Outdoor Organic Balcony Stealth Quadlining: White Widow/Gorgonzola

[Stunger]

Update on gender. I have found pistils going on 2 plants, 2-WW and 3-WWG. So that is good, one of my big pots (50 liter) and one of the small 30 liter pots are female.

The past few weeks as I have been watching the tiny gender structures for signs of pistils or balls. I have found the same structures in appearance on all 4 plants, yet there are exceptions where some nodes or some pics where the angle taken is slightly different can make these structures appear different. Because males usually express their gender early, I would like to hope that these 2 will also soon start to show pistils. Funny enough I have never seen pistils so early on with my previous outdoor grows, it has always been 2nd or 3rd week in January, atho to be fair I haven't previously looked as hard for them as I have been doing this grow season. With a bit of luck the remaining 2 plants will reveal themselves very soon.
Pistils showing on 2-WW

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

2-WW gender structure

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019
• 1

2-WW pistils erupting

Pistils showing on 3-WWG

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

3-WWG pistils showing

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

3-WWG erupting pistil

 

[Stunger]

The two remaining plants that I am waiting to reveal their gender are 1-WW and 4-WWG. Here are a couple of closeups of the gender structures visible at their nodes. I am happy for anyone to chime in with what their guess is for the resulting genders.


1-WW

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

1-WW

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

1-WW

4-WWG

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

4-WWG gender structure

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• Stunger
• Dec 1, 2019

4-WWG gender structure

 

[Emeraldo]

I can't really explain the paler shade of green of 4-WWG compared to the 3 quadlined plants (1-WW, 2-WW, 3-WWG), one which (3-WWG) is a sibling of it! ...I am hoping very soon I will know what it's gender is...

Well, absent any possible problems with the soil or due to nutrient deficiencies, it could be a male. You said these were all from "regular" seeds, so that is a real possibility.

Looking at your WW-1, it seems that a "pedestal" is present under the incipient flower. With WWG-4, it is still too hard to tell for me. Those are good pictures though. How did you take them?

 

[Stunger]

Well, absent any possible problems with the soil or due to nutrient deficiencies, it could be a male. You said these were all from "regular" seeds, so that is a real possibility.

Looking at your WW-1, it seems that a "pedestal" is present under the incipient flower. With WWG-4, it is still too hard to tell for me. Those are good pictures though. How did you take them?

Yes indeed, either or both of those 2 could be male. The biggest strongest plant to me is 1-WW which unfortunately is the one plant I am guessing from it's gender structures to be the most likely one to be male. A shame, but with regular seeds one has to be realistic. But if there was 1 male and it was the pale 4-WWG then I'd be rapt, as the 3 balcony quadlined plants I feel are looking great. I gave them all another diluted nice worm wee drink today as their pots were getting light.

My camera is just an aging pocket sized Sony RX100. The pics only come out ok by chance, and when they do they seem to show a bit more detail than phone cameras altho they are improving too. I usually shoot off 5 to 10 pics per node to try and obtain one that is in focus but even then it doesn't always happen as I am usually at maximum closeness and have to contend with the wind moving the plant and myself trying to keep steady holding the camera.

 

[Stunger]

This morning I gave the plants a third foliar feed. This for 1 liter of dechlorinated water I added 2ml of 'Seasol' kelp seaweed concentrate and 2ml of 'Magic Botanic Liquid (humic and fulvic acids) and 2 drops of organic liquid dishwashing soap as a surfactant. The Brix reading this afternoon was getting close to 15%.
I am thinking I will continue with foliar feeds bi-weekly while results are good.

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• Stunger
• Dec 3, 2019

After 3rd foliar feed of dilute kelp 'seasol' liquid concentrate

 

[Stunger]

I feel I have a problem with my non topped plant, it is now almost a meter high. It is definitely lighter, more of a lime green, than my 3 quadlined balcony plants. After doing some online research, I have wondered if it is a deficiency of either magnesium or iron. The soil pH using a cheap garden probe comes out between 6 and 6.8 or thereabouts. I feel the soil should have enough Nitrogen, and also last week I did 2 foliar feeds of Fish Hydroslate which is rich in Nitrogen, and that didn't really appear to make any difference to the lime greenness of the leaves.

