Here's Are Some Thing I've Learned From Growing My Cannabis Plant

Growing my plant turned out to be a complete waste of time. The whole appeal of DIY growing was not having to spend money on bud. From what I understand, a plant can yield about a pound of marijuana which would have lasted me at least 6 months, however, my plant turned out to be a male which is basically useless. 

I know, I know...what do you mean useless? Well, male plants aren't the ones we smoke; it's the female plants that produce the potent sticky icky bud we all love. 

Yes, I'm disappointed that my own grow was a bust, however, I figured I could at least share the things I learned along the way. 

Male Plants versus Female Plants

If you happen to come across a seed, or two, there's no way to tell whether or not a plant is male or female until it starts to grown, so my first tip is that if you only have the one seed, pray...pray real hard or skip planting all together because if you do end up with a male plant, it's more of a hassle than it's worth. 

Seriously, I looked it up and growers literally throw away the male plants. In very rare cases people use it to make concentrates or hashish, but overall the potency just isn't worth risking their entire crop, so unless they are trying to breed the plants, they just toss them out. 

https://leafwell.com/blog/female-vs-male-weed-plants/

If you take a look at the picture on the right, you can see the difference between the male and female plant. Male plants get taller than female plants, so in general the stalks will be thicker and the plant will have fewer leaves than the female plant. 

Again, the only reason you want to keep a male plant is if you're breeding them and want seeds. If you do not remove the male plant(s) from the female plant(s), the male could get pollen on the female plant thus impregnating it which in turn will ruin the potency of your harvest, so make sure if you're going to grow, or are currently growing, you check your plants to identify them as early as possible to prevent any mishaps with your harvest. 

Starting the plant

Starting the plant is easy. They taught us how to grow things in grade school. You can guy a kit, or you can do it the old school way with a paper towel. If you have more than one seed, you're going to do this process for each seed, but, what you want to do is take the paper towel and fold it into a square and put the seed between the fold. It doesn't have to by really small, just small enough to fit in whatever you plan to let the paper towel set in. 

I used a small Tupperware bowl to store mine, but you can use just about anything. Put some water on the paper towel and let it sit for about 10 days. You want to make sure and check the moisture each day because if it dries out the it could ruin the process, so it's critical to make sure that the paper doesn't dry out. (Don't drown it either. Just make sure the paper towel is fully saturated.) After the 10 days, you should be ready to put it in the dirt.

Potting the Seedling

It's best to get a pot that's at least 18 inches wall and has decent width to give the roots plenty of room to grow. Some strains can get fairly tall, so it's important to make sure the planter you use is fairly large. Once you have your planter, you can use whatever potting soil you want, and what you're going to do is fill up the pot with the soil. Once the dirt is in the pot, you're going to make a hole about inch to a half inch deep, placed the seed in that hole and then cover it. 

Maintaining the Plant

Maintaining the plant in the early stages is relatively easy, especially if you've used good potting soil. Early on the most important thing is keeping the plant properly hydrated and making sure it's getting the required sunlight and dark hours. (Yes, marijuana plants need hours of complete darkness because it's part of the growing cycle. If you're growing indoors, consider storing the plant in places where it won't be exposed to light during dark hours. This can harm the plant and in some cases, cause your plant to become a hermaphrodite.) [Click here to read more on that]

As I mentioned before, not only do you want to check moisture levels, but you also want to check for the sex of your plant and you want to keep an eye on the leaves, especially during the vegetation stage. When checking the moisture levels, stick your finger in the dirt about an inch down. If it feels wet, don't water it, but if it feels try you can go ahead and water it. Depending on the size of the pot, you may only need to water the plant every 2 - 3 days, but you want to make sure that you are checking the soil to make sure you are not over, or underwatering your plant.

Vegetation Stage

https://2fast4buds.com/news/understanding-the-vegetative-stage-of-cannabis

The vegetation stage of plant life is when the plant begins to grow it's first set of leaves. As you can see from the image on the right, the plant has grown new leaves. During this time it is critical to monitor your plant's health. 

Different things can effect your plant's health like fungus, lack of nutrients, under or overwatering, and things like that. Every day you should be taking some time to inspect your plants for any color changes in the leaves or stalk as they could be signs of something wrong, however, if you are caring for the plant properly, you should have minimal issues. 

Pre-flowing and Flowering Stages

Once your plant is in the vegetation state, it will start to grow rather quickly and once it starts getting taller, it's going to require more nutrients, so if you notice the leaves turning colors, don't panic because it may be an easy fix. [Click here to view a reference chart for diagnosing leaf color changes] I had some color changes in mine, but I added a little plant food every two weeks. I mixed it in with water and it worked out just fine. 

Some people use fertilizers, but the point here is to make sure that your plant has what it needs in the soil to produce a health crop. There are also devices out there that check the levels in the dirt, so there are a lot of ways to keep your plant healthy. I did very minimal work to grow mine and if it were a female plant, I'd be harvesting here in the next month of so, but alas, that is not my fate. 

Anyhow, you're also going to be to tell the sex of your plant a lot easy now, and if you've been skipping doing that you should be careful because if you have a male it's looking like an obvious male plant, You could be a day away from ruining your female plant. 

From here it's just maintaining until it's harvest time. 

Harvesting

You'll know you're plant is ready to harvest when the hairs on it start to look milky. Some strains have a different color to them, but overall, once the hairs start looking milky white, it's time to harvest. The two weeks prior to harvesting you want to flush your plants which is essentially like overwatering your plant. You want to stop giving it nutrients and only water it. Keep an eye on the plant, because over those two weeks, you will see some yellowing due to the amount of watering which is okay, but you DON'T want that yellowing to ruin your harvest so make sure to keep a balance between watering and not watering to prevent ruining your plant. 

Once that two weeks it up, it's time to wet trim or dry trim. People use either method, but from what I can tell, it's just a preference. Wet trimming is trimming done while the plant is still in the ground. Dry trimming is when the whole plant has been removed from the dirt, dried, and then trimmed. Once you've trimmed it, it's time to hang up it and let cure for two weeks and that's it. That's the process. 

I really wish I were going through the harvesting process, but thanks to that stupid male plant there will be none of that going on around here. Hopefully your grow operation will have a better result than mine.

Cheers.