Trouble reading today's article? Click
here: Issue #268 - Sunday, June 4, 2017 Dear Fellow Grower,
In today's issue... - How can a grower get a reasonable idea of what kind of yields to expect? Today's article will use the 'limiting factor' to show you how to do exactly
that!
- Although current breeding practices have produced monster yielding strains, it's crucial to remember that yields aren't all-important!
- A crystal clear picture of beautiful plants under fluorescent light!
Nebula Haze & Sirius Fourside (founders of GrowWeedEasy.com) "The age factor means nothing to me. I'm old enough to know my limitations and I'm young
enough to exceed them."
~Marv Levy
What Determines Your Yields?
(aka "The Limiting Factor") by Sirius Fourside |
One of the most common questions we get asked by new cannabis growers is “How much bud can I expect to yield with my setup?” |
It’s a tough question to answer accurately since there are so many variables that affect your yields. Plus, as a cannabis grower, you are the most important variable that affects your
yields!
That being said, it’s a totally valid question! People can be - understandably - timid about starting to grow cannabis and they want to make sure they know what yields to expect. No one wants to invest time and money into something if they feel they won’t be happy with the results. That’s where the "limiting factor" comes in.
In nature, a limiting factor is an environmental condition that is key in restricting the size of a population. For example, the number of healthy foxes in an area plays an important role in the rabbit population in the same area. Foxes are a limiting factor to rabbit populations, or, foxes are a factor that is limiting the maximum population of rabbits in their area.
When
growing cannabis, a limiting factor is something that is key in restricting the amount of bud a grower can harvest. For example, if you grow a high-yielding strain of cannabis under a 600W LED light in a solo cup, the solo cup becomes a limiting factor in that it’s the main factor that’s limiting how much the grower can
harvest.
What cannabis yields can you expect to harvest from a specific grow light or setup?
It would be tough to guess exactly how much you’re going to harvest even with detailed information about a grower’s entire setup because experience makes a huge difference. However, by
identifying the limiting factor in a cannabis growing setup, we can get a good approximation of what a grower can expect for yields provided everything goes smoothly. How This Works In the next section, we’ll go through 5 aspects of a grow setup that have a major impact on your yields: grow space, grow lights, container, strain and plant training. Although all five of these aspects affect your yields, we only use the grow space, lights and container to give you an expected weight range for yields. I’ll explain that part a little later.
There are two very important things to keep in mind about this info: - Each grower’s unique set of skills can drastically change the amount of bud harvested from a grow. This guide is meant to give you an idea of what ballpark figures to expect; they’re not set in
stone!
- Every item in each of the topics we discuss will have a range, for example: 1oz - 10oz. The low end of that range (1oz) assumes the grow didn’t go so well and that you’re using equipment in the lower end of the range you’re in. Conversely, the high end of the range (10oz) assumes the grow went great and you’re using equipment in
the upper end of your range! So, in the 1oz - 10oz example:
- 1oz would be close to what a grower should expect to harvest if the plant was unhealthy and grown with weaker equipment.
- 10oz would be close to what a grower should expect to harvest if the plant was healthy and the grower used quality
equipment.
Grow Space
Your ‘Grow Space’ is the area your plants call home. This could be a grow tent, a cabinet, a closet, a PC case, a room in your house or the great outdoors! Basically, it’s the area that
physically limits how big your plants can grow (with walls, fences, etc.).
Note: If you're growing outdoors, I'm jealous and I hate you. Awww...I take it back. You're swell. Stealth (PC cases, tiny cabinet grows, etc.) - Expected yields: Up to 1oz
Small Tents & Larger Cabinets - up to 9ft²
- Larger than a PC case, but not larger than a 2‘x4’or 3’x3’ area
- Taller than 4 feet
- Expected yields: 1oz to 10oz
Hobby Level - 10ft² - 25ft²
- Larger than 3’x3’, but no larger than a
5’x5’ space
- Taller than 6 feet
- Expected yields: 7oz to 2lbs
Large Tents/Rooms/Etc. - 26+ft²
- Larger than a 5’x5’ tent
- Taller than 6 feet
- Now we’re nearing the ‘grow operation’ size, so the yields can vary by a wide margin as the tents turn into rooms
- Expected yields:
2lbs+
Outdoors
- Outdoor yields vary wildly depending on the grower, container size and the amount of growing space available. The hours of direct sunlight a plant gets each day also plays a huge factor!
- Expected yields: A few ounces to many pounds
Light Size
Your grow lights
provide the energy for your cannabis plants to grow big, strong and potent! Your grow bulbs produce light, your plants turn that light into energy and that energy fuels the growth of leaves, stems and buds. Generally, more light grows larger plants! Incandescent - These are the old-fashioned house lights that were replaced with CFLs and LEDs.
- NEVER USE THESE TO GROW CANNABIS!
