Flowering Using only Metal Halide

Found this on on Canibis Culture web page in the Ask Ed section.

http://www.cannabisculture.com/articles/4134.html

Bless,
DZ

Wow,
there are a lot of ideas about using metal halides either to end flowering or in conjunction with high pressure sodium during flowering to supply a more complete light spectrum.
Bless,
DZ

Yep, that's been my experience. The best results are reached with 50/50 MH/HPS. In the early days ('79-80') the first grow shops like Seattle Halide only carried 1000watt MH lights and no one knew about the roughly 10% bigger yields from HPS. I think it was about '82' when I saw a 1000 HPS on display at old Dr. Feelgoods on the ave in the U District.

I have full set-ups for HPS and MH mode. But the MH is a lot hotter to run so I use only HPS for vegging and flowering. Works 4 me, BigSteve.

bigsteve said:

I have full set-ups for HPS and MH mode. But the MH is a lot hotter to run so I use only HPS for vegging and flowering. Works 4 me, BigSteve.

Click to expand...

Didn't know MH run hotter. My Virtual Sun kit came with both and planned on using the Halide as a backup bulb. May scratch that now and shell out the $$$ for another couple HPS to keep around. Running my dimmable ballasts at the 1100 setting and not sure how much it will shorten bulb life.

They are making duel ballast set hoods with two sockets so you can use one 600 watt HPS and a 600 watt MH.

I should also mention that using a MH during flower will give you more cannabinoid production and a stronger medical effect and in my opinon even give a slightly better taste, also MH will probably be better all around if you are running a full organic or veganic setup.

You all may have noticed that most of the newer HPS bulb manufacturers are claiming that their bulbs have up to 20% higher enhanced blue spectrum than standard HPS bulbs. They wouldn't go to the effort of fixing what isn't broken (the standard HPS bulbs) if there wasn't some advantage to the modified light spectrum. Old school conventional wisdom was always that you use MH to veg and HPS to flower, but both of those spectrums are restrictive and don't mimic natural sunlight very well. I'm betting that there's some truth in mixing bulb types to increase quality and yield. If anyone has some A vs. B experience in unique bulb arrangements, please chime in.

There are to many neat bulbs out there. I like some of the fuller spectrum bulbs but they do seem to offer less lumens. It would be nice to experiment with these bulbs just to see what it does for the taste and texture of the smoke. Even if I yielded a bit less if you got better tasting bud, it would be worth it too me. Although, I still do need to learn how to grow my strains to their fullest potential using what I got or any results using a different light would just be inconclusive.

I'm taking a risk on my first grow and trying some mixed spectrums. My plants got too large while I was waiting until I could afford the 600W HPS, and now the single fixture isn't large enough for all three plants. I decided to use 3 of my T5-HO units to provide supplemental light from the sides, and I have both 3000K and 6400K bulbs. What I'm thinking is that I'll set up the fixtures with one 6400K bulb and three 3000K bulbs each. Then, for the last two weeks of flowering, I'll switch the bulbs so each fixture has four 6400K bulbs. I didn't want to experiment with too many variables on my first grow, but it looks like I pretty much have to use the additional fixtures, so why not try it and see what happens. I'll definitely report the results in about a month.

I have use mh for veg and flower also tried hps for veg and flower and imo it takes a long time to know what bulb works best at what stage
and some strains need different light at different stages of growth to get the best yield

say your are growing a sativa strain 12 weeks in flower
I would use mh in veg and flower up to when the buds start to grow (true flower) as the mh will reduce the stretch and keep the stems strong and stocky where a hps would make the plant stretch in the first few weeks in flower after that time a mh will give you more airy buds if you keep using it so you need to change the bulb over to a hps

also a sativa need to be grown in a smaller room as the strain needs more light in flower, OK the temps will be higher but that's OK with sativa strain as they like a hotter room