Autoflower Light Schedule – Auto Myths, Tips and Tricks

[0:07] What's up you amazing listeners? And I'm back with an all-new episode of the "Homegrown Podcast" brought to us by Homegrown Cannabis Co. Be sure to head over to www.homegrowncannabisco.com where you can get your top-notch cannabis seeds. Now, I am your host Chronic from the Cannabis Chronicles on Instagram and YouTube. In today's episode of the "Homegrown Podcast," I'll be going over autoflower light
 

[0:28] schedules along with some myths, tips, and tricks to help you growers learn more about this very special offspring of ruderalis genetics. So pack that bowl, drop a fat dab, and get stoned as we set sail into some sweet cannabis content. Let's begin. In this first segment, we're going to break into autoflower light schedules and which light schedule I personally recommend.
 

[0:53] However, first, we need to discuss exactly what autoflowers are and give some genetic backstory as I often get messages and questions about autoflowers with growers not knowing much about them. Autoflowers are generally not pure ruderalis offspring. They're generally ruderalis crossed into a photoperiod, or a photoperiod crossed into a ruderalis, and that continued back cross happens with their
 

[1:19] offspring. Ruderalis are the landrace cannabis strains that learn to grow in rocky regions in places like Russia, Northern Europe, the mountainous regions of the Middle East, and northern parts of Canada and Alaska. These landraces developed a genetic trait that allowed them to induce the production of ethylene or the female flowering hormone used to produce the cannabis flower that consists of so many plant parts we know
 

[1:43] including calyx, pistils, and bracts. These landrace strains learned to flower this way due to limited light, rocky terrain root locking the plant, or too much light at all time, or various other variables. These pure ruderalis are where all the modern-day autoflowering strains and fast version plants come from, which in a future episode, I'll be breaking down fast versions for all you listeners out there.
 

[2:09] Autoflowering strains that we see come from companies such as Homegrown Cannabis Co. have taken these ruderalis and crossbred them with photoperiod plants to bring out stable autoflowering traits with specific taste or terpene profiles through countless generations of breeding to match the various strain profiles they're seeking. So when discussing autoflowering strains, the reason all that lineage is important is because many breeders often use
 

[2:33] landraces from either northern Canada, Alaska, or Russia. The reason being is these specific ruderalis see upwards of 14 hours of light almost all year round which makes them perfect to create autoflowers that will flower under any light cycle. Oh yeah, I did forget to mention, South Africa has some insane ruderalis landraces as well. Technically by genetics, Durban
 

[2:56] Poison is a ruderalis and also by landrace location in South Africa, which is why Durban Poison females have a high chance to hermaphrodite due to the nature of being roughly under 13 to 16 hours of light yearly depending on how north it's grown in the wild. So the preferred ruderalis to work with are the more stable 16 to
 

[3:16] 20-hour light landraces which help hone in preferred breeder lighting cycles. There are few big companies aside from Homegrown Cannabis Co. that recommend 24 hours of light as their go-to light cycle for autoflowers to get the fastest results and best results, which this is absolutely what I recommend. Whenever I grow autoflowers, I use 24 hours of light and nothing
 

[3:38] else. I always keep the light on them because with how they are genetically bred, their sleep cycle ends up being bred out of them to the point where most autoflowers on average only enter the REM cycle for 30 minutes during a 6-hour dark period. During REM for photoperiod plants, they utilize various chemical processes inside themselves to uptake
 

[4:00] more CO2 which is why they will breathe out a lot more CO2 at night to actually breathe it in which helps various processes in the plant. This is called the Calvin bonding process. This doesn't happen in high amounts for autoflowers, so it's always more beneficial to run your lights 24 hours on while amending CO2 into your garden for your autoflowers to breathe in CO2
 

[4:22] or Calvin bond at all times. This makes up for the lack of sleep time autoflowers don't really have. In return, you get all the same density, development, and benefits as if your plant was sleeping using CO2 in your garden. So CO2 is highly, highly recommended when growing autoflowers. Now there are some breeders who recommend 20 hours of light with 4 hours of
 

[4:44] darkness, and that can be very beneficial. I personally don't care to waste those 4 hours not underneath a good light for an autoflower, as I find it's just way more beneficial for 24 hours of light with CO2. Now that's not to say I haven't seen some insane plants under 20 hours of light and 4 hours off. I definitely have seen some amazing autoflowers underneath that light cycle.
 

