Smallzz's 5 Steps to bigger outdoor plants

[Smallzz]

Oh, and the 4-5 lbs was with someone else managing my plants for the last half of flower because of personal issues. I wholeheartedly believe my girls would have been bigger if daddy had been there for them throughout their lives. :)

Not bad for a first timer I don't think.

 

[Smallzz]

 

[jaredman]

would love to see some proof of your alleged 4-5 lbs harvest on your first try. Have fun with your amazing hydro indoor futuristic grow bro. Hydro is def the future not organic as everyone knows hydro is much better than organic. Good luck though and good luck with your know it all attitude. Peace

 

[Seamaiden]

Smallz, that temperature and water transmission is also known as transpiration, and it is *the* plant's circulation system. Can't grow if it's not functioning properly (read stuff from ttystick and squiggly to get a better understanding, ttystick especially has posted quite a bit on the subject of vapor pressure deficit).

even if you have clay soil you can make a French drain and fill in large holes with amended soil. Ground is still better. And why would the only people with good growing advice have to post pictures? I could post pics of my 12foot tall perfectly round hedges to prove I know what I am talking about but I think it is dumb to post pics.

I'm not saying anyone has to post pix, I'm saying that those who believe that the only posters TO be believed or listened to should *only* be those who post pix is wrong. There is a very specific reason why I pretty much post no photos any longer, and in fact do my best to not discuss what I actually have growing on in any manner that's publicly viewable, but that is another issue.

My plants are as big as blaze or any other outdoor thread from this year.

Cool! It's exciting, isn't it?

I was simply saying that before giving advice someone should be telling fact from personal experience not read a bunch of forums and be an expert off others work.

Cool, that's pretty much what Smallz did. :)

I only post on experience though I have read most every thread on here. I don't notice to many pics of your grows by the way sea? The real reasons for achieving a monster plant are not mentioned really at all in these tips, something along the lines of "I can't reveal all the trade secrets". That is because the trade secrets are unknown to this individual. Best advice for anyone reading this thread is this, don't confuse amateurs advice for fact.

He already shared the biggest, best, easiest 'trade secret' anyone really needs to get big plants--sufficient room/soil volume. You won't notice any pix of my grows here, or anywhere else that's publicly viewable. I honestly didn't interpret him to be putting himself out there as an expert, he simply shared what he did this year to achieve plants that hit 4-5 units per. I still don't see what's wrong with that.


As for going directly in-ground, truthfully, I'm not about to dig up my property to install all kinds of French drains just so I can go in-ground. Besides, how much soil biology will really be living in those French drains, all filled with gravel and tubes and such? I will continue to build up my soil structure best I can, as I've been doing over the years, and use the above-ground pots I mentioned for growing the far more demanding cannabis. It works most efficiently for me, and I am speaking from at least a few years of experience on that. :)

 

[Smallzz]

would love to see some proof of your alleged 4-5 lbs harvest on your first try. Have fun with your amazing hydro indoor futuristic grow bro. Hydro is def the future not organic as everyone knows hydro is much better than organic. Good luck though and good luck with your know it all attitude. Peace

Jared, I'm not opposed to being proven wrong. The coco point you made, probably a touche on that. I think I remember reading about gorilla-growers using coco to help hold extra water while they're gone. It's all a matter of perspective though, in properly draining soil coco wouldn't help provide aeration and drainage, it would help with water retention. In soil that wasn't properly amended, wouldn't coco do the opposite?

The whole point of this thread was to help some guys out with some tips on growing outdoors, and start a lively discussion with people such as yourself who know enough to teach me more than I already know. Unfortunately despite your claims of who knows it all and who doesn't, you came into the thread with your own shitty attitude and took a dump on me. Now why don't you instead come back, shake hands over the internet like two men, and we'll sit down and make "Smallzz outdoor guide 2.0" or even "Jaredman's outdoor guide" together for the benefit of the community? That's what this was really all about in the first place, me trying to give back to the community that's helped me as much as it has.

