When looking to beef up your indoor grow operations—either at home or for your company—it’s a smart first move to look at what some successful commercial grow rooms are already doing well. Indoor grows can be expensive, so you should prepare yourself for spending a decent amount on improving your system. But there are some small tweaks you can make to improve your operation that will yield significant results.
There are very specific conditions necessary to cultivate a strong harvest in your commercial grow room. The environment needs to be completely controlled, with no holes in insulation that could lead to moisture or harmful air getting in which would have negative effects on your plants. It requires a lot of tenacity to stay on top of each element of your grow room, so it’s best to not go at it alone.
In the cannabis industry, for example, very specific types of lights, watering habits, artificial wind from high-powered fans, and other factors are essential for an indoor grow operation. This uses a lot of manpower, energy, time, and labor. All of it is for nothing if the indoor grow room design isn’t effectively constructed or maintained.
Your grow room will look different if it’s only for personal use. In legal states, like Colorado, for example, a person over 21 may only grow up to six plants at once, with just three plants flowering at one time. So you won’t need all the bells and whistles a commercial grow room would have. But since you aren’t allowed to grow plants outside, or in locations visible to others, you’ll need some sort of indoor operation.
This article aims to arm you with all the information you need to replicate some form of commercial grow room in your own space. Home grows can be fun and challenging hobbies, so you want to execute them correctly so your time and labor go to good use. Below are five things you can do at home to replicate qualities of successful commercial grow rooms. Happy growing!
1. Choose An Ideal Controlled Space, Room, or Tent
Since it can be difficult to completely insulate a certain room of the house, most people opt to set their grow rooms up in a tent, shed, or another off-site area of their home. If you keep a grow room in a major room in your house, your entire living space will adopt the smell of the crop you’re growing.
A tent is an ideal choice for first-time home growers since you can regulate the climate relatively easily and keep it all in one small, sealed location. However, go for a bigger fan because you’ll need to be able to keep additional supplies in your grow space. Keep in mind your plants will grow in size—often double in size—throughout the process, so leave room to grow.
2. Light Proof Your Room
Light pollution is one of the worst things that can happen to your plants. Generally coming through windows or door frames, unwanted light can harm your potential yields when plants enter the 12-hour split between night and day. If plants get unexpected or unwanted light during the night portion of the growing process, the plants can become confused about flowering which can give you a smaller or weaker harvest.
Plants need a stable routine and environment to flower and grow properly. Unwanted light can create stress, trigger the wrong reactions, and throw a cork in the critical flowering process of your plants.
3. Control The Air
Since the climate needs to be completely under control for plants to have a consistent indoor environment, insulation is absolutely crucial. No excess air should get into your plants’ space. This air can bring dust, bugs, or unwanted fumes into your plants’ climate, which could compromise the whole operation.
Also, the air needs to be circulated. Your plant needs constant airflow and fresh air to promote a healthy growth cycle. Your home grow requires at least one oscillating fan to guarantee the continuous flow of air, although other high output fans remove stale air and keep clean air circulating. A carbon filter can help ensure the air is clean and healthy and filters materials that could clog your plants. But be careful with having too many fans, which can cause broken stems or branches, or wind burn that can harm plants.
4. Use The Right Lights
How much light you’ll need depends on the stages of your plants. For instance, your plants will typically need 18 hours of light during the vegetative stage and 12 hours during flowering. Because of this, it’s critical to either be meticulous in setting timers for your lights or automating them, which is the more expensive option.
When considering your light source, you need to consider the coverage area, intensity, strength of the lights, and other factors. Below are three different types of lights used in indoor grow operations.
- HID (high-intensity discharge) grow lights – These generate a lot of heat and are ideal for large spaces, and generally require fans to offset high temperatures.
- Fluorescent grow lights – These lights don’t use the heat that HIDs do, but are inefficient and take up a lot of space.
- LED grow lights – Maybe the best option, these lights don’t produce much heat and are more efficient than fluorescent lights. But these are very expensive and can be harsh on plants because of their intensity.
5. Consider An Irrigation System
Since we’re assuming this is an at-home situation, it can be totally practical for you to manually water your plants daily. But consider using an irrigation system to set up automated times for watering plants, using more exact amounts of water, and making your life more convenient, particularly if you work long hours or leave town often.
This will cost you a decent amount of money, so prepare yourself for a hefty water and installation bill, but if you find it makes your home grow operation easier and you can afford it, more power to you. You can implement nutrients to be filtered into the water periodically to regularly pump your plants with the exact amount of care necessary.
