By Luke Sumpter

Are your weed flowers taking forever to mature? Has the blooming phase far exceeded the estimated time stated on the seed packet? Well, worry not. We’re about to explain why this is happening and exactly what you can do to correct things.


First things first, let’s cover the very basics. Cannabis plants rely on optimal temperature ranges to facilitate proper growth and flowering. During the blooming phase, try to maintain a steady temperature of 20–26°C. Next up, you need to dial in your watering. Too little water can cause stress that impacts flower development, whereas too much can increase the risk of diseases. To keep things simple, you should only reapply water when the top 3cm of soil becomes completely dry—simply place your finger in the soil to test this.

If changing these parameters fixes your problem, then congratulations—you got out easy! If you’re already a master at balancing these variables, read on to discover the root cause of your flowering issue.

1. Cannabis Flowers Maturing Slowly: Three Common Factors

With the usual suspects out of the way, let’s explore some of the other key culprits that cause cannabis plants to flower slowly.

Genetics

Some cannabis strains simply take longer to flower than others. Selecting varieties with this in mind will drastically reduce blooming times. Large sativa photoperiod strains take over two months to reach the end of the flowering phase.

Solution: If you're looking to get flowers quickly, you can choose from our selection of autoflower cultivars, our line of F1 hybrids, or our fast-flowering strains. These varieties can go from sprout to harvest in just a few weeks.

The Fastest Flowering Cannabis Strains
The Fastest Flowering Cannabis Strains

Nutritional Deficiencies

Cannabis plants require different nutrients to fulfil different physiological processes, including flowering. A lack of key minerals during blooming can impact flower development and speed of maturity.

Solution: Ensure your plants have ample access to phosphorus, potassium, calcium, magnesium, and sulphur during the flowering phase.

Sulphur deficiency
Sulphur deficiency

Long Light Cycles

Whereas autoflowering cannabis plants don’t require changes in light exposure to flower, photoperiod plants depend on a reduced light cycle that mimics the end of the growing season outdoors. Leaving your lights on for too long each day can lengthen the flowering period and even force plants to re-veg. Additionally, growers tend to disturb the dark cycle by checking on the plants, causing the plants to stress unnecessarily.

Solution: Maintain a correct flowering light cycle; expose your plants to no more than 12 hours of light per day, and avoid interrupting the dark cycle.

2. Light Burn and Light Stress Slow Weed Blooming

Light burn and light stress are two forms of abiotic (non-living) stress that can interfere with optimal growth and flowering. Light burn directly damages flowering tissue, resulting in yellowing and browning. While light stress is less severe, it can still mess with flower development,

Solution: Apply LST to your plants to keep the canopy horizontal and to prevent colas from growing too close to your light source.

Light burn
Light burn

3. Pest Infestations Affect Flowering

Pests are one of the biggest threats when it comes to growing weed. Although they primarily affect outdoor plants, they can also work their way indoors. There are many different types of cannabis pests, but all of them produce a degree of stress. Left to inflict enough damage, different species can interfere with nutrient uptake and transport, photosynthesis, and leaf and flower development. By sucking out resin and leaving residue on plant tissue, pests can also give rise to different diseases. The stress caused by pests can delay the onset of flowering, reduce resin production, and also stop flowering altogether.

Solution: Sow companion plants close to your outdoor crop to draw in beneficial predatory insects. Consider netting your plants outdoors, or growing them in protected greenhouses and polytunnels. Use insect screens and sticky traps to prevent and manage indoor infestations.

Pest infestation in a Cannabis plant
Pest infestation in a Cannabis plant

4. Fungal and Bacterial Diseases Are a Big Issue

Pests are hard to deal with—but at least you can see most of them. Microbial pathogens, including several species of bacteria and fungi, are much harder to detect until things start to get serious. Some of the most common and damaging cannabis pathogens include botrytis (bud rot) and fusarium (root rot). While less physically damaging, powdery mildew can also render cannabis buds unusable. During the development of these diseases, plants experience profound levels of stress as their cells are attacked and destroyed. Root diseases impact the uptake of nutrients and water, whereas those that directly target the flowers impact bud development.

