6 On 6 Off 6 On 6 Off Lighting Schedule, Ever Tried?

Has anyone ever read, heard of or seen anything about this. Any thoughts or opinions on it?

6 hours on then 6 off, then 6 on then 6 off in a 24 hour day mimicking hopefully 2 days. What would it achieve? Maybe flower quicker..?! Would they hermie? Would it confuse them so much that they stay in veg or would it initiate the onset of flowering much quicker??

What do ya reckon????

Pretty sure they need the 12 hrs consecutive dark to flower and would probably hermie and/or stay in veg.

I don't have any understanding of how that is replicating any natural form of light cycle that occurs in nature. I would just stick to the traditional method as it has proved successful.

christhjesus said:

Pretty sure they need the 12 hrs consecutive dark to flower and would probably hermie and/or stay in veg.

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Basically this. When the lights are off the plants build up flowering hormones. When enough build up flowering is triggered. Without a long enough dark period this won't happen

yah, like it's already been stated, it's not the hour of light that a plant gets that triggers flowering, but rather the amount of hour of darkness they get, so by only giving them six hours of darkness at a time, sure sounds like to me that they would only stay in veg, and never want to flower. and also by giving them only six hours of light at a shot, you're limiting the amount of photosynthesis that they can do at one time as well, which i'm guessing would stunt growth a bit as well, not exactly sure on that though, just taking a somewhat educated guess is all...

TrichomeTrent said:

Basically this. When the lights are off the plants build up flowering hormones. When enough build up flowering is triggered. Without a long enough dark period this won't happen

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Yes i've read this but did not find out how many hours exactly are needed. Just bare in mind i have the sapce and equipment to try it out so it's not like it affects my other crops....3 flower rooms..

racerboy71 said:

yah, like it's already been stated, it's not the hour of light that a plant gets that triggers flowering, but rather the amount of hour of darkness they get, so by only giving them six hours of darkness at a time, sure sounds like to me that they would only stay in veg, and never want to flower. and also by giving them only six hours of light at a shot, you're limiting the amount of photosynthesis that they can do at one time as well, which i'm guessing would stunt growth a bit as well, not exactly sure on that though, just taking a somewhat educated guess is all...

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True i was thinking smaller plants and yes i am aware that the dark period is key to flowering but i cant find definitive proof that says you need the 12 hours of darkness.

There may be something to this idea...I will try slowly changing the lights to 6,6,6 or starting one from seed when I get a chance. Has cannabis evolved to be dependent on the light allotted by our constant orbit or is it more adaptable than we know? Is it the actual hours of light or the ratio of on/off that count most? hmmm stoned

serioussquirrel said:

There may be something to this idea...I will try slowly changing the lights to 6,6,6 or starting one from seed when I get a chance. Has cannabis evolved to be dependent on the light allotted by our constant orbit or is it more adaptable than we know? Is it the actual hours of light or the ratio of on/off that count most? hmmm stoned

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Well to my mind yes it has kind of because when it was taken indoors it adapted to a regimental allotment of on hours and off hours compared to natural daylight increasing and decreasing during the seasons. I understand that this is not a huge deviation from natural cycles though. Perhaps the experiment would be more helpful to the plants if they were exposed from seed rather than a plant that has weaned on a more traditional lighting schedule making stress less.

newworldicon said:

True i was thinking smaller plants and yes i am aware that the dark period is key to flowering but i cant find definitive proof that says you need the 12 hours of darkness.

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it's definitely not 12 hours that makes flowering occur, this much i do know, lol... the reason that indoor growers go with 12/ 12 usually is it's the best compromise that they have come up with... there are ways to figure out exactly how many hours of darkness that a certain strain needs to start flowering, but it seems like a pretty long drawn out process where one slowly takes the amount of light hours down till you get signs of flowering begin.. i would imagine that you'd have to wait a good week or two in between each time that you decrease the day hours in order to make sure it has a chance to flower before making anymore hours.. i'm sure that there's gotta be a better way, lol... i think this is why they just go with the 12 / 12.

racerboy71 said:

it's definitely not 12 hours that makes flowering occur, this much i do know, lol... the reason that indoor growers go with 12/ 12 usually is it's the best compromise that they have come up with... there are ways to figure out exactly how many hours of darkness that a certain strain needs to start flowering, but it seems like a pretty long drawn out process where one slowly takes the amount of light hours down till you get signs of flowering begin.. i would imagine that you'd have to wait a good week or two in between each time that you decrease the day hours in order to make sure it has a chance to flower before making anymore hours.. i'm sure that there's gotta be a better way, lol... i think this is why they just go with the 12 / 12.

