Meeks' 2013 Dapper Grow Log

[delae632]

Haha not really the answer I was looking for but whatever man. We can in no way shape or form compare indoor cannabis cultivation to growing commercial produce. We're not talking about preserving fresh apples here...we want our cannabis dried slowly, cured and ready for sale/smoking. Residential electricity prices, store bought nutes/supplies/co2/equipment, high mortgages/rent, etc. all prove that quite easily...we pay full price for EVERYTHING to produce this and most of us do not have the luxury of commercial rates/prices on utilities/nutes/equipment, not to mention the tax write offs. You're talking in terms of full on commercial agriculture which I understand as that's what you're going to school for but it's not a valid comparison imo. As I'm sure you know by now, it costs a lot of money to do a run from seed to smoke...well from buying seed to smoke if you really want to break it down. The prices have plummeted in Cali so it makes zero sense to spend more time/energy on it's production than we already do. This is actually causing growers to do the complete opposite and most of the product you see in disps prove that.

We've gotta think of cost vs return in mom and pop corner shop terms here man...not commercial ag.

Just my .02 brotha. ;)

D

 

[nMEEKS]

Haha not really the answer I was looking for but whatever man. We can in no way shape or form compare indoor cannabis cultivation to growing commercial produce. We're not talking about preserving fresh apples here...we want our cannabis dried slowly, cured and ready for sale/smoking. Residential electricity prices, store bought nutes/supplies/co2/equipment, high mortgages/rent, etc. all prove that quite easily...we pay full price for EVERYTHING to produce this and most of us do not have the luxury of commercial rates/prices on utilities/nutes/equipment, not to mention the tax write offs. You're talking in terms of full on commercial agriculture which I understand as that's what you're going to school for but it's not a valid comparison imo. As I'm sure you know by now, it costs a lot of money to do a run from seed to smoke...well from buying seed to smoke if you really want to break it down. The prices have plummeted in Cali so it makes zero sense to spend more time/energy on it's production than we already do. This is actually causing growers to do the complete opposite and most of the product you see in disps prove that.

We've gotta think of cost vs return in mom and pop corner shop terms here man...not commercial ag.

Just my .02 brotha. ;)

D

Hmmmm, sorry I didn't answer your question D, is there maybe a way you could rephrase it? I didn't mean to say that cannabis growers and commercial agriculture were on the same scale or both capable of the same low production costs. I just meant to convey that we are all growing plants that eventually reach a consumer for consumption, and we can draw a few parallels between our industry and larger agriculture in hopes of learning a thing or two about efficiency in production and quality control, since our costs are rising and product value dropping like you said. With that said, growing cannabis indoors can be done successfully for way below what most growers are spending right now because they are using way too many over priced nutrient inputs, the solution to the problem you say growers are facing is that simple. I do agree that some breeders have there seeds priced stupidly high right now, but if the market supports it I can't say it's too high. Personally, I am joining you on the clone monocrop wagon now that I have gone through all the seeds I spent money on last year!







I have a Flowering Day 13 Update for everyone this weekend! These girls are really filling in the screen nicely, and I am very happy with how things are looking so far at almost 2 weeks in! I still have not applied anything (even water) as a foliar spray to these plants even a single time during their life from seed! I have already posted the recipe I am feeding as a constant fertility program using my drip irrigation system. I keep an eye on my runoff and have done a couple flushes using either low ppm or high ppm solution, depending on if my reading were lower or higher than what I wanted to see, but never changing anything in the ratio of nutrients, just dilution rate with RO. Other than that, I have done two preventative drenches with Azamax, once a few weeks into veg, and once last week at the beginning of flowering. I will be going through and thinning excess branches later today and tomorrow, possibly doing some leave removal while I'm at it. As I said, I am getting super excited looking at these girls growing so well right now! I hope things continue on this track over the next couple weeks, which is when I have had trouble in the past if I am going to have any.

