Lighting What's the best lighting cycle for autos - 24/0, 20/4 or 18/6

[derek420colorado]

I'm one of those with energy bill concerns living in a very high rate zone.
I'm debating wether to run my T5HO lights at 24/0 for the 3 weeks or so and then switch to my 315 LEC on either a 20/4 or 18/6 for the rest of the way.

I have 2 630 LEC's now and maaaaaaan those things are the future if you ask me, they are freakin soooo bright for 315 watts and the light is as close to the sun as you can get in artificial lighting, but I am sure you know that already lol. I also have 2200 watts of DE HPS in there as well but you can see the difference in light spectrum of the two. The LEC's are seriously just like the sun its awesome. But that has nothing to do with your situation, if you can run it 20/4 that would be better than 18/6 Just think of it this way the two hours of difference over 90 days is 180 hours that is a whole week that the plants will not be producing photosynthesis actually 7.5 days to be exact.

 

[SHRED]

I have 2 630 LEC's now and maaaaaaan those things are the future if you ask me, they are freakin soooo bright for 315 watts and the light is as close to the sun as you can get in artificial lighting, but I am sure you know that already lol. I also have 2200 watts of DE HPS in there as well but you can see the difference in light spectrum of the two. The LEC's are seriously just like the sun its awesome. But that has nothing to do with your situation, if you can run it 20/4 that would be better than 18/6 Just think of it this way the two hours of difference over 90 days is 180 hours that is a whole week that the plants will not be producing photosynthesis actually 7.5 days to be exact. View attachment 638950 View attachment 638953

I love my 315w LEC. It's the perfect size for my 3'x 3' x 7' Gorilla tent.
Thanks for the advice.

 

[derek420colorado]

@derek420colorado I might agree with you about 24/0 originally. But autoflowering have come a long way and are now further bred. I've grown 3rd generation autos. Basically ruderalis crossed with something else. Yield was good but doesn't even compare to 5th or 6th generation auto. Now how much ruderalis do u think there is in this generation ? (I have no idea, that's why i'm asking you). Breeders that want autos to big yield are breeding the strains to enlarge the vegetative period of this plant (over the years from 2-3 weeks to 4-5 even 6 weeks). Why does it work, cause the plant gets bigger.
Now we can speculate about the automatic gene. Ruderalis doesn't bring only the automatic gene, it also brings all the other genes it contains. Now if we could isolate the automatic gene just to keep it (what I think breeders are now trying to do to increase yield, potency and taste), that would mean that the new auto created is really different from the ruderalis found in nature up north.

All these are just speculation of course, but informations on autos are just kind of hard to find. Have we correctly understood yet how the automatic process works ?
I'm not saying you're wrong cause your theory makes a lot of sense (and will surely yield better) but so many protocols could be experimented in order to validate it.

Your roots looks awesome btw, what strains are you growing and how much power was used ? I don't even have to see your plant to know it's huge thanks to ur root mass. I've seen people bash on autos about small yields for the past few years. Funny thing is they always used a low volume of medium which reduced the root mass. I was truly impressed once I put em in bigger pots or DWC.

Thanks for answering, wish u the best

Well you are now in the right place for the best auto info on the net, this is the largest collection of the best auto growers on the planet from all over the globe. To answer your question simply yes they have identified the reason that ruderalis autoflowers. It has to do with the SDFH Short Day Flowering Hormone(it is called something like SDHP or something but I cant remember exactly) and its ability to not have florigen dictate its photoperiod dependent sexing cycle. You are correct in the fact that autos have come a long way in the last few years, with most focusing on potency and yield. Basically the only trait breeders are trying to get to is the autoflowering part and nothing else from the ruderalis. There are certain things that are going to be bred out of the ruderalis part but that is the one thing they are trying to keep, if that makes sense. The new autos are in fact way better, because we have bred them that way to suit our needs and wants. So with that being said the light cycle that they receive in nature is going to be what that part of the plant uses in order to maximize its genetic makeup(whatever that may be) for other things like potency and yield. So while other parts of the newer generations of autos are going to be different like potency and yield giving them 24/0 of light or close to it is what they will always crave in order to be all that they can be. I hope I am making sense, I need to do another daaaaab before going all educated botany lol. I do love to talk about botany though, that is what my degree is in.


Also Yes the plants were huge, the grow is in my sig I used 2000 watts of HPS light and a 6 site RDWC system with my Max O2 theory. I am about to start 60 beans and I have 15 strains all together 95% is @mephisto the above picture is of my indoor greenhouse. You see this is the whole key to my entire setup, the 24/0 of light is essential to what I am doing. I am giving these plants all the natural sun during the day then, the other half will be the 3600 watts of LEC and DE HPS light. I am trying to grow 30 lbs of weed in under 100 days. Because I am in Colorado and its winter I have to heat the space up at night, so I will be using propane heaters which in turn produce wet cO2. This is the reason I have named my property the "Dream Farm"

 

[Sensyganja420]

Well you are now in the right place for the best auto info on the net, this is the largest collection of the best auto growers on the planet from all over the globe. To answer your question simply yes they have identified the reason that ruderalis autoflowers. It has to do with the SDFH Short Day Flowering Hormone(it is called something like SDHP or something but I cant remember exactly) and its ability to not have florigen dictate its photoperiod dependent sexing cycle. You are correct in the fact that autos have come a long way in the last few years, with most focusing on potency and yield. Basically the only trait breeders are trying to get to is the autoflowering part and nothing else from the ruderalis. There are certain things that are going to be bred out of the ruderalis part but that is the one thing they are trying to keep, if that makes sense. The new autos are in fact way better, because we have bred them that way to suit our needs and wants. So with that being said the light cycle that they receive in nature is going to be what that part of the plant uses in order to maximize its genetic makeup(whatever that may be) for other things like potency and yield. So while other parts of the newer generations of autos are going to be different like potency and yield giving them 24/0 of light or close to it is what they will always crave in order to be all that they can be. I hope I am making sense, I need to do another daaaaab before going all educated botany lol. I do love to talk about botany though, that is what my degree is in.


