Photo Story: Cannabis Greenhouse Farm in California

A starting point in the life of every cannabis entrepreneur should definitely be a visit to a professional cannabis farm. It doesn’t matter if you plan a small craft cannabis grow or whether you want to shake up the entire market: Once you dive into such a green realm, you will feel like in seventh heaven. Standing in a sun flooded greenhouse, surrounded by thousands of plants, makes you high by not even smoking them. You will feel the necessities of these wonderful plants immidiately. Growers will recognice all the exciting technologies used, nutrients and greenhouse management frameworks.

Some may even be disappointed by too rudimentary use of technology. For example, you’ll miss lights on the average cannabis farm in California – that’s what the sun is for. But pictures are worth a thousand words at this point – so enjoy our never-ending photo gallery of Paul’s Farm, the Cannafornia cannabis greenhouse farm complex near Salinas in Central California.

Let’s start with an overview of the cannabis greenhouse farm

bird's eye view Cannabis Greenhouse Farm from above
Bird’s eye view: new greenhouses are under construction on the left, with water tanks a little further to the right. In the middle of the picture you can see the farmhouse, on the right you can see the greenhouses for the growth phase.
Cannaforniafarms drone picture flowering stage greenhouse
The huge roof of the flowering greenhouse fills the picture, on the right you see the foundations of the new facilities. Mind you, Cannaforniafarms only started building this farm some months ago?

At the beginning of the approximately three-month creation process of terpy cannabis buds, countless clones of even more countless strains and varieties have to be cut.

Meter-long shelves full of clone trays line up in the attic of this cliché-esque farmhouse. Here, under artificial light illumination, priceless values grow into clones about ten centimeters height.

Ten clone trays with cannabis clones on a three tier shelf
Countless such cutting boxes can be found in the attic of the farmhouse
rockwool starter cubes in cannabis nursery Cannabis farm
Tried-and-tested plant cultivation methods are used, as seen here: starter blocks made of rock wool. Later on, the cuttings make themselves comfortable in their little cutting boxes.
three cannabis clone trays with white cookies and chemdawg cannabis farm
The collection of cuttings from Cannafornia-Farms is probably not worth the money. Probably not even Leafly.com knows so many varieties! Nice to see in the picture how the whole system is optimized to the small rockwool blocks.
clone shelfs cannafornia farms cannabis farm
Only a fraction of all clone shelves under the attic.

Once the grower has settled on a variety, it’s on to the vegetation stage greenhouse at the cannabis farm.

In the vegetation area, the cuttings slowly but surely grow into more root-rich, side-shoot-forming plants. Under 18 hours of light per day, the juvenile plants intentionally do not form flowers yet and can devote all their energy to side branches, leaves and height-oriented growth. In California, the juveniles grow naturally with plenty of sunlight, but especially in winter, artificial light must be used to help out in order to achieve the 18 hours of light every day. If this were not ensured, the plants would produce flowers much sooner and develop fewer side shoots. The yield, however, is much higher if the plant is first given adequate height and side growth under 18 daily hours of sunlight – after all, this way we get exponentially more leaf axils in which juicy flowers will later settle when we switch to the flowering cycle. But first, let’s raise the curtain on the “veggie phase,” as the growth phase is colloquially known – not just on American farms.

Vegetation Period Cannabis plants Greenhouse Cannabis Farm
Each of these plants will put a smile on the faces of many people one day. The plants shown in this picture are still in small plant pots and are just getting used to the well-ventilated vegetation area at this wonderful cannabis greenhouse farm.
Vegetative Cannabis Plants in black plastic pots Greenhouse Cannabis Farm
The smallest plants in the facility at Cannafornia Farms get special care: In “Smaland”, the approx. 30 centimeter high cannabis plants grow close together. The plants are developing splendidly, as can be seen from the short internodes, as the gardener of the world calls the distances between two branches on the main shoot. We remember: many branches = many flowers. Otherwise, 95% of the plants show a healthy green, which speaks for an almost optimal nutrition, light exposure and irrigation strategy in this cannabis greenhouse farm.
Cannabis Greenhouse roof window roof ridge ventilation
Small excursion into greenhouse technology: The advanced gardener will immediately notice the motor, which can open the skylight for ventilation purposes via an axle and sprockets. Ventilation can be used to counteract the heating “greenhouse effect” and regulate the relative humidity and temperature in the greenhouse.
Cannabis mother plants getting inspected Cannabis Greenhouse Farm
Someone volunteered for quality control. He is clearly comfortable in his role as Cannafornia style icon. It is easy to see that when the plants reach a certain size, they are placed in larger pots. In this specific example, so-called smart pots are even used.
Cannabis Greenhouse Workers plan new Cultivation
Professionals were flown in specially from Mexico to conceptualize and expertly prepare new vegetation areas for fresh passage. The picture still shows one of the vegetative stage greenhouses.
Cannabis Greenhouse Circulation Fans Vegetation Stage
Circulating air is everything. Well, not everything – but if you want to grow vigorous plants that don’t stand out due to above-average sparseness, you should install enough circulating air fans in your grow box or greenhouse. Wind makes for vigorous shoot axes and sometimes even makes for woody stems!

