Dec
Whether you’re growing your plants outdoors or indoors, having an idea of the flowering time of a strain can be essential. For indoor growers, this knowledge is used to time each crop, ensuring that the veg space doesn’t become overgrown and ensuring there’s a quick transition between the flowering run and the next batch, this type of perpetual growing style helps to increase annual harvest amounts.
For outdoor growers, flowering time is important mostly because of seasonal changes. This is especially true for growers in areas with winter rainfall. A crop that takes too long to flower can mean you’ll be harvesting once the rains have already arrived, not great for preventing molds and mildews.
So, now that we understand why knowing the flowering time is important, let’s look at how accurate breeder specified flowering times are, and other ways to keep track of your crop timing.
How Is Flowering Time Determined
Flowering time is much like any other trait of the plant, similar to flower formation, yield or potency. It’s a variable that’s defined by its genetics. If both parents had long flowering times, it’s likely that the offspring will have those same traits, and if both parents were short flowering plants the offspring will also likely be shorter flowering.
But if you cross a short flowering plant (8 weeks) with a long flowering plant (13 weeks), the resulting progeny will consist of a mix. Some are likely to finish quickly, others taking 13 weeks and then many others falling somewhere in-between.
The Accuracy of Breeder Specified Flowering Time Varies Depending On Genetic Stability
The accuracy of estimated flowering times vary dramatically depending on the breeder. Some breeders will test out large amounts of their cross and then take the average flowering time from all genotypes.
Other breeders will grow out a smaller population and do the same. But the larger the population, the more accurate the estimate will be.
Then there are breeders who simply give the standard “8 to 10 weeks”, which is usually the default for most hybrids. Most plants will finish in this time frame unless they are unworked and closer to what would be considered a pure Sativa. Sativa landrace strains can sometimes run up to 18 weeks.
So ultimately, can you trust what you read on the packaging?
Usually not entirely. You should use the times listed as a rough guide, but keep in mind that you’re likely to find multiple different genotypes of plants in a pack of seeds and some seeds may finish quickly and others may take longer.
The best option is often to look at the lineage and see how long each parent typically flowers out for. This will give you a basic gauge on what to expect when you run the seeds out. If there’s a long flowering Sativa in the cross, there may be some long flowering seeds in the mix too (depending on how much the breeder worked the line).
Flowering Times As They Relate To Indica, Sativa and Hybrids
A lot of what we learn in our early years of smoking turns out to not be true, but there is a difference between Indica and Sativa strains and their flowering times. Landrace Sativas, like those found in Africa, South America and Asia often have long flowering times that range from 11 to 18 weeks.
Inversely, many landrace Indica’s, such as those in the Afghan region, can finish quite quickly. Some varieties even finish flowering in under 8 weeks.
It’s when these two lineages are crossed into each other that we create a hybrid, and true F1 hybrids will have plants that range between each parent. As the breeder works the line further, he will likely select certain plants, usually with shorter flowering times.
That is why today, most Hybrids finish in between 8 and 10 weeks.
