Best Grower in the World!

“G”, a Swiss grower, manages the most productive indoor garden I have ever seen in my life. And believe me I have seen a few grow shows! I first met “G” four years ago, he was one of 15 growers in an all day grow seminar I was conducting near Zurich. The group of growers blew me away with their knowledge level, professionalism, dedication and love of cannabis. It started at 8 AM sharp, Swiss time you understand, and went until 5 PM. We had an hour break for lunch.

All fifteen of the growers brought examples of their most recent harvest, and as you might expect, every bud I inspected and sampled looked as good or better than anything you would find at the Abraxis Coffeeshop in Amsterdam.

As the seminar progressed, growers continued to ask more and more specific questions. They felt I was not giving them the whole story. They thought I was leaving something out, the special information, the tricks and secrets they needed to increase production. All of the growers were focused on yield, and would always run into a brick wall, never able to produce more than one half-gram-per-watt (GPW/30) of light for every 30 days plants were in the flowering room.

“I am growing hydroponically with the most advanced system I can find, and I am unable to grow more than 0.5 grams-per-watt! Once I grew 0.6 grams per watt, but only once,” complained a perplexed grower.

Dense wall-to-wall buds are crammed under intense 600w HP sodium lamps. Lamps are only 12 – 18 inches above plants, which gives many more lumens per watt than if lamps were 2 – 3 feet away.

‘Hash Plant’ and ‘Cyber Crystal’ plants are in the back. In front on the right are ‘Chronic’ and more ‘Hash Plant’ are on the left. The middle of the garden is filled with ‘Intro-Pack’ from Paradise Seeds.

“Look, all you guys have to do figure out what your plants need and give it to them. Keep plants growing fast and healthy at all times. Never let them slow down. Use quality nutrients, plenty of light, keep the temperature and humidity in the right zone and use a growing medium that holds a lot of air but still drains well. That’s the secret!” I repeated over and over again!

Growers are bombarded with “good advice” all the time. Much of this “good advice” is driven by [advertisers] competitive greed to sell more products and make more money. Other times the “good advice” is pontificated by egos steeped in ignorance, misinformation and often fueled by paranoia. The result is a hell of a lot of inferior information that results in more ignorance, frustration and miserable yields. More than half of the hundreds of grow rooms I have toured in the last 25 years yielded less than half the standard I feel to be the benchmark, 0.5 grams-per-watt of light for every 30 days of flowering.

My favorite excuse is, “It’s not about yield dude it’s about quality”. Bullshit! Quality is a factor of genetics. Good seeds/clones produce good dope. Once the genetics are in place, the only thing left up to the grower is how well they are able to nurture the seeds and clones into mature plants. Too often, a great variety like ‘Chronic’, that has the ability to produce 1.0 GPW/30 is poorly grown and produces only a quarter (0.25 GPW/30) its potential. Other plants like a personal favorite ‘Super Silver Haze’ yield only 0.4 GPW/30 when well grown, but most growers harvest a meager 0.2 GPW/30.

Whether growing with a 250w or a 1000w lamp, any grower should be able to meet the benchmark for specific varieties, many of which are listed below. Growers that do not pay attention to the basics and learn what plants want are doomed to repeat history.

Four years after that seminar near Zurich, Switzerland, I visited “G” and his grow operation. It was in a garage attached to his home. The overall operation was clean and well organized. After entering the most productive grow show I have ever seen, we got down to business. The next few hours were packed with questions, knowledge, smiles and some of the best-grown dope I have ever experienced!

Even the “Best Grower in the World” makes mistakes. This plant got too much potassium and got a little too hot.

“G” keeps mother plants in an Aqua-farm garden (General-Hydroponic). He likes this system because it is big enough to handle the large root system of plants grown from 4 months to a year. The length of time he keeps plants depends on how they look. He fertilizes with Advanced Hydroponics (Dutch) blend and mixes 3 components together to formulate his nutrient solution.

He keeps more mothers than he needs (6 – 8) and takes clones whenever he needs them. Every week “G” takes 20-40 cuttings. His trick for healthy clones is keeping mothers healthy and growing fast. Mothers are removed when they get too big to handle efficiently.

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