Need help topping my auto + light to bright?

[Biic]

hello, this is my first grow, i choose seedsman auto northern lights. as you can see in the pictures below, my girl looks like shes a little short and compact. i can see the leaves kinda canoeing upwards a little, is this a result of my light being to bright? i have a qb288 v2 rspec at 24 inches away. it was damn near turned all the way up to 2200ma / 132w. does anyone know how bright it should be? feel like thats the reason shes so compact but its my first grow so im paranoid haha. i talked to someone else and they told me its fine and that i should top it when i get 4 sets of leaves. I tried counting and im confused because the bottom set of leaves only has 3 point leaves so i didn't know if those count too. could someone tell me if i have 4 sets yet? i believe the 4th set came out yesterday and the 5th is a little nod that popped out the top today. i could be wrong tho. anyways, thanks so much for the help! i appreciate it

 

[Olderfart]

FWIW, I count the first real leaf (i.e. the first set of leaves above the non-serrated cotyledons) as node #1, and I top above node#4 or 5. Above 5 will make for more colas/bush than above #4. I top as soon as there is enough stem visible above the node to let me get in there without damaging anything below the cut. I think it is an advantage to top as soon as you can before a lot of vegetation grows above the topping spot. Could be FOS, but all my topped plants have been happy growers 1-2 days later.

Your Northern Lites Auto is likely to get big, and take a while, so I expect that I would top it if I were in your shoes. I topped the CQ in my current grow, but I will not be topping the 24Cs as they will stay a lot shorter than the CQ.


As far as your light is concerned, your plants look plenty happy to my noob eyes. I doubt that a quantum board of that power would be a problem at that distance and this point in the grow in your grow space. If anything, it could be a little less power than you will want later in the grow, but I have no direct experience in the matter.

The NL will likely start to put on some serious stretch once you get to pre-flower, so I would not worry about the squat structure at this point. You may end up wishing you had more height. In any case, there is certainly nothing suggesting to me a need for immediate adjustment. I will be interested to see what other more experienced growers have to say.

 

[Death The Cultivator]

hello, this is my first grow, i choose seedsman auto northern lights. as you can see in the pictures below, my girl looks like shes a little short and compact. i can see the leaves kinda canoeing upwards a little, is this a result of my light being to bright? i have a qb288 v2 rspec at 24 inches away. it was damn near turned all the way up to 2200ma / 132w. does anyone know how bright it should be? feel like thats the reason shes so compact but its my first grow so im paranoid haha. i talked to someone else and they told me its fine and that i should top it when i get 4 sets of leaves. I tried counting and im confused because the bottom set of leaves only has 3 point leaves so i didn't know if those count too. could someone tell me if i have 4 sets yet? i believe the 4th set came out yesterday and the 5th is a little nod that popped out the top today. i could be wrong tho. anyways, thanks so much for the help! i appreciate it View attachment 1132202

The plants look perfectly fine. I wouldn't top it unless you're having height issues. They are pretty short and still developing their root system, pruning can deter growth especially when a small plant like yours is still young.

I grew two auto northern lights but I only did LST and super cropping. I don't really prune my plants unless I need to fill a a SCROG on a photo towards a certain direction otherwise I just LST for yield. My NLs started short but I cropped them to let them branch out more so by the time they started flowering I had plenty of strong side branches from spreading the plant out. They took around 90 days and were heavy yielders imo. Not a hard strain to grow and outside of LST I wouldn't really do too much to them but make sure they eat enough and do several foliar feeds every week.

 

[420Forever]

hello, this is my first grow, i choose seedsman auto northern lights. as you can see in the pictures below, my girl looks like shes a little short and compact. i can see the leaves kinda canoeing upwards a little, is this a result of my light being to bright? i have a qb288 v2 rspec at 24 inches away. it was damn near turned all the way up to 2200ma / 132w. does anyone know how bright it should be? feel like thats the reason shes so compact but its my first grow so im paranoid haha. i talked to someone else and they told me its fine and that i should top it when i get 4 sets of leaves. I tried counting and im confused because the bottom set of leaves only has 3 point leaves so i didn't know if those count too. could someone tell me if i have 4 sets yet? i believe the 4th set came out yesterday and the 5th is a little nod that popped out the top today. i could be wrong tho. anyways, thanks so much for the help! i appreciate it View attachment 1132202

NL for the win! heya @BicGro and to afn! i'm by no meanz a lighting guru, lol, so can't answer to that, but, i do know one thing fer sur -> ur gonna need lotza popcorn & a nice comfy chair to grow NL, uh-huh and, diff peepz count the leavez/nodez differently, but i meself start count on the first set of single-fingered leavez, so by that count, it lookz like the 5th set is out & the 6th is on itz way as far as it bein short & compact, that'z simply the nature of NL, plain & simple, so no worriez there but seriously, excepting casez of divine intervention, ur lookin at 100d at least for NL...don't mean to burst any balloonz, but that'z jus the way of it anything else u need, jus give a holler

ppp &


:smiley1:

 

[Proph]

The general rule with QB's is, the bigger the space, the higher the light.... the smaller the space, the lower the light.. So if you have a small space, 24 inches from the plants is fine. That qb will have no problem flowering both those plants just fine.

As a new grower on your 1st grow, my advice would be to not top your plant and just focus on the learning process. You have 100 questions right now just being a newbie.. You'll have 100 more after you top it.. If you're not sure how leaf sets are counted, or what "nodes" are.. I would start looking up that sort of info. It's gonna be a long ride, lol.

Plant size, height, finish times, ect are mainly based on genetics.. It also has to which pot size, light schedule ect.. Every plant is different. There have been countless seedsman nl autos grown on this site... Some finish in 60 days, others 120. Good luck on your 1st grow and welcome to AFN!

 

[Biic]

NL for the win! heya @BicGro and to afn! i'm by no meanz a lighting guru, lol, so can't answer to that, but, i do know one thing fer sur -> ur gonna need lotza popcorn & a nice comfy chair to grow NL, uh-huh and, diff peepz count the leavez/nodez differently, but i meself start count on the first set of single-fingered leavez, so by that count, it lookz like the 5th set is out & the 6th is on itz way as far as it bein short & compact, that'z simply the nature of NL, plain & simple, so no worriez there but seriously, excepting casez of divine intervention, ur lookin at 100d at least for NL...don't mean to burst any balloonz, but that'z jus the way of it anything else u need, jus give a holler

ppp &


:smiley1:

thanks for the information, i appreciate it! i have one question, i'm gonna try LST instead of topping since that seems like the route everyone is telling me to take. is my big girl too small to start? around what height should i start? thanks for the info again.