Thanks for checking out my grow thread, I hope everyone is having a great first weekend in March!


-Meeks:D

 

[NaturalTherapy]

Amazing amount of information here! Great job Meester Wizard

 

[Goodsen Cranium]

Looking nice and green as always, Meeks. Hope the weekend's being nice to you!
LG

 

[nMEEKS]

Amazing amount of information here! Great job Meester Wizard

Thanks so much NT, I have been trying to post more info because it seems like there are more than a couple people these days who actually read my super long posts!

Looking nice and green as always, Meeks. Hope the weekend's being nice to you!
LG

Thanks LG, I got some minor clawing yesterday on half the plants. . . . was bummed about that but think they should all be ok, growth is still very rapid. This is still shaping up to been a great crop as long as I can keep the nose from diving over the next week. I had a very relaxing weekend with great weather, thanks for the positive vibes!







I have a couple photos from the hydroponic tomato greenhouse I work in, and a couple pics from another house I've been growing a few crops in this Winter. I hope you enjoy this little change-up from the cannabis norm.


Easter Lilies:

Hydro Tomatoes:

-Meeks:)

 

[pura]

Those tomatoes look so damn good

 

[nMEEKS]

Those tomatoes look so damn good

Thanks Pura! It's nice to hear that even when I am growing edibles, they still look like ornamentals! :D Studies have actually shown that consumers care much more about the appearance of their produce, than they do about the taste!







Good Evening Farmers!

I have been traveling around over the last few days visiting a handful of large scale ornamental greenhouse operations, and got a ton of pictures to share! I will try to write a few little bullets under any pictures that need some explanation, but feel free to ask any questions about what you see and I will do my best to explain what you are looking at if it's not clear! The main thing to understand is that these are multi-million or billion dollar operations and a majority of the systems you see are mechanized or automated to reduce labor costs and increase efficiency and uniformity! In some cases the greenhouses are higher tech or lower tech depending on the value of the crop being grown and the expense it warrants. In all cases, the crops are grown on a perpetual schedule, so these are not time lapse photos, but rather I am walking from greenhouse to greenhouse and the plants are of varying ages in different zones of the operation. I am sharing one or two pictures at each stage, even if there were many many greenhouses with plants of that size I assume you can get the idea.



First up, Rocket Farms, Inc.

These guys were growing mostly potted roses and campanula, and obviously the roses were being grown in their newest and highest tech greenhouses.

Here is a shot of some of their greenhouse roofs, no where near all of their property, but a good view:

Here are their campanula stock plants are various stages:

Doesn't the uniformity just make you want an automated pot spacer so badly?!


And here are their production campanula getting up to size for bloom and sale:

These plants are just starting to bloom and will be shipped out very shortly. . . the consumer gets to see the full bloom, not the grower.




Now onto their more exciting rose production houses!


Here are their propagation houses kept at close to 100% RH with high pressure foggers:

Then a transitional house to harden them off with lower %RH once they are rooted:

Notice the endless rows of HID lighting used to supplement natural light intensity . . . .


They let the roses grow out:

And then run the benches under a horizontal saw blade which does a very rough mechanical topping to every plant to encourage more branching instead of lanky single stems:

The plants are then allowed to grow out again before being flowered:

Anyone trying to count the number of HID lights? I lost track after 20,000 when I was there! Also, check out the number of sulfur pots they have to keep PM in check!

Then finally they start to flower. . . just before shipping of course:

Well, I hope you liked seeing Rocket Farms, Inc. There is more to come in the next few posts!

 

[nMEEKS]

Next up, Bay City Flower Co.


These guys just constructed a new very nice set of glass houses for their propagation zone! Running on an Ebb n' Flow system with 931 plants per tray and 40 trays per row, there were over 4 million plants in propagation while we walked through these houses!

Even with millions of individual plants, this operation still uses hand labor to top every single plant at a certain size, to encourage branching for 3 or 4 flower heads instead of just 1.


