# Why no stretch



## woodydude (Apr 10, 2011)

For my last 3 groups of plants put into flower, there has hardly been any stretch, maybe 50%.
Before that, I was getting between 100 & 200% but not any more.
I have changed almost everything about my setup since my first 2 or 3 batches of plants, I am now using AN Sensi veg & flower, big bud, Voodoo Juice, B-52 and Overdrive. I keep the EC around 2.75 while flowering, progressively 1.25 - 2.5 veg over 6 weeks)
I have 2x 600W hps in cooltubes and lights on temps are around 75-82 depending how hot it is outside and around 60 lights off, again depending on o/s temps) 
I have a 715M3/h fan exhausting (23 second air exchange) through the cool tubes and a 275m3/h bringing supplementary fresh air in. (I only run these lights on due to the noise, could it be this?) I had thought of just running the intake fan during lights off?? It will give me +ve air pressure but am willing to try anything.
I am now using RDWC buckets with each bucket getting around 5l/min air per bucket.
The strains that have shown very little stretch include Strawberry Cough, Big Bud, Blue Cheese, White Widow and Wonder Woman.
I have been using some stuff called Colossal Budblast which could be the culprit? Anyone any experience with this.
I put some into flower yesterday but used veg nutes instead of flower nutes for the first time.

I am at a loss thinking of why so little stretch which is why I am asking here. As far as I can make out, I am doing everything "by the book" and following good advice (from you MPers) and am now at the stage where I am getting a sore scalp with all the head scratching I am doing!!

Any suggestions??


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## 4u2sm0ke (Apr 10, 2011)

are all these runs of the same strain?...I know stretch can depend on strain..I have some that stretch more then others...another thing that creates stretch is lack of light..or to many plants createing low lumes..Good luck and stop scratching that head:giggle:


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## dman1234 (Apr 10, 2011)

i have a "the church" at 8 1/2 weeks that stretched/grew about 5 inchs, sitting right beside a kush at 8 1/2 weeks that stretch/grew 2 feet in flower.


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## Locked (Apr 10, 2011)

My pre 98 bubba cut hardly stretches at all....the LVPK likes to shoot For the light and has significant stretch. Most differences I have seen have been strain related. Also I believe light reflecting up underneath the leaves causes "competitive" stretch.


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## 4u2sm0ke (Apr 10, 2011)

> Also I believe light reflecting up underneath the leaves causes "competitive" stretch.
> __________________



please explain this?


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## Locked (Apr 10, 2011)

4u2sm0ke said:
			
		

> please explain this?




Wish I cld....lol

I think it goes something like this:
If you crowd your plants together the light gets reflected off the top of the leaves and since they are too close together it gets reflected underneath the Neighboring plants leaves causing them to competively stretch for the light source....I think it is the reason you don't want to put a reflective Material on the floor of your grow space.

Or I cld be talking nothing but dog farts here and be totally wrong...


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## woodydude (Apr 10, 2011)

Hamster Lewis said:
			
		

> Or I cld be talking nothing but dog farts here and be totally wrong...


Love that line!!
Thanks for the comments guys.

The odd thing is that the Strawberry Cough and Blue Cheese I have which have not stretched recently are both grandchildren of my first cuttings, being clones of clones of clones and the original plants did 200% growth in flower. Of course, this could be due to the strain loosing its prowess several generations down the line but the smoke from both is getting better with each grow.

Thinking through the list of possible causes, light, CO2, plants per m2, nutrients, water, ph, etc, everything in the grow room is better. My original light was a 400W with a Son-T bulb (does this cause stretch?) but I now use Sunmaster bulbs in both lights (could that be the cause? But I would have thought the dual spectrum would cause stretch) 

I have some Big Bud cuttings and an NL from seed put in to flower yesterday of which my friend has put the sisters into his flowering room so we can see the difference but he has also commented he does not get much stretch during flowering.

Is the stretch/growth a good thing???
Recent yields have improved without the stretch as the lower buds get more light.

It is annoying me quite a bit now lol


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## 4u2sm0ke (Apr 10, 2011)

Hamster Lewis said:
			
		

> Wish I cld....lol
> 
> I think it goes something like this:
> If you crowd your plants together the light gets reflected off the top of the leaves and since they are too close together it gets reflected underneath the Neighboring plants leaves causing them to competively stretch for the light source....I think it is the reason you don't want to put a reflective Material on the floor of your grow space.
> ...


