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How To Start Your First Garden

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How I Started My First Garden With Less Than $60

Sometimes starting a garden can be quite  expensive and overwhelming. I remember 7 years ago when I was starting out on my gardening adventure I did everything on a budget. I Started my garden for less than $60. Not knowing if I was going to be good at gardening or like gardening I did not want to sink a whole bunch money into my first garden. Fast forward into my today’s garden I have over $10,000 to $15,000 worth of equipment and is still growing strong. So for this article I’m going to discuss how I started my first garden with less than $60.

Starting Your Garden

Lights

The first thing that I needed when starting my garden was to figure out what kind of lights I would be using and where to get them from. Keeping my decision simple wasn’t my main objective but not knowing how complex gardening can be I was oblivious to how complicated the decisions could be . I bought my first set of lights from HomeDepot and they were T8’s lights. The fixture cost around  $17 dollars and the bulbs cost around $10 for a 2 pack from HomeDepot. A little more pricier today then when I bought mines but we should still be under budget.

T8 Light fixture

T8 Light Fixture $17

T8 Light Bulbs $10

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Total Cost $27

So far just for the lights we’re at $27 dollars. Now keep in mind that these lights are not the best for the full grow cycle but will still get the job done! My first grow yielded me a little bit more than an ounce. I wasn’t growing pounds and pounds like I do now and just using these lights you might never grow a pound. But will still always have a use for them, for example I use T8’s now for my seedlings sprouts. I even still use the fluorescence bulbs instead of leds bulbs at this stage. I found that the Leds don’t produce enough heat for seedlings and would require a heating mat. Adding extra cost and breaking our $60 budget.

Soil

Buying soil will be one of the highest recurring cost associated with growing along with nutrients. As you advance in your grow garden the type of soil you use can be the difference between top shelf and mid shelf. Example:When I started out I was using a cheap bag of Miracle Grow that had premixed nutrients into the soil. As time progressed I realized that each strand of cannabis or type of plant required different combinations of nutrients and that a all in one bag of soil and nutrients wasn’t ideal for advancing my grow skills to the next level. But for beginner purposes all in one bags of soil are more cost effective and entry to barrier is easier because most big box retailers carry those brands. 

When starting my garden 7 years ago I knew nothing about soil and amendments. I originally grabbed soil from my yard but had no success. I bought one those cheap bags from Walmart that’s always sitting outside. Note to self, “there’s a reason why they’re super cheap.”  The bags worked for my first garden but buying soil that has been sitting outside  is a boiling pot for pest!

Cannabis Seedling

For this article we’ll be bypassing the mistake of buying outside soil or not treating your outside soil. A brand that I have used in the past was Kellogg Organic Garden Soil. It’s not the best soil on the market but gets the job done. For the price you can get a decent harvest from it. A bag of this soil normal cost about $10 dollars and can fill close to 2 five gallon buckets.

T8 Light Fixture $17

T8 Light Bulbs $10​

Soil $10

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Total Cost $37

Containers

If your planning on growing outdoor then this step isn’t needed. For the most part you can get used garden pots for free from a nursery. Believe it or not I actually picked up dozens of used flower pots from my local Walmart. I went to the nursery department and asked what do they do with the pots when plants die. And pretty much in a bunch of words they said they throw them away! Now if free isn’t your style then you can always pick up 5 gallon buckets for about $4 at the most from big box retailers. Note if you go to a grow specialty store you can expect to pay around $10 -$15 dollars for a 5 gallon grow pot. For this exercise we’ll budget for two 5 gallon buckets at $4 duckets a piece.

T8 Light Fixture $17

T8 Light Bulbs $10​

Soil $10

5 Gal Buckets $8

_____________________________

Total Cost $45

Nutrients

Starting out I knew nothing of organic and inorganic nutrients. The only thing I knew was that a few people suggested Age Old Grow to me, and that is the only bottle of nutrients I used for my first grow! If you would like to know what each nutrient is used for read this post!

T8 Light Fixture $17

T8 Light Bulbs $10​

Soil $10

5 Gal Buckets $8

Age Old Grow $15

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Total Cost $60

Special Consideration

This guide is meant to be the first steps of action and  to simplify complicated decisions. Everything in this post is the same way I began minus a few mistakes along the way.  When asking people for advice when starting out I was always told that growing cannabis is close to growing tomatoes. If you would like a more complete grow guide visit my 14 step guide to growing Cannabis!

How I Clone Cannabis Easy!

