Autoflowering Seeds Explained

Cali Special Gelato Auto | Aztech Genetics

Autoflowering Seeds Explained

May 14, 2024

What is an Autoflower?

Most traditional cannabis strains are classed as photoperiods, this means they have evolved to be sensitive to changes in the daylight hours in order to trigger flowering. A typical plant growing naturally outdoors would germinate in spring and establish during the longer summer months. When the daylight hours start to shorten towards the end of late summer/early autumn the plants will naturally trigger into flowering phase.

Cannabis is an annual plant and it would usually germinate from seed, grow out and flower and then hopefully reproduce by creating either seed or pollen all in the same year. Because cannabis doesn’t do so well in colder weather the shortening of the daylight hours indicates to the plants that winter is approaching and it’s time to flower away.

This is replicated in an indoor set up by switching the plants to a repeat cycle of 12 hours light and 12 hours uninterrupted darkness when the grower is ready to start flowering stage.

Autoflowers are different and they will flower when they get to a certain size or age regardless of the light hours received, in fact with autoflowers the more light they receive the bigger the plants and the bigger the yields.

Autoflowering cannabis strains are an increasingly popular choice with customers and have come along way since the very early days of autoflowering cannabis varieties.

Autoflowers Explained | White Widow Auto | Aztech Genetics

Autoflowers Explained | Northern Legend Auto | Aztech Genetics

How did cannabis evolve the autoflower trait?

Cannabis evolved the ability to autoflower thanks to us humans and our long lived relationship with the cannabis plant. As our ancestors gained more knowledge about the benefits of hemp and cannabis as a food source, medicine and versatile material for many different things we started growing cannabis as a farmed crop pretty much everywhere we went and it would grow.

It is expected that the first autoflowering cannabis likely originated from escaped cultivated hemp plants that were grown in colder climates such as Russia, as these wild cannabis populations spread further North the only way they could reproduce successfully in these harsher conditions was to evolve into the autoflowering cannabis subspecies variety known as cannabis Ruderalis

“Cannabis evolved the ability to autoflower thanks to us humans”

The Early days of Autoflowers

Due to ruderalis being a descendant of hemp and being fairly short in nature due to their autoflowering characteristics they were not really valued either for medical use or hash as were very low THC content and didn’t really produce the same amounts of fibres or seeds in comparison to the normal photoperiod variety hemp crops. Although wild populations continued to spread cannabis ruderalis plants weren’t really of much interest to the majority of cannabis cultivators around the world.

A few keen breeders did however see potential in starting projects using ruderalis genetics but found it very hard to create anything of commercial interest and many projects were simply abandoned completely.

One breeder however who persevered with creating stable autoflowering genetics was The Joint Doctor and his Lowryder autoflowering strain. The joint Doctor was originally given some ruderalis cross genetics from a friend, in the form of seeds known as Mexican Rudy. These genetics are thought to be some kind of Ruderalis x Mexican cross and had been cultivated a few years before The Joint Doctor obtained them.

The joint Dr used these Mexican Rudy genetics and began to experiment crossing with different strains on a quest to lock down the autoflowering trait and increase the THC levels to appeal more to growers and smokers,

In early 2000 the Joint Dr did eventually succeed with the creation of a stable autoflowering variety called Lowryder, these plants were very small, didn’t yield that well and were really something of a novelty amongst the growing community. However there was definitely potential for these projects to be worked on further and the compact size of these small plants also allowed plants to be grown and maintained in very tight spaces which was also appealing to some.

The joint Dr continued his work and eventually created Lowryder 2 which was more potent and better yielding .He then went on to release further autoflowering strains and it wasn’t too long after that other breeders too started to offer some form of autoflowering cannabis in their seed catalogues.

Over 20 years on and Autoflowers have come such a long way, Initially it took a while for autoflowers to shake off the reputation they had for being small, weaker plants with low yield but the results from autos just kept on getting better.

We actually sell more Autos then photoperiod now on our website and on our free seed promo the autoflower option is always much more in demand from customers too.

Advantages of Autoflowering Seeds

Outdoor growers , especially in regions where the summers are shorter find autos a better way to guarantee a harvest before any frosts or colder weather especially for sativa growers who would struggle to finish a long flowering photoperiod sativa outside.

Autos outdoors can also be staggered in planting allowing for several harvests in the same season even in the same grow area.

New growers seem to prefer Autos to start with as some get a bit overwhelmed with the idea of having to alter the light cycle indoors in order to flower a photoperiod and generally find autos are easier to do.

Disadvantages of Autoflowering Seeds

Less overall control for the grower, Autoflowers will autoflower when they are ready which might not coincide with the growers exact plans , where as a photoperiod can be triggered flowering precisely when the grower chooses simply by changing the light hours.

Can be fussier in response to low stress training techniques, although autos can be given LST the plants may not respond as well to it as a photoperiod would, Autos given LST outdoors for example may struggle to respond as well as autos given LST indoors under constant light.

Indoors autos yield best given plenty of root space and as much light hours as possible, often this is at least 20 hours of light and some growers will do under a constant 24 hour light regime, this is obviously more expensive on electricity compared to flowering under 12/12 cycle however bigger autos can yield enough to make up for this fact.

Browse our full range autoflowering seed strains

View All

Aztech Genetics Most Popular Autoflowering Seeds

has blessed every Dutch coffee shop menu since its birth in the 1990s and a personal fav here at Aztech Genetics. For our Medical users Sanatio CBD Haze Auto is another popular strain because of its balanced ratio of THC to CBD. From our Cali Special range we just love our West Coast Diesel Auto that crosses x2 Diesel lines, Original Day Wreaker and West Coast Sour Diesel. Plus finally from Lineage Genetics we have Zkittlez Auto, which tastes of mixed berries and sweet candy.

White Widow Auto Feminised Seeds Aztech Genetics

Menu