Growers and Growing

Articles

A review of the changing attitude and knowledge gap in cannabis cultivation and more.

Gaining Deep Knowledge About Cannabis Cultivation: How and Why

Gretchen Schimelpfenig, PE, is the Technical Director of RII and manages the organization’s Technical Advisory Council. She is an LED-lit home cultivator. While serving Burlington Electric Department customers, she incentivized horticultural LED lighting equipment through energy efficiency programs, and has commissioned LED lighting designs and installed systems in commercial and industrial buildings, including greenhouses used for academic research on hemp and other cultivars. She authored the RII 

Best Practices Guides on HVAC and LED Lighting for Cannabis Cultivation and Controlled Environment Agriculture.

 She has a B.S. in Architectural Engineering from the University of Wyoming and an M.S. in Civil Engineering from Stanford University. She is a licensed Civil Professional Engineer in California and Vermont. 

Learn the ways light energy from different parts of the action spectrum can affect plant expression, harvest structure, and quality characteristics and how light-emitting diode light fixtures can be controlled to modulate light intensity and spectral distribution to produce different effects.

How LED Light Recipes and Controls Can Improve Quality and Yield for Cannabis Producers 

Part I of this article series explores the concept of balancing leaf temperature to optimize plant growth.

Why Does Leaf Temperature Matter in a Commercial Grow Room?

Chase Towery, the COO of Cultivera, discusses his company, the concerns affecting supply management in the cannabis industry, and much more.

A Look at How Seed-to-Sale Management Software Alleviates Supply Management Issues

Learn the ways cannabis cultivation uses water as a resource, how to measure and benchmark the key performance indicators (KPIs) for water efficiency and productivity, and the benefits of monitoring, quantifying, and ranking KPIs for water.

Cannabis Water Report Highlights Opportunities for Water Efficiency

Soil, water, and nutrient compositions play important roles in one’s quest to produce ultrapremium flower material; but unequivocally, it is lighting spectrum, coverage, and penetration that have the most influence over the terminal outcome, particularly in controlled environment agriculture.

Lighting: Setting the Stage for Genetic Potential in Cannabis and Hemp

This article explores what we do and don’t know about the origins of Cannabis ssp. from a botanical perspective and outlines some of the hypotheses proposed to explain the “why” of cannabinoid production in plants and the approaches that researchers are taking to try and answer this elusive question.

Back to the Root The Role of Botany and Plant Physiology in Cannabis Testing, Part IV: The Botany of Cannabinoids or Why Do Plants Produce Cannabinoids and What’s in it for Them?

Understand what information to gather for cultivation operations, which KPIs are important, and how to interpret a performance benchmark.

Resource Benchmarking for  Competitive and Efficient Cannabis Cultivation and Production Processes

Learn tips about monitoring environmental conditions to further improve yields.

HVACD Controls for Plant Health, Product Quality, and Energy Efficiency in Cultivation and Drying Processes

David Hodes has written for many cannabis publications, and organized or moderated sessions at national and international cannabis trade shows. He was voted the 2018 Journalist of the Year by Americans for Safe Access, the world’s largest medical cannabis advocacy organization.

From setting up a grow to tracking each plant, a look at new cultivation technology solutions designed to both improve  efficiencies and create more data analytics.

Cannabis Cultivation: The New Agriculture Tech Playground

This article discusses the difficulties of reining in the intense energy use of the cannabis industry from the perspective of the most energy efficient state: Massachusetts.

How to Rein in Cannabis Industry Energy?

Here we explore the role that terpenes play in plant immunity, defense, and signaling.

Back to the Root The Role of Botany and Plant Physiology in Cannabis Testing, Part III: Genetic and Environmental Factors Associated with Terpene Synthesis in Plants

A closer look at the benefits of incorporating drone technology into commercial cannabis operations.

Invasion of the Drones: How Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Can Help Cannabis Growers Improve Crop Quality, Lower Costs, and Save the Planet

With grow light technology constantly advancing, Noah Miller, CEO of Black Dog LED, discusses the research behind grow light technology and its future in cannabis.

The Science Behind LED Lights

The industry needs to address energy efficiency, plastic use, and wastewater to build a long-term reputation of accessibility, legitimacy, and sustainability.

Three Ways Cannabis Can Correct Its Trajectory Toward Sustainability

Let’s explore some options for growth substrates that are essential to the health of your plants.

The Root of Success:  Using the Right Growth Substrate

A closer look at how cannabis cultivation management platforms can track data for you and make recommendations based on intelligence and logic discerned from the numbers.

Cannabis Cultivation is More Math than Science: The Role of Data in A Successful Grow Operation

A case study that demonstrates the utility and necessity of environmental screening in a cannabis production and processing facility.

Environmental Screening of a Cannabis Production and Processing Facility:  A Comparison of an Environmental DNA Microarray and Traditional Microbiological Plating Methods

This article analyzes profitability impacts as they relate to your business by providing a knowledgeable look at the technologies accessible to all sizes of operations and describing the relative economics for various systems.

Smart HVAC Selection for Successful Cannabis Cultivation

Use the techniques described here to pass the state tests and ensure safe cannabis for consumers.