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If you’re new to growing cannabis then cloning cannabis could seem very difficult. Where to cut your plant, how to cut your plants, and why you cut your plants the way you did. Are some of the questions I asked when starting out. So for today I’ll answering those questions in hope to save you time. I’ll be explaining how to clone your cannabis plants and answer those questions as well.  

Why Clone Cannabis?

Cutting Cost

Before I learned how to clone cannabis I was buying seeds and clones from other people. Paying between $5- $20 per clone depending on the strain.  I wasted countless hours looking for sellers and messaging people just to find certain genetics. I have ordered seeds online but those too were expensive. Then they took a long time to arrive. You could buy cheap seeds without the sex identified  and hope for females. (Normally 50% Chance) Or you could buy or make feminized seeds. Buying feminized seeds will run you for about $10+ per seed plus shipping. Making feminized seeds is great, but you still need you first plant.

Cal Okes Clones

Guarantee Plant Sex​

Nothing beats growing the same plant that you already been growing for the last 6 months.  Knowing the sex before you start is a crucial part for a successful grow. Each strain of cannabis grows completely different and requires a different balance of nutrients. When you clone your plants what you’re essentially doing is making a copy of the mother plant you was already growing.

Guarantee Genetics​

Just like the sub tittle states  clones guarantee genetics. A clone is the same as the mother plant. If the mother grows a certain way then the clones will grow the same way. No need to worry about males no need to worry about bud formation.

Stay regular Cannabis Nugs

How I Clone My Cannabis Plant Easily Explained! ( 7 Step Guide)

Step 1. Figure out where you'll want to cut!

When cloning my cannabis plant I like to typically cut the stems that isn’t getting enough light or from branches that are growing  wild and untamed. When I’m cutting my clones I like to only take cuttings from growth that grows outside of my plan. Such as branches that would produce popcorn nugs or that don’t want to grow with my trellis. When taking cuttings I usually look for 5 things.

  • 1) Health of the plant.

  • 2) How big will the cuttings be?

  • 3) Where the new growth is starting to form.

  • 4) How many cuttings can I take?

  • 5) Which method works best?

Step 2. Making The Cut!

Always use a brand new razor when performing cuts. Our goal is to stay as sterile as possible to keep healthier plants. Picking the location to cut is mainly up growers discretion. But I’ll tell you how I pick my location to cut my mothers. I typically like to make my cutting decision based on how I want my mother to grow.  For instance if my mother plant is too tall then I’ll take some cuttings from the top and etc….  

Cal Okes cloning Cannabis

When making your cut use very little pressure to push down while holding the stem with the other hand. Let the razor blade do all the work! 

Step 3. Make A Diagonal Cut

Just like the picture shows you make a Diagonal cut on your stem.  The reason your making a diagonal cut is to increase the surface area for your roots to form. The length of the diagonal cut isn’t too important, just make sure that your stem can support the plant.

cloning cannabis
cloning cannabis

“Cutting your diagonal cut in half isn’t a must but I like to go the extra mile for my roots”

Step 5. Cloning Gel

Now we are almost done! At this point you should have a cutting that is ready to be dipped into a cloning gel. You can use the rooting powder from Home Depot but you’ll have a lower success rate. I normally would rotated between Clonex and Rootech on my cloning gel. So far I haven’t find a major difference besides packaging. Dip you clone stem into the cloning gel. For this be generous when dipping clone.

Rootech Cloning Gel

Buy From Amazon!

cloning cannabis Cal Okes

Step 6. Insert Clone Into Grow Medium

Preparing your grow medium! If your using rockwool cubes you’ll want to soak them in water with a light nutrient mix. (The one I use is Oliva’s Clone Solutions ) I would PH my water between 5.8 and 6.5. Since at this stage I’m not feeding so the accuracy of my PH isn’t that important to me. I like to do a broad range and soon as I get roots I’ll dial it in. Preparing soil is a lot easier for me. I just find soil with bad drainage and use that for my clones.

When inserting your clone into it’s grow medium you’ll need to pay attention to the diagonal cuts you made. If you insert your cutting too aggressively you run risk of breaking your clone stem or wiping off all the rooting gel. 

Carefully insert your clone into its grow medium and then cut half of all your leafs  off. By cutting half of the leaves you’re forcing the plant to send out more roots to support the new growth. ( Remember Your not cutting your leafs completely off just in half)

cloning cannabis Cal Okes

Step 7. Water And Spray Twice A Day

Cannabis In Humidity dowm
Cannabis roots

The finish line! Once you have you clone cuttings ready to go put them into a humidity tray for about 2 weeks. Spray and water them at least twice a day to prevent your clones from drying out. At this stage you shouldn’t have to feed them for about 3 weeks. As soon as your roots start to show you’ll want to transplant them into your grow medium asap and light feed.