P.S. Sorry I don't have more verifiable proof of the yield of my plants for you, and even if I did I probably wouldn't be posting that sort of information online. Hopefully that isn't going to be the point of contention that keeps us from working together.

 

[Legal Grower]

Hey dank! Good to see you again, thanks for the welcome home (I was born in WA).

The girls got turned over to a neighbor for the last half of flowering due to some personal issues, but even being raised by some, in my opinion anyway, subpar growers, they were the biggest plants in his garden at 4-5 Ps each. Still drying some more on the second one.

If I can find some real estate to grow on in 2014, I'm pretty convinced I can get closer to my 10 p goal of med grade per plant. My ladies would have been bigger than they are now if daddy didn't turn them over to the neighbor haha

You should hit me up sometime, if my cali connections don't work out I'm going to be looking for someone more local I trust that I can help out with a grow next year. Would even love to get me some indoor rollin' again too.

My partner and I might be needing some help with a large legal grow we are putting together in Washington State. Just signed up for this site and not sure if one can send a message but if interested drop me a line.

 

[Smallzz]

Hey Legal, I really appreciate the offer but I'm about 99% sure that I found a new home to grow at already. I had a post a little while back in the co-op section and met a new friend. If things don't pan out for some odd reason I'll make sure to get in touch with you.

 

[ttystikk]

would love to see some proof of your alleged 4-5 lbs harvest on your first try. Have fun with your amazing hydro indoor futuristic grow bro. Hydro is def the future not organic as everyone knows hydro is much better than organic. Good luck though and good luck with your know it all attitude. Peace

Exactly whose "know it all" attitude is the issue here?

 

[jaredman]

read my first post and see how I was stating a couple of things that could be helpful and telling the truth of the matter, then read the smartass responses I got and you will see. Honestly I don't give a shit if people want to follow bad advice but the point of this thread is to help new growers then it should help. It kind of reminds me of high times articles, they give you some very vague info that doesn't really help at all. I tried to get a lively discussion going without hurting feelings but since I felt nobody wanted to do that and acted like smart asses then have fun with your little high times lame ass thread.

 

[Seamaiden]

No one, no one at all? I tried to make a good discussion, even though I disagree with your assessment of the thread. Hrm.

 

[Smallzz]

Last thing I have to say to Jared, since everything coming out of my mouth is apparently instigating a fight.

:rolleyes:

You're not "no one" in my book, Sea. <3 :p

 

[Blaze]

Overall these are good points though I would not agree with every exact detail. Going as large as possible with your container, and getting your root mass out of the dirt with either a smart pot or raised bed are very important. Even if you change nothing else on your grow other than those two things you will see a huge increase in yield. Actually had a neighbor this year that did exactly that after seeing my set up - switched form 45 plastic pots to 300 gallon smart pots. Everything else they did the same - same location, same nutrients, soil, etc. They ended up getting almost 3 times as much yield out of the same space.

From what I saw this year with some side by side experiments even using a larger pot during early veg makes a huge difference. I'm going right from 4" plastic pots to 5 gal smart pots, to the raised beds next year. In just 3 weeks I got 2-3 times as much growth with the 5 gallon smart pots as I did with the 1 gallon plastic pots.

 

[Smallzz]

I actually started my cuttings off in 7 gal pots, grew them to bushes, and then moved them outside, but man oh man was I pissed at my 100 gal smart pot size choice when I was pushing drip emitters through a giant root mass in mid veg.

I know some points of contention can be made with my post, I tried to keep it short, sweet and concise so that people would read it and not glaze over it. Thanks for your input though, I look forward to your 2014 grow Blaze.

