First grow - Anxious about harvesting

[SoyBeing]

Hi folks,
So as the title says this is my first grow and I somehow ended up with 25 plants from bag seeds, none of which I expected to survive, all of which did and all of which ended up being female. They're growing outside in Australian summer weather right now and I'm keeping a close, untrained eye on them.
It's getting to the point where even a total scrub (i.e. me) can tell they're at the point where knowing when to harvest and what to look for in a harvest is good info to have. I only have a few photos of one particular plant because that one is the one giving me the most anxiety about not knowing when it's harvest time and not wanting to fuck up a very coincidental grow at the very last moment.

So anyway I read up as much as I could about harvest time, all about trichs and pistils and all that jazz and I'm still pretty torn as to how to read my plants because of conflicting info which just brings up a lot of questions I can't find answers to (do I read the trichs or the pistils? Do I read both? What percentage of amber should I look for? How have I got myself into this situation? What am I doing with my life?) which is why I felt like a more personally-applicable opinion would help.

So far this particular plant seems to be the most advanced one, it has somewhat cloudy trichs, with a tiny percentage of possible amber (it's so fuckin sunny lately that checking with my magnifying glass is blinding). It reeks to the high heavens and looks the heaviest (out of the others, not as a general plant) with calyxes but on the other hand it's still really leafy rather than... buddy? It also sprouts new pistils consistently and they all are still white and fresh and they also seem like pretty skinny buds to be harvested yet (I do know some strains put out skinny buds, so if that's what's happening that's fine). It's been growing for a while and was the first to sprout out of all of the seeds so it feels like it might be the most advanced, and while it's been a long time growing I'm happy to leave it longer if that's what it needs, my problem is just that I'm so unsure about everything about it.

Sorry if I've left out necessary info or put in unnecessary info, any help is greatly appreciated and also gentle confirmations that I haven't fucked up would be cool too ta.

TLR pls when do I harvest this plant

Also sorry if the pictures aren't clear, my partner took them and they're not really sure what they're looking at whenever I try to talk to them about the plants, bless their little cotton socks. I can take more photos in a couple of days when I'm home again if needed



Edit: they're also pretty scrawny/small plants due to stress early on in the grow so they aren't abundant with bud and they never will be, I guess I just want to know when to harvest these plants to get the most out of a first time, barely-successful grow. I've got clones starting up already and a lot more info on proper growing so this is kinda just trying to minimise loss of an already probably small harvest.

 

[Hillbilly420]

Man by just looking at the pistols you still got a little bit to go, how's the tricones looking like?

 

[TheFertilizer]

Wait you got 25/25 female? You should get more of that seed! Good job.

Also it seems like you've probably read all the traditional wisdom. The most important thing you should remember is that it's up to you and at this point, it's going to get you high. Now I know you probably have heard "but it's so much better if you wait" but don't concern yourself too much with what people say you should do and just use your instinct. If you wait for a plant to go half amber and half milky or something, you could harvest some buds too late, and you can do the same is you try to shoot for half clear and half milky. It's more like just a good guideline to get the best balance of potency, yield and high type, and plus you gotta be the judge on how fast your plants grow. So you want to wait for side branched to go milky while your main colas are all amber by the time it happens?

Personally I have never heard many people recommend going by pistils except old school sources. I think you'll find most agree trichomes are a better measure, and the general consensus is that 50/50 milky/amber gives you the best balance between yield and a high thst still has a headiness to it. If you wait until it's mostly amber then it's more of a sedated body type of high, where most say clear/milky is a more heady and clear high. All clear and they're mostly CBD and not THC... But CBD is nice.

You gotta experiment to find what you like, good news is you sound like you have a lot of plants to choose from so you could harvest some now, a little later and then way late and experience it for yourself. But most of the milky/amber advice comes from yield growers. My most trusted grower harvests at the first sign of amber, he doesn't wait for it to be half because it can turn mostly amber really quick.

 

[SoyBeing]

Thank you Fertilizer! I've been testing some sugar leaves in a vape and they've been doing a pretty decent job so I guess it's pretty safe to say there's plenty of thc hanging around in there regardless, I guess I was just concerned because most of the trichs were cloudy but the buds seemed so skinny overall. I'll wait for a bit more amber to pop up and then probably go with harvesting the more advanced plant and see how the others go. I guess it was pretty overwhelming to have 25 plants to worry about haha, but you're right, the point is to get high and that's gonna happen regardless at this point of growth so why not. Thanks again, I'll wing it and see how it goes with the advanced plant and go on from there.

 

[Kalimaki420]

It will take some weeks in my mind.
I would not think about harvest before hairs change colour.
If they change it is still 2 weeks to go most of the time.

Take some samples and try to get some idea and let some go longer if you have enough.

 

[SoyBeing]

Thanks for the advice, I keep seeing conflicting opinions on the pistil colour's relevance in ripeness but they are still super fresh looking so I'm happy to wait until they at least don't look so white, and I have plenty of plants flowering so I'm not too limited in ability to test plants as they go. Thanks again

 

[TheFertilizer]

The thing with pistils is sometimes some strains will have them change color earlier and later on, and some even keep growing new ones way out at the end of growth. I think it is probably safe to say they're little early if your pistils are that white, but if for example you have mostly milky and a little bit of amber trichomes, you may not want to wait for the pistils to catch up. There's really nothing written in stone about it.

I am still shocked you got 25 females out of 25 seeds, with bagseed. I would be checking for male flowers, a small possibility you got the seeds off a hermie plant (seeds from a hermie = female flowers 100% of the time), so yours could too with the right stress triggers. Another reason I'd avoid letting them go too long, self-pollenation is something cannabis plants do if they sense they're getting close to the end of their lift without having reproduced. Just watch for bananas and don't stress it, but it is another thing to think about.

Oh for that reason I'd really avoid harvesting a little at a time off one plant too, because IF they have a higher chance of going hermie, cutting most of the buds off will be a huge stresser so it could happen then. Again just watch for them bananas, I am probably making a bigfer deal of it than it is. But 25 females from 25 bagseeds... Either you have awesome luck or they probably came from hermaphrodite plants.

Nice looking weed, especially for bag seeds!

 

[Sejd2131]

Nice looking Sativa plants you have growing...

 

[SoyBeing]

Yeah I couldn't believe it, I've been obsessively checking for any bananas because it seems so unlikely but I haven't seen a single plant that looks suspicious (so far, touch wood). I'll keep checking them and do my best not to stress them, they're pretty comfortably set-up now so I don't bother them as much as I did when I was first panicking what to do with 25 plants haha.
It's comforting to know they aren't too close either way and I have some leg room to kinda play it by ear, probably give them some room to breathe and stop hawking over them as obsessively except for check-ups.