There are obvious benefits of growing cannabis indoors, so growers are tempted to grow the amazing plant at home. For one, growing indoors lowers the cost. Second, you don’t have to go out and proceed to a local dispensary to purchase cannabis for recreational or medical purposes. However, beginners sometimes commit mistakes in using LED grow lights. In today’s article, we’ll talk about these common pitfalls when using these LED lights so that you can avoid them.
Overheating the cannabis plant
Another top beginner mistake when growing cannabis indoor is heating it too much. It happens by placing the light too close to the leaves that they turn brown and then dry. You should watch out for this sign if you want to harvest the best cannabis strain later. Check the thin outlines on the leaves outer portion. Another sign you’re overheating the plant includes its leaves curling up.
Too little lighting
Opposite of overheating is supplying too little lighting to your cannabis plant. To prevent this problem, you must know the size of your operation, the number of LED lights needed and the number of plants you’re growing. In addition, you must consider the light’s luminosity. Ideally, about 100 grams of yield would require a 2000W LED light. Bottom line, you must have enough number of lamps. However, you should also consider not overdoing with lighting, so you should find balance.
Using low quality grow lights
For the thought of saving money, some beginners purchase more affordable but lower quality products, such as the high-pressure sodium lights. However, old school lights are outclassed by top performing LED lighting in specific departments, including energy-efficiency and money savings at the end of the day. You should consider that lighting needs varies per growth stage – vegetative and flowering, respectively.
That is why it is important to choose high quality lighting systems for your cannabis plants. For example, during the vegetative stage, the plant can benefit from a blue spectrum instead of a red spectrum that won’t help cannabis to grow at this stage. To get the best results from indoor cannabis growing, you should use top end and full spectrum LED grow lights.
Not adjusting the light
Some newbie growers fail to adjust the lighting system’s height as their plant is growing. That is why their cannabis plant ends up with brownish and then later burnt leaves. Aside from adjusting the light, you should not also forget to rotate the pots to keep them from leaning or reaching towards the light.
Using the wrong light spectrum
Different growth stages obviously require different types of lighting system. By choosing full-spectrum LED lights, you can easily achieve your goals. but if you don’t, you might choose a wrong setting that will lead to the plant not growing well. Aside from lighting spectrum, you must also check the room condition where you’re growing the plants. For instance, if the cannabis plant is in its vegetative stage, it will need a blue spectrum, not a red spectrum. Or else, using the red spectrum will slow down the plant’s growth.
Not maintaining and protecting the LED lights
In addition to the above-mentioned mistakes in using grow lights, some growers also fail to maintain and protect their LED lights, which are valuable to the indoor growing of the plant. You can save your valuable investment by learning how to maintain them. For example, you might want to consider using a power stabilizer that you can connect to the LED grow light so that they receive equal voltage. Doing so, you can protect the light’s chip.
Switching from HIDs to LEDS and overwatering
The prior emit too much heat because they also blast infrared light, drying the cannabis plant fast, tempting the growers to water their cannabis plants more often. It is not the case with LED lights, which don’t generate infrared light nor produce much heat. With LED grow lights, you don’t have to water very often.
Positioning the lighting system in an incorrect distance
Both lack of lighting and overheating are due to not having enough number of lamps or having too many of them at once. Also, incorrect distance, meaning positioning the lights too far or too close from the plants, is another mistake committed by beginners. But then, there is no hard and fast rule in terms of setting the distance, but ideally, a good LED grow light should be at least 12 inches or at most 18 inches away from the cannabis plant.
Not being aware of the correct lighting schedule
Do not leave the lights on 24 hours or forget to turn them on as scheduled. It is one of the most common beginner mistakes they tend to mess up with the lighting schedule and then later making minor changes, negatively affecting their plant’s growth. You should leave the lights on for about 18 to 24 hours during the vegging stage, and only 12 hours when it’s in the flowering stage.
Not considering other things
LED lights aren’t the only items or things you need in growing weed indoors. While they’re great and valuable for their plenty of benefits, including a longer lifespan versus other lamps have and top energy savings, they’re not the only equipment/accessories you need. Other essentials if you’re looking to grow happy and healthy plants include nutrients, soil (not if using the hydroponics method), airflow/ventilation, seeds or clones, media, grow tent and so many more. Bottom line, you should not just buy high quality lights but also topnotch accessories and items needed to complete the indoor growing set up.
Final Thoughts
Using a good LED grow light isn’t enough to achieve the best yields in growing cannabis indoors but also adequate and proper knowledge on how to use it properly. Again, its distance placement, color spectrum, lighting schedule and other things we’ve discussed above should be considered to avoid those mistakes that will negatively affect your harvest later. So before setting up the lighting system in your grow room, remember not to commit these mistakes. We do hope you learned a thing or two in this guide and be able to grow happy and healthy cannabis plants, which growth are optimal with the proper use of LED grow lights.