stressing a plant

[mad librettist]

so I'm thinking of trying some ways to stress my plants before harvest. I don't want to talk about whether it helps, really, but I'd love to hear about some interesting ways to stress a plant.

So far I am probably going to put my plants through a drought.

anything else?

 

[trichosaurus]

Water deprivation, light disruptions, temperature fluctions. There are many ways to stress a plant.
Why are you doing this exactly? Stress at the end of flower seems unnecessary. Some people stress plants early in flower to cause hermies but never heard of stressing at the end.

 

[mad librettist]

well, I don't want to start fights...

but I've noticed all manner of plant putting an extra kick into flowering just before dying. So I figure, I can make the plant think it's dying.

But if it's been tried and found to do nothing, what's the point?

 

[trichosaurus]

Never heard that before but Id be interested to know what you find. Seems like a very difficult thing to determine but good luck.

I dont know if its stressing the plant like youve explained but I alwys pull my plants out and leave them in the dark for 2-3 days before chopping and hanging. Not sure if it does anything or not but Ive never been disappointed by my bud so no need to stop now, ya'know?

 

[Matanuskan Flo]

some landrace strains in asia are specifically or rather purposely Girdled to mostly aid in the curing/drying process. but, many also say that it does what you hope to achieve - shock the plant into survival mode & excrete more corpsules/stamen in an effort to procreate. girdling involves the stripping of a portion of the lower stem, much like if you were to strip a stereo wire w/ wire strippers, but right in the middle of the wire, not the end part. so, on the plant, you would strip an inch or so tall area all the way around the stem stalk, the depth of the stripping is what i am not certain about. i believe you go into the phylem, but i am not certain. so, look that up.

on a side note, def cut off a few buds before you do anything to make a viable comparison to the ones you stress.

 

[Duckmang]

I stressed my plants once with a low pH due to being too lazy to calibrate the meter regularly. It was right after I put them into flowering. Once they bounced back they took off flowering like crazy looking like they had several more weeks flowering than they actually had. Been meaning to reproduce those conditions to see if I could duplicate those results but havn't yet.

 

[Young Pumpkin]

I stressed my plants once with a low pH due to being too lazy to calibrate the meter regularly. It was right after I put them into flowering. Once they bounced back they took off flowering like crazy looking like they had several more weeks flowering than they actually had. Been meaning to reproduce those conditions to see if I could duplicate those results but havn't yet.

I've done similar my self with a breeding plant. Just really didn't pay much attention as I was overcrowded anyway but when I had room and the time the darn thing went into overdrive. I just wanted some seeds when I started. I've wanted to duplicate that too. To have been so overlooked and then BOOM. I was amazed. Haven't tried the seeds yet. I wonder now, for the heck of it, what the M/F ratio might be? I'm pretty sure the ph and other factors were way off from would they should have been

Oh, fer grins, mine bloomed for a long time, and maybe a bit more than it should have. But again it was a seed mother. Amazing results tho.........all things considered.........and I have now re-arranged the lights and can get to all four sides quite easily. No more "in the corner and hard to reach" areas. I'm not sure what the normal yield is as it was new to me, but it seemed like I got more than I might have normally. Almost like a 2nd bloom cycle took over. I think I bloomed it for close to 5 months. I just let it do its thing to see how it turned out. Glad I did.

 

[milehighmedical]

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[mad librettist]

hey, old school is the best school!

thanks guys, looks like I'm not crazy.

 

[PhenoMenal]

keep in mind that stressing some plants can also make them throw out pollen pods. You can actually use that pollen to create feminised seeds, but such stress-receptive plants are usually avoided at all cost when breeding (whether making regular or feminised seeds).

Stress-resistancy on the other hand is a very good quality for a plant to have

 

[messn'n'gommin']

This may help some:

"The Chemical Ecology of Cannabis," by D.W. Pate
http://www.hempfood.com/Iha/iha01201.html

Namaste, mess

 

[mad librettist]

keep in mind that stressing some plants can also make them throw out pollen pods. You can actually use that pollen to create feminised seeds, but such stress-receptive plants are usually avoided at all cost when breeding (whether making regular or feminised seeds).

