Growing marijuana indoors is a challenge. You have many things to consider as well as manage. You have to control the light, water, temperature, nutrients and of course the flow of air. I go into all of these subjects in the different pages of growing indoors or out.

Complete Hydroponics System

Here is a complete hydroponics grow tent. This can be purchase individually or as a complete system. they take up a very small space and are easy to hide. Not going to grow a lot in here but you can easily sustain your own needs with it. You can purchase bigger sizes I believe!

Here is a compact Hydroponics system. Made mostly out of PVC, the tote holds the nutrients and there is a pump inside that pushes the nutrients up into one side of the plumbing and flows out the other end at the bottom back into the tote. These are all available online or you can DIY!!!Here is a checklist for maintenance of your hydroponics system, no matter what you buy or make this is a general checklist that will help keep you from failing!

Testing the nutrient balance of your liquid solution should be done at least every 3 days.  There are several ways to check the pH of the nutrient solution in your hydroponic system.  Paper test strips are probably the most inexpensive way to check the pH of the nutrient solution.  Liquid pH test kits are the most popular method for the hobby gardener.  The Most high-tech way to check pH is to use the digital meters.  The most popular type of meter is the digital pen.

• Checking the water level in your system container should be done at least every 3 days.  When adding water to the system, first enhance that water with your nutrient solution or you will dilute the container liquid and throw the proper nutrient balance in to a tail-spin.
• You should daily check the plants for growth patterns, and to see if any pests or disease has attacked your plants and then immediately do whatever is necessary to counteract the infection or deficiency.
• When plants are full grown (especially herbs) you should consider topping or clipping the plants at the appropriate time so that the plant will acquire new vigor, grow even better, and you will gain the clippings for use in your cooking.  Of course, harvest any ripe or fully grown herbs, fruits, or vegetables so that the plant will sprout more produce, and you will then have the advantage of vine-ripened additions to your kitchen.
• Just be ever aware of the level of light, whether sunlight or artificial light and wind where the plants are growing so that you are able to adjust for excesses of those items, such as adding or removing screen cloth, or moving the system to a more protected area, as they could damage the plants.  Also, if the plants have been subjected to rain, check your nutrient levels quickly to avoid dilution of your liquid sources.
• Try to monitor your unit at the time the pumping system should begin to always make sure the pump is working and effective to deliver the nutrients to your plants.
• Completely change the nutrient reservoir at least every three weeks.
• Periodically, flush a mix of clean water and hydrogen peroxide through your system to keep the piping clean and free of harmful buildup.  You should maintain the cleanliness of your system at all times.

Hydroponics Wick and Reservoir System

The system below, the wick and reservoir system is the simplest to make and use. There are descriptions and drawings of a hydroponic system in later pages.

The base the pot sits on may not be very stable compared to a reservoir system, and a knocked over plant will never be the same as an untouched plant, due to stress and shock in recovery. The reservoir system needs only a good medium suited to the task, and a pan to sit a pot in. If rock-wool slabs are used, a half slab of 12″ rock-wool fits perfectly into a kitty litter pan. The roots spread out in very desirable horizontal fashion and have a lot of room to grow. Plants grown in this manner are very robust because they get a great deal of oxygen at the roots.

Plants grown with reservoir hydroponics grow at about the same rate as wicks or other active hydroponic methods, with much less effort required, since it is by far the simplest of hydroponic methods. Plants can be watered and feed by merely pouring solution into the reservoir every few days. The pans take up very little vertical space and are easy to handle and move around. In a traditional hydroponic method, pots are filled with lava/ vermiculite mix of 4 to 1. Dolomite Lime is added, one Tblspn. per gallon of growing medium. This medium will wick and store water, but has excellent drainage and air storage capacity as well. It is however, not very reusable, as it is difficult to recapture and sterilize after harvest. Use small size lava, 3/8″ pea size, and rinse the dust off it, over and over, until most of it is gone. Wet the vermiculite (dangerous dry, wear a mask) and mix into pots. Square pots hold more than round.