More!

What’s in Liquid Karma and Why?

hy519-pop

How To Grow Cannabis In 14 Steps

Cal Okes Clones

How To Make Feminized Seeds!

Cannabis Feminized seeds

Why Do Plants Need Calcium?

How To Make Feminized Seeds!

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How To Make Feminized Seeds For Beginners!

Have you ever wondered how people make feminized cannabis seeds and how do they  know that the seeds are feminized? Well let me shed some light on this topic for you. There are many different ways that people can achieve this, but the two methods that I have done is using colloidal silver (my favorite) and the other is Rodelization(Not my favorite). Here in this article I’m going to explain how they make feminized cannabis seeds and why colloidal silver is my favorite technique. 

What Are Feminized Seeds

First thing first what are feminized seeds? To better understand this you have to know that cannabis is a dioecious plant. Meaning that there is a female and Male plant.  The female plant is the one that everyone loves with the buds and resin. While the male plant produces very little resin does not have buds and makes the pollen sacks. The way to identify the difference between the two plant is to check for pistils with white hairs or small balls where the nodes are. When cannabis is pollinated with a male and female plant you have a 50/50 chance for a female and a 50/50 Chance for a male plant from the offspring ( seeds ). 
To feminize your seeds you have to take out the male in the equation. Then force the female plant to hermaphrodite. Once you force the female to hermaphrodite and pollinate your plants your offspring (seeds) will not have genes from a male plant. Because the male plant was originally a female. Below I will describe ways to force your plant to hermaphrodite out! 

Rodelization

Rodelization is a technique that stresses the female cannabis plant forcing it to hermaphrodite out. But with this technique it emphasis on the genetics that have hermaphrodite tendencies already in the plant’s lineage. Hence why some strains tend to herm out more often than other strains. There are hundreds of ways to stress the plant out but the most common way is light poisoning. By constantly flipping your plant in and out of the flowering stage you will raise the chances of the plant to herm out. Some growers prefer this method because it’s a natural way to induce hermaphrodites and your not spraying your plants. The only drawback is the success rate could potentially be a lot lower. That is why this method is my least favorite for making feminized seeds. 

Colloidal Silver

Now we have finally made it to my favorite method for making feminized seeds, colloidal silver! “Yay!” Now let me explain what it is, colloidal silver are tiny particles of silver suspended in distilled water. The measurement of the silver particles are by parts per million (PPM). I was always told to use colloidal silver that is at least 30 ppm or over. 

Colloidal silver is fairly easy to make, but since I have not made it yet here’s a link to a website that teaches you how to make it.  ( How to make colloidal silver ) If your like me and do not have the time to make it you can purchase from amazon like I did! ( Buy colloidal silver ) Steps To Making Feminized SeedsHere I’ll explain the 5 steps that I use to make feminized seed. Click The Image To Buy From Amazon

Step 1: Picking The Perfect Starting Point

Using colloidal silver as a way to make feminized seeds you need to keep in mind that wherever you spray your plant you shouldn’t smoke. The seeds are good, but it’s highly recommended not to smoke the buds that you sprayed. That being said you’ll need to think twice about spraying your entire plant!     ( When I spray my plants I leave the main cola alone and will only spray 3 to 4  of the smaller branches on the bottom )

Step 2:  Figure Out How To Spray

This may sound simple, but Colloidal silver is actually real silver. Meaning that it is not cheap! If you put it into a massive spray bottle you can find yourself running out well before the balls develop. A beginner mistake that I made was spraying too broadly, it’s alway nice to keep everything exacted . ( When I spray my plants I use a small hair spray bottle) 

Step 3:  Spray Cycles

The First day of flowering is when you would want to spray your plants. You’ll need to spray your plants everyday until you see the balls begin to form! When you spray make sure that you heavily saturate the entire branch you want the balls on. This step usually takes about 3 weeks but some strains it could take longer. ( I spray mines twice a day, once when I wake up and once before I go to sleep until I see the sacks forming )Buy on Amazon click the link or image!Click The Image To Buy From Amazon

Step 4:   Inspect Plants

Remember that colloidal silver is a water base substance. You’ll want to make sure that your not growing mold with your plants. If your plants have an infection or disease there is a higher chance that your seeds would be deformed, or when you store your feminized seeds that the mold would transfer to the seeds. When your plant starts to make pollen sacks watch them closely because the sacks are more likely to catch mold than buds.

