5 Tips for Flowering Cannabis
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LED Grow Lights: Spectrum, Intensity, and Timing
No shocker to anyone growing indoors, lighting is a significant component to harvest success. The light spectrum, intensity, and photoperiod all work together to steer cannabis plants toward flower and encourage specific morphological changes including density, coloration, and terpene development.
The key to this control is advanced LED grow lights. High-performance indoor LED grow lights allow you to shorten daytime to 12 hours and shift the spectrum toward red. LED grow lights make it possible to increase intensity without also increasing plant damage and HVAC load. As many growers know, light intensity encourages greater biomass production– so long as the rest of the environmental supports are increased in conjunction.
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Environmental Factors: Temperature and Humidity
Cannabis plants prefer warmer, slightly humid environments. There are subtle shifts throughout the plant’s life cycle, but in flower, that means daytime temperatures between 72 to 85 °F (22 to 29 °C) and nighttime temperatures between 55 to 70 °F (12 to 21 °C).
Relative humidity in the flower stage should exist within the safe range of 45 to 60 percent, with the ideal point at 50.
When done right, these two factors improve transpiration rates, which is the plant’s ability to move water and nutrients from its roots to its leaves. However, growers must also do this without increasing the risk of mold and mildew, which thrive in hot, damp environments.
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Nutrient Flushing
A long-standing practice during flowering is to flush the plants one to two weeks before harvest. Flushing eliminates nutrients and any pesticides or fungicides from the biomass before the plants are cut and dried.
Once you stop feeding and/or treating your plants, they will continue to pull any lingering nutrients from the system. Timed correctly, plants will eat up these additives before harvest, and you’ll ensure the crop has a better taste and aromatic profile.
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Lab Analysis: Continued Testing
For data-driven grows, ongoing testing can help inform decision-making, especially when working with new genetics. Incorporating lab analysis into the cultivation routine ensures a better understanding of phytochemical development and ideal harvest timing.
Testing, alongside other grow room data, is also useful for guiding crop steering tactics and fine-tuning choices during flower stage to get the best possible outcomes.
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Crop Steering: Electrical Conductivity, Water Content, Dry Backs, and More
An advanced tip for cannabis flowering is to incorporate crop steering techniques to manipulate flower development. Crop steering uses heightened environmental management to push plants into and out of periods of stress. Stress helps guide biological responses.
While far too complex to detail in a few sentences, cultivators often apply specific generative levers to increase harvests. These include:
- Reducing watering frequency (dry backs)
- Increasing water volume
- Adjusting substrate electrical conductivity
Data and Control Keys to Cannabis Flowering
It’s no surprise that cannabis flower tips all revolve around two concepts: grow room data and grow room control. The better the control over the indoor environment, the better the grower can direct the outcome.
Larger, denser, more aromatic buds are only possible through meticulous management of the indoor environment, including lighting, fertigation, temperature, and humidity. But environmental control is only as good as the data it produces, which is why testing and data collection are equally as crucial for optimizing cannabis flowering.
Data is the pillar of Agrify Insights, a cultivation software designed to crunch millions of points of information to increase the consistency and quality of each harvest. Agrify’s tightly integrated hardware and software platform combines automation, precise environmental control, and data science with the scientific method
Talk to an Agrify expert today for more information on successful cultivation practices for optimal flower.