[5:04] But I see a lot more frequent better autoflower grows underneath 24 hours of light with CO2. That's just my opinion and what I've seen. I don't personally recommend 18 on and 6 off or 12 on and 12 off at all for any type of autoflower. They don't need that many hours of darkness and you'll be wasting a lot of
 

[5:23] precious growth time. The only light cycles I recommend for autoflowers are 20 hours on and 4 hours off and amending CO2, and then my preferred method being 24 hours on with CO2 always being available in the garden. Which to be honest, regardless of the light cycles like I said, adding CO2 to a veg garden or flower garden is immensely helpful to vigorous
 

[5:45] growth, higher resistance to heat stress, and light potency, and various other benefits. I recommend using TNB Naturals canisters. They make very high-quality CO2 that is easy to mix and lasts a good amount of time. Now that you are all set up with the proper light cycles, amendments to add, and some lineage of autoflowers, go ahead and pack another fat
 

[6:07] bowl, light up that torch for a big old glob and stay tuned as we take a short break with @NateHammer420 from Instagram When Isaac Newton coined the phrase, "Standing on the shoulders of giants," he was talking about the amazing minds that came before him. It's a phrase that embodies the Homegrown collaboration with Steve D'Angelo, Kyle Kushman, Nikki Lastreto, and Swami Chaitanya.
 

[6:38] They are your giants. These legends are sharing more than just their vast amounts of knowledge. However, they also have a range of Homegrown seeds we have lovingly christened Cultivars with Character. Each seed is a personal favorite, especially chosen pheno selected for resilience, reliability, and ease of growth. Basically, they're more forgiving phenotypes of classic, time-honored cultivars with all of the quality. My advice?
 

[7:02] Choose their seeds, stand on their shoulders, and aim high. It's exactly what they're here for. Head over to homegrowncannabisco.com for more details. And we're back from that amazing break with @natehammer420 from Instagram. Be sure to check out his page where he films some pretty badass content with Homegrown Cannabis Co. In this segment of the Homegrown podcast, we'll be diving into
 

[7:27] autoflower myths, tips, and tricks, which if you haven't already, be sure to follow along on whichever platform you're listening from so you don't ever miss out on these amazing episodes. Now let's do this. Now the biggest myth I think I see in countless Facebook groups and various forums or random YouTube know-it-alls that think they're bigger than their britches is the
 

[7:47] fact that autoflowers suck, plain and simple. They cannot compete with any photoperiod counterpart. Which whenever I see these posts or comments, it absolutely cracks me up because it shows that they did zero research, had a failed attempt because they aren't actually quality cultivators it seems to be, and gave up, but threw a hissy fit while giving up, and slandered a plant instead of their lack
 

[8:08] of patience with learning how to cultivate autoflowers. Autoflowers are very, very, very different than cultivating photoperiods, and every single seed will act completely different. Some might be more easily stressed out and quickly hermi, thinking they're shocked, and some might take a beating like nobody's business, and some might just flower if you look the wrong way at it or breathe the
 

[8:31] wrong way at it. Autoflowers are not a set science in a sense. The genetic variations and ability of the autoflowering trait already make it an unstable plant to work with. Even once you stabilize the individual plant, it has the individual capability to flower at any given time from shock. That's what makes ruderalis so special, and this is why you really need to be
 

[8:53] patient with autoflowers. You have to pick a routine or a planned training and feeding schedule and stick to it. If you haven't heard the other podcasts on autoflowers, we have a bunch of them on training techniques, methods, and all sorts of stuff. But the basic fundamentals for this myth to be broken are simply germinating your seed with little to no stress during the seedling stage in a
 

[9:14] healthy, properly set-up environment and not outdoors. I can't stress this enough. If you plan to buy autoflowers to grow outdoors, you have to veg them to a certain size and then transplant them into massive grow beds outdoors or massive pots. They need to have an established root system with a quality set of fan leaves to be able to handle the intense light potency, heat stress,
 

[9:39] and damage that the elements can put it through. Autoflowers do absolutely best in greenhouses if you're going to grow outdoors, and this is why many growers slander autoflowers, because growing them outdoors requires a lot of patience, care to plants, and watering, and potentially losing them, and this is due to the intense stress that the heat can put on autoflowers.
 

[10:03] So you may have to build shade covers for the plants if they aren't movable. I learned a lot of this knowledge from South African growers who often veg their ruderalis right to when they see pistols start to form. This is when they transplant to massive grow beds in the ground. The roots are then able to spread out where these ruderalis get the
 

[10:21] size of trees and re-veg. Because of how far south these farmers are, the light cycle is 18/6 all year round, so they have to use autoflowers to create their flower. So when it comes to the myth of autoflowers sucking and can't compete, it just isn't true. You have to adjust everything you do when it comes to cultivating autoflowers or ruderalis compared to
 

[10:41] photoperiods. They just are not the same as your photoperiod sativa or indica strains, which really should be called equatorial versus mountainous strains. Your normal photoperiod strains or feminized strains that are not autoflowering at all Cannot produce ethylene until 12 hours a night prompt the production of ethylene. That's the major difference of the ruderalis trait. Now for fast versions, these act like photoperiods.
 

