Turn out the lights?

[Zachb503]

So I'm on my first grow and was curious about turning the lights off before harvest.
The only trick with this is I'm doing this outdoor.

So I live in Oregon where there is a lot of rain so for these coming months I built a little tent to out around them. By little I mean 10x5 ft. My plants got really big really fast. Literally 5ft by 10 ft between four plants, bushy as hell.
So with my tent made of pvc pipe and 6mm polyethylene plastic. Towards the end of the grow could I just throw a black tarp over it for two weeks, then harvest? What does this do? How much difference does it make?

 

[Curly Beaver]

So I'm on my first grow and was curious about turning the lights off before harvest.
The only trick with this is I'm doing this outdoor.

So I live in Oregon where there is a lot of rain so for these coming months I built a little tent to out around them. By little I mean 10x5 ft. My plants got really big really fast. Literally 5ft by 10 ft between four plants, bushy as hell.
So with my tent made of pvc pipe and 6mm polyethylene plastic. Towards the end of the grow could I just throw a black tarp over it for two weeks, then harvest? What does this do? How much difference does it make?

2 days maybe, 2 weeks..... NO.

 

[Richard Richardson]

If you have bushy plants, make sure you check daily for mold & have lots of ventilation/airflow.

Don't cover the tent with a tarp, unless you want to speed up the flowering schedule by inducing early evenings.

There is no benefit to darkness longer than 14 hrs in any 24hr period. Plants need energy from the sun every day to balance their circadian rhythm. Light intensity & timing are also signals that plants need, in order to produce the proper chemicals & genes required for healthy growth and strong flower formation. If you take away the light/dark cycle for an extended period of time, your plants may get sick before they stop flowering and die. This is not a good scenario for a greenhouse tent.

The earth does not stop rotating in autumn, there is no large flowering plant on earth that thrives on 2 weeks or even 2 days of uninterrupted nighttime.