Vermiculite will settle to bottom after repeated watering from the top, so only water from the top occasionally to leach any mineral deposits, and put more vermiculite on the top than the bottom. Punch holes in the bottom of the pots, and add water to the pan. It will be wicked up to the roots and the plants will have all they need to flourish. The reservoir is filled with 1 1/2 – 3 inches of water and allowed to recede between watering s. When possible, use less solution and water more often, to pull more oxygen to the roots faster over time. If you go away on vacation, simply fill the reservoirs full to the top, and the plants will be watered for 2 weeks at least. One really great hydroponic medium is Oasis floral foam.

Stick lots of holes into it to open it up a little, and start plants/clones in it, moving the cube of foam to rock-wool later for larger growth stages. Many prefer floral foam, as it is inert, and adds no PH factors. It’s expensive though, and tends to crumble easily. I’m also not sure it’s very reusable, but it seems to be a popular item at the indoor gardening centers. Planting can be made easier with hydroponic mediums that require little setup such as rock-wool. Rock-wool cubes can be reused several times, and are pre-made to use for hydroponics. Some advantages of rock-wool are that it is impossible to over water and there is no transplanting.

Just place the plant’s cube on top of a larger rock-wool cube and enjoy your extra leisure time. Some find it best to save money by not buying rock-wool and spending time planting in soil or hydroponic mediums such as vermiculite/lava mix. Pearlite is nice, since it is so light. Pearlite can be used instead of or in addition to lava, which must be rinsed and is much heavier. But rock-wool has many advantages that are not appreciated until you spend hours re-potting; take a second look. It is not very expensive, and it is reusable.

It’s more stable than floral foam, which crunches and powders easily. Rock-wool holds 10 times more water than soil, yet is impossible to over-water, because it always retains a high percentage of air. Best of all, there is no transplanting; just place a starter cube into a rock-wool grow cube, and when the plant gets very large, place that cube on a rock-wool slab. Since rock-wool is easily reused over and over, the cost is divided by 3 or 4 crops, and ends up costing no more than vermiculite and lava, which is much more difficult to reclaim, sterilize and reuse (re pot) when compared to rock-wool. Vermiculite is also very dangerous when dry, and ends up getting in the carpet and into the air when you touch it (even wet), since it dries on the fingers and becomes airborne. For this reason, I do not recommend vermiculite indoors. Rock-wool’s disadvantages are relatively few. It is alkaline PH, so you must use something in the nutrient solution to make it acidic (5.5) so that it brings the Rock-wool down from 7.7, to 6.5 (vinegar works great.) And it is irritating to the skin when dry, but is not a problem when wet. To pre-treat rock-wool for planting, soak it in a solution of fish emulsion, trace mineral solution and phosphoresic acid (PH Down) for 24 hours, then rinse.

This will decrease the need for PH worries later on, as it buffers the rock-wool PH to be fairly neutral. Hydroponics should be used indoors or in greenhouses to speed the growth of plants, so you have more bud in less time. Hydroponics allows you to water the plants daily, and this will speed growth. The main difference between hydroponics and soil growing is that the hydroponic soil or “medium” is made to hold moisture, but drain well, so that there are no over-watering problems associated with continuous watering. Also, hydroponically grown plants do not derive nutrients from soil, but from the solution used to water the plants.

Hydroponics reduces worries about mineral buildup in soil, and lack of oxygen to suffocating roots, so leaching is usually not necessary with hydroponics. Hydroponics allows you to use smaller containers for the same given size plant, when compared to growing in soil. A 3/4 gallon pot can easily take a small hydroponically grown plant to maturity. This would be difficult to do in soil, since nutrients are soon used up and roots become cut-off from oxygen as they become root-bound in soil.