I decided to do a foliar feed of Epsom Salts. I mixed about 1/2 a teaspoon in a liter of water, sprayed the leaves, and also sprayed the leaves of some pale sweetcorn I also have growing before tipping the remainder on the plant's soil. It'll be interesting to see if any change is noticed. Below is the plant showing the lime green coloration of the leaves and a close up of a 5 blade bottom leaf (from the 3rd node). The original 2nd node 3 blade leaves had begun to dry and I pulled those off a few days ago. So the color of the bottom leaf may also be from it reaching the end of it's natural usefulness. There is a middle leaf and an upper leaf too for comparision. If anyone has any guesses/insight into what the leaf pics suggest I'd be most happy to hear.

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG - Lime green leaf coloration. How best to treat?

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG - lower leaf

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG - middle leaf

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG - top leaf

 

[Stunger]

Most days I have been looking quite closely at what the preflowers are doing, to try and determine what the gender of the plants are. They have all been grown from regular seeds. So far, 2-WW & 3-WWG have displayed developing pistils so at least they are female. After looking over and over at node closeups I feel with a lot of certainty that 1-WW & 4-WWG are going to turn out to be male. It is an interesting exercise to look closely at the developing preflowers to try and determine the resulting gender. When looking at the enlarged node pics on the computer screen, depending on the angle, the focus etc, the pic can cause one to think that it is a female calyx that is being viewed when actually it is a male. I just wanted to share some thoughts on how I am viewing such closeup pictures and what is starting to stand out to me. Just my 2 cents, I am happy to be talking a load of bunk as if I am wrong and those 2 suspect plants are actually female then that'll great!

Anyway, the female prefower generally has a swollen base that tapers off to an elegant point.

The male preflower (and it is my self educated guess) can sometimes display a similar appearance to the female preflower, sometimes it appears on a 'stalk' but I have seen some female preflowers that have also appeared to be on a stalk too (probably caused from the viewing/camera angle) but yet later they erupt with pistils confirming them to be female. But there is another feature I have noticed, it is a small difference that to me suggests the gender structure will more likely turn out to be a male. It is to do with the outer protective 'shuck' that covers the male 'ball'. I have observed it to display where that 'shuck' has separated into several petal type shucks, sometimes one petal type shuck overlaps at the end point to appear like a little hook. Some times the petal type shucks will twist and curl around the male ball, sometimes one petal shuck seems to rise up where it's profile alone on a pic can appear similar to the female preflower with a swollen base and tapering point (altho most of the time these appear thinner and longer than a female preflower). It is separation of the 'shuck' that is suggesting to me that it is a male, as from my (limited and amateur) observation the female calyx always remains intact, a swollen base that tapers up to point where eventually pistils erupt from. Also too, I feel the suspected male preflowers have their swelling often more in the middle whereas the female preflowers the swelling is more at the base.

Anyway, I am trying educate myself from my observations so I may be deluding myself, but I will post a few pics of the gender structures of my suspected male plants that illustrate what I am trying to describe above about the protective shuck or petal shuck structures. This may be what people talk about when they mention the appearance of 'crab claws', However when the male flower develops further the male balls 'open up' into 2 half 'cups' which is similar to 2 crab claws to reveal the pollen structure that 'pokes out' to drop/release pollen, so when it comes to crab claws I am not sure at which stage of the male preflower development that is referring to.
1-WW

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

1-WW on the lower preflower structure, there appears to be 3 or 4 'shuck petals' opening and...

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

1-WW both preflowers appear to show the separation of the outer shuck into curling 'shuck...

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

1-WW this preflower is almost white, appears on a stem, and with a dominant 'shuck petal' rising...

