The main aim of every cannabis grower is to get better yields. It’s true that the strain and genetics of plants you select influences the amount of marijuana that you’ll harvest. However, there are things you can do to increase your yields. If you’re a beginner, you should always aim at having healthy plants. But this begins by buying the right seeds from Homegrown Cannabis Co.
Here are a few ways of increasing your cannabis yields:
- Enhancing Light Intensity
If you’re growing your cannabis outdoors, you can increase light intensity by selecting an appropriate planting spot. Every plant needs an excellent light source to grow. Light is a source of food for your marijuana plants. However, you can maximize yields by growing your cannabis indoors.
The darkness time is essential for a successful harvest, just like the light period. But a correct light intensity at the right time can help you gain better yields for almost all strains of cannabis including blueberry autoflower. The light period enables the plant to photosynthesize and produce sugars which stimulate the growth of buds. On the other hand, the darkness period enables the plant to produce florigen – a hormone that enables the plant to flower.
Tall and thin plants don’t give many yields like short and bushy ones. So if your plants are tall, it could be that they’re having an issue with their light intensity. Enough light during the vegetative stage will allow your cannabis to develop buds and branches that aren’t spaced out, thus creating a bush.
Experts advise boosting light intensity in the flowering stage if you want to get bigger yields. You should ensure that you maintain the room temperature even as you increase the light intensity because the plants need a cooler temperature as they flower.
You can easily increase light intensity without boosting the room temperature by moving the source of light closer to the plants. However, they shouldn’t be too close because they may end up burning the leaves’ tips. Every bud should also be completely exposed to the light.
Increasing light is one of the best ways of stimulating the growth of bigger and better buds. If you’ve already reached the highest light intensity but aren’t noticing positive results, try increasing CO2 levels. CO2 helps cannabis to absorb more light. Therefore, increasing it at the appropriate time can help to boost your yields. If you add CO2 before the light intensity is at its maximum, they’ll be no difference in growth.
- Use Appropriate Nutrient Amounts
The hack of using nutrients for increased yields is to ensure you don’t use too much or too little. Some people have a false perception that because marijuana feeds of nutrients, they can add as much as they want. However, marijuana requires more light than nutrients. The nutrients you feed it help it to photosynthesize and digest the food it has absorbed.
Though light is vital, nutrient deficiency can greatly impact your plants’ health. Fortunately, your plants will communicate through their leaves when they’re lacking some nutrients. If you notice the leaves changing color or wilting, it’s a sign that they lack some nutrients.
The problem of nutrient deficiency can be easily fixed. However, you need to be cautious not to add too many nutrients because it’ll lead to nutrient burn. You also need to know the right proportion of nutrients to apply to the plants to prevent them from suffering from poor health.
As a rule of thumb, when you buy a nutrient schedule, start by first using half of what’s suggested as you monitor the plant’s behavior. If they need more nutrients, you can add them gradually.
Two to four weeks before harvesting your plants, feed them with fewer nutrients. As they start producing healthy and bigger buds, don’t worry if some of the leaves at the top wither and fall off. Too many nutrients at this stage of your plants’ growth may prevent the plant from producing buds. That’ll make you lose out on yields.
- Prune Your Plants Regularly
Pruning your cannabis plants is one of the simplest ways of enhancing yields before harvest time. It’s advisable to start pruning them after you’ve increased the light intensity. You can also prune parts that grow more rapidly than the others. That way, you’ll ensure that light is evenly distributed around the plant.
One of the most common methods of pruning cannabis plants is topping. You can undertake this process when the plant is in its vegetative state. This technique involves cutting the branch tip of the plant to spread its energy focus. Once the first branch is gone, the next two branches will become the next energy focus. If you repeat this process continually, you’ll have almost double the branches and more potential spaces for bud’s growth.
Other methods of pruning the low-stress training (LST) change the way that the cannabis plants grow completely. This technique will encourage your plant to grow wider and flatter as opposed to lankier and taller. This will promote a better light distribution around the plant and encourage more yields.
Light distribution and pruning are inseparable. If some parts of your plants aren’t getting enough light, prune the leaves of the part getting the most light to enable equitable energy distribution.
- Maintain Temperature And Humidity
Controlling the temperature and humidity of the environment is vital in achieving a better yield. Growing your plants indoors will enable you to easily control these two variables. Plants grown in cold places may experience a slower growth rate compared to those grown in a well-maintained temperature.
Such plants may survive but they’ll not give higher yields. Too high temperatures also slow down marijuana’s growth. If your plants have signs of brownish or wilting leaves, that’s a sign that the temperature is too high. Like temperature, a higher humidity also affects plants’ yields.
Plants grown in such conditions may have problems like mildew and mold. You should maintain the humidity of your plants, especially during the flowering stage. Low humidity during this stage will also encourage the growth of trichomes.
Conclusion
You can achieve the aim of boosting your plants’ yields by carrying out a few techniques. Such techniques include improving the light intensity, applying the correct amount of nutrients, pruning, and maintaining the humidity and temperature.
