Using MH light during the first 2 weeks of flower?

I was wondering if this would be a good idea and if it would reduce the stretch of the plants if there is any info or input on this I would greatly appreciate it

If you have a hps I'd switch. Mh keeps them shorter in veg but in flower they are going to stretch regardless, try bending stems over if they get too long.

alright thanks for the quick reply height for my plants is not a concern I was just wondering if there were any advantages but thanks for the info because I should be flowering my plants soon in like a week

no advantage that i can see...never heard of it. if you decide to go for it, let us know how it does.

I'll just go ahead and switch to hps as soon as I start flowering as this is my 1st indoor grow and I would not know how much they normally stretch with a hps anyways so I wouldn't be able to tell if there are any advantages but maybe in the future I can mess around a bit and see what would work best.

interesting, i don't use MH(cfl grower), but i have been doing this with cfl's
first 2 weeks of 12/12 under 5500k, rest of flower under 2700k
no grow higher than 30 inches(though no pure sativa), seems to do what you posted, keeps the stretch down during the 1st 2 weeks

i have a micro mini grow box not more than 2x2 and mabe 2 1/2 feet in height.basically under my desk... using one 100watt Sunpulse 6.4k and 10k lights also have 100watt HPS Phillips bulb. i plan on upgrading it all to 200watts soon to penetrate a dense sea of green heh..anyways i too have to worry about excess strech, my method! simple, Watch the amount of Nitrogen and certin supplememtal feeds when in veg going into flower. Also i dont use high amounts of N % in my Veg solution. when in transition i use the 6.4k SP MH for week n half....then switch to my HPS. Soon will run dual lights at 100watts...keep overhead cooler dubble wattage and mix spectrum...So far my nugs look like the top of Mt high...Going into flower i use certian NPK ratios and feeds to keep this all in line while ading in enough nitrogen....In middle of veg i use Dutch master Gold.....which has low P...then i move to the CNS17Ripe.....while still in veg transition to flower...then i cut the CNS17 all together and go with Solid PK and K boosters at the appropaite time along with additves and Humic acids, honey later down the line.....it all comes out dank.

CNS17 even though for rip still has a good NPK for a quick 1week -2 week add in as a base....1-5-4

But this all changes from strain to strain......Currently The Durban Posion OG is lovin it.

Great post Jcazz, i very much appreciate the detailed info you gave I may just keep the mh on for the first week or two of flowering to see if it really does keep the stretch down like I said before I'll be flowering in like a week so I'll come back and post my results to see if it does have an effect or not

for reals if you can use both, it best

what wattage are you using?

i forgot to mention that i use CNS17 again at the last week...for one shot, mabe week before, all this is all dependant on stain and of course if you are growing Sativa, or a Indica plant....remeber that genetics will make a big call in all of this as well.

Brick Top said:

what wattage are you using?

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I use a 400w convertible MH/HPS light

Locked Up said:

I use a 400w convertible MH/HPS light

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The reason I asked is if you used a 600-watt or a 1000-watt I would say you might want to try one of the dual filament bulbs that are both MH and HPS. The 600-watt is 300-watts of MH and 300-watts of HPS and the 1000-watt is 400-watts of MH and 600-watts of HPS. I thought that might be a better option for you for getting a mixed broader light spectrum for your plants.


But using a 400-watt you could go with an AgroMax 400 watt High Pressure Sodium Bulb. It puts out 55,000 lumens and adds an additional 30% more "blue" spectrum over standard HPS bulbs.


I can understand the desire to keep down what wold be normal flowering stretch but being in flower your plants do wand and need more HPS light spectrum so I was thinking of ways to give them what they want and need the most and give you at least some of what you hope for too.


No matter what you do the natural growth spurt in flower, that people like to call stretch, is genetically coded so you will only be able to limit it so much no matter what you do and it's not worth not giving your plants what they want and need the most while in flower trying to fight genetics.


If you want shorter final plant height, veg for a shorter length of time, but give your plants the light spectrum they want and need the most in flower. They will like it better and they will thank you with better production and higher quality.