Light Controllers & Timers

Lighting is crucial when you are growing your cannabis, whether indoor or outdoor. The light cycle you use for flowering cannabis directly correlates to a crop’s quality and overall yield. Yes, you need light to grow your cannabis, and here is what you need to know about the cannabis plant light cycle.

Vegetative Light Cycle

This is the stage where your plants are growing. This stage is very vital for the success and health of your cannabis plant. At this stage, the stems and leaves of the marijuana plants start growing larger and taller. However, also at this stage, the cannabis plant doesn’t produce any buds and you will have to control the shape and size of your plant. That is where the cannabis light cycle comes in: the light for your plants can be manipulated at this stage to yield better growth. The more lighting your cannabis plant receives, the better their growth and future yield.

When marijuana plants are in the vegetative stage, keep them under a minimum of 18 hours of growing light (also known as 18/6). But if you are one of those growers that would like their plant to grow as big as possible, then you may keep them under 24 hour (24/0) indoor light.

Cannabis plants don’t start developing flowers until they start receiving 12 hours of continuous darkness. Otherwise, they will continue to remain in the vegetative stage. As long as your cannabis plants are getting about 13 hours of light (or more) every day, you can keep your plants in this stage forever.

The Flowering Stage Light Cycle

For your plants to move from their vegetative stage to the flowering stage, they will need to be exposed to 12 or more hours of darkness each day to start flowering.

Most growers that grow their plants indoors begins from the point of 12 hours of darkness immediately the plants have reached the desired size and shape during their vegetative stage. Usually, most growers prefer an indoor vegetative period of 4-8 weeks under a 24/0 or 18/6 light period.

To grow cannabis successfully indoor, you need to mimic the natural growth pattern. When you grow your cannabis outdoor, they start to develop buds (flowers) as the days gets shorter, and they receive a minimum of 12 hours of complete darkness. To do this, just switch your light usage from 18 to 24 hours of good sunlight daily down to 12 hours of light and also of 12 hours of darkness for the cannabis life cycle.