A: To get your plants to take up more horizontal space and less vertical, you will need to take advantage of several growing techniques. You must encourage good growth with at least 50 watts per square foot. To take full advantage of these watts, you must keep the light source close to the plant-as close as you can without burning them. You can keep 1000-watters within 12", and 400-watters as close as 6" from your flowers if you rapidly circulate and replace the air in the grow space. Fans are also important from the very beginning and help encourage plants to grow stocky and less tall. It's called wind stress, and using an ever-increasing intermittent breeze on your plants will do wonders for your yield. Finally, I can tell you about topping and pruning. If you have a high yield garden that is over 1000 watts, you can prune extensively. Lower wattage gardens should only "top" once or twice to create additional budding sites. You must match the size of the animal to its environment.

Q: I'm a first-time grower and just harvested my first buds. The problem is they won't burn. I dried them in the closet where I grew them, where there is plenty of air movement and a temperature of about 86 degrees. I read that you need low humidity to dry out buds. Well, I hung them on the rim of lampshade for about 6 days. Still they won't burn. I have had some on the tray that has been cut up real fine and it won't burn as well. It has been on tray for about three days after hanging for three and the rest is still hanging. What can I do?

A: If they've been dried properly and still burn hard and leave black ash, and you've been using chemical fertilizer, you've probably over-fertilized them. Too much fertilizer in the last few weeks of flowering can leave unused chemicals in the plant matter, which won't burn easily. Next time, stop fertilizing and begin flushing your system with water the last week or so of flowering. If you've been fertilizing all along, the plants will have enough to finish and you'll cut down the amount of unused chemicals.

Q: I've been growing for several years now. Right now I've got two 70w HPS lighting an area of 2'x3'x3'. I've got a total of six plants. Average temperature is 79.3F. And the average humidity is 49%. I've got an oscillating fan a few feet away. Everything is perfect, except I think I may have a late-maturing, equatorial-sativa. I'm 10 weeks into flowering, and it's only showing very sparse buds. I stopped fertilizing 4 weeks ago and my sweet early-maturing indica is dead ripe (2 weeks past, it seemed to want to go a little longer than what I anticipated). Anywho, what is the latest time for a late-maturing sativa? My other four are indica-sativa hybrids. What kind of yield can I expect from this sativa?

A: Sativa strains can take up to four months to finish. I would continue fertilizing for a while longer and watch them. Near the end of maturation, cannabis flowers will begin to fill out very quickly as I'm sure you've noticed. Be patient and give it some time. Do you know the history of this particular variety? If not, it may be a weak-performing strain. It may not fill out as well as the indicas. Watch the resin glands for ripeness and harvest accordingly. Don't let them go too long, hoping for more than they're capable of giving. You'll just ruin what you've already got as the THC will begin breaking down.

Q: Today two fellow smokers and I were behind a friend's house smoking a J. While we were cutting through someone's backyard we found a weed plant. It was in a ceramic pot with a cut 2-liter soda bottle over it. The plant was 8 inches high, supported on a stick in the plastic bottle. We decided to steal the plant and hide it in another location. We are clueless on how to grow it. Please help us.

A: You are piece of shit. Stealing is wrong, and stealing marijuana is sacrilege, plain and simple. People work hard for what they have and deserve to enjoy the fruits of their labor. If you've ever had something that you cared about and nurtured and grew with your own hands ripped off, you'd understand. Grow your own, dirtbag.

Q: A friend of mine says that if you water your plants with bongwater, it will increase the amount of THC in the plants. If this complete bullshit or has he stumbled on a way to make your herb better?

A: Complete bullshit! But it is true that you will get way drunker if you pee in your beer.

Dear Dr. Rotten:

My plants are doing great until the 3rd week of blooming. I was told the more you feed them, the better they grow. I feed bloom fish emulsion with power flower and blast off and some sea bird guano. I also spray my leaves with a weak solution of food. I want to stay as organic as possible. What should I do?

It sounds like you are overfeeding your plants. Flush them with straight water, sort back on your feed and try it at a half solution and go from there. Overfeeding your plants will not give you bigger buds; all it is going to do is burn up your big leaves, giving you smaller buds. Do you think if you over feed your girlfriend she will get bigger tits?

How often should I water my plants? I usually let them dry out before watering and then hit them up real hard.

You should not let your plants dry up; the dirt should constantly be moist, and you should have holes in the bottom of your containers so the excess can leak out. By letting the roots dry, you’re damaging them and it will give you a smaller yield.

I want to get a new job but the company I want to work for requires a piss test. Some of my friends say I can get a quick fix at a health food store or head shop, but one of my friends say they are all bogus and I have to stop partying for a month. He said it took him 3 months to get clean. Is this bullshit or what?

There are many different products out there that claim that they can fool your drug test, or even clean out your system completely. The price range on these products is $40-200. Most of these products are bullshit. They guarantee to double or triple your money back—big fucking deal; you will lose your job. And when you try to get your money back, let alone twice as much as you paid, first you will have to send them a copy of your drug test, you know the one with your name address and the list of drugs you had in your system. If this doesn’t stop you from trying to get your money back, they will ignore you, and when you finally get a hold of them, some of them will tell you were taking an illegal substance and doing so you broke the law, that it’s like trying to collect money from a gambling debt, and that shit aint happening. Most of these products tell you to quit partying for at least 2-3 days, some even longer, and drink lots of water: 1-2 gallons while taking their product. Drinking all this water at one time will dilute whatever is in your bladder anyway. The only one I know of that works is the “cock in the box,” which is fake dick (available in different colors) that you fill with clean or artificial urine. If you quit partying, remember the weed out there is so strong that depending how much you smoke and what your metabolism is like it may take you 5 months to pee clean. If they are doing a hair test they can tell what drugs you partied on any piece of your hair. Shaving your head won’t work they can use your pubes if they want. By they way, if your career at McDonald’s doesn’t work out, come down to The Beast; we’ll hire anybody.

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