Stress-resistancy on the other hand is a very good quality for a plant to have

good point. I forgot to mention this plant is bulletproof and could care less about light leaks. It will flower without problems (other than low light) on a windowsill.

 

[milehighmedical]

.

 

[grapeman]

I vote to girdle the stalks down at the bottom of the plant. Lots of crops are girdled using a specially made knife. But for this, I would recommend a "cane girdle knife".

Girdling would certainly shock and stress the plant. But with the added effect of backing up the nutrients from the roots into the top portion of the plant, making fruit or flowers bigger (the flower part is theory on my part but I know it works on fruits). Permanent crops such as grapes and stone fruits are girdled every year, but the trunk heals in several weeks. The cut on this plant would not heal, therefore I would suggest you girdle only in the last week or 2 before cutting.

I've read that the old "Columbian gold" from the 1960's and '70"s were girdled.

I've got a cane girdler on my shelf and have been meaning to try this but I always forget. Same could be done with soft wire I suppose, just tighten the wire around the stalk at the bottom until the wire cuts into the Phleom up to, but not into the the Cambium layer of the plant.

You can see in the link below that even Sunflowers were girdled by the USDA while they studied the effects, which were increased carbohydrates and sugars in the fruit and flowers at the tops of the plants.

http://books.google.com/books?id=qd...AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=girdling techniques&f=false

 

[Danseur]

As already touched on by some other members, stressing can be useful for a number of things. If you are looking to increase resin production by stressing I would urge you to incorporate these "stress" over time rather than just before you harvest.

Your reasoning for the "stress" is to increase resin production, a valid reason at that! This stress imo is not bad. What is stress anyways? IMO stress is something that takes focus from one aspect of growth and lending it to another in an inefficient way far away from the intended goals of the gardener. Stress imo should be avoided unless used to weed out the unfit from a specific environment. If growing for increased resin is the goal of the gardener, then that is what all focus should be on in the first place! It goes from being a stress to being the method. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder type of deal. Not so much semantics as it sounds, but a different view to approach your goal from.

Please be wary of incorporating stress that will adversely affect other systems within the plant. If you want to max out the resin on a cut you are already familiar with, then you will only be satisfied for the same quality but more resins. This will take time and you are the only real judge as to what your preferences are.

The genetics, environment, and grow meathod are your variables, so set a control and start tweaking from there. I will leave you to determine how controlled your own tests are, as each person will have a varying degree of what "control" is. lol How do you plan to measure your results? I scientific grade microscope should do just fine, but might I suggest taking samples from multiple sites if comparing and taking notes. For example, a section of the flower itself, a calyx, abaxial leaf side ect.

Cannaboids serve multiple purposes on the plant including being an: anti-feedant, anti-dessicant, anti-microbial as well as play uv-b pigmentation roles. The resin production imo is directly related to these functions, and surely I am unaware of other functions. I only know that I know nothing at all. toke break...ahhh better!

You already mentioned watering less, and that would serve to the purpose of manipulating the cannaboids anti-dessicant purpose; I would first start with manipulating humidity and see if that shows progress. IMO go for a very healthy plant, fully fed (because you already got a grip on it) but in a more arid environment. Plants lose a great deal of their water through transpiration, and if I am not mistaken as relative humidity rises transpiration falls. Then subsequently as relative humidity drops transpiration accelerates. Some large trees can transpire hundreds of gallons of water a day! It is supposed that up to 90% of water taken up by the roots will be used for this process. Getting off topic sorry, but imo it will come down to what triggers each plant uniquely. Keeping an eye to see what the actual cause is can be the hard part.

So much of these topics will have a varying degree of opinions, but I say go for it! Not much is known about the genome of cannabis in relation to other plants we have here on mother earth. Cool topic

As for other ways to manipulate the resin production you could utilize a different lighting spectrum. As for manipulating the resin production used as an anti-feedant I am unsure how to accomplish this without an actual infestation of some sort. IMO plants are cognitive of knowing a perceived threat from an actual threat.

Damn another toke break! this topic takes me on tangents and my brain is about to melt, I hope you can find a nug of help within these texts friend.