is it too late?

I just stumbled upon this forum today, and I've been enjoying reading all of your posts thus far. I would really like some advice on my little baby girl. I've never had any experience with growing before, and she was sort of an accident...*gasp!* but please don't tell her that =)

When I moved into my house a few monthes ago, the people before me left fixtures and lights in the furnace room, I'm fairly certain they were growing, but I really don't know how successfully, the lights are not the expensive ones that people mention here, but merely four 48" cool white cfl fixtures and a bunch of really cheap infra-red lights that get hot like metal halide ones and put out a deep red colored light.

I had a handful of small seedlings at the time, and I immediately started putting the lights to use. I managed to kill all but one little lovely girl, using the really hot halide like type lights. She survived and I moved the light farther away for her protection, I know realize that this causes her to grow really tall and spindly. Anyhow...

I had her on 18-6 with halide lights since the time she was about 4 inches tall, its been about a month and shes now a good 25-30 inches. The thing is...she already started budding a few weeks ago, after reading around here, I sort of decided that the really red halide lights caused this.

to make a terribly long post a bit longer...the question is. Now that I've got her back on cfls will she resume vegetation or is she stuck in flowing mode for good?

perhaps I made that all a bit more complicated then it needs to be...but if someone would impart me a bit of their wisdom I'd greatly appreciate it! thanks much in advance.

I can't be 100% here but I'm almost positive that once flowering has begun, there is no reversing it. One suggestion I might make is to just drop the extra coin and invest in a standard HID lighting setup. The reason I say this, is because the red light you described sounds les like a horticultural grow light, and more like a light for reptiles, and other animals. Also by getting an HID setup, you will have more control over the grow.

As always, I don't claim to know it all so do get second and third opinions if you can.

Good Luck to Ya

Sorry to answer your question with a question, but do you have any pictures of the plant and the lights? I'd say switch it to 12/12 but I'm not sure how stretched it is.

some plants veg regardless of the light cycle, I'd say it's tall enough and it's already started flowering so switch to 12/12. IMO

thankyou all for the advice, the plant was very really stretched out. I don't have any pictures, but it doesn't really matter now...the light fixture broke and crushed her pretty well. It was a little sad...but on the bright side of things, now I get to start over and implement all of the information that I learned on this forum!

thanks for the help guys, I'll be back for sure =)

sorry to hear about the death of your girl but you've got a great attitude about it. I can't wait to start my next grow. I did everything wrong starting out on my current one, but they are 30" tall and all budded out now. I'm actually looking forward to starting 20 new young'uns more than I am my current harvest! Go figure.