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

1-WW - the outer 'shuck' appears to be opening and separating - suspected male!

4-WWG

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG here the 'shuck petals' are 'warping' and separating away from the inner ball - suspected...

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG here the shuck petals remain almost together almost giving the appearance of a female...

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG viewed from above the shuck petals opening out from the inner ball - suspected male!

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG this could be the first pic showing multiple 'balls' and would confirm the plant as a male

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• Stunger
• Dec 4, 2019

4-WWG the right hand 'shuck petals' appear to be opening showing the male ball - suspected male!

 

[Stunger]

Given that 4-WWG is displaying a paler lime green coloration and that I suspect it is a male. I am using it as a guinea pig by treating it with a foliar feed of Epsom Salts as once confirmed as a male I will give it the chop, but in the meantime it gives me the opportunity to observe what if any change occurs from such treatment so I can learn from the experience.

 

[Stunger]

After giving them a nice 10:1 dilution of worm wee this morning I crushed a leaf this afternoon to find a Brix reading of 18%-19%, it is a little problematic taking a picture thru the refractometer eyepiece. I must admit to being a little surprised at what seems to be quite good Brix levels. It seems as if the foliar feeding is making the difference. The 3 quadlined plants are looking great, strong lush color, to be honest they look better than any previous grow that I have done. Early days though.

Brix reading 18-19%

• Stunger
• Dec 5, 2019

6th Dec

 

[Emeraldo]

Males often have a slightly different plant structure, longer internodes, taller overall. I had a Jack Herer plant this past summer from "regular" seed that seemed more male-looking. Since I had another Jack Herer that was looking more and more like a female with little white pistils taking shape, I decided to chop the other before any pollen started making the rounds with my girls.

Still I found a seed in a Arjan's Strawberry Haze bud this week. I doubt it was from the "male" Jack Herer. It may have been from self-pollination by the ASH itself, though I never saw any nanners on any of my plants.

Your WWG4 and WW1 may be males, but there's no need to chop "him" until you are sure. If the ball sits on a pedestal, it is a sign that it's a male. It's a multi-factor test: overall look, internodes, pedestal, also timing of male flowers ought to be earlier than the girls.

Glad to hear your quadliners and doing well. More photos, please!

 

[Stunger]

I feel convinced that 1-WW and 4-WWG are both males. Pretty each day I have looked closely at many pictures of their gender structures and I feel I have 'dialed in' the characteristics that those 2 share which are absent from the other 2 plants (2-WW & 3-WWG). I'd love to be wrong but I feel it's just a matter of time before I start seeing multiple balls which would confirm for me that they are male.

I was surprised that pistils showed so early this season, when in previous season's growing (the same White Widow strain) I have only ever noticed pistils in mid January which is the northern hemisphere outdoor equivalent of July, would that be right? But this season pistils appeared 2 weeks ago in late November, which would be late May in northern hemisphere. Is it possible that on previous grows, that the pistils developed at the same time and I failed to spot them for 6 weeks, it seems difficult to imagine because surely pistil development over 6 weeks would presumably be quite substantial and obvious.

Anyway, I am interested in how my 2 confirmed females are going to develop from here. Should I be saying they are currently near the end of their 2nd week of flower? As I always viewed day 1 of flowering to be the day I saw the first pistil. Time will tell.

Would you germinate the seed you found in the Arjan's Strawberry Haze as presumably it would be a genetic female? Some folks might say it may carry more of a tendency to hermie, yet I have read some opinions that all cannabis has the potential to hermie as it is a survival thing.

 

[Stunger]

Today I did a foliar feed using
1.5 liter de-chlorinated water (What is leftover I use on vegetables too).
2.5ml (quarter teaspoon) 'Seasol' seaweed liquid concentrate
2.5ml humic & fulvic acids
2 drops organic dishwashing liquid as a surfactant

This is the 4th foliar feed I have given them, I have done them bi-weekly for 2 weeks now. Next time I would probably start foliar feeling earlier in their development. Once pistil development really kicks off I will stop foliar feeding them. Right now I am just not sure when that will be as I have always viewed as day 1 of flowering as starting when the first pistils have been spotted. I have looked back thru my library of pictures that I have take almost daily.

