Lloyd Johnson - The Beginner's Guide to Growing Marijuana

Outdoor growing has the advantage of using the sun, air, wind, and rain—all of which are free. The plants can get larger when planted in the ground, and are generally healthier with less trouble and preventative labor associated with an indoor grow. Soil improvement can take place on site instead of using only expensive bagged organic soils. A lot depends on the initial condition of your site’s soil, but the more years you aerate, mulch, and add compost to a site, the better your soil will become. The garden repays you for your ongoing investment in time and materials each time you renew it.

If money is tight, you can plan ahead and improve your soil by mulching and composting with free materials. Leaves are everywhere in the fall and are excellent for improving soil. Many people bag their fall leaves for pickup by the city. Ask politely if you may take the bagged leaves instead; it saves labor for you, and the city homeowner is going to rake and bag the leaves anyway. Mulch your areas in the fall and till in the composted leaves in the spring. Rain-spoiled hay is usually available for free or very cheap in rural areas; it holds down weeds in early spring and the composted hay improves soil very quickly.

The rural outdoor grower can gather manure for composting without offending the sensibilities of nearby neighbors. Goats, chickens, horses, and cows are usually nearby, and you can get wonderful nitrogen-rich compost makings for free.

Outdoor cultivation requires far less expensive equipment, electrical expertise, and labor. The plants still need to be regularly watered and fed, but most of their development will be accomplished simply by allowing them to grow over spring and summer.

Growing outdoors eliminates the need for artificial lights, fans, and humidity control devices, as well as the power to operate them, the indoor grower’s biggest expense.

Outdoor plants generally yield more than indoor ones. This is simply because they are able to grow larger. Few indoor setups can accommodate plants as large as those grown outdoors. Assuming that detection is not a problem, outdoor plants can comfortably grow six to eight feet in height. It is fairly normal for plants of this size to produce a pound to a pound and a half of dried buds. Germinating seeds early in the growing season allow your plants a long vegetative period before flowering is triggered by the shorter days of late summer.

Many people prefer the taste and effect of organically grown cannabis and insist they can easily differentiate between cannabis grown with soil and sun and cannabis produced with hydroponics and grow lights.

The sun produces more light than any amount of metal halides together in one grow room. When comparing indoor to outdoor cannabis growing, there can be no doubt that growing cannabis by burning fossil fuels is less than earth friendly.

Indoor growers are frequently forced to spray chemicals for pest control or face losing their crop to spider mites. Not only does this encourage the development of pesticide-resistant pests, but there are health implications for the end users of the cannabis. The health issues are even more serious when the cannabis is grown for medical use; patients can be especially sensitive to chemical residues.

Unlike an indoor grow, outdoor growing only requires a little electricity at the beginning and for a few months at the end of the cycle when the crop is hanging and drying. Little seedlings are generally started indoors, partly to get a jump on the growing season, partly because it is easier to monitor them closely when they’re handy, and partly to get them to a size where they are in less danger from natural predators like earwigs, pill bugs, slugs, and birds.

Starting outdoor plants indoors requires very little other than a warm and clear well-lighted workspace. They are not going to stay inside for very long—ten days at most. A seed-warming mat is very useful, but it’s not really needed. Grow lights can be good, but new tender seedlings do fine with cool fluorescents and a side source for warmth. You will need seeds or clones; small starting pots; clean, lump-free soil; and clean water.

Some outdoor growers fence their cannabis, while others hide it with camouflage plantings. Both of these systems have advantages and disadvantages. Fencing needs to be high and of stout materials. This can get expensive and can alert potential thieves that you have something of value enclosed. Using camouflage is generally less expensive but can cost you your crop if casual trespassers, wildlife, or livestock come across the crop and steal it or browse it to the ground.

Fencing has three functions: to screen your garden from casual observers, to keep out livestock and wild browsers like deer, and to keep out thieves. Thieves are the most difficult to prevent reaching your crop.

For optimized ripper protection, you can use a high board fence to minimize visibility, electric wire on the inside of the fence top to discourage climbers, and heavy-gauge wire or stock panels around the plants. Add a large and noisy dog, and never leave the crop unguarded.

The grower who decides to grow plants in the ground will still need containers, especially if you grow from seed and must wait for sexual determination by the plants. It is far easier to control the male plants and pollen if you can simply pick up a container and move them into a closed environment away from your females.

A seedling should be grown in a protective container until it is two to three feet tall before placing it in the ground. You will need a three- to five-gallon container for each of the seedlings during this interim phase.

The outdoor grower must determine how to get water to the plants. This is generally achieved by sections of hosing. If you are growing in your backyard, this can mean a simple garden hose or two. If you are growing in a rural area and the crop is not near the water source, you can either haul it in or run potentially hundreds of feet of hose to the site, a definite expense. If you have long runs of hosing, remember that you should conceal or lightly bury it; visible hosing going into the brush or too far from a “normal” garden will alert thieves that you are growing cannabis. All they have to do is to follow the hose right to your crop.

Depending on the water source, an outdoor grower should factor in the costs of watering through a long, hot summer. Cannabis, particularly in the ground, uses a great deal of water, especially during the vegetative phase of growth. If your water has a bill attached to it (as opposed to having a well or spring), approximately $100 to $200 per month for three summer months is a reasonable estimate to water eighteen to twenty plants.

You may find that it is easier and less expensive to run PVC piping to the grow site instead, but either way, bringing water to the crop is an expense to evaluate when you determine the grow site location.

The outdoor grower’s most valuable tool is a stout and well-made garden fork. You will use it for aerating soil, digging, and turning compost. You will also need a good long-handled shovel, a wheelbarrow, and a compost screener. Less essential, but useful and good to have, is a composter, especially if you live in a more urban area. Although a well-made compost pile should never smell, an enclosed composter will keep your composting activities inoffensive to neighbors. This has a side benefit of making them less likely to come over to your garden uninvited, or to start peeking over the fence.