Cannabis is one of the most rewarding botanical species to cultivate, but they come with extremely specific growing needs. Providing the optimal environment is vital for healthy growth. But can you raise marijuana plants in an outdoor grow shed?
It’s natural to associate garden sheds with dusty, tool-filled areas that hoard various dust mites and insects. How do marijuana crops survive in such conditions? You’ll be surprised at how sanitary it becomes when you’ve converted your shed into a cannabis-growing haven.
Remember that garden sheds usually have few windows or none at all. Don’t waste your money on buying outdoor marijuana seeds for your shed as they won’t grow well, instead opt for indoor seeds.
Here we’ll discuss the benefits and the how-to’s of growing marijuana in a garden shed.
Growing Cannabis in a Grow Shed: The Facts
Learning how to grow weed in a garden shed is a great cannabis investment. The initial setup can be demanding, but the rewards are all worth spending the money and time.
Simulating an outside environment is the primary objective of providing the crops with exactly what they need. Thanks to the Screen of Green (ScrOG) technique, you can maximize your growing space even if your shed is small.
Apart from having an endless supply of your favorite weed, let’s discuss some other advantages of cultivating your marijuana in a garden shed.
- The crops have their own space: Sometimes, cannabis plants can get in the way of the living space within our homes. Having a shed dedicated to growing your crops conceals them from the outside world as some strains have potent fragrances during flowering.
- Control over the growing environment: Come rain or shine, you protect your crops from uncontrollable conditions outside. You manage the lighting, temperature, humidity, airflow, and feeding patterns from seed to harvest. High-quality buds are grown from crops in controlled environments. It doesn’t subject you only to grow when the seasons are ideal.
- Lesser chances of cannabis pests and diseases: Most marijuana strains are prone to developing nuisances like mold and powdery mildew. Pests like spider mites often terrorize crops too. Utilizing grow sheds eliminates this problem due to controlled humidity and clean growing areas.
With global warming on the rise, the weather is becoming more unpredictable. Securing your plants inside deems to be safer and more rewarding in many ways.
The following factors influence setting up a garden shed for cultivating marijuana.
- Space and pots: It’s vital to know how your crops stretch out as they reach the vegetative stage. Do they focus on lateral growth with side branches reaching for the walls? If you’re not applying the ScrOG technique, leave enough room between each pot. Remember, you need to easily move between the plants too.
- Keep the grow space clean: Cannabis plants draw in everything surrounding them. It’s important to keep the area clean throughout maturation. Any contamination could affect the plants’ health leaving you with low-grade yields.
- Ensure the shed is light-sealed: Marijuana crops depend on certain light cycles during different stages of development. Some strains require uninterrupted hours of light and darkness. Any outside influence of light can deter growth patterns.
- Use the correct grow lights: You’ll probably spend a significant amount on your lights for the shed. High-quality lighting is vital for growing cannabis in a controlled environment. HID, CFL, or LED grow lights. are ideal for raising your crops indoors
- Nutrients and water: The three vital nutrients your marijuana crops need are nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Because you’re controlling the environmental needs, the nutrient ratios need to be on point. Don’t overwater the crops—it leads to other unwanted drawbacks.
Growing Marijuana in a Garden Shed: What’s Needed?
The excitement starts with setting up a garden shed to cultivate your marijuana crops in. Growing weed in a garden shed is the new way of cultivating indoor grow seeds outside.
Ensure your grow shed is well prepared with the right materials to provide optimal conditions for your crops. Here’s what you’ll need:
- Insulation
- Quality soil and pots
- Lighting
- Ventilation
- Pest control remedies
Insulation
Regulated temperatures are vital for cannabis plants to thrive indoors. Pad the walls with closed-cell spray foam to keep the warm air in and the cold air out. It’s a convenient way to create a light-tight environment.
Choosing the right insulation plays a pivotal role in making the space airtight without condensation. It also helps with light reflection for your crops and keeps unwanted glares out during the plants resting time.
Quality Soil and Pots
When growing cannabis in a shed, choose quality soil with pot sizes that allow the roots to expand freely. The height to which your plants grow determines the proportions of the pot you’ll need. Three types of pots to look at are.
- Standard pots: These are the usual pots at any hardware store for growing plants.
- Air pots: The perforated sides allow for better airflow through the soil for the roots.
- Cloth pots: Allows increased airflow and better drainage of water.
Use quality fertilized gardening soil. Monitor the pH consistently, ensuring that it’s always between six and seven.
Lighting
Securing the best lighting for your garden shed is the costly part. Energy usage counts as part of the expenses, so you’d want to select the most cost-effective type.
Light provision of 400–600W/m² is ideal for a shed. Any one of the following artificial lighting options is viable:
- High-intensity discharge (HID): It’s popular among growers because it’s cheaper, easy to set up, and provides a lot of heat. Provision of sufficient ventilation is essential.
- LED: These lamps are energy efficient, keeping your energy bills low. It conducts less heat, allowing you to control the environment better.
- Fluorescent: Provides less light but can be placed closer to the plants for increased heat absorption.
Ventilation
Your outdoor grow shed needs to have adequate airflow for your marijuana plants. With all the warmth and humidity inside, installing sufficient ventilation is vital.
Acquire this by making use of fans, filters, and air ducts. It allows you to maintain airflow within the shed and purify in and outgoing air using the vents.
Proper ventilation is important to prevent mold and mildew build-up on the plants or the walls.
Pest Control
Keeping pests under control is vital to sustaining a healthy growing plant. Use products like neem oil—an organic pesticide that keeps insects and unwanted infestations away.
Cannabis Shedding
So is it time for a shed make-over? Utilize that space and grow your favorite cannabis seeds to have tasty buds all year round. It’s the ideal controlled environment for the home grower to cultivate marijuana discreetly.
Round up your tools and create the best indoor environment for cannabis plants. Insulate and light up the grow room and watch your plants mature into the robust beauties you want them to be.
Douglas Kester
Douglas Kester, a cannabis growing expert at I49 Seed Bank. He has been working in the weed industry for more than 10 years. During that period, he built up a vast experience and depth of expertise in this field. Douglas has a detailed understanding of every aspect of marijuana, from its cultivation and species to the effects it brings. He’s also up to date on all the cannabis-related legislation nuances.
