Plants reaching for light??

My plants are about 6 days old and I am using 150w CFL's...

They seem to be reaching for the lights, but my lights are about 3 inches away from them. Could it be another problem? Maybe underwatering?

REP+ for all contributors!

u using real 150w cfls or 42 actual watt 150w incansesent equivelent cfls? can you get the lights any closer w/o burning them?

Can you post a pic? And by strecthing... how tall are they exactly? Some seedlings just tend to grow up a few inches, then stop the rapid vertical growth and begin to bush out. Ive seen it under HID and sunlight. A picture would be great.

I know people say get them closer etc etc but if they are real 150watt cfl's and the seedlings are only 6 days old i'd say they don't need to be three inches away and that is too close, is there heat problems here too?

no heat problems... i think that the lights might not be actual 150w's... I am gonna get stronger lights... thanks for the advice! REP+ for all!

I have an actual 125w cfl and it is quite big, small rolling pin size, seedling cannot be kept within three inches of this so would guess you just got a rip of cfl that says it is 150watts but in reality it is 30watts and will never be more than 30watts. Sorry dude, post pics of your bulb and i will confirm it for you. Peace

Cfl's stretch the truth, yes they can advertise a 30watt at the equivelent of a 150watt but that is only half the story, they are not 150watts to a plant and never will be. Only after about 60 watts do these things start becoming even remotly intresting. My brand is envirolite and they are not cheap so it is not a money saving thing, just envirolite are brighter than all the rest hands down. They are also not broad with their colour spectrums and plants generally are not keen on them when it comes to usable light to grow. I grow with them but they suck at low wattage.

cant imagine them stretching under two that close but anyway ... can you maby repot them and put your grow medium up to lowest leaves. This kinda gives you a little better stem and starts your first branches lower . I assume you have a fan on them to be able to stay that close with that much wattage .. If not an oscolating fan helps build stonger stems if they seem weak from the stretching . Hope this helps some ... good luck

No point repotting 6 day old seedlings and neither is it the best idea to bury them upto their first leaves, i disagree with the practice of burying plant stems except by an inch every repot but in this situation i was taught that if you bury seedlings you are likely to bend or snap their weak flimsy stems with the first watering under soil compaction. If i was to bury seedlings or plant stems deep i would be sure to use some rooting powder or liquid so at least they had a chance. People do this successfully but i do not think that this is answering the question, he says his plants are stretching for the light he placed 3 inches away and even if repotted upto the first leaves he will still have the lamp placed at three inches.

Kingrow, what is your opinion on a single 150watt CFL vs multiple smaller bulbs adding up to a total of 150watts. How many 150watt CFLs do you use and for how many plants?

I have 125watt 200 watt and 250 watt cfl's, the bigger the better, anything under 125 sucks, and if you have more lower wattage cfl's as oppose to one big bright one you better make your plants dam short. Most if not all brands are rubbish compared to Envirolite, only buy these and yes they are brighter than the rest. I wouldn't use anything under 125 for flowering and anything under 60watt for veg.

Cfl's that say they are the equivelent to bigger wattages are full of sh!t and not for plants.

ive found that in alot cases stretching seedings act like this cause they havent settled right in soil meaning the still trying to attach properly into it , some individuals thopugh seem to stretch no matter of type of germination , i put some air flow direct on them so to help them strenghten up and if they do it to a degree where they start to get loose and droppy i just put some more soil on top and make them sit tight on one place

I figured it out... They just needed water. It wasnt that they were stretching, it was the leaves were reaching towards the light....looked like this ----> \/

lol, sweet drawing.

Anyways thanks everyone for the help. REP+ for all!

If you would have given it a day or so it probably would have started to wilt. I find that this dry period before watering is when my plants really do grow. Looks like you added water at the perfect time. I add water slowly so that it wets the top layer and soaks down not pour lots on let it soak from the bottom up. Sprinkle water don't pour it and give it 5 mins for a little water to soak in and then water a little more.

So the bulb is ok at 3 inches? You still haven't said if it was a true wattage cfl or an equivelent one with a true lower wattage? Make and model number would be a start dude. Thanks

Hey dude, I just wanted to put my 2 cents into this because I grow solely with CFLs.

Right now I am using 150w equiv. CFL DAYLIGHT bulbs to veg, and 300w TCP CFL bulbs for flowering. The heat is NOTHING and is dispersed through regular fan exhaust and nothing more. Right now I have a grow box that isn't working out as well as I would like so I am going to be putting all of this in a vacant closet.

The 150w cfls are FINE, but do you have reflectors on them? Part of the reason people shy away from CFLs for growing is because they have a 360 degree lighting. If you REALLY think your bulbs are too weak, try buying a 2-3mm thick mylar sheet and fabricate a little reflector onto each of your lights. This will cause the light shining from the back of the bulb to reflect onto the plant therefor adding more lumens/light to the plant if done properly.

A little tip though, if you take my advice please dont use tin foil. I made that mistake, #1 the tin foil is HIGHLY conductive and if placed in the wrong spots you could get a nice zap - on top of all of that tin foil isnt 100% reflective, it absorbs a lot of the neccessary light spectrums and only reflects the "brightness" - it also creates heat spots which could seriously damage your plant during growth.

If you want to speak about CFLs please PM me I would be more than happy to send you some pics of my grow, show you my bulbs and even tell you how to fabricate the mylar reflector - its pretty simple.

Let me know dude

Yer tinygrow reflectors increase the light but the reason that people shy away from cfl's is that they have lots of small tubes generally in a circular formation. The top of the tubes closest to the plants light is quite lost and the same with the tubes on the top. I don't know if i have made my self clear enough but there is a lot of light lost from cfl's that even a reflector dosen't help with. Also the science behind them is not so great and they rate as a poor source of light and give low penetration.

I'm not saying don't grow with them but it would have to be the right situation to use them as most other light sources are a lot better. I seriously rate flourescents but not cfl's even though i grow with the real true wattage ones.