Pics of Grow - When should I start to Flower?

First real grow. Been veggin from bag seed about 3 weeks. 24/7. Soil with ph of about 6. Humidity between 50-55 %. Temp between 84-86 . Feed with every water(using fresh well water with ph of 5.5-6. 20-20-20 mix with 1/4 tsp of epsom salt. Using 100w equilivent CFL's on 8 plants and rotating them around with fluro's cool white and grow. 3 fans circulating and a 130 cfm exhaust fan in celing.

Sorry if too much info, but after reading everyone's posts these are the ?'s normally asked.

About 1/2 are 2ft tall and the other half are not quit at a foot yet. I was hoping to start flowering in about 2 weeks so I can start to weed ( no phun intended) out the males.

Suggestions????? Advice??????

Yes, i was planning on flowering all at once. This is my only space. I don't understand Topping???? I thought you didn't want to mess with the top part becasue that is where you get the biggest bud? Can you explain further. Thanks!

I would flower now, a 2 foot plant is perfect

Well if you TOP what happens is the bottom limbs will continue to grow and the place you top will stop and repair (2 weeks) so the plant will bush up, Yes that is where your Top Cola would of been but you will be pushing Hormones (Auxins) into lower branches. So you would get more Buds from bottom too, and they might all turn out real nice, just with out one huge cola. I never grow straight up.
If you are going to flower all at once I would top at 24 " and when other plants get 20" I would then 12/12 . I think it would be better for over all weight/harvest.

WOW! Great pictures. I do see how both of you have a point and that topping seems to be the way to go.

A few Questions? How do you actually top? How far down do you go? And can I clone the top?

Usually you just want to remove the top node- the little tiny leaves that are just starting to form. Take em right off. Then your current nodes will grow higher, and act as main cola's. I had a light fall on one of my plants, and the result was a 4 headed plant. I definetly should have topped all of my plants, and will for sure next time around.

what is the grow medium you are using.

there is topping... and then there is topping...

see the above plant shows the easy way... you cut off the main shoot and the plant catches up....

What i like to do and get loads more tops is on the new grow of the plant.. the little leaves i spread them open carefully... then you can see a little nub inside.... take about 3/4 off with a pair of nail clipper ... like they said..be fareful not to damage the leaves you just opened up carefully... the plant wont really stop growing and catch up per say.... what it will do is that with the little 1/4 that you left it will grow more shoots... i have had up to 8 shoots from 1 top.... experiment... dont worry and have fun learning your plants.

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]PRUNING FOR YIELD
Pruning is the action of manipulating the number of node regions (potential bud sites) that your plant creates and has nothing to do with the thinning process. Cutting a plant at the stem will automatically result in Hopping'. For this reason, plants that are thinned via cutting will end up growing more than one top cola. Topping is discussed in the next section. This section covers pruning to increase yield.
By using stakes you can also control and separate branch growth after pruning.

This plant has generated more than eight new node regions after pruning.
Prune cuts are made using clippers held at a 45-degree angle to tbe shoot being cut. For every stem or branch that you prune, the cut area will develop two more branches.This process is natural: just look at any tree to see how the stem divides into branches which sub-bivide into more branches which divide into new shoots and leaves. Marijuana plants grow branches out from the stem. Any filling out occurs when new leaves and branches develop at the node regions. Some of these branches may develop new shoots, but these are somewhat smaller and thinner and don't support as much bud growth. If you prune your plant you can make it more like the example of the tree.

Recall that Indica plants tend to be smaller than Sativas. If you learn to prune your plant properly you can produce small bushy Sativa plants that grow in tiny spaces. Without pruning, a Sativa plant can stretch to five feet or more.

Keep in mind that there is a limit to how much you can prune a marijuana plant. If you prune the stem, it will split in two. You can prune both of these new stems and end up with four stems. You can try to prune each of these four stems to create eight stems, but results will depend on the strain and its genetically predetermined branching limit. You might be able to prune some of the lateral branches, but again, if the plant has reached its threshold it will not produce more branches. All strains are different in this respect. [/FONT] [FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]TOPPING
Some marijuana growers will take a pair of clippers to the top of their plant just above the last branch formation during the third or fourth week of vegetative growth. The top is removed by shearing it away at the stem. What happens next is that the main stem splits off in two or more directions, creating a V-shape at the top of your plant. The end result after flowering is two or more top colas instead of one. Now, two top colas instead of one does sound appealing and some growers have even managed to force a plant to grow more than six top colas using this method. Unfortunately this topping method of pruning doesn't always lead to better results.

Depending on the strain and the growing environment, the 'topped' plant may produce two small top colas instead of two big ones. Also, each strain has a threshold for bud production that cannot be improved upon because it is a genetically predetermined factor. On the other hand, some plants when fully grown without topping do not reach their threshold. The strain Blueberry is a good example of this. If you grow Blueberry without topping you won't achieve maximum bud production from that plant, but if you top the Blueberry, you will. Other strains aren't so flexible and the two top colas will simply share the same volume of bud that a single cola would have produced on the same strain.[/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]It's advised that you keep in mind that pruning for yield using the topping method is strain-dependent and experiment carefully with this pruning method. Do this with 2 out of 10 plants in every grow. You'll find in time that during this vegetative prune you will be able to shape your plant. Plants are generally pruned three to four weeks into their vegetative cycle, but can be pruned sooner or later or more than once.

Pruning during flowering is not advised as the plant will be forced to divert its energy from bud production into branch and leaf production. This results in a slower rate of bud growth. For optimal growth finish your pruning well before flowering.

FIM Technique
There is a topping method known as the FIM technique. If you push the leaves apart at the very top of the plant you should see a small bud (not flowering bud but an actually leaf bud). Use a pair of nail clippers to pinch off about 3/4 of the bud. This should result in more than two top colas being developed. In a single FIM clipping you can produce up to eight new top colas.
The origins of this technique are humorous. As the story goes, FIM was discovered accidentally when a grower messed up a topping exercise. FIM stands for: "Fuck I Missed".[/FONT]

there's also super cropping
u can just bend the top part careful not to break it and it kinda acts like topping

that or LST both work.....i would reccomend lst cause its causes the least amount of stress...but requires a bit a work look em up and do some rescearch.. or u can message me ill hook u up