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Yeah I get the compromise, it makes sense. I suppose the only way to find anything out is try it.

racerboy71 said:

it's definitely not 12 hours that makes flowering occur, this much i do know, lol... the reason that indoor growers go with 12/ 12 usually is it's the best compromise that they have come up with... there are ways to figure out exactly how many hours of darkness that a certain strain needs to start flowering, but it seems like a pretty long drawn out process where one slowly takes the amount of light hours down till you get signs of flowering begin.. i would imagine that you'd have to wait a good week or two in between each time that you decrease the day hours in order to make sure it has a chance to flower before making anymore hours.. i'm sure that there's gotta be a better way, lol... i think this is why they just go with the 12 / 12.

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Dead on another main reason we do this is because alot of true sativas (and many sativa dominant hybrids) NEED 12 hours darkness to flower and this removes the guess work. Anyways to satisfy your curiousity (maybe) this has already been studied a bit at Oaksterdam University. I havnt heard of a 6/6/6/6 test but when cannabis received 6 hours of dark, then 1 hour of light, and another 6 hours of dark it never went into flowering. I just can't imagine a longer light period (further lowering flowering hormones) having an opposite effect.

Illumination said:

Well it definately will NOT flower on a 6/6 schedule as 6 hours of darkness is definitely not going to trigger flowering as witnessed by the majority of growers vegetative hours are 18/6 darkness. A thought and since you have the room would be to run a 24/12 hour schedule in flower...you have the number of hours of darkness and twice the amount of light so should in theory work and raise production....that would be much more telling an experiment...just saying

namaste'

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Good point there but then it begs the question, where is the threshold for flowering, is it 12 hours or where along that scale is the starting point. If it does keep the plant in vegetative state without herming and showing enough growth then it would show that this schedule can knock off at least 4 hours of consumption. I have done 2 plants from seed, one under 14/10 and one under 16/8, the latter only showed about a 10% increase of growth. I did not document this so please take it how you will.

My overall reasoning with this was to try and establish if it was possible to flower out at this schedule to keep the overall consumption at ANY GIVEN time below 1200W for stealth sake. 1200W may sound like nothing but where I am and in context of where I live any much more than that seems like a large amount to use, add to that the stereotypical 12/12 pattern and you can see why I am looking for potential aternatives.

Illumination said:

If you are considering this to limit awareness of your activities you are worrying too much...DO NOT TELL ANYONE YOU GROW AND DO NOT SELL...the electrical usage will only be looked at AFTER THEY ARE WATCHING YOU...it will not allert them to your activities...there are many other hobbies...reef tanks and reptiles just to name a couple...will generate the same electrical usage...oh and always pay your bill on time

as for the amount of minimum dark time depends highly on the strain...as some sativa require MORE THAN 12 hours darkness to flower...while some indicas less than 8...but have never even heard of any flowering at 6 darkness

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Um no offence but it gets tiresome to hear the same reguritated stuff all the time, do you think I got to 2 dedicated flower tents and a veg room not knowing or considering this stuff.

Thanks for your input anyway..

newworldicon said:

Um no offence but it gets tiresome to hear the same reguritated stuff all the time, do you think I got to 2 dedicated flower tents and a veg room not knowing or considering this stuff.

Thanks for your input anyway..

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I apologize but was not regurgitating anything.... facts will not change dependent on circumstances....didnt mean to offend so will withdraw my input

Illumination said:

I apologize but was not regurgitating anything.... facts will not change dependent on circumstances....didnt mean to offend so will withdraw my input

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No sweat dude. here in the Uk we are slowly going to have a monitoring device installed by your supplier in every home within a few years, these are real concerns.

I have seen from 8-12 hours of continuous darkness work depending on the strain. I don't think I have seen anything other than auto flowering plants flower with less than 8 hours of continuous darkness.

If you change your lights to 6-6-6, Satan will appear in your grow room. He takes many forms but in this instance he would likely choose spider mites.

how about just grow autos in that light lol cause its only going to cause problems with photoperiod plants.

If your worried about power consumption run call your power company and tell them you just bought a pottery kiln and want to know how to save on other power usage. They wil make a record of it and it could help if people started poking around. I went to time of use/ off peak power rate schedule and they were like..your drawing 6,000 watts an hour at night. "oh yeah, that is my 30 amp 220 kiln"