Looking for advice on setting up a No-Till grow in a walipini Greenhouse

Discussion in 'Growing Organic Marijuana' started by jujuofthebush, Jan 13, 2018.

  1. Hey all looking for some help laying out plans for setting up a large No-Till grow op in a walipini style greenhouse, this will be a legal Medical grow In MI, wanting to do a perpetual harvest, thinking of having the vegging done at a different site to allow for more flowering plants in rotation,(MI allows 60 or 72 for a caregiver) l'm looking for pointers in hammering out logistics, soil building, supplemental lighting,what size and style of pots i should use, figuring out how large the greenhouse needs to be,air flow and climate control and I'm thinking a seperate building for soil mixing,composting,worm bed,mixing act's and what not, I know I'm asking a lot here, but I'm hoping that someone with some knowledge and some free time can bounce ideas around with me thanks to anyone who replys
     
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  2. I only have a small indoor NoTill grow and no experience with greenhouses but if you haven't seen it already and need help with soil building check out

    No-Till Gardening: Revisited

    No-Till Gardening: Revisited


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  3. I dont have much input on growing in a walapini but I love the idea. There are lots of permaculture videos online detailing at least the basics though.

    My one big question is why veg on another site? Moving plants around leads to stress and puts you at greater risk of picking up bugs/disease in transit. If you have 2 sites available why not just grow half at each? Then if something goes wrong at one (and youve been careful about going in between) half of your crop might still be safe.

    As far as pots/soil volume/plant count goes I firmly believe bigger is better and my single plants in 80g beds (2×4 space) get huge and usually grow very healthy. The one issue I have with my big beds is my space/setup requires me to veg in 7g pots and then transplant to the beds as flower space becomes available. This costs me about 1.5-2 weeks every round as I wait for the roots/canopy to fill in. My ideal would be to just have 2 identical rooms that could just rotate between veg and fower instantly without moving/transplanting anything. More likely for now that ill just drop back down to the largest pots I can possibly move back and forth with 1 helper.
     
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  4. I think you just pay attention to air movement, humidity, and keeping soil temperature above 68F. You can supplement with any lighting method you choose. Other than it being a very novel approach I dont think much changes from the basic requirements...does it?

    Have you tried over in the greenhouse forum?
     
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  5. do 10' wide beds raised 2' and plant every 5 feet..scrog the whole bed the length of the greenhouse..vent and mitigate pests..profit..

    you could excavate the dimensions of the green house and go like 3 ft' down and then replace with appropriate soil..more the better..less water use too once you saturate all the way through..
     
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  6. I would put a lot of thought into how to deal with light pollution and how you are going to light dep. That would be the tricky part for a perpetual grow in greenhouse.
    I would start small. 60 -72 plants is a shitload!
    good luck
    cheers
    os
     
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  7. 72 is a metric fuck ton, literally, lol
     
  8. First off thank you everyone for the responses!!!!! The reason i was thinking a veg and then a flower area is MI laws and always being able to keep one area set up for flower and one for veg but yea i could see keeping both areas cycling would work too.... how much square feet do you think I'd need for 60 plants at 3 ft deep how much soil do you think I'd need to buy..... I've read threw those threads in the past I'm trying to get together a bussiness plan to show some investors because they want in they just want to know the logistics to be honest I'm in over my head a bit but I've been reading for 20 years have grown a little myself and understand organic gardening on a whole
     
  9. Dude you may want to put something in the Greenhouse section. We would help...but I think there are not many greenhouse growers here in organics. I like your idea though. Keep us updated!

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  10. @jujuofthebush you've got many, many, variables to work out my friend. Dont get too far ahead of yourself is my advice. Start small and work your way up. Starting from seed you might be looking at 6 mos before first harvest and with rooted clones and a quick veg you're looking at ~4 mos before first harvest. And this is if everything works well.

    What's your preferred style of growing? Bushes? SOG? Right there is your first decision. If you're growing bushes i recommend either 7 or 10 gal containers and nothing larger. Fabric or plastic doesnt matter - growers choice. A 7 gal container is ~1 cubic foot, and a 10 gal container ~1.5 cubic feet. Do the math and you'll come to the nbr of cubic yards of growing medium you'll need.

    A robust and healthy 7 gal container plant is going to need a minimum of 4 sf of growing space and for planning you might plan 6 sf or 9 sf per plant. IMO. Dont forget about space to work on and around your plants.

    For your plant count dont forget to add your clones if you're trying for a perpetual or minimum down time between harvests. The clone mothers have to be included in your count and in order to support your maximum 72 plant count you might need 3 or 4 mothers to support that demand in order to keep all cuts on the same rotation (time to root). With a 72 plant max growing in a perpetual fashion you shouldnt have more than ~30 plants in flower at any given time. Roughly speaking.

    Have you got another pair of hands to help? One person taking care of that many plants, 7 days a week, is a real chore and a real push for one person. IDK. "Go big or stay home" has its place but starting fresh you may want to start smaller than your maximum allotment. Just a suggestion until you shake things out. Plan for 9-12 months of operation until you get it all straight IME. I hope you have good well water. You might be looking at 1/2 to 1 gallon consumption per plant per day. That can get expensive from a municipal tap also IME.
     
