Pistols

Well it is almost time to harvest my indoor plants. I have been growing since august and my plant is nearly five feet tall smells good, looks good is very healthy I haven't had any problems until recently. Yesterday I noticed that my pistols that were about 80% brown and amber.. and suddenly right before my eyes (about 4 days later) new white pistols has emerged from everywhere (bottom to top)!!!!!

I am so confused and as i said i was ready chop her down but now i am very unsure..
what I want to know is has this happened to anyone else?? and if i chopped it down now is this a late harvest? or would this phase be considered to early to harvest?
PS. ( through my microscope 60x 100x it is very difficult to tell, I did see a mixture of clear cloudy and amber but I am still unsure if it's ready) and as I stated earlier; my pistols were 80% amber until these new white pistols appeared!!! ANY IDEAS???? PLEASE HELP... THANKS

You don't look at pistols to accurately gauge harvest. You look at trichromes for the amberness. I would say keep going, I suppose. Are the buds getting bigger?

Yes. The buds and the cola are very very swollen, they had been swollen about a week days before the fresh/ new white pistols emerged everywhere!! (top to bottom) With my naked eye_ one day I was seeing about 80-90% and then about 5 or 6 days later it was only about 60-70%. amber due to the new "growth"?
I have been looking through my microscope 60x-100x, I can tell you that I've seen, clear, cloudy, and amber every time that I have looked through the microscope recently, but.. I guess my vision isn't all that great because I am unable to tell Confidently if is it ready by looking through the scope

Even if I could accurately tell via the microscope, having these fresh white pistols emerge everywhere so late into flowering/near harvest is so confusing.. Have you ever seen/experienced that before???????????? I want to keep it going as you said I'm just really confused by the new white pistols....
I don't wanna over do it, don't wanna under do it...
Any more ideas, advice or any suggestions are a great help to me!

Ps. Posting pics tomorrow afternoon( lights are off right now..) any feed back is greatly appreciated from you until then..
THANK YOU!!!!

1) They are "pistils"

2) It's perfectly normal for new flowers to appear late in bloom. When observing pistils as you are, simply ignore the newer flowers. However, the above poster is correct in that you should be looking at more important characteristics such as trichome color, calyx size, and pistil recession to determine your harvest time, not pistil color.

Alright, sugaweed. I'm about 2 weeks from harvest myself and my buds are looking pretty mature. I watered them tonight and noticed that they have exploded with white hairs where there were a lot of nice red and brown one's already; I'm guessing just like yours is doing. I guess they just keep doing this until they're ready to harvest. wmd, do you have any experience on this? dude, the first thing I would do is not freak out. The plants feel the nervousness of newbie growers and I think it reflects. I'm not really worried about when they're supposed to be ready. At this point, if it takes another month, so be it. I'm tired of smoking shitty herb man. It's an epidemic around here.

And isn't 70% amber a shit-ton? As in, way past due?

R theygoin back nto calyx

scrottiemcboogerballs said:

Alright, sugaweed. I'm about 2 weeks from harvest myself and my buds are looking pretty mature. I watered them tonight and noticed that they have exploded with white hairs where there were a lot of nice red and brown one's already; I'm guessing just like yours is doing. I guess they just keep doing this until they're ready to harvest. wmd, do you have any experience on this? dude, the first thing I would do is not freak out. The plants feel the nervousness of newbie growers and I think it reflects. I'm not really worried about when they're supposed to be ready. At this point, if it takes another month, so be it. I'm tired of smoking shitty herb man. It's an epidemic around here.

And isn't 70% amber a shit-ton? As in, way past due?

Click to expand...

Yes, 70% amber is WAY overdone. Means up to 70% of your THC has degraded.

boogerballs i am so glad to hear a similar story (i looked every where and could find anything on "new white pistols! @ Boogerballs and Wbd and everyone else thank you for your input and suggestions! @ Price purple the have receded, and I have decided that I am going to wait just a few more days seeing as though i noticed more "snow" on the leaves after the new pistols had emerged. I just flushed it, and now I'm simply waiting on it to dry before harvest. Please note: that when i made reference to 70-80% of the pistols being amber i was only referring to the outer pistols with my naked eye.

