Sunlight vs Indoor

orangegoblin

Active Member
so, I have a weird question... sorta noobish




what is more powerful, sunlight or indoor growing?


I live in BC, just curious... someone told me no matter what the sun intensity is stronger than any HPS, etc....


so, if you grow outdoors, can you expect a larger yield?
 

rebelfied

Well-Known Member
Growing outdoors is the natural way to grow weed. Put it outside and let mother nature do her thing!

sun>artificial light
 

polar

Well-Known Member
If you used, say, 5 1000w HPS bulbs for one plant (and somehow keeping temps normal and everything else normal), and planted a clone of the same plant outdoors in the middle of an open field on the equator, which clone would produce more bud? The one indoors with the gazillion lights, or the one outdoors with the sun (assuming water, nutes, CO2, temp, pH, etc is all kept constant for both plants).
 

polar

Well-Known Member
Mathematically speaking, Sun = 10,000 lumen per square foot. 1000w HPS = 140,000-200,000 Lumen. If you used 5 HPS lamps (one on each side of the plant plus the top), @ 150,000 lumen, it would total 750,000 lumen for that one plant. Assuming that the plants both grow to be 2ft x 2ft x 4ft, the sun (assuming it hit every side of the plant perfectly and not just East/West) would be providing 360,000 Lumen per plant. So basically, indoors you would have 750,000 lumen surrounding your plant, outdoors, you would have 360,000 lumen. Also, I guess the color spectrum range plays a role too, so if in addition to the 5 HPS lights, I added a ton of CFLs ranging from 2500k to 6500k+ to compensate for the color... Then what? would the sun still be better?



Or, how do yields compare between indoor and outdoor, if both plants are started at the same time, vegged, flowered and haravested at the same time? So this assures that the plants will be similar height and the outdoor isn't a tree that's been growing for 8 months...
 

Ripshot

Active Member
There is something different about indoor buds. I think indoor plants are defintley less hardy than outdoor plants, and the smokeable qualities of a particular strain is more defined when grown indoors under lights with good ventilation, and good nutrient management.

One thing is for sure, yeild per plant will always be higher outdoors than indoors. As well as cost, its alot cheaper to use the sun .
 

TeaTreeOil

Well-Known Member
Wow... Bunch of ignorant responses so far.

Indoor growing can bitch slap the fuck out of the sun/outdoors. A hardy plant can probably handle up to 20,000-25,000 lm/sq ft. This is twice the PEAK sun output here on earth. That's peak output, it's a sine wave, basically. The average is between 6000 and 7000 lm/sq ft(varies depending on your 'artificial' day). That's all you need of a constant radiant output to match outdoors using 16/8, 18/6, or 12/12. You could go lower with longer days(eg. 20/4). All that really matters is the total light collected over the day(obviously your other environmental factors have to be in check).

Plus you can CO2 dope, and perfectly control the environment. No cloudy days, no fucking bugs! Etc. Indeed, the finest weed is grown indoors.

Then again, no doubt the sun is a hell of a lot cheaper, and gives great results. As long as nature doesn't fuck you over.

It takes much more than light to grow weed, just remember that.

Genetics, care, light. That's how I see growing in stages of importance. You obviously need the plant. It needs to be taken care of(whether by nature or you). Lastly, the light. It is by no means unimportant, just least important. It should be something you basically 'forget' about, besides paying the bills for uhm.

You can focus on the lights all you want, if you don't focus on the genetics and the care, you'll still end up growing nothing special.
 

plantsinpants

Well-Known Member
Wow... Bunch of ignorant responses so far.

Indoor growing can bitch slap the fuck out of the sun/outdoors. A hardy plant can probably handle up to 20,000-25,000 lm/sq ft. This is twice the PEAK sun output here on earth. That's peak output, it's a sine wave, basically. The average is between 6000 and 7000 lm/sq ft(varies depending on your 'artificial' day). That's all you need of a constant radiant output to match outdoors using 16/8, 18/6, or 12/12. You could go lower with longer days(eg. 20/4). All that really matters is the total light collected over the day(obviously your other environmental factors have to be in check).

Plus you can CO2 dope, and perfectly control the environment. No cloudy days, no fucking bugs! Etc. Indeed, the finest weed is grown indoors.

Then again, no doubt the sun is a hell of a lot cheaper, and gives great results. As long as nature doesn't fuck you over.

It takes much more than light to grow weed, just remember that.

Genetics, care, light. That's how I see growing in stages of importance. You obviously need the plant. It needs to be taken care of(whether by nature or you). Lastly, the light. It is by no means unimportant, just least important. It should be something you basically 'forget' about, besides paying the bills for uhm.

You can focus on the lights all you want, if you don't focus on the genetics and the care, you'll still end up growing nothing special.
id like to see your light outgrow our sun!! :mrgreen:
 

tip top toker

Well-Known Member
people don't really seem to be taking into account the growing cycles between indoors and outdoors..

if you were to grow an indoor plant under a pair of 1K's for 5-6 months or however long the outdoor harvests can be, then hell, no reason at all you can't grow yourself a tree.

as TeaTreeOil said, there is a hell fo a lot more going on than lumens per square foot
 

tat2d420

Active Member
Wow... Bunch of ignorant responses so far.

Indoor growing can bitch slap the fuck out of the sun/outdoors. A hardy plant can probably handle up to 20,000-25,000 lm/sq ft. This is twice the PEAK sun output here on earth. That's peak output, it's a sine wave, basically. The average is between 6000 and 7000 lm/sq ft(varies depending on your 'artificial' day). That's all you need of a constant radiant output to match outdoors using 16/8, 18/6, or 12/12. You could go lower with longer days(eg. 20/4). All that really matters is the total light collected over the day(obviously your other environmental factors have to be in check).

Plus you can CO2 dope, and perfectly control the environment. No cloudy days, no fucking bugs! Etc. Indeed, the finest weed is grown indoors.

Then again, no doubt the sun is a hell of a lot cheaper, and gives great results. As long as nature doesn't fuck you over.

It takes much more than light to grow weed, just remember that.

Genetics, care, light. That's how I see growing in stages of importance. You obviously need the plant. It needs to be taken care of(whether by nature or you). Lastly, the light. It is by no means unimportant, just least important. It should be something you basically 'forget' about, besides paying the bills for uhm.

You can focus on the lights all you want, if you don't focus on the genetics and the care, you'll still end up growing nothing special.
I have to agree that the light is not the deciding factor on how well your plant grows. Indoors is more costly but can produce very similar results as outdoors. I think it all comes down to preference. Plus some people cannot grow outside because of the risk and their area may not work for them.
 
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