How long do plants veg for?
- Thread starter dustyD
- Start date
GrowingfortheGold
New Member
It is up to you to determine how long the veg is. Could be 8 months to 1 week whatever is best for your grow and setup.
Chickadie
Member
How long to veg your plants is somewhat of a personal choice. Plants tend to double or triple in size during the flower stage, so some people may need to put their plants into flowering earlier in order to prevent any height issues during flowering.
Ideally you would wait until the plants have alternating nodes before putting them into flowering.
You can veg a plant as long as you would like though. Many people will keep a mother plant in a vegetative state for many months in order to take clones from her - and put her into flowering at a much later date.
Yield can also be a factor in deciding when to flower your plants. The longer a plant is in vegetation the more growth you will gave, and therefore the more yield you will get.
Chickadie
Member
oh - I'm sorry. I node is like a joint (the body kind not the smoking kind). Either where a branch comes out of, or where a leaf is/was attached to the stem.
GrowingfortheGold
New Member
Just for reference a 3 gallon pot will hold a plant for about 2 months. A 5 Gallon is about 4. If your plants are growing slowly though a 3 gallon could go 3 months and a 5 gallon could go 5 months. This is all total time in pots (Veg+Flower)
However you should consider your light footprint and lumens aswell. Yield will also increase the longer you veg.
So how long you veg is really an understanding of your own grow. It is a combination of the limitations of your container size, total light output, and efficiency of longer veg vs yield.
Checked out your grow looking good. I'd flower your plants by now though man. What size are your net pots? Over 2 week veg is usually pushin it with small net pots.
However you should consider your light footprint and lumens aswell. Yield will also increase the longer you veg.
So how long you veg is really an understanding of your own grow. It is a combination of the limitations of your container size, total light output, and efficiency of longer veg vs yield.
Checked out your grow looking good. I'd flower your plants by now though man. What size are your net pots? Over 2 week veg is usually pushin it with small net pots.
dustyD
Well-Known Member
aha! i see wut your getting at being this as my first grow im a little anxious to get my girls from plant to paper quick
thanks for the help i appreciate it +rep
greenjumble
Well-Known Member
You want to shoot for 5-6 nodes or sections where the branches come out of the stem. I saw 3 on your plant and you should not include the pre-leaves or very first set. You also have to look at the height space and light that you have. "Patience is the key" be careful with the nutes your using I was using them and they have a lot of salt and Ph fluctuation associated with them. B.C./technaflora does a nice recipe that doesn't burn your plants and keeps the Ph stable. Basically if you let your plants grow to a fully mature 6 nodes you will get a nicely developed plant. If you flower too soon you will get a smaller less producing plant. If your plant is Indica Dominant I would let it veg to 6 nodes and at least a month's worth of time. This will give you a nice harvest. Larger robust plant with the right light=Larger robust buds. Flower earlier/smaller=less buds. Hope this is helpful
dustyD
Well-Known Member
yea they are really small, 6in pots so how should i start for the whole flowering phase, should i change my lighting from 16/8 to 12/12, wut else do i need to do, i was hoping to get a HPS on the plants for the flowering phase. also one last question does the room have to be totally fenced off during the flowering phase?
leethewarmage
Active Member
i veged my 1st grow in a hydro with 360 spayers for almost two months. that was a bad idea, put them in to veg around 19 inchs for the indicas and 24 for the sativa now i am like 6 weeks in to flower and they are well over 50 inchs. half the space i have is two 34 gallon totes stack so be carfull and use fem seeds. i used bag for my 1st( waiting for seeds to come from nirvana, dont get mixed fem you wont know what they are) gentics are all werid some flowered later then others and i ended up with one hermi(dead) one male(dead) two sativas and two indicas, who knew!
Chickadie
Member
I'm sorry -- I have to disagree with you on this one - as I have seen many mother plants kept alive/healthy for MUCH longer than 4 months in a 5-gallon pot.
superdave5
Active Member
Im going to have to agree with chickadie on that one. Good info and mother plants can EASILY survive more than 4 months in a 5 gallon pot. Also, chickadie- welcome to the site its nice to have more female growers. So WELCOME
Chickadie
Member
Thank you Super Dave! Someone from his site (via a google search) inspired me to try perlite hempy buckets - so, I thought I'd join.Im going to have to agree with chickadie on that one. Good info and mother plants can EASILY survive more than 4 months in a 5 gallon pot. Also, chickadie- welcome to the site its nice to have more female growers. So WELCOME
GrowingfortheGold
New Member
In flowering roots will grow a great amount. Those time frames were accounting for flowering and veg not just veg. Flowering nutes are high in phos which is key for the expansion of roots as it take huge amount of energy to produce buds. Plants will transpire more in flowering and use more water and are able to due to the massive root zone.
GidgetGrows
Well-Known Member
To initiate flowering you change your lights timer to 12/12 and if able change your light spectrum to 2700-3000k.
Chickadie
Member
This is going to be an easy one! Just change your light schedule to 12 hours on, and 12 hours off.
You want to make sure that you have ZERO light leaks in your space, as light leaks are the #1 cause of hermies.
You'll want to avoid going in or out of the grow space when the lights are out - so when you schedule your lights for 12/12 be sure that the lights are on during times when you are most likely to be gardening. Also, when deciding when to turn your lights on - consider that it's best to water in the morning (or when the lights first come on).
Be sure to use a timer for the 12/12 schedule - as inconsistency in light times can also cause plants to turn hermie.
as the previous poster said - you'll also want to change your bulbs to either a HPS bulb, or 2700k spectrum bulbs.
dustyD
Well-Known Member
Sounds simple enough! looks like i got some work cut out for me on this week off school is flowering under flourescents worth the time? i also have a 400 watt HPS bulb but no ballast or fixture so thats alot of investments at this point, for the first time grower wut do you suggest?