(What I found that helps prevent this is to defoliate unwanted growth and isolate the branches that you want leaving a gap! )

Notice that the branch is isolated and there is a gap from the rest of the plant. This keeps the colloidal silver off the other branches along with keeping the moisture from the spray away from the rest of the plant. Remember wherever colloidal silver is sprayed you do not want to smoke!

Step 5: Repeat Steps 3 And 4

Each strain flowers and reacts differently. Patience is the key! As long as you stay on top of it you should have feminized seeds in no time! 

Extras

Just to keep in mind when making feminized seeds is that every pair of white hairs would make a seed. If you pollinate your plant properly you should have a minimum of a few hundred seeds to a few thousand seeds. ​

Thank You!

Why Do Plants Need Calcium?

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What Is Calcium?

What is calcium? Why do plants need calcium? Where do we get calcium from? These are some of the questions that beginner growers ask. Let’s begin with the basic first, calcium is a alkaline metal with the symbol Ca and its atomic number is 20 on the periodic table. Calcium is the fifth most abundant element in the earth crust, and every living cell depends on it. But for today we would be talking about why plants need calcium. 

Why Do Plants Need Calcium?

Calcium is an essential secondary macro-nutrient that is absorbed by the roots of plants and travels by the xylem to new shoots and leaves. The plant uses calcium to strengthen cell walls, hold cells together, plants metabolism, and activates specific plant enzymes. Calcium improves the absorption of nutrients and helps in their translocation within the plant. Calcium is a alkaline metal which helps neutralize organic acids in plants that form during cell metabolism such as bonding to pectate acid to form calcium pectate. Unlike most macro-nutrients calcium is not a mobile nutrient meaning that it starts at the roots and ends at the leaves, it does not go up and down.This Island Is Covered with Limestone
( Limestone is mainly composed of  calcium carbonate or dolomite)

Calcium Deficiency 

In nature calcium deficiencies are rare because there is so much of it in the soil, unlike everything else calcium is not considered a leach able nutrient. But depending on your soil condition, what calcium you have could not be available to your plant. In This section  we are going to discuss a lot of the main causes for calcium deficiency.   

Environmental Stress

Calcium travels by transport of the xylem, as the plant draws in new water it releases the old water thru its leaves into the air. Humidity, temperature, light, soil condition and wind could potentially slow down transpiration affecting the intake of calcium. ( “Xylem: the vascular tissue in plants that conducts water and dissolved nutrients upward from the root and also helps to form the woody element in the stem.”) Definition from dictionary.com

Lack Of Watering

Very similar to environmental stresses the lack of water can and will cause a calcium deficiency. ( Remember that calcium is up taken with water by the xylem)

Water PH

When your PH is below 6 the solubility of calcium drops. ( Ideal PH is 6.0- 7.0)

What Happens When There Is Too Much Calcium?

Excessive calcium creates a nutrient lock preventing other important macro nutrients and micro nutrients from being adsorb. (Potassium, magnesium, manganese and iron and etc…. ) When you have an excessive amount of calcium you’ll begin to see symptoms of other deficiencies making it hard for the beginner grower to spot and diagnose.Calcium is consider a non leach able substance meaning that it doesn’t drain away with water. If you are adding more calcium than your plant can use and keep adding more and more flushing your plants might be difficult then anticipated.

Sources Of Calcium

Gypsum: Composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate ( Will Not Raise PH )   Buy Now!

Lime: Calcitic lime and/or Dolomite lime  ( Will Raise PH ) According to U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine some plants could pull carbon from calcium carbonate instead of from the air.   Buy Now!

Grounded Shells: You’ll want to bake them around 200 degrees  and then crush them up. ( Remember this method is more natural but takes longer to be available, you can add vinegar to speed up the process)

Bone meal:  Just like the name implies bone meal is finely grounded up animals. Buy Now! 

​Cal Mag: Calcium and Magnesium deficiency are most of the time associated together.    Buy Now!

 In a recent study we provided evidence that pigweed, an aggressive weed, attenuates this problem exploiting large crystals of calcium oxalate as dynamic carbon pools. This plant is able to photosynthesize even under drought conditions, when stomata are closed and water losses are limited, using carbon dioxide from crystal decomposition instead from the atmosphere. ​ U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine  

References 

ScienceDirect

Soil in the Environment By Daniel Hillel   

U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine  

Cell.com

​North Carolina  Department Of Agriculture And Consumer Services
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