You can grow cannabis—for personal use only—in Massachusetts.
Adults can grow up to six plants for personal use, but the plants must be grown inside. These are the same laws that apply to people who buy marijuana from a dispensary, so it’s unlikely police will stop you if they see you with less than six ounces of weed.
Although growing more than six plants is against the law, prosecutors have said they will not prosecute adults who grow more than the legal amount for personal consumption (but there’s no guarantee that this won’t change in the future).
It is illegal to sell marijuana in Massachusetts, whether or not you grew it yourself. You can give your homegrown weed away as gifts or trade it for other things (although we’d recommend not trading it for anything illegal).
Getting Started with Growing
- Get your germination on. This is the process of taking a seed and getting it to sprout. You want to ensure that you have healthy seeds with a good rate of germination. Determining if your seeds are viable is best done by looking at how old they are, since freshness matters when it comes to germination (you don’t want dormant seeds). Another easy way to tell if your seeds are viable: look for a white tail poking out from one end—this indicates that there’s life in there waiting to be unleashed! Germinating can be done using various methods (soil, paper towel…the options are endless!), but we’ve found the easiest method is simply soaking them in water until the taproot emerges. If you don’t feel like doing this yourself, you can always purchase clones or seedlings from a dispensary or through an online vendor.
- Get ready for some light! Cannabis plants will grow anywhere they can get some sun, so you don’t need much to get started as long as you have access to sunlight (either indoors using fluorescent bulbs or outdoors), but budding growers should note that getting the right equipment for lighting their plants will make things much easier down the road. There are several different types of lights available; each type has its own pros and cons so do some research before choosing what works best for your situation. Some examples include LED, HID, fluorescent…and many more! The basics here are simple: the more watts per square foot of coverage area you have invested in lighting (aka watt density), the better off they’ll be growing without any issues such as leggy stems caused by heat stress caused by high temperatures underneath those powerful lamps!
- Nutrients? Fertilizers? What’s going on?! Nutrients and fertilizers play an important role in growing cannabis plants because these substances provide essential minerals needed for survival during vegetative growth stages — which means it does not matter if your plants aren’t producing buds
Choosing the Seeds
The first step in choosing the right seed for you is to figure out what kind of weed you want to grow. The Cannabis plant has different varieties, and each variety has its own characteristics. Some types have a more pungent smell, some grow more quickly under certain conditions, and each type will give you a different high.
You also need to consider what method of growing you plan on using, how much space you have to work with, the climate where you’re living, how big your budget is, and what your experience level as a grower is. These factors come into play when deciding which seeds are best for your grow-op.
Trimming, and Harvesting
- Trimming: In order to trim your plants, you need a sharp pair of scissors, as well as some good music. You’ll be sitting for a while. When trimming cannabis buds, always cut the large leaves from the bud first before trimming any of the small sugar leaves. The best way to trim is by hand. It’s good to trim in between watering so that the plant can rest from being handled (since the roots and stem are fragile). A good time for this is when you’re flushing your plants—the nutrients within them will have been used up, and they’ll be resting for a week or two before harvest.
- Harvesting: A healthy cannabis plant will produce huge buds with many white hairs that slowly turn brown over time. But how do you know when they’re ready? In general, you judge by color and density: The more dense and firm the buds feel, the better they smoke; if they’re spongy or soft they definitely need more time! The hairs on your buds should be mostly all brown now but not curling yet—that means it’s too late!
Using a hydroponic system
Using a hydroponic system is a great choice for beginners who want to start growing cannabis. You can use a hydroponic system indoors or outdoors, though it is more expensive than soil. However, it does require less maintenance than soil. Some examples of hydroponic systems are:
- Ebb and Flow: Ebb and flow systems (sometimes known as flood tables) are an extremely popular type of hydroponic system that is easy to set up and maintain. The plants are placed in trays above the flooded base, where they get their nutrients from the water below.
- Nutrient Film Technique (NFT): In this technique, the roots of your plants sit at the bottom of a long tube connected to a reservoir with a pump that sends constant nutrient-rich water flowing through the tube. This allows your plants to easily absorb nutrients without their roots becoming saturated with too much water.
- Avid: Avid’s system handles the entire process of growing from seed to harvest so that you can both track the progress and get straight to enjoying! All you need to do is add water to the proprietary system.