful.

Doctor Cannabis said:

Yes, yes you can. This is called secondary budding.

What you usually do is star flowering, then in the middle of flowering you switch back to 18/6. Revegging starts, the plant streches more, creates more bud sites, while the buds keep on growing. Then, after 2-4 weeks, you switch back to 12/12 and the old buds will continue growing while new ones pop up in the new bud sites.

Heard of this technique first time from KingSp4d3. I'v enever heard of this process producing hermies, even thou it seems stressful.

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As for hermies, I honestly don't think we know just yet what causes a hermie. Some say light leaks will, but plants are exposed to stray light 24/7 in the wild. Some say stress does it, but I've broken plants in half, completely cut their foliage off, nute burned the hell out of them, all of which would be extremely stressful to a plant; and still no hermies. So yeah there are occasions when people have done this and the results were hermies, but that is not the case everytime and we cannot 100% say that this process is what caused the hermie in the first place.

I did it in two different ways with some White Widow.
I of them I harvested almost every flower off her careful not to cut off any leaves I didn't have to.
The other girls I left the flowers on and revegged as well.
I would have to say that I should have just harvested all of them and started again.
The one I cut up grew new branches and new budsites that were very similar to regular budsites.(But the harvest is small)
The other girls basically just swelled with new leafs and then swelled again with new flowers.
The problem though is that some of the older budsites start to die off!
This can't be seen unless the buds are man-handled and pulled away from each other.
Which brings up another issue. No air gets in between these flowers like it should.
This means the center is very fluffy.
I wouldn't do it again unless I couldn't get more clones or seeds.
All in all, I think it is much more productive just to start anew.
Good luck, though.

AquafinaOrbit said:

As for hermies, I honestly don't think we know just yet what causes a hermie. Some say light leaks will, but plants are exposed to stray light 24/7 in the wild. Some say stress does it, but I've broken plants in half, completely cut their foliage off, nute burned the hell out of them, all of which would be extremely stressful to a plant; and still no hermies. So yeah there are occasions when people have done this and the results were hermies, but that is not the case everytime and we cannot 100% say that this process is what caused the hermie in the first place.

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I've heard the thoery that it's actually the seed companies fault due to feminizing or just bad genetics that cause hermies. Saying that hermies are caused by stress thus becomes a way of shifting the blame away from the seed companies. And if you think about it, plants are exposed to stress in the wild all the time (animals tromping on them, bugs chewing on them, uneven photoperiods due to clouds), never seen a wild hemp plant hermie...

I'm not saying this theory is absolutely true, it's just that I support AquafinaOrbit's questioning regarding hermies. More research should be done on this subject.

feminized seeds are known for turning hermie. i had a hermie that had an extremely stressful life, light leaks, lack of water, nasty dirt and lots of bad shit, but it held out and must have been female dominate cuz i picked the balls of carefuly and none ever grew again. ... not sure about hermies.

So it's possible, with not always successful results. Sounds interesting. I think I'll go ahead and do this, I have plenty of plants starting to finish, and I kind of want these to turn into big bushes. They don't stretch much during flowering, so my sativa dominates just have completely outgrown them at this point. Thank you everyone for the help.

alot of stress man...

It is indeed a lot of stress. I won't be too disappointed if they turn hermie, I'll just make some fem seeds in that case.

nine33 said:

So it's possible, with not always successful results. Sounds interesting. I think I'll go ahead and do this, I have plenty of plants starting to finish, and I kind of want these to turn into big bushes. They don't stretch much during flowering, so my sativa dominates just have completely outgrown them at this point. Thank you everyone for the help.

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Ya, it's definitely possible.
Here is what my White Widows look like today.
The front right one was harvested once and the other three just re-flowered.

Looking good Sure Shot. That boasts my confidence in doing this.

From what I've read, light leaks and light exposure in an irregular manner is what generally causes hermies. The definite change from 12/12 to 18/6 and continuing with 18/6 doesn't apply the same stress as random exposure used in light poisoning to create hermies, which never get brought out of the flowering process. By bringing it back into veg, waiting awhile, and then putting the plant back into flower, it minimizes stress.