 

[jaredman]

yeah I usually start off In the keg cups go to three gal airpots then to seven gal airpots then up to twenty gal. If you are starting from seed you can usually sex them at the seven gal stage. This way there is no root bounding issues however it is def pushing it if you start your beans near march first. This is the main thing I would say to increase yield is never let your plants want more container. Never let them get rootbound at all or they will slow for a significant time and in my experience never be as vigorous as if they never encountered the prob. Also I think a huge part of better yield is always grow from seed if you are outside. The vigor and the bud structure and plant structure seem to produce much larger colas then from clone, however there are def exceptions, but for the most part this is true. Clones are always proven quality though so I usually gamble with half the garden on seeds and run clones in the other half. Here is another free tip for those who love smartpots so much, they are expensive and they got hot as hell two negatives in my book. Take a roll of chicken wire cut it to the length you want the circumference of your pot to be. make sure the wire is four feet wide the other direction. fold the wire in half lengthwise so you have like a twenty five by four piece of chickenwire folded to two by twenty five. Take some bales of straw, I prefer rice straw as it seems to not grow too much new grass, and break off a couple inches at a time so you got a like three inch thick square of straw, continue this for the whole bale until you have several pieces like this. lay your wire down on the ground and unfold it a little. lay the straw down and cover the two foot by twenty five chicken wire with the sections of straw until it is completely covered. fold the chicken wire back over so the straw is in between the two sides of the wire. run some sort of tie wire and secure it at intervals until it is good. now you can lay it on end and pull the two ends together. you now have a smartpot that does not have a bottom, does not get hot and does not cost 75 plus dollars a piece. now if you set this on top of good foot of amended soil with good drainage underneath that and fill it with amended soil you have a really great place to grow and your roots wont be hindered by the smartpot, especially the tap root. not hindering the taproot I think helps get your plants really big. If the taproot gets airpruned I think it slows down the vigor of the plant. These are just theories from my experience and I am no expert.

 

[jaredman]

The thing I would change about the part In this post about training by topping and lst or whatever would be not training but support. You can train your plants all day but if you do not have proper support you will have big problems. Support is the most important tool of training as they go hand in hand in my style. I make cages out of concrete remesh that are seven feet tall and about five feet in diameter. I buy rolls of two hundred feet by seven of ten gauge wire with six inch square openings. You can get twelve cages out of one roll of remesh. Anyways I pound some metal t posts around the plant, eight footers three for each cage/plant. sit the cage where it will be and mark where the posts will go because you will be attaching the cage to the posts. Once the posts are in the ground, two feet deep, you can attach the cage. I measure two feet off the ground or the top of the pot, this is where the bottom of the cage will start so that you can access the bottom of the plant easily and water and whatnot. Also you don't want any branches that can not reach out through the cage. The level of two feet is good to clear everything out that does not come through the cage. Now if you have timed this right your plant will be getting to be the same size as the cage and you will want to pull the branches through the six inch squares as soon as they reach. You will want to pull them down to reach like straight across not reach up if you can visualize it. your branches should be two and a half feet long to reach out of the cage horizontally, not three or four feet long and reaching out diagonally. this is what trains your plant. It is like bending the plant over when you pull the branch down to come out of the cage it will grow secondary shoots much more and faster so there is no need for topping or pinching of anything. then when your secondary stuff reaches the cage you just pull that through also. Try and pull the first branches through evenly spaced around the cage so you can pull the secondary stuff through where it will be spaced evenly too. If you put to many branches to close on the first round the second round will be a cluster fuck. at this point just walk through the garden every day and pull branches that are long enough through the cage and try to keep everything spaced out nicely. you will end up with a perfectly spherical hedge if you keep things spaced out nicely without ever snipping one tip. Now the branches will grow out of the cage another four to six feet so you will need additional support. if you have the cage two foot from the ground the top will be nine feet tall so the plants mass will mostly be below that with the top couple of feet sticking out the top. You can use garden tape, the half inch kind, to tie every individual branch back up to the cage. tie it about six inches from the tip when you start to flower on every branch. I used ten thousand feet of garden tape this year. the tops are pretty well supported but you can run six foot bamboo through the cage from side to side to support the stalk wherever you want. this is useful all season also to keep your plant growing straight. just slide the bamboo through the cage to the other side and you can bend the stalk any way you want. do this all around the top of the cage so the plant can't move and the whole top should probably be supported. It can be windy as hell rain two inches, whatever this will support you plant no matter what and will train it as well. Also you buds will stand straight up no matter how fat they get so they keep getting that sunshine on the top of the leaves all year. So support instead of topping and lst is what is needed.l

