How to Grow Marijuana Outdoors – Growing Weed

Growing marijuana is achievable in most habitable places around the world and only the coldest or driest areas would make this difficult.

Growing weed outdoors in the colder states of America, Scandinavia, England, Scotland, Ireland and the other American or European  ‘sun free’ zones of this world is also possible but you should consider which marijuana seed strain you might want to start with. Alaskan Thunder Fuck seeds do what they say on the tin and grow in Alaska and other colder places. It will flourish even if the temperature does not rise above 75 degrees.

Growing marijuana in the USA is often not legal unless you are a medical marijuana grower. However if you live somewhere where it is legal to grow marijuana outdoors then this will be a useful guide.

Growing marijuana outdoors offers you a wholesome 100% organic harvest! If you are looking for
how to grow weed indoors, click here.

Sunlight

Marijuana plants need an absolute minimum of five hours of sunlight per day (more like 8 ) and should be planted in late April or early May, make sure you plant after the last frost of the year.

Growing weed outdoors

Au natural growing outdoors has been the favoured method over the centuries. Growing weed outside simply means fresh air, natural sunlight, soil between your hands and 100% organic cannabis. Cannabis seems to grow better without as much attention when in its natural habitat. The results will be a clean and natural product with no hydroponic nutrients added.

Of course, an outdoors setting requires special precautions not encountered with growing weed indoors. When growing marijuana outdoors you must be able to avoid detection, both from law enforcement and common freaks, both of whom will take your weed without a seconds thought and maybe drag you off to jail with them. We do not promote commercial growing here just for personal use.

Advanced Outdoor Growing by the Hawaiian Masters.

 

Seeds and clones

Access to good female marijuana clones which have already been successfully grown outside is a perfect start. If you don’t have access to clones or any seeds then it is well worth purchasing a good outdoor marijuana strain. For outdoor use we recommend feminized seeds which are chemically treated so that 95% to 99% of them turn into female plants and seed strains that can tolerate outdoor weather. Yes they cost money but you will never doubt the seed strain and waste your time on super indoor varieties that hate the cold nights.

The seeds should be virile, that is, they should not be grey and shrivelled up, but green, meaty, and healthy in appearance. A nice test is to drop a couple of test seeds on a hot frying pan. If they CRACK, they are probably good for planting purposes. More about good and bad marijuana seeds.

Now that you have your outdoor marijuana seeds there are two ways to germinate weed seeds. One says you should germinate marijuana seeds at home for about ten days in an indoor starter box. The other says plant them straight in the ground, pointy end up, about an inch under the surface in good soil. How you start your seeds off is a choice you will have to make.

Germination and sprouting

The best all round sprouting method is probably to make a sprouting box (as sold in nurseries) with a slated bottom or use paper cups with holes punched in the bottoms. The sprouting soil should be a mixture of humus, soil, and five sand with a bit of organic fertilizer and water mixed in about one week before planting. it might be helpful to check out these marijuana pictures and refer to the germinating marijuana seeds page or the indoor germination process.

When ready to transplant, you must be sure to leave a ball of soil around the roots of each plant. This whole ball is dropped into a baseball-sized hold in the permanent soil.

If you are transplanting outdoors, you should time it about two hours before sunset to avoid damage to the plant. Always wear cotton gloves when handling the young plants.

After the plants are set in the hole it is also a good idea to use a commercial transplant chemical (also purchased at nurseries) to help then overcome the shock. More information on weed seedlings and marijuana vegetative growth.

Soil

Make sure the soil is fertile looking, brown with good drainage, not full of rocks, clay, lime etc. Note what else is growing nearby? Clear the area of weeds and general pests. You need to dig a hole out for each plant approximately two foot deep and two feet in diameter at the least.

Line the base with 2 inches of gravel to enable good drainage and then fill the rest of the hole with good store bought potting mix as this kind of soil will be far better than most soils found on site. You could consider adding a small amount of slow release fertilizer but don’t go overboard as you will kill the plants with too many nutrients. Think about where the sun will rise and fall, don’t plant under big trees or in their shadows. Your babies need sunlight. We also suggest adding some polymer crystals to the soil, these hold water and disperse it at a slow rate which helps your plants from drying out after some really hot days.

Good soil should compact when you squeeze it, but should also break apart with a small pressure and absorb water well. A nice test for either indoor or outdoor growing is to add a bunch of worms to the soil, if they live and hang around, it is good soil, but if they don’t, well, change it. Worms also help keep the soil loose enough for the plants to grow well. Other growing mediums are discussed as some farmers include perlite or clay rocks to the soil to help aeration and drainage.

