Too much light? Is that possible.

Ok I've grown outdoors since the late 70's and every year since so I am not a total idiot when it comes to growing the weed. Always started some plants indoors in mid-March and outplanted them early may, growing under flouro's and natural sunlight/window. They tended to get lanky but always performed well.

Anyway I decided to do an indoor this year my first. (gonna still do maybe 10 outdoors, it's a hard habit to break) Got 5 girls up, all 5 different ind/sat mixes from Greenhouse Seeds/ Sea of Seeds. (Wh Widow, WW X Cheese, White Rhino, Straight Cheese and Lemon Skunk)

Anyway not sure if the strain even matters.

I've got them under a 600W MH cool tube,positioned about 14" away. Also got a couple 60W (actual) 6500K CFL's right in their face. Temp stays around 82-85, and humidity around 30%. Lights on 18/6. Working on getting the humidity up, bought a POS cheap humidifier from wal-mart that is going back.

The plants have great color. They are smaller than I would like, and here is FINALLY my question. I am getting no height growth. Or stated another way, very little internodal stem, the leaves nodes are just stacking up. I have the cotyledons obviously, the single leaf, the triple leaf, and working on 2 sets of 5's but there IS NO internodal length/distance. The nodes are all coming out crammed in a very short vertical distance, like an inch or slightly more.

Is it possible to have the lights too close or too much light? that is my basic question. I planned on topping and or fimming and doing LST but unless these things stretch out a bit I don't have any room to work in, if that makes any sense.

Wondering if I should cut/move some light back to get them to stretch a bit?

Anyway thanks in advance to anyone who cares to offer an opinion on this. Don't really care to go to the trouble to post pics but if you ride my ass maybe I could. They are a very nice green color, maybe 5" tall, going on 5 node sets within about 1.5"-2" of vertical stem.

Peace - Aim

Yes, during veg I keep my 600 2-3 feet away.

So you think it's possible to overload them with light and make them like bonsai compact, which is what seems to be happening? I have done the most common recommended thing which is lower the light as far as possible without getting light burn, but am at a point where I need some height growth. Maybe I am just trying to rush things. Just wanted to do some topping and training and these girls are wanting to stay short and compact.

Thanks slab, any more input, from anyone, definitely appreciated.

For sure, you could do some fatal damage. I would run those cfl s as the primary light source and then have that 600 a couple a feet away and run it only for a fews hours each 'day'.

waste of lamp at this point and costly.

This has happened to me when I blast them with too many lights....don't ask...ive just trimmed off the ones that are bunched up,moved my lights up a bit...wait a couple days for it to recover or grow a few more nodes then top as you like.GL.peace

they'll start stretching here soon. thats actually a good sign. you dont want stretchy plants.

AimAim said:

So you think it's possible to overload them with light and make them like bonsai compact, which is what seems to be happening? I have done the most common recommended thing which is lower the light as far as possible without getting light burn, but am at a point where I need some height growth. Maybe I am just trying to rush things. Just wanted to do some topping and training and these girls are wanting to stay short and compact.

Thanks slab, any more input, from anyone, definitely appreciated.

Click to expand...

How old are they? Indica dom. will tend to grow short and compact.

Plants look healthy, happy? Leaves feel cool?

Could probably ditch the CFL,s, might lower temps a bit.

Yeah thanks for the answers. I think I'll back the 600 up to a couple feet and shit-can the CFL's. The plants are really nice dark green colored, compact plants, I just want them to stretch a bit. Don't consider this conversation over, I'd like to hear more ideas if anyone has them.

Yeah plants look healthy and leaves are cool, grow room runs in low 80s during lights on. Never heat stressed them and I know what that looks like cause I've done it many times in the past. i.e. I've cooked some leaves accidentally more than once.

Peace - Aim

How long are you gonna veg?You can cut down heat and energy by using a couple 26w cfl's for 2-4 weeks

What to much CFL light does 24/7 for 2 months with 20, 23 watt 6400 bulbs View attachment 2526998View attachment 2526999View attachment 2527000View attachment 2527001View attachment 2527002View attachment 2527003View attachment 2527005View attachment 2527006View attachment 2527007View attachment 2527008View attachment 2527010View attachment 2527011View attachment 2527012View attachment 2527013View attachment 2527014View attachment 2527015 Sannies Madshack, one of the best strains known in the Galaxy ! Over 50 Main COLAS

6weeks veg.....almost 2 weeks into flower.....16 cfl's above.....7 on the side and 2 t5's........ogxny diesel....IF USED PROPERLY i don't think you can have too much light

NerdJr said:

What to much CFL light does 24/7 for 2 months with 20, 23 watt 6400 bulbs View attachment 2526998View attachment 2526999View attachment 2527000View attachment 2527001View attachment 2527002View attachment 2527003View attachment 2527005View attachment 2527006View attachment 2527007View attachment 2527008View attachment 2527010View attachment 2527011View attachment 2527012View attachment 2527013View attachment 2527014View attachment 2527015 Sannies Madshack, one of the best strains known in the Galaxy ! Over 50 Main COLAS

Click to expand...

What's with that small ass container.................nice looking plant dude!!!!

NerdJr said:

What to much CFL light does 24/7 for 2 months with 20, 23 watt 6400 bulbs View attachment 2526998View attachment 2526999View attachment 2527000View attachment 2527001View attachment 2527002View attachment 2527003View attachment 2527005View attachment 2527006View attachment 2527007View attachment 2527008View attachment 2527010View attachment 2527011View attachment 2527012View attachment 2527013View attachment 2527014View attachment 2527015 Sannies Madshack, one of the best strains known in the Galaxy ! Over 50 Main COLAS

Click to expand...

Nice looking plant with 50 TOPS, not main colas.....

B166ER420 said:

6weeks veg.....almost 2 weeks into flower.....16 cfl's above.....7 on the side and 2 t5's........ogxny diesel....IF USED PROPERLY i don't think you can have too much lightView attachment 2527522View attachment 2527523

Click to expand...

With CFLs and T-5s you are correct because your maxing out at around 5000 lumens. HIDs are an entirely different story altogether......

5000 lumens????How do you figure that when 1 bulb puts out 1750 and I have 22 or more bulbs.........just asking ive heard that lumens don't add up but that just don't make sense or I would have a shitty looking plant with only 5000 lumens.......right?

Lumens do not add up. 5000 lumens is enough to grow a decent plant. We were growing plants with magnetic core T-12s in the 70s with good results and probably never topped 3000 lumens.

I hear ya dude........its just seems 22 23w cfl bulbs putting out 1750 lumens each would put out more than 5000 lumens collectively......all I have to say is 5000 lumens?? Prove it!!....lol........either way if its only 5000 im fine wth it).peace

Inverse square law. The larger number of bulbs just give you more coverage of what they have to offer.

You guys are funny, there's such thing as too much light but your nowhere near it. You need to increase your dark cycle so they don't look like that. Switch to 18/6 and pump up the light. I using 1000's to veg.

Plants only absorb so much light it's true, then the rest (sleep) learn to read the plants cycles and you will see a different type

Alexander Supertramp said:

Lumens do not add up. 5000 lumens is enough to grow a decent plant. We were growing plants with magnetic core T-12s in the 70s with good results and probably never topped 3000 lumens.

Click to expand...

No offense intended but I'm happy we have come so far in 40 years. I'm happy to hear you had success but there's easier ways now