Will 150w HPS outperform 372w of T5HO?

[OMB]

Thank catbuds! Good info. Maybe that's why my buds are tight? The mix of warm and cold? I was thinking of adding some CFL sidelights, I have a few laying around I used for mama for awhile.
Speaking of mama plant....I think she might be rootbound. She has leaf yellowing and some droop too. I have a bigger pot for her, I'm going to do that right now..... I can't stand to see her less than Vibrant.
Right now I am watching my side by side T5HO vs. 150W HPS "bud off". It's been 7 day's and I think the HPS is slightly ahead as far as any growth or color, but no flower's yet on any of them.
But.....My new clones are popping roots, my first buds from the tops of the "stumpy's" are drying, and it's Friday night. It's all good.
"Here I come Mama, I have a new pot for you"...If Mama is Happy, well, you know the rest.

I have decided I will call you "Mama catbud's" Just seems right to me.
Thanks for the help "mama".

[catbuds]

LMAO! mama's always glad to help!

[catbuds]

BTW. HPS tends to cause stretching. Look closley & see if there are more leaf sets, or just stem stretching. If its just stem stretching, the buds will be longer, so you'll need to compare by dried harvest weight. That will be the only way to determine if your growing more bud, or just more stem. I like experimenting!

[OMB]

I will check for that mama catbuds. I am ok for some stretch, but I do like my stumpy plants due to height restrictions. Gotta keep 'em under 3 feet.
No problem with my other two I flowered, after the LST they never broke 9 inches tall! Haha.....but 16"s wide. Go stumpy's! :dance
The new 4 in flower are a little bigger, they vegged for a little over 4 weeks. They are about 12"s. Or were, until I LST'd them tonight. They are about 8"s now.
I'm having a great time with this, thanks for the help mama.

[OMB]

All the girls are showing flower's now, but I have to say the T5HO plants have more developed flower's at this point. Right now, the T5's are winning. Size is equal, though I have tied the the T5 girls down while leaving the HPS girls alone. (testing that penetration thing)
I will try to get some pics up, I realize this thread is useless without them.

[catbuds]

Hey, I hope you cloned that 4" top you cut off. If not, hope you ate it ! LOL! Thats what I do if they're too sm to root, I eat a lot of pot! Probably the the only healthy thing I eat, grazing my garden!
-- Yea! Go T5's! Can't wait to get get over this flu & finish my cabinet! New 6tube 4' T5's & lots of cfl underlighting & side lighting. For now, they're under plain ole T8's + gro-lux side lighting. Awesome little fat sumo wrestlers, but I'm afraid if they get to big for this light to penetrate, they'll start stretching & get leggy. T5's give pretty good penetration as fluorescents go, so if your restricting size, sometimes hids can be a waste as the T5's will do just as well. So, seems like I've found someone to back me up when I find myself arguing this point! I really like them, enough that my hps just may stay in that box in attic! Since I do grow outdoors too, it doesn't make sense for me to grow BIG plants indoors.
-- If you're going to do any side/underlighting with cfls, try the reveal 20watt (75watt replacement). Awesome little warm lights. Use them in your home too. Great to read by. They're made to simulate sunlight, & they do great things for a plant in flower! On another forum, a couple of the guys have given up big plants & hids in favor of T5's on a sog. They all agreed T5's produced nice tight compact buds. Shovelhandle has a nice pic of a plant he flowered under them. Its one of his older posts & I can't find it, but maybe he'll jump in here & post it for you to see.
-- The reveals are 2500k with an output of 1200 lumens for the 20 watt.

[OMB]

I sure did clone 'em Mama Catbuds! Though I found the tops to take the longest to root compared to a lower "twig" type cutting. Eat 'em? Now there's a thought...little
bit of balsamic vinegar in that salad? Lol
On the sidelighting, I was doing some thinking...Do the BOTTOMS of the leaves Photosynthesize? If not, shouldn't the sidelighting be slightly angle downward to catch as much of the tops of the leaves as possible?
Those T5's are quite impressive, though I'm not sure how "fair" the comparison of 150 watts of HPS to 372 watts of T5 is.
You are right about the smaller tight buds though...The upper buds on my 1st grow were tight. Some of the smaller, inner plant ones were "airy", though I know I can do better.
They really got very little 'nutes...a vacation towards the end and temp issues my caretaker had, not to mention the Evil Spider mite attack shortened my flowering
a bit.
The new girls are all bigger than the 1st grow and looking healthy so we shall see. They are sleeping now but I will get some pics up tonight.
I have more clones than I need now, gonna help another guy out with some of my "stumpy" strain and see how he does with it. He is a veteran grower and it will be interesting to see how he does with them.
Thanks Mama!

[Chromophore]

The underside of the leaf can absorb light, but most of the chlorophyll containing cells are concentrated near the upper surface. So energy absorption will be much less efficient. Also the surface tissue on the underside is different in composition than that on the upper surface, and tends to be more reflective.

[catbuds]

Those smaller inner buds (lower buds), you were talking about being "airy", that's what the underlighting is for. It will help plump them up & make them tighter. I harvest the top riper buds first & the lower ones aren't far behind with the underlighting, just a matter of days. Or if you prefer, harvest the whole plant, but then I seperate the riper tops (some amber trichs, buts still mostly milky) for pm & save the lower buds (milky, but no amber yet), for am. That way you have 2 different highs from one plant, & keeping them seperate, you don't end up with an 'up' high at bed time, or a sleepy 'down' high early in the day when you have things to do. But definitely underlighting will make those lower buds bigger & tighter. As for the photosynthesis, the leaf is translucent enough for that extra light to reach the photo cells, so yeah. If you try it, you'll like the results.
-- I kinda miss the old days.. 600+ big momas outdoors & 20-30 3 1/2- 4 footers indoors 3X's a year. Kinda crimps the breeding experiments, but too many thieves & snitches to go commercial where I am now, so what would I do with it all? Just one of the many reasons why I find the T5's & cfls so perfect for what we do, sm personal stealth grows.

[catbuds]

Chromophore, I had to stop for a minute & think about the size of your trees! OMB & I are growing little guys, SOG. We try to finish around 2' tall. The underlighting hits the sides of the bottom half of our plants, getting light to the lower buds. But you're kinda right about the undersides of leaves, but the photo cells still respond somewhat to the smaller amount of light they get from underneath, but we're mainly concerned with lighting the lower smaller buds to beef them up. This wouldn't help you at all. Your jungle is too tall for underlighting to reach them unless you used pole lamps!!!! I'm still playing the cartoon in my mind where you get lost in 'the jungle'! LOL!