The lights being too far away is definitely your problem.

8-10 inches might be good for a 400 watt cmh, but for a compact fluorescent, one or two inches would be better.

Your plants stretched up to try to get better light, causing the stocks to get too spindly.
Mustelid Reviewed by Mustelid on . I think I killed them! I discovered recently that my timer was set to 24 hours of light with no dark. My plants shot up nice and tall and then sort of just fell over! I discovered the mistake, propped up the plants and now I wait. I do have new growth but if the stalks don't fatten out and the roots take hold I may end up in trouble. I think out of the 5 that I recently started, maybe 1 or 2 will survive. And who knows if any of them are even females. Rating: 5