Solution: Manage humidity levels, especially during the flowering period. Protect your plants from excessive rainfall outdoors, especially as your plants near the end of the flowering phase. Use routine organic sprays during the vegetative phase as a pre-emptive measure, including neem oil as a natural fungicide.

Mold in a Cannabis plant
Mould in a Cannabis plant

5. Over-Fertilisation May Slow Weed Flowering

You probably think you’re doing your weed plants a favour by bombarding them with the right nutrients during the blooming stage. However, just as too few nutrients can cause issues, too many can also result in slow flowering growth. Why? Because high levels of certain nutrients can cause a lockout of others. For example, excess nitrogen can resist access to phosphorus—a vital nutrient during bloom. Over-fertilization can cause stress on plants due to toxicity and cause slow and stunted growth. The over-application of certain minerals can also cause soil pH to drop, which can also interfere with nutrient uptake.

Solution: Apply synthetic bottled nutrients according to the manufacturer's instructions. If possible, transition to organic nutrients that break down naturally over time. Keep an eye on your soil pH and aim for an optimal range of 6.0–7.0.

6. A Lack of Sugar Can Cause Snail-Paced Buds

You’re used to giving your plants NPK and micronutrients—not sugar. However, simple carbs can help to kick your plant into overdrive during weed blooming. Think about it, plants produce their own sugars during photosynthesis. However, issues with photosynthesis due to a lack of light or other forms of stress can reduce the amount of cell-powering sugar that plants can create. Obviously, this creates a metabolic problem during the flowering phase of the growing cycle.

Solution: Applying sources of sugar, such as molasses, to your growing medium in the appropriate quantities will give your plants access to sugars that they use to deal with environmental stress. These applications act as osmotic agents that help plants hold onto water. Sugar also feeds beneficial soil life, including fungi. These organisms give plants increased access to important flowering nutrients, including phosphorus.

Benefits of Molasses for your Cannabis plant
Benefits of Molasses for your Cannabis plant

7. Protect Your Cannabis Flowers From Physical Damage

If it doesn’t kill your plant outright, physical damage can drastically impact flower development. Although cannabis plants develop a thick and woody main stem quite quickly, side branches and petioles remain relatively delicate during the entire growing cycle. Strong winds, falling objects, and general accidents can damage these structures. Because branches contain the vasculature that transports nutrients and water, snapping or injuring them can restrict developing buds from accessing these substances. Damaged petioles, the small stems that join leaves to plants, can also cut off the valuable sugars made during photosynthesis. Also, avoid stressing your plant with HST techniques at this stage.

Solution: Learn how to keep your weed plants from falling over, and protect them from external forces. Trellises and stakes are effective means of keeping your plants upright during adverse weather, and when they become top-heavy during late flowering. Tomato cages will also help to prevent knocks and bumps. If you need to train your plant, bend it gently or start earlier next time.

Trellising
Trellising

8. Leaving Plants Flowering For Too Long

Are your specimens really taking too long to finish blooming, or are you simply leaving plants in flower for too long? If you let your buds get too mature, you run the risk of them undergoing rodelization. Cannabis plants naturally want to reproduce. When they aren’t fertilised by male pollen, some plants get so stressed that they become hermaphrodites; they put out male flowers in a last-ditch attempt to pollinate themselves. If successful, this will result in poor-quality buds filled with seeds. After raising your plant through the entire growing cycle, you don’t want all of your hard work to end like this.

Solution: Get to know the signs of when to harvest to make sure you aren’t leaving your buds on their branches past the ideal time. These signs include milky white trichomes and orange pistils. Ensure you harvest and dry your flowers before they get too mature.

Orange pistils
Orange pistils

Problem Solved: Enjoy A Trouble-Free Flowering Phase

Now you’re aware of all the issues that can cause cannabis plants to flower for too long. But it’s not all bad news—you're also equipped with the solutions to all of these problems. Remember, keep your temperature and humidity in optimal ranges, make sure you’re supplying enough light (but not too much), sow companion plants to deal with pests, and make sure you harvest your buds at the proper time to prevent them from getting too mature.

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Privacy Policy - Royal Queen Seeds

To ensure a safe online environment and guarantee adequate data protection, we strictly comply with all legal requirements. In this privacy statement, we provide information about how and for what purpose data is collected, safety measures, storage periods and contact details.