Once they are established to the proper size, the plants go into the forcing zone to be flowered:

Hydrangeas are this operations staple crop, although they do produce a variety of other things, this is their bread and butter. Each variety has been bred to be better suited for blue or pink, but the color is only produced correctly when the pH of the media is manipulated the correct way. Aluminum sulfate is added one to four times throughout the blue crops life to lower the pH and bring out the color!


This company also took us into their cooler, which is kept at 36 degrees and is used to slow the growth of plants they are not yet ready to ship.

You can see Rocket Farms are not the only ones growing campanula!




So that was Bay City Flower Co., they have their plants available through 1-800-Flowers if you're interested!

 

[nMEEKS]

This next operation is a lower tech, but also much lower input cost operation.

Schubert's Nursery produces topiaries and other non-flowering decoratives, mostly in the world of ivy! Because they are growing a crop that takes 2-4 years for production before sale, this business decided to build their greenhouses without any fancy mechanization, or even heaters for that matter! Their plants may not be as eye-catching or showy as the flowering plants from the other operations, but they are hearty plants that add a long-term, beautiful, lush-green color to any room and can tolerate consumer abuse much more easily!


The ivy is propagated and grown up to a certain runner size before being trained into whatever shape they are destined to become!

Their growers mentioned to us that he was getting faster runner growth when he allowed the runners to hang freely, rather than spread across a bench top. They are currently in the process of converting all their sizing benches into hanging areas!



Once they get enough length to work with, the ivy is shaped around a wire frame for effect:

Obviously, the larger plants wholesale for much higher price tags. . . as high as $120 for some of their items going to Pottery Barn (who turn around and sell it for $340)!


And then there are the value-added designs that most consumers go straight for when they see them.

Like the moss animals:

They call this the Bunny/Bear Army!






And they also grow a few other things, like Olive standards and my favorite, the Lemon Cypress:

This plant smells like an extremely strong lemon pledge when you bend the branches! Makes my living room smell nice and clean!



Now you have seen what a slightly less expensive growing operation looks like, and clearly Schubert's Nursery is still very successful with the right crops!


One last stop. . .

 

[nMEEKS]

The last place I was able to tour is Matsui Nursery, Inc.

This is the largest orchid production operation in the country and the pictures I am showing are a fraction of the property they have for growing! Over 35 acres in full production, and 25 more being converted now, these guys have their stuff dialed in!

They start by buying in their plants from a tissue culture propagator. Although they have the facilities on site and used to tissue culture their own plants, the grower mentioned that he just cannot compete with $2/hour skilled-labor costs in other countries.

Each bottle contains an agar-gel with all the necessary plant sugars and hormones, and holds 8-10 tissue cultured plants. The bottles are glass recycled from the alcohol industry and the company has an area where they shatter the bottles to remove the plants!


The tiny plants are put into sphagnum peat moss to establish under poly-tunnels before they are hearty enough to go into production houses:

Once they are appropriate size, they are transplanted and taken out of the plastic tunnels:

Properly timed temperature and nutrient stress causes the orchids to produce their flower spikes and eventually bloom:

It is at this point where the plants are brought into the temporary holding greenhouses, where they will wait to be sleeved and boxed for shipping! As I said, I only uploaded a small chunk of the greenhouses for production, but you can see the wide range of flower types seen in the holding greenhouses:

And then obviously, with Easter coming soon there were a ton of pink and white Phalaenopsis:

Well, there you have it! Matsui Nursery, Inc. is the last of four operations I was able to visit and tour around! I really hope you enjoy seeing the scale of these operations as much as I do! I did my best to capture the grander of it all, but you really have to be there, walking down endless rows of greenhouses to understand how much each of these growers are producing!




As I said at the beginning, any questions about what you see in the photos are welcome! I will do my best to explain what you are looking at.