 

[Seamaiden]

Overall these are good points though I would not agree with every exact detail. Going as large as possible with your container, and getting your root mass out of the dirt with either a smart pot or raised bed are very important. Even if you change nothing else on your grow other than those two things you will see a huge increase in yield. Actually had a neighbor this year that did exactly that after seeing my set up - switched form 45 plastic pots to 300 gallon smart pots. Everything else they did the same - same location, same nutrients, soil, etc. They ended up getting almost 3 times as much yield out of the same space.

From what I saw this year with some side by side experiments even using a larger pot during early veg makes a huge difference. I'm going right from 4" plastic pots to 5 gal smart pots, to the raised beds next year. In just 3 weeks I got 2-3 times as much growth with the 5 gallon smart pots as I did with the 1 gallon plastic pots.

Folks, this right here is stuff you can take to the BANK. Let me see if I can get some pix up of my homemade SmartPots, inspired by YOU!

 

[caregiverken]

Nobody on this forum knows how to get huge plants better than Blaze!

Folks, this right here is stuff you can take to the BANK. Let me see if I can get some pix up of my homemade SmartPots, inspired by YOU!

View attachment 347874

View attachment 347875

View attachment 347876

:woot:
Where did you get the felt cloth?

 

[Smallzz]

Another vote for bigger soil capacity for your root system. Not my plants (unfortunately :(), but someone I was gleaming info from while growing myself. These are still in veg and haven't stretched yet.

 

[Blaze]

Also I think a huge part of better yield is always grow from seed if you are outside. The vigor and the bud structure and plant structure seem to produce much larger colas then from clone, however there are def exceptions, but for the most part this is true. Clones are always proven quality though so I usually gamble with half the garden on seeds and run clones in the other half.

This is a good idea, I always do half seeds and half clones as well. Good seeds will not be a gamble with quality though.

Here is another free tip for those who love smartpots so much, they are expensive and they got hot as hell two negatives in my book.

Heat is one of the reasons I have come to prefer raised beds to smart pots. That outer edge never gets nearly as hot with a raised bed. Building wooden beds is more expensive than smart pots however. They will last longer, so if you figure you will be at a spot for more than a season or two, the extra expense is worth while. The home made smart pots like Seamiaden showed are by far your cheapest container option, and they work great. They do take some extra time though, which is something that should always be kept in mind. Time is money after all!

The thing I would change about the part In this post about training by topping and lst or whatever would be not training but support. You can train your plants all day but if you do not have proper support you will have big problems.

This has generally been my experience as well. LST is sort of pointless for outdoor in my opinion. Much, much more important to provide support for the plant. You guys should check out the Hortanova plant trellis, I have found it to be much faster to put up than bamboo / T potsts / wire cages, etc. You won't have to do much if any tying either, I only use maybe a few rolls of tie tape per season now. It has saved me literally hundreds of hours of work since I started using it. You can buy it from the Peaceful Valley website for $400 for a 79" x 3280' roll.

 

[Blaze]

I actually started my cuttings off in 7 gal pots, grew them to bushes, and then moved them outside, but man oh man was I pissed at my 100 gal smart pot size choice when I was pushing drip emitters through a giant root mass in mid veg.

Yeah it is amazing how fast they will fill up their space. Most of my beds are the equivalent of a 500 gallon pot and I still find roots out to the edge of the bed within a few weeks of planting. I thought they were plenty big enough when I first built them, but my plants have still ended up pretty root bound by the end of the season the last few years. When I re-do my garden I will probably put it a single 84' x 8 or 10' wide bed for 6 plants (equivalent to 10,000+ gallons).