Pistils first spotted
1-WW 25 November
3-WWG 22 November
Which would suggest week 3 of flowering is soon to start??

My pale non topped plant seems to be much the same, not much better or worse. It was the first of my large pots that I transplanted up into, I left the 3 topped for quadlining plants languishing in small pots for several days while I checked that the transplanted plant was happy (it wasn't pale then).

I re-amended all 4 pots some months ago so plenty of time to cook and settle, but then I started to read about high Brix growing and realized that I couldn't take out what I had already added in the way of Nitrogen amendments but when I read of a 6-5-3 ideal ratio for some high Brix related amendments being Limestone:Soft Rock Phosphate:Gypsum, so I took out and re-mixed the soil of each container and adding in those amendments.

The only guess I can make on the paleness of 4-WWG, is that shortly before using the containers I decided to emulate one of the conditions of a past grow that produced a fantastic result, which was that I had made, perhaps a 2 inch layer of volcanic scoria in the bottom of container, at the time for the purpose of letting the roots breathe and not get water logged, but perhaps the scoria gave the plant a super mineral boost? Anyway, I decided at the last minute that I didn't want to wait for another year to test that theory, there was also an increase in quantity of other re-amendments I added too, but I would need to look for what I wrote down on a note somewhere at time to know what they were. So it possible that the pale plant got transplanted before I did that round of re-amending and it's container missed out, maybe?!.

But paleness aside, it is my strong belief that the pale plant (4-WWG) as well as 1-WW are both male. I am waiting for multiple growing groups of balls to confirm that, but always happy for pistils. So I am not too bothered about trying to remedy it's paleness, as if it is male I will chop it out, and look at kicking off an auto.

4-WWG suspected male

• Stunger
• Dec 7, 2019

L-R: 3-WWG, 2-WW, 1-WW (suspected male )

• Stunger
• Dec 7, 2019

 

[Emeraldo]

I feel convinced that 1-WW and 4-WWG are both males. Pretty each day I have looked closely at many pictures of their gender structures and I feel I have 'dialed in' the characteristics that those 2 share which are absent from the other 2 plants (2-WW & 3-WWG). I'd love to be wrong but I feel it's just a matter of time before I start seeing multiple balls which would confirm for me that they are male.

I was surprised that pistils showed so early this season, when in previous season's growing (the same White Widow strain) I have only ever noticed pistils in mid January which is the northern hemisphere outdoor equivalent of July, would that be right? But this season pistils appeared 2 weeks ago in late November, which would be late May in northern hemisphere. Is it possible that on previous grows, that the pistils developed at the same time and I failed to spot them for 6 weeks, it seems difficult to imagine because surely pistil development over 6 weeks would presumably be quite substantial and obvious.

Anyway, I am interested in how my 2 confirmed females are going to develop from here. Should I be saying they are currently near the end of their 2nd week of flower? As I always viewed day 1 of flowering to be the day I saw the first pistil. Time will tell.

Would you germinate the seed you found in the Arjan's Strawberry Haze as presumably it would be a genetic female? Some folks might say it may carry more of a tendency to hermie, yet I have read some opinions that all cannabis has the potential to hermie as it is a survival thing.

Well, if you are pretty convinced those two are males, I would at least move the two male "suspects" to a different area so that pollen might not reach the females. It is unclear to me how early male pollen can be emitted, but I have read that it can be emitted several weeks before females start to show their sex. In that case, your males might even now be sending out early pollen. You may find so seeds if you have pistils.