An update at 21 Days of Flowering will be online tomorrow at some point, so don't miss that!:D


-Meeks:snaphappy:

 

[jlr42024]

Hands down the most interesting thread on the farm. Your above and beyond anything here at the farm Meeks and I for one appreciate everything your trying to do as far as enlightening the community, please keep it up!

 

[ShivaSkunkPunk]

Bravo Bravo, appreciate ya takin us on your journey's nMeeks, I'd have a hard time keeping my jaw off the floor, Peace SSP

 

[nMEEKS]

Hands down the most interesting thread on the farm. Your above and beyond anything here at the farm Meeks and I for one appreciate everything your trying to do as far as enlightening the community, please keep it up!

You flatter me JLR, I hope that my contribution to the farm helps others get as interested and enthused about growing all kind of plants as I am!

Bravo Bravo, appreciate ya takin us on your journey's nMeeks, I'd have a hard time keeping my jaw off the floor, Peace SSP

Thank you so much for the very kind words SSP, it made my morning reading JLR's and your comments when I woke up!







Good Afternoon Farmers! As promised, I took some photos this morning of the White Skunk ladies on Day 21 of Flowering! I think you will all be surprised with how much they have grown in just 8 days since the last photos, especially considering there were no flowers visible last week and now . . .

You can see that a couple plants are still unhappy with me and showing a bit of clawing on the fan leaves. . . . . Luckily it seems as though I am on the right track for fixing the problem and only 1 plant appears to be getting worse, rather than better, at this point. I have dropped my Cal-Nit down a bit by diluting my feeding solution to 550-600ppm, and have been bumping my Mg, P, and K up slowly each day back to the usual levels.

Of course these problems are only very minor, I am just mentioning them so that everyone knows my recipe isn't perfect yet, although most of my plants are loving it!

I hope everyone is having a great weekend! Don't forget to bump your clocks/timers up an hour today if you haven't already, I end up walking into a dark grow room at least once every year because daylight savings throws me off my normal schedule.


-Meeks:cool:

P.S. Crazy to think that these plants are only 8 weeks old from seed germination!

 

[GR33NL3AF]

:eek: You've managed to amaze myself and this forum once again, you're truly in the appropriate field!

My girlfriend is a florist so I get the opportunity to venture to the Flower Mart in SF every now and then. I always found myself wondering what a large scale flower operation looked like.

Really awesome Meeks, Thanks!
-GL

 

[Quazi]

Very cool info nMEEKS! and pics.

Could u imagine Marijuana being grown on a scale like that....

 

[ftwendy]

My dreams will now be filled with greenhouses. Thank you meeks.

 

[soserthc1]

Meeks , weather is starting to break and i know temps will still hover around freezing a few nights - i just moved and really wanna start my outdoor flower (reg flowers ) asap which varieties are able to be planted early . I wanna put three bushes in the front yard 2 - swirly bushes and 1 - pom- pom but I will hold of on them till mothers day or consistent temps thou as they are a bit pricey - thanks for the garden shots - that stuff amazes me also....

 

[nMEEKS]

Thank you so much everyone! I wish I had the time to respond to you all individually tonight, but unfortunately this is what people call 'Dead Week' at my school since it is the week before Finals, and I am swamped with work for the next 10 days.

Soser I think this link will be as helpful as I could be in answering your planting questions:

http://cals.arizona.edu/pubs/garden/az1100.pdf

There is an amazing chart/calendar in the second half of the PDF and it should have most everything you are familiar with.



I hope everyone is doing well! There is still one plant unhappy with me, but everything else is chugging along and looking like it's on the right track!


-Meeks:bookworm:

 

[nMEEKS]

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that my plants are happy.

White Skunk Day 26 Teaser Photos:

I am hoping to have time for a full update and more photos on Day 28 (Sunday), but just incase I don't, I wanted to get these up for everyone to see!



-Meeks:D

 

[Quazi]

Damn, can't wait to see them filled all the way up. She is really startin to stack up nice for u.:cigar:

How they stanking? Skunky?

Did u keep cuts of them?