COMPANY NAME: SNORKEL SPAIN, SL (hereinafter ROYAL QUEEN SEEDS)

C/ Vilar d'Abdelà, 5 (nave 1) CP: 08170 de Montornès del Vallès

+34 937 379 846

support@royalqueenseeds.com


The present Privacy Policy sets out the terms on which we will treat personal data at ROYAL QUEEN SEEDS; this includes any personal data collected through our website https://www.royalqueenseeds.com/ as well as any other data we process in the course of our business activities.

ROYAL QUEEN SEEDS collects the following personal data for the purposes listed below:

SECTION 1 – PERSONAL INFORMATION WE COLLECT

1.1 Account purchases

Account purchases can only be made if you are in possession of a personal account. When you create an account or purchase something from our shop, as part of the buying and selling process we collect the following personal information that you provide to us:

This information is required for delivery. In addition, when you browse our shop, we automatically receive the Internet Protocol (IP) address of your computer. Based on this information, we can optimise your online experience and at the same time protect our online environment.

Purpose of data collection

We collect and store account-related data for the following purposes:

(a) to carry out obligations arising from any contracts between you and us, and to provide you with information, products and services that you may request from us;

(b) to set up, manage and communicate with you about your account and your orders;

(c) to conduct market research and analysis;

(d) to confirm your age and identity, and to detect and prevent fraud.

1.2 Newsletters

With your explicit permission, we may send you newsletters about our shop, new products and other updates. We send newsletters based on your explicit consent. In the event that you purchase a product, and in accordance with current regulations, we may send you commercial communications in accordance with the legitimate interest of our company, always about products or services similar to those you have purchased or contracted. In any case, you may exercise your right of opposition through the channels announced in this Privacy Policy. The following information is collected in relation to the newsletter:

We do not need to know the sex of the person in order to send the newsletter (data minimisation: by law we must ask for data that is strictly necessary to provide the service, and in this case knowing the sex is not necessary to send the newsletter).

Purpose of data collection

The data collected is used to:

(a) personalise our emails, including your name and gender;

(b) provide gender-specific content.

You can withdraw your consent at any time by using the link provided in the newsletter or the contact information provided in section 2.

1.3 Customer service and contact form

In order to provide appropriate support, our customer service employees have access to information related to the account. Consequently, their support will be highly effective and friendly. The data provided in our contact form is used by our CRM provider, SuperOffice. We will only use your details to respond to your message.

SECTION 2 – LEGITIMATE INTEREST

If you have purchased any of our products, please note that we may process your personal data for promotional purposes, based on Royal Queen Seeds' legitimate interest only to offer you products or services from our company and about products or services similar to those you have purchased. You may exercise your right to opt out of future messages by the means set out in this Privacy Policy or through any notification you receive.

2.1 How do you withdraw consent?

If you change your mind, you can withdraw your consent for us to contact you for the purpose of collecting, using, or disclosing your data at any time by reaching out to us at: support@royalqueenseeds.com.

SECTION 3 – DISCLOSURE

We may disclose your personal information if we are required to do so by law or if you breach our Terms of Service.

SECTION 4 – HOW LONG DO WE KEEP YOUR DATA?

At Royal Queen Seeds, we will not retain your data for longer than is necessary for the purposes described in this Policy. Different retention periods apply for different types of data; however, the longest period we will normally hold any personal data is 10 years.

4.1 Account information

Data relating to the account remains relevant for as long as the consumer is in possession of an account. Therefore, the data remains documented for as long as the account exists. When our customers delete an account, the associated data will be deleted within a reasonable period of time. Requests regarding the inspection or correction of stored personal data or the deletion of an account can be sent to support@royalqueenseeds.com.

4.2 Newsletters

In the event that you give us your consent to inform you about our products or services, we will keep your data until you express your wish not to receive any further communications from us. However, we regularly (every month) carry out a relevance check. Registered customers (and their personal information) will be deleted whenever customers do not reply to our request. In addition, our newsletter mailing has an opt-out feature. Consumers can withdraw their consent by using this opt-out feature.