Planting & water

The plants should be planted at least five feet apart if not 10 feet, getting too greedy and stacking them too close will result in stunted plants due to lack of light. Cannabis plants like water during their growing season, BUT not too much. This is especially true around the roots, as too much water will show you ‘root rot’ which means the plants are getting too much water and not enough oxygen. Think about supplying your plants with between 20 to 40 gallons of water from seedling to harvest time depending on the environment they live in.

Site selection and protection

Assuming that you are growing this marijuana away from your own property then site selection is paramount for security, water and a happy healthy plant. Think about locations far away from any tracks that can be accessed by walkers, try a site up a stream to avoid creating any new tracks. Your plants need lots of light and also access to large amounts of water so near natural water sources with good access to the sky above is a great place to start.

Marijuana also grows well outside when surrounded by corn or hops, and these plants will help provide some camouflage. It does not grow well with rye, spinach, or pepper-weed. It is probably a good idea to plant in many small, broken patches, as people tend to notice patterns. More info on site selection.

Outdoor marijuana trees – Unchecked marijuana can reach a height of twenty foot or more and grow tree trunks over 8 inches in diameter. Usually the male plant dies in the 12th week of growing, the female will live another 3 – 5 weeks to produce her younguns. Females can weigh twice as much as males when they are mature.

Marijuana vegetative growth

Your marijuana plants will start to grow very quickly given warmer days, access to plenty of sunlight and good soil that is not allowed to dry completely. Watering your plants can be a difficult problem given that sometimes you may live many miles from your babies, setting the plants up near a creek or other water source is very beneficial and solves the problem of carrying water into the site but will of course leave tracks back to your grow. You may also visit regularly bringing water in your backpack. Sometimes it can work well for a reservoir to drip feed the plants and the reservoir to be filled either automatically from a water source or by hand. Look here for more information about plant visiting.

Marijuana sexing

The male plants will be taller and have about five green or yellow sepals, which will split open to fertilize the female plant with pollen. The female plant is shorter and has a small pistillate flower, which really doesn’t look like a flower at all but rather a small bunch of leaves in a cluster. More information on marijuana sexing and here also.

If you don’t want any seeds, just good weed, you should pick the males before they shed their pollen as the female will use some of her resin to make the seeds. Alternatively choose feminized marijuana seeds to begin with and you won’t get any male plants. Feminized seeds produce all female plants because they have been pre treated with a special chemical substance, again this can be against the ‘organic’ grow that some people look for.

After another three to five weeks, after the males are gone, the females will begin to wither and die (from loneliness?); this is the time to pick. In some nefarious Middle Eastern countries, farmers reportedly put their beehives next to fields of marijuana. The little devils collect the grass pollen for their honey, which is supposed to contain a fair dosage of THC. The honey is then enjoyed by conventional methods or made into ambrosia. If you want seeds – let the males shed his pollen then pick him. Let the female go another month and pick her.

Harvesting, curing your outdoor cannabis plants

On large crops, this is accomplished by constructing a drying box or drying room. You must have a heat source (such as an electric heater) which will bring the box/room to a temperature of around 130 degrees Fahrenheit or dry it in a well ventilated room over warm airy days.

The box/room must be ventilated to carry off the water-vapor-laden air and replace it with fresh. We suggest drying in sheds, well ventilated rooms or outside under thick trees so it does not get direct sunlight. Drying will take many days and drying it faster will just ruin your organic outdoor buds. More marijuana harvesting ideas.

A quick cure for smaller amounts is to run a piece of string across your bathroom or shed and hang the plants up. Keep the location well ventilated and away from prying neighbours noses, you might be used to the smell but they aren’t!

You can also dry marijuana in the oven, not a great method as you risk vaporizing the buds!

Sick plants? Check out our quick table of help

Always check the overall environmental conditions prior to passing judgment – soil around 7 pH or slightly less – plenty of water, light, fresh air, loose soil, no water standing in pools. More detail on marijuana pH and watering.

 

SYMPTOM	PROBABLE CURE
Larger leaves turning yellow – smaller leaves still green.	Nitrogen deficiency, add nitrate of soda or organic fertilizer.
Older leaves will curl at edges, turn dark, possibly with a purple cast.	Phosphorous deficiency – add commercial phosphate.
Mature leaves develop a yellowish cast to least venial areas.	Magnesium deficiency – add commercial fertilizer with a magnesium content.
Mature leaves turn yellow and then become spotted with edge areas turning dark gray.	Potassium deficiency – add muriate of potash.
Cracked stems, no healthy support tissue.	Boron deficiency – add any plant food containing boron.
Small wrinkled leaves with yellowish vein systems.	Zinc deficiency – add commercial plant food containing zinc.
Young leaves become deformed, possibly yellowing.	Molybdenum deficiency – use any plant food with a bit of molybdenum in it.

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