CFL shortrider auto grow. Need some Help/Advice

Hey guys, this is my first thread on rollitup, been trolling for some time reading up on auto's, cfls etc. Anywho, heres the rub. Ive got two short riders going under cfls, one is about 30 days old give or take a day, only about 5-6 inches tall, the second is a week and a half behind and having some issues. Leaves turned real yellow so i watered it with some nutrients. question is, why is the older plant so short? and why does the younger plant seem SO far behind the other? And i understand the autoflowering concept, but i only bought them under the impression that seed to harvest would only take roughly 2 months, so should i switch the lighting to 12/12 on the bigger plant? I only have 2 feet of height. Any help or insight would be much appreciated

looks like calcium deficiency to me, hopefully the nutes you used were high in it

socalstoned said:

Hey guys, this is my first thread on rollitup, been trolling for some time reading up on auto's, cfls etc. Anywho, heres the rub. Ive got two short riders going under cfls, one is about 30 days old give or take a day, only about 5-6 inches tall, the second is a week and a half behind and having some issues. Leaves turned real yellow so i watered it with some nutrients. question is, why is the older plant so short? and why does the younger plant seem SO far behind the other? And i understand the autoflowering concept, but i only bought them under the impression that seed to harvest would only take roughly 2 months, so should i switch the lighting to 12/12 on the bigger plant? I only have 2 feet of height. Any help or insight would be much appreciated

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can we get some more info...what soil,what nutes...are you checking the ph of the water?
as for the size...most autos have proven to be at best unstable...some grow huge..some stay small.ive seen 2 autos grow at the same time..same soil..same light..and get 2 different plants...they tend to stay small...but to get the most out of the light and get the best growth autos run best on a 20/4 cycle...only switch to 12/12 if it dont autoflower on its own...which many auto strains wont flower on their own...since your at 30 days..and if its showing no sign of preflowers..then go ahead with the 12/12

Autostrains dont grow to well under cfl's. I used hps, 18 hours of lights /day, until they reached the flowering phase then i turned 'em on to 12/12 light cycle. And when using nutriens you have to be carefull, the little ones dont take em as good as the normal ones. AAnd as for the pictures, mybe its calcium(CA) ,mybe Boron (B) but Im not shure couse the pict dont show much.
Good Luck

Just took a look at the plant to look for preflowers and i saw tiny curved leaves with pointy ends that kind of resembled preflowers by the way they point upwards but instead of being straight they had a curve to them... not sure if that helps at all, camera on my iphone wont show the detail.

"Im using Mg organic soil,general hydroponic nutes, floramicro, floragro, and florabloom. PH is good and neutral"?....Your growing in soil and using GH?hm....I know it can be done, but i dont recommend it. It is general HYDROPONICS but still if i were you i would get some good soil nutriens (again;cant help you here). Ph is good and neutral?Neutral as in what?7.0?Couse that is neutral Ph, and that is NOT GOOD for your ladies. You should be feedin 'em with 6.0 - 6.5 (hydro is lower) and if you SEE that she has started to flower, you REALLY should flush them. (Regular tapp water Ph set to 6-6.5) Just to get out the vegg nutts.

Well i was going to do a hydro grow at first so i picked those nutes up, switched to soil and on the packaging it states it can be used for soil and hydro. figured that meant it was ok. and slightly acidic. its been between 6.0 and 6.5 with the exception of the first few waterings. and i see that they just dont look EXACTLY like other preflowers ive seen, a little curved. ok, how much should water should i flush with? 3 gallon pot. been using distilled water the whole grow.

I've used GH for my hydro grow, no 1&2, my friend tried using GH in soil, he had problems, so...I've done auto not to long ago, coco, and i think i would be better off with doin hydro, just pump 'em full of nutts! Do you check your run off?How often you do water em?and flush (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aBzO7f2cmk) i hope this will help you.

Im going to try hydro after this grow depending on how it goes, lol IF it goes. I water them every 2-3 days. Not really sure how much i should be watering them. I dont get much runoff as the mg soil absorbs the water before there is any runoff. Not sure if that means im not watering them enough? Just flushed them now. Hoping for some flowering soon. Pretty sure what i saw at the nodes were preflowers and its a girl.

With Hydro there is less room for error so IMO soil is the way to go for beginers anyway.. keep the ph more around 6.5 for soil and it seems like your watering schedule is good.. Make sure you water them in good though because leaves will yellow and die off really quick if you wait to long to water them and they dry out. I'm not going to go into to much detail on watering because you will learn as you go..

As for the shortrider strain, I just got done growing it! It was my frist grow, it was done with soil and cfl's for lighting and I yielded about 42grams... So whoever said cfl's don't work with auto's are wrong.. Even though I don't consider this strain an autoflower, shit I have 2 monster clones about to go into flowering right now With that being said, if you only have 2ft of height then you definitely need to switch them to 12/12.. Like I said I've had personal experience with this strain and I can tell you that none of mine autoflowered and they will grow to 2 plus feet in veg if you don't switch them!

