Plants possibly stretching, lights to far away?

[the image reaper]

personally, I wouldn't be wasting total 800 watts of metal halide on seedlings ... just hang a cheap CFL or flourescent tube, about 1" over their tops, save money, and wont be throwing all that heat, either ... :smokin:

the image reaper Reviewed by the image reaper on 04-08-2006. Plants possibly stretching, lights to far away? Hey guys, i have a bunch of seedlings and im pretty sure there stretching, i have 2 400w mh's rockin' and there 3.8ft high. they got there second set of leaves but there already about and inch give or take a lil more or less high. I think there stretching, im going to post a picture as soon as possible but i am able to hold my hand a foot away from the light with out getting really hot, should i maybe adjust the lights so they hang around 2-2.5ft high or? i know a picture would help, so im Rating: 5

[postmandave]

What he says.the postman.

[Kevin Spencer]

so yea i think i might actually go get a floro, one of the cheap ones and do that, but since im going to do that, how long do i keep um under the floro before moving to the mh? like maybe when its got its 5 node or what? thx again guys

[rodekyll]

I have a loose rule of thumb on when to transplant or move seedlings or clones under larger light (I do both the move and transplant at the same time): When in doubt, wait till you see bits of root start to wander out the holes in the bottom of those little pots you're using. Then you know you have a good, viable root ball. You can probably do it sooner, but good roots are the basis of a good plant, so personally, I'm not in that big a hurry.

I agree with the folks voting for less light. For the first few nodes, gentle light, gentle everything is better. I get those little 18" and 25" full-spectrum gro sticks. They're cheap, self contained, cool (10w/ft), mount anywhere, and don't draw any attention. They last about two years. I just bought one today to replace one that gave up at about exactly 25 months.