The sun is a harsh mistress

It was a beautiful day here yesterday-- sunny, seventy degrees, nice breeze, so I thought I’d set my new (sprouted in soil two weeks ago) plants outdoors for a little-- you know, out of the fake light in the grow space and into real, full-spectrum sunlight. I misted them before I set them out, and checked on them constantly, aware that the sun is harsher than indoor lights.

It was a good thing I did that-- after barely twenty minutes, I noticed the leaves on two of the plants had started curling! I immediately moved everything back inside, but the damage was done. Only one more plant’s leaves curled, but many of the rest of them developed yellow edges, apparently sunburned. Since I live at 6500 feet (2k meters) elevation, the sun was too fierce for the little girls/guys, I suppose. Hope they recover…

I would put a plastic cup or something over them and it will keep humidity near 100% for a few days.

the same thing could happen at sea level…I hope they make it…and at your expense a good lesson for others on the difference between the sun and indoor lights and the need to shade the babies when taken outside until they harden up a little.

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Don’t mist them while they are sitting on full sun, the water drops are acting like magnifying glass…
Other than that just take it slow but keep exposing them to real sun, it will pay off big time in a long run…
Good luck

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Thanks to all for your replies. I was aware that exposure to sun needed to be gradual, but I had no idea the plants would be THAT sensitive…

bryan, I had just re-domed the two plants that got burned the worst when I read your post. Now they’re all re-domed (for a couple of days). Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll report back in a few days on the patients’ recovery.

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Indirect sunlight is perfect throughout the whole grow cycle. IMO

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Wow. Never heard that. Will keep in mind…

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@Myfriendis410 you hit it right on the money my friend mine have always had to have a little bit of shade but it also depends on the strain to I can put the Afghan start to finish outside and it goes crazy in the sunlight but it has to be in the sun the whole time Skunk number one that I’ve grown likes to have some shade it all depends on the strain a very good point

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I’ve got some OG Kush, White Widow, and a few Jack Herer, ATF, and
Blueberry Kush.

How about sun/shade for those?

The white widow blueberry & The Jake H is good in sun og kush 1/2 to 3/4 light is how I would do it and it also depends if you’re putting directly in the ground or if you are leaving in the pots

I tried an experiment where I measured the light output in my grow box (1,600 watt equivalent LED) and an overcast morning today at around 9:30. It was essentially identical. So, full sun is a LOT more intense than we think. When I put my girls outside they go in an opaque greenhouse. Basically they love it.

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Wow. Got it. Very cool. Gonna get to work and put some shade cloth over my
garden before I put the little girls out there…