obviously i know nothing, but it seems that cfl's are perfect for beginners who are on a budget and growing for personal (1-2 plants) use with no intent to profit. Esp. those in an apartment with electric included. It's a smaller initial investment (26 watt bulbs are 15 bucks for a 5 pack at Lowes and Home Depot, enough for one plant i'm told).
cfls don't require that i buy a 300 dollar lamp and extra money on cooling it. cfls also don't require the electrical expertise needed to do real lighting cheaper than ready made units (don't want to burn my house down). If i do get some smoke with cfls, it would be more smoke than i had initially, and maybe i'll be encouraged to go bigger and better on the next grow (hydro instead of soil, real lights instead of cfls).
Point being, nothing is really lost except time. The cfls have other uses, such as screwing into your lamp. If for whatever reason, i can't/don't want to grow anymore, i'm not stuck with an expensive lamp and ballast that have no other use to me.
HPS and MH lamps are obviously better, the evidence is all over the internet. However, your examples showing that the buds from real lights are bigger than those from cfls reinforce another obvious fact--you can grow bud with cfls.
Smurph bro, I was not trying to knock or put down cfl grows in any sense .. Afterall,I began growing with cfls...
ALL I am trying to humbly do with the intention of this thread ....
Is share and spread the great knowledge I have obtained from research and upon great advice from many of the proven growers On this site and others..So that new growers can use this wisdom to make the best decissions possible when deciding what light source to use during flower period...And hope they dont make the same mistakes thru trial and error as I did first starting out..
With all this being said, My first response to HPS was uncomfortable and maybe stand offish cuz i didnt understand the full meaning of the info being presented to me.. I couldnt afford the big daddy hps lamps..And knew that yes I could harvest a yield using cfls.
In this thread I Spoke of very Inexpensive hps lighting supplements ( U dont need a 300 dollar HPS lamp in a stealth grow) sold at stores very near to most of the people looking at or growing inside this forum...
I explained that by supplementing cfls with these lights..Growers can grow the same type quality and yield amazing quantity...
Bro, THE pix in the first post of this thread....
2 plants side by side.
Cfl plants largest yielded dried bud was 6 grams dried...Yes i didnt do this experiment with the reccomended 125 watt cfls sold at dro stores for about 140 out the door...I did this with several 42 watt cfls sold at home depot which consumed about 4 X more space and output about 3 X more heat..
On the Other hand... The whole entire reason and basis of this thread:
The other plant...My hps bud depicted in the pix was grown under (1) 42 watt (32 bux )same as 150 watt hps lamp sold at home depot..At cure and dry time the largest top cola measured in at 9 inches @ 22 grams dried in the same amount grow room.
What is there to be summed up in this...? Anyone in stealth OPS especially working with cfls in small grow areas should and must begin supplementing cfls with these inexpensive...low heat...space saving supplements.
On Edit: Temps can be easily controlled with small fans just like in cfl grows.....
Also on edit: These fixtures can also be supplemented in addition to the DADDY hps lamps, By placing 3 inches(42watt) above the colas u see fit for uniform maturation and yield during harvest!