( not looking through the microscope.) 70% amber on the outer pistols wont give you a shit ton right????? lol. from what i"ve heard if you look underneath the microscope and see 70% amber, then THAT would be considered a shit ton/overdue right? (Please correct me if I am wrong) Im pretty much still a new but i have been having excellent results THANK YOU guys again your comments are VERY appreciated!!!!!.

If you want.. Please take a look at the videos (I posted a link that directs you to my you tube videos /page http://youtu.be/g6IIySBjhW4 just copy and past!

along with the pictures that I"ve posted here, and please leave Suggestions, Comments, and Questions!!!! and let me know what you think!

[video]http://youtu.be/g6IIySBjhW4[/video]

[video]http://youtu.be/g6IIySBjhW4[/video]

here are the pics that i promised!

I think the video gives a little more detail, and there is no need to copy and paste simply click the link and my home video will begin(Posted from youtube) thanks in advance for all your help!!

You been given all you need regarding info.

If your plants are @ 70% amber trichs you are already too late, you might be able to get something out of it though, but every hour you wait will just contribute to less THC and less potent herb.
Just make sure you try to aim for 100% cloudy trichomes next time, to ensure maximum potency

Now you've got my second guessing myself now dude. My leaves look a bit amber but there is a lot of new growth on the buds. I am going to be stubborn and give it two more weeks as I have originally intended but I definitely see the amber tint on the leaves. I'm going to chalk up my paranoia to the bud within my lungs right now. It certainly hasn't been long enough according to the website and from what I understand, one usually has to give it longer than those say.

scrottiemcboogerballs said:

Now you've got my second guessing myself now dude. My leaves look a bit amber but there is a lot of new growth on the buds. I am going to be stubborn and give it two more weeks as I have originally intended but I definitely see the amber tint on the leaves. I'm going to chalk up my paranoia to the bud within my lungs right now. It certainly hasn't been long enough according to the website and from what I understand, one usually has to give it longer than those say.

Click to expand...

Do you have a microscope?
Because that'll help an awful lot.

k0ijn said:

Do you have a microscope?
Because that'll help an awful lot.

Click to expand...

It's becoming abundantly obvious to me that I'm not going to be able to fight getting one of those anymore. To radioshack I go.

well if your like me they will only help to a certain degree the 12-15 dollar ones are waaaaay over rated if you ask me! I purchased mine from radio shack and it help some.. i still felt as though i need "more" like those microscopes from back in biology class!! Lol

Try a USB microscope attached to a laptop, mine does 100x zoom and takes pictures like this...

Some of them are blurry but thats my fault from just pushing the button too hard to take the pic and knocking it outta focus.

okay those are good pics. And thats a great alternative....didnt think of that....thanks

You can also use a powerful camera (12 MP or above should do the trick).
Then take _macro_ shots in high resolution, you'll end up with pictures where you can zoom in and see the individual trichomes.
But if you don't have such a camera already, a microscope is a cheaper option.


Edit: Here's a picture I took with a 12 MP camera 4000 x 3000:

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/511/img0558y.jpg/

If you right click + save and zoom on it you can clearly make out the individual trichomes (you have to save it as 4000 x 3000)

How about split the difference? Harvest half now, half later and see what's best.

xxsugaweedxx said:

here are the pics that i promised!

Click to expand...

needs round 2 more weeks those hairs are very alert and white. Its still growing, very slowly though and doesnt look very happy. no offence or anything but is this a bag strain and are you just beginning? I only say this because when I first started mine use to look like that...full of hairs, looked decent on the plant but once it was dried is shrank to next to nothing. And smoked like shit. You want the hairs to recede to swell the calyx which is where the thc is...not of the hairs. Then they will look nice and ripe