Are these ladies about ready to be harvested; are they too early, or too late?!?

Hello cannabis.com community!

So, like most other posts here, this is my first grow. Here's some details about the plants and their atmosphere.

This is a closet grow, SOG method (more or less..)
the plants were raised from seed, but not from a seed bank. (i realize that this may be a large source of my problems)
the medium used is MG soil. Full Spectrum CFL bulbs for vegetation.
Two Quad-Band 450 LED panels (mixed red, blue, orange, and white LED's) used for flowering
i've used small doses of MG plant food over their vegetation.
two of the three plants have gone through some stress of bending while flowering.
supplemental c02 has been used in the form of seltzer water and from a tank, however the regulator is not the right type.
there is a small fan in the bottom right and there are ventilation holes in the top and bottom.
a small ceramic heater keeps the temperature between 70-78 degrees.
they have been in flowering for (approximately) 2.5 months.
during this last half month i have been using Snow Storm Ultra per it's instructions.

Now, there's two main issues i'm having. It seems like about 50-70% of the pistils are turning color, and i have not looked through a magnifying glass at the trichromes. According to the pistils, it seems like it's harvest time.

BUT, how can it be harvest time when the buds dont look like they're dense AT ALL! there's so much space inside of the buds that i'm afraid it will just crumble to ashes when it's cured.

So, pretty much my main questions are:
Do these plants look like they're ready to be harvested?
If so, then what might have caused their lack in density?

I would extremely appreciate an educated answer and/or some constructive criticism as to what i could do better in the future, as well as how any future threads should be constructed!!

Thanks a Pot!
-MrBGrower

And here they are! (click any of them to enlarge)


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"Do these plants look like they're ready to be harvested?

No, they do not.

" i have not looked through a magnifying glass at the trichromes"

Then I suggest that you obtain a glass and employ it.
They are under $10 and will save you many times that.

The leaf shape says Sativa.
It could take up to 12 weeks to fully mature a sativa kine, and the pistils are not a good indicator of ripeness.

"then what might have caused their lack in density?"

You are trying to flower with ~15 Watts per panel.
It can be done, but not well.

LEDs are efficient, but they are subject to the laws of physics.
There are simply not enough photons to grow fat, dense buds.
Those crappy panels are barely suitable for cloning.
Triple the power and you'll grow some half decent bud.
These were flowered under 55W. of red and blue, 3W. LEDs



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I'm not sure there is much of a problem here as they look pretty good, but since you say that they're not bulking up the way you'd like, I suggest you consider the problem to be your soil. Doesn't MG soil have a lot of fertlizer to it compare to others? And if so, the extra feeding isn't necessary. So... I'm guess that what's going on here is that they appear to be finishing to early because of high phosphorus content of the soil. Maybe flush with a good deal of water, then let the soil dry out and see how they respond. Maybe the red hairs will stop and bulking up will take place. Happy Frog soil next time, or something similar. As Weez mentioned, maybe some more light like a sodium would help.

gotta agree more light, they just look light starved a bit.

You have two symptoms that are showing too much nitrogen - dark green leaves and brown leaf tips. This is more of your problem than the light. Too much fert in the soil. Give them a flush.

Thank you all for the suggestions.

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You are trying to flower with ~15 Watts per panel.
It can be done, but not well.

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I have another panel that i can install, and they are 15 watts each; hopefully 3 panels putting out 45 watts will show some better results.

Quote:

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Then I suggest that you obtain a glass and employ it.

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I'll get on that! What are the trichromes supposed to look like when the plant is ready to be cut down?

Quote:

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Too much fert in the soil. Give them a flush.

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I flushed them when i transplanted them for flowering, however i think MG does have some time-release fert or whatever, so I will definitely give them another flush soon.
Where can i get these other types of soil from? i don't really want to order it online.

Thanks for the feedback!

if you dont have a strong enough magnifying glass to see the trichomes like you need to
then go by the white to brown (hairs) ratio i think its like 70 to 80 percent brown hairs
but buying a magnifying glass is the best thing you can do
and the trichomes will turn a amber color and start to hunch over and thats when its time to harvest
and wow on the grow its looking not to bad considering the low level of light!!!!!!!

I don't think Miracle Grow soil is designed with growing consumables in mind. If you want a soil that will last most of the grow, without any additives, then I'd suggest Happy Frog soil by Foxfarm, sold at your local hydroponic grow store. If they don't have it, Roots should be okay too. Towards the end of the grow you might have to add a little fert kicker just to feed them while they finish. This is actually a good thing because you don't want any fert to be in the plants in the last week or so of flowering. The fert in the soil should deplete, then maybe you add a little if they don't look so good, but don't give fert in the last week or so of finishing, just water.

" What are the trichromes supposed to look like when the plant is ready to be cut down?"

I like "mostly cloudy", but if you want a more soporific effect, let them got to ~30% amber colored;

X100


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Here's a closeup at 400X;

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Enjoy and aloha,

Weeze

Nice pictures and illustrations Weezard! A very informative thread! :rasta: pr