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  11. @Possuum thanks for chiming in, yes big bushes was the idea, I am planning to have a couple sets of hands on deck... I understand about the time to get a grow like that going doesnt happen overnight(or easily), i have a friend that shares my passion for organic gardening, he flips houses for a living, and has some investors that are open to our ideas,we got tired of hearing how land owners are fucking over growers (a few friends in OR&CA have told us some horror stories) and we aren't greedy, so we are thinking 10+ acres to be divided up for growers, each parcel would have a home, a greenhouse and whatever equipment they need we are going to use me as the guinea pig for the 1st home/greenhouse, we hope to make a working organic community of course they'll be plenty of plants and veggies grown there but depending upon laws end game would be to have a farm to table restraunt, a dispensary adjacent to the properties, make it where people could come tour the farm, and we just want everything to be organic everything help feed everything else while leaving as little of a foot print as possible hopefully the current federal laws change and we can just comfortably grow giant outdoor bushes and just use the greenhouses for veg stage and fruits n veggies.... possuum do you think 10gal pots is better than making a giant bed? And everyone thanks i forgot gc had a greenhouse forum... i had a stroke a few years back and i get forgetful i will be doing a bunch of research in those threads and posting something up there too.
     
  12. juju from what i'm understanding with your scenario the 10's will be great. I think the 7's will also work great. I consistently produce 4+ cured oz's using 7g so you might try both sizes to see if that extra 3g of soil, nutrients, and 4 mos of extra water for the10's produces more at harvest than the 7's. Space, resources, etc at some point have to pay for themselves. 'Bigger is better' only validates up to some "x factor" variable that the other environmental parameters can support. Make sense?

    Just MHO.
     
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  13. I would definitely start with containers. This gives you options if you find things aren't working out quite right. You at least have the option of simply moving plants around, or inside to flower if needed, without having to dig them up.

    I started out with 5 gallon containers. When I had a good handle on that, I recycled the 5's, added more amended compost (vmc) and aeration and moved to 7 gallon containers. Then when I had a handle on that, I did the same thing and moved to 10 gallon containers. You would always be able to use the smaller containers for the food you want to grow later on.
    I would listen to @possum on this one. After a year or so, you may decide that permanent beds are what you want, or really large containers. I would start small and simple, and scale up as needed.
    hth
    cheers
    os
     
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  14. Yessir. I didnt address beds vs containers. Everything OS said is well said IMO. Same-same :smoke:
     
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  15. No offense man but you want to take on investors and you're asking about soil mixes...i think you should really take baby steps. If I was growing fpr someone that didn't know how to mix soil I would take them...it happens man. Go do lots of research.
     
  16. Major, bro I've grown before and i grow all my veggies organically.... I'm asking because I've never done stuff on this scale... i have over 20 years in reading on Marijuana, ive helped with grows and I've completed my own grow... the thing is people on GC are a wealth of knowledge, they are folks in here already growing on this size and much much larger... so therefore they have practical knowledge I'm paying my due diligence to my investors bud these people are willing to drop some major $$$ to see this dream go down, so i want to come at them with everything written out i want them to know I'll know how many darn screws and nails I'll need and that i got them at the best price possible i want them to have on paper every cost every possible hiccup, and i can figure out without help but it wont be the best it can be and will take me twice as long to hunt the knowledge down that all you wonderful blades are helping me work threw, anyone can look up a soil recipe, but whats the best of the best? What works best for the $$$ they are going to want to know all of this and way more.... I'm just trying to do this right for them, for myself and for any patient i will have
     
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  17. Ok glad to hear. You understand how many folks throw up threads and talk about the big adventure of growing cannabis and how they invested their life savings and then they're asking how to grow...from start to finish.

    That's obviously not the case here. I don't want you to be undermined is all. I see people get taken by skilled growers with no money. They use your money to collect genetics....believe me it's ugly bro. Matter of fact there are a lot of prominent breeders with nothing but stolen genetics.
     
  18. For sure man, I've seen a million of them over the years, and yea I've seen and read about some shady shit surrounding Good ole cannabis, part of the reason my friend and i are starting down this path is friends of ours that grow out west are telling us how property owners rip off growers and also make them live in shit conditions just so they can grow, We aren't greedy people, we are trying to set this up to hopefully be a growers dream gig, as i said getting my grow going is phase one and hopefully in a couple years I'll have the whole system dialed in so we can start bringing in growers and giving them a good home, all the right equipment and a spot to grow, it's our belief if the grower has very little stress, has everything they need, and they themselves is surrounded by good positive people then, there plants will be all the better for it, if the grower is happy and full of good vibes then everytime they go to deal with the plants they'll put that positivity into the plant it just makes sense, well to me it does........I honestly feel I'm still weeks away from having something on paper worth taking to the investors, and i agree with everyone saying pot size is a good place to start because from there i can start to figure out how big the greenhouse will need to be and possuum I'm with you on the don't forget size to work around your plants, I learned that the hard way lol
     

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