Barely flowering at all... :/ and hoping to top a clone??

So I played around a few months ago and grew one small pot plant on my kitchen countertop in my apartment. Then it came to an unfortunate end before I even started flowering (because I didn't know what that was). But recently I decided to get serious about growing because weed is really expensive here haha. So I did a shit load of reading and youtube watching to get a good setup and set of skills down to finally grow my own. Since this was basically my first grow, I made a couple newbie mistakes. i.e. had the light too far away and now all my plants are lanky.

But now, roughly 3 weeks into flowering my first grow, I've noticed that the females I have aren't really budding very fast at all. The only reason I decided to post about this is because everytime I get on here and see other people's plants 3 weeks into flowering their plants have at least started actually budding.

So here are my plants. I would love any advice. Right now I have them in about a 5x2x4 closet that is coated in aluminum foil on a short table with the light roughly 35" away form to table top. I've got a 4' shop light with two plant&aquarium lights from walmart and one little clip on lamp with some flourescent grow bulb that I use for flowering. All of the plants are in 1.5 gallon pots with normal miracle gro potting mix. Covering the table is a light proof curtain that drapes to the floor. Underneath the table I have a 2' flourescent attatched to the underside with a plant&aquarium light and some sun-like light tube that I keep on 24/7 for clones and a mother plant. My plan is simple: a SoG perpetual grow. I saw it on a post on this website. However I'm trying to keep the clone in the pictures below as a mother plant by keeping it in a wide shallow container and topping it to make it short and bushy. Then I would take cuttings every two weeks and let them veg. And every two weeks following I would put two more plants into the flowering section.

I know my setup isn't the greatest so I'm totally open to advice. However, I'm on a budget and working with limited space and time. But please give me whatever advice you are willing to give, because I'm very excited about getting this two work.

Anyway, here are the plants. Let me know how they are looking after 3 weeks of flowering. the first picture is a "full body" and the next one is a close up.


And this one is the clone (right around 5-6"). Is this chick still too little to top?

clones in a curry tray.......really?

get it in a pot!

don't top yet, it looks too weak

what light u using to flower?

For starters stretching your plants could slow the flowering process, plus your not giving the plants bloom nutrients which would give them more energy to focus on bud development. Did you give those at least 2 weeks to heal after you topped them before flowering, because if not that's another problem. Also if you want to yield anything do not top during flowering.

Keep this in mind, until I started going around on this site I always thought that flowering times were based on the first day you go 12/12, and they are in some cases.

It should be standardized but it never will be, some folks say flowering time starts when you flip the light, some say when you first see female flowers (could be 7 - 14 days) so when you see someone say week 3 of flower they could be 4/5 weeks since going 12/12, not trying to confuse at all.

I count from the say I flip, if I started from the day I saw female flower I would have a 48 day and a 50 day finisher but they are 55 and 57 day finishes from 12/12. I really don't understand why people would count it from the day they first see flower, it makes sense that someone would want to know how long once I flip the lights... but i digress.

my first grow was just like yours, kinda... the 4' shop lights served me well. my yield was horrible but the smoke was the best ive ever grown in my opinion. ive only got 5 grows under my belt but i still think the t12 shop lights can be used to make amazing medicine. you dont have enuff lights and thats a given. your plants are barely getting enuff light to stay alive, let alone blossom nice buds. i understand you are on a budget so my advice is this, if you can afford it of course.. change the plant bulbs to a warm spectrum bulbs for more lumens and a closer spectrum for flowering. also more light. anything really! cfl's, or more shop lights whatever u can do. if its cheaper to add more lights tham chamge the plant lights thats ok, just get more light. if u can afford it all plz do so, also you want side/ bottom lighting. good luck, if u need anything p.m me

You're plants seem to be budding just fine. They come in kinda slow at first and then build in eachother. You'd probably see more growth if you hit them with some bloom nutrients, and I'm not sure how much light they're getting but tossing a couple of more warm white cfls into the mix couldn't hurt.

you have light issues someplace, they look on the verg of flowering but cant as some light is getting their.

tin foil and miracle grow are 2 things you would have read on the bad growers section of youtube- where ever you read to use it

plus you also stretching tomuch light should be inches away not feet

also your plant looks sativa dominant, what strain are you growing? it may take a long time to finish so dont exactly fret the slow flowering time. my guess is its the lighting but could be strain related too

Well I figured the tray would let the roots go out as opposed to down because I don't have that much room for height.

So, I'm not really sure if I can fit anymore lights in there. And the reason it's so far away now is because I didn't realize that it would be a problem untill it was too late. From the beginning I had the lights too far away and didn't want to kill the plants topping them because I wasn't comfortable doing it yet haha. I actually use a bloom booster. GH Flora bloom. The only problem is that each pot has a small watering tray, so I hand water the trays independently. And the measure ments on the bottle say I should only use 15 ml for one gallon of water! That's like none at all. The biggest thing I have to pour with at the moment is a coffee pot lol. so I just out a little under 15ml of the bloom booster and fill it with water and water the trays. Am I not using enough, cause I've been really confused about that?

And I'm not sure how to do that quote thing for multiple people yet so to jvo: I only topped one plant to try to get the clone because it was female, nothing else has been topped.