7. Growing Techniques

(Troy with the ladies in 2017, in Quincy, WA.)

Smart people learn from everything and everyone, average people from their experiences, and stupid people already have all the answers.

Low-Stress Training

LST allows you to shape and train your plant without much risk of damage. This is done by gently bending and tying the newer, younger stems while they are still soft and pliable. You can usually do this work up until the first few weeks of flowering.

Super Cropping

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

Super-cropping works off of the principle known as hormesis. Most people best understand this as the old adage of “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

By utilizing hormesis, super-cropping can potentially help you increase your flower production. With super-cropping you are essentially bruising your plant. Technically speaking, by applying a mild stress to the plant you are expecting a beneficial response. This can be accomplished by strategically inducing plant tissue damage without breaking the protective skin of the outer stem through bending or gently girdling the stem with your fingers.

In a lot of ways this is a lot like your pot plants going to the gym twice a week to fit in some strength training and power squats.

Lollipopping

Change your opinions, keep to your principles; change your leaves, keep intact your roots.

‘Lollipopping’ your plants means pruning leaves and branches that are growing towards the side or the ground, typically 6’-12’ inches up from where the stem meets the soil. In the process, this redirects the plant’s energy back into the remaining branches. It also helps increase the airflow at your watering point. This is helpful in mitigating any ‘damp foot’ issues.

For the plant that is; this won’t help you in any way if you’re wearing heavy Timberland boots outside while you’re working.

Lollipopping can also be an important tool to maximize your allowable canopy, depending on the rules in your state.

For instance, in Washington State, there is a horizontal canopy limit, but no vertical one. In theory, if you could grow a hundred-foot-tall pot plant, that would be ok.

So, in order to capitalize on the vertical space, and reduce horizontal growth that eats into our canopy, we used lollipopping techniques to direct our growth upwards.

Topping

We were pretty good mates until the Beatles started to split up and Yoko came into it.

Topping can also be an important technique to maximize growth. Topping works off of the principle of apical dominance. This is applied to the cannabis plant by cutting a stem at the node. This will create two branches where the one was growing. Basically, you are splitting that stem into two more stems or ‘tops’ that will each produce flowers.

A potential downside of topping is that while it produces a thick crown of flowers, with many strains, depending on the length of your veg season, it may limit the overall height of the plant, which could run contrary to a strategy employed to maximize vertical canopy growth.

Pruning Leaves

Cleanliness is next to godliness.

It’s important for several reasons to stay on top of regularly pruning leaves from your plants. Not only will this help the plant redirect its energy in more desirable directions and open the canopy to improve light penetration & air movement, but it will prevent dead leaves from falling into your grow pan and creating a vector for mold and an invitation to thrips. 

Flush

(Plants in 2015 after a week’s flush,  Quincy, WA.)

Sometimes you've got to let everything go - purge yourself. If you are unhappy with anything... whatever is bringing you down, get rid of it. Because you'll find that when you're free, your true creativity, your true self comes out.

Currently there is a lot of discussion about the value of a flush. We will ignore that for now and just share how to flush if you so choose to. If you are  wondering what in the world a flush is, let me explain. Prior to harvesting your flowers for human consumption, you ideally want to flush them of any residual nutrients or chemicals. This is done by feeding them pH’d water without nutrients, for about a week to ten days before harvest. When done right your canopy will take on a beautiful autumnal look as the nutrients are slowly drawn from the leaves as the plant tries to make one last effort to send energy into its flowers before facing its looming death.

It’s funny when you see people who raise pot plants from the time they’re tiny little seeds, sprouts or clones until harvest.  We treat these pot plants like they’re our little children. Growers read to their plants, they’ll play Mozart and sing and play original guitar music to their garden.

These cannabis growers will even tell their pot plants, “I love you.” So much time, so much care, so much energy, love and devotion will be shown to these cannabis plants until one day… everything changes. Then out of nowhere these ‘plant-parents’ will suddenly pay a derelict hippie or some washed-up bottom-of-the-barrel hobo, from a temporary labor force, or a greyhound bus station parking lot, to ruthlessly massacre their ‘leaf-babies’ and gracelessly cut their f***ng heads off with a giant pair of scissors no less.

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Key Chapter Takeaways

The Do’s and Don’ts of the Dope Industry

  • Do– Strategically torture your pot plant, to make them stronger and more resilient.
  • Do– Lollipop if you need tall and skinny plants for your spacing plan.
  • Do– Consider topping as a way to maximize your flower production.
  • Don’t– Bunch up as many plants as you can into a small space!
  • Don’t– Don’t forget to keep your plants pruned, for better healthy and higher yields.
  • Don’t– Don’t get too emotionally attached to your garden and name individually plants because you’re going to savagely murder them eventually.