hey guys, im about to start my first grow ever today. i just need to know the following about the stages:
germenating- how long does this take?
The reason you may not have found direct answers to your question is probably that you are just not familiar with the site and thats ok, I wasn't familiar with it for a long time, I have an excuse, I am old. Germination can take from a day to a couple of weeks, no one really knows why, some say you can speed it up by germinating in a warm place, I haven't found that necessary, just a wet paper towel, in a closed plastic container is what I use, if you want to see how you could view the first few pages of my blues thread.
vegetative- what light cycle should i put it on?
-and how long does this stage take
You may get 2 different answers to this one, experienced growers have proven that a 24 hour lights on schedule can give you a bigger yield, some prefer the 18on/6 off schedule just becasue they like it, I am one of those, you have to decide this one. As far as to how long you can veg, its kinda dependant on the height you have available, keep in mind your plants will at least double and possible triple thier size once you start flowering so you have to plan for that. Take the height of your pots, and the height of your system, if any, the height of your light and about 2" for the space to your plants if your using cfl's. allow maybe a foot at the top for venting and such. Subtract that from the height of your space. When your plant are 1/3 of that difference, flower them, if it leaves you in the hole the space won't work.
flowering- what light cycle should i use?
- how long does this stage take?
You force flowering changing your light cycle to 12on/ 12 off. And how long that takes is strain dependant, any where from two to three months, sometimes a little more, depending on lights, most seed sellers tell you how long you can expect flowering to take.
some other questions are: what wattage cfl's should i get? is higher or lower better? whats the difference?
Now, here is where you are going to have to do some research, like abe kinda on your own. We even have a subforum for cfl growers, and hundreds of folks have spent thier time posting journals about thier cfl grows, one of our members wrote a book about it, do a little research, go read some grow jornals, they even have pictures. The difference is price and the amount of light they put out, and the yield you get.
i ahve searched 1000+ posts and have not found answers that directly answer these questions, so plaes dont say "research it"
I believe you, name three of them just to show the rest of the folks though, ok. VV
