The Garden

Sixteen square 11-liter pots are packed lip to lip into each square meter (one meter = 39.375 inches). Square pots are a technological breakthrough over round pots. More growing medium will fit in a square container than a round one. There is no wasted space on the table. Each square meter, a 600w HP sodium lamp hangs 18-22 inches above plants. John used to cultivate up to 49 plants per square meter in 4-liter pots adhering to Sea of Green and Screen of Green (SCROG) principals. But it was too much work and the harvest weight turned out the same as when cultivating fewer plants in 11-liter pots. I’m sure there are growers enamored with SCROG and SOG will dispute this John’s findings. If you have a rebuttal, please send it to me, jorge@marijuanagrowing.com, along with harvest weight statistics and photos.

Besides yielding the same as SCROG and SOG, fewer plants create lower legal liabilities. In America, land of the free, more plants increase legal penalties. Gardens with more than 100 plants, including clones, are subject to Federal prosecution, a real can of worms. In fact a prominent attorney calls federal cases a “slam dunk for the prosecution.” Just ask Ed Rosenthal about the difficult and expensive the federal court system.

Irrigation from the bottom keeps the roots working hard. Bottom watering works well because the plants can pull in as much water/nutrient solution as they need. The solution is wicked up into the medium. The top of the medium stays dry which lowers incidence of algae growth, fungus gnats, stem rot, etc. As the water dissipates from the growing medium and is used by the roots, the gravitational force on the medium pulls air in from the top of the medium, bringing in more oxygen to the medium.

In general plants are given one liter each irrigation. The rule of thumb for watering is when you can stick your finger in the soil to the first knuckle and its dry, it is time to water. You have to play with it and gain some experience to know exactly when to water. When there is about one inch in the bottom of the tray after watering. The second or third day the bottom will be dry. The fourth day, there is a wet spot under the pot. John waters when the dry spot is gone below the pot. At first when plants are small, there are 4-6 days between waterings. By harvest time, he waters every 3 days. If you water too much root rot could result.

The biggest drawback to ebb and flow systems is the large quantity of water on the table that evaporates into the room. The easiest way to remove this water from the room is with an air conditioner that also controls humidity. Water is removed from the air and deposited into a container for daily removal. In a 10-light room an air conditioner removes about 25 liters (6.5 gallons) from a room on a humid day. This is one of the most expensive items you will need for this type of a room.

This airy mite-infested bud was grown in the same ebb and flow system, but the grower let the temperature climb to 85 degrees F. and the humidity rose to 80 percent and more. Cooling the room would have netted him 30 percent more harvest.

Overview of this ebb and flow garden shows the 6-inch lip to contain water in lower right corner.

The charcoal filter is placed above lamps so it will suck in and evacuate the hottest air in the room.

Clones

Clones are the key to starting and harvesting a heavy crop. You can spend $500 on the coolest clone machine that yields a profuse root system on stems. But, the old axiom “garbage in garbage out” still rings true. Let’s apply scientific empirical observation to learn why.

Growers in The Netherlands have found that clones are best taken from a robust F1 hybrid mother grown from seed. F1 hybrids are a cross between two true breeding parents. The resulting offspring from this union, the F1 hybrid, has “hybrid vigor” and grows about 25 percent faster and bigger. When such a vigorous mother bears clones, they are just like her in every aspect, including resilience and vigor. The genetic information in the mother and her clones is strong and pure rather than weak and diluted. When clones are cloned and cloned again, there is a definite weakening of genetic characteristics with each successive generation. The dilution is more and more pronounced after the second or third generation of clones. According to at least one big clone producer and several Dutch and Swiss growers, harvest yield drops about 15 percent every time a clone is taken from a clone and this clone turned into a mother plant. A strong healthy clone that was taken from a female grown from seed could be two or three times as vigorous as a plant that is the result of 5-6 generations of clones. Such degenerated clones yield proportionately less.

Clones are purchased in trays of 60 or 77 at $2 each. After transplanting, they let the plants get accustomed to the new environment (hardening-off) by growing them under fluorescents for 7-10 days before moving them into the flowering room.

Precision wiring and room design are a Dutch passion!

After transplanting, clones are grown in the vegetative stage under fluorescents and HIDs until they get used to the environment in about 5-10 days.

These vegetative clones will be put into the flowering cycle tomorrow.

Vegetative

Some growers don’t enough space to pre-grow clones in a different room, so the pre-grow them in the flowering room. They turn on half the lights and grow them for 5-10 days before turning the lights to 12 hours.

At this point the little clones are watered from the top so that they get enough water and shoot roots down. When you fill the pots up with moist soil that has been used, little clones don’t need much water. Soil wicks all the moisture from small rockwool cubes in about two hours. Watering from above regularly ensures the rockwool cube is moist until roots are able to penetrate soil. After about a week, depending upon root development, clones are watered from below.

Flowering

The flowering process is the easiest part of all. It is a simple matter of keeping an eye on plants and maintaining the fertilizer/irrigation regimen outlined under “The Reservoir” above. Depending upon the variety, he harvests big strong hard well-formed buds in the eighth to ninth week of flowering. John brings in a harvest of at least 600 grams per square meter, often more. The harvest is simple, easy and regular!

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