I am an experienced vegetable and fruit Gardner, with the recent laws changing in my state I decided to grow Pot.
I will cut to the chase… I started growing white widow Autos outdoors. Zero issues with pest, disease, mold, fungus. Very green And the most part healthy looking plants. BUT my girls were tiny as hell, 4 plants finished between 10 and 14 inches After 12-14 weeks. My dry weight was a little under 1 ounce total for all 4.
I have increased pot size from 1 gallon to 3 gallon, I use Fox Farm Ocean Forest, I use store bought spring water, or just rain water, fx farm nutes the top 3.
Since increasing Pot size I have 1 white widow at about 16 inches and a 2nd at 8 inches, those have started flowering and are at wk8. I thought maybe it was the batch of seeds so I ordered the Auto sweet mix pack and have one of each currently starting the 3rd week. I was hoping for a possible different outcome but they look like they are headed down the same direction.
My Suspicions were at first with pot size. Now they are more towards sunlight. I get about 4hours of direct sun a day. Also my humidity is around 95% because I live in the south. The plants I chose, I chose specifically for the climate I live in. So I am left frustrated and scratching my head.
Any ideas would help. My experience with gardening other plants it’s most likely it’s one or two factors once I correct that I will be golden.
Please help.
Also to add I have a friend who is an indoor grower , says besides my plants being small and dwarfed they look super healthy.
It does look young. Do you have close ups of the one you chooped? Maybe pics of the whole plant before harvest? Are you checking the trichomes to determines your harvest times?
So the top pic was at about week 9 5 weeks Before I harvested. The lower pics are each a whole plant once chopped. The pic next to the fork those are to whole plants chopped and trimmed.
1st pic may have confused a few, it was 5 weeks before harvest. Tri combs We’re definitely ready. Buds dried and cured by now and look and smoke great. The issue is not age. The issue is size.
Welcome to the forum. I am leaning towards a couple issues. Pot size for sure. Auto and small pot. As soon as her roots fill that little pot she will flower. 4 hours good light not gonna cut it. And add a little more time to the flowering stage. She looked like did not finish filling out to her potential. Just my thoughts from pics and info. 5 gallon would treat you better. If can get a few more hours of good light would be nice. The build engine wont run with no juice. This next round go on up in pot size i would suggest and move to a sunnier spot. Just my thoughts.
3 gal is the smallest pot you want to use. 5 gals even better.
Both of these are contributing factors. Cannabis is a light hungry plant, even autoflowers.
Correct! You did great with a 1 gallon pot and 4 hrs direct sun. 95% humidity pretty high. Not alot you can do about it outside. A fan on it wouldnt hurt.
He is correct.
In FF soil no need to feed for a few weeks at least. Use the runoff of your waterings to tell you when to feed, the tds will drop bellow 1000 and then feed. Start at anout 1/2 strength and go from there. Feed then when pot dry water, feed then water.
Your 1st picture is pretty far out from harvest. You will be able to tell you are close to harvest by the hairs. They will turn red and shrivel some and Stop standing straight up. Thatz when you will need to pull out a jewlers loope. And use this chart.
Despite the timeline often given by breeders cannabis does as cannabis does it can take longer sometimes. The true tell of done-ness will be the trichomes. There are probably alot more things I could say but if you need, feel free to ask Im here everyday. Just stick an @Docnraq in there somewhere and the board will notify me you tagged me and Ill answer. Welcome to the ILGM community.
Your right size does matter
New to growing but as soon as I read “4 hours sunlight” I was sure that’s is the biggest issue. We grow inside with 24/0 20/4 18/6 16/8 12/12 10/14 for various stages/preferences, your plant is only getting a fraction of that! Also imo it looks like you are giving too much nitrogen during flower. At 5 weeks before havest picture looks dark green to me. I’m not a fan of fox farm nutes. Never used it but having to flush imo is stupid (never plan to use it either). I’m more for organics. Anyways This is my opinion. There are many others like it, but this one is mine.
I would also like to point out “that’s what she said”
Hi i do autos and there are a few things tou need to know about autoflowers ,yes they finish faster and u don’t need to change ur light cycle either but when it comes to growing autos it can be a hit or miss ok now there are things you can do to a sure that you get a better size plant now the first thing is make sure you get good genetics thats one of the most important things get ur self some good soil or good coco coir now once u have that make sure if ur doing organics with dry amendments make sure u amend ur soil a month before u pop a seed that way ur soil can cook for a while and the food will be breaking down ready for the plant .with coco coir if ur using bottled nutrients u will be feeding straight away a Coco coir doesnt really have any fertilizer in it .but when u go to germinate ur seed dont soak it in water get ur self some makeup removel pads the cotton pads ,what u do is get a plate or dvd case place a pad on the plate or case spray it down with water and then place ur seed on top then take another pad place it on top of the seed and spray it down cover the plate with plastic wrap put two holes in it and place in dark warm place and with case u close it up and u put it in a dark warm place in 24 hours ur seeds should be popped it may take a little longer .once they popped place them in to there forever pots and let them grow
I am fairly new to growing by this is just what i learned that it is alot easier to grow auto flowers in a tent with a controlled environment i grew 3 wwa in a tent back in March i had a 3x3x60 tent plant’s were touching ceiling so next i grew 2 northern lights autos outside used same soil and used ff trio nutes grew half the size. The one’s in my tent were in 3 gallon pots the one’s outside were 10 gallon pots. So i don’t thank it is as much as pot size as it is environment also got 3 photo period plants outside and they are thriving. I have only feed them cal mag and tiger bloom
Yes, thank you! There are plenty of pictures here with people killing it in small pots! Especially autos.
@Pot4Veterans amount of sun your plants getting is probably at least contributing, but may not be only reason. Anything that could possibly stunt your plants growth will eat up the limited veg time of an auto. And once they have fully transitioned to flower are pretty much done growing vertically. The following would all probably help you be more successful.
Try growing photoperiod plants that don’t have genetically programmed veg time.
Get plants more light.
Switch to more airy media that will provide faster dry out times and allow you increase feeding frequency.
Revisit your methods and look for things to decrease plant stress. High wind, high temps, excessive handling, watering/feeding schedule, proper nutrition etc.
Got nothing to do with pot size, it’s all genetics, all mine here are autos and all by FastBuds, never have issues with them, and I see a lot of FastBuds growing the size of some photos I’ve seen in 10-12 weeks
Here are my 4 autos 2 in 5 gal fabrics, 2 in 5 litre plastic pots all FastBuds genetics
They got alot bigger than i thought. It took time but once the roots took hold they took off. at first i thought they would be runts. they proved me wrong🙃