 
I agree with the craming in of plants that causes lack of light...But not on the reflective floor...Ive painted my floor white and added side light...so Im not sure I agree with the floor reflecting...Nice debate though..:48:


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## StoneyBud (Apr 10, 2011)

"Plant Competition" is a very involved study within the study of Plant Biology.

It's quite a bit more involved than with just side lighting and reflected lighting.

However, anyone who does a side by side test of seedlings will find that those with reflective floors under them will experience more stretch than those without.

With side lighting, the light has to be reflected to the underside of the leaves for it to be considered as competitive growth lighting.

There are literally thousands of pages of text available on the subject on the net and probably millions of pages available via studies, textbooks and papers.

Not believing in gravity won't make you any lighter in weight. It'll just means you don't believe that gravity exists.  

Competitive growth has been proven to exist. There is no doubt about it. If you place a plant into a position or in conditions that favor competitive growth, you will get competitive growth.

4U, if you didn't get competitive growth from your white painted floor, it's because the plants were large enough so they didn't even see the floor. If the undersides of the leaves *see* the floor, yes, you'll get competitive growth every single time. There is no doubt about this. Its as proven as gravity.

Any questions? hehe



.


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## Locked (Apr 10, 2011)

Thanks for chiming in Stoney....I thought it was from you that I had first heard of this but wasn't sure. Glad you cld shed some light on it.


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## niteshft (Apr 10, 2011)

4u2sm0ke said:
			
		

> please explain this?


 
I read it's because the underside of leaves attempt to move away from the light.


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## 420_Osborn (Apr 10, 2011)

My tent has reflective flooring tho


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## The Hemp Goddess (Apr 10, 2011)

woodydude said:
			
		

> .............I have changed almost everything about my setup since my first 2 or 3 batches of plants....
> 
> 
> I am at a loss thinking of why so little stretch which is why I am asking here. As far as I can make out, I am doing everything "by the book" and following good advice (from you MPers) and am now at the stage where I am getting a sore scalp with all the head scratching I am doing!!
> ...



I'm confused--you talk like this is a bad thing.  Stretch is not good and is not a desired growth pattern.  I'm not sure what your concerns are.  We all want nice tight close internode spacing and it seems you have it.....

You have changed everything--that probably accounts for the difference in growth patterns.


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## Locked (Apr 10, 2011)

420_Osborn said:
			
		

> My tent has reflective flooring tho




So does mine but it is usually too dirty to reflect anything.....


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## kiksroks (Apr 10, 2011)

The Hemp Goddess said:
			
		

> I'm confused--you talk like this is a bad thing.  Stretch is not good and is not a desired growth pattern.  I'm not sure what your concerns are.  We all want nice tight close internode spacing and it seems you have it.....
> 
> You have changed everything--that probably accounts for the difference in growth patterns.



I assume that he had accounted for the stretch in the design of his space and veg. time. So he didn't get the expected stretch and failed to efficiently take advantage of his grow  space. 

Will plants that didn't "stretch" yield as much as a taller stretched plant of the same genetics, grown under the same conditions? We all love smaller easier to handle plants but would they yield the same as the taller, larger plant?


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## StoneyBud (Apr 10, 2011)

Hamster Lewis said:
			
		

> Thanks for chiming in Stoney....I thought it was from you that I had first heard of this but wasn't sure. Glad you cld shed some light on it.


 
You're very welcome, HL. 

Competitive actions in the plant world are what make plants evolve. Its a fascinating subject and like I said earlier, its so in-depth, that there are millions of pages of research material out there about it.

Finding the articles that deal only with competitive lighting is more difficult, and many papers require that you buy the paper before reading anything but the synopsis.


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## StoneyBud (Apr 10, 2011)

420_Osborn said:
			
		

> My tent has reflective flooring tho





			
				Hamster Lewis said:
			
		

> So does mine but it is usually too dirty to reflect anything.....


 
Then during the seedling stage, where the floor could reflect light to the underside of the leaves, your plants would benefit from your covering that floor to stop the reflection.

The plants will stretch more if light is reflected to the underside of the leaves and also hits the top of the same leaves.

The plant *sees* this under-side lighting as being reflected from the tops of the leaves of a neighboring plant or plants. The plant will then send more stem-elongation hormone to its topmost branches, resulting in the plant growing faster and with longer inter-nodal length. The stems will also be weaker and thinner.

