So back in my covering to trees thread, I asked a lot of questions about how others were growing their trees- and I got even more than I asked for. Thank You! My head was spinning with ideas about growing bigger plants than I ever had before, and with questions about how to deal with the extra heat, the ventilation, and so on. I just kept looking at my drawings and being disgusted at all that light going places there weren't plants.

I read Cap's thread about his wall o' dank, and listened carefully to Jalisco Kid's comments about both his hedges and his concerns about ventilation. I ruminated, I smoked a few bowls, I put it down and came back, and still I did not like the trees approach I was taking. It just seemed like an incredible waste of power- and, inspiration struck!

TURN THE TREE INSIDE OUT! The 4' tall field fencing I was going to trellis the trees with, about 3.5' in diameter, would now be the trellis for vertical wall o' dank style grow, only now I'm putting the bulb INSIDE the cylinder! Now, I know you have a thousand questions, so let me cover the basics first:

"It" is two half circles of 4" square mesh field fencing, four feet tall by 5.5 running feet. Two of these together make a four foot tall by about 3.5 foot diameter trellis. Doing the math; that's 22 square feet for each half, or 44 sq ft per cylinder, and 4 cylinders will fit in the room! That's 176 square feet of CANOPY SPACE in a room that is only 100sq ft in size! These are wired together at the ends so they can hinge a bit when closed, or open easily for the grower to get inside and work. These are also hung from the ceiling, eliminating stands, feet, etc. Under each half moon is a 27 gallon tuffbox with one 10" net pot in it. The net pot is full of chowmix and fed with top drop irrigation- water comes from the RDWC beneath. The 8 tuffboxes in the room make up the RDWC feeding all these plans.

1. Heat- with a whole 21" from bulb to trellis, how am I going to avoid burning everything? I designed a vertical light mover, to raise and lower the bulb and socket up and down the centerline of the cylinder. Since it moves, it eliminates the hot spot. In addition, leaf shading is also a memory. I'm kitting up the vertical mover now; total cost of parts is about $50. If anyone is interested in McGuyver's latest gadget, let me know and I'll start a thread about it, over in the advanced techniques forum.

2. Ventilation- how do I get air to the plants? Well, since it's a vertical cylinder, the things ventilate themselves! If needed, I can place a fan in the middle blowing straight up, cooling everything and making a lovely breeze- cool and co2 laden air up from the floor, hot air exhausted out the top. Too easy!

3. Lighting- how does this 44 square feet get adequate light? Hang a 1000w bulb vertically in the middle, and let my little vertical light mover lift and lower than bulb through those 4 feet all day long... This is the heart of the system; nearly 100% efficient utilization of the bulb's light output. Next to no light will escape; early on, I will wrap mylar around the lower part of the cylinder to help it grow, but once the canopy fills in, even this will be unnecessary. So now every square inch of the entire 44sq ft canopy is all at the exact optimum distance from the light.

I will elaborate on my progress regularly. Ask any questions you like, I think that between the cylinder and the vertical light mover, this is a brand new concept.