Early pistils. Late November (or late May for N-hemisphere) would be remarkably early indeed. As we approach the solstice (Dec 21/June 21 or so), you would expect to see flowering, of course. Yours this year seem to be a month ahead of what I'd expect. Yes, if you have seen pistils, flowering has started, so you know you can start counting the days. But one thing I've learned is you cannot translate the breeder's flowering time for indoor grows, (e.g., 8 or 10 weeks), directly to outdoor growing. Climate and individual plant characteristics have to play a role here, e.g. my Arjan's Haze #1 did not even look like she was flowering at all until early October and then went a month longer than GHS suggested.

The earliest I ever had flowering was in 2017 (female seeds grow), when Purple Maroc started flowering on July 8. But that strain has a cross with a ruderalis (autoflowering) somewhere in the background mix. Female seeds has specialized in breeding early flowering sativas for growing in Holland, which has a much shorter growing season.

Indicas flower earlier than sativa as a general rule. You might look into that angle, especially since you grow white widow. How much indica genetics were present in the plants that produced your seeds? Do you know? I recall you mentioning bagseed at some point, which would be an unknown. I've also grown several white widow plants and these are known to be mostly indica. This year my white widows were visibly flowering in mid-August and were harvested by the end of September, a month before the earliest sativa harvest.

Other than that, it's a mystery.

I may grow out the ASH next year, I haven't decided. It is a very nice plant to grow, its cerebral effect is clear and just the right kind of buzz for me.

 

[Emeraldo]

Today I did a foliar feed using
1.5 liter de-chlorinated water (What is leftover I use on vegetables too).
2.5ml (quarter teaspoon) 'Seasol' seaweed liquid concentrate
2.5ml humic & fulvic acids
2 drops organic dishwashing liquid as a surfactant

This is the 4th foliar feed I have given them, I have done them bi-weekly for 2 weeks now. Next time I would probably start foliar feeling earlier in their development. Once pistil development really kicks off I will stop foliar feeding them. Right now I am just not sure when that will be as I have always viewed as day 1 of flowering as starting when the first pistils have been spotted. I have looked back thru my library of pictures that I have take almost daily.

Pistils first spotted
1-WW 25 November
3-WWG 22 November
Which would suggest week 3 of flowering is soon to start??

My pale non topped plant seems to be much the same, not much better or worse. It was the first of my large pots that I transplanted up into, I left the 3 topped for quadlining plants languishing in small pots for several days while I checked that the transplanted plant was happy (it wasn't pale then).

I re-amended all 4 pots some months ago so plenty of time to cook and settle, but then I started to read about high Brix growing and realized that I couldn't take out what I had already added in the way of Nitrogen amendments but when I read of a 6-5-3 ideal ratio for some high Brix related amendments being Limestone:Soft Rock Phosphate:Gypsum, so I took out and re-mixed the soil of each container and adding in those amendments.

The only guess I can make on the paleness of 4-WWG, is that shortly before using the containers I decided to emulate one of the conditions of a past grow that produced a fantastic result, which was that I had made, perhaps a 2 inch layer of volcanic scoria in the bottom of container, at the time for the purpose of letting the roots breathe and not get water logged, but perhaps the scoria gave the plant a super mineral boost? Anyway, I decided at the last minute that I didn't want to wait for another year to test that theory, there was also an increase in quantity of other re-amendments I added too, but I would need to look for what I wrote down on a note somewhere at time to know what they were. So it possible that the pale plant got transplanted before I did that round of re-amending and it's container missed out, maybe?!.

But paleness aside, it is my strong belief that the pale plant (4-WWG) as well as 1-WW are both male. I am waiting for multiple growing groups of balls to confirm that, but always happy for pistils. So I am not too bothered about trying to remedy it's paleness, as if it is male I will chop it out, and look at kicking off an auto.

4-WWG suspected male

• Stunger
• Dec 7, 2019

L-R: 3-WWG, 2-WW, 1-WW (suspected male )

• Stunger
• Dec 7, 2019

I've had some plants look paler than others. Don't know that it is anything to be alarmed about. He (or she?) looks healthy in all other ways.