If the plants have reached a stage where the floor is no longer visible to the lights, then no light could reflect from the floor. This will end the problem *if* it has existed prior to that stage.



.


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## rotten_socks420 (Apr 10, 2011)

Wow, ive always tried to explain this to my buddy but never could... now I can thank you.


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## leafminer (Apr 10, 2011)

All those details about ferts etc are irrelevant to stretch.
In my own experience, stretch is directly related to the 'normal' final height of your strain, versus the height at which you went 12-12 and put it into flower.
In general, my experience over a wide range of growing conditions varying from 12-12 from seed, to free unrestricted growth, gave me this result:
(Since this is strain-dependent to some extent I will give an example of a strain with which I'm very familiar: Sensi Seed's Black Domina. 5Gall pot coco/ greenhouse natural solar)

1. Germ under 12-12 conditions = straight into flower.
The plant shows sex very early, typically 3 weeks from germination, and then goes into flower yielding a plant about 1 m tall in 10 weeks to harvest. The yield is roughly 2 oz. The plant can be regarded as 'stretching' continually because it's simultaneously in flower and growing.

2. The same seed germinates under 16/8 and is allowed to veg until it shows signs of sex, at which point it goes 12-12.
The plant grows to a well-branched specimen about 1.7m tall, then goes into flower, but does not stretch to any appreciable degree. The yield is roughly 4 oz.

I have the strong impression that when you force a plant into flowering by reducing its light hours to 12-12 before it would otherwise go into flower, the result is that the plant is forced into flower by the photoperiod, but will try to make up for it by stretching during flower as much as possible. There's not a great deal you can do about that if you insist on going 12-12 too early.


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## woodydude (Apr 11, 2011)

kiksroks said:
			
		

> I assume that he had accounted for the stretch in the design of his space and veg. time. So he didn't get the expected stretch and failed to efficiently take advantage of his grow  space.
> 
> Will plants that didn't "stretch" yield as much as a taller stretched plant of the same genetics, grown under the same conditions? We all love smaller easier to handle plants but would they yield the same as the taller, larger plant?



Got it in one!!!! Thought there are other issues.

   Here is where I am coming from, I was over visiting a friend a couple of days ago and saw his grow. I hadn't seen it for a long time and when I walked in, there were these huge monster plants staring me in the face, 6 footers. They were all cuttings I had given him around 3 months ago. Some of it was very bad stretch, for example, I have a 12" plant that is 3 weeks into flower that has double the bud of a cutting he has grown on that is my 12"s sister but his plant is nearly 3ft.
   However, some of the bigger plants were magnificent including one that was 6ft and had a bud the size of a tennis ball at 3 weeks into flower. I know you will say this is a man thing, but the girth on the stems was huge and made mine feel totally inadequate. (Now I know how other men feel if they catch a glimpse in a public bathroom ;-) )
  So seeing this got me thinking, why has my stretch disappeared, I am putting plants into flower at 12/15" expecting them to go mad and grow 1/200% but they are only growing maybe 50%. I have my lights dangling down with 6ft to go into that will not be needed. 
  All this is making it difficult to know when to put my girls into flower. If I grow them on to 3ft, then flower them, can I expect them to put on the 50% or the 200%??
  If I were advising someone else, I would say take the height from the top of your bucket to the max height of your light, deduct 6" (for cool tubes, 12 without) then divide by 3, this is your safe flowering height. In my case, that would be 2ft to end up with a max 6ft plant.


  But THG, you are right, I am not sure if it is a problem, I just need to flower the same strain a few times and find an average growth spurt.


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## PencilHead (Apr 11, 2011)

leafminer said:
			
		

> All those details about ferts etc are irrelevant to stretch.
> In my own experience, stretch is directly related to the 'normal' final height of your strain, versus the height at which you went 12-12 and put it into flower.
> In general, my experience over a wide range of growing conditions varying from 12-12 from seed, to free unrestricted growth, gave me this result:
> (Since this is strain-dependent to some extent I will give an example of a strain with which I'm very familiar: Sensi Seed's Black Domina. 5Gall pot coco/ greenhouse natural solar)
> ...


 
This is a phenomenon I've noticed on my own--I've never seen anyone offer this as a possilbe culprit in stretch.

My style has evolved to vegging out to about 3 feet--I'm now getting nominal-to-no stretch beyond normal bud stacking.  When I run a calyx donor, I throw her early as possible and get crazy, mad stretch.  No science--just personal observation.


