Yo, what’s up growers? I’m Dan, and today, we’re gonna talk about how to grow sativas indoors. Most people think it’s a big no-no, but I’m here to tell you that with a little bit of effort and some planning, you can harvest some top-notch sativa buds in your small room or tent. Keep reading for the lowdown on how to make it happen.
Growing sativas indoors can be a challenge because they grow larger than indicas and have a longer flowering stage. Sativas come from regions with long, warm, and humid summers, which means they can be tricky to grow in limited indoor spaces. The plants also tend to stretch before and after they start to flower, making it easy for them to reach the top of your room or tent.
The apical growth of sativas can cast shadows over other branches and bud sites, resulting in small “popcorn buds” instead of a generous harvest. For this reason, most growers opt to grow indicas or indica-dominant hybrids indoors.
But, if you’re up for the challenge of growing sativas indoors, keep reading for some tips and tricks.
Pick the Right Strain for Your Space
When it comes to growing sativas indoors, choosing the right strain is key. Analyze your grow space first and then pick a strain that will fit within your limitations. At Royal Queen Seeds, we offer a wide variety of sativas and sativa-dominant hybrids that have been purposefully bred to stay compact and flower faster to suit the needs of indoor growers. Our sativa-dominant autoflowers are an excellent choice if speed and size are paramount to your growing operation.
Use Small Pots and Cut Down the Veg Stage
Planting your seeds or seedlings in smaller-than-average pots can help control the vigorous growth of your sativas. The exact size of your pots will depend on the amount of space you have available and how many plants you intend to grow at one time. We recommend using 5-7l pots if you have a standard 1m tent.
Cutting back on your sativas’ vegetative stage can also help limit their growth. Most indoor growers let their plants veg for about four weeks before flipping them to bloom. With sativas, however, you may want to consider flipping your plants after only two or three weeks.
Keep Optimal Conditions in Your Grow Room
Once your sativa plants are established, maintaining optimal conditions in your grow room or tent is crucial for avoiding potential problems or ending up with a subpar harvest. Sativa strains hate cold conditions but are pretty tolerant of humidity (much more so than indicas). They’re also more sensitive to nutrients and love long hours of high-intensity lighting.
Use LST or HST
Apical dominance and stretch are two significant challenges when it comes to growing sativas indoors. Light burn can damage overly tall plants that grow too close to lights, while plants with towering main colas can produce nothing but popcorn buds on their lower branches.
Training techniques can come in super handy here. Try topping or fimming your sativas early and regularly. Combine this with low-stress training (LST), and you should be able to encourage more horizontal growth rather than just shooting upward.
Use Lollipopping and Defoliation
Experienced growers may want to experiment with lollipopping, defoliation, and side lighting to avoid harvesting popcorn buds. These techniques help direct the plants’ limited energy towards the areas that produce the biggest and most potent flowers.
When To Harvest Sativas Indoors
Sativa strains generally have longer flowering times than indicas due to their origins in regions with longer summers. While modern sativas take approximately 10-11 weeks in bloom on average, this varies depending on the strain.
Choose genetics that are primed for flourishing under grow lights and spatial limitations. With some care and upkeep, you’ll see satisfying yields of quality sativa buds!
Benefits of Growing Sativas Indoors
Growing sativas indoors is challenging but rewarding as they typically produce great yields thanks to their size. They make a great challenge for growers looking to increase their mastery as well. There are claims that sativa strains tend to produce more THC than indicas—though this is increasingly hard to measure with so many hybrids on the market. Still, sativas do tend to produce distinct cannabinoid and terpene profiles from indicas, making for a unique cannabis experience.
The Best Sativas To Grow Indoors
Ready to kickstart your indoor sativa grow? We’ve handpicked our favorite strains that produce spectacular results in rooms and tents:
1) Super Lemon Haze: With motivating cerebral effects, delicious lemon aromas and flavors, and predominately sativa genes.
2) Amnesia Haze: Descends from Hawaiian, Thai, Cambodian, and Jamaican genetics. It boasts beautiful sativa flowers with extreme potency.
3) Super Silver Haze: A classic cup-winning sativa-dominant strain with super frosty flowers. It takes roughly 11 weeks.
4) Moby Dick: The result of crossing White Widow with Haze. These flowers are exploding with trichomes and yield profusely.
5) Blue Dream: Boasts heavy yield harvest, plus delicious blueberry aromas and flavors.
Growing Sativas Indoors Is Possible!
Don’t get caught up thinking that growing sativas indoors is impossible! It’s all about choosing the right strain for your space and using various techniques like training (LST/HST), lollipopping/defoliation/side lighting during bloom phase as well as picking optimal conditions like lighting/humidity/nutrients which will help control growth patterns while producing some top-quality buds from homegrown Sativa strain!