New Grower When to harvest autos? Your leaves will tell you.

One of the most frequently asked questions is how do I know when my autos are ready to pick? The convention wisdom from growing photo period plants was to watch for color change in the trichomes, or crystals. For an uplifting high, harvest when the trichomes are all cloudy, for more of a stone, wait till a percentage have turned amber. Sound advice, for photos. But autos are a little different. While some strains have shown amber trics, many do not.

So how do I know when they are ready? I watch the the fan leaves. Over the past several years of growing autos I started taking samples at various stages of growth to evaluate the high. I tend to prefer my smoke with a little stone so began to leave them longer than the 8-9 weeks that are advertised. I find that around 11-12 weeks the plants are ripe for me. I also began to see a correlation between the color of the fan leaves, the color of the trics and the high/stone quality of the smoke at the various sample intervals. It seemed that the greener the fan leaves, the more clear trics the buds had. As the fan leaves started to yellow and die off, the trics became less clear and more milky. By the time that all the fan leaves had died off and the bud leaves were starting to yellow, I got the quality of smoke I wanted. At that time most of the trics were now milky with no, or only a few, clear ones. Here are some examples:



I've found this to be a very reliable method. It takes about 3 weeks for the fan leaves to die off. During that time the buds will continue to fatten up as the plant uses the energy stored in the fan leaves. So when I see my leaves start to yellow, I wait a week, then begin cleansing them. Two weeks later they will be well cleansed and read to harvest.

Of course there will be other factors such as genetics, lighting, nutrients, pot size, etc. that will effect how long a plant takes. But as a general guide for when to pick, just watch your leaves.

NOTE: If you have questions regarding your personal grow, please post them in the appropriate forum and not in this thread.

 

[CGR]

Does "cleansing" leach ?.

What do mean by leach ...all the nutes should get use up by the end of the cleanse ..:stylez rasta smoke:

 

[hank]

Does "cleansing" leach ?.

What do mean by leach ...all the nutes should get use up by the end of the cleanse ..:stylez rasta smoke:

You want the plant to use everything out of the soil and inside the plant itself.

By leach I would think you mean flush.

 

[Muddy]

Does "cleansing" leach ?.

No, but flushing does.

 

[BayLee420]

One of the most frequently asked questions is how do I know when my autos are ready to pick? The convention wisdom from growing photo period plants was to watch for color change in the trichomes, or crystals. For an uplifting high, harvest when the trichomes are all cloudy, for more of a stone, wait till a percentage have turned amber. Sound advice, for photos. But autos are a little different. While some strains have shown amber trics, many do not.

So how do I know when they are ready? I watch the the fan leaves. Over the past several years of growing autos I started taking samples at various stages of growth to evaluate the high. I tend to prefer my smoke with a little stone so began to leave them longer than the 8-9 weeks that are advertised. I find that around 11-12 weeks the plants are ripe for me. I also began to see a correlation between the color of the fan leaves, the color of the trics and the high/stone quality of the smoke at the various sample intervals. It seemed that the greener the fan leaves, the more clear trics the buds had. As the fan leaves started to yellow and die off, the trics became less clear and more milky. By the time that all the fan leaves had died off and the bud leaves were starting to yellow, I got the quality of smoke I wanted. At that time most of the trics were now milky with no, or only a few, clear ones. Here are some examples:

View attachment 46420View attachment 46421View attachment 46418View attachment 46419

I've found this to be a very reliable method. It takes about 3 weeks for the fan leaves to die off. During that time the buds will continue to fatten up as the plant uses the energy stored in the fan leaves. So when I see my leaves start to yellow, I wait a week, then begin cleansing them. Two weeks later they will be well cleansed and read to harvest.

Of course there will be other factors such as genetics, lighting, nutrients, pot size, etc. that will effect how long a plant takes. But as a general guide for when to pick, just watch your leaves.

NOTE: If you have questions regarding your personal grow, please post them in the appropriate forum and not in this thread.

This tread should be required reading for all AFN growers; Noobie or Pro.

 

[Macnasty]

Excellent info and very helpful :thedogsbollocks:

 

[Nik]

harvesting time

 

[CharlesoOo]

Awesome looking plant bud congratulations:dance:

 

[Hazy]

I think i may know why you are not getting to see amber trichs. I think it may stem back to the retarding of the flowering process, by not givimg the plants the nutrients they require at the right time. As we know autos have a finite life span, and by retarding the flowering process you may be missing the window of oppertunity to finish the plants, hence the trichs not ambering up. what you may have is a plant that has reached the end of it's life span but the buds themselves never had the time to finish up.

I also think that starving the plant for 2 weeks before harvest and relying on the sugars stored in the leaves may very well hurt your yeild, in general with mineral based nutrients 7 days cleanse should be more than enough.

What i find is that my leaves show autumn colours and plenty of green but i have no problem getting the amount of amber i'm looking for, because i never try to retard the flowering process in the hope that the plant will be bigger at the end of the stretch. The size of the plant usually is determined by the size of pot, the light and the genetics of the plant.

Anyway i hope this gives some food for thought.

 

[Muddy]

I think it's more related to the amount of UV the plants are getting. Amber is the plants response to UV. Clarke, in Marijuana Botany, states that this is how the plants protect themselves from the degradation of THC. It will be interesting to see if members using the Solar Storm LEDs that have the UV fluoro tubes consistently get amber trics.

 

[Hazy]

Very interesting Muddy, i know that uv is a sure fire way to get more THC production, and like you i too look forward to seeing what kind of results these new lights produce.Not sure about what Clarke says about this though, as growing under HPS produces virtually no uv, as the glass in the bulb shields the uv, so you would expect plants grown under HPS to show no ambering. But to be honest the more i read on the subject the less i now feel inclined to let them amber at all, as peak THC production happens when the trichomes are cloudy. But i think we can agree that the best way to find out if the plant is ready, is to take test samples, until the weed suits your own personal taste.