This problem does not seem to occur nearly as quickly for hydroponic plants, since the roots can still take up nutrients from the constant solution feedings, and the medium passes on oxygen much more readily when the roots become bound in the small container. Plant food is administered with most watering s, and allows the gardener to strictly control what nutrients are available to the plants at the different stages of plant growth. Watering can be automated to some degree with simple and cheap drip system apparatus, so take advantage of this when possible. Hydroponics will hasten growing time, so it takes less time to harvest after planting. It makes sense to use simple passive hydroponic techniques when possible. Hydroponics may not be desirable if your growing outdoors, unless you have a greenhouse.

CAUTION: it is necessary keep close watch of plants to be sure they are never allowed to dry too much when growing hydroponically, or roots will be damaged. If you will not be able to tend to the garden every day, be sure the pans are filled enough to last until next time you return, or you can easily lose your crop. More traditional hydroponic methods (active) are not discussed here. I don’t see any point in making it more difficult than it needs to be. It is necessary to change the solution every month if your circulating it with a pump, but the reservoir system does away with this problem. Just rinse the medium once a month or so to prevent salts build up by watering from the top of the pot or rock-wool cube with pure water.

Change plant foods often to avoid deficiencies in the plants. I recommend using 2 different plant foods for each phase of growth, or 4 foods total, to lessen chances of any type of deficiency. Change the solution more often if you notice the PH is going down quickly (too acid). Due to cationic exchange, solution will tend to get too acid over time, and this will cause nutrients to become unavailable to the plants.

Check PH of the medium every time you water to be sure no PH issues are occurring. Algae will tend to grow on the medium with higher humidities in hydroponics. It will turn a slab of rockwool dark green. To prevent this, use the plastic cover the rock-wool came in to cover rockwool slab tops, with holes cut for the plants to stick out of it. It’s easy to cut a packaged slab of rockwool into two pieces, then cut the end of the plastic off each piece. You now have two pieces of slab, each covered with plastic except on the very ends.

Now cut 2 or 3 4″ square holes in the top to place cubes on it, and place each piece in a clean litter pan. Now your ready to treat the rockwool as described above in anticipation of planting. If growing in pots, a layer of gravel at the top of a pot may help reduce algae growth, since it will dry very quickly. Algae is merely messy and unsightly; it will not actually cause any complications with the plants.

Indoor Equipment

Indoor growing

Growing marijuana indoors can be a challenge but it is a hell of a lot easier than outside sometimes! Indoors you have control of everything! All you need is the right information. When you grow indoors, there are some things to consider. What you are going to grow in, what type of lighting is needed, what is the best temperature and humidity, what ventilation do you need and where are you going to get power? Another issue is schedule. Everything has to say on the same schedule and that is hard to do without timers.

Some people use 5 gallon pails and some build elaborate systems including pumps, timers and fans. Growing marijuana indoors is done best with an automated system that way you don’t have to access it as often and cuts down on any unneeded attention. A rack or table with a slight angle will allow water pumped up to drain back in the reservoir so it can be pumped back up. Buckets can have fittings with hoses that run back to that same type of tank, that sits lower than the table with the pump in it!

Hydroponic is the method of using a base for rooting and pumps to send water over the roots at given intervals per day and night. Usually small gravel is used so it drains well and the roots dry. The pumps pump this mixture of water and fertilizer several times a day to feed the plant with enough time between for the roots to dry! If you have a lot of lighting, drying shouldn’t be a problem and you can set the timers so they pump nutrients to the plant 3 to 4 times a day. The roots have to dry or they will mold and rott.

Lighting is also set up on timers so you can adjust the time of the lights. For starting and growing you should set the timers for about 16 hours a day and when you want to start the flowering process then just turn the time down to under 12 hours and they will be flowers in roughly 6 weeks.

Lighting is all dependent on you! If you go with lower output lighting its going to take longer to get to maturity. The brighter stronger the light the faster they will grow and flower when you turn down the time the light is on!

You will need some type of PH test set or test strips so you don’t let the mixture of water and food to get too high (Alkaloid) or too low (Acidic) or they will die quicker than sh*t! Marijuana prefers a little alkaloid so if a strip or tester is used then it should be about a 6 or 7 out of 10 and with a test strip, depending on the type could either show you colors or a range. Neutral is 5.