Also Yes the plants were huge, the grow is in my sig I used 2000 watts of HPS light and a 6 site RDWC system with my Max O2 theory. I am about to start 60 beans and I have 15 strains all together 95% is @mephisto the above picture is of my indoor greenhouse. You see this is the whole key to my entire setup, the 24/0 of light is essential to what I am doing. I am giving these plants all the natural sun during the day then, the other half will be the 3600 watts of LEC and DE HPS light. I am trying to grow 30 lbs of weed in under 100 days. Because I am in Colorado and its winter I have to heat the space up at night, so I will be using propane heaters which in turn produce wet cO2. This is the reason I have named my property the "Dream Farm"

Thank you for answering. And what you saying definitely makes sense and is easily understandable (french speaker here). That's some really cool new info for me. Thank you very much.

Colorado seems like a nice place, I've never been there before though. I've seen that weed is legalised there. That's a good thing to learn more about this plant. I gotta make sure I don't miss out on your future post. Your experiments sounds very interesting.

Cheers

 

[derek420colorado]

Thank you for answering. And what you saying definitely makes sense and is easily understandable (french speaker here). That's some really cool new info for me. Thank you very much.

Colorado seems like a nice place, I've never been there before though. I've seen that weed is legalised there. That's a good thing to learn more about this plant. I gotta make sure I don't miss out on your future post. Your experiments sounds very interesting.

Cheers

I will tag you and it will show up in your alerts. Yes weed is legalized here and being a botanist who got my degree because I like to grow weed it is a lifes journey coming true. I can now openly grow pot and yes do some actual research on the plant we all love so much. I will be applying the scientific method to lots of "theories" out there about cannabis. The craziest thing I am excited about is that there has been virtually NO actual research done on the autoflowering cannabis because of phenotypical variance. You see with photo plants you can clone them easily and therefore get a control group, with autos each plant is different so you would have to grow out lots of plants and get the averages of the phenos to get some semblance of a control. I cant WAIT

 

[Sensyganja420]

I will tag you and it will show up in your alerts. Yes weed is legalized here and being a botanist who got my degree because I like to grow weed it is a lifes journey coming true. I can now openly grow pot and yes do some actual research on the plant we all love so much. I will be applying the scientific method to lots of "theories" out there about cannabis. The craziest thing I am excited about is that there has been virtually NO actual research done on the autoflowering cannabis because of phenotypical variance. You see with photo plants you can clone them easily and therefore get a control group, with autos each plant is different so you would have to grow out lots of plants and get the averages of the phenos to get some semblance of a control. I cant WAIT

This is so true, that's why running a side by side experiment with only a few numbers of plants wouldn't be representative of the whole automatic group.
Well I'm glad that u can explain all these. Those are topics i've been looking for on the internet for years.
I'm a former personal trainer who kinda hate broscience since it's always sent me backwards (blame my genetics). Your input on autos here is very valuable and will surely help the market as a consequence.

 

[derek420colorado]

This is so true, that's why running a side by side experiment with only a few numbers of plants wouldn't be representative of the whole automatic group.
Well I'm glad that u can explain all these. Those are topics i've been looking for on the internet for years.
I'm a former personal trainer who kinda hate broscience since it's always sent me backwards (blame my genetics). Your input on autos here is very valuable and will surely help the market as a consequence.

That is the plan, I am trying to establish the commercial viability of autoflowers. I just know what I know and in theory it should work, I am just trying to apply the theory at this point. I am tryin to get some true science based info out there with the documented proof to back it up. I am glad you are here. I tagged you in the LS thread so you really should come say high

 

[TheJoker]

I start seedlings 24/7 for the first 2 weeks under CFL's and then switch to 18/6 under HPS.

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Industrial Plant Auto CBD by DFem
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[Exotic Flower]

Also Yes the plants were huge, the grow is in my sig I used 2000 watts of HPS light and a 6 site RDWC system with my Max O2 theory. I am about to start 60 beans and I have 15 strains all together 95% is @mephisto the above picture is of my indoor greenhouse. You see this is the whole key to my entire setup, the 24/0 of light is essential to what I am doing. I am giving these plants all the natural sun during the day then, the other half will be the 3600 watts of LEC and DE HPS light. I am trying to grow 30 lbs of weed in under 100 days. Because I am in Colorado and its winter I have to heat the space up at night, so I will be using propane heaters which in turn produce wet cO2. This is the reason I have named my property the "Dream Farm"

I want to visit your garden, @derek420colorado !

 

[arpowre3]

Very impressive derek. I also am a fan boy of the LEC.. they are so rad

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