Now we finally get to the cannabis farm’s flowering greenhouse!

After about a month of vegetative stage, the cannabis plants move from the vegetation greenhouses to the flowering area. But why can’t the plants just finish growing in their vegetative environment? It’s because at these huge scales, factoring in labor costs, land costs, and yield, a plant’s cycle is most economically kept when the growing phase is about a month and the flowering phase is about 2 months. As we need different requirements for vegetative and flowering environments, at least 18h of light vs. 12h, two separate areas are the most economically way to go. One also have to consider that the plant doubles its height during the flowering phase. The end result is that at least twice as much area is needed for the flowering phase as for the growing phase. After all, plants in vegetative stage take up significantly less floor space at the beginning of their growth than they do in flowering. So it makes sense to move plants during their life cycle for best use of existing infrastructure and resources.

Cannabis plants in vegetative stage get transported on a hand wagon
At the beginning of flowering, the pre-grown plants are transported from the veggie house to the flowering house on a hand cart in a fairly traditional manner.
Cannabis Greenhouse Farm flowering stage Drone View
Aerial view in the flowering greenhouse.
Cannabis Greenhouse Farm Rolling Benches
On tables made of wire mesh, hoses for drip irrigation join countless plant pots with cannabis plants in the initial flowering phase. The tables are used for efficient maintenance, as this eliminates the need to plan for aisle space. When work needs to be done, the tables can be variably moved using the casters located in the table frame – similar to huge archive rooms. In addition, tables ensure a comfortable working height.

Budporn.

Cannabis Flowering Stage in Greenhouse
Cannabis is a plant – depending on the ambition of pruning, the plant grows sometimes higher, sometimes lower. Where there is light, there is also shadow – where plants grow taller than average, they steal light from other plants at the same time, which is why the latter remain smaller than average. The specimens shown here grow especially lush.
Cannabis Buds in FLowering Stage living plant
In detail, the flowers show particularly photogenic.
Cannabis Farm Huge Water Tanks
If we are already talking about flowers, we should also talk about water: California is known to have a water shortage. Scarcity would be an exaggeration. The water of the Colorado River is still sufficient to supply California’s year-round agriculture and various cities such as Salt Lake City, Las Vegas and Los Angeles. To distribute water from the Colorado River throughout California, numerous (uncovered) canals and huge infrastructure projects like the California Aqueduct exist. As numerous elevations rise in the path of the “state water project,” $200 MILLION worth of energy must be used per year to power pumps and other critical infrastructure. In the picture the water supplies of the Cannafornia farm in Salinas are to be seen.
Cannabis Greenhouse beautiful plant 5th week of flower
But that should be enough for our the small excursion into the Californian water problem. Here again a magnificent plant with not sooo thick flowers.

And what happens to the plants after harvesting?

After harvesting, the plants are first chopped up quite roughly, i.e. only freed from the fan leaves, and hung up in full length to dry. This is done quite easily by means of hangers. After a certain time in the ventilated room on the hangers and one or the other intermediate step, the plants then end up with the trimmers, who shred the flowers exactly the way we like it best. Afterwards a bright green plastic box is labeled and the way to the distributor can begin.

Cannabis Trim Workers
In loving manual work, the harvested plants are roughly trimmed and hung up on clothes hangers to dry.
Cannabis plants drying on hangers
Lined up on the clothes pole, Reserve OG and Chemdawg dry in a race.
Cannabis Trimming Woman
At the trim station, these employees take care that the flowers look absolutely photogenic when sold.
Cannafornia Packaging Cannabis Packaging
Labels and tins in which the precious flowers are packed at the very end of the process.

So. And now the most important question: How does the weed from Cannafornia Farm taste?

We received two packs of Raspberry Cookies as a guest gift. A strain with shallow 10% THC, delicious raspberry flavor and pleasant sativa high. Nothing special in comparison, but not the worst buds of our trip either. You can taste out that was fed with mineral fertilizer. However, only slightly, because even at Cannafornia Farms, the plants are once again rinsed with only water for a few days before harvest. Nevertheless, organic / bio has not been worked here.
Otherwise, raspberry and cookie notes actually dominate, whereby personally, as a declared cake variety fan, I was immediately satisfied with the smell and taste. Still, my favorite organic weed plays in a different league. What Cannafornia Farms can do, however: The right size of the flowers. Nice and small, you don’t pay for stalks here. Nice and compact, perfect for a blunt and without the need for a grinder.

Dried Buds Cannafornia Raspberry Cookies
Yummy Raspberry Cookies!

At this point, unfortunately, we have already reached the end of our little excursion to the large scale cannabis farm. Please not that all photos belong to Lorenz Minks and any third party use is not allowed.

 

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