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## The Hemp Goddess (Apr 11, 2011)

Stretch does not give you more bud.  More bud sites gives you more buds.  IME, plants that stretch do not yield more than plants that do not stretch.


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## Roddy (Apr 11, 2011)

*"My style has evolved to vegging out to about 3 feet"*

ALRIGHT!!!! Glad to see I'm not the only one here that loves em large! Anyone reading my gj will notice the last gals in bud have grown only minimally when flipped, no doubling of size like many fear. In fact, I am now vegging them a touch larger since they didn't reach the height I had thought they would, experimenting to see what works!


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## Hushpuppy (Apr 11, 2011)

I am not real experienced in this area as a newish grower, but as an experienced "systems troubleshooter" I noticed the one thing yu said yu are doing different this grow is yer nutes. Everyone was previously talking about causes of stretch but not causes of nonstretch. If all factors are the same, IE, plant strains, light regimen, grow medium, and all variables are the same, IE, temp, ph, RH, then the only "culprit" would be the nutes. If yu changed to a better nute source, then the nonstretch could be more efficient growth from better nutes. the only way to prove this is to complete the grow and record yer yeild, start another grow and do exactly the same thing and see if the results repeat themselves. IMO


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## Hushpuppy (Apr 11, 2011)

After posting I went back and saw that yu said yu changed everything. More efficient lighting combined with better nutes could easily account for the lack of the type of stretch, that occured with previous grows. it appears that at least some of the stretch that yu had seen previously was the anomoly, not the lack of stretch now. the real answer, IMO, will be in yeild. hope it proves right for yu.


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## woodydude (Apr 11, 2011)

I do too HP!!

Interesting discussion about competative stretch though. I do have some shiney surfaces underneath my plants but this is a recent thing since the changes which goes against what is being said about it causing stretch (it may be causing it but not as much as I got before)

Having read what everyone has said I believe my friends plants, which look amazing, will end up yielding less than mine, mainly due to my lower buds getting more light. Time will tell!
Peace W


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## StoneyBud (Apr 11, 2011)

woodydude said:
			
		

> I do too HP!!
> 
> Interesting discussion about competitive stretch though. I do have some shiny surfaces underneath my plants but this is a recent thing since the changes which goes against what is being said about it causing stretch (it may be causing it but not as much as I got before)
> 
> ...


 
Most of the reason that top buds get larger is due to the hormones within the plant. The most growth hormone is sent to the upper parts of the plant. No amount of light at the bottom will make the plant send those hormones to the bottom of the plant.

The increased light will help the buds reach thier largest, despite the lack of growth hormone.

More light, more photosynthesis, more growth....to a point.


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## Roddy (Apr 11, 2011)

My Big Band brought in a whopping 7.5 oz dried, not bad for a plant of 40" (+/-). I got a much less 4 oz off a comparably sized and shaped PEx recently and around 5 oz from the much larger White Widow. I credit the addition of the 400w HPS used in vert style as side-lighting, this added light to the lower buds which really bulked up. Now, would the same have happened had I put the light in a hood overhead? IDK, but I'm really pleased with the improved yield!


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## Hushpuppy (Apr 11, 2011)

That might be worth experimenting with it to see if it proves out. If yu compare a scrog where the branches and bud sights are all kept at the same light intensity, it appears to me that there is more yeild per lumen than in other setups (all things being equal), IDK but it appears that way. It might be worth doing a large-ish scrog with "overkill" lumen supply to see the results.


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## PencilHead (Apr 12, 2011)

Hushpuppy said:
			
		

> That might be worth experimenting with it to see if it proves out. If yu compare a scrog where the branches and bud sights are all kept at the same light intensity, it appears to me that there is more yeild per lumen than in other setups (all things being equal), IDK but it appears that way. It might be worth doing a large-ish scrog with "overkill" lumen supply to see the results.


 
Hmm--might even work with trees, huh? http://www.marijuanapassion.com/forum/showthread.php?t=52156&highlight=flattop

This was the first flattop I ran. It's dialed to totally-obscene now.  I came up with this style in response to the draconian plant-count laws in my state.  Basically a SOG with only 4 main stems. Equally shared lumens is the bomb--every bud is a winner.

Roddy, you should be pulling a minimum of 8 zee's per super-sized unit.  I shoot for 14, usually get 10-12 each plant. I'm not that good, so maybe I've been lucky.


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