[11:05] They don't have the autoflower trait bred completely into them to the point of automatically flowering. I'll go over much more in the future episodes, but I wanted to mention that because so many growers who are growing fast versions don't know they have to use a 12/12 light cycle to prompt flower. So on top of all these points I've made, autoflower, they actually test on
 

[11:25] average higher percentage or the same percentage as their photo counterparts for THC with the same medicinal compounds found, and some actually have higher medicinal compounds found. The really big pro that autoflowers have is the fact that they grow in a fraction of the time that it takes full photoperiods to grow. Yes, the yield may not be as high, but if you grow a SOG
 

[11:46] with countless autoflowers and have three harvests in one year compared to one, and all three harvests equal the same weight as that one harvest you normally pull, then all of a sudden you just increased your weight that you pull per year immensely. Which if you're a large facility or farm, that can make a massive difference having autoflowers being able to
 

[12:06] produce quality, medicinal-grade bud for various extracts, concentrates, processing, or other types of sales. Now the cons would be you can't clone an autoflower, or you really wouldn't want to as it would be the same age as the mother and it would flower pretty much around the corner. So instead of vegging longer, it would just go straight to flower. Cloning an autoflower is very, very hard
 

[12:29] and I just wouldn't recommend worrying about that headache. I'll tackle that whole technique some other time and show it maybe on YouTube, but for now it really is very hard to clone an autoflower with their root system being so exposed, they usually go into shock which keeps ethylene producing. Cloning an autoflower is just quite hard. It's due to the ethylene production and how long it takes it to stop
 

[12:53] after you basically clone it and it goes into flower, and then you have to stop the ethylene production and re-veg it, which can take twice as long as starting from a seed. So you might as well just start from seed. I will tackle all of that stuff in a future episode I'm sure. I'm sure people will ask, and if you do want to hear that in a future
 

[13:13] episode, definitely head over to www.homegrowncannabisco.community and tag @kronic, that's K-R-O-N-I-C, and tell me that you want to hear that in a future episode on a post. So I'll tackle the myth right now that some people say that you can't clone them. Yes, you can technically. You can make a fully rooted clone and it will re-veg, but will
 

[13:34] it be worth it as compared to starting from seed? No. It will flower almost immediately and it will take an immense amount of time to re-veg it, and if you're wasting plant space limits, you're basically just wasting your time. Unless you do micro SOG grows with dozens of little tiny single nugget plants, then I guess you wouldn't really mind the time waste.
 

[13:54] But even then, growing from seed would be much more beneficial for autoflowers, just plain and simple. I get asked this all the time if you can clone them, and I just really don't recommend it. I know people have done it and people can do it, and they really love their autoflower. But the thing about autoflower genetics is generally if you buy from a very
 

[14:13] good company like Homegrown Cannabis Co., your autoflowers are really going to be 80 to 90, I'm going to say 90 to 95%, because all of mine have been within that range, to pretty much the same terpene profiles and medical compounds. Every single strain and seed within that strain is going to produce slightly different results, and that's what
 

[14:35] phenotypes are, so you can't... Unfortunately it's really hard to keep an autoflower alive from clone. So really you don't want to clone an autoflower. I promise you, it's just going to take a ridiculously long time and if you don't believe me, go check out my YouTube video where I re-veg an autoflower, and it took over 100 days for it to completely
 

[14:55] re-veg. So if you want to spend 100 days re-vegging, absolutely go for it. Now, to be honest, now that I got to ranting about autoflowers and talking myths and tips, just assume most of the myths, if not all, are false. There are growers on record pulling over half a pound to a full pound of quality dense bud off an autoflower over the
 

[15:15] years, so autoflowers definitely don't suck. They can pull weight, they can grow as large as you want them to grow if you know what you're doing. You can re-veg autos like I talked about, and I do have a video on it, and that's where I'm going to touch next. And I think I probably just tickled a whole bunch of growers' anger
 

[15:33] completely sideways with my re-veg comments. They're probably sitting there about to unfollow this podcast and turn it off, but hold on. Just hold on. I have actual proof on my YouTube of me re-vegging an autoflower, and not the way you're probably thinking. So technically you can re-veg an autoflower after it flowers, but it's incredibly hard and you
 

[15:56] need a seriously stable phenotype, and that phenotype will take a long time for it to realize that it can grow again, which that's the way I kind of did my re-veg was like the South African method from the farmers, but mine was indoors. So instead of re-vegging after flower, when my plant was in a 3-gallon pot and began to show pistols, I placed her into a 5-gallon
 

[16:19] pot which she did keep her pistols that she developed, but she started completely re-vegging producing new growth. And she grew about 4 feet taller, making herself almost 6 feet in total. This is where I learned that re-vegging for an autoflower is the plant turning ethylene basically on and off, re-vegetating itself at free will. Now I get haters who yell at me and say, "That's not
 