On the other hand I have noticed that most SHORTRIDERs that do autoflower like there supposed to, seem to be feminized seeds.. I'm guessing you just went with regular like me? Either way if your tight on space you might want to think about "lst" low stress training to save you some room and definitely switch to 12/12 asap.. IF you not seeing little white hairs after 30 days chances are they are not going to autoflower for you..

I have a very detailed shortrider grow on here in the cfl section, its call cfl/stealth cab/short rider I think.. Give it a look if you want to see the harvest and what she looks like budding

I

Hey smelly, actually i was hoping youd tune in, i read your whole grow journal and was very impressed. yeah going to go switch to 12/12 right now actually. dont have tons of room to spare. hoping to get at least an oz out of this but well see : / thanks for the info!

yea switched to 12/12, and actually i got feminized treez, but no white hairs, hoping the switch it light doesnt stress it out and turn hermie : /.

Another question guys, should i let it flower for only a month? or more than that? and flush for 2 weeks before i pull them right?

socalstoned said:

Well i was going to do a hydro grow at first so i picked those nutes up, switched to soil and on the packaging it states it can be used for soil and hydro. figured that meant it was ok. and slightly acidic. its been between 6.0 and 6.5 with the exception of the first few waterings. and i see that they just dont look EXACTLY like other preflowers ive seen, a little curved. ok, how much should water should i flush with? 3 gallon pot. been using distilled water the whole grow.

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distilled water should have a pH of 7.0, so how is it possible that you are between 6 and 6.5 ? How are you measuring the ph ?

They flower for around 60 days and flush the last two weeks, that's right.

Flowering time depends on what you would like from your treez. "Head-High", "Body-High" etc. And the ONLY REAL way to know that they are ready for harvest is to use a microscope, 30 - 100x zoom, and then you look at the trichomes and their color, clear, milky or amber. More amber, more head high but if you leave them to long the "THC" (trichomes) start to dimish.

And as for the flush, if your not using high EC levels, you can flush em a week before harvest.Just make shure you flush em right and with enough water to to the job.

paxneotech said:

Flowering time depends on what you would like from your treez. "Head-High", "Body-High" etc. And the ONLY REAL way to know that they are ready for harvest is to use a microscope, 30 - 100x zoom, and then you look at the trichomes and their color, clear, milky or amber. More amber, more head high but if you leave them to long the "THC" (trichomes) start to dimish.

And as for the flush, if your not using high EC levels, you can flush em a week before harvest.Just make shure you flush em right and with enough water to to the job.

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i learned on my last plant ya cant go just by trichs....my plant started getting mostly milky trichs at week 4 into flowering...then a week later was back to clear trichs...then the next week it was cloudy again.it really depends on that strains flowering period...a lot of people chop early cause their trichs changes.know the strains flowering period....then chop after its reached that and the trich have changed...if you chop just when the trichs change you might be jumping the gun..trichs will change as the plant grow....then when its reached its full flowering time...check the trichs to know what type of high your going to get

I've mostly been going off the looks of the bud when I harvest, once the pistils receed and the calyxes swell its about that time to start checking the trics if you want clear or amber or a mix etc...

socalstoned said:

Hey smelly, actually i was hoping youd tune in, i read your whole grow journal and was very impressed. yeah going to go switch to 12/12 right now actually. dont have tons of room to spare. hoping to get at least an oz out of this but well see : / thanks for the info!

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Nice, I'm glad it helped you socal !!

socalstoned said:

yea switched to 12/12, and actually i got feminized treez, but no white hairs, hoping the switch it light doesnt stress it out and turn hermie : /.

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Don't worry about it going hermie, just make sure it has 12 hours of straight dark every night and you will be golden!

socalstoned said:

Another question guys, should i let it flower for only a month? or more than that? and flush for 2 weeks before i pull them right?

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Mine took 55days to flower and I think I took it a few days early, I would expect 60-70 days flowering including about a week to flush. It could mature faster but it better to prepare yourself.. So more like 2 months flowering for this girl.. IF you keep those lights close and keep her happy you shouldn't have a problem pulling on oz!! Good luck and I'm looking forward to seeing how they turn out for you! I'm about to harvest my second shortrider that was grown under a 1k watt hps, it went through a ton of stress and still didn't hermie but the buds are pretty fat a juicy! I'll throw a couple pics up in about a week when I chop her, I'll let you know if you want to peek at them

Hopin i keep my plant under 2 feet lol ive got two 48" t8's 32w 3000k for flowering and i have some 26w 2700k spirals for side lighting but my plant isnt tall enough for the side lights yet. You think the two t8's should be enough for the time being? i have them always an inch or two away from the plant.

Hows the smoke on the shortrider? good high? yeah let me know how those clones go! super stoked you can clone SR's