This article originally appeared in the June 2018 print issue of Cannabis Business Times. To subscribe, click here.
More and more cultivators are going vertical, but the vast majority of grows are still built on a single level, giving a slight mystique to the idea of building up and not over. As Justin Clapick, head cultivator at Deschutes Growery, puts it, “It’s like 95 percent of people are doing it the old way, and so there aren’t a lot of people talking about growing vertically.” But Cannabis Business Times is pulling back the vertical-growing curtain, with three head cultivators sharing details on their growing operations and offering advice on how you can go vertical, too.
Paul Disdier, Head Cultivator, The Fireweed Factory
At the Fireweed Factory in Juneau, Alaska, growers cultivate some 40 strains of cannabis—classics such as Blue Dream, Bubba Kush, Green Crack and GG4, plus original varieties such as Strawberry Rhubarb, Chinookie Cookies and Blue Totem—in two vertical flowering rooms that span 192 square feet each, with vertical racks that take up no more than 62 square feet of floor space, says head cultivator Paul Disdier. For a cultivator working in condensed and expensive warehouse space, maximizing every inch matters, Disdier explains.
“We decided to go vertical from the very beginning,” Disdier tells Cannabis Business Times. Not only was the cost-savings obvious, but warehouse space is hard to find in Juneau, he says, and because of that, the Fireweed Factory knew it had to make the most of what it had. “We got lucky and found a warehouse with high enough ceilings to let us have three growing levels,” Disdier describes. What’s more, “the warehouse was an empty shell, so we were able to design our grow rooms around the vertical rack system we wanted to use.”
That system is composed of three vertical tiers, each 4 feet high. On each level, you’ll find four Fluence SPYDRx Plus LED lights. “We went with three tiers because we feel it is the sweet spot for efficiency and workflow,” Disdier says. “We use rolling podium step ladders to access the third level—anything higher would make the workflow a lot more difficult.”
To read the full article in Cannabis Business Times' June 2018 issue, click here.
Top photo courtesy of the Fireweed Factory
