Why Are The Spaces Between Nodes So Large?

[PippinTook]

Hi guys, I'll try keep this short and quick: I've always been super happy with my bud after harvest; super dense and frosty, even the small wispy buds lower down will turn your brain to mush. But for some reason I have a persistent problem of the spaces between flower nodes stretching to eternity when I flower. I never see this issue during veg!

I've attached some images, the first three being of my indoor photoperiod plants and the 4th being of my casual outdoor autoflower. You can clearly see the density of buds on the autoflower is significantly higher than the photoperiods and I swear I didn't do anything different between each of them!

Indoor
Strains: 2x OG Kush and 2x King Kong
Days in flower: 14 days
Light: 8 year old purple spectrum Mars Hydro 600w equivalent LED
Light distance from canopy: Moved to around 35-40cm from canopy during flower
Nutrients: Terra Aquatica 3 part (Micro, Grow, Bloom). And a dash of Diatomaceous Earth every feed for the Silica
pH: Generally around 6-6.3
Growing Medium: Freedom Farms 70/30 Coco Perlite Buffered

 

Outdoor
Strain: Zkittles Auto
Days in flower: No idea to be honest I wasn't paying that much attention to this plant
Light: Good old fashioned sun
Amount of light: I actively move the plant around to chase the sun as much as possible.
Nutrients: Exactly the same as above but more diluted as you can see some burn going on there
pH: As above.
Growing Medium: Freedom Farms 70/30 Coco Perlite Buffered

 

Edited April 8 by PippinTook
Accidentally posted unfinished post

[Spaidan]

Hey man. Large spaces are either formed from not enough light and sometimes its just a trait of the strain. Maybe try defoliate more to expose bud sites. Sometimes the problem is not the amount of light, but instead the light coverage. There could be other reasons, however this is all I know of. On the breeder packs it will let you know if the strain stretches during flowering and sometimes they will mention the common internodal spacing. Different strains have different characteristics during flower and different phenotypes of the same strain can have different plant structure. If you constantly have the same issue, it could be a different reason.

Good luck man

[Spaidan]

You see the spacing is tight with the auto which is grown outdoor with the sun. Where your indoor plants have large internodal spacing. This gives me reason to believe its a light issue. You mentioned you using a 8 year old blurple light. I would recommend getting a new light such as a LED quantum board. I have a 120w quantum board from Green Houston, next to my old 100w Mars Hydro 48 reflector in one tent. (70cm x 70cm) and they work great together. When looking for a quantum board always look for ones with Samsung diodes. 

Ill provide the link to the one I purchased. There are different sizes and versions. But any quantum board that uses Samsung diodes such as LM301H diodes will be excellent.

https://www.greenhouston.co.za/products/quantum-board-led-125w

Depending on the size of your tent you might have to go larger or buy multiple. However if you just get one Quantum board, you can combine it with your old light.

[AK-47 Gold Arabesque]

You could reveg, try take two clones of one plant and grow them in different conditions to really check what the issue could be.

My two cents, its probably just strain dependent. I'm only on my second grow, and my bud density qualms from the first grow were resolved by changing strain  Everything else stayed the same.