Trichomes not clear 5th week of Flowering

These trichomes look too milky for me in the 5th week of flowering. Comments? (Soil, 400w MH veg 8 weeks, 400w MH/1000w HPS flower).

Take a macro picture of the trichomes...the bud itself doesnt look ready though. What strain by the way?

The pistils are all white and the bud isn't bulky enough. I start looking at my trichomes when all the pistils start turning color and pulling back into or close to the calyx. So it's not time to even look at trichomes. The reason I try to limit getting close to trichomes is they come off the plant on your hands/camera/loupe etc..

You need a loupe or something in the neighborhood of 30 to 100 magnification. You can get a Carson Cooper Handheld microscope for about 10 bucks at most Radio Shacks. So you can see them close enough to tell for sure. I have some trichome images in my grow journal if you'd like to see them.

Essentially trichomes start out clear, go to milky and finally amber. So if they have all turned milky on you you are close to harvest but from that photo your trichomes look they are mostly clear no cloudy. Anyway you are still early - mid flower.

yah what he said. so many people checking trichs when the time isn't even near...

I think it is useful to check trichomes whenever possible and follow them along, even in mid-flower. Perhaps it may be interesting for others reading the thread.

Anyways, another better macro photo shows clearly that all of the trichomes are clear as they should be.

A good portion of them still look clear mate. Not yet.

Oh, forgot. The strain is El Dorado. Plants are not molested for photography.

By the small photo you have provided, my educated guess would be you are at best half way through flowering.

She is no where NEAR ready dude! That strain goes 11-12 weeks!!!
And you can only start counting days of flower AFTER it starts flowering in 12/12- no matter how long it is IN 12/12 before it starts! With a Sativa dominant strain like Eldorado- that can take 2-3 weeks-- so she MAY only be in week 4 of flower and have 6-8 to go!
Without a good magnifier- you can't really tell what the trichomes look like--- they should look like lollipops or mushrooms- some at this point will look like fingers or spikes-meaning they are not mature and contain little-to-no THC...
look for milky Trichomes around week 10-11 then start flushing....

OOPS! posted while you were putting up your last photo..

Yeah- those are ALL clear hun.. and like I said- that strain of MJ takes 11-12 weeks.. you need a LOT of patience-- cuz you got at LEAST 5 weeks to go!!!

What did you use to take the close up picture?

Canon EOS 7D with the Canon EF 180mm macro lens, and MT-24 flash unit. I get more magnification with 1/4 inch spacers, but image quality is degraded. So I zoom with Photoshop.