Your whole grow looks great this year. Those quadlined plants look wonderful.

Apart from moving the male "suspects" away from your girls, I wouldn't chop them until their sex is incontrovertible.

 

[Stunger]

re 1-WW & 4-WWG; both of which I suspect are males. I say this because at first I was confused at what I was looking at when it came to viewing the early pre-flower gender structures. But after viewing probably a daily average of 150 closeup pics of the nodes where the early pre-flowers are visible. I feel I can now see the difference quite clearly. It is no problem of course once multiple balls or pistils appear because by then appearance of the pre-flower structures has developed to show several distinct signs of their gender. But it is the distinction of gender in the early pre-flower stage that is trickiest to tell, whether this or that is a feature of a female or male plant. What I think now about identifying early male pre-flowers is firstly the identification of the outer 'shuck' that covers a suspected male pre-flower, which as it develops will often warp and separate into thinner 'petal type shucks', and secondly the appearance of the swelling from the ball inside that is closer to the middle of the pre-flower structure whereas the early female pre-flower develops it's swelling closer to the base with usually a longer tapering point. Of course for now this is just my speculation until these 2 plants show for sure their gender, i.e. if they are indeed males then I expect soon they will develop multiple balls on stalks which would confirm it.

Because I am closely checking the development of the suspected males every day once I spot a single node or two with multiple balls I will give them the chop. But yes, I intend to wait for that confirmation moment, not just to avoid misidentification and mistakenly chopping a female, but also to confirm or not what I think I am seeing, so in future grows I can then jump the gun on waiting for a definitive gender reveal and instead be able to cull out any males early without waiting for pistils or balls to develop. The features I mentioned above, require fairly sharp close up pictures/magnification to be able to see these differences. Most of the times where folk are posting pictures and asking for advice on whether their plants are male or female, their pictures are too poor and fuzzy to be able to tell and therefore they have to wait for the development of pistils or balls.

The tall paler plant, seems if anything to possibly have regained a little color, whether that is from the application of lime mix I gave it, or the foliar feeds, or epsom salts, I don't know.

I am quite surprised for flowering (the show of pistils) having occurred at least 6-8 weeks earlier than in previous grows. The important thing is that I have 2 females. The White Widow female (2-WW) is from a second generation offspring from White Widow parents where the seeds came from AMS (Amsterdam Marijuana Seeds). The White Widow/Gorgonzola cross (3-WWG) was the offspring of last season's grow using an AMS Gorgonzola female and pollinating it with a second generation AMS White Widow pollen. And both females last season (which are the mothers on my current grow) didn't start flowering until at least mid January, I am at a loss to explain that.

The quadlined plants are indeed looking very well, so much so, it is almost disturbing how well. If I can only keep them that happy to harvest it'll be great. Yesterday they were dropping a bit, and on lifting their containers I realized they were in need of watering, so this morning they're looking really perky and stretching up. I will shortly go and take another batch of photos of the nodes and attempt to tie down and train their vertical stretching to be more horizontal.

 

[Emeraldo]

If it's not autoflowering, maybe it's a recessive early-flowering gene, one in a million. Oh, yeah, two. Nah, it's a mystery.

 

[Stunger]

It is a mystery because the mothers of this current grow were the plants I grew last season, and of those I didn't spot the first pistils until 22nd January, about 8 weeks later than these.

 

[Stunger]

As a note to myself. Yesterday I noticed the plants all dropping and realized the pots were light and needed a watering. I even have to water stealthily, I didn't have much time and poured the water out pretty quickly, because my plastic pots have many holes drilled into the bottom and sides quite a bit of water quickly came gushing straight out. I gave them enough to all be nicely perked up this morning but I need to remind myself to in future slowly water them to let the volume of soil be more fully and evenly hydrated and avoid wasting nice diluted worm wee as run off.