SECTION 5 – COOKIES

Cookies are small information files that notify your computer of previous interactions with our website. These cookies are stored on your hard drive, not on our website. Essentially, when you use our website, your computer displays its cookies to us, informing our site that you have visited before. This allows our website to function more quickly and remember aspects related to your previous visits (such as your username), making your experience more convenient. At Royal Queen Seeds, we use two types of cookies: functional and analytical.

5.1 Functional Cookies

Functional cookies are used to enhance your online experience. Among other things, these cookies track what is added to your shopping cart. The use of these cookies does not require prior authorization.

5.2 Analytical Cookies

Analytical cookies are used for research and market analysis. The data collected with these analytical cookies is anonymous, making it unusable for third parties. The use of these cookies does not require prior authorization.

SECTION 5 – THIRD-PARTY SERVICES

Third-party services are required to conduct transactions and provide our services. In general, the third-party providers we use will only collect, use and disclose your information to the extent necessary to enable them to perform the services they provide to us.

However, certain third-party service providers, such as payment gateways and other payment transaction processors, have their own privacy policies regarding the information we must provide to them for your transactions.

We encourage you to read the privacy policies of these providers so that you can understand how these providers will handle your personal information.

In particular, certain suppliers may be located or have facilities located in a different jurisdiction than yours or ours. Therefore, if you choose to proceed with a transaction involving the services of a third party, your information may be subject to the laws of the jurisdiction in which that service provider or its facilities are located.

Once you leave our website or are redirected to a third-party website or application, you are no longer governed by this Privacy Policy or the Terms of Service of our website.

Web analytics service (anonymous data)

On this website we have integrated an element of a web analytics service (with anonymisation functionality). Web analytics can be defined as the gathering, processing and analysis of data about the behaviour of visitors to websites. An analytics service collects, among other things, data about which website a person came from (the so-called referrer), which sub-pages they visited or how often and for how long they visited a sub-page. Web analytics is mainly used for website optimisation and for a cost–benefit analysis of internet advertising.

Courier service

To complete deliveries we use a courier service. This courier service carries out the delivery between our company and the consumer's home. To complete these logistics, the company requires access to the consumer's name and address information.

Mailing service

Royal Queen Seeds uses a third-party mail service provider to send its newsletter. This provider has access to limited account information related to opt-in consent (e.g. email address).

Marketing services

Royal Queen Seeds has the support of a company that specialises in marketing and communication activities. Their access to personal information is very limited and mostly anonymous.

Payment services

At Royal Queen Seeds we use external payment services to handle our transactions (e.g. credit card payments).

SECTION 6 – SECURITY

To protect your personal information, we take reasonable precautions and follow industry standard best practices to ensure that it is not inappropriately lost, misused, accessed, disclosed, altered or destroyed.

If you provide us with your credit card information, the information is encrypted using secure socket layer technology (SSL) and stored using AES-256 encryption. Although no method of transmission over the internet or electronic storage is 100% secure, we follow all PCI-DSS requirements and implement additional industry standards that are commonly accepted. Information related to the account is protected with a hashing method. This method transforms the information into a generated hash. As a result, confidential information is protected and invisible, even to us. In addition, our databases are exceptionally protected against unauthorised access. For example, access to the database is only possible and permitted via approved IP addresses (e.g. from Royal Queen Seeds headquarters). Other attempts and addresses are rejected at all times.

Furthermore, data is anonymised as much as possible, so it cannot be directly linked to a specific consumer. With this data, however, we may be able to carry out market research and analysis. In addition, the third parties concerned (e.g. mailing service) are examined prior to our collaboration, comply with the GDPR from the EU and receive a processing agreement. Within Royal Queen Seeds, employees are assigned different access permissions. Specific permission provides access only to information that is strictly required to perform a task. Digital security measures are subject to change and must meet high requirements to ensure the safety of online customers. That is why, at Royal Queen Seeds, we appoint a security officer. Regular verification and improvement of security measures (where necessary) are part of the role.

SECTION 7 – CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time, so please check back regularly. Changes and clarifications will be effective immediately upon being published on the Website. If we make substantial changes to this policy, we will notify you here that it has been updated so you will know what information we collect, how we use it and under what circumstances, if any, we use and/or disclose it.

SECTION 8 – YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO: