36 hours darkness @ 1 week into flowering

hey guys, i just read about giving plants a 36 hours dark period BEFORE inducing budding, but my plants are now 1 week into flowering, and im thinking about giving them a 36 hours dark period to reduce stretching, due to height limitations. would this be possible? anyone done it before? and wont it make em go hermie?
thx in advance
sickboy

i would leave the lights alone and just pinch the stems, not break them just crush them a little below most of the bud sites, slows the stretch and they come back even stronger . just one spot on each main cola at the bottom. it helped with my sativas that way. good luck.

I agree with bagseed. Never heard of giving them 36 hours of darkness before flipping the lights. Not to say it isn't true, Id just go with a documented method like pinching the stems.

I am an avid user of the 24-36 hours of darkness at the light schedule change. I have never tried it after a week and doubt it will help much because your ladies are getting to the point that the darkness would have gotten them to. Plus, I've never tried it and dunno if its really great... extra darkness in flowering isn't the worst though. It's extra light thats bad..But you don't want either

from what ive read, a 36 hour dark period would reset the plants internal clock, and kick it into flowering immediately, hereby reducing stretch, rapid bud formation, even in the first weeks, and reducing flowering time. anyone else who has experience with the 36 hour thingy, and/or has tried it in flowering?
sickboy

I've done it with sativas and it seemed to work.

I've also heard(or read, rather), that giving 24-36hrs of dark a few weeks before chop will help the plants produce more resin, any truth to this?

i think a 36 or 48 (?) dark period right before harvesting makes the resin glands swell a bit...

P.S.: did u do it in flowering or right before the flip?

Bog used to do these "dark periods'. I never noticed a worthwhile difference using his strains...

Hello sickboy.

Dark periods are for inducing flowering (prior to 12/12), and also at the end of flowering, to aid in the final finishing of the crop (prior to harvest).

Can't say i'v heard of doing this during 12/12, other than there being some kind of problem with lights/timer....

I'd even suggest tying the tops down. Although nipping the tips can also be effective in slowing growth.

Good luck fella

Jus thad this happen by accident, some favorable results, but I have bene meaning to get pictures, show side by side and give some analysis

I would NOT do that its likely to cause more problems then anything. There are many methods to limit the growth of your plants. Easiest being just pinch the stems with your fingers.

i do this all the time ... if i need a quicker crop i will put them into 36 hours darkness then go onto 12/12 , it nocks 1 to 2 weeks of you're flowering time , but reduces yield , bud formation isn't as long , because of the less stretch factor of putting um into flower quicker ... sativas love it , very short and quick flowering indicas hate it , meaning they dont yield much at all and stay to short to get a good yield and finish to fast ...

If I am growing a land race pure sativa I some times put them in darkness before 12/12 for as long as 4 days , they seem to need longer to trigger quicker flowering . Then I will flower them on a 10 hour lights on 14 dark cycle …
this keeps them very short compare to 12/12 with no pre dark period ...

If you are thinking about topping your plants , it is generally considered wise to top them at least 5 days before changing your light cycle to 12/12 .
This is because your plants need time to generate the hormones that tell the plant which is its main head .
after topping and waiting say a week before changing your light cycle you will notice that what were side branches are now almost as big as single main heads ... but topping just before you switch to 12/12 will make for a far less yield at harvest , because the side branches didn't get time to turn into heads and stay small ...
if we top our plants it is normally a good idea to trim the leaves and small shoots at the bottom of the plants, as they will become very bushy and hard to trim at harvest time . also it makes for more bud to leaf ratio on the overall crop ...

try using netting and pull the branches through it till the netting is lower than the top of the plants , then gently bend with out snapping and wieve them through the netting , this will save you loads of high trouble , and keep your buds from falling ... then on your next crop try the 36 hour method or topping .... hope this help you out matey ..

thx for the replies guys now i just noticed today that internode spacing is getting tighter, so i hope the most of the stretch is done, ill try pinching the shoots a bit and we'll see how it goes, if i rlly get height issues (burned tops etc) ill tie em down, no problem i just underestimeted the sativa-ishness of the strain its mango from kc brains, supposed to be a afghani like strain, but does quite a sativa stretch, afghanis are mostly indica right?
ttfn
sickboy

Edit: p.s.: im growing with a scrog, changed to 12/12 when they were nicely aligned to the scrog, now they've shot up about 25 cm already^^

I just tried it with my current crop, mainly because it was recommended by the bloom supplements (Agricultural Organics aka the yellow bottle stuff) to kickstart flowering. So far it's been nearly two weeks and I don't see any real difference from doing it the normal way....hasn't hurt anything though.

- kgb

I fed 4 sativa plants nothing but plain water for the first 3 weeks of flower. They were vegged until they were a foot tall. They stretched to 4 feet. If you want to control stretch then control the veg. There is a lot of energy stored in them there leaves. Pinching works, but it makes more shoots (if thats what you want).

I did the 36 hours with the Bloom nutrients as they suggested...the nodes are a lot closer in than last batch...and had flowers a 3/5 days sooner...

I'm doing this instead of BushMaster/Phosphoload...

I also use the pinch method to stop stretch...on one of the "Urban Grower" shows they called it "Supercropping" - pinching top and bending over at 90 degrees but not breaking (pops back up next day)...

But as everyone said, this at turn of 12/12 not a week into 12/12...best bet is pinching or BushMaster...(run at 1/4 of what they say)

doing this right now for the first time i'll post up results since it was hard to find topics

made my plants stretch a few inches for some reason??? turned the leaves a light green,,from a decent dark green colour. left in dark for 48 hours.

hairs are showing 2 days after flipping, plants look better should have green back in 2-3 days