[16:43] re-vegging." But that's actually exactly what happens after a re-veg or during re-vegging after fruiting, and that is by definition the act of re-vegetating a plant. So yes, autoflowers can re-vegetate or go through the veg cycle on their free will if given the root space to do so. Now, aside from all those autoflower myths that just really get me on certain rants and going
 

[17:10] If you really want to see proof of those myths, like I said, I have YouTube videos on the Cannabis Chronicles. You can watch me grow a Blueberry autoflower from Homegrown Cannabis Co. where I re-veg her almost 100 days of life, and like I said, almost to six feet tall. It's quite impressive. So if you really don't think these myths are myths, I can promise you I have
 

[17:30] proof otherwise. Now, I can't think of too many other autoflower myths. I really can't. But I'll give a few tips and tricks to finish off this episode. The first tip is to always start your autos at a quarter dosage of what's recommended from the nutrients you're using, and don't begin feeding nutes until week three or four for ages of autoflower.
 

[17:48] They can be very shocked early on, and generally, they don't need too much to begin. First month of feeding, I only use molasses and water, and a very, very small amount of molasses at that. Just give enough to feed the microbial life in the soil, give some nutrients to the seedling, and not completely flush everything. Now, at the third or fourth node is when you would want to top your
 

[18:09] autoflower for my next tip if you plan on topping your auto. Which, come to think of it, I believe that's a big myth in the community actually, is you can't top your autoflowers. You'll absolutely want to test it on the strain you're growing, like if you're growing four seeds of one strain, test one of the seeds you have
 

[18:29] and see if it can handle it. Generally, most autos, if topped early enough, will grow like normal and respond like a photoperiod would. I've seen some insane autos that were actually topped two to three times. I've actually seen one topped four times, which was absolutely crazy. I personally recommend just using low-stress training to bonsai your plants, which will allow all those lower
 

[18:51] tops to come in and be great for colas. This is where I spend most of my time super cropping, doing Kushman chiropractics, or generally just strength training those branches to hold more weight. Autoflowers can be transplanted as well, which I guess I'm breaking another myth that they can't be transplanted, but that is false. I have many videos on transplanting autos.
 

[19:13] You just want to transplant your autoflowers very cautiously and before the roots touch the edge of the container and become locked, which will keep your plant vegging. If your roots do become locked, then ethylene can start to be produced. You also want to minimize damaging the roots, like I said, during the transplant, so just be gentle. It's always best to do the transplant on a feeding day
 

[19:35] as well. Generally, I time pretty much any stress training I do with autoflowers, which includes transplanting, with a feeding day. It helps them bounce back completely and much faster, and they know that they have the nutrients to survive and thrive for much longer, so they're not going to shock themselves. It basically keeps them from genetically freaking out and telling themselves that
 

[19:56] they need to self-preservate or pop a nanner to produce offspring and keep themselves living on. Those are most of my quick tips and tricks along with dispelling some myths. If you want to hear more on autoflowers, we have a ton of episodes covering autoflowers. As well as that, I have episodes talking about re-vegging autoflowers and working with them on my YouTube channel
 

[20:15] called the Cannabis Chronicles. I am Chronic from the Cannabis Chronicles on Instagram and YouTube, and I'll be back every single Wednesday to teach you amazing listeners all about cannabis. I hope you all enjoyed this episode of the Homegrown Podcast brought to us by Homegrown Cannabis Co. Be sure to head over to www.homegrowncannabisco.com and go browse some insane autoflowering, fast-version,
 

[20:42] feminized, or regular cannabis seeds. If you enjoyed this episode, go ahead and hit that follow button on whichever platform you're listening from so you never miss out on any episode we post. If you would like to ask me a question or simply have a chat, be sure to head over to www.homegrowncannabisco.community, where you can sign up for free and tag Chronic, that's
 

[21:02] K-R-O-N-I-C, and chat with me along with over 4,000 other cultivators. If you need a place to document your grows with ease and be able to check out what other growers do, head over to www.homegrowndiary.com, where you can sign up for free as well and get started documenting your grow journey. If you like free seeds and learning from industry
 

[21:25] leaders like Kyle Kushman, be sure to check out Homegrown Cannabis Co. on Facebook and give their page a like. You won't want to miss out on growing lives where you can ask Kushman your questions. Follow @homegrownworld on Instagram for daily updates and behind-the-scenes content. I hope you all have a wonderful day. Much love, happy growing, and peace.
 

[21:55] If you enjoyed this video and want to learn more about growing your own cannabis at home, hit that like button, subscribe, and turn those notifications on to keep up to date with the amazing marijuana content Homegrown Cannabis Co. has to offer. See you next time.