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Class is in session! Pull out your pencils and paper and get ready to learn how to document your cannabis grow. Documenting a cannabis grow will help you improve your growing techniques in the future.

Take notes on your plant from seed to harvest. Reviewing these notes helps reveal opportunities for improvement, makes you aware of things to avoid, and helps you learn about how different cannabis seeds perform.

If you’re someone looking for ways to make their future cannabis grow more successful, here’s how you can get a head start.

How to document a cannabis grow?

We have several tools at our disposal to document a cannabis grow. Pick what works best for you and will help keep you motivated to continue note-taking throughout your entire grow. Your notes are invaluable, so use one or more of these techniques to keep track of your progress:

• Write it down in a journal
• Type notes on your phone, tablet, or computer
• Record audio notes
• Take photos and videos

Keep an archive of notes on each grow to reference as needed. Include dates, type of strain, and other general info.

7 Things to document in a cannabis grow

Now that you know how to document, it’s time to look at what to document. Here are a few things to get you started:

1. Energy usage

If you’re not careful, growing cannabis plants at home can cost more than you anticipated. Plants are living things and require lots of energy to maintain. Monitor your utility bills for lighting and electricity to ensure you stay within your budget.

Every stage of growing cannabis seeds can be energy-intensive. The vegetative stage requires 18+ hours of lighting to simulate natural sunlight. Plants get especially thirsty for constant water during the flowering stage. And you’ll have fans rotating in your grow room non-stop to regulate the temperature and air circulation. 

Track how much you spend to power your operation and adjust with energy-efficient lighting or more improved watering methods.

2. Resource usage

Treat your cannabis plant like your child. To mature and bear abundant buds, you must feed it, give it the right environment, and regularly maintain the growing space. For new growers, it seems like there’s always something new to buy at every stage of their grow. These costs can quickly add up and exceed your anticipated budget for the grow project.

Monitor how much nutrients you’re feeding your plant, how much soil you use, and even specialised cleaning products safe to use around your plant. Once you know how much you use during a grow, you can buy bulk for future grows to save money or see areas where you can reduce waste.

3. Growth cycle

Cannabis plants have four grow stages in the life cycle:

• Gemination stage
• Seedling stage
• Growth/Vegetative stage
• Flowering stage

Document details about your plant as it progresses through the cycle. Each stage can be slightly different depending on the cannabis seed. Also, each stage requires different resources to keep your plant healthy. Understanding what to look for in each stage will help you give it what it needs and recognise when your plant is ready to move to the next stage.

4. Details about the plant

No matter how many cannabis plants you’ve grown, the magic of going from seed to mature plant never gets old. The satisfaction in growing is getting to know your plant at each stage and helping it along the journey. You’ll spend plenty of time thoroughly examining your plant during the grow cycle, so be sure to keep notes about what you see.

How tall did your plant grow every week? How bushy are the leaves? When did it start producing an aroma? What shade of green are the leaves? Did you implement any low-stress training? How did it react when you changed food or water type?

You should have very detailed notes about as much of your plant as you can. These notes help when growing the same cannabis seeds. Also, things to remember in general for growing indoors to improve on the next harvest.

5. Harvest weight

Before rushing to dig in and start consuming your harvest, take time to document the results. Your harvest is the final result of your grow and helps indicate whether it was successful or not.

Healthy plants produce large harvests. One of the most important things to note is the final weight of your harvest. Be sure to weigh after your buds are fully dried to avoid counting water mass. You can even get as detailed as noting how many branches produced buds, the size of the nugs, etc.

There are several hacks you can implement to increase cannabis yields indoors. Compare the results with a previous harvest to see if you were successful in increasing the yield.

6. Quality of the harvest

In addition to the size of your harvest, you should also document the quality of your harvest. These notes come before and after the harvest.

The quality and colour of the trichomes help indicate when it’s time to harvest your plant. Note the number of trichomes you see on the buds and the time it takes for them to turn from a milky white colour to an amber tone. Amber is a sign that the plant is near the growth peak and ready for harvest.

After the harvest, your notes will be based on the buds produced by your plant. Examine their consistency, density, colour, scent, taste, etc. Compare these notes with your next grow to see what techniques yielded better results.

If you have access to a lab, getting your cannabis tested for THC levels is also helpful for documenting your plant details.

7. Things that went wrong

Unexpected events always occur when growing cannabis. Giving enough attention to your plant will help minimise problems. You’ll also catch any occurrences early enough to fix them promptly and keep your plant healthy. As much as we’d like to forget about everything that went wrong during a grow, this information is very helpful for future grows.

If anything doesn’t go as planned, document the following:

• What happened?
• What are some potential causes?
• How did you solve it?

With enough experience, you’ll have notes to recognise many common challenges to growing indoors and avoid them in the future.

Documenting your cannabis grow is essential for learning from the past to improve in the future. There’s a lesson in every grow, and detailed notes make it easy to find solutions for improvement. Your notes from your previous grow, plus our premium cannabis seeds, are the recipe for your most successful harvest yet!