This morning I trained lower all the limbs of the 2 confirmed female plants, as over the last few days they have been noticeably stretching.

 

[Emeraldo]

Returning to the outdoor grow early flowering phenomenon. Your longest day is December 21 or thereabouts. The daylength will be shorter than 12 hours after your autumn equinox, in March, correct? Maybe there's something I'm missing, but I assume that in the southern hemisphere the dates triggering photoperiod plants are mirror images of those in the northern hemisphere (where longest day or solstice is around June 21, equinox around 21 September).

This year I had flowering starting in third week of August on most plants, about two months after the summer solstice and a month before the equinox. That is pretty standard for most strains at my spot on the orb, 47N.

But strains can vary as to when the first pistil appears. The earliest I've ever had a plant start go into full flowering mode was July 8, Purple Maroc (a strain with some autoflowering genetics). It was in my Female Seeds grow in 2017. In that same grow, I had a Sexbud plant that pushed out a pistil in early July but was not visibly in full flowering mode until several weeks later. Maybe that's what is going on with yours. The latest flowering ever for me was this year's Arjan's Haze #1, which showed pistils in late September/early October and was harvested November 21.

If your timeline were exactly the opposite of mine, your flowering would commence earliest around the middle of February (in northern hemisphere = August) if they are photoperiod plants. That would be my limited experience. However, you first spotted pistils in late November. That's maybe three months early by my experience, although for you late January would be the earliest flowering you've seen. If you germinated your current grow in September, these plants are now about 3 months old, which is mature and capable of flowering. But why?

Why they are flowering in November is a mystery. We don't know why your plants started pushing pistils a whole month before the longest day of your year. How can they kick into flowering while the days are still getting longer? This isn't supposed to happen this way. I've heard of growers who grow indoors on 18/6 for a month in the early Spring and then move the plants outside, where the plants go into flower because the daylength outdoors is not 18 hours, so the plants experience "shorter" days than in the indoor grow room and flowering is triggered though the days are still getting longer. I assume you did not do that.

The fact of flowering in late November -- three months early, it would seem -- would normally raise the question of whether your plants are photoperiod or autoflowering. Or stress, possibly, but that might mean hermies.

What we do know is that the seeds from which your current grow sprouted all came from plants you grew last year, and these were all "regular" seeds. I wonder if any of your original seeds could have had a cross with an autoflowering plant, not saying that, just wondering if it is possible.

This will be interesting to watch.

 

[Emeraldo]

I did some checking. AMS still carries White Widow XTRM (regular, 60% indica/40% sativa) and Gorgonzola (only in feminized, but 25% indica/75% sativa), both are said to need 8/9 weeks flowering and would be harvestable "September/October". These are very common ranges. If we assume, reasonably, that harvest might be at the second week of October, then count back 8/9 weeks. Flowering might start around beginning of August, which would translate generally to February in the southern hemisphere.

If my math is correct, your crossed plant (WW/GG) is about 42.5% indica / 57.5% sativa, which ought to be very close to my Jack Herer this year (45/55), and I can tell you that is a great balance in the effect. Your straight WW will be a nice complement to that.

However, is it correct that your Gorgonzola plant was from feminized seed? If that is so, I'd suspect that the seed resulting in your WW/GG might have been genetically unstable, and for that reason I'd be on the lookout for hermies. If you have any hermies/nanners, that might explain early flowering (but hermies don't usually show up this early).

Maybe you just didn't see the pre-flowering changes in the plants last year?

I think you started your grow quite a bit earlier this year as well. Maybe that is a factor.

Anyway, I still don't get why either strain would start flowering in November (while the days are still getting longer!), unless it is just a mature plant putting out an early pre-flower. It may be that the plant is just getting its ducks in a row, preparing, and will not yet go into full blown flowering mode. However, a potentially long flowering time is a blessing as you may be able to harvest early or, at least, you won't be under stress because winter is coming on (like my own situation last month).