- Expected yields: :( (yes, that’s a sad face)
Stealth lighting
(<100W)
- Usually consists of 1-4 CFLs, 1-2 LEDs (1-5 household LEDs), or a T5 array
- Expected yields: A few grams to 50g
Smaller lighting (101W -
300W)
- Usually consists of a bunch of CFLs or a few high-powered ones, 1-3 LEDs (or an array of smaller LEDS), a T5 array, a single LEC or a single small HPS...phew!
- Expected yields: 15g to 9oz
Medium lighting (301W - 600W)
- At this point, the majority of all indoor lighting is LED, LEC or HPS
- Expected yields: 5oz to 20oz
High-powered lighting (701W - 1000W+)
- Can be LEDs, but is generally HPS lighting, especially once you get to 1000W. Commercial growers use multiple 600 or 1000W HPS lights which means the potential yields can vary greatly.
- Expected yields: 10oz to
2lbs+
Bonus Information: Ok, now that we have some examples, here’s the general formula we use to determine what yields can be expected for each type of grow light. This is not exact in any way, but it's a good place to start if you’re looking for a ballpark figure.
When talking about “watts”, I mean the number of watts being pulled out of the wall by the light, not “equivalent” numbers. You’re interested in actual power draw. It's also worth noting that the Sea of Green
technique can utterly destroy these numbers! Think of the container for a cannabis plant as a hard hat. It protects
the most important parts of a plant - the roots - just like hard hats protect our most important part: our brain!
And just like a hard hat (or a hat of any type, really), it’s very uncomfortable to wear one if it’s too small. Similarly, cannabis plants don’t like spaces
that are too small for their root requirements. Limiting the size of a plant’s container has a direct effect on the maximum size of the plant, and thus, its maximum yields.
Note: Container size is a major limiting factor to final plant size in soil, but DWC/hydroponics
containers are not counted in this group. Although root space matters in hydroponics, the rules aren't the same and larger yields can be obtained from a relatively small space.
Solo Cup - Solo cups are great for stealth or people that are timid to start purchasing equipment to grow. Expect plants grown in these to be tiny!
- Expected yields: up to 1 oz.
Very Small pots (1-2 gallons)
- Often used for the Sea of Green (SoG) technique, or as an in-between container during the transplanting process. This can also be a good pot size for someone trying to limit their plant's growth via purposely making them rootbound.
- Expected yields: up to 4 oz.
Small pots (3-5 gallons)
- For mid-size grows, and smaller grow tents.
- Expected yields: up to 10 oz.
Medium/Large pots (6+ gallons)
- This group consists of pots that are more than 6 gallons in size, or plants that are planted in the ground with plenty of root-room.
- Expected yields: up to many pounds
Yield are great but your taste is more important! |
It's easy to get caught up in the fervor of of trying to yield as much as possible...who doesn't want lots of bud?!
But it's important to take a step back and remember the old adage: 'quality over quantity'.
That's not to say that high yielding strains aren't high quality; Wonder Woman has notoriously high yields and potency to match!
But some of the best strains were bred with other things in mind and are just as worth your time. Today we present two strains:
|
Barneys Farm Critical Kush
Critical Kush is almost like an edible. It starts out deceptively gentle so you actually have a bit of time to wonder if it's working...before it washes over you out of
nowhere!
|
Thanks for sharing so much knowledge. And an extra special huge amount of gratitude for how well put together and easy to follow everything is. I really appreciate all your hard work.
Thanks!!
~David |
Trophy Pictures of the Week! |
|
Just wanna show my ultra low budget set up with fluorescent lights. Had most of the stuff around the house so I spent around 50 dollars so far :)
The strain is THC Bomb. |
This is my first time around so I hope it will turn out good! Growing in soil.
~sWEEDen We encourage you to forward this email to a friend in need!
Check Out Our Growing Community! |
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Who Runs This
Newsletter? |
Nebula Haze:
I'll be honest with you, when I first started growing, I struggled. Now, it is my mission to
make it easier for new growers to get started as well as help advanced growers get bigger, better yields with less time and money. We are updating and adding articles every single week and our goal is to eventually build a comprehensive growing resource so anyone and everyone can grow if they want to! If we all share the knowledge there's more buds in the world for everyone :) |
|
Learn which seed sources are personally recommended by Nebula Haze |
Sirius Fourside:
Sirius Fourside is a hobbyist grower who has gained the bulk of his experience growing in water as a medium (deep water culture, bubbleponics).
"Growing cannabis can be a relaxing hobby in and of itself, but it also saves you money and keeps you from having to deal with shady characters. Cannabis is much easier to grow than people give it credit for, and growing in water
doesn't increase the difficulty much, if any. But whether you want to grow in water, coco, or a different medium, we'll show you how easy it can be!"
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