A very interesting question! I'm not sure if I understand exactly what you are asking - but I'll take a shot at it anyway.
The mature, female, cannibis plant has two stages (as we all know), "Vegetative" and "Flowering". These are two completely different "lifestyles" (if you will), something akin to a woman being pregnant. Dietary needs change, harmons are different - everything's different (you fathers know what I mean!). I'm not drawing a scientific similarity here, I'm just indicating a vast difference between vegging and flowering here! In fact the difference is so vast that the plant has to be induced in order to "Shift Gears" and make the big change. In "Nature" the days become shorter as late Summer turns into Fall, when day and night are "about" equal, 12 hours each, the mature, female, cannibis begins to "Flower". It has crossed the threshold and "Shifted Gears".
In "Nature" there is no way back to Veg stage - the plant flowers, becomes pollinated, produces seeds then dies! The concept of "re-vegging" a plant is a man-made process and requires a certain effort, as well as crossing another lighting threshold that is somewhere around 14 hours light and 10 hours darkness. Otherwise the plant will stay in flowering mode.
This "Inertia" concept of being forced through a threshold in order to Switch Gears and "Change Modes" is probably what is keeping your plants in Flowering Mode. The "Auto Flowering Responce Gene" has been, pretty well, de-activated in all sub-species of cannabis exept Ruderalis. But all sub-species need to be mature in order to flower, and all except Ruderalis need to be at the (about 12 hours of darkness) threshold.
Make any sense?
Oh yeah, almost forgot - - - - Even though your plants are growing "In Nature", you have interceded and interrupted the normal time schedual of the growing season - thereby providing your plants with